Somewhere between the list of components for a new box (not to mention a high end monitor), I gave in to temptation and started playing with an IQ504 in a local store last summer. The sleek design actually was (to me) the best of that genre and really appealed to me. And it was just, well, a lot of FUN to use.

The IQ816 was “to die for” but at least $500 more. For my purposes, the IQ506 had enough awesomeness. (And I already have two Media Center OCUR/DCT boxes connected to high res widescreen displays for HDTV goodness). At the time, I didn’t have any Blu-Ray DVDs so I was pretty happy with the specs of the IQ506.

So I ordered myself an IQ506 in early October. Before the stock market and the economy took an atomic nose dive. And I knew someone that could put the old desktop to good use, so I gifted it. I’m not sorry I spent the money even though it is going to now put a cramp in my holiday plans.

Click the image above to watch a VERY entertaining demo.

And after 5 weeks, I’m still as much in love with this computer as day one. This is a FUN machine. It’s possibly the best family oriented machine I’ve seen and unless you are a hard core pc gamer, it is a machine to seriously consider as a general purpose machine.

The touch screen interface doesn’t take long to become accustomed to (and you always have Windows Vista’s default interface available when you want it.

It’s kind of neat to drag my fingers along the bottom to bring up the various applications. And yes, you can add RSS feeds and view web sites within the interface.

Above shows how my blog appears inside the TouchSmart interface. I think it is cool that I can drag my finger up and down over the website to scroll. It’s like having the best of a tablet pc interface with all this neat HP touch functionality at the same time. Did I say it was fun?

There isn’t much not to like about the IQ506. My biggest beef was that these come with Vista x64 Home Premium and some trialware and Symantec crapware with 60 days of Live Update pain. But, I easily formatted the hard drive, installed Vista x64 Ultimate SP1 and then the apps (including TouchSmart) that I wanted from HP, plus all the drivers are on the HP support site. Sure I could have done a Windows Anytime Upgrade, but it’s much better to have Ultimate and do a complete image backup after you get your apps installed and everything running perfectly than it is to use an OEM “recovery” which puts you back to crapified whatever. Shame on Microsoft for not including this in Home Premium. Maybe with Windows 7 this will change.

Anyway, I’m having lots of fun with my IQ506. My advice is – go get yourself one of these. If you are impatient, some of the Best Buy stores have started carrying these. And start having FUN.

Full specs as supplied by HP:

	Operating system		Genuine Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit edition with Service Pack 1
	Processor		Intel Core2 Duo Processor T5850
	Memory		4096MB
	Memory speed		PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM
	Total memory slots		2 SoDIMMs
	Maximum memory		N/A
	Graphics card		Integrated Nvidia GeForce 9300 M GS HD graphics module with 256MB dedicated video memory and support for Microsoft DirectX 10
	TV and entertainment experience		TV Tuner: Dual-format NTSC or over-the-air ATSC high-definition TV tuner, HP Media Center remote control with IR (infrared) receiver
	PCI expansion		N/A
	Hard drive		500GB 7200RPM [gigabyte is defined as 1,000,000,000 bytes, accessible capacity may vary]
	Primary CD/DVD drive		Slot-load SuperMulti DVD Burner
	Secondary CD/DVD drive		N/A
	Networking		10/100/1000 BaseT network interface; Integrated Bluetooth and 802.11b/g/n Wireless LAN with built-in WLAN antenna
	Sound card		Integrated High Definition Audio with 2.0 sound capabilities
	Speakers		High-performance 2.0 Speakers
	Front-side bus (processor dependent)		667MHz Front Side Bus
	Power supply		N/A
	I/O ports		5-in-1 memory card reader supports Secure Digital (SD, SDHC), MultiMedia Card, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro 1 FireWire (IEEE 1394) port (front); Headphone (front); Line-in (back); 5 USB 2.0 ports(2 front, 3 rear)(5 available); Line-out (back); Digital Audio Out (back)
	Software, full versions		HP TouchSmart Music – Create playlists with your favorite music; HP TouchSmart Video – Watch, record and upload your personal videos using touch; HP TouchSmart Photo – Share your fun and memorable moments in life with family and friends; HP TouchSmart RSS Feeds – Get the latest news right at your fingertips; HP TouchSmart Browser – Browse the web in a whole new way; HP TouchSmart Calendar – Manage your busy schedule and stay in touch with family; HP TouchSmart Notes – Quick and easy text and voice notes right at your fingertips; muvee autoProducer Basic: Automatically create professional looking home videos and burn to DVD; Cyberlink DVD Suite Deluxe: Automatically fix and edit videos and create CDs and DVDs. Edit, burn and archive data to discs; Microsoft Works 9: Includes a word processor, spreadsheet, database and calendar; Adobe Reader 8.0: Read and print PDF files; HP Total Care Advisor: Customizable desktop tool provides support, system health and shopping information
	Software, introductory versions		Norton Internet Security 2008: Protect your PC out of the box (60 days of complimentary live updates)
	Trial Internet service		Easy sign-up to major dial-up and broadband Internet Service Providers High Speed Internet Services Comparison Shopping
	Dimensions		21"(L) x 2.6"(W) x 17.4" (H/D)
	Basic warranty		One year of hardware parts and labor coverage, 90 day software toll-free phone assistance

And I took it home. I like the machine alot, but it isn’t perfect because as shipped, with Home Premium, it doesn’t include two things I need, RDP Host and full image based backup. (It’s stupid that MS does not include full image backup in the Home SKU. Probably the single most helpful software when disaster strikes. Ultimate Extras are a joke and don’t matter to me at all.  You can read about the specs at http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/sony-vaio-aw125j-h/4505-3121_7-33309981.html but this post is more about my continuing adventure in transforming the machine into an x64 Ultimate (instead of Home Premium).

This is the first VAIO I have owned. I’ll write about it when it is running the OS I prefer.

Windows Anytime Upgrade from inside the GUI displayed a browser string and would not lead me to the correct web page. I contacted MS support who told me I needed to get this upgrade from Sony. I know how to get to the anytime upgrade site, but I was concerned.

Well, I’ve been having adventures now for a couple of weeks. Bottom line is that using a regular x64 Ultimate DVD and performing and in place upgrade installs a new copy of Vista. And many of the Sony supplied utilities don’t work and definitely the WinDVD Blue Ray software does not work. A format and clean install of x64 Ultimate, and then an attempt to reinstall Sony drivers is only partially successful. And forget trying to reinstall the apps I really wanted. No can do.

I made some noise and got hooked up with a very senior support VP office. Exchanged email. Had a phone call.  Some MS folks were conferenced in as well. This happened on 11/12 and afterwards I responded by email:

Thanks so much for taking the time to speak with me. I’m thrilled that you are going to provide me with an x64 Ultimate install DVD and all Applications for this machine.

While I didn’t get the DVD and drivers to fix me up overnight as initially promised, a week later (11/20) I got another phone call. This time Sony asked to conference some more Microsoft folks in and I agreed. So a bunch of people were looking at my issue. Sony acknowledged the problem scenarios and said that the WAU should work, but I’d need to uninstall and reinstall some apps and they were working with MS on the issue with WinDVD. I thought I was promised that a WAU upgrade would be sent on that first con call (11/12) but maybe I misunderstood.

So last night I was told it would take 7-10 days to ship me a WAU DVD x64 SP1 Ultimate WAU disk. (And I don’t know how they would ship it.) That threw me, as I don’t quite understand why the MS folks that promised to send me the DVD can’t grab one and stick it in a FEDEX envelope. So I expressed some displeasure and they said they would expedite and ship it “express” (whatever that means). Update: that meant express mail and it just arrived 11/22. And Sony was supposed to email me instructions and a KB fix link as they had successfully performed the upgrade and other than these “work arounds”, I should now be able to perform the upgrade.

I suspect I will see the DVD WAU media around XMAS and I’m not sure when Sony will be emailing me the instructions and KB fix info.

I asked what they were doing for the user community, and they said that they would get the information up on their esupport site.

All in all, I am happy that the Sony and MSFT folks are going to fix me up with what I need to get the OS I want on this machine. But the waiting is horrendously painful. Sony should ship these with x64 Ultimate to begin with.

Stay tuned..

Nice looking hardware, piano black finish (production units will have a neat Zen imprint) with a solid heft/feel. Connections for component and HDMI (720p and 1080i supported on both). An HDMI cable is included (nice touch). Audio jacks include RCA stereo (analog) and Optical Digital (SPDIF). No Coax digital, but that suits me just fine. I ranted some about the lack of Optical output on the ”competing” (and I use that term loosely) Linksys DMA-2100.

802.11a/b/g/n (Draft 2.0n) wireless (and 10/100 Ethernet) connect this device to your home network. The device sports USB ports front and rear and includes a HP Pocket Media Drive Bay (the 21st century version of sneaker net storage used to move your digital “stuff” between computers and devices).

If you are looking at size and aesthetics, this image shows the sizes of the x280n, the Linksys DMA-2200 (the 2100 is even smaller and as I blogged, chintzy in feel and cheap looking), the D-Link theater component size DSM-750, and an Xbox 360. For me, it is a draw between the component sized D-Link which, in the real world would fit nicely on the rack that holds my home theater receiver and the HP x280n which would fit nicely and discreetly on top of or under the TV. Top to bottom: HP MediaSmart x280n, Linksys DMA-2200, D-Link DSM-750, Xbox 360.

HP includes a really nice handheld remote. It’s certainly the best of the remotes offered with any of the extenders I’ve seen. It’s backlit (which for me is a must in a darkened room). Setting up the x280n was menu driven and simple. It found several of my 2.4GHz  “N” networks (I’m not certain it is seeing 5GHz N yet, more to come). I associated it, entered the WPA2-PSK passphrase and it was off and running. The first thing it did was check for new firmware. Finding a newer version, it downloaded and applied the newer firmware. After a reboot, it was back up and ready for action.

I elected to set it up as a Media Center Extender first and verify that my OCUR/DCT high def streaming was good to go. No problem there. Since I can do MCX setups in my sleep, and at the speed of light, I was able to quickly get through setup and watch Live and Recorded HD TV.

Exploring the HP MediaSmart interface:

I had a short amount of time to explore HP’s MediaSmart proprietary interface for Media Sharing. I used Windows Media Sharing and UPnP streaming from a server. I have yet to setup HP’s own MediaSmart gateway software, but I’ll get to that. HP has developed a slick and intuitive interface which can be used with Windows XP, Vista, and most likely will be future proof, at least for a while. I like the HP interface and functionality slightly more than D-Link’s MediaLounge interface. Linksys has no such secondary interface. I was easily able to start playing some music and access my photos and play a slide show. This works almost exactly the same way it does on the Media Center Extender interface. All in all, in my first look, a nice, user friendly, solid piece of hardware with great functionality.

I’ll be updating this post as time permits as I continue to explore and experiment.

Before I left home, I recorded a few TV Shows with an external USB tuner I already owned using Vista’s Windows Media Center. (HP does have a tuner for the TX2000 but I have not had the opportunity to see/try it.) The passenger in the middle row seat on my outbound flight asked some questions as I had the TX2000 in tablet mode and was watching some of this recorded TV via Media Center.  He had earbuds and I let him plug into the spare earphone port. The TV in my hotel room was an old CRT tube type and I just can’t watch those after living with LCD’s and Plasma’s. Watching recorded TV on the TX2000 was a much better experience than watching anything on the hotel television.

One of the first travel incidents that happened to me was that I broke off a prong on the Jawbone BT earplug A/C power plug. It’s a two piece deal, USB plugs into the wall wart. I now very much appreciate the three USB ports on the TX2000 (and I’d definitely been scratching my head wondering how I could use three at once). One port each for my Moto RAZR phone, my IPOD Touch, and my Jawbone BT adapter. Obviously notebook has to be powered on to charge up these items, but I found a routine of waking up, plugging in, showering, etc. reading email and doing morning online stuff before leaving the hotel was enough time to charge everything for the day.

Battery life on the TX2000 was pretty decent. Even with the smaller 6 cell battery installed (to save space and weight), I found that by using Power Saver mode coupled with an electrical outlet halfway through the day for a quick drink of energy that I could pretty much get through a day of presentations and meetings (not constant use). Like other true tablet pc’s, the screen can be a little hard to read in bright sunlit settings. A few times where I was sitting in an enclosed courtyard environment with natural bright sunlight I had to move around a bit and turn up the brightness.

Wireless connectivity “just worked” thanks to the built in Broadcom 802.11a/b/g/n wireless radio. No matter what SSID I needed to connect to, there were no hassles. I had a chance to use the wired Ethernet as well on this trip and had no issues. Not that I wouldn’t expect this great performance, but I am sure glad that HP did not use the problematic Intel 4965 wireless chipset (lots of driver issues).

After taking some NEF+JPG images with my Nikon D300, I used a Lexar Professional USB 2.0 high speed Compact Flash Reader to get images into the TX2000. While the TX2000 has a built in media reader, it does not handle the larger format compact flash cards (which is true of all other notebooks I’ve seen). I’m pleased to report that some batch processing with Adobe on this 64 bit Ultimate machine with 4 gigs of RAM is very acceptable (as compared to the TX1000 which was quite slow). It was pretty neat to put the TX2000 in tablet mode and play a slide show of the day’s photos for some friends. Speaking of friends, quite a few of them (30 or so) had some hands on with this TX2000 on this trip. Since I’d been talking about it and blogging about it, there was a lot of interest. Even folks I didn’t know (on the airplane and at the conference) wanted to take a look at the machine. Definitely thumbs up from a very discriminating crowd of geeks. Only a couple of friends that are business tablet users felt that it would not suit their specific needs. Even people I didn’t know wanted to take a look at the TX2000. On my outbound trip, TSA at my local airport at the security checkpoint said, “is this a new laptop” and went off to inspect it. I think they were curious and not alarmed. When they handed it back to me, the comment was, “this looks pretty cool”.

All in all, it was a great trip. The TX2000 was a great machine to take on the road, serving all my needs.

” A small number of early production DSM-750 Wireless N HD Media Center Extenders have an issue with a corrupted security certificate, which results in the communication error messages described in this post when trying to affiliate the DSM-750 with a PC running Windows Media Center. Unfortunately, this defect cannot be rectified through firmware upgrade, and can only be addressed by a factory-trained technician.

If you receive the communication error while attempting to affiliate the DSM-750 with Windows Media Center, please call D-Link technical support at 888-900-3939, Monday-Friday from 9am-5pm PST. This a special number which will allow you to directly reach appropriate technical support agents. They will assess the issue and determine if your unit needs to be replaced. D-Link is ready to quickly resolve this issue; tech support agents have been briefed and customers will be shipped replacement units if needed. “

Almost exactly one year after receiving the TX1000 for review, HP contacted me and asked if I was interested in looking at the HP Pavilion TX2000 Entertainment PC. Of course I said yes. And I won’t keep anyone in suspense. I REALLY like this notebook. Below are my first and early impressions in detail.

The TX1000 series was not a true Tablet PC and as I wrote a year ago, handwriting recognition was pretty iffy and slow. The TX2000 series is definitely a “real” tablet, with a good active digitizer. It even understands my hen scratches (a tough thing to do since not only has my handwriting degenerated over the years, but because I type 99% of the time, when I do use a pen or pencil, ten minutes after I’ve written something I might not be able to read it myself!)

HP has listened carefully to end users. (And I don’t know of any other computer manufacturer that has gone to this much trouble to solicit feedback, yet alone incorporate it, in a consumer notebook product.) Circuit City is describing the TX2000 as an HP Pavilion TX2000 12.1″ Touchscreen Entertainment Laptop. I’m guessing that the word “touchscreen” has less of a “business only” connotation than “tablet”, but it is a true tablet pc.

The nitty gritty: The machine I received was one at the top of the line. According to the website (as of April 11, 2008), models start at $899.99 for a base configuration and with HP’s recommended Config, currently cost $1168.99.

The hardware I received:

Turion 64 X2 TL66 (2.3 GHz 512+512 L2 Cache)

4 GB DDR2 System Memory

Fingerprint Reader + Webcam + Microphone

Wireless a/b/g/n (draft) + Bluetooth

250 GB SATA 5400 RPM hard drive

LightScribe 8x DVD+/-RW Double Layer

Wireless Remote Control (for Windows Media Center and Quick Play)

6 cell & 8 cell Lithium-Ion batteries

Tablet Pen Digitizer and Cord

12.1” (1280 x800) WXGA Nvidia Go6150 powered graphics (shared memory)

2 sets earbuds

I’m forever converted to x64 computing, so a machine with 4 Gigs of RAM, Vista Ultimate x64 and a dual core AMD Turion loads an impressive deck. (Actually the top processor offered in this series, the AMD Turion(TM) 64 X2 Dual-Core Mobile Technology Gold Edition TL-68 (2.4 GHz, 512KB+512KB L2 Cache) is one of the faster of its kind.)

Setting up and firing up the TX2000 for the first time was a breeze. HP includes their standard poster for folks that can’t figure out how to insert the battery and assemble the two pieces of the power cord. After powering it up for the first time, the typical OEM Windows Vista setup screens appeared including license acknowledgement and after Windows setup completed, HP’s own registration application. It’s all pretty slick as you can see from the shots below. A short video was next and a few screens asking me if I needed an Internet provider. Since I’m a very happy Comcast broadband user, I was all set.

HP’s default wallpaper is shown below. This same design is imprinted (black on a striking piano black finish) on the top pf the notebook.

I “pointed” the a/b/g/n wireless at one of my 802.11n (draft 2.0) networks and was off and running, actually speeding. Windows Vista downloaded a ton of updates while I looked around and worked on personalizing my drive configuration. The 250GB hard drive was configured as a single volume (Drive C) and one of the first things I did was change the hidden recovery partition drive letter to F and then shrink the C drive, create a D drive and format as NTFS. I like to keep my data (including images, videos and music) on a non system drive. Old habits die hard!

Multimedia Powerhouse

There’s no question that the TX2000 is an Entertainment Notebook PC (and is deserving of that label). The stereo speakers (Altec Lansing) are quite good for a laptop. I’ve certainly seen my share of crappy, tinny laptop speakers driven by cheap chips over the years). There are TWO earphone/earbud out ports. Couple this with tablet functionality and turning the TX2000 into tablet mode, watching a DVD on an airplane with a travel companion is a great experience. Both of you can enjoy the DVD while everyone around you can watch the movie offered by the airline that you’ve already seen twice. I carry some great Shure sound isolating high performance earbuds which provide an incredible experience, but entry level inexpensive earbuds are available as options from HP with the TX2000. It’s not a bad idea to carry a set of these if you want to share with someone not carrying their own earbud gear. HP includes Quick Play button functionality (which launches Vista) to give you one button access to your music and more.

Windows Vista Media Center is a powerhouse on its own and is included in every version of Vista Ultimate or Home Premium. For $100, you can order an optional HP USB Digital/Analog Tuner w/Remote for a premium Live and Recorded TV experience. On top of that, HP has added enough additional entertainment features that I was tempted to look for the kitchen sink

Kitchen sink aside, HP includes a link to SlingMedia’s web site for a 15% discount on a Slingbox (and the Sling Media player is pre-installed). StarZ Vongo is also pre-installed. The basic version of muvee autoProducer is pre-installed (along with the option of activating a 21 day free trial of the fully featured version). Cyberlink full version software is also pre-installed: Power Director 6 (for the Steven Spielberg in you), Power2Go v5 (media burner), Label Print and YouCam (webcam effects). HP Photosmart Essentials is also included.

Electronic Arts Trial Version of Sims Life Stories is also pre-installed. It’s not really my “thing” but HP certainly includes a rounded selection of entertainment vehicles.

HP included a lot of other software (loaded to the gills, actually), including a 60 day trial version of Microsoft Office 2007 Student and Teacher (which I am replacing with a full Office 2007 Ultimate and Expression Web). The S&T version may be just right for the average user, but I’m accustomed to the Ultimate version of Office 2007 and I do author PowerPoint decks. Also preinstalled was a 60 day trial of Norton Internet Security. Norton is one of my least favorite apps, and after 10 minutes, I uninstalled it (and substituted Eset’s NOD32 which I like a lot as it is lightweight but strong). I do understand the need to include a working AV product out of the box.

Much of the included software has easy access shortcuts on the default desktop and/or in the system tray, but some only appears on the Programs menu.

The TX2000 is currently shipping with updated drivers and Vista Service Pack 1 pre-installed. This means that out of the box, the machine doesn’t need to download hundred’s of megabytes of updates and fixes and that the drivers are SP1 compatible. (My review unit needed some updates from the HP Support site, including a BIOS update and some drivers, but HP has one of the best systems I’ve seen and their “Softpaqs” are nearly bulletproof. After installing the HP updates, I made a few passes at Windows Update and downloaded and applied a few rounds of updates before SP1 was offered.) After Vista was done downloading about 121 megs, SP1 installed in about 25 minutes.

The networking options for wireless vary, but the higher end selection of a/b/g/n (draft) 802.11 with Bluetooth certainly meet all my criteria. The hard drive choices are 160, 250, or 320 GB 5400 RPM SATA. For an optical drive, HP included a LightScribe SuperMulti 8X DVD+/-RW with Double Layer Support.

Like the TX1000 series, the TX2000 NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) Go 6150 graphics chip drives the display. Video memory is shared and not dedicated (one of the few things I dislike). You can, however, alter the amount of dedicated memory in the system BIOS settings. The Video rating is what drives down the overall Windows Experience rating. In spite of the rating system (which I don’t think really represents any real time normal usage), I’m happy with the performance of this notebook.

The TX2000 has 3 USB ports (but no Firewire-fortunately the ExpressCard 34 firewire cards I bought work just fine so I can hook up my Canon HV20 camcorder and import and edit video). Video out is VGA (I’d prefer HDMI or DVI). A 12.1 inch screen runs a max resolution of 1280 x 800. It weighs about 4.5 pounds and at its thickest is 1.5 inches.

After using the fingerprint reader on the original TX1000, I don’t think I’d consider purchasing any notebook or tablet that didn’t include one. I use the TX2000’s fingerprint reader for convenience. Much easier than typing in long passwords on web sites and having it actually encourages me to use different strong passwords for individual websites. One trick I learned living in a changeable climate where outside is 10 degrees and inside is 70 – my fingers when cold don’t register the same way as they do when at normal room temperatures. So on each hand, I’ve registered two fingers at room temperature and two more when I’ve just come inside from colder weather. And I have a warm and cold thumb as well. This insures quick and positive authentication.

While providing business class tablet pc features, the TX2000 is an entertainment centric pc. As I look around at what is available from manufacturers that include true tablet functionality, a webcam, fingerprint reader, media center and music player functionality, the TX2000 stands alone and in a class by itself. This would actually make a great business machine. While I doubt Enterprise IT types would be interested in mass deployment (sadly), anyone with a small or home based business should take a good hard look at this one. I’ve got a friend in the real estate business that would LOVE the TX2000.

Anyway, I’m about to take the TX2000 on an extended road trip. I’ve loaded up both Adobe’s photo processing software and Nikon Capture NX as I plan to do some digital editing of what I shoot with my D300. I’m hoping that the weather cooperates. The TX2000, my Nikon D300 and various necessary odds and ends all fit nicely in my Kata 101 photo backpack. I’ll be posting a follow up on performance (and more) after my return. In the meantime, I see that Circuit City is starting to receive a pre-configured model, so if you want to check the TX2000 out yourself..

Some unboxing and setup images can be found at one of my websites.

Out of the box, the DSM-750 blows the dinky Linksys DMA 2100 out of the water. Solid construction and a nice looking peripheral that doesn’t look like cheap plastic in my living room. The DMA 2100 has no optical SPDIF (RCA flavor digital SPDIF only) and worse, does not see Atheros based 802.11 Draft 2.0 N SSID’s and probably some other brands. The DMA 2100 only has two antennae. D-Link has all the ports and three antennae, which really helps with wireless connectivity .

D-Link integrates network setup with Extender setup and it is a real easy task to get up and running. While I admit to having had experience with a beta engineering sample, the engineering sample was wired only without the 802.11n dual band capability. I was really impressed with how well it worked and how integrated it was. D-Link has tons of experience with something like 6-7 previous versions in the Medialounge wireless media player line. This experience shows.

The Linksys takes forever to connect to the host Vista machine while the D-Link connects seamlessly and far more rapidly.

In my opinion, if you have a choice between the Linksys DMA 2100 and the D-Link DSM-750, the D-Link is well worth the wait. Linksys was first to market, but the race is not always to the swiftest.

Acer refuses to provide a 64 bit winphlash. I finally figured out a quick and easy solution (not wanting to buy a USB floppy). Acer adamantly refuses to acknowledge that 64 bit users want to update their BIOS. And the Ferrari 4000 doesn’t support booting from a USB flash key.

So I figured it out. Ingredients, hardware, and instructions:

Hardware

1. Acer Ferrari 4000

2. USB Flash Drive

3. Vista 32 bit DVD

Instructions

1. download the BIOS from ftp://ftp.support.acer-euro.com/notebook/ferrari_4000/vista/BIOS/ 

2. Unzip to root of USB flash drive (mine was formatted as FAT32)

3. Unplug the USB flash drive and power down.

4. Insert the 32 bit Vista DVD and boot from it (you are not actually going to end up installing it or doing anything, this just gets you to the 32 bit WinPE environment)

5. Click through until you get to the screen with the activate online checkbox and uncheck it.

6. Connect the USB flash key to the computer

7. Press Shift-F10 to open a command prompt

8. Change to the correct drive for the USB flash drive

9. type winphlash and press enter

10. browse to the correct wph file and go for it!

11. after the flash is complete, before letting the machine restart, EJECT the DVD. (remember, nothing was installed and nothing really happened except you had access to a 32 bit WinPE environment which you needed to flash the BIOS).

Microsoft has published my column on Vista computers and devices that all work together transparently on my home network.

I priced a machine today, to see if the $$ were more reasonable than the Dell $1700+ for a friend. I was pleased to see that the price is now under $1300. No monitor included. You can beef this up when you customize. No option for no installed crapware though (unlike Dell who doesn’t force you to take Norton, etc.)