Lenovo Announces ThinkPads Preloaded With XP

BBCWatcher writes "Lenovo just announced new ThinkPad T61 models preloaded with Microsoft Windows XP. Ironically they're called ThinkPad T61 'TopSeller' models. Lenovo says they're aimed at small and medium-sized businesses. The XP TopSellers are available immediately, and the part numbers are 6465-03U, 7658-04U, and 7664-06U (PDF links). "Lenovo recommends Windows Vista Business"? Not so much."

Dell too.

[RandoX]

When you pull up their laptop page, there are two links. "Customize with Windows XP" and "Customize with Windows Vista". Same price.

This is news?

[inphinity]

Maybe I'm missing something, but we've been buying T61's with XP for months now, without any difficulty at all.

And we're not some large megacorp either -- we buy maybe 2-3 computers every 6 weeks.

Re:Dell too.

[PlatyPaul]

Easier than that: if you want an XP-loaded dell, just go here [dell.com].

They're hardly pushing it (see quote below), but it's still very much an option.

Windows Vista® is the latest Operating System release from Microsoft. Windows Vista® Home Premium1 & Windows Vista® Ultimate1 offer great features like Windows Media Center which allows you to easily manage your photos, videos, & audio files and the cool interface of Windows Aero is designed to make your computer experience dynamic and fun. All versions of Windows Vista® offer new security options such as Parental Controls and integrated Anti-Spyware which help protect your family when accessing your personal data or information from the Internet and new tools such as integrated search which help enable you to get work done faster.

The choice is Yours. Dell is offering Microsoft® Windows XP on the PCs below.

Re:Why Won't MS Do Dual Licensing?

[Tranzistors]

They do - for business and ultimate versions:
The OEM versions of Windows Vista Business and Windows Vista Ultimate include downgrade rights to Windows XP Professional, Windows XP Professional x64, and Windows XP Tablet PC.

From here [microsoft.com]

I have one since September

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a T61 (exact model is ThinkPad T61 7661-A12 ) since late September... best laptop I ever had, flying fast.

How is this news?

[Junior J. Junior III]

You could always order a CTO Thinkpad T61 with Windows XP Professional preloaded. It cost a bit more than Vista Home Basic, but the same as Home Premium or Business.

yes

[geekoid]

Dos 4
Windows 2
Bob
Me

Re:But...

[BCW2]

Check out Emperor Linux, they have T60s and T61s preloaded with a custom kernel so everything works out of the box. Been around for a few years and have had very good reviews from Linux Journal and others.

Try http://www.emperorlinux.com/mfgr/lenovo/toucan/

Already upgraded.

[binaryspiral]

I ran with the factory Vista Ultimate image on my T61p (Core Duo 2.4Ghz 2GB Ram) for a month, and couldn't take the performance hit compared to XP on my R52 (Single Core 1.8Ghz 2GB Ram).

After reading about the 1% perf increases of Vista SP1, I decided that wasn't good enough and nuked Vista, and installed XP - it's like I've weighed anchor and hoist ye misen mast.

Re:But...

[shutdown -p now]

For everything there is to know about running Linux on Thinkpads, you should check ThinkWiki [thinkwiki.org]. In particular, here's the page on Ubuntu on T61 [thinkwiki.org].

From personal experience with Thinkpads, they are quite Linux-friendly. My old R51e has full hardware support in Linux. The latest version of Ubuntu works fine, in particular, and so does Debian.

Re:This is the end I tell you!

[BUL2294]

What impact? Microsoft's shareholders don't care what the company does as long as the dough keeps rolling in... And it's rolling in--but for XP and not Vista. Case in point, how much money has M$ made on Internet Explorer? NONE. IE has been a total loss! Nobody ever bought a Windows PC "just to have IE". (Remember that as recently as 2000, IE5 was available for Macs, UNIX, and even Windows 3.1x!) To add, IE has cost M$ hundreds of millions in legal fees and EU sanctions... By definition, the shareholders should be revolting--but they're not.

M$ has many other products like SQL Server, Exchange, Windows Server, and Office that bring in the dough, even if Vista totally fails...