In my last posting, I discussed how to create a custom Windows XP installation using the nLite product. In a similar fashion, you can use a product called vLite to create a custom Vista and/or Windows 7 installation that is slimmed down in size. This link has an excellent step-by-step procedure outlined to do this specifically for the Dell Mini 9.
Now, I’ve read several postings on the MyDellMini forum where people have praised how quick Windows 7 (beta) runs on their Minis verses Windows XP and Vista, so I’m thinking of installing Windows 7 just for kicks. I downloaded the beta version ISO file from Microsoft when they first made it available (earlier this month), however, I decided to not install it since the beta version will expire in July 08 and I didn’t want to reinstall Vista or WinXP on one of my computers. But, my new Dell Mini (when it finally arrives) might be the perfect machine to test Windows 7.
So, I went ahead and tested vLite using the Windows 7 beta installation files, and the procedure is very similar to using nLite. I followed the directions from the site that I mentioned earlier, and was able to reduce the Windows 7 install file size from 2.5 GB to 1.5 GB for my custom installation. Now, the Windows 7 beta ISO file that I used was for the “Ultimate” version, so I probably could have stripped out more components to make it smaller (and I might do so later just for kicks).
Of course, before I install Windows 7 I’ll clone my existing WinXP system disk on the Dell Mini so I can re-image it later and be right back to WinXP if I don’t like Windows 7 or when the beta version expires.
So, I’m ready to install Windows 7 if and when my Dell Mini ever arrives from Dell…
Updated (29 Jan 08): As a test, I tried installing my vLite version of Windows 7 on a “Virtual PC” which I created using Microsoft Virtual PC. I just want to see if Win7 would install, and if any problems would appear because of the components that I removed using vLite. As it turned out, the installation went trouble-free, and I’ve got Win7 running in a virtual environment. The first thing Win7 did after the install was ask to install two updates from the Internet (Windows Defender Update and Win7 Client Update), which it did successfully. So the final installation took up 4.44 GB of disk space on the Virtual PC. Now, I followed the component removal suggestions from the link mentioned previously, so I might be able to reduce the installation size further if I’m willing to try removing more stuff. But for now, I can live with using up 4.44 GB of storage space if I use an SDHC card for my other applications and/or files.
March 14, 2009 at 12:32 pm
Finally! Some one who wants to do the exact same thing!
I want to put Windows 7 on my Mini 9 without a few features.
I have been toiling for at least 5 hours to get this to work.
I have done it with an “out of the box” version of 7 and have 51MB of space left from an 8GB hard drive.
I now want to try to use vLite. I will try one more time, show what I have done and how it will fail.
Hope you can help…!
March 14, 2009 at 3:48 pm
Joseph: I’ve got a slimmed down version of Windows 7 running on my 4-year old Dell D610 laptop, and it seems to work pretty well. Since my Dell D610 has a 80 GB hard drive, I wasn’t too concerned about slimming down the OS for space reasons, but I wanted to eliminate all the “junk” that I didn’t need.
Good luck with your efforts.
March 15, 2009 at 10:04 am
Well I have done it…
Just a few things to iron out now…
Most importantly, I want an estimated Battery time remaining.
But can’t seem to get one!
Thanks for your guide!
March 15, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Joseph: I noticed the same thing also– there wasn’t a way to check the remaining time on battery power. When I was running WinXP on my Dell laptop, I was using a utility called SpeedswitchXP that would reduce the CPU speed from 1.6 GHz to 800 MHz whenever it was on battery power (to use less battery power when not plugged in), and that utility also showed the time remaining on battery power. I haven’t tried installing this utility on my Win7 machine, but I’m thinking of doing so.
March 31, 2009 at 7:59 pm
I use a utility called Battery Bar 3.0 to show battery time remaining, among other battery details, like time to full charge, battery life used,etc. It’s free-do a Google search.