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Mossberg - Vista Is Worthy, Largely Unexciting

Posted by Zonk on from the it-cannot-slice-tomatoes dept.

Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "Wall Street Journal tech columnist Walter S. Mossberg says Vista is the best version of Windows yet, but doesn't represent a major step forward: 'Overall, it works pretty much the same way as Windows XP.' More from the review: 'Nearly all of the major, visible new features in Vista are already available in Apple's operating system, called Mac OS X, which came out in 2001 and received its last major upgrade in 2005. ... in my tests, some elements of Vista could be maddeningly slow even on new, well-configured computers. Also, despite Vista's claimed security improvements, you will still have to run, and keep updating, security programs, which can be annoying and burdensome. Microsoft has thrown in one such program free, but you will have to buy at least one more. That means that, while Vista has eased some of the burden on users imposed by the Windows security crisis, it will still force you to spend more time managing the computer than I believe people should have to devote.'"

28 of 398 comments (clear)

  1. Downloadable by fittekuk · · Score: 5, Informative

    Has anyone else noticed that Microsoft is going to allow you to purchase and download Vista over the net, instead of having to buy the physical CDs?
    I guess many here are not planning to buy it, but anyway, this is something new from Microsoft. I guess they are really happy with their Genuine Advantage to go through with this.

    1. Re:Downloadable by kaoshin · · Score: 4, Funny

      I'm sure both vista users will appreciate this innovation.

    2. Re:Downloadable by edmicman · · Score: 4, Funny

      Will it be through the Microsoft Pyrat Bhay website?

    3. Re:Downloadable by fractalVisionz · · Score: 5, Funny

      But how will I get new cd keys when I call because I swapped around my hardware to much. They usually ask questions like, what color is the cd, what is in the upper left hand corner. My replies, its shinny, and cd's don't have corners. I won that battle.

      BTW, that is the easiest way to get new cd keys.

  2. Heh by Stormx2 · · Score: 4, Funny

    And so, the last horse crosses the finish line...

  3. Soon after this article came out... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    you could hear the sounds of chairs breaking all over Redmond.

  4. My 2c by Toreo+asesino · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Vista is indeed a worthy improvement, but not a worthy upgrade. I'd buy it on a new PC, but in no way buy it outright...

    UAC is one of the biggest improvements in my opinion; not in that it makes Windows nicer to use (far from it in fact), but that finally, Windows has adopted a more *nix based approach to user-security (in at least, you don't have to be a full admin to do anything useful, and full-admin rights are difficult to obtain) and thank god for that!

    But like I say, I'm not rushing out to buy it...and not many people will either if you ask me.

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    1. Re:My 2c by ThinkFr33ly · · Score: 5, Informative

      Perhaps you're not fully aware of all of the new features in Vista.

  5. He likes it, but doesnt want to say he likes it by derrickh · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Have you ever felt that sometimes people go out of their way to put down Microsoft.

    Basically the article says:
    Vista is the best version of Windows ever...But its not.
    Vista is very secure...But only if secure it.
    You get a free Antivirus program...Buts its not as good as the ones you have to pay for.
    Vista is very easy to use...But I still had to click on stuff, so it sucks
    Vista has a cool search feature...But Apple had it first.

    D

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    1. Re:He likes it, but doesnt want to say he likes it by maynard · · Score: 4, Funny

      Have you ever felt that sometimes people go out of their way to put down Microsoft.

      http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4915875929 930836239#7m00s

      'nuff said.

    2. Re:He likes it, but doesnt want to say he likes it by Vellmont · · Score: 4, Informative


      Have you ever felt that sometimes people go out of their way to put down Microsoft.

      No, I feel that the reviewer was expecting more from 5 years of development, and not to be burdened by hefty hardware requirements to take advantage of the new improvements. He compares it to OS X because it's gotten steadily better over the past 5 years, where the offerings from Microsoft, a much larger and richer company isn't really worthy of 5 years of development efforts.

      Really I think the article sounds quite honest. He mentions that there's some improvements, but the majority of people don't have the hardware to take advantage of the improvements. The average guy is wondering "Should I upgrade to Vista?" not "Does this guy like Vista or not?" The article essentially say that unless you have a gig or more of memory, a recent computer, and a fast graphics processor.. Vista doesn't provide any benefits worth upgrading for.

      Ultimately I think it indicates a larger problem at Microsoft. It's been more than 5 years since XP, the last desktop OS from Microsoft. That's pretty horrible considering that previously Microsoft has released a new desktop OS every about every 2 or 2.5 years (3.1 in 92, 3.11 in 93, 95 in 95, 98 in 98, 98 SE in 99, ME in 2000, WT2K in 2000, XP in 2001).

      Look at all the major changes in previous 5 year spans. Compare Windows 3.11 in 93 to Windows 98 in 98, or Windows 95 in 95 to Windows 2000 in 2000 and you'll see what I'm talking about. Hell, compare the initial (really awfull) release of OSX 10.0 to the decent release of 10.4 only 4 years later. Sure there's a lot more to improve in OS X since it was so totally new.. but the fact that Apple can pull off more in less time doesn't speak well for Microsoft.

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    3. Re:He likes it, but doesnt want to say he likes it by Vellmont · · Score: 4, Insightful


      I wonder, maybe XP was just good enough, and didn't really need to many improvements, besides the security patches it has been receiving, not mention two full service packs.

      Well, I'd disagree that XP is an OS that doesn't need improving. One thing that I simply HATE is the
      constant rebooting you have to do when you either upgrade some critical part of the OS, or re-install a piece of software.

      The rebooting problem is a major flaw of the OS. It was designed with the philosophy "rebooting is OK, since updates are infrequent and won't affect the user experience". Linux/Unix was designed with the opposite philosophy, i.e. "this is a multi-user system that needs to be available 24/7. Rebooting is just plain terrible and should be used as a last resort".

      This flaw has been improved somewhat in Vista with the new driver model, but it still hasn't really been fixed.

      There's also some things I'd love to see Microsoft support in the UI. Why can I get a weather report, stock ticker, dictionary lookup, etc from out of the box on a Linux machine.. but I have to go download spyware laden 3rd party apps (or try to dig through multiple free windows apps) to get the same thing on Windows?

      If I can come up with a few things that's improve the Windows experience in 5 minutes, why can't Microsoft develop some actually usefull stuff in 5 years? I'll withhold final judgement until I actually try Vista, but so far the reviews I've read haven't exactly been stunning.

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  6. Best Windows version ever? by ThanatosMinor · · Score: 5, Funny

    Seems to me kind of like saying "Best Pauly Shore movie ever"

  7. Congratulations, Microsoft Users! by WhiteWolf666 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm glad that you can be welcomed to the world of the-rest-of-us, with Operating System features we've had since 2005 or so.

    Now, I can only hope that Microsoft got this security "issue" fixed, so that you PC users will stop spamming me with sexually explicit crap and drug sales, and maybe my shared cable modem speeds will go up, with the worms circulating the internet being fixed in Vista.

    Hopefully, in time, I can welcome you all to the world of computing with minimal/no time spent on security and maintenance. Either way, I'm glad the world is catching up.

    --
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  8. Tomato Slicer by eldavojohn · · Score: 4, Funny
    from the it-cannot-slice-tomatoes dept.
    Well, if you get the super duper upgrade maxi plus version of Vista for $800, it comes with accessories. But wait! Order within the next fifteen minutes and Steve Ballmer will throw in his patented hair growth formula! A $4500 value for 8 easy payments of $100 plus shipping and handling!
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  9. Re:Someone is alittle too idealistic... by WhiteWolf666 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Uhh...

    Unix users don't really worry about these things. As an admin, I occasionally poke around to make sure everything is okay (verify checksums once in a while), but invariably, everything is fine.

    I ran a virus scan for fun, once. (ClamAV).

    Once you setup a Unix-y network, you just leave it, and things tend to keep working until the machines rust. I'm including Apple in this category, but we've got plenty of Linux machines around, too.

    It's not so much a mother still makes the bed for me, as it is a I enjoy city-provided water and natural gas supply. I don't like lugging propane cyclinders, I hate chopping wood, and I wouldn't stand for no-running-water.

    Why should you spend ANY of your computing time. If you're going to waste your time, at least waste it on Slashdot, not Norton Anti-virus.

    --
    WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
  10. The BEST reason to switch! by NorbrookC · · Score: 5, Funny

    FTA: even a slicker version of Solitaire

    What more could you want?

  11. Works like XP is a recommendation? by vtcodger · · Score: 4, Interesting
    ***Overall, it works pretty much the same way as Windows XP.***

    That's sort of like overall this year's flu virus is a lot like last year's. Or President Bush's new Iraq strategy isn't much different from the old strategy. Hardly a recommendation.

    I just spent an hour finding and killing some mysterious Browser Helper Object on my wife's XP-SP2 PC that devoted its life to helping out the browser by popping up ads in IE. At least I think I killed it. Every year, the malware gets more clever. Every release, the software gets more bloated and complex. Every year, the Internet becomes more of a mess and it is harder to find information on exorcising malware, or on persuading Windows to do even the most simple and basic things. And every year I get older, dumber, and less interested in dinking with Windows just in order to do stuff I do find interesting.

    Screw it. I never upgraded to XP, and I don't believe that I'll be upgrading to Vista. I have finally moved from Windows 95 to Windows 98 despite the fact that W95 boots faster and runs as well. But only because I think eventually I will need USB that works and I don't think that will ever be available in Windows 95.

    I don't really hate Microsoft, but they are going to have to do a lot better than NT based Windows desktops to make me a customer again. Let me know when MS releases an OS worth buying. It hasn't happened for quite a few years, and doesn't look likely to happen again any time soon.

    --
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  12. Issues of trust... by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I've played with Vista a little bit. It is prettier than XP and I could see some interesting and promising features in the new OS, but I have issues with the DRM and security model.

    The DRM embedded in Vista has been well hashed here and I believe the implementation will cause many people headaches, especially those wanting to view digital media.

    I'm concerned about the new security levels of the OS and that there are two levels higher than Administrator, namely System and Trusted. The sticking point for me is that (as far as I know) no user on the system, not even the admin, can access these higher levels. In other words, we are not and cannot be "trusted".

    I don't like the idea that there may be things on *my* computer that I cannot access, but Microsoft, or other entities they trust, can. I'm not sure I trust them that much...

    --
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    1. Re:Issues of trust... by Rick17JJ · · Score: 4, Informative

      It looks to me that when creating Vista, Microsoft must have spent most of their time and energy on the new Windows Vista Content Protection. It is such an amazingly complicated system, that I can easily see why see why it would have taken Microsoft 5 years to create Vista. Most other new features that Microsoft had originally announced would be part of Vista were dropped, along the way, most likely because creating the protected environment for DRM was a difficult enough task by itself.

      In Vista, many of the core operating system elements have been extensively reworked in order to provide DRM content protection. Vista goes to great extremes to block the owner of the computer from gaining access to unprotected content in any possible way either in the software or the hardware itself. One example is the extreme measures taken to make sure that computer owners can not access unencrypted content on a user accessible bus. To prevent that, they plan to use 128-bit encryption on the fly at high bandwidth. I don't understand most of the details, but apparently it partly involves keeping the content encrypted as it goes from one hardware component to another. Vista is so insanely paranoid that that it also goes out about 30 times per second polling hardware to try and catch anyone playing games with any component. The system is so incredibly complicated that I don't plan to ever try to understand how it all works.

      I also wonder what effect all the extra overhead required for various components will have on hardware requirements. It sounds to me like Windows Vista itself largely was designed to be a secure DRM delivery system that Hollywood and the music industry can trust. Apparently for some reason, Microsoft did not show the same level of effort and paranoia in making Vista computers secure? Apparently protecting user's privacy is not as important. Below are three articles that are critical of the effect that the various new Windows Vista DRM features might have on hardware requirements. At the top of the first two articles there are also links to mp3 versions that are also available. The last article has already been discussed on Slashdot recently.

  13. Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked... by sootman · · Score: 4, Funny

    Will people be lining up at midnight to buy it?

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  14. Re:Wait for it, wait for it, wait for it..... by Divebus · · Score: 5, Informative

    OSX 2001 was garbage, even Mac users admit as much.

    Correct. In 2001, there wasn't much there. By 2002 [10.2], it was pretty good. Stuff just worked, so Vista was only bested by 5 years, or almost 2 years if you count the current features in OS X mimicked by Vista in their unique, crudely inferior way.

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  15. Re:And OSX Tiger isn't much different than OSX 10. by sootman · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This has nothing to do with fanboyism. The difference is, OS X from 10.0 to 10.1 (faster) to 10.2 (smoother looking) to 10.3 (expose) to 10.4 (dashboard, spotlight) has had lots of improvements, and each previous release was only a year or so apart, and 10.4 came out over a year ago, while Vista took the largest software company in the world 5 years to come up, stripping features the whole time, which is is just coming out now. (Where by "now" I mean "soon.") So of course the differences in each version of OS X are smaller, and of course it's more impressive to have had a product with most of the same features out sooner, and of course MS looks like crap for taking so long to deliver so little.

    Add to that the system requirements, the many different versions, and Microsoft's abysmal security record--their response to which is mostly to ask users "Are you sure you want to do this?" before every trivial operation, AND NOT EVEN REQUIRING AN ADMIN PASSWORD TO SAY 'YES'--and you can see why people aren't getting excited about it.

    On a related note, I think it would be the funniest thing in the world if Apple announced tomorrow that 10.5 would be released on Monday the 29th. :-)

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  16. Re:Someone is alittle too idealistic... by gb506 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Because we all know that with insecure women, trojans are a very good investment...

  17. If it wasn't for the games... by Jaeph · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If it wasn't for the games, I wouldn't even consider vista. I have a mac laptop, and that serves most of my needs just fine. However, the selection of games on a PC is better, so I keep upgrading mine to play them.

    However, I'm starting to challenge my gaming habit, as it is getting tiresome to keep that PC going. It's not a technical challenge - I'm a typical slashdotter with experience in PCs, Macs, Unices of various sorts and so on. Nor is it a financial challenge; I have a decent job and could replace my PC now.

    The issue is the work involved just to maintain a security hole for gaming, especially when there are a few decent games available on the Mac. They may not all be exactly the games I want, but they're decent and it's only gaming.

    Now add a substantial OS upgrade to the mix, and I really am having a hard time justifying upgrading my PC more. Maybe I'll just get a console for choice in my games.

    -Jeff

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  18. Resource requirements by ChrisWong · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Does anyone know why Vista is such a resource hog? I don't mean the fancy UI/eye candy. I mean basic OS functionality: even Vista's most basic mode without the fancy features has a bare minimum RAM requirement of a half gig. At home, I have a Linux/KDE box with Windows 2000 running in a VMWare image -- hardly a minimal environment -- all with 384M of RAM. Apart from the exotic graphics stuff turned off, what is it about Vista that is hogging all that RAM? Can that junk be turned off?

    Most of the time, I want an OS to boot up and get out of my way so I can open up my applications where I do my real work. I'm not sure I'm too excited about an OS that wants most of my RAM just to wake up, leaving me with little room to do real work.

  19. Re:You can hear the marketing drones whir up now.. by Overly+Critical+Guy · · Score: 4, Funny

    Imagine what realistic quotes on the box might look like:

    "Yesterday's technology today!"
    "Doesn't slow games down more than 10%!"
    "Easier than driving through a tornado!"
    "Angers your Mac friends!"

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  20. STOP THE FUD by RzUpAnmsCwrds · · Score: 4, Informative

    You know, there are plenty of legitimate ways to critisize Vista (UAC being annoying, Integrated WGA), but I am sick and tired of hearing the line that you need "hefty" hardware to run Vista. You don't. It runs fine on anything that's remotely modern. I ran Vista (RTM) - including Aero Glass - on a P4 Willamette (2GHz) system with 512M of memory and a GeForce 6200. Vista (RC1) also ran fine on the cheapshit $150 Celeron system I got in 2005 for Black Friday, albeit with a memory upgrade (to 512M using an old DIMM I had sitting around) and without Aero Glass.

    Aero Glass requires DirectX 9 hardware. Any low or midrange standalone card released in the last couple of years will work. Hell, even GeForce FX 5200 cards work. Even most integrated video works, including Intel's GMA950, ATI's Radeon Xpress, and NVIDIA's GeForce 6100. My $50 Athlon 64 motherboard has integrated video that works. HP's $269 desktop has video that works.

    Does Vista require more memory? Absolutely - you want 512M at a minimum, preferably 1GB. Does it require more CPU? A bit more.

    These are not high requirements. The cheapest system sold at Best Buy can run Vista with Aero Glass. Yes, that's right - the eMachines T3516, with its 3.2GHz Celeron D, Radeon Xpress 200 graphics, and 512M of memory will run Vista just fine.

    So much for "hefty" hardware.