Let me start by saying that I am primarily a Mac user, which means that aside from OS X I am very familiar with Windows XP, and fairly comfortable with Linux. However aside from playing around a few times with Vista running under Parallels on my iMac and setting up a Dell Vista machine for my parents the experience is next to nothing.
When it came to my Mini-Note purchase I wanted to get the faster processor and have the notebook come with the 2GB of RAM pre-installed so that meant opting for the $749 model with Windows Vista Business installed. So aside from getting used to the notebook itself, its been a little bit of a challenge with Vista.
Overall I like Vista, well I don’t hate it is most likely a better statement but I don’t think it’s as bad as I had heard. I hate to make a rash or quick decision but I may like it better than XP.
A few things that I have had to change, well actually fix is the login and sleep issues. I am not sure if this is a notebook issue or something with Vista but I was forced to login in each time I turned on or woke the computer from a sleep state. Which although they only took a few extra seconds, I am impatient and it turns out that they were both easy fixes. So just in case anyone else is in the same boat as me, I thought I would share the fix.
Boot without a login:
- Open the Start menu and click Run
- In the Run field, type netplwiz, then click OK and Continue
- This will open up User Accounts and on the Users tab there will be a checkbox towards the top
- Uncheck the box next to “Users must enter a username and password to use this computer”
- Click Apply, then OK
Wake from sleep without a login:
- Open Control Panel
- Open Power Options
- In the left side column, click “Require a password on wakeup”
- Click the link that states “Change settings that are currently unavailable”
- Click the “Don’t require a password”
- Then click the Save Changes button
