Windows Vista Notebook Compatibility Guide

(the original post and reply to thread for this article is here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=28207, this copy was made for ease of finding in the guide forum)





Introduction and Article Summary

There have been quite a few posts in the NotebookReview.com forums lately on the subject of Windows Vista. Most of the posts are related to whether the "$1,500 notebook I am about to buy will be obsolete when Vista is released at the end of next year". This guide hopefully will shed some light on the subject. A lot of the information is in flux at the moment, as Microsoft has stated that the final requirements will not be known until the summer 2006.



Windows Vista desktop screen shot ( view larger image )

Windows Vista Versions & Release Date

There is supposedly going to be seven versions of Windows Vista:

• Vista Starter Edition -- Likely a crippled version like XP Starter Edition.
• Vista Home Basic Edition -- The version you'll see on most consumer PCs/Laptops like Windows XP Home. All the stuff you will need for a basic PC/Notebook.
• Vista Home Premium Edition - Like Media Center Edition
• Vista Small Business Edition -- Designed for small business without IT staffs.
• Vista Professional Edition -- It is similar to XP Pro.
• Vista Enterprise Edition -- Designed for large institutions.
• Vista Ultimate Edition -- It has everything.

Here is a nice link from Windows SuperSite outlining what all the version of Vista will include. It also has information on CPU and memory support for the different packages.

http://winsupersite.com/showcase/winvista_editions.asp

One thing to note, most versions of Vista will likely be offered in 32 and 64 bit. Vista is supposed to be released in Q4 of 2006 (around the December 2006 time frame).

System Requirements

Here is, according to Microsoft, a ballpark estimate for the system requirements for Vista As stated above, the final requirements for Vista will not be known until next summer. I can tell you I have had Beta 1 running on my IBM ThinkPad T42. I will tell you more on that later:

• 512MB of memory
• Dedicated graphics card with DirectX 9 support
• Recent Intel Pentium or AMD Athlon CPU

NotebookReview.com as viewed in IE on Windows Vista ( view larger image )

There has been a lot of speculation Vista will need a 128 MB graphics card and a 64 bit CPU run properly. Notice there is nothing mentioned about a 64 bit CPU or 128MB graphics card as being required for Vista to run properly. Since Vista will be released in 32 and 64 bit, I think we can safely cross off the 64 bit requirement. From all the reading I have done, the graphics card maybe more tricky. Since this is NotebookReview.com, we deal mostly in laptops which are much more difficult to upgrade than a PC. Aero is the GUI in Vista. Microsoft says these are the requirements for Aero:

• Requires a DX9 GPU
• Requires at least 32 MB of VRAM
• Minimum Resolution is 1024x768x32
• AGP 4x

Aero Glass is the high end GUI for Vista with these requirements:

• Requires DX9 GPU
• 64 MB VRAM (128 MB recommended)
• Longhorn Display Driver Model
• AGP 4x
• Needs to be Performance Qualified

So which graphics card should I get if I want to run Vista if I am concerned it will not run properly? I would say the minimum would be a 64MB card with DirectX 9 support. It will probably run on lower configured systems.

Personal Experience With Vista

A few weeks after the release of Vista Beta 1, I installed it on my T42. The specs on my T42 are:

• 1.5GB of DDR memory
• 64MB ATI 9600 GPU which has DirectX 9 Support
• 1.8Ghz Pentium M CPU

For the most part it ran fine. It was a little crash prone, but it is a Beta. I installed all of the programs I normally do with XP. A few applications like Photoshop and ZoneAlarm would not install, but most everything else installed and worked well. I didn't play around with the graphics system, but everything ran smoothly and looked good. It ran at 1400x1050 which is the native resolution on my T42. I burned a few discs with Nero. It had the drivers for my WiFi card and I was able to surf with Internet Explorer 7. Watched a few movies and listened to some music in Windows Media Player 10. All of the things I normally do with my laptop. It did not seem to run any slower than XP.



Nero in Windows Vista ( view larger image )

Conclusion

Hopefully this article provided some detail and relieved some angst about Windows Vista. Beta version 2 is going to be released at the end of the year. It should be more widely available to the public and should give more information on what is required for Vista. If you really want to buy a system that is Vista ready, a 64MB DirectX 9 card is in order and a recent CPU. I don't think memory is an issue, since most laptops sold today support 2GB of memory. Even if you don't get a system that is Vista ready like a laptop with an integrated card, the fact remains XP will be supported well into the future, beyond the natural three year life of a laptop. Windows XP Service Pack 3 is slated for release in 2007. I know many people with Pentium II laptops with Windows 98 that are content to use it surf the net and do Office. For those things, they work well.

Sources

Here are some good articles from which I sourced the information here if you would like read further:

• http://www.winsupersite.com/faq/vista.asp
• http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/display/graphics-reqs.mspx
• http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/newsroom/winxp/VistaBeta1FS.mspx
• http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2005/09/07/vista_hardware_reqs/
• http://winsupersite.com/showcase/winvista_editions.asp
• http://www.neoseeker.com/Articles/Hardware/Features/winhec2004/4.html

 

The 64-bit compatibility point is a good one, AMD probably doesn't mind people thinking that they'll need a 64-bit processor to run Vista (as they're the only chip company offering a 64-bit processor to the mobile market right now) but this will not be a requirement to run Vista. Now, will it be beneficial to have a 64-bit processor for a 64-bit version of Vista? Maybe.

If you get a notebook that's considered to have very good specs by todays standards, it's highly likely that 1.5 years from now you'll be able to run Vista without a problem and this is exemplified by the T42 managing the Beta.

Nice job of a short concise guide here and clearing the fog a bit. And thanks for reminding people that Windows XP isn't going to go anywhere soon and it's still a good OS to have even if it's what you have in three years time still.

 

Good post.

But could Microsoft seriously make this any more complicated? 7 versions? What are they thinking? That's just stupid. In my opinion Vista is just ugly too. I don't want it taking away my graphics power. I really don't want Vista. It's too simplistic and Apple-ish, and that's why I buy a PC to begin with and not an Apple.

 

so vista needs a dedicated video ram?

 

My guess is that the some of the less popular versions will get dropped as they are discovered to be less popular. I thought the black taskbar and start menu was stylish. One thing I did not like is that the title bars were clear meaing you could see what was behind them making them hard to read. They also seem to be trying to hide the folders pane in Windows Exlplorer. Took a few minutes to find it. If you want to be sure you can run Vista, a dedicated card is a good idea. It may run on lesser systems. I didn't have one to test it on.

 

What the heck happened to the Windows based dock that MS was working on before it even began Vista. I mean if they want to really make this new OS so much better they need to work on stream lining the interface and the smoothness of the OS. I have been running Beta 1 on my Ferrari for a couple of months and I am not impressed at all. I understand that it is a Beta, but even for a well developed Beta version it is way too jumpy and choppy. MS needs to work on the work system resource load of Vista before they release it. I would much rather them get it right, then release it (but I know MS will release a version full of bugs and expect everyone to buy it because it is MS software). Plus I am not too impressed with the "new" features.

Vista seems to be just a new look for XP. If MS wants to really appeal to consumers they need to allow a more Apple-ish interface. I am not saying to make the apple-like GUI be the only option, MS should allow users to choose there GUI type (not just their theme). Say if I wanted to have an XP looking system, but I wanted the benefits of Vista OR at another time or under another user I want to have an eye-candy GUI in Windows (eye-candy by an Apple-user's standards, not by a Windows user's standards). This would give people the ability to basically manipulate the interface of the OS and I imagine people would actually like being able to do what they want with an MS OS instead of having MS tell you what is neccessary or not.

Just my two cents!

 

Thanks for that guide zazonz. It is nice to know that buying a machine with a pentium M will not be a problem when Vista is released.

 

Well, nowadays CPUs like the Pentium-M line etc. should not be a problem at all. But some of the the limited notebook GPUs could be, if you want later make use of Vista's Aero 3D-UI features and that's the only more interesting point here.

BTW, some days ago there was an info at DigiTimes titled "ATI chips to be in Windows Vista-ready ThinkPad notebooks" related to this theme, see:

http://www.digitimes.com/NewsShow/MailHome.asp?datePublish=2005/10/4&pages=A2&seq=7


However, actually one can also find more infos about Vista and notebooks by looking over some of the Channel 9 videos, where a lot of Microsoft employees are already using nowadays notebooks and Tablet PCs with Windows Vista without much problems. - See:

http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowForum.aspx?ForumID=14&TagID=27

http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowForum.aspx?ForumID=14&TagID=29

...and so on...