Intel Viiv Software | You’ll probably find you actually can’t install this one until after you run Windows Update. |
| It comes up with an error during installation which is fixed by a hotfix although I don’t |
| know which one. Intel Viiv software lets you create a Media network for sharing content |
| with other devices on your network, including DRMed content downloaded from a growing |
| number of online vendors. I install this one as well, although I don’t have any content yet |
| which requires Viiv. |
Sony MP4 Shared Library | The first one I don’t bother with. It’s probably used by a bunch of Sony applications that I |
| don’t install, and certainly isn’t needed for playing MP4 files generally if you install a codec |
| pack (more on codec packs later). |
|
|
Sony Video Shared Library | Same as above. |
VAIO Control Center | This application is a joke. It’s a wrapper that provides access to about a dozen control panel |
| applets. It’s completely pointless. |
|
|
VAIO Event Service | From what I’ve read, this seems to have something to do with special keys (like “Fn” keys) |
| on the keyboard. I always install it. |
Wireless Switch Setting Utility | This lets you switch from a 2.5GHz band wireless network to a 5.0GHz band wireless |
| network, and turn on the Bluetooth device which Sony reliably inform me doesn’t actually |
| exist on this model. If you don’t have a 5.0GHz wireless network, this utility will do nothing |
| for you. |
|
|
VAIO Action Setup | This is a little utility which allows you to configure what the silver buttons on your keyboard |
| do. I don’t use those buttons anyway so I don’t bother installing this one. |
VAIO Hardware Diagnostics | I always install this. You never know when you might need it if you start having hardware |
| problems. |
At this point, after a few tweaks here and there to Windows so I have it just the way I want it, I install a copy of Norton Ghost 2003 which came with my old laptop, and I take a snapshot of the C: drive to a .GHO file. That way, I never have to go through this process again – I can always get back to a clean image of Windows Media Center Edition 2005, with drivers and Windows Updates and Windows settings tweaks already done. If you take the image any further on than this, you’re likely to have a bunch of software on installed that will be out of date next time you want to reinstall your operating system. Of course this is an optional step and you need Norton Ghost or an