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Toshiba M200 + Vista Aero = Awesome

By In Technology0 Comments3,799 Views

So I’ve done the pain staking (very worth it) process of installing Vista on my epic Toshiba M200 Tablet but for the longest time I couldn’t use Aero. Now as my last statement suggests, yes I found a way to run Aero… semi stable (see the list of things that I’ve noticed crash Aero).

To do so I needed:

So first up, I uninstalled my current drivers using the Control Panel, restarted and then ran Nasty File Remover (see below for how I had mine setup)

as you can tell, Aero is running... taken after I did this
as you can tell, Aero is running... taken after I did this

After I did that I downloaded and extracted the nVIDIA ForceWare 98.16 drivers from above to my desktop and copied the modded nvgm.inf to the folder (had to overwrite the existing one). Once it was copied I ran the setup.exe in the folder and restarted my computer. Once my computer was back up and running I started the Desktop Window Manager Session Manager in the Windows Services and applied the Aero effect in the Window Color and Appearance option in Personalize.

I decided to run a Windows Experience Index test to see how my stats improved and I was quite pleased, Gaming Graphics went from 1.0 to 2.3 although Graphics stayed at 1.0.

Windows Experience Index

Things I’ve noticed that crash Aero:

  • Opening some programs in full screen
  • Opening Windows Media Player
  • Opening Paint (yes… mspaint)
  • Going to My Pictures (probably due to thumbnails)

I’ve noticed it flickers sometimes on and off when opening some things, but if it ever crashes I can minimize all my windows then go into the Windows Services and restart the Desktop Window Manager Session Manager. To help improve its stability I went to the Performace under Advanced system settings and toggled Adjust for best performance then checked off Use visual styles on windows and buttons. I had to minimize all my windows and restart the Desktop Window Manager Session Manager to get Aero back but it’s now running fairly well.

Here’s a screenshot of Aero Glass running at 1400 x 1050 @ 32bit color on the Toshiba M200

M200 Aero Demo

As a side note, one may ask why I’m not using the latest 179.xx Forceware drivers and well the answer to that is simple: they don’t work (I tried them). What I may try next are the ~100.xx  Forceware drivers to see if they can add more stability, but for now I’m pleasde with what I have at the moment.

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T.

Toshiba M200 + Vista Ultimate = ?

By In Technology0 Comments3,582 Views

Well they don’t have a word for it yet.

But anyway, I did indeed install Vista on my lowly Toshiba M200 (exact specs except I have 1GB of DDR, soon to be 2GB). So far, I’m quite impressed at the overall performance of the machine, the system lags a bit more then XP did but the functionality and ease of use went up. I’m thoroughly impressed with the Vista Tablet functionality vs XP Tablet.  Surprisingly enough, my frame rate in World of Warcraft (yes it can play on the M200) is pretty much the same as it was in XP.

One thing I noticed right away was the responsiveness of the Tablet Pen, it seems to have increased quite a lot. I also combined that with OneNote 2007 which with the improvements from 2003 has made my note taking a lot more easier.

Would I recommend upgrading to Vista on the M200?

Sure. Make sure that you have at least 1GB of memory however, and I’d recommend installing Vista from a folder on lets say a network or USB drive. The reason for this is the 24x External Toshiba drive sucks for transferring files, if you go that route be read to spend a good 1-2 hours getting to the “Installing” screen. I installed Vista from XP from a folder on my network storage. Took about 1 1/2 hours to install from the time I first ran the installer to when I could first login to the machine.

I will say that anyone who wants to upgrade will need 2 things:

And that’s it, Vista will take care of the rest. If you download/install anything else from Toshiba, you’re installing too much redundant/old software. I say you should download Toshiba Tablet PC Button Driver because it contains the drivers needed to change the Display Brightness and Rotate the screen. Once installed you can use the Vista Mobility Center (press Windows Key + X) to rotate the screen and change the Display Brightness depending on your power status.
Mobility Center
Mobility Center
O.

Ohhh Cellular-Ma-Fone.

By In Technology0 Comments3,312 Views

I lost Samsung u740 two days ago and I’ll be honest… I feel mildly useless with out it. I mean I didn’t store anything incredibly important on it besides my contacts, but still! I’ve already run into situations while on the road or away from home where I’ve needed a phone… so terrible. But to top things off, I burnt myself on a Shindaiwa T230 trimmer on the same day!

But on the bright side I bought a HTC Touch Diamond on eBay for like $200, which is pretty damn good considering my retarded cellular company sells them for well over $400. What I did find the most interesting about those retards is they only use the location feature to find your phone in the case of an emergency (normally for the paramedics to find you) and it requires a court order. But I have to wonder… why do I (the owner of the phone) need to have an emergency and a court order to find my own phone? Their response: Wut?

I did however learn something from them about the streaming radio issue I previously had with the Samsung u740. The other cellular company they were partnered with provided an RTSP relay in the network which solved the problem of not being able to use RTSP streaming. Since they are no longer partnered… no more relay, but is my cell company going to fix it? Apparently there is no estimated on a fix for the ‘issue’. Fantastic.