I plan on buying a HP laptop once the dual turion X2 comes out in may. Right now their video cards are the 128MB ATI RADEON(R) XPRESS 200M w/Hypermemory(TM). This could all change by the time the new lap tops come out, but if they still have this video card, will I have trouble running full Windows Vista with all of the bells and whistles?

From what I have read, I don't think the ATI 200 integrated video should have "Vista" problems. I have read several places that the integrated video is already compatible with "Vista", but I haven't read that it is "Fully" able to run it, so I'm not 100% sure. I would bet $ that the X2 related laptop will be compatible. I hope this helps you out?

The graphics card will not be DX10 compatible so will not run the AERO Glass feature of Windows Vista so you will be stuck with vista looking like windows xp rather than the "fluffy" new interface

Correct me if I’m wrong: doesn’t vista beta work on current video cards? I know it does, so the aero desktop supports Dx9 as well.

Yes, but what about the performance? There is probably a very good reason why its still in beta stage

Will you be doing alot of gaming with your laptop?

I’m not a fanatic gamer, but I have tried on my laptop (1.66GHz dual core, 1GB RAM, nVidia Go 7400) a few racing games like CMR 2005 (medium quality settings). It played ok, so I recommend getting something like a dual core or 2+GHz processor and 1 GB of memory.

Intergraded ore ok. But if you do a lot of gaming you need a better vid card.

ummm, well I'm sure you're right about the graphics card not supporting DX10, aero glass does not need a DX10 compatiable card, it just needs a fairly good card.[/quote]

I read an article in PC Magazine where only 10% of all the computers out there are going to be able to run Windows Vista Aero... cut that number dramatically for the 64 bit version.

KillerNotebooks ELIMINATOR with x1600 256 MB will run the DX10 and Aero 32&64 bit no problem.

just outa curiosity, but how do you know that the ati card will be dx10 compatable?

I have Vista running on an Eliminator right now.

The video cards now will be able to run DX10 stuff, but not with it's new features. There are no DX10 cards out yet, so if you want full DX10 support you will need to wait for Nvidia and ATI to release them, which I would assume will be around the launch of Vista itself.

I think they might offer better video for the turion X2s.

But after all this being said in this thread, let's keep in mind that Vista only need DX9.