older hardware: install 11.10 or wait for 12.04?

[rawlins02]

I have an older machine, a Lenovo T60. Been using it as a backup work machine for almost 7 years. Besides a noisy fan it's still going strong. Time to do a fresh install as it's currently running 9.10.

A few questions.

I don't use the machine much. Would it be better to install 11.10 and then upgrade to upon the release of 12.04 LTS in May or should I wait, thus eliminating the occasionally troublesome upgrade method?

If I can run the LiveCD of current daily build of 12.04, and everything seems to work OK, does that suggest I'm likely to experience no major issues with that new versions on my older hardware?

I've saved a list of my installed packages, my .config directory, my .cshrc file, and xorg.conf. Any other preparations that may save me some trouble when I do install?

[2F4U]

I am running 11.10 on a T60 without any problems. Keep in mind that the GUI changed considerable from previous releases and it will again change with 12.04. It may take some time to get used to the new interface if you haven't worked with it. Therefore it could be a good idea to install 11.10 now and then upgrade.
However, an upgrade is always a risk and may fail, so if you want to be on the save side, wait until 12.04 will be released.
Since ThinkPads are usually pretty Linux-compatible and if the liveCD runs without much problems, I would expect that 12.04 runs well on the T60. I don't know your exact hardware specs but keep in mind that Ubuntu tends to become more resource hungry with every release.

[rawlins02]

I'm going to wait for the official release of 12.04. Just fired up a LiveCD of today's daily build. It doesn't establish an ethernet connection on my T60. Perhaps I should pass that info on to the developers.