Windows 7 x64 on T400: What works and what doesn't.

After being quite tentative about installing Windows 7 on my laptop I have pleasantly surprised when I found out that almost everything works. For those who waiting to pull the trigger on W7 this thread is for you.

So after saying that, comes the things that do NOT work right now on W7.

1. Switchable Graphics : Currently this does not work and the only way to change between the integrated Intel graphics and the discrete ATI graphics is in the BIOS.

2. Intel Graphics : For the most part this is working but when I was watching a movie and playing World of Warcraft, screen artifacts appeared. Not a serious problem as the movie was still watchable and the game was still playable.

3. Trackpoint middle button : Like the intel graphics this sort of works. It currently behaves much like the middle button of a mouse without a scroll wheel. So you can scroll, but the response is not what you expect.

4. Power Management : Battery life is significantly reduced. My laptop can usually anywhere from 4 to 6 hours when i'm browsing on power saver mode with the brightness set to medium. After using it for only 15 minutes, using the same settings my battery dropped from 100 to 89% and W7 was estimating that I only had about 2 hours before the battery was drained. I will test this further and get some more concrete numbers and more on battery time. But until then be warned.

Other than these things W7 is working perfectly and it is much faster than Windows XP or Vista ever was. The new interface improvements are very impressive and will surely increase your productivity. My system is not configured with the webcam, fingerprint reader, or bluetooth module so if anyone knows if these work in W7 post it up on the thread. I will try to keep this thread updated as new updates are released.

I hope everyone enjoys W7 because I'm loving it.

 

I can confirm what you listed below, though the middle button works as expected and I think I’m getting 30 minutes more battery life than you are (for whatever reason). However, some of the bigger annoyances I have with this right now are below. Do you experience them as well?

1. I’m unable to control the screen brightness via Fn + Home/End.
2. My T400 is configured to sleep when the lid is closed. This works, but upon opening the lid, while the system comes out the sleep, the LCD never comes on.

 

I just tried that sleep on lid close thing... and this display does not turn back on and I had to hard reset. However, I am able to control screen brightness using fn + home/end though.

When I press my middle button using the nipple the pointer does not lock up like it does in vista. Instead, it is free to move which is quite annoying. Can't decide whether to use the touchpad or the nipple.

 

Hmmm. My BIOS is set for switchable graphics—which seems to leave me with the Intel card in Windows. What is yours set to? Also, I’ve been able to work around the LCD issue by putting the machine immediately back into sleep via Fn + F4 and then getting it out of sleep again via the power button. Alternatively, Fn + F4 and then closing the lid allows me to open the lid and then press the power button to restore from sleep successfully.

As for the middle button, the pointer locks up just fine. I have the touchpad disabled in the BIOS as I have no need for it.

 

Hmm.. maybe that's why by middle button is being lame.

We just have to avoid setting On Lid Close --> Sleep.

As for switching to the discrete card you have to disable the switchable graphics in the BIOS and make sure you select the discrete card. This leaves me with the ATI card in windows.