Ok Seriously I hate Vista

I have 10 reason why I hate vista. The top ten, unlike the top any number of reasons. They are all valid tech points that m$ needs to read. The full list is too long (icedoutcat.blogspot.com) to post here, but here's one.

5. Can't Backup to a NAS, even backing up to hard drive fails on large disks. Does this make sense? We have been backing up to NAS devices for, well for a long time. Now all of a sudden, the really terrible backup program that you pay for now in Vista ultimate, has actually less features than the free one in XP. VALUE ADDED.

yet again ...

Another article from this site bashing Vista (MS), nothing new ... and yet again from the same poster. Vista is working 100% for me and for so many ppl, don´t like the system(can´t use it right)? Simple use another one. Maybe its enough for you, that way you stop talking about other guy´s choice in terms of SO.

La Vista

Maybe windows is searching for all your little private files and then communicating to home...

Demente....

Vista, bad very bad

Well, Mr Thomas, one thing about Fista is that we can bitch about it forever, we will always find something that never work as supposed to. I use Fista 64 since the first day it came out. The good side of the story is that I used to be a computer addict and now I use my computer only if I have to. After trying to fix some issues with the Microsoft support peoples, the last answer was that I should go back to XP, because they could not fix those issues. Day after days I live with those annoyances, like the icons on the desktop who decide by themselves to resize. Adobe flash player is not supported in Explorer 64 bit, ETC ETC. The list is so long....I never got a grip on that silly search feature and I'm always surprised if I find what I want. Folder management is so complicated , full of things we don't use and there will always be some folders opening with the details settings even if we told Fista that we want a list. I wonder how a newbie could manage this OS, I was an expert on XP and I can barely manage Fista.
Anyway as I've said, you can bitch about it forever because Fista will never get better. It's like being with win95 all over again, trying to make it work. Fista has a mind of it's own and we just don't own it..
One totally stupid thing is that media player doesn't even have a "stay on top" option, while every other media player on the market have one..
Because of Fista being so lame ,Linux is gaining ground, which is a VERY good thing.
So, I'll stop right here, because we could bitch about it for pages and pages...and don't expect any valid answers from microsoft.. We have been taken for a bumpy ride.. Microsoft has decided to make it impossible to have XP and Fista on the same machine and being able to boot the one we want, so we are stuck with it.

As to XP, I've had to reinstall it so many times over the years that my CD is unusable and I would have about 500 megs of updates to do if I decide to put it back on.. not too shabby neither.

O.S.hit

Yesterday I did a Windows Update on my laptop preloaded Vista Business,
afterwards my laptop crash-looped, booting/shutting down. I 've had it. A friend has the same laptop, same specs, but with Xp, an it's running ultra fast compared to mine. Even Sony is now offering Xp drivers to downgrade the Vaio from this preloaded pile of O.S.hit.
Another one? Sometimes I can't select multiple items. To fix it you have to go through the registry deleting "bags" (bugs?? surely). A week later or so you have to do it again and again.

I hate "open letters"

These "open letters" have got to be the most ridiculous forms of communication there is on this internet. Who is going to read, let alone respond to, such immature diatribe made "open" because the author wants to be praised by his fan-club? If you want to be taken seriously, write a real letter and post the response, not this immature nonesense. Try to maintain at least some semblance of journalism.

yet again....yet again

Yet another poster complaining about an article written on Inq, that they are fed up of reading over and over. Here's an idea... go read something else and stop whining.

Vista

Yep ... its crap ... utter crap.

I love XP and dread the idea that MS will slowly force Vista like "improvements" on us over coming months with updates.

If they try I'll go penguin ...

Funny how updates are turned off on my machine but I received some a couple of days ago.

Vista

The only thing that's rubbish is INQUIRER. If you know how to setup Vista, it runs a lot better than xp.

Running Vista 32 bit with the latest sp1 beta.

Maybe the reason people dislike Vista...

To Melga...maybe the reason many do dislike Vista is because it is so bloated. If it's working 100 percent for you, wonderful. But yours is one experience. I know MANY who dislike it, from everything from being bloated to just being not very functional, to the drivers even now not working well much of the time. It's NOT a case of not being able to use it, it's a case of the operating system itself not working well. I'm glad you enjoy Vista, Melga. But that DOESN'T mean that others experiences with it are invalid. Or to put it another way, is a site ALLOWED to say they dislike a product, and post about it, just because you do like it?

can't believe i'm doing this

in andrew's defense, i don't think i'm wrong here but please let me know if i am, i think he used vista for a long time and has been known as a supporter.... his complaints seem picky but these are some of the technological workings under the hood that should...well, work. hard drive grinding away even with services disabled (i think someone else pointed out another service - prefetch - that may also need to be disabled), that's one of the main ones for me, everything i do, even changing from one window to another in even an xp system causes hard drive grinding on my work system. sometimes the screen draws into view from top to bottom and my mouse get's stuck...stupid things like that make it a pain when u've used other systems that stay quiet for the most part, not to mention 'peppy'... just being honest about our experience here, i think, melga

SCSI

Why do my SATA drives show up as SCSI drives in Ultimate x64?

jeeeez, cmon

Cmon Melga, grow up. Are you getting paid by M$ to go around on the web and write this s*&t? It doesnt matter what the opinion of the writer of this article, or any other article is. The PROOF that Vizta (MEII) sucks ass is in the sales. THE PUBLIC has said that Vizta sucks and they dont want it, by demanding Dell, HP and others start offering XP again on new PC's. That ALONE is enough evidence that Vizta is an over priced, bloated, privacy invading P.O.S. You flame the author for asking a legitimate tech question (and thats what it was, a tech question, NOT an opinionated rage filled M$ flame article) saying he is bashing MS..... wtf? Isnt that hypocritical.

Ive been a tech for 15 years. I have YET to see these "me and so many others" who love Vizta and have had NO problems with it. The majority of people who use Vizta without complaints or problems are the average "Joe User USA" who isnt aware of what his O.S. is/isnt doing. A LOT of those that KNOW what is going on, have had problems and legitimate questions, just like the author above.

You have NO idea how silly you look making excuses for a company and its product, when the VAST majority of the public has turned their back on it and said "NO WAY".

Does the Inquirer bash M$? Youre damn right they do....... BUT, they bash ANYONE who puts out a crappy product, or puts out a product that doesnt do what it said it would. They are just as hard on Intel as they are AMD, they are just as hard on Nvidia as they are ATI. They dont show favoritism to ANYONE. And yes, they even talk bad about Linux, NOT just M$. Ive read numerous articles about Linux never taking over M$ due to end users being too intimidated by the 100's of distros out there, and the complexity of them, not to mention the supporters of the various distros arguing about which one is better.

Anyway, I love the Inquirer.... keep up the good work Andrew!

*B*

You must be joking...

"yet again ..."

Thomas is the most rabid micrograft fanboi on the planet...and he's been such since cholesteral wiped out the dinosaurs. He's been an ardent, (and mildly psychotic), supporter of all things Redmond and Vista in particular.

I find it vaguely interesting that he's managed to bring himself to question MS at all...much less publicly.

If I cared even a wee bit...I'd probably, in fact, be shocked.

As it is, I'm merely somewhat nauseous...but that could be from the Thai meat on a stick...

Re: La Vista

MS wants my pRon? Some of them aren't little.

For the most part Vista works well, except when they issue updates, the updates always bork my system or after an update my system runs sluggish (100% cpu usage with no apps running) then is fine until the next month when they issue 20-30 updates again.

Just say no

We are MS resellers, and we are early adopters of MS products. We have tested beta versions of every MS release since Windows 95.

Vista has broken new ground in computing. It has achieved a new high tide mark in usability. That is, it is unusable.

In fact, Vista is the only Microsoft OS ever to be spontaneously UN-installed by every techy and sales person in our business. What can you do with a Vista PC? Reformat the hard drive and install XP.

Two of our business customers have gone Apple. We expect more to follow. None of them wants Vista.

Vista is an insider laughing-stock in our industry. This I suspect indicates that the MS years are nearly over, just like with Netware 5.0...

Objectivity seriously lacking in school education

So, whatever OS you have is working for you, therefor any and all criticisms are just gratuitous bashing and should not even be uttered ?
Wow. I know that MS-bashing is a world sport, but hey, does the fact that Vista is NOT SELLING tell you anything ? Are you aware that MS has had to recant on its decision to terminate XP support because Vista sales are absolutely DISMAL ?
You are apparently in dire need of a clue.
Here's another one : there are people who actually like their Lada - that does not mean that it is a good car.
People made loads of complaints about XP as well, but it sold like hotcakes. Frankly, I think XP is the best OS that MS has ever made.
Next to XP, the Vista sales record is like looking for water in the Sahara. Maybe that has some significance as to the VALUE of the thing ?

Yet again?

Are you honestly trying to suggest that because it's working for you (Melga), the greater majority of the technical community is supposed to believe that this is a good operating system? The chaps at The Inq are the only ones that hate it?

Is that why nobody is buying it? Why do you think Microsoft has extended the sales of XP until next June?

This all might be difficult for you to quantify, so let me give you the cliff's notes regarding the general summary from those of us that don't have our heads buried shoulder-deep into our rectums.

It's rubbish. The end.

Well...

The desktop clock and possibly constantly prodding the sidebar (making the gradient background fade in and out) is the problem.

I've been running the weather, date, slideshow, and a recycling bin gadget for 23 hours now (on Ultimate x64) with 1.5 million page faults and 1 minute 14 seconds of CPU time.

I'd suggest not using the clock unless watching it tick and/or increase page faults at around 270/s makes you happy. Why do you need two clocks on your desktop anyways (the one on the taskbar is more useful and still visible when programs are maximized)?

If 'bloat' is a problem, go to 'Turn Windows features on or off' from 'Programs and Features' and uncheck what you don't want.

Windows 98 was more 'bloated' than 95, ME was more 'bloated' than 98, XP was more 'bloated' than ME and 2000, and Vista is more 'bloated' than XP. People keep wanting more features, and then complain when they get them. More features require more hdd space and resources - for any OS - and if you don't want something, disable it.

Vista 3.0

After months and months of reading all of the Vista articles I finally decided to try it and I'm pretty impressed with it, but I have to say there are a few problems but these are not problems that are limited strictly to Microsoft, these are things that a lot of people in the software industry are guilty of.

First and foremost, if a program isn't 100% ready, tested, and free of bugs, don't release it in the first place. Obviously Microsoft took way too long on this project, delayed it about a billion times, and people just got fed up with it. There was probably intense pressure on Microsoft from stockholders and people in the hardware industry to release the OS and get it out into the market and Microsoft caved in, even though they knew the software wasn't complete and that components like videocard drivers and sound card drivers were nowhere near ready.

This is why there is universal hate for Vista and I completely understand it. Nobody wants to pay for something that doesn't work properly right out of the box.

On top of that, Vista has new hardware requirements and it won't work well on a majority of the computers out there without upgrades. Had Microsoft finished Vista a lot sooner instead of delaying it for 5 or 6 years this would not be an issue, but they lagged behind and this is the result.

I like Vista and even as someone that so far thinks it is a very cool OS, I have to admit that I know it wouldn't work properly, out of the box, without all of the downloads and patches, but there are several other software companies guilty of releasing games and other software, knowing it's not ready, with the expectation that they can just issue a patch or a bug fix, weeks or months later and get away with it.

The reality is Microsoft is punished for this in terms of sales and in terms of profits and their reputation is suffering as a result of all of this. This is sloppy. The development of Vista was sloppy, giving questionable release dates time and again was sloppy, and releasing an unfinished product was sloppy. It's not something that you would expect from a premier software company and it's something that should not have happened in the first place.

Clearly Microsoft needs to do a lot of reorganization and strategizing so that this sort of thing won't happen in the future, or one day there simply may not be a Microsoft anymore.

hate Vista

not being a computer whizz, thought Vista will do it for me...NOT..... after a month or so did the backup that Vista insisted to do .... big mistake... think many people did the same mistake , because there is a help file... but it did not do dodoo for me , and Microsoft help just kept giving me the same help page...Lucky that I' don't have to work with it. Being 69 year old it's just for fun ... but not getting that much fun from it either ... forget about making DVD home movies,like I' did with XP...oh well so much for Vista...hmmm wonder if verification code will work

Open letters existed before the internet...

To BB and everyone else who didn't know this: open letters have been around for some time in paper journalism, often directed at politicians, so the readers know where the newspaper stands on an issue AS WELL AS the newspaper wanting issues addressed.

So BB, Andrew Thomas says Microsoft havent replied to the Inq's questions... because the format is an open letter we, the readers, know what the questions are, and are better informed about the whole situation.

turn it off

First thing I do with Vista is turn off that sidebar. I have no use for it. I am quite happy with the clock on the system tray (big plus that you can have a second timezone on that clock as well now).

While trying to fix Vista systems here at work I have noticed the sidebar process jumping up the CPU list periodically. This gets it terminated pretty quick :)

Visa is blah!

In my personal opinion Vista is the worst operating system I have ever seen. Yes it take the cake for being worse than windows me.
Let’s start off with the positives

-Side bar (which you could download for free on xp)
-Cool theme (still can download for free)
-Faster file searching (I think Google has this for you)
-Bit locker encryption (I rather use file lock)
-Direct x 10 (hardly any drivers and if there is they suck especially for crossfire and SLI and currently there is only about 5 fully direct x 10 games and applications)
-More security but not letting the user be a admin (I know how to use my computer don’t make me mod files or click buttons to be a admin)


Negatives
-Slow as crap
-No support
-¼ of your stuff will not work or have less performance then xp
-Eats your virtually memory
-Cost 100 dollars for something you already have (basically)
-Your programs random crash for no reason with a error number that’s not even in the Microsoft support database.
-CPU usage is through the room
-Possible DRM stuff coming (pain for legal users of all software like myself)
-New hacks coming ever day (as its new and their is a lot of loop wholes)


Personaly I will never upgrade to vista I use it on my dad's computer rarely and that's enough vista for me.

I think is microsoft wants to make some good money they better learn that people don't pay for windows areo!!!

Vista is blah!

In my personal opinion Vista is the worst operating system I have ever seen. Yes it take the cake for being worse than windows me.
Let’s start off with the positives

-Side bar (which you could download for free on xp)
-Cool theme (still can download for free)
-Faster file searching (I think Google has this for you)
-Bit locker encryption (I rather use file lock)
-Direct x 10 (hardly any drivers and if there is they suck especially for crossfire and SLI and currently there is only about 5 fully direct x 10 games and applications)
-More security but not letting the user be a admin (I know how to use my computer don’t make me mod files or click buttons to be a admin)


Negatives
-Slow as crap
-No support
-¼ of your stuff will not work or have less performance then xp
-Eats your virtually memory
-Cost 100 dollars for something you already have (basically)
-Your programs randomly crash for no reason with a error number that’s not even in the Microsoft support database.
-CPU usage is through the roof
-Possible DRM stuff coming (pain for legal users of all software like myself)
-New hacks coming ever day (as its new and their is a lot of loop wholes)


Personaly I will never upgrade to vista I use it on my dad's computer rarely and that's enough vista for me.

I think if microsoft wants to make some good money they better learn that people don't pay for windows areo!!!

Another boring Vista-hate "article"

I am a long time reader of the inquirer, but ever since Windows Vista was released, I cannot stand reading this bull$hit journalism "articles" about vista.

I feel like you guys are only testing the system to find any bugs and non-working devices so that you have material to post to this site.

I have Linux (ubuntu) installed on one of my computers and the system does not support one of my printers.

Will you write article about that?

bad setups

I think a lot of the problems people have with vista is that it takes a high spec to run properly . Vendors throw machines out with Vista installed that would of had trouble running XP smoothly . I was given a Tosh laptop to look at last week that was preinstalled with Vista Basic . It was crawling . The reason was Tosh shipped the laptop with 512mb of Ram , 128mb of which dedicated to the onboard graphics . It spent more time paging than anything else . Upgraded the ram to 2gb and it now runs smoothly . Vendors need to stop under speccing hardware . 512mb ram minimum means free ram . And anyone with half a wit knows that will be inadequate to run smoothly .

Once you add Aero into the mix then you need 256mb of graphics ram or more . On high end systems vista is fine .

Contrary to belief a lot of xp drivers work fine on vista its just the installers that dont run .

Admittedly Vista has some bugs that need shifting . The way it handles file transfers over the network being one of them . UAC is another . Nice idea but far too intrusive .

Then again everybody trashed XP when it was released so why break the habit of a lifetime eh .

Until . . . .

Im sticking with XP there is absolutly no reason for me to even try Vista (give me money for a barely point update) It broken from all I hear, MS fanbois scream loud here I guess. I loved Windows up till now, but im not gonna buy Vista. Im hoping I can hold out with XP long enough till Haiku is finally done. Haiku-os.org check it out basedon the old BeOS operatiing system, which rocked but died too early.

i think...

your argument, Melga, isn't valid.. maybe you could explain your use of Vista.. ? if people have been using programs on Windowses (or however it's spelled) before and suddenly they don't work in the oh so glorious vista, don't you think there's something wrong?
I'm trying out Vista to, and yes, almost all programs work with a few workarounds or googling a bit, and there's this laggy feeling on everything I do, it's like everything is running on java or something, but do you think that's how it should be? for like 150 or more $, who knows how much time in development and coming from like the biggest company in commercial OS's ??

This is a little dumb.

I'm not a fan of Vista either, but writing a fart-sized rant everytime one little thing goes wrong on the Vista box you're working with is not going to get you any kind of respect.

Is the INQ supposed to be a journalistic site, or a "bog"?

widgets

I too had to get rid of the widgets as it seemed to slow things down. Once they were gone, everything was OK. I also thought Vista might be more intelligent in recognizing where my files should go (media, for example) but it still gets things mixed up. It looks nice but thats about it.

Not a Fault

You do realise that a page fault is not actually a faulty. It probably just means that the page of RAM that the sidebar was trying to access has been swapped out to disk. As you state, the sidebar doesn't do very much which makes it a prime target for the virtual memory subsystem in Windows. It could also indicate that you don't have enough physical RAM in your system.

Oh, and 40 minutes out of 100 hours is 0.7% of your processor time, you're probably not going to notice that it's missing.

The Pain of Vista

Yes, Vista sucks.

Yes, there are thousands of posts out there that are bagging out Vista.

Yes, the fanbois are in damage control.
Yes, people are (at least) considering going back to XP, using Linux or buying new hardware and going to Mac.

Yes, Microsoft is refusing to answer criticisms and are still tricking mum and dad consumers by saying Vista is the best thing since sliced bread.

Shame, Microsoft, shame.

Junk

Its junk...a memory and resource hog...they could have done much better....ME wasnt this bad...

The beginning souind of implosion....

Can you hear it? The first distant rumblings of corporate implosion...... Ah, 'pride is the beginning of a crash' so sayeth a wise man.Does a grand Vista awaits ye, or rather the depths of proud arrogance to be swallowed by capital markets that reward true value? Boom.

Gosh golly, my oh my.

3 of my friends, now in University, thought it a wise move to buy a laptop with their hard earned cash (ha-ha). Not one of them is pleased with Vista. Infact they're pretty annoyed, an I'm not surprised, Microsoft seems to of reverse engineered XP, taken it back a few years to Windows ME and then 'Blinged' it up with some 'amazing' 3d desktop . Who's laughing now? Infact I bet Microsoft are in hysterics that they're selling this crap.

So you all have been using computers for what, 3 years?

Seriously. I've been running Vista for 6 months and find the interface and functionality improvements well worth it. I spent about a day configuring things and have barely touched a setting since.

Perfect, no. But if you are so hot and bothered for XP, DO YOU NOT REMEMBER HOW BAD IT SUCKED when it launched? I stayed with bloody 98se for 2 years after XPs launch. Vista is a dream compared to early XP. Perfect no, but darn good for an early version OS.

The Inq is getting harder and harder to read. I've always been able to look past the goofball rumors because there was often insightful and incisive information and opinion. Now it seems to have veered into constant streams of single author opinion and bile against any mainstream players.

Bleh.

...it's like unzipping the mouth on my mask

i was very open minded when i first started with vista. i knew i was going to have some issues, but i was no prepared for this dysfunction.

i could show u, but just look.

what

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/serialnumber2012/2-1.jpg

and why

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/serialnumber2012/3-1.jpg

the only vista i'm seeing out of this window is one full of problems.

An explanation of Vista

In my 20yr IT career I have used basically every OS out there extensively. Never, and I mean NEVER have I come across anything as horrible as Vista. Windows XP was a great evolution and I had high hopes for Vista but it is a complete disaster far worse than the windowsME debacle. It is utterly shocking. My definition of Vista is "Windoes XP with viruses", therefore I believe Vista SP1 should actually be a downgrade to XP. Vista should then be scrapped completely and msft should start from scratch. How much duct tape can they keep putting on this sinking raft called Vista? Here is sit typing this on my Q6600 bug ridden pre-alpha acting vista box. What a cockup!

just use ubuntu!

-no spyware, viruses, ...
-data/identity more safe
-doesn't break
-doesnt suck
-less bloat, no 100meg pdf viewers, no update programs running at startup
-automatic updating of all programs
-faster on much less hardware

and ubuntu gets 2x as good every year, so if you tried it a year ago, its time to try again!

I would also like to know...

...why the print spooler service crashes at the slightest hint of a network printer, why the patch which says it fixes the problem doesn't and why all the user areas on my fileserver are now all called "Documents".

Answering the INQ? Why?

If I was Microsoft, I wouldn't answer the INQ and especially this author, too. Not even a work experience guy at Microsoft should be forced down to that level the INQ is regarding anything from MS.

As for the comments: Most people "hating" Vista haven't even seen or used it, and a LOT of people claiming they did and "hate" it are either liars or stupid. It's a re-enactment of the "XP is crap"-show of 2001.

res

So if a *nix distro does not work on my system as expected (lack of drivers, or any other problem) should/may I make the same comments as you do over MS products? Would you use the same sentences to characterize *nix products? Problem of this is many ppl forgetting how it was the first years of XP, the same problems the same bashing, but now it´s the "MS imba OS" that so many linux users are saying. Some of my colleagues are *nix users only, as usual its the same MS bashing, but if you ask them if they did even try Vista .... the answer is 90% of the time NO (some did not use 2000 or XP yet). The problem of this is the "hype/its in" to say MS sucks. First thing one must do before using/install something is determine if the system is "ready" for that OS/soft (drivers, etc ...) if not then just pass over it.

Vesta.....

yeah yeah yeah we all know Vista is working great for the Notepad power users.

Once this OS is pushed by a knowledgeable user it really does begin to show how sloppy it really is.

Vista makes us love XP

Strange.. Before Vista came out, we all hated XP. Now we all love XP and hate Fista. How cute.
On a serious not, Vista has many defects.
One I descovered is that when you hybernate and turn back the computer, Internet Expolorer starts working with some feautures disable, like favorites, right click menu.
And there are many more stupid things in this thingie.

asta la vista

Vista died for me the day i saw a preview version running in some hardware store, i opened the taskmanager everything looked normal but then i moved the mouse and watch the cpu go to 99%. lolz

Yet again?

Melga, Vista is another one of those things people either love or hate. It comes down to what the system is used for. I know a number of folks that are truly enjoying it, unfortunately for MS I also know a LOT of folks that can't stand it. I am glad you find yourself in the first group.

I'm in the second group for various reasons.
I run CPU intensive tasks that take longer to complete in Vista for no better reason than Vista likes to play with itself and not concentrate on the task I give it.
I've got some higher end hardware that is basically crippled due to MS's new DRM policies that make it near impossible for the companies that make the hardware to include the advanced features in the drivers. There is no way to easily set 5.1 surround sound in a manner that better balances the volume levels in my lil office.
Niether the remote or front panel for my Creative X-Fi sound card work as they should if at all (Prob as this would make it easy for me to legally copy something More MS DRM)

Frame rates on most of the games I play are much lower than in XP.

This system scores a 5.2 on Vistas performance scale. If so, why are things so sloooowww.

Why no Open-GL on my Vidboard? (Oh yea, that would allow us to use rendering that is faster and looks better than DX9.)
But that's not just a Vista thing. Loading any MS prvided vid driver from updates will get your card to forget how to do it.

With each update, Windows media player takes longer and longer to load. Very annoying. Sure I can use a third party app, but with the way the OS is scheduling CPU time in some cases you wind up with choppy sound and skipped video frames.

I know I've tried it.

I purchased my first copy of XP the day it hit the shelves, I do not recall having this many issues with it. Sure it ran slower than the 98se I updated from, but since the computer was lower end for the requirements, it was expected. The readiness tool puts this computer as "ready" to run Vista Ultimate, And yet even with the Business edition it is quite SLOW for me.

O.K., I can go to a faster CPU to speed things up a little... But that still doesn't fix my main gripe of my hardware not being able to perform ALL it's functions just because IMHO MS wants to treat us all like multimedia pirates.

My Vista experience so far

Actually, you can run both Vista and XP on one box; I do it at work so I can support them both. You just add a new drive and put Vista Business on it, then at boot, you choose from a menu the drive to boot from. Not too bad.

The annoyances so far are fairly minor: No TWAIN support for my old SCSI scanner, so I had to shell out some $ for VueScan...

Lots of times, only some updates will come down, and others will fail, leaving an Icon in the tray to remind me that I need to download the updates that don't work...

Occasionally, when trying to read data off a CD that was burned on an XP machine, my video subsystem goes completely haywire, flashing and strobing until I eject the disc, then everything returns to normal...

As for bloat, I stuck a spare 4-gig Corsair flash drive in a back slot to do the fast cache thing, and the system does seem faster than when I'm booted into XP...

I haven't bought into either High-Def disc format yet, so the DRM stuff hasn't visibly impacted me so far: AnyDVD and DVD Shrink both work just fine on Standard-Def DVDs...

They added a lot of junk to the Windows Explorer that I mainly find irritating. As for Aero, I've actually tuned the interface to look and feel as much like Win2K as possible, so it doesn't really seem that different to me.

I'm not a First-Person-Shooter, but Hearts of Iron II DD Armageddon runs just fine (Not that I play it at work, of course, I was just curious to see...)

At home, I have an old Northwood P4 in an ancient Micron full-tower case stuffed full of hard drives, and a dual-G5 Power Mac. Do I like OS X better? Yep, for everything except the Finder, which is a pain. Does anyone know of an OS X app that exactly mimics the WinXP Windows Explorer? It really is so much better, and one area where Stevo should come down off his mountain and do a little creative borrowing from Bill, for once.

Why do I stay with Windows? For a handful of apps an games: VirtualDub (or put otherwise, Stevo's refusal to have anything to do with .avi's, in spite of the fact that 5/6ths of every video file out on the web is an .avi...) and my Hauppauge capture card.

AnyDVD (Hey guys, write a Mac version already!) and DVD Shrink (still the best ripper out there) and for that matter, the Watch Now features on various web sites such as NetFlix are still PC-only...

My K-Ninja web browser...

And a hand-full of games: HoI2DDA (there's a Mac version, but all the freebie 'helper apps' are inevitably written in Windows) SFC Orion Pirates, my old favorite Romance of the Three Kingdoms III, etc. But that's about it.

I'll probably replace both my home systems with a Mac Pro next June, when the new 45-nano chips and boards make it to the Apple side, and I'll probably put my old copy of WinXP on a Windows drive with Parallels, just for that hand-full of windows apps.

So good I bought a Mac

Well the prophet Biliam(aire) of Redmond turned out such a magnificently incompatible pile of bile, that I have sold all my PC gear and bought an iMac. Never thought I would see the day. Not sure that St Steve is any better but at least his desktop box does what it says on the tin (and so far, so good, all without issue). Despite a recent machine Vista certified compared to "works with vista" led to plenty of surprises. I am now in the position that i find things marked as not working with a Mac actually do and not the reverse. Go aead flame me into the inferno but hell Vista is just bad news...

Unbuntu maybe?

Hi all,

I used to be a Linux Desktop hating people.
Servers, yes, Linux is the best!

However, did anybody have a look at Unbuntu 7.10RC lately????
Well I did install it (32bit, 64bit is crap), oh wonder, to my big supprise it's way past Windows VISTA in options and speed!!!!!

Wine works!!! no problems from what games I tested!
Videocards, yes, fully supported and fast WITH all gimmics turned on!!!!

Sound? No problem, just works!

Networking? Even a fool can make that work!!!

I must say, I was very supprised to see Linux actualy WORK!!! and real good too!!!

It has allways been real bad compared to Windows, well, whom ever saw the light, THANK YOU!!!

Sorry, Linux finally MADE IT!!!!! AND IT WORKS!!!!

Try Unbuntu 7.10RC yourself, it took me about 2 hours to set everything up.
Windows, normally 10 hours!!!!

And this from a non-Linux-desktop believer.....I'm sold...to Linux Desktop!

If you don't believe me, try it....it has never been that easy.

Worst OS ever?

Well M$ has managed to make another worst OS ever....
80's DOS
90's Win3.x, 9x, Me
00's Vista!

The only decent OS'ses ever made by M$ are 2000 and XP, other then that, they never ever produced anyting good at all.
Worst of all, 2000 and XP can't even do what OS/2 did years before them!!!!
Even Vista has no clue...and today, Linux and OS/2 (yes about 15 years old!) are still way ahead of Windows.
Linux just past, OS/2 has been further since OS/2 2.0 LOL

to rejean marchand

While I do share your general dislike of Vista, I must point out that some of your comments are unfair or inaccurate. For one, flash not being available on 64bit is hardly MS's fault. That should be laid at Adobe's door. That said, it is still a pain.

Furthermore, it is very possible to set up a dual boot setup with XP and Vista, so that claim is simply false. (Had such a setup running for quite a while in the past.)

Finally, as for reinstalling XP: You *do* know that you can create yourself a brand spanking new install CD *with* all the updates on as well, right?!?!? (Hint: Google for "nlite" and/or "Ryan's RVM Integrator"

If you want to slate things, at least be fair.

Vista works

Vista 64 works for me and all, read all, my extras. I dual boot between vista and Xp, so don't believe what that guy says about you can't do that. In fact, vista give me more resolution options in older games than XP, wonder will never cease. Yes it's a litlle slower than XP, at least the 64-bit Vista is slower than the 32-bit XP. But I think the 64-bit XP is slower than the 32-bit XP but I'm not sure as I don't own the 64-bit XP. I think everyone's pissed because Vista works differently than Xp and you have to click more. I can understand why IT departments don't like it, more work. Took a while for XP to catch on also. I remember all the bitching about XP when it came out, and when SP2 came out.

That's what going on here you know, people rather bitch than get on with it.

stronger current

the complainers are outweighed by those who understand what they put on their computers.

vista haters

vista is maturing just like all os's it has its teething problems, I have used vista since day 1 and have been pleased with it so far, as long as u dont have ancient hardware it runs well. I was so happy I bought another copy to use as a media centre as the media center 2005 was the worst os that ms ever released, the media centre is awesome, 100% 7 days running straight, its also a media server for the laptop and my other gaming PC, and also does my downloads, it handles all this with ease.
also to the guy that cant get indexing to turn of, you stopped the windows search service (disable) thats good, then you have to go to my computer, right click on the drive> advanced, and uncheck index this drive for searching, apply to all folders and you are now indexing free just like me !

IT WORKS

I have had vista ultimate from the start and it work better then XP yea you read that right it is better then XP.

If I remember right then the same was said about XP when it came out and win 2000.
In fact in 2 years time most people will be using vista

and a tip for all you people that think it does not work LEARN HOW TO USE IT .....
USE IT .....

another vista bash

This is for sure the last time i vists this site, every time i check this site for news etc, it's just vista bashing going on.

Vista Sucks: Officially

I'm an OS Junkie, I've bent over backwards for vista and watched my systems crash over and over again, downgraded back to XP and sheer bliss...
Vista runs like a shaky beta, I'm sorry but it's true. I've written a much more crass and inappropriate article about it here (crotchmail.com) please enjoy. Its a funny but harsh take on trying to go to vista in my house.

Nothing is perfect

Are these comments not typical of what was said when XP came out?

Microsoft have changed alot and rushed things abit (ripping out large parts of architechture so late in the dev cycle can't be good) so its expected that the software will be dodgy for a while. Hoping SP1 will change all that though.

Just hold on.

That or they could go back to XP and re-release it with all the billion updates cleaned up and optimised for a nice clean fast install / running system.

F*Vista

A friend bought herself a brand new toshiba laptop (A215-s7422) yesterday, she asked me to help her remove Vista, install XP only to find out that there ARE NO SUPPORTED DRIVERS for XP for this brand new Toshiba laptop so it forces me to install Vista to make it run. Crazy huh? Toshiba says that this machine only supports Vista... wow.

Stuck in an endless loop....

So the person who says "Its works for me, you just have to have SP1(beta) and know how to set it up right". Funny, that's exactly the sort of criticism that gets fired at Linux -- its great if you're a geek, otherwise you're screwed.

Vista's supposed to be for the masses. Anyway, can someone please explain to me why it need 1GByte ram, a fast processor and what-have-you? What's going on in that system? Does even Microsoft know?

Vista cost's us time and money

I got Vista with new PC's that came into the office thinking it was good enough for word and emails!

Those 16 laptops/Pc's are now back to running windows XP

The worst thing about vista is the constant annoying requests to allow or deny stuff....waste of time and money... Nuff said!

Dual Boot...

I dual boot XP MCE 2K5 and Vista Ulti and personally, I like both, I just need to unplug the HD with XP before I install Vista so that Vista will not mess it up. Hope this helps with people who wants to dual boot...

Vista = Complete Rubbish

To: Reynod

I had the same problem. The easiest solution is to go to run -> msconfig
In the services tab select:
Automatic Updates
and uncheck the box.
That stopped the updates and the redirecting to ms update site every single time I opened IE. However, I use
Win xp pro x64 version.

As for Vista, I think it is a complete piece of crap. It offers reduced performance, low compatibility, and a paranoid as well as highly flawed and therefore pointless security system. For more information on the nature of the security Vista employs i recommend reading this:
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.htm
I fail to remember where I got the link, I'm thinking it was from here in fact. But, I feel that I should post it as it provides a very stable and reasonable argument against vista.

some old, same old

why do we have the same old arguments?

I would imagine that the people now moaning about Vista also moaned about XP and previosuly moaned about Win98...

ok, Millenium Edition was &^%&%^ and only lasted 2 days on my pc!

i run xp its generally fine, unless the To****** at 3 / Huwei cant write decent XP software for their usbmodem (works fine under Vista)

I also have a laptop which i use more than my desktop these days, that has a duel boot XP + Vista installation and all works fine! in fact Vista works better than XP (but i think thats because Dells XP drivers are %%%%)

as for the cost off all this, Join in a pact with evuil soft and you can get office + every flavour of windows for a flat fee thorough one of their technet stlye programes.

Vista or OS X? - bring on Linux!

It could be worse, it could be OS X Tiger - which after recently converting to a couple of months ago and after spending more time than I have at real 'work' on it I find is a complete pain in the rear.

Bring on Ubuntu! At least if I have to spend the hours 'tweaking' it I know I haven't had to pay for the luxury!

I use Vista and OS X Tiger on this new Aluminum iMac 24". Although Vista isn't perfect - I will be the first to agree that it's very bloated and slightly unfunctional - it has given me less gripe than the Apple operating system (cheap hardware excluded) which I have had to become an expert on! Who would have thought I would need to be using Terminal this much!?

And because Vista is supported by third parties (such as the hardware manufacturers producing drivers like ATI/Nvidia) more often than not fixes come out MUCH sooner than they do on OS X. You just know that more companies are working towards the same goal...

Its not all bad

I actually like vista. Once you get over the fact that they seem to have changed some things just for the sake of changing them. Their is a lot more features, it looks a lot nicer and when it crashes its generally because of poorly written drivers or XP programmes. But I still can't get Vista to log onto wifi automatically.

I really hope when MS makes a new OS that they take a leaf out of apples book and start a complete fresh, no backwards compatibility, only drivers that a digitally signed by MS and somehow make it modular so you can buy/download the parts of the OS which you really need.

Get a Clue

It is completely untrue that adobe flash player does not work on Vista 64. I have had no problems with anything on it. People having all these problems either have low end hardware, no name hardware or just don't know how to set anything up properly.

Money grabbing scum

there was no demand for a new operating system - MS just wanted to extract lots of money from pc sales and wallow in the mirth of turning people into gullible mugs (again).
vista is fine if you like waiting, like having your privacy invaded, like halving your hardware performance, have no brain.
It seems that some comment posters fit into some if not all of the above.
It just reconfirms my belief that in general, people are useless at seeing through scams especially when there is hype surrounding it.
i think i will invent a disfunctional OS and invest in a vast marketing campaign to compensate for its wretched performance - then i will be quids in as all the mugs willingly hand over their ill-gotten cash.

Premature

The biggest problem with Vista is it was released prematurely. There are so many programs that aren't compatible with it, such as my beloved Avast Antivirus and so many hardware peripherals that don't yet have drivers for it. It is crazy because Vista has been out for nine months now, and still there is hardly any support.

The things that drive me nuts about Vista personally are the UAC and file permissions crap where I have to set permissions just to access folders and delete files I don't want.

Also, Vista doesn't natively support older WAV files and lacks many of the codecs that previous versions of Windows came installed with. Installing a Vista-specific codec pack should alleviate playback problems. I also recommend WavePad, as it will allow you to resave an older WAV into a Vista-ready format.

Time for reflection

It has been several months since Vista's release. Have people's opinions mellowed? Have previously happy users now noticed it isn't as perfect as they claim?

For me, it is a complete turkey. My brand new laptop from HP runs like a slug (2GB memory) and I avoid touching the file management like the plague - Microsoft don't like you using your own computer unless you do it their way (ever tried deleting an unwanted .exe file). Don't even get me started on the User Asses Control.

I'm probably even wasting my time writing this as it seems IE or VISTA has to think 5 minutes or more before doing the most basic non-SMTP mail.

Ubantu here I come. No thanks to HP for enforcing me to use Vista and no thanks to Microsoft for producing this unnecessary piece of rubbish