Windows XP for Laptop PC

Does a laptop pc (I have a IBM Thinkpad T41) take a regular windows operating system, or do I have to buy Windows XP Pro specifically for a laptop?

I was given a this PC from work for home use, and I can no longer connect to the office with it. So I was thinking of just reinstalling a more home version of windows rather then the office build that is on there now.

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

I have 2 laptops and 2 desktop PC's, all run the same windows XP pro.

Maybe the thinkpad is a different kettle of fish, dunno.

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

All Windows XP within a given flavor (home, Professional, whatever) is the same.
BUT, the manufacturer will usually supplies a disk or the provide the means to make on if the OS is factory installed with the drivers specific for that machine, laptop or desktop. These drivers may or may not be included with a retail version of XP. Laptops are typically finickier than desktops so it is possible that after you get XP installed, you may have to go to ibm to download some drivers to take advantage of the sound card, video, or other IBM specific features.

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

My family has 2 Dell laptops. The new one uses Vista but the older one has XP.
Try installing it. IMO it should work but then again, I'm no geek.....

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

Go to the IBM website and see what the system will support. Alot of the newer PC's will not support an older OS because there will not be any drivers for it. XP should do fine.

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

Mark42 said:

Does a laptop pc (I have a IBM Thinkpad T41) take a regular windows operating system, or do I have to buy Windows XP Pro specifically for a laptop?

I was given a this PC from work for home use, and I can no longer connect to the office with it. So I was thinking of just reinstalling a more home version of windows rather then the office build that is on there now.

Click to expand...

XP will work fine.

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

This Compac is using XP home edition service pack 3.

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

make sure you have another PC up and running to download your drivers (especially for network cards) When installing a fresh copy of XP, alot of integrated components on laptops (ethernet cards, winmodems) are not detected upon install or are detected but the windows XP disk driver cab file does not have the driver for that particular piece of hardware.

Nothing is more frustrating then trying to download drivers from the internet when you cannot get a connection due to no LAN driver.

-DrCox

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

Mark42 said:

Does a laptop pc (I have a IBM Thinkpad T41) take a regular windows operating system, or do I have to buy Windows XP Pro specifically for a laptop?

I was given a this PC from work for home use, and I can no longer connect to the office with it. So I was thinking of just reinstalling a more home version of windows rather then the office build that is on there now.

Click to expand...

Mark,
Your T41 will certainly run Windows XP or Windows XP Pro. If given the choice, go with the Pro version. The Home version is crippled , in my opinion. Win2K is my choice for an OS, but it's your call. If you can still get online with it, bop over to the IBM web site and download a small utility that when run, will access the IBM file server and the utility will download and upgrade all of the drivers for your laptop.

If you can't get online, use another computer to get the utility and the NIC driver just in case. The driver download utility makes things a snap. Even with a reload of the OS, you're probably still going to need the help from your work IT department to install software for the office VPN connection.

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

Thanks for all the info, guys.

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

A couple questions...

If you got the laptop from work to be used at home, does your employer retain an interest in it? That is, might he ever want it back? Does your employer still consider it a company PC or did he give it away / sell it to get rid of it? If it's still a company PC (laptop), then check with your IT department before you install anything on it.

From my viewpoint, that PC is still relatively new -- most people would consider my PC's to be boat anchors, but they still do everything I want. You should be able to run almost any OS on it (well, maybe not WinVista). Get the highest level OS you can (like XP Pro or Media Center if the PC has the hardware).

But an even greater question -- why do you want to do this?

If it's to be able to connect to work again, the issue is not the OS but some other networking connection, setting, or firewall. Your IT department should help you to reconnect.

If you have no interest or need to connect to work, does it meet your needs otherwise? Why change the OS? If it's just because you think it would be neat and want to, ok. But you really shouldn't have to. If there's some glitch in the system, that can be addressed short of an OS change.

Each step up in Microsloth's Windoze steps requires huge steps in hardware capability. If it's currently running W2K, I'd stay with it. It might be a bit slower than XP to boot, but it's still a good OS. (And who ever would have thought we'd think of W2K as sleek?).

Re: Windows XP for Laptop PC

If it originally came with XP, it should have the product key sticker on the underside.

You should be able to obtain a product recovery disk from IBM. I doubt it'll be free, but it'll cost a lot less than paying for a new XP license.

My IBM workstations at work are a little old, but when I use the IBM product recovery CDs on them, it installs IBM Update Connector. It won't connect to IBM which makes me think IBM has shut down that program after handing of the Thinkpad and Intellistations to Lenovo.

If you have a newer Lenovo thinkpad, I would expect their update software to work.

Any any case, if you have the sticker, consider yourself licensed. You only need to pay for media. And remember, XP Pro that's not joined to a domain (like at work) won't be so "officy" at home.