> I'd recommend against buying it for Windows use. I tried it for a couple of days just to see what it was like. It comes preloaded with lots of rubbish (including aggressive Norton popups) and no install media. Awful. The base installation took up half of the 128GB hard disk, which seemed crazy. I uninstalled as much junk as I could, and it worked OK for a bit but later my VPN client stopped working.
I think that any hackers who are going to use a Windows laptop should be familiar and OK with doing a clean install. Nowadays, it's an extremely easy process. You can get an ISO via direct download straight from Microsoft's servers[0] (the one you want is probably "English x64: X17-59465.iso"). You would be surprised how nice a clean Windows 7 install is.
You may also want the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool[1], which will let you install Windows from a USB drive.
I'm pretty sure you can use the OEM key to register the clean Windows install, but I've always just used the Windows 7 Loader[2]. It's fast and easy, and always works.
I think that any hackers who are going to use a Windows laptop should be familiar and OK with doing a clean install. Nowadays, it's an extremely easy process. You can get an ISO via direct download straight from Microsoft's servers[0] (the one you want is probably "English x64: X17-59465.iso"). You would be surprised how nice a clean Windows 7 install is.
You may also want the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool[1], which will let you install Windows from a USB drive.
I'm pretty sure you can use the OEM key to register the clean Windows install, but I've always just used the Windows 7 Loader[2]. It's fast and easy, and always works.
0: http://www.mydigitallife.info/official-windows-7-sp1-iso-fro...
1: http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msstore/html/pbPage.Help...
2: http://forums.mydigitallife.info/threads/24901-Windows-Loade...