I don't know why I had so many problems getting it installed on my 2nd Vista machine.  I just went back to the old box I had run the betas on and also installed the MSDN RTM and I found that I actually had the W2K3 SP1 Admin Tools installed and they were working.

Anyway, I installed them on my main Vista box and they work great.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=E487F885-F0C7-436A-A392-25793A25BAD7&displaylang=en

The other thing I noticed is that UAC is disabled for Admins on my test box...but I don't remember doing that...hmm.

There's an awesome little video of Windows Server Virtualization on the MSN Soapbox...

http://soapbox.msn.com/video.aspx?vid=5119240c-6579-4827-8338-7f5539930402

8 CPUs in a VM, hot-add hardware in a VM...looks REALLY cool.  I am excited to see it when it finally makes it into Vista.

nVidia released the new 101.41 drivers and I was actually able to put my computer to sleep and wake it back up and back log into Windows!

It took them a long time, and some extra pressure from customers, but things are looking better again.

nVidia is also doing a lot of hiring.  On the job boards they've got numerous positions open for various jobs.

Today I stumbled across 2 media players for Windows and one fit my requirements perfectly (so far). 

www.MediaMonkey.com is a free media player with an option to upgrade to a "gold" version for $20. 

So far, it's working great under Vista x64.  No errors, poor performance, etc.  It just works! 

Now available, this update gives CPU-Z full functionality in Vista.

Since almost all of my posts are related to Vista, I've decided to create a new category for Vista posts.

I did a little digging (actually googling) and found the solution to the nagging px.dll problem that WinAmp pops up every time you run it. 

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?s=946663fd0535e647d7ff2814a9ed8d65&postid=2119645

Unfortunately, I couldn't locate that pesky px.dll file on my system, so I fired up an XP VM in VPC07 and installed the latest Winamp there, copied it from my VM to the desktop, then copied it into the correct system folder.  Vista/VPC wouldn't let me go directly into the folder due to the UAC.

Today I replaced my old Seagate 120GB 8MB Cache 7200RPM SATA I hard drive with a new Seagate 300GB 16MB Cache 7200RPM SATA II drive.  My WEI score jumped from 5.1 to 5.6 for the primary hard disk!!  Nice!  There was no change when I went from 2GB to 4GB.

My current WEI scores are:

Processor:           5.8      Intel x6800 @ 3.47GHz

RAM:                   5.9      4GB PC2-7200 (OCZ Gold900)

Graphics:             5.9     nVidia 8800GTX 768MB

Gaming graphics: 5.9      nVidia 8800GTX 768MB

Primary HD:         5.6      Seagate 300GB 16MB Cache 7200RPM SATA II

Newly updated WEI for my original Vista test box

 Processor:           4.8     Intel Pentium D 930 

RAM:                    5.5    2GB PC2-5300

Graphics:             5.9     Ati X1800 GTO

Gaming Graphics: 5.7     ATi X1800 GTO

Primary HD:         5.0     WD 120GB 8MB Cache 7200RPM ATA 

It's too bad that WEI is capped at 5.9, since it's hard to believe that an 8800GTX and an X1800 are that close!! One unfortunate thing I found out about this the X1800 is that it uses shared memory, even though it's got 256MB onboard.  I haven't found a way to disable it yet.

Well, being stubborn I decided to give nVidia another try.  Manually removed all the old drivers and reinstalled with my AV software disabled.  I just booted back up with all the newest nVidia drivers installed and no bluescreen yet.  It's too early to tell if I got a good install, but I'll post here as "testing" continues.

nVidia offered up another version of video drivers for the 8800GTX and guess what!?!?!?!?

Hiberation and sleep under Vista x64 now work.  I tried both and I'm able to get my vidia back after returning from hibernation or sleep!!!!

Update:  After 4 nvstor64.sys bluescreens on my system the only way to get any stability was to do a system restore before last weeks Windows updates.  Reapplying the 100.64 drivers didn't fix the hibernation/sleep issue this time.