New T61 on the way -Need advice!

Outstanding forum... I ordered a Lenovo for the first time to a great extent because of reading through the info here... thanks!

I ordered a T61 a few days ago and could definitely use some advice on it. I ordered it with Vista Business, which I will keep, but will set up XP Pro later (using Arkit3kt's excellent thread) as a dual boot on a Hitachi 200GB. I may later do a clean install of Vista, but won't have the time for everything I would like to do when I get the T61. I understand a 'custom factory restore' is still a better choice than just uninstalling unwanted progs and a general
cleanup.

The problem is, I've never had anything to do with a Lenovo of any sort (Dells previously) and am not familiar with any of the utilities like ThinkVantage and such. If I do a CFR I would really like some advice as to what to eliminate or change during the recovery. Anything else that anyone has to add as to setting up a new T61 with Vista Business would be most welcome. I know the general stuff on what to do at first with a new computer, but anything Lenovo related (any Lenovo updates, etc.) would be helpful.

I realize there are likely different opinions to such a questiion, but any and all are welcome. The info could possibly be of help to some other new Lenovo owners also.

Thanks very much for your time... Quinn

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My guide to taking out the bloatware

http://the-trusted-adviser.spaces.live.com/Blog/cns!2880A69A9408F8CC!505.entry

 

I originally was going to keep all the thinkpad stuff, thinking it was better than, lets say a toshiba's crap, but to me, it isnt.
I did a clean install of xp and only kept the hard drive protection.

 

Get rid of all the ThinkVantage crap. We use Thinkpads at work, and the first thing we do when creating a custom image for our machines is dump that stuff. The T61 is a really good machine - you're gonna like it

 

Thanks for the responses everyone... haven't had time to go over it completely, and don't have the notebook yet, but Ideasmiths' guide looks very useful.

Is it pretty much unanimous to dump all ThinkVantage rather than keep some selected ones?

Any other recommendations or opinions on anything in my first post still very welcome.


Thanks... Quinn

 

Why replace the 1G stock chip with a 2x1GB chips? You aren't going to get any noticeable performance increase with a matched pair of chips. You'd be better off getting a 2GB chip and ending up with a total of 3GB usable.

 

I don't do any gaming or run any really high memory intensive programs on a laptop, so 2GB works great for my purposes on Vista. Since I have another place for the 1GB stick, I decided to put the 2x1Gb in the T61. I didn't check to see if the T61 runs dual-channel, does anyone happen to know? If not, might put a 2GB in the T61 and leave one open for the future.

Thanks... Quinn

 

The chipset supports dual-channel RAM. I'll second what LaptopGuru says.

 

You're saying 3GB for Vista is better all around than 2GB running dual-channel?

If it more than offsets, I'll get the 1x2GB rather than 1x1GB... I was going to order tonight but haven't yet.

Thanks again... Quinn

 

I'm pretty sure the pros of raw amount of memory outweigh the pros of dual-channel. Someone might be able to chime in on this one.

 

I think the raw amount of memory outweigh the pros of dual-channel if you were comparing something like 1X2GB vs 2x256MB (512MB). However, if you compare 1x2GB vs 2x1GB (2GB) or even 2x512MB (1GB), the latter prevails.