I remember the *last* time I tried OS installs at work...

Do you all remember that?

Lost my DVI converter in my friggin' *pocket*, went through four install routines, and then had to do the job at home?

Yesterday, I let my new laptop spend most of the day loading Vista 64 bit, because it came with Vista 32 bit.

(It "only" has four gigs of memory, so 32 bit should be okay. But it also has a 1 gig video card, and other issues pull addressable memory from the total as well... so, realistically, if you have anything above about 3 gigs of physical RAM, you really need a 64 bit OS.)

It turns out it had locked up during startup. So I finally restarted it, and let it boot normally and I had it ready to roll. (NB: This was about 7:30 pm, 1.5 hours after I was supposed to leave, but I'd been on a long call.)

Except... it wouldn't connect to the network.

Hah. Although my network card would boot to the network, it still needed a driver to connect to the network once Windows was fully installed.

No problem... I had the driver disk.

32 bit drivers only.

*32 bit drivers only*.

I can just barely believe you'd sell a laptop like this with a 32 bit OS. But not to include 64 bit drivers on the drivers disk? Grrr.

So I went home and re-loaded the recovery disk, just in case I wanted to, you know, use the laptop at any time, or something.

I came back in today, determined to load a proper 64 bit OS. I downloaded the 64 bit drivers (at least 2 copies of the network driver, just in case), packed my laptop, mouse, and all driver disks.

Got to the office, started to set it up, reached for the... power cable.

Power cable? No, it's not possible. No, I *packed* the laptop. I remember physically picking up the power cable.

But it stubbornly insists on not being physically present.

Sigh.

(On the plus side, it's still usable. I have 32 bit Vista installed on it.)

I remember the *last* time I tried OS installs at work...

Do you all remember that?

Lost my DVI converter in my friggin' *pocket*, went through four install routines, and then had to do the job at home?

Yesterday, I let my new laptop spend most of the day loading Vista 64 bit, because it came with Vista 32 bit.

(It "only" has four gigs of memory, so 32 bit should be okay. But it also has a 1 gig video card, and other issues pull addressable memory from the total as well... so, realistically, if you have anything above about 3 gigs of physical RAM, you really need a 64 bit OS.)

It turns out it had locked up during startup. So I finally restarted it, and let it boot normally and I had it ready to roll. (NB: This was about 7:30 pm, 1.5 hours after I was supposed to leave, but I'd been on a long call.)

Except... it wouldn't connect to the network.

Hah. Although my network card would boot to the network, it still needed a driver to connect to the network once Windows was fully installed.

No problem... I had the driver disk.

32 bit drivers only.

*32 bit drivers only*.

I can just barely believe you'd sell a laptop like this with a 32 bit OS. But not to include 64 bit drivers on the drivers disk? Grrr.

So I went home and re-loaded the recovery disk, just in case I wanted to, you know, use the laptop at any time, or something.

I came back in today, determined to load a proper 64 bit OS. I downloaded the 64 bit drivers (at least 2 copies of the network driver, just in case), packed my laptop, mouse, and all driver disks.

Got to the office, started to set it up, reached for the... power cable.

Power cable? No, it's not possible. No, I *packed* the laptop. I remember physically picking up the power cable.

But it stubbornly insists on not being physically present.

Sigh.

(On the plus side, it's still usable. I have 32 bit Vista installed on it.)