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Posts tagged: ultimate

Making the move to Windows Vista Ultimate 64 Bit Edition

admin | October 13, 2008

I posted a few weeks ago about installing Vista Ultimate x64 Edition on my desktop and how that experience went. Since that time I have probably booted into Vista x64 less than 10 times and as for spending any amount of time in the OS – almost nothing – zip – zilch – nada. Now that is certainly not a case of trying to convert to the 64 bit operating system.

Well I have decided today to make that move and really start using the 64 bit version of Vista to see if there is truly a difference in the reliability and use of the system.

I started with all my regular applications that I use and worked to get them installed.

What has worked so far:

Outlook 2007 (Outlook Connector as well)
Symantec Anti-Virus Corporate Edition
Windows Live Messenger
Windows Live Writer
Windows Home Server Connector Software
ActivClient Card Reader Software
Synctoy 2.0
Woopra Client
IE8 Beta 2
Twhirl (a Twitter client)

I did have an error after installing the most recent ATI/AMD drivers for my x1650 video card (yes I did use the 64 bit version). Upon booting into the system after the installation Vista would not let the control center run. I went ahead and just uninstalled the control center itself and left the drivers intact – so far I have not had any other errors.

I also think a power outage caused my computer to enter a strange sleep mode and I could not wake it up with the keyboard or mouse. I think this is unrelated to X64 itself but I will keep an eye on it and update the blog with anything I discover about that.

So from today forward the default OS for my desktop system is the x64 bit version of Windows Vista Ultimate – hear we go into the wild blue yonder I guess!

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Tags: 64 bit, ultimate, upgrade, vista, windows, windows update, x64

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Windows Vista 64 Bit Installation Experience

admin | August 21, 2008

A couple of weeks ago stories started to appear on the Internet talking about the increased percentages of 64 bit Windows that was accessing the Windows Update site and I got intrigued about trying to run the 64 bit system again myself.

So I went ahead and cleared out my secondary 300GB SATA drive and booted up using my Windows Vista Ultimate 64 Bit install DVD disk. Vista is quite good at taking care of the dual boot menu so I was not worried about that with the exception of renaming the entries to ID 32 vs 64 bit at the end. I used EasyBCD to edit those entries and set the menu delay.

Anyway, installing 64 bit Windows is just like installing the 32 bit version – absolutely no difference at all. Once the system booted into the final stages and allowed me to pick a user name, photo and desktop background it ran through the normal system tests and then gave me access to the desktop.

At that time I started the update process. The first scan of the system with Windows Update resulted in 62 important updates and 41 optional ones appearing. Most of the optional updates were the language packs. So began the update odyssey and it only took two more cycles to get everything updated on the system. I was impressed in the fact that Windows Update had drivers for much of my peripherals. It identified and installed drivers for my Logitech webcam and its sound element, Realtek Gigabit ethernet card, ActivCard USB card reader, Pinnacle 800e USB TV Tuner, Radeon 1200 (on the mother board) and my Radeon 1650.

So all in all very good at finding my devices and setting them up for use but then I do not have anything real obscure.

The big run for me right now with my 64 nit install is that I have barely booted into the system to really start testing how it will function on a daily use basis. That is my next step – I want to be able to see if I can do those things I do each day in 64 bit Windows and make the cut over to it on a full time basis. I have a lot of software to test out and see if it will work as well.