Sony VAIO VGN-TZ170N quick look (ultra-portable)

This last week or so the company i work for had in several ultra-portable laptops to evaluate.   To my surprise and delight, one of them happened to be a VAIO TZ model. 

I've always have been a pretty big fan of the VAIO VNG TZ series in the ultra-portable world.  So, would Sony keep me as a fan or would Vista on it be a show stopper?  Lets take a quick look at the VGN TZ170N (youtube video quick look embedded at the bottom):

-Features:

Vista Business Ed
2GB DDR2 memory
1.0 Ghz Centrino Duo
Dual Layer DVD-+RW
60GB s-ata HDD
Biometric Scanner
Sprint EVDO Modem built-in
WLAN (a/b/g)
First thing that i noticed from boot was how SLOW it was initially.  This was mainly due to the slew of bloatware/trial software Sony preloaded.  I really hate how companies think they need to add a ton of trial/shareware software on it.  It really does not help them sell their machines if a company that is looking at the laptop takes 15mins to boot to the desktop; not a very good first impression.

After finally removing all of the bloatware apps, boot time was much improved.  Vista does look nice on the machine but personally i would have preferred XP Prof or Media Center Ed.  In my opinion, any machine that does not have a 1.5 ghz processor or above should not run Vista. 

The video is just a quick looksy at the laptop; i plan to post a full review over at http://tech-recipes.com  later this weekend.

Overall, i would give the laptop a 7/10 however this score would most likey be a 8.5/10 if i had XP Prof on it vs Vista.