Thoughts from Lenovo on Windows 7

[z3r010]

Windows 7 RTM is finally here! It feels like it’s taken a long time to get here and yet all the effort made time pass by quickly since we started working with Microsoft in early 2007. Our Lenovo teams from around the world have been engaged with Microsoft to help bring Windows 7 to this milestone. Since Microsoft will tell you about Windows 7 features, I wanted to share a snapshot of how Lenovo and Microsoft have worked together on Windows 7.

Beginning with the Basics

Our collaboration between software and hardware began with many meetings over many months to discuss technology strategies, customer needs, priorities and schedules. Testing started early with Lenovo PCs in the Microsoft labs from the start of development ensuring Lenovo PCs work well with Windows 7. We started our testing with the beta in the first half of 2008, providing ongoing feedback as we received each new version of code.

Technology Deep Dives

We identified several technology areas for joint focus, and we spent many months collaborating on – performance, touch, WWAN, Fingerprint , XP Mode, Device Stage, Display Connectivity and more:

• Performance: PC performance will be a significant measure of the success of Windows 7. This means not just the performance of Windows 7, but all the pieces that make up a PC: BIOS, device drivers, applications and how they are configured to work together. We worked with Microsoft to improve Windows 7 and all of these components. Our developers have kept performance a key measurement in their work and requirements to our suppliers. As a result, Windows 7 runs significantly faster, especially on solid state drives making the new ThinkPad T400s the fastest Lenovo laptop yet.
• Touch: Multi touch has created a “buzz” in technology circles, and we’ve been working with Microsoft to bring you not only great hardware but software solutions that offer expanded usability. We’ve worked together since the prototype stages and soon we can show it off.

Quality – Testing and More Testing!

No matter how great the technology is, it doesn’t matter unless it is a quality solution. We start with a quality design and then test every part of the solution, every step of the way during the development phase of both Windows and Lenovo PCs. Our testing includes not only the new PCs you haven’t seen yet, but PCs customers already own to so they can be seamlessly upgraded to Windows 7. We test the hardware, every piece of software and how they work together. And we do this for 25 languages!

Applications are Important Too

As part of a Windows 7 Lenovo PC, you’ll not only get a great new operating system but a set of applications designed to embrace and extend the new technologies. Lenovo developers have redesigned our ThinkVantage solutions to bring you enhanced functions, improved usability and improved performance on Windows 7. We also work with our software suppliers to ensure their solutions are ready and perform well on Windows 7.

Enterprise Customers

Enterprise customers bring a unique expertise to testing a new operating system because of their requirements for manageability and mass deployment. Lenovo has been working with enterprise customers who started testing Windows 7 early, providing technical assistance along with device drivers and applications for use in their corporate environments.

Finishing Touches – More work yet to do

As we receive the RTM version of Windows 7, we now begin the finishing touches to bring a new operating system to customers as part of Lenovo PCs. We’ll add the applications and drivers to Windows 7 and run the final performance, compatibility and Windows logo testing on our PCs.

This RTM milestone marks the final phase to launch a new set of products across the PC industry. Lenovo still has a lot to finish before the Windows 7 launch on October 22, but we will be ready to bring you significantly better performance and great new functions on day one. Our manufacturing team is ready to produce Windows 7 on all our product lines: ThinkPad business laptops, ThinkCentre business desktops, ThinkStation workstation PCs, IdeaPad consumer laptops and netbooks and IdeaCentre consumer desktops.

Debra Kobs-Fortner
Director of Software Strategy, Lenovo

More...

 

[DJG]

I have to say my Lenovo tablet has worked beautifully under Win 7.

 

[PotatoMan83]

I cant wait for OEM

 

[SNaRe]

I have lenovo y530 . Windows 7 works great. I'm happy i have notebook as lenovo

 

[dmillergv]

My Lenovo Y410 has no problems with 64bit.

Retired IBM System Engineer.

 

[lkh128]

Lenovo 3000 Y410

Hi dmillergv, I see that you had no problems with Windows 7 for your Lenovo 3000 Y410. I am thinking of a clean install and would appreciate it very much if you can tell me where you obtained the drivers for the Y410 from. Did you use the same drivers as those available at the Lenovo website? Thank you.

 

[toughbook]

Your best bet is to do a clean install, let W7 find the drivers it needs. It will tell you if it can't find a certain one. Then check for one's you know you don't have. Go to Lenovo's site and download them for Vista 32 or 64 bit, which ever you need. Then of course, if some of those don't work with W7 do them in Compatibility Mode. Lenovo will be releasing the drivers for W7 very soon though!

 

[dmillergv]

I am running X64 and all but 1 driver were found during install.
I found the energy management driver IN1EGC17WW3.EXE for Vista X64 in either the 500 or 700 series. Got a case of CRS this morning.

 

[lkh128]

Lenovo 3000 Y410

I am running X64 and all but 1 driver were found during install.
I found the energy management driver IN1EGC17WW3.EXE for Vista X64 in either the 500 or 700 series. Got a case of CRS this morning.

Thanks dmillergv and toughbook. You have been very helpful. I will certainly give it a go with a clean install.

 

[Mjcanton]

That answers some of my questions with a clean install too! Thanks guys! I'm excited to get Win7 up on my Y650.

One more question if someone knows the answer.. What to do with the Lenovo partition.. Should i leave it or format the whole hard drive??

 

[toughbook]

What all have you got on the Lenovo partition? Is it just the Lenovo's seperate partition that alot of OEM's have set aside? If so, it depends on what is on there you want. If it was me, I would do a complete, 100%, **** cavity clean install:shock:

 

[Wii Master 64]

Even though I have a compaq, I thought I would just share my input. What I'm gonna do is just backup all my drivers, put them on a cd, clean install, reinstall all drivers, and then let windows update update whichever drivers need it. The reason why I want to back them all up is so if windows update fails, I have a backup plan.

 

[harpua]

I have a Thinkpad that originally came with Vista. Lenovo provides a way for you to burn your own recovery disks. Before nuking the recovery partition, I would recommend burning those recovery disks and verifying them to make sure you have a good burn. That way, if you ever want to sell your laptop, you can recover it to the original state it came from the factory with the OEM OS and all drivers installed. And you can keep your W7 OS for something else. Also, just in case you ever want to go back for some other reason you still will be able to.

But the original recovery partition is pretty useless, imo, once you have W7 installed because it is unlikely that you would want to restore to the factory OEM OS once you have W7 installed except if you were selling the notebook.

So when I installed W7 on my Thinkpad, I did away with the recovery partition (after burning my disks) and instead of using Lenovo's buggy rescue and recovery (or whatever they call it now), I just use Acronis TIH which does offer the option to put a recovery partition of sorts on that you can boot into by hitting F11 at start up, if windows won't start. And then from there you can access your backups and restore them if/when ever needed.

But once you've moved on to W7, a dedicated partition to restore Vista seems pretty unnecessary and a waste of space, imo.

 

[toughbook]

I want that Lenovo screen saver that you always see in there advertisements. The one with the red lines going from top to bottom. That is a cool scene.

 

[Mjcanton]

I have a Thinkpad that originally came with Vista. Lenovo provides a way for you to burn your own recovery disks. Before nuking the recovery partition, I would recommend burning those recovery disks and verifying them to make sure you have a good burn. That way, if you ever want to sell your laptop, you can recover it to the original state it came from the factory with the OEM OS and all drivers installed. And you can keep your W7 OS for something else. Also, just in case you ever want to go back for some other reason you still will be able to.

But the original recovery partition is pretty useless, imo, once you have W7 installed because it is unlikely that you would want to restore to the factory OEM OS once you have W7 installed except if you were selling the notebook.

So when I installed W7 on my Thinkpad, I did away with the recovery partition (after burning my disks) and instead of using Lenovo's buggy rescue and recovery (or whatever they call it now), I just use Acronis TIH which does offer the option to put a recovery partition of sorts on that you can boot into by hitting F11 at start up, if windows won't start. And then from there you can access your backups and restore them if/when ever needed.

But once you've moved on to W7, a dedicated partition to restore Vista seems pretty unnecessary and a waste of space, imo.

Many good points there.. Don't really need a Vista system restore I'll probably do the same, and for sure back up the Lenovo partition on my external as well as on a disc.

What about programs like Lenovo ReadyComm 4.0 and Easy capture.. How can those be backed up?