Windows Vista Launches To Mixed Reactions

Thank you, brave gamma testers... by hal2814 · 2007-01-30 05:18 · Score: 4, Insightful

Thank you, brave gamma testers for being bold enough to put this OS on your computer now so that at least some of the more glaring bugs can be worked out by the time some software company puts out a "must have" app that only runs on Vista at which point I'll have to upgrade.

Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Samalie · 2007-01-30 05:25 · Score: 4, Informative

I've Beta'd Vista since Beta 1, and while the software has.....matured....since the initial beta, quite frankly, its still not ready for primetime.

Vista will still peg your processor at around 30% most of the time, mostly for bullshit you don't need or want. User Rights Management may be great for Grandma, but if you know what the fuck you're doing its just obtrusive (although it can be turned off). Driver support is dodgy, even with the big boys (Your video card will probably work, but expect signifigantly lower performance).

Oh, and add in the time during Beta 2 where Windows Update fried my install completely. Thank you for playing, re-install your OS. Yes, it was Beta still, but shit, I can see breaking pieces, or degrading performance, or any other assorted issues I expect. Frying the OS I do not.

All in all, as far as I'm concerned, this is just the next WinME

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09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by jsnipy · 2007-01-30 05:34 · Score: 1

I think most major software is released like this now, at least I beleive it to be true with most games. I bet the gimp orc carrying the torch in The Two Towers to blow up the wall at Helm's deep installed it already.

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-- if you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by qortra · 2007-01-30 05:48 · Score: 2, Insightful

User Rights Management may be great for Grandma

Really? Why?

DRM isn't great for anybody, including the unethical institutions that espouse it (though most of them would disagree if asked).
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Samalie · 2007-01-30 05:52 · Score: 2, Insightful

URM may be great for Grandma since it does bring up an annoying extra layer before Grandma deletes core windows files, or even her recipie folder. Of course, if Grandma just ignores the window and hits Continue, its all irrelavant anyway.

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Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by qortra · 2007-01-30 05:59 · Score: 3, Informative

You don't need URM [DRM] to prevent deletion of "core windows files". Plus, XP already does it..

And URM [DRM] isn't responsible for "annoying extra layers" during the deletion of recipes. That is the purview of MessageBox calls in Explorer. URM [DRM] prevents you from doing things at all, and let's face it; the prospect of losing control is never a welcomed thing, especially for an old person.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by PCM2 · 2007-01-30 06:02 · Score: 5, Informative

Vista will still peg your processor at around 30% most of the time, mostly for bullshit you don't need or want.

This is the second time I've heard this figure cited on Slashdot and I have no idea where it's coming from. I call bullshit. Here is the Task Manager of my Vista system running idle. This is a 3.4GHz single-core P4 system (with HyperThreading, hence the two CPU meters), with 2GB RAM and an nVidia 6600 with 256MB. I have Aero enabled and this screen shows the system with several processes running, including Thunderbird and the Windows Media Center services.

The only thing I can guess is that a lot of the people who are reporting outrageous system demands from Vista are running to check the performance meters right after the system boots. (Just because you can move the mouse doesn't mean it's done yet.)

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Breakfast served all day!
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by drzhivago · 2007-01-30 06:03 · Score: 3, Informative

He meant, User Access Control or whatever it's called.

That's not the DRM aspect of the OS. If it weren't so stupidly intrusive (or so I've heard), then yes it would be great for grandma.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by genooma · 2007-01-30 06:04 · Score: 1

DRM is different from URM...
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by qortra · 2007-01-30 06:11 · Score: 1

DRM is different from URM

You need to back that up with evidence. I checked, and they seem to me to be basically the same. A sibling post to yours suggested that your grandparent poster was talking about User Access Control. This makes more sense, and UAC is indeed different from DRM. But, the best I can tell is that URM is simply used to mean DRM in 90% of cases (Solaris 10 being the only interesting exception).
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by qortra · 2007-01-30 06:18 · Score: 1

Ahh, thank you for clarifying; that does make more sense.

I think it's User Account Control, and it is supposed to enforce a user model more similar to the admin/user model that Unix/Linux has been using for years.

Even assuming this, I still maintain that UAC is not good for Grandma. There is a reason why distros like Ubuntu and Linspire downplayed that model, and it is because most people are not capable of understanding that abstraction. To them, the extra work required to do admin operations is just wasted time.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by aonaran · 2007-01-30 06:30 · Score: 2, Interesting

Ubuntu doesn't downplay the user/admin split, it takes it to a higher level. Just like MacOS X, Ubuntu uses sudo for admin activities, and the actual root account is locked by default (has no login privileges at all).

This is not getting rid of root, it's making it more restricted in that you still have to have root access to do admin jobs, but you cannot, by default log in as root. Instead, you (if you are on the sudoers list) request root level access on an application by application basis, this way you cannot accidentally run something with elevated privileges, and you don't have to log out of your safe user account to do something as an admin.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by BalanceOfJudgement · 2007-01-30 06:34 · Score: 1

Vista will still peg your processor at around 30% most of the time
You've GOT to be kidding me. Why in the world is the OS using so much CPU? Unless I'm doing something really intensive, the CPU on my XP box never goes about 2-3%.

Increase electric bills, much?

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We are the fire that lights our world.. and we are the fire that consumes it.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by soxos · 2007-01-30 06:35 · Score: 2, Insightful

What's the cpu at when you're accessing content (watching a movie, reading a pdf, writing to disk)? That's when the encryption hit happens. I don't care if the cpu is idle when the OS isn't doing something. I care about what happens when it's doing work for me, ymmv.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:44 · Score: 0

You do know that the DRM routines which are you thinking will chew up some many CPU cycles are only active when the actually content already has DRM on it. So if you have a video without it you won't see the DRM overhead. The only time you'll see it when writing to the disk would be if you have an encrypted file system with bitlocker or the like.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by DimGeo · 2007-01-30 06:44 · Score: 5, Informative

What's pegging your CPU at 30% is the rendering of the clock gadget. Sounds silly, but try turning it off (only the round clock gadget, not the whole gadget sidebar) and see the difference. Looks like it has something to do with IE7 rotating the clock hands images each second.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Orange+Crush · 2007-01-30 06:45 · Score: 4, Funny

but you cannot, by default log in as root.

sudo su
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:45 · Score: 2, Interesting

Thank you very much for the screen shot of your task manager. OK, so your processor is only 1% used. I also see that Vista is using 1.08 GB of your RAM, and that you only have 30MB of your 2GB actually listed as "Free", after the caching is done. (I assume you took this screen shot after a clean boot, with no user applications manually launched.)

As a gamer, I like having my Athlon 3.5+ GHz system with 2GB of RAM only report that I've breached my first 1GB when I'm running a memory intensive game, like X3. Some of these games actually use > 1GB of RAM. Sorry, but until I see the how-tos for cutting all of the excess fat from the OS to make room for my games, not to mention assurances that DRM isn't going to get in my way, I'm not touching Vista.

Oh, and as far as DRM goes, I've only rip a few CDs to listen to on my MP3 player in the car, so I'm hardly the file-sharing pirate that the RIAA and MPAA claim to be targeting. I just want to be able to use my PC to enjoy my CDs and DVDs when I'm in the computer room. Yet, I'm very concerned about the way in which it sounds like Vista has been hamstrung in order to get the licenses from the media monopolies to use my hardware on the new OS.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:46 · Score: 0

All in all, as far as I'm concerned, this is just the next WinME
You seem to be right about that; when I went to the MS website, to see the video mentioned on a post right below, I found out that the actual address for it is:
http://www.microsoft.com/winme/0701/29339/GA_Launc h_MBR.asx
The 'winme' could stand for windows media but it sure is a strange coincidence.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by TheWanderingHermit · 2007-01-30 06:48 · Score: 1

This is not getting rid of root, it's making it more restricted in that you still have to have root access to do admin jobs, but you cannot, by default log in as root.

True, it doesn't get rid of root, but it is extremely easy to make it so you can login as root. When I'm setting up a new system, I hate using sudo for a ton of commands and would rather have access to a root shell while I'm first setting up a computer or when I'm setting up a new application.

On the one hand I think it's a good idea because it means a newbie won't end up running as root all the time out of ignorance or laziness, on the other hand, it makes it just as easy to do anything by just typing "sudo" first. There are some of my systems where I don't want sudo enabled at all. I know not everyone likes that, but it's my way.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Omestes · 2007-01-30 06:52 · Score: 2, Insightful

I doubt my grandmother (or the general novice users we're using her as a symbol for) would even notice, much less get angry that her valuable right to hose her OS out of ignorance is gone. I for one LIKE this, since I am the family tech, and still can't sell my parents (uncles, grandfolk, etc) to move on to OS . There is nothing more fun than a lazy Sunday afternoon with the family, sitting in a dark room trying to find what version of "thisfilewillhoseyouros.exe" someone deleted, all while having 2 or three people in the background yelling "stop doing things so fast! you'll break it!".

Perhaps its like school, once your out of it you see that more restrictive measures are good, for the students own good. Being that Windows doesn't effect me (except something I get the joy of doing free support on), I really don't really have a stake. Geeks can turn this crap off, and have unfettered access to delete *.*, format C:/, and open email attachments with impetus, though why a geek would be running Vista as their primary OS is a little beyond me, but these operations are not things someone who has no clue what their doing should be permitted to do. Yes, they still CAN, but think of knowing how to turn of protection as a certificate of half-assed competence that Grandma needs to get before being able to hose her OS and call me.

Yes, I understand that "DRM" is something very nice to rant about, but in this case I think you over step, and wax a bit overecstatic, this is not Grandmothers the world apart losing their valuable rights, this is a silly bunch of over priced computer code with some protections built in. Yes, code is not life, contrary to /., and accordingly deleting Vista's "vitalfile_001.exe" is not a right. Your free to install Linux on it, then Grandma can muck up as much as she pleases, or give her OS X, where she can do likewise.

Out of curiosity, is
chown
and permissions also DRM? Everytime I get flagged with "you must be root to do this operation" am I loosing some freedom? To me it is an aggravation, even if I do know I'm not running as root for my own good.

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A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by qortra · 2007-01-30 06:54 · Score: 1

I understand what you're saying, and your facts are correct; however, I don't think you understand the conceptual implications to the end-user. The fact is that it does downplay the user/admin dichotomy - primary because there are no longer two accounts involved in the security schema. In fact, there really isn't a dichotomy at all in Ubuntu's default configuration; there is merely a mechanism for confirmation that you are the currently logged in [super]user. I am not saying this to insult or complement Ubuntu (I don't know if this is good), but only to claim that Ubuntu makes an effort to minimize the conceptual barrier to administration.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by vertinox · 2007-01-30 06:54 · Score: 1

This is the second time I've heard this figure cited on Slashdot and I have no idea where it's coming from....I call bullshit. This is a 3.4GHz single-core P4 system (with HyperThreading, hence the two CPU meters), with 2GB RAM and an nVidia 6600 with 256MB

What about a P4 2.8 GHz without hyper threating with 512mb of ram and a ATI Radeon with 128 video ram? ;)

Your system isn't Uber compared to many high end rigs, but it is far from average with the low end systems. In fact I will be eventually running vista with those specs I gave you since that is the average Dell setup at this office unless they are feeling generous when it comes new computer time.

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"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by aonaran · 2007-01-30 06:57 · Score: 4, Informative

exactly, sudo su or sudo bash will (depending on the configuration of your machine) allow you to open a bash session with root privileges but you can't log in as root. No telnet, no ssh, no console, nada. Yes you can still single user mode it, but that's it.

It is HIGHER security than usual root login because you now have to know the username and password of a user that has sudo access, not just the password of root, and scripts can't be run by accident as easily as before. Mind you you still have to be careful who you give sudo access to, but at least it is safer to give sudo to 5 people than giving out the root password to 5 people.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by ChronoReverse · 2007-01-30 06:58 · Score: 2, Informative

Because it isn't. I can't believe people are literally lying through their teeth about that.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by aonaran · 2007-01-30 07:03 · Score: 1

Not at all, there are sudoers and regular users, but now sudoers aren't god until they give the computer the magic password again. (ie if you are an admin in the old style of thinking, and walk away from your computer to get a coffee someone can slip in and "accidentally" delete an important directory, using sudo they have to unput your password to do that even though they caught you leaving your terminal open.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by crabpeople · 2007-01-30 07:04 · Score: 1

WTF dude? Is the os, JUST the os using a gig of ram?!?

My windows xp right now is using 324 mbs of ram with firefox open, email and rdp connections. 1gb of ram for an IDLE machine?!?! How is that in any way acceptable! And for the record, my cpu is sitting at 0% with all that stuff running.

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I'll just use my special getting high powers one more time...
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by ender- · 2007-01-30 07:05 · Score: 4, Informative

When I'm setting up a new system, I hate using sudo for a ton of commands and would rather have access to a root shell while I'm first setting up a computer or when I'm setting up a new application.

There is an easy fix for this. If you've got a bunch of stuff to do as root, just use "sudo su -", and boom, you've got a root shell. Just remember to CTRL-D [or run 'exit'] when you're done.

Not that either method is any better than the other, but you don't have to type 'sudo' before each command, and it still keeps the root account locked.

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Nothing to see here
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Mwongozi · 2007-01-30 07:07 · Score: 3, Insightful

When I'm setting up a new system, I hate using sudo for a ton of commands and would rather have access to a root shell while I'm first setting up a computer or when I'm setting up a new application.

sudo -i
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by clodney · 2007-01-30 07:07 · Score: 5, Insightful

Wanting to have free memory makes little sense. RAM is a resource that the system should use whenever it gets a benefit from doing so. If by using more RAM it can increase working sets, disk caches, display caches, whatever, it should do so.

RAM that is not in use is a resource that you paid for that you are not getting any value from. The only time RAM should be free is if the O/S can't think of anything useful for it to do.

The hard part comes when the O/S has to figure out how to sensibly allocate RAM with the system under load. That is a hard problem, and I make no claims to know what it should do. But looking at RAM usage in the idle state is not a good indication of how the system will perform under load.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:09 · Score: 0

And lets not forget DVDs and hard drives not working. What's up with that? Already hardware is failing with Vista? Arghhhh! Why would I want to run this crap?

Windows 2000 was the last version that had a good balance of *stability* and features. XP was OK, but did tend to use way too many CPU cycles. Now you have this garbage that wants to eats all your and your neighbors cycles and will purposely stop supporting your DVD player or HD on a whim.

Microsoft leave our hardware alone you don't know what you are doing!

Vista is just going to push more people to OSX and Linux.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by MrCopilot · 2007-01-30 07:11 · Score: 1

Best part of Vista Launch was Bill Gates on the Daily Show.
Brave Testers indeed. Jon Stewart Asks Bill "Can testing Vista Beta make you sterile?"
My immediate response was Mentally, yes.

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OSGGFG - Open Source Gamers Guide to Free Games
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by MrCopilot · 2007-01-30 07:13 · Score: 1

Damn, Forgot Link: http://www.comedycentral.com/shows/the_daily_show/ videos/most_recent/index.jhtml?kw=billgates&gclid= CM-gh7_riIoCFRNaUAodVkc_gw

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OSGGFG - Open Source Gamers Guide to Free Games
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:13 · Score: 0

"When I'm setting up a new system, I hate using sudo for a ton of commands and would rather have access to a root shell..."

Is sudo -i is too much trouble to get a root shell? The advantage of not having a root account is that the root account name is known. For a user account, a remote attempt would also have to guess/know the account name. The main advantage of a root account is for someone who has to administer many accounts on one machine.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by xoran99 · 2007-01-30 07:19 · Score: 1

sudo -s

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Karma: Bad (mostly due to all those "In Soviet Russia" jokes)
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by mobby_6kl · 2007-01-30 07:21 · Score: 1

>What about a P4 2.8 GHz without hyper threating with 512mb of ram and a ATI Radeon with 128 video ram? ;)

I'm sure it won't be much worse than a Northwood (no HT) P4 2.6 with 1GB of RAM and a 128mb 6600. That's what I'm running Vista on, and it works just fine. After turning off the Sidebar and Defender, the system uses around 300 megs of RAM, so I think your setup will be fine for office tasks or web browsing, even if you use something as bloated as Firefox and OpenOffice.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by maynard · 2007-01-30 07:23 · Score: 1

You know, most every UNIX out there will use up all available RAM for filesystem caching too. So what?
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by indifferent+children · 2007-01-30 07:33 · Score: 1

What kind of an idiot gives their grandmother the root password to her box?
(note that we are using 'grandmother' as code for a user who does not want to learn to admin a box; any real grandmothers out there who are qualified to admin a box...we are not talking about you)

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Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it. --Mark Twain
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Asztal_ · 2007-01-30 07:35 · Score: 1

Yeah. The new Resource Monitor shows that the total CPU usage is about 4%, and almost all of that is Windows Media Player 11... Maybe these complainers are using Pentium IIs? RAM usage is at about 700MB though, which I'm fine with. XP used to use about 500...
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Vellmont · 2007-01-30 07:36 · Score: 1

What about a P4 2.8 GHz without hyper threating with 512mb of ram and a ATI Radeon with 128 video ram? ;)

Your system isn't Uber compared to many high end rigs, but it is far from average with the low end systems.

I'll do better than that. I've got a Athlon 2000XP with 512 megs of RAM and an ATI Radeon 9600XT with 128 megs of RAM (about 3 years old). The processor idles at maybe 4%, and 2% of that is task-manager itself.

The people that're claiming 20-30% idle processor usage are either lying, aren't making accurate tests, or have something wrong with their PC (bad driver, app, etc).

I will say that there's a LOT of business machines out there that have no 3-d graphics capability to speak of, even newly purchased systems. So those systems aren't going to be able to get the eye-candy Aero interface stuff. I suspect Vista will finally make lower end 3-d graphics a requirement for a PC, even in the low cost onboard video market.

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AccountKiller
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by man_of_mr_e · 2007-01-30 07:39 · Score: 1

Yes, it will use a gig of ram if you have a gig of ram to waste. If you don't, it won't use as many resources. Vista will scale back it's usage when memory becomes more scarce, otherwise there's no reason not to use RAM that's sitting unused.

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If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by caseih · 2007-01-30 07:41 · Score: 2, Insightful

The amount of memory shown as "free" is meaningless in any operating system these days. Any linux distro I've used in recent memory always shows a small fraction of the main memory free. That doesn't mean that your main memory is not available. I would expect a 2 GB system to regularly use as much of that memory for caching as is practical. Given the size of the operating system files these days (and disks), I'd say using a big chunk of this memory for caching that is efficient use of resources. As your game loads and takes over RAM, the caches get flushed out of the way. No big deal. The game gets 1.5 GB of RAM. Seems like you are caught up in the numbers game here.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by yodleboy · 2007-01-30 07:44 · Score: 1

good for you.
all i can say is i have been running vista RTM since it became available on MSDN and it runs great. i have yet to see it use more then 20% of 1GB at idle.

Athlon64 3000+
1GB RAM
GeForce 6600GT 128 MB

the spec above runs everything i throw at it without any noticable performance issues. a sample of these would include: FarCry, Half-Life2, Prey, SplinterCell: Double Agent all at high resolution and except for Splinter Cell, with all details turned up. Adobe Premier, Adobe Photoshop CS, DVD Shrink, Nero 7, Dreamweaver 8, various media converters/encoders. i could go on all day.

here's a thought folks, try installing the OS on a decent PC and working with it before making uninformed, knee jerk comments based on a friend of a friend hosing his system while using an under-spec machine and running Beta 1. do you make all your decisions based on internet forum chatter? i hope not. funny isn't it that this kind of crap would get blasted if it was about OS X or Linux.

please note that nowhere in this post did i say "windows vista pwns " or "Vista is perfect, blows goats."

mods, how in the name of all that is quasi-holy can you rate this 30% crap "informative?" hey, the moon is made of green cheese because the guy in the next cube knows a cheese making astronomer. so it's soooo true. yeah. uh-huh. you may now mark this paragraph "informative"
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Eggplant62 · 2007-01-30 07:54 · Score: 1

Where does his comment say anything about Digital Rights Management?

Read it again: User Rights Management, which I'm hoping means what portions of the file system does Gramma have access to?

I'll agree, though; the DRM features of this OS will keep me from every buying it.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by nrdlnd · 2007-01-30 07:59 · Score: 0, Troll

Windows Vista is illegal. Microsoft is trying with the DRM that's against your right of free speech to further strengthen it's monolpolistic position on the market. They control the operating system of the PC, now they want to control ALL media including the hardware that it's going to be used on. Microsoft has declared war against your human right of free speech.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Adam+Zweimiller · 2007-01-30 08:00 · Score: 1

I don't know about 1gb of RAM usage while idle, that doesn't reflect on what I've seen on numerous clean Vista installs. I'm typing this on a Vista Ultimate box with the following specs:

Core2Duo E6400
2048mb PC2-6400
Geforce 8800 GTX

and after boot, my RAM usage is around 450mb, about 20%. For someone to have 1gb used while idle they must have installed alot of apps that have their own services or unnecessary startup entries in the registry. I know Win2k didn't have it, but msconfig is your friend, kids! In all seriousness, after installing Acrobat, Quicktime, Java, and PowerDVD on my system, each of them took it upon themselves to run a bg process on startup and eat my ram. acrotray.exe, qttask.exe, pdserve..etc...all useless. Remove this crap and you won't have 1gb idling. I'm far from sold on Vista, but it doesn't use THAT much ram, nor is my CPU usage above 1-2% idle. Let's stop foaming at the mouth and be realistic.

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mmm...muffins
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by moochfish · 2007-01-30 08:00 · Score: 1

holllly shit. 1 GB of memory used and... what you say? Thunderbird and Windows Media Center? I'm scared to see what happens when someone tries to play a game or run an application that actually uses system resources. Let's see, my XP machine is marked at 0% (popping up task manager spiked it to 5%, unlike your crazy screen shot), and RAM usage is at 700MB and I have open Thunderbird, MySQL Query Browser, Enterprise Architect, MySQL/Apache running in the background, WMP, Open Office, and an instance of Firefox I haven't shut down since I booted up (150megs of RAM and counting). Oh, and my machine hasn't been turned off in days.

Your little screen shot there actually served to scare me away from Vista if anything.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 08:08 · Score: 5, Insightful

Yes, I understand that "DRM" is something very nice to rant about, but in this case I think you over step, and wax a bit overecstatic, this is not Grandmothers the world apart losing their valuable rights, this is a silly bunch of over priced computer code with some protections built in. Yes, code is not life, contrary to /., and accordingly deleting Vista's "vitalfile_001.exe" is not a right.

Actually, yes. Deleting any file I please off of my hard drive is a right. And yet again, WinXP has critical system file protection; and without DRM to boot! Please don't turn the DRM issue into an argument over basic OS safeguards, it isn't about that. The DRM isn't to protect system files even moreso (you can beat XP's, but you have to boot into an admin console and manually overwrite files or use kernel hacks; not something "grandma" will be doing), it is to protect the media industries' rights to charge you for the same media over, and over, and over and over again. Got a scratch on that flimsy unprotected disk? Another $20, please. Want to upgrade that VHS to DVD? Another $20. Want to upgrade that DVD to BD-DVD? Another $30. BD-DVD to HVD in a few years? Another $40. Want it on your iPod and cellphone? $20 and $20, please. Nevermind that you won't be physically able to play your VHS tapes in a few years when they are no longer on store shelves, or your iPod video file when your old iPod breaks and your new one doesn't support the old format anymore.

Everyone knows that if you can see something with your eyes, and hear it with your ears, you can copy it. And it only has to be copied once: even if it requires millions of dollars of equipment to do it, it only has to be done once by a professional and the protection is forever broken. Pirates will always pirate, and only the people who legitimately want to pay for their media and support the artists (eg, me) will lose out. Now, not only do we have to keep buying the same media again and again, but our PCs will no longer obey us, hobbyist drivers will no longer be possible to create and distribute, we'll pay more for our DRM/HDCP/TCPA protected hardware and have to replace all of our old "non-compliant" hardware, and we will incur greater speed penalties from all of these extra protections running constantly in the background. Ah, but thankfully Intel and co are stepping up to sell us newer, faster hardware to meet these ever increasing hardware requirements.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 08:15 · Score: 0

My immediate response was "if you're beta testing vista it doesn't *matter* if you go sterile."
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by gilesjuk · 2007-01-30 08:16 · Score: 1

But it's an operating system, it just launches applications and provides base services, file system, GUi etc..

After bootup the more memory you have available for applications and running programs the better. Are you telling me Microsoft needed to have 1GB of OS application resident in memory all of the time? surely we can have minimalist tasks running that when needed load and unload DLLs to do the work, which saves having them in memory all the time.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Ubergrendle · 2007-01-30 08:21 · Score: 3, Interesting

So instead of popping up Clippy (utilising system resources that are comparable to calculating Pi to the 10,000 digit) we get Clocky? I just demoed Windows Vista at Best Buy across the street over lunch and I can confirm the ~30% figure for the clock. The widget menu bar also has a 'cpu monitor' which conveniently lets you see real time how detrimental the new UI is to performance.

I find it interesting that there's no big launch party, midnight madness, etc for Vista. Wii got it; PS/3 got it; Xbox 360 got it; heck even The Burning Crusade got it. There is a definite lack of hooplaa with this release. I think the retailers know that its a dog sales wise; its a standing in place upgrade whose main sales will come through OEM equipment.

This is probably the most underwhelming release since Windows ME. I get the sense that Microsoft really has jumped the shark. 5 years for this? Oi vey...

--
John Maynard Keynes: "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?"
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 08:24 · Score: 0

Well, my RAM meter(Task Manager) is pretty linear most of the time. As I start opening apps, the RAM usage increases until it goes over the physical RAM size and keeps growing into virtual memory. My system starts getting bogged down and I know the exact reason, my page file is being more heavily used. It didn't get to the top of the RAM and stay there for a while while the system gave back resources to be used for apps. That seems like a pretty good indication of system performance to me.

I know some apps such as MS Exchange and MS SQL server will reserve lots of RAM and give it back if another app needs it, but when you're looking at task manager for your average apps running on WinXP, it actually gives a pretty fair indication of what your applications and OS are both using, and wont give up.

Telling people they should be maxing this out is not helpful to them. Telling them their OS should be maxing it out without giving any indication of when the OS is likely to start hitting virtual memory is not being very helpful either. How do they know how much RAM they should buy if their OS is not bright enough to tell them what squeezable overhead they have before it starts hitting the disk?

Maybe Bill, Linus, and Steve should put their heads together a make a better standard for system resource metrics, but until then, the XP task manager is plenty useful to the average home XP user.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Stormwatch · 2007-01-30 08:24 · Score: 1

What band is that? The singer is terrible.

--
Circumcision is child abuse.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by mattcoz · 2007-01-30 08:33 · Score: 1

"Vista will still peg your processor at around 30% most of the time"

I've been using Vista for about a week now, and I am not experiencing this at all.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by swillden · 2007-01-30 08:35 · Score: 1

WTF dude? Is the os, JUST the os using a gig of ram?!?

My windows xp right now is using 324 mbs of ram with firefox open, email and rdp connections. 1gb of ram for an IDLE machine?!?! How is that in any way acceptable! And for the record, my cpu is sitting at 0% with all that stuff running.

That's because XP is stupid, not because XP is good. (Note that I'm not saying Vista is good -- I haven't used it and probably won't touch it for quite some time).
If you have free RAM, then your OS is wasting a valuable resource. My machine has 2GB of RAM, and Linux uses nearly 100% of it all the time. The only time I have any significant amount of free RAM is shortly after boot. Of course, most of the time most of that 2GB is just being used for disk caching, and if the OS needs to allocate that memory for some other purpose it simply discards some portion of the cache and allocates it to an application, or whatever.
Right now, for example, I have a KDE desktop (with lots of bells and whistles turned on), Firefox, Kontact, Kopete, Kerry, and OpenOffice running. My "free" RAM is 38 MB, out of 2048 MB. Sounds terrible, right? Actually, 1469 MB of that is used for disk caching and buffering, so only 579 MB is being used for OS and apps.
A smart OS will use all of your RAM, all of the time, if there's anything it can find to use it for. RAM is way too valuable to leave idle.

--
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Mex · 2007-01-30 08:44 · Score: 1

Holy molly, ONE gigabyte of memory used just to run the system? Wow.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by nasch · 2007-01-30 08:45 · Score: 1

Wanting to have free memory makes little sense.
Without more detailed information, the ideal situation is to have just a little bit of memory free. If you have no free memory, you cannot tell if it's because you're just barely using it up or if you need twice as much memory as you have, and you're paging like hell. Again, I'm assuming that your only metric is the amount of free physical memory. If you have just a little free, assuming your OS doesn't suck at memory management (another big assumption) then you know you're making (basically) max use of your asset without having extra that you paid for but aren't using. This doesn't address the question of whether a given OS performs better with a certain amount of free memory. Beats me.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by nasch · 2007-01-30 08:50 · Score: 1

Wanting to have free memory makes little sense.
Forgot another thing - free memory means you can do more with the machine later without starting to page more. If my memory is maxed out, that means in the future if the next version of Anyware uses more memory, then it will degrade my performance to upgrade. If I want to start having X + 1 programs running instead of X, again I take a hit. So having free memory has upsides. For that matter, what's different about memory compared to any other resource? Should your processor, disk access, disk space, and internet connection all be maxed out all the time too?
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by muhgcee · 2007-01-30 08:51 · Score: 1

or sudo bash, sudo csh

That is what I use. And then I just "exit" when I am done.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Billly+Gates · 2007-01-30 08:54 · Score: 1

"What's pegging your CPU at 30% is the rendering of the clock gadget. Sounds silly, but try turning it off (only the round clock gadget, not the whole gadget sidebar) and see the difference. Looks like it has something to do with IE7 rotating the clock hands images each second."

Wow did that remind me of the unix haters manual. Particually about X and Xclock using the ram of 1024 commodores just to display the time. :-) Appearently the authors have not yet ran Vista as it probably uses more ram than 1024 xclocks running back to back.

My god the more I read about Vista the less I want it and the more happy I am with ubuntu on my laptop.

--
http://saveie6.com/
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by sarathmenon · 2007-01-30 09:07 · Score: 1

It is HIGHER security than usual root login because you now have to know the username and password of a user that has sudo access, not just the password of root

You don't need the root password at all for the login. In fact no one knows it. It's either not set while the system is built, or is a random scrambled password.

--
Microsoft: "You've got questions. We've got dancing paperclips."
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by jejones · 2007-01-30 09:16 · Score: 1

>I find it interesting that there's no big launch party, midnight madness, etc for Vista.

Well... CompUSA opened at 10:00 p.m. last night offering various items for sale pending the midnight availability of Vista.

Also, evidently MS held some sort of launch party at various sites in Second Life. People have noticed that a goodly number of the sites chosen in SL for the party (it was necessarily distributed, since at most 40 people can be at any one place in SL) are places at which "escorts" are commonly available.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 09:20 · Score: 0

What he's saying is that when that 1 Gb would just be lying fallow, the OS might as well use all of it to make things just that much zippier, even if it just means pre-loading from disk certain OS components that may not be used. If they aren't, then just overwrite the memory..
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by aonaran · 2007-01-30 09:24 · Score: 1

That's exactly my point, sarathmenon.

In a normal root user/normal user set up you already know the username you are after is root in 99% of the cases, you only need to guess the password.

In a sudo setup with root account logins disabled you need to know the username of a sudoer AND that user's password. And even if you are waiting for the admin to get up from his chair and leave the screen unlocked, you still need his password to do anything deadly because it'll be prompted for as soon as you try to type "sudo somethingevil" at the command line.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by secolactico · 2007-01-30 09:27 · Score: 1

When I'm setting up a new system, I hate using sudo for a ton of commands and would rather have access to a root shell while I'm first setting up a computer or when I'm setting up a new application.

"sudo bash" doesn't work for you?

--
No sig
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by TheWanderingHermit · 2007-01-30 09:51 · Score: 1

Actually, that's close to what I did. I just did "sudo passwd" and created a password for root. From then on, the whole thing worked like I'm used to it working.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by clodney · 2007-01-30 10:01 · Score: 3, Interesting

I can well believe you with respect to the linearity of RAM usage. I am not claiming anything in particular about the behavior of Windows in situations where it has to treat RAM as a scarce resource.

What I am saying, is that so far as the O/S is concerned, there is no downside to using more RAM, up until the point where it runs out. If the system decides that it can benefit from having 1/2GB of disk cache, and no one else has asked for that RAM, why not let it have the cache? The RAM isn't being used for anything anyway.

My point was rather narrow - RAM that is not in use does nothing for you, and if by using it the system could prevent a page fault later, it may as well use it. Hence my contention that RAM usage in the idle state need not be a good predictor of O/S bloat or how memory constrained the system really is.

Once demand for RAM heats up and the system has to determine how to parcel it out to the running tasks is where things get interesting, and where a well designed memory manager will make a big difference.

It is kind of like screen real estate. You may not need your browser maximized to read /., but if your eyes aren't looking at anything else there is no downside to maximizing. It is only when you try to do that and watch a compile and watch a news feed that you have to decide how to apportion display space.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by nanoakron · 2007-01-30 10:03 · Score: 1

The only thing I can guess is that a lot of the people who are reporting outrageous system demands from Vista are running to check the performance meters right after the system boots. (Just because you can move the mouse doesn't mean it's done yet.)

Really?

Because OSX lets me get straight on with things once the desktop pops up (about 20secs boot on my Core1Duo MacBook Pro 2.16GHz).

Wow...Vista sure sounds great already.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by jacksonj04 · 2007-01-30 10:04 · Score: 1

I'd love to see some evidence for this claim. How exactly are they infringing on your right to free speech? I'll leave the whole UAC/URM/DRM argument aside since they're three different things, and assume you're talking about DRM and not the same level of user access control implemented in Unix, Linux and OS X since the dawn of time.

DRM limits what you can do with protected content, and in no way impairs your right to free speech. They do not have control over all media, only media with DRM embedded. Nor do they have control over the hardware. They offer support for TPC, and some of the DRM used may insist on a TPC platform, but this is not actually anything to do with Microsoft. There is nothing stopping you installing Vista on non-TPC hardware and playing any standard MP3 file which may take your fancy.

Tell me how exactly Vista interferes with your human rights to free speech and I'll listen. Until then, quit with the FUD and stop playing the 'human rights' card where it has no relevance.

--
How many people can read hex if only you and dead people can read hex?
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by spoco2 · 2007-01-30 10:16 · Score: 2, Informative

But it's an operating system, it just launches applications and provides base services, file system, GUi etc.. You're missing the point...

While there is nothing else wanting to use the memory, the OS should be using it to cache data, pre-fetch things, and whatever it can use it for to make your use of the system more responsive and pleasant.

As long as the system gives these RAM resources over to an application/game when it's requested for there is NO PROBLEM.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 10:18 · Score: 0

Hey, guess what? During the time that all this Longhorn-hype was going on, I upgraded my desktop OS about five times. Some things run a little faster, most about the same, but everything runs. I got new functionality, but I didn't have to re-buy the whole operating system to get it. Nowhere in this process did I lose anything, or have to re-install from scratch.

Honestly, who really cares about Vista? It's like most everything else in the retail, home consumer-level market: Hype 'n' drop. All those market meatheads are screaming with prominent veins in their necks and spittle flying ("Yuahhh! VISTA! LET'S DO IT!"), but in the end, it amounts to an interface upgrade. They couldn't even handle that without screwing up the rest of the operating system.

p.s. Is USB support now complete, reliable and functional? I've been waiting since Win95C for reliable USB support.

p.p.s. Did they get rid of the poor multi-user imitation and replace it with some like a '/home' directory? Ha ha! I'm joking, I know it's too late to fix it.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by tallguywithglasseson · 2007-01-30 10:18 · Score: 0, Troll

Vista has built-in DRM, in that it allows you to play HD-DVD or Blu-Ray through an HDCP output. Otherwise it would be downgraded to 480p or whatever.
Don't like hamstrung hardware? You probably won't be playing any HD-DVD movies, so it will be a non-issue.
Apple will follow suit. Linux will be in a bind, and probably won't support copy-protected HD content.
Other than that, Vista supports DRM in that it will play DRM'd content. There's nothing in WMP11 that will stop you from ripping CDs to DRM-free MP3 format.
But it's easy to spread FUD about DRM. MPAA! DMCA! RIAA! Oh, my! Vista's gonna secretly call the feds on my when I put in my K-Fed bootleg!
That said, having tested Vista on several systems, it's a slight improvement if you've got great hardware and don't need 100% of it for performance (like gaming). Otherwise I can't see a compelling reason to upgrade until some DX10 games to come out.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 10:19 · Score: 1, Informative

Not necessarily, if the data has already been written to disk but is held in memory with the possibility that it may be needed, then it can be over written without paging and no noticable loss of time.

Regarding your CPU, Disk space remark. Only if it makes sense for the system to run these to the max when they could be otherwise running idle. With memory, you use it as a disk cache (data to be written when it is convenient for the system, or data that is read from the disk with the liklihood of it being needed by the system)as it is much faster than a hard drive. Now I know that it has to be read from the hard drive (and/or written to eventually) but the idea is that this will be done when the system can do so conveniently and you (hopefully) will not notice because the system is otherwise idle. This is why programs that are designed to flush memory to the paging file are a bad idea. Let Windows/Linux/whatever manage your RAM.

This is my take on it.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by rjstanford · 2007-01-30 10:19 · Score: 2, Informative

Forgot another thing - free memory means you can do more with the machine later without starting to page more. If my memory is maxed out, that means in the future if the next version of Anyware uses more memory, then it will degrade my performance to upgrade. If I want to start having X + 1 programs running instead of X, again I take a hit. So having free memory has upsides.
Not really. You're confusing "free" memory with "available" memory. Most OSes will happily fill your memory full of cached disk pages. The thing is, only a very few of these at any time are dirty. Of the clean ones, a bunch haven't been checked in simply ages. When any program, even a new version of Anyware, asks for more memory, it gets it with no waiting and those old cached pages are discarded.

What doesn't make sense is to throw away cached disk pages that are already in memory before you need to. After all, even if there's only a .001% chance they'll be needed before some program does a malloc(), there's a 0% chance they'll be available if you toss 'em. And they don't cost you a thing - not a single cycle, not a spare watt. Nothing. If your thoughts are shared by a lot of people I could see splitting the cache pool into two labels - "current cache" for pages that have been accessed recently (or just by currently running programs, or whatever), and "opportunistic cache" for all the other stuff. Or call the second pool "Available" or something. Either way, its an education issue not a technical one.
For that matter, what's different about memory compared to any other resource? Should your processor
Seti@Home? Folding?
disk access, disk space,
BitTorrent? Local copies of email and newsfroups and pr0n?
and internet connection all be maxed out all the time too?
BitTorrent again I'm afraid...

As long as directed use of any computing resource trumps background use with very little lagtime, and there isn't a power/burnout factor involved, then why do you care what the computer's doing behind your back, as long as the net result is a better/faster/gniftier experience for you, the user? Serious question.

--
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 10:36 · Score: 0

Why don't you just have your in-laws run as a non-priviledged user?

Then again, some software is evil and doesn't like to run in that fashion... It is worth a shot anyhow. :-)
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by nasch · 2007-01-30 10:56 · Score: 1

You're confusing "free" memory with "available" memory.
Then substitute "available" for "free".
As long as directed use of any computing resource trumps background use with very little lagtime, and there isn't a power/burnout factor involved, then why do you care what the computer's doing behind your back, as long as the net result is a better/faster/gniftier experience for you, the user? Serious question.
As long as it's something I authorized I don't care, and I'm not making any claims about any of those things. I could be mistaken, but it seems you're saying all those resources ought to be fully utilized all the time. If so, I disagree. something@home is great. I use one and I think others should too. As far as disk and internet access, I'm not going to go out and download and upload stuff just to make sure I'm making full use of my investment in the computer. And I don't run Folding@Home while I'm actually using the computer because it makes the CPU fan spin up and the computer is at least twice as loud as normal. I value quiet more than making full use of the processor. Actually I value just about anything more than making full use of the processor. If you're saying it's okay to have all those things maxed out all the time, then I agree, except that you can't help but shorten your disk drive's life if you're using it all the time.
Sorry if I posted part of this twice, I may have hit enter accidentally.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by StikyPad · 2007-01-30 10:59 · Score: 1

The two things that struck me as terrible right off the bat were 1) The "lock" buttons in WMP and WMC (easily bypassed with CTRL-ALT-DEL -> Task Manager), and 2) The drivers (presumably) for my Hauppauge 500 card still make the picture look like utter crap. (Picture looks great if I boot into MCE2005, and I've changed the default MPEG-2 decoder, so I can only assume drivers are the issue.)

Additionally, I was not at all impressed by most of the changes to Media Center. Videos don't display the name until you select them. Whose bright idea was that? As if I could tell the date of a Colbert Report (or the content of any video, for that matter) just by looking at its thumbnail. Worse, the horizontal arrangement makes it less intuitive to navigate. And it still locks up frequently and gives two dialog boxes (which can't be controlled by the remote) before restarting after a significant delay. Just exiting gracefully and manually restarting, especially with the green button, would take less time.

I'm still using Vista on my HTPC, for now, but only so I can keep abreast of and test updates with minimal effort. I wouldn't dream of putting it on my main PC, or anyone else's in my house for that matter.

--
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Christianfreak · 2007-01-30 11:03 · Score: 1

sudo bash
passwd

After you create a password, you can log-in as root. If you're on Ubuntu its a good idea because for some reason sudo needs to be able to see localhost. If you accidentally corrupt your /etc/hosts file (like I did with an errant keystroke in vim), sudo will no longer work and you'll have a sad day because you can't log in as root.

Fortunately recovery mode logs in as root as well.

--
The Anti-Blog
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Oblong_Cheese · 2007-01-30 11:05 · Score: 1

As a gamer, I like having my Athlon 3.5+ GHz system with 2GB of RAM only report that I've breached my first 1GB when I'm running a memory intensive game, like X3.
Why not use memory if it's there? By the sounds of things (I haven't used Vista myself), Vista's keeping important, commonly-used files in RAM for fast access; the 'cache' that people keep referring to, which is apparently emptied quick-smart once foreground applications (like games) start needing that memory for their own purposes.

The mentality is, if the resources are there, why not use them? Fair enough applications should be programmed with the most efficient memory use in mind, as should the operating system, but if after all of your core system files needed for operation are loaded, you still have a few hundred megabytes (or even gigabytes) available, why shouldn't those free resources be used for speeding up general computing? Lord knows Vista needs it, and that's why it's there.

It's just a waste of memory if it's only being used when on the odd occasion you happen to fire up X3.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:50 · Score: 0

Being that Windows doesn't effect me

Id hope not.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Khabok · 2007-01-30 12:01 · Score: 1

Exactly right. And since that is the hard part, and doing hard stuff takes CPU cycles and doesn't always work right, it's a lot nicer to have the memory free and un-allocated for when it's needed. This kind of memory usage we see here is wasteful, because everything the OS thinks of to use the RAM for could be made a lot smaller. The measure of how good your OS is at launching and running big applications at will is whether all those processes are sufficiently compact to not vomit data all over the RAM.

This cap shows 30MB free. Vista has puked inside the computer, then urinated.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by dbIII · 2007-01-30 12:10 · Score: 1

This is moving backwards again - I want to be able to delete "core windows files" when spyware corrupts them for instance. I have wasted huge amounts of time because I cannot delete registry keys that should not be there already without the problem of not being able to delete files that should not be there. Obviously was is on home computers with people that for various reasons could not reformat and reinstall their compromised machines.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anpheus · 2007-01-30 12:20 · Score: 1

Right now, for example, Windows XP is using 700MiB of my 1GiB RAM for cache. It also says I have 600MiB RAM available for whatever I want. So either Windows XP is giving me 1.3GiB of RAM, or it's doing what it should: aggressively caching to avoid hitting a bottleneck in I/O.
Re: Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Dolda2000 · 2007-01-30 12:49 · Score: 2, Informative

just use "sudo su -"
I can't believe I see people using that command all around. Instead of spawning two extra processes with two extra execs, why not just run "sudo -i" or "sudo sh"?
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by aonaran · 2007-01-30 12:58 · Score: 1

actually I'd advise against doing that.

The case you mentioned is not a good enough reason to open up the root account for possible network logins, that very rare occasion can be handled by booting into single user mode and fixing it at the console.

Unless your machine is in another city and you don't have someone on site that you can trust to fix it and not remote KVM (what are you crazy to let all these things happen?) there is no real advantage to having a real root network login.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by thephotoman · 2007-01-30 13:00 · Score: 1

URM != DRM, from what I understand.

If I remember correctly, URM is more akin to having tiers of users who have specific levels of write access to the system. Sure, you have the old all-powerful administrator (root) account, but you also have regular user accounts that may or may not be able to use a sudo-like process to install programs.

DRM is evil and puts someone else in control. URM is a good idea that keeps outsiders from making unauthorized changes to your computer--keeping you in control.

--
Haec merda tauri est. Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by drsmithy · 2007-01-30 13:31 · Score: 1

As a gamer, I like having my Athlon 3.5+ GHz system with 2GB of RAM only report that I've breached my first 1GB when I'm running a memory intensive game, like X3. Some of these games actually use > 1GB of RAM. Sorry, but until I see the how-tos for cutting all of the excess fat from the OS to make room for my games, not to mention assurances that DRM isn't going to get in my way, I'm not touching Vista.
You clearly do not understand memory management and, as such, should refrain on both a) commentary and b) purchasing decisions based in that lack of knowledge.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by longcz · 2007-01-30 13:42 · Score: 1

The woe starts now!
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by suckmysav · 2007-01-30 13:51 · Score: 2, Informative

They offer support for TPC, and some of the DRM used may insist on a TPC platform, but this is not actually anything to do with Microsoft.

How can you say that with a straight face? They designed the whole TPC specification. It is they who wanted it in the first place.

It is not something that they have begrudgingly decided to "offer support" for as you have attempted to imply.

The fact is that if Microsoft's vision of a rosy DRM future for us all comes to fuition, we could potentially see linux PC's being denied access to large swathes of the internet simply because Microsoft deems them to be "untrustworthy", due to their refusal to comply with Microsoft's DRM requirements.

--
"You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by dave_f1m · 2007-01-30 13:53 · Score: 1

Not memory hungry, is it?
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Sj0 · 2007-01-30 14:10 · Score: 1

Wouldn't there be a speed hit for having to deallocate excess cache? I'm sure you'd have to check if it's available, and from there, I'm sure the disk subsystem would love to know that it's lost a bunch of memory. Also, while all this is happening, does the CPU cache get all blown to hell because it has to muck around in the kernel getting all this stuff done?

Honestly, I think you're overstating your case.

--
It's been a long time.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by rapidweather · 2007-01-30 14:31 · Score: 1

Vista will still peg your processor at around 30% most of the time, mostly for bullshit you don't need or want.

I am running my Rapidweather Remaster of Knoppix Linux, and with Firefox 2.0.0.1, "top" reports my AMD K6-2 is running at 98.4% idle. Let's see what happens when I open GIMP also, with 12 images. I put the size filter on at 500 KB or greater, some images are about 1.5 MB. Now I have "top" showing 98.0% idle.
I have 256 MB of RAM, and a generous swap partition, now showing 79624K used.

All I can say is that the new computers that can run Vista, with the reported 30% idle useage are going to be powerhouses, can't wait to get ahold of one, with a dual-core processor, and 2 GB of RAM. My Remaster should
be much easier on the hardware.

But, here are the problems, scenarios and challenges that I may face trying to run my 2.4 kernel Knoppix Remaster
on these newer machines (Designed for Vista):

1. Won't have drivers for the wireless card on laptops. Especially Dell's with Intel wireless.
2. Have no way to just boot my linux directly from the hard drive, without the CD, as I do with Windows 95-98
and MSDOS computers, using a MSDOS menu, and some loadlin batch files.
3. Can I partition the Windows Vista hard drive with QTParted, and not upset the Vista file system?
I have done that with XP, then only item is XP will want to run "checkdisk" (it that it?) when I reboot into Windows XP after repartitioning.
4. May not be able to get the graphics card to run better than 1024x768, but for me that's OK. (Don't want the
text to be so small)
5. Can just do the "toram" knoppix cheatcode on the 1 and 2 GB machines, after booting from the Rapidweather Remaster CD.
6. Security? I have the Guarddog firewall, switched on by default, with dns, http, https, ftp, pop3 and smtp.
Also, all three web browsers run in "control scripts" that delete any ~/.flock, ~/.opera or ~/.mozilla when the browser is closed. (Privacy).

(some time later...)
Now, I just closed GIMP, and all the images that were open, and I have "top" showing that the processor is 98.7% idle.

-- Rapidweather

--
Rapidweather's Linux Screenshots.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 14:38 · Score: 0

Athlon64 3000+ 1GB RAM GeForce 6600GT 128 MB the spec above runs everything i throw at it without any noticable performance issues. a sample of these would include: FarCry, Half-Life2,
I call bullshit. I'm running almost the exact same specs, except I have a 6800 GPU, and I have poor performance with both those games on Windows XP. It isn't going to be any better with an operating system that's using more memory.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by phaggood · 2007-01-30 14:47 · Score: 1

> Everyone knows that if you can see something with your eyes, and hear it with your ears, you can copy it.

Brings to mind a recent "Discovery Friday" show I saw where some researchers were allowed to do an extremely deep scan on the "Mona Lisa" - this scan used lasers to record every bump on the thing to a ridiculus DPI. Seems to me that the recording of this data means that in a few years, fabbers will be able to dump the file and a few layers of colored plastic (or a regular fab modded with an inket) and create their own ML to hang in their house.

As one of those folks who doens't see why so much value is placed in owning "The Original" of much of anything, I more attracted to the idea of one day owning a really really nice copy of a nice painting (and $$millions cheaper) than the frikkin original.

(tho in this particular case, I gotta admit I don't get what folk see in that frumpy woman's portrait)
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by phaggood · 2007-01-30 14:50 · Score: 1

> When I'm setting up a new system, I hate using sudo for a ton of commands

sudo -s?
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by PyroMosh · 2007-01-30 14:58 · Score: 1

Simple anecdotal observation from my system.
I'm running a Core 2 Duo 6400 (1.8GHz) on an Intel DG965WH.
2GB Mushkin 800MHz DDR2 (1GB x 2) in dual channel of course.
ATI Radeon X850XT w/ 256MB onboard
Several drives, etc. No raid or anything special.

I've got Vista loaded on one drive and XP MCE on a second. Only thing unusual about each install is that I have the MS firewall turned off on both, the profiles directory for XP lives on seperate physical drive, and Windows Defender service is turned off on Vista. Otherwise they're more or less stock. Nothing that should impact performance too much.

3DMark scored better under Vista (32 bit) than under XP. So did the built in benchmark of Half-Life 2: Lost Coast.

From my playing around it seems that for systems with 1GB or less (my GF's PC, or the PCs at work) XP will outperform Vista on the same hardware. No surprise, Vista wants more memory.

HOWEVER, if you go over 2GB, the tables start to turn. Vista starts to outperform XP, despite the extra services running, etc. I can only guess that what MS says is actually true. Vista just has better memory managment.

YMMV, but this is my experience.

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Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by PyroMosh · 2007-01-30 15:01 · Score: 1

Sorry to reply to myself but that's a mistake. That should have read "HOWEVER, if you go over 1GB, the tables start to turn..." I probably put 2GB because I was thinking of my system or something. Just wanted to clear that up.

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Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by PyroMosh · 2007-01-30 15:03 · Score: 1

The fact is that if Microsoft's vision of a rosy DRM future for us all comes to fuition, we could potentially see linux PC's being denied access to large swathes of the internet simply because Microsoft deems them to be "untrustworthy", due to their refusal to comply with Microsoft's DRM requirements.

One can hope so!

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Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by rjstanford · 2007-01-30 15:28 · Score: 1

Wouldn't there be a speed hit for having to deallocate excess cache? I'm sure you'd have to check if it's available, and from there, I'm sure the disk subsystem would love to know that it's lost a bunch of memory. Also, while all this is happening, does the CPU cache get all blown to hell because it has to muck around in the kernel getting all this stuff done?
Actually, no. When - and keep in mind I may be a little simplistic here, just trying to be brief rather than comprehensive - when the system needs a few blocks of memory, it goes to the Least Recently Used piece of the cache and simply grabs the memory. All it has to do is delete the pointer to it from the cache. It doesn't have to spend any significant time reallocating it because it is the allocation system and its already being reallocated. Seriously, this is incredibly highly tuned stuff - its what memory managers do for a living.

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You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Listen+Up · 2007-01-30 15:37 · Score: 1

Yes, code is not life, contrary to /., and accordingly deleting Vista's "vitalfile_001.exe" is not a right.

Wrong. I make a very good living developing code. As a matter of fact, my entire life has always revolved around code since I fell in love with computers and coding when I was a young child. Therefore, code is in fact life.

If you have no idea what you are talking about, then do not post.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 15:58 · Score: 0

So instead of popping up Clippy (utilising system resources that are comparable to calculating Pi to the 10,000 digit) we get Clocky? What a clock-up.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by suckmysav · 2007-01-30 16:04 · Score: 1

I assume that this was just a tongue-in-cheek quip along the lines of "Well who would want to connect to a webserver running IIS anyway?" but really this is not a terribly helpful attitude to take cuz were this to actually happen it would kill the internet as far as it being a usable entity for me and many others.

If this day comes around you can say goodbye to buying stuff online ("I'm sorry, but for you to purchase Widget X we require you to use a Trusted Computing Client such as Windows Fista SP32, Thank you! Come again!"), Internet Banking or potentially even sending emails to a the majority of people and businesses.

If you think this is fine and dandy then more power to you.

--
"You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by PeolesDru · 2007-01-30 16:42 · Score: 0

I see a lot of complaints about DRM - and I sympathize with them to some extent. It pisses me off when I try to hit "menu" on my DVD player and am told the operation isn't allowed right now. But it always comes down to this: We don't have to watch big (DRM'd) Hollywood movies, or listen to big (DRM'd) recording stars. And even if DRM lived up to the FUD prophecies, and the meer act of copying the video of my son's birth required me to jump through draconian hoops, ultimately no one would be able to DRM me going down to the local bar and listening to some local talent live.
But imagine if it got that far - no one would be buying any new equipment. It is in the interests of the DRM software and hardware makers to make sure the DRM is no more obtrusive than people are willing to tolorate. In fact, they would compete with one another to be less obtrusive. But you could always learn an instrument - or, assuming "they" somehow made that illegal, learn to sing a capela.
But I imagine that the future holds many more convenient delivery systems for the fancy DRM'd stuff we enjoy as well as many more opportunities for non-mainstream artists to build audiences for their non-DRM'd wares. We should certainly be vigilant against government being directed to force things on the marketplace. For example, in a long-shot scenario imagine that the record companies, facing slumping sales despite their nearly tamper-proof (because of government, not some impossibly unbeatable technology) DRM, somehow manage to get the law written so all artists must pay a fee and get DRM'd in order to distribute their recordings. What are they going to do if the market continues to recoil from them and simply resorts to going to live shows? I just don't think it would go that far, but even if it did - even if the media producers decided to collude with the state apparatus and very, very thoroghly shot themselves in the foot - we could just read books and sing our own songs.
Sure, lets make sure things like Linux and distributing your own works on mp3 are not made illegal, but there's just no point in insisting that Windows Vista (or the latest Sony gadget) not have any restrictions placed on them - because the simple fact is that the people that make these "limited" products are working off of the assumption that the user will be willing to put up with some amount of hassle to be able to do things like download HD-quality movies to their "media center" (or whatever) on demand.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by PeolesDru · 2007-01-30 16:51 · Score: 0

Well put. I'm very curious to learn how gracefully Vista manages to do this. I would be very surprised if it, for example, kept Aero loaded when running a DirectX 10 game.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by DarkJC · 2007-01-30 16:58 · Score: 1

I'm replying to this, but this is aimed at the entire argument below this particular parent. You guys are arguing over a misunderstanding of terms. When he said URM, he meant the User Access Control system which warns you when you go about doing malicious stuff. It can be turned off. It is not the same as DRM, which is in place in different areas of Vista that have nothing to do with UAC.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by PyroMosh · 2007-01-30 17:11 · Score: 1

No, it was just a tounge in cheek way of my taking a cheap shot at Linux. It's no secret that I'm a fan of Windows on the desktop, and I don't usually follow the party line here on slashdot. I LIKE Windows. Linux is great for servers. Mac is great for... being different, I guess (seriously, great product, I just see it as a solution looking for a problem). Linux on the desktop for me though... it's just a toy. Something for me to nerd out with. If I want to be seriously productive, I go to Windows. Anything that's "work" for me via linux occurs via Telnet or SSH.

I don't really envision a future like that as being a good thing. However I also don't envision it as being very realistic, either.

I *COULD* see a day where for the stuff you need 128 Bit SSL for now (online banking, etc), you need some kind of TPM based connection instead. However I can easily see that failing too due to poor adoptation rate (look at what happened with the Processor ID numbers on the Pentium 3s (or was it P4s?)).

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Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by curious.corn · 2007-01-30 18:13 · Score: 1

Man, your PC has a couple of basic text communication apps running, the ever so mighty aero flying and you're already 1234 MB swapped out?! Geez... Vista is a memory pig and there must be some serious memory leaks...

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Mi domando chi Ã il mandante di tutte le cazzate che faccio - Altan
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by therufus · 2007-01-30 21:22 · Score: 1

All in all, as far as I'm concerned, this is just the next WinME *blinks*

Oh my God no!!!!!!! Not again!!!!

*dies*

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You moved your mouse. Please restart Windows for changes to take effect.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by suckmysav · 2007-01-31 00:07 · Score: 1

Well, congratulations on preferring Windows to Linux on the desktop. I disagree wholeheartedly but I accept that is your to maintain that position.

What I don't understand is why I should accept becoming the internet equivalent of persona non gratis just because I choose not to accept being lorded over by some suited clowns in Redmond.

The paragraphs I quote below were written in 2002, over five years ago regarding Microsoft and their DRM intentions. It is eerily accurate. It could in fact have been written yesterday about Vista.

I suggest that you read it and think very carefully about where you hoist your metaphorical flag in this debate. I don't even care whether Vista is really better than Linux or not. To argue about such things is to miss the point entirely.

What we are talking about here is freedom. Freedom to choose and freedom to express, no more, no less.

With this announcement, Microsoft competitors and independent programmers should be gearing up for another court case, as this concept reeks of Redmond's historic anti-competitive tactics in the marketplace. Savvy consumers should be very concerned that Palladium will mean that their computers and information are no longer under their positive control but rather under the omnipresent surveillance and enforcement of a third party more interested in turning a profit than empowering their customers to think and act for themselves. The computer will essentially become a tool of surveillance, judgment and control over users, rather than a tool of innovation, communication, and enlightenment.

Given the pervasiveness of computers in modern society, the worldwide social ramifications of Palladium are enormous. Consider the ability of one entity -- in this case, Microsoft -- to dictate acceptable behavior and content (remember Smart Tags?) in service of its own commercial aspirations. If your behavior or actions are deemed 'unacceptable' by such a third party, you could find yourself impotent on the global stage. So you'd better toe the party line and be a good little Windows user.

Palladium represents a modern 'innovation' which could lead to a Digital Dark Age: a period of innovative stagnation where the majority of the world's computing population will become unwitting subjects and indentured servants to the profiteering desires of the new corporate ruling class, and Microsoft the enforcer.

The first step in any revolution is the seizure of the lines of communication to hinder the target population's ability to communicate and exchange information amongst themselves. Palladium has the ability to do just that, and convert the open fabric of the modern computing environment into a closed, proprietary domain under the rule of Redmond.

Under the Palladium concept -- despite the marketing spin and hype -- the danger is that you will be asked (though not directly) to pledge allegiance to Microsoft and its dismal record of security and reliability while unwittingly relinquishing your ability to remain an independent person in cyberspace. In essence, you'll go back to the future instead of forward to innovation and enlightenment.

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"You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by suckmysav · 2007-01-31 00:09 · Score: 1

FYI, the quoted material above is from the article previously cited at The Register

--
"You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by PyroMosh · 2007-01-31 04:51 · Score: 1

Nothing would stop TPM from being adopted by Linux, Mac OS, etc. Form a standards body to govern it. Perhaps make it an ieee project. Compete with Microsoft's on even ground. (Unless this isn't strictly a MS project, I could be mistaken there).

This is a feature. It's a feature that you and many of the slashdot crowd don't like, however nothing, short of your attitudes would keep Linux, etc. from adopting this type of technology.

The problems I see are that the type of people who go to linux do so because they don't like this. So it wouldn't be adopoted if implemented. Therefore there's no reason to develop it, unless someone does it because "they can".

I could see IBM or someone doing something with this. I just don't see it getting any traction.

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Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-31 05:42 · Score: 0

I've always been under the impression that extra free ram is ideal because the computer shouldn't have to think about what it can get rid of when it needs to put something new into ram, rather just put it there. Disk Caching is not something that should be done idle anyway if you ask me, rather, any program that is run should cache whatever files it might need to run during it's use.

That may be the case... i had the vista beta 2 and it used about 450/1024 MB just sitting and indeed, like 30% of the cpu. I've been hoping the release version is better, but perhaps not...
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by suckmysav · 2007-01-31 10:37 · Score: 1

This is not exactly true. OSX will take it on board, in fact they (apple) had a hand in drafting the "standard" if I recall correctly, OSX is closed source and Microsoft is keen to see apple survive (to a point) to keep the anti-trust dogs at bay.

As far as Linux is concerned, there is evidence that one of the main objectives of Palladium is to marginalise and destroy Linux. Microsoft knows full well that FOSS cannot properly "embrace" palladium and still retain the GPL.

Microsoft will argue (correctly) that for palladium to work, its internal workings must be kept secret, therefore the only people allowed access to it would be those willing to sign up to highly restrictive non-disclosure agreements with penalties imposed for the leaking of their "secrets".

Obviously this cannot work for a software development model that is predicated on openness and source code sharing.

So, sorry Linux, you can't be trusted, it's "go directly to jail, do not pass go" for you I'm afraid.

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"You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by swillden · 2007-01-31 10:55 · Score: 1

I've always been under the impression that extra free ram is ideal because the computer shouldn't have to think about what it can get rid of when it needs to put something new into ram, rather just put it there.
No, you're confusing cache with swap. The amount of work involved in deciding what cache to dump is trivial -- and actually pretty much the same amount of work involved in finding some free RAM, especially if the OS has bothered to organize the free/cache list in advance (which any good OS will do, of course). Having to swap out application data is expensive, of course, because it requires disk I/O, and also means that the data will probably have to be swapped back in at a later time.
Disk Caching is not something that should be done idle anyway if you ask me, rather, any program that is run should cache whatever files it might need to run during it's use.
Disk caching shouldn't be done speculatively, I agree. But whenever a file is read from disk, if there's free RAM available, a copy should be kept in RAM just in case it ever needs to be read again. If the OS had a good way to predict that another file would likely be needed in the near future because a given file was recently read, then it would make sense to use idle time to prime the cache. That's a very hard problem to solve, though, and I'm not aware of any OS that does that.
i had the vista beta 2 and it used about 450/1024 MB just sitting and indeed, like 30% of the cpu. I've been hoping the release version is better, but perhaps not...
I hope so, for the sake of everyone out there who will use it.

--
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by Omestes · 2007-01-31 11:25 · Score: 1

And good for you, you are a member of a very very small minority. Regardless, not being able to delete a silly file, in a silly (optional) operating system still isn't a right, or even something very important in the grand scheme of things. Don't like it, move to something else, or find a work around.

And if you look at the comments above you, you'll notice that no one was talking about YOU, we were talking about your hypothetical computer illiterate grandma. I'm glad you enjoy coding, I'm glad you found a job doing what you enjoy. Thats very nice for you. But its kind of sad that you would find arbitrary computer code the meaning of your life.

I grew up with computers, and being elbows deep in their guts, etc... But computers are not my life, just a mere part. At best a hobby I can live off of, at worst an obsession that distracts me for more real aspects of life. But this is neither here or there. You should relax, no ones attacking you.

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A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
Re:Thank you, brave gamma testers... by man_of_mr_e · 2007-02-01 05:24 · Score: 1

Vista takes that a step further. Yes, it will cache a great deal, but this doesn't get counted against your total memory commit (available memory). However, other features, like the Compositing engine, and the 3D desktop will use more memory if you have it, and that WILL get counted against your available memory, though it will reduce it's usage when memory becomes tight.

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If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here

I'll Answer This Later by dethndrek · 2007-01-30 05:19 · Score: 5, Informative

Since XP support is due to last until 2011, I'll let you know how it is in about four years.

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-JWR

Re:I'll Answer This Later by networkBoy · 2007-01-30 05:24 · Score: 1

And going legit on XP was expensive enough (of course now I'm legit on all six machines on my lan) 1x2K, 2xXP 3xLinux.
I ain't buying Vista 'till I have no choice.
-nB

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whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Re:I'll Answer This Later by jimstapleton · 2007-01-30 05:28 · Score: 1

You're migrating to vista then? I plan on dropping windows then and completely converting to FreeBSD.

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34486853790
Connection too slow for X forwarding? Try "ssh -CX user@host"
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Thansal · 2007-01-30 05:31 · Score: 1

Yup, I am still running 2K, however I am getting close to the point that I might actualy have to upgrade as more and more companies are no longer making drivers for 2k/XP, in stead they are "XP only" and will refuse to install under 2K (I got around this with ATI by ussing Omega, but it is still anoying).

And if I do upgrade I will probably grab Vista, just for all these games that will eventualy come out for "Vista Only".

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Do Or Do Not, There Is No Spoon, There Is Only Zuul. Everything in the above post is probably opinion.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Mateo_LeFou · 2007-01-30 05:34 · Score: 1

Does anyone else suspect the DRM stuff in Vista is at least partially an upgrade-forcer? I remember way back when I used XP occasionally to play media I'd get these "acquire license" thingies... lots of users could be persuaded to "upgrade" if their music didn't work anymore in XP

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My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
Re:I'll Answer This Later by networkBoy · 2007-01-30 05:36 · Score: 1

Yeah, that's where I'm OK. I'm one of those casual only gamers. If it won't run on my console or on my pc then I don't much care. Besides I *still* have my 2600 and *still* play river-raid on it. (and my Odyssey2 and I love KC Munchkin and Ringmaster :)
-nB

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whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Re:I'll Answer This Later by networkBoy · 2007-01-30 05:38 · Score: 4, Interesting

"That's a nice music library you've got there, be a shame if anything happened to it..."

So long as my existing music works then no problem. The moment I'm locked out of my own files to force an upgrade we're talking RICO suit.
-nB

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whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Blue+Stone · 2007-01-30 05:44 · Score: 2, Informative

I think I'll wait too. Especially since Microsoft's indefensible policy of charging TWICE the price for Vista in the UK as in the US. (Bunch of crooks!)

--
Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility. - Ambrose Bierce
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Carrot007 · 2007-01-30 06:02 · Score: 1

-1 BAD MATH.

Really, this needs to be a valid moderation.

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+----------------- | What is the question!
Re:I'll Answer This Later by eno2001 · 2007-01-30 06:22 · Score: 4, Interesting

That's always been my main issue with MS: cost for doing the serious stuff at home. While many people might want to relegate people like me to the insulting category of "hobbiest", there are some of us who want enterprise functionality at home and use it in a serious way. Of that set, there are those of us who want to play by the rules and would therefore buy legitimate copies of an OS. If MS was really smart, they'd realize this and would provide multi system license packs for home users who want enterprise features. I'd happily pay $500 to have the right to legitimately install Windows Vista on five of my fifteen machines at home. I'd happily pay $750 to set up a full Windows AD domain at home with Win2K3 + five Vista clients. While my needs may not be mainstream, there are more people like me that you'd think.

But since MS only focuses on the largest markets, many very important sectors are ignored. That's where F/OSS and GNU/Linux come in. Thanks to FOSS and Linux I've been able to more than accommodate my need for 15 machines plus seven virtual systems without having to worry about licensing or cost. The money saved goes where it counts: large amounts of redundant storage, RAM and CPU.

Regarding the insulting moniker "hobbiest", my main problem is that it downplays the need that the average home has for enterprise class storage, user and resource management, print management and distributed computing. We don't call electricians who work on their wiring at home or plumbers who work on their plumbing at home, "hobbiests". In fact we tend to praise them as being self-sufficient and skilled. The same metric should be applied to the IT guy who sets up enterprise class centralized storage (Global Network Block Devices or iSCSI), hardware assisted virtualization or paravirtualization (Xen + AMD SVM or Intel VT) and centralized application serving (persistent remote desktops using VNC or NX protocols). These are serious solutions to real problems encountered in the home. The age of the standalone PC is long dead, but MS doesn't seem to get that.

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-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
Re:I'll Answer This Later by sconeu · 2007-01-30 06:54 · Score: 1

While many people might want to relegate people like me to the insulting category of "hobbiest",

Hey, I'm "hobbier" than you!!!!

You mean "hobbyist".

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General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by sootman · 2007-01-30 07:11 · Score: 1

Since I've never needed support for W2K, I'll let you know... never.

Seriously, I won't use Vista until a) some app I want requires it or b) I buy a new computer that comes with it. Since I primarily use OS X, it's entirely possible that I'll never have a Vista machine at home. That said, I did run the beta on a pretty nice Dell (no Aero, but otherwise good) and I just see no reason to move to it. There is literally not a single thing about it that appeals to me. The only thing that W2K lacks that would make it better in my mind is fast user switching. Back when W2K was the main machine in my house, that is. Now my main Windows box is a Parallels VM.

My company, OTOH, *loves* MS and I'll probably be using Vista at work in a couple months. That's the plan, anyway. We'll see how it turns out.

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Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by gentlemen_loser · 2007-01-30 07:14 · Score: 1

Ya know, if you had Macs, you could go buy a family pack (five licenses) of OS X for 199 ;-)
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:15 · Score: 0

I've had just about enough of your 'hobbier-than-thou' attitude!
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:28 · Score: 0

accommodate my need for 15 machines plus seven virtual systems
You can't be married.

If you are, how the hell did you pull that off?
Re:I'll Answer This Later by jcayer · 2007-01-30 07:35 · Score: 3, Informative

If you are willing to spend $500, sign up to be a partner...it's free and buy the Action Pack: https://partner.microsoft.com/actionpack
It costs less than $500 and includes piles of licenses, etc for guys like you.
josh
Re:I'll Answer This Later by eno2001 · 2007-01-30 07:40 · Score: 1

The only problem I see with that is that the partner program requires that you sell your services or goods outside of your business. As I am someone doing this stuff at home and don't sell anything (although I do give away free access to my systems to my friends and family), and there isn't any legitimate way of making it seem that I do, it would appear that I don't qualify.

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-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
Re:I'll Answer This Later by CDarklock · 2007-01-30 07:41 · Score: 1

> I'd happily pay $750 to set up a full Windows
> AD domain at home with Win2K3 + five Vista clients.

Any good Microsoft Software Advisor, such as myself, can handily point you at the Microsoft Partner Program - where just registering is enough to qualify you for the Action Pack subscription at about $700 annually. It includes Windows Server and *ten* Vista Business clients.

Of course, there's no money in it for *us*, so most won't bother. But maybe you should go check it out.

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Microsoft cheerleader, blue flag waving, you got a problem with that?
Re:I'll Answer This Later by eno2001 · 2007-01-30 07:43 · Score: 1

I am married as a matter of fact. With one kid even... What do you mean how did I pull that off? My wife is a non-tech but she likes a lot of what I can enable with technology. Plus I'm very particular about where and how the machines get installed so that they are essentially hidden for the most part. The laptops are basically wireless thin clients, and she's very aware of the fact that her desktop is on a server in the basement. And considering that it's really inexpensive to have multiple machines when you're not having to pay through the nose for overpriced software... well it's an easy sell really.

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-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
Re:I'll Answer This Later by man_of_mr_e · 2007-01-30 07:45 · Score: 2, Interesting

That's not really a requirement. Have you ever fixed someones computer for them? Did they give you anything in exchange? Even if it's a can of coke? You just sold your services. Big deal. Microsoft doesn't really care.

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If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
Re:I'll Answer This Later by FLEB · 2007-01-30 07:46 · Score: 1

TechNet and "evaluating" a slew of software? I've been half-looking into it myself.

--
Information wants to be free.
Entertainment wants to be paid.
You just want to be cheap.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by billcopc · 2007-01-30 07:52 · Score: 2, Insightful

I don't know what kind of plumbers you have in your area, but I certainly don't praise mine for what he does in his living room. If you take offense to the term "hobbyist" then you need to come back down to earth. A hobbyist is someone who has a hobby, aka something you do on your own time, to fulfill your personal interests. You're probably upset because your "enterprise class" endeavors get lumped in with your half-brained neighbor who keeps bragging about how he put 3 DVD burners in his K6-350mhz to keep up with demand. He's a hobbyist too, just like you. He's also a worthless imbecile, but that's a separate topic.

I have a funky home setup, probably even crazier than yours, with a compile cluster, bigass file server (8tb), and an 8-way opteron rig hosting a couple dozen virtual machines. I live in a small downtown apartment, I work a normal job that doesn't involve server administration nor programming. I do this crazy stuff for my own enjoyment, as a hobby. I am a hobbyist, and I'm certainly not the least bit insulted by the word.

If anything, I wish there were more like me, because having all that fast modern technology at my fingertips just makes me realize how utterly insignificant the OS is. On the virtual server, I've got Windows 95, 98, 2000, 2003, XP; a few Linuxes, FreeBSD, CentOS, and an old Netware. They all do more or less the same thing: run applications. The only reason I need all of them is because they've each got their quirks so that an app that was fine in 95 won't fly on XP, or a server that runs fast on CentOS will drag FreeBSD to its knees. Netware is in there for completeness, just so I can keep my skills current. Do any of these operating systems matter when surfing the net, or writing a letter, crunching a spreadsheet or burning a CD ? Not at all, all those tasks are performed by software like Firefox, MS Word, Lotus 123 or Nero. I don't give a crap about Vista, because it is yet another upgrade hurdle that breaks more than it fixes. Does it come with a word processor, spreadsheet and full-featured burning suite ? Nope. It does have a web browser though, the same one as XP, the same one as 2000. What can it do better than a Win 2000 machine from eight years ago ? Absolutely nothing. It's what you make of it that truly matters. Is it really that difficult to have a filesystem, graphical display and network stack ? Does it warrant 5 gb of disk space just for those basic features ? Are they worth the hundreds of dollars MS is charging considering you can hardly do a thing without spending yet more money on 3rd party applications ? I think not.

Sorry Microsoft, I may have all the CPU power, RAM, disk space and graphics horsepower to make your new OS scream, but if you're only going to piss away all that expensive hardware on security popups and rounded rectangles, I'll pass.

--
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Qoroite · 2007-01-30 08:12 · Score: 2, Informative

hmmm? The Math's not that far off; certainly not enough to whine about, here's an example: Vista Ultimate Upgrade in the US(we'll use CompUSA): $259.99 = About £132.06 Vista Ultimate Upgrade in the UK(We'll use PCWorld; may be able to find it cheaper, who knows; I'm not biting yet): £249.99 = About $490.37 So yeah that's not 2 times; but ~1.89 times the price is bad enough.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by gsslay · 2007-01-30 08:19 · Score: 2, Informative

Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate US RRP: $399.95
Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate UK RRP: £369.99
Current exchange rate = £0.5095 : $1
UK equivalent dollar RRP: $725.70
That is 181.44% of US price. Not twice the price, but close enough.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Short+Circuit · 2007-01-30 08:20 · Score: 1

You use the OS that comes with the PC?

I swap out the hard drive and install my OS of choice. (I keep the hard drive, Just In Case.)

--
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
Re:I'll Answer This Later by eno2001 · 2007-01-30 08:30 · Score: 1

Holy crap! An answer from someone with a brain finally! You actually "get it". Even the part about being pissed off that I get lumped in with the neighbor with three DVD drives. If I actually met you in person, I'd buy you the beverage of your choice. That was honestly the most refreshing post I've read on here in years.

--
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Some_Llama · 2007-01-30 09:11 · Score: 2, Insightful

"Seriously, I won't use Vista until a) some app I want requires it "

Which is exactly why MS is providing DX10 on vista only, to cash in on the gamer market, first using the enthusiasts to buy the newest DX10 games, which will then drive more development of those games and less DX9 development, eventually to be able to play any "current" game wyou will need to be running Vista to use DX10.

Sucks because I always liked Opengl and it's not proprietary.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by wgaryhas · 2007-01-30 10:26 · Score: 1

For me it was $299 plus tax.

--
"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." - H.L. Mencken
Re:I'll Answer This Later by jez9999 · 2007-01-30 10:26 · Score: 1

He's Bill Gates.

--
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Mopatop · 2007-01-30 11:51 · Score: 1

"The money saved goes where it counts:"

Electricity bills?
Re:I'll Answer This Later by ldj · 2007-01-30 12:53 · Score: 1

The moment I'm locked out of my own files to force an upgrade we're talking RICO suit.

Ah, Rico... Suave!
(Sorry, but I can't always ignore the voices in my head.)

--
Open Source: I'll show you mine if you show me yours.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by drsmithy · 2007-01-30 13:53 · Score: 1

I'd happily pay $750 to set up a full Windows AD domain at home with Win2K3 + five Vista clients. While my needs may not be mainstream, there are more people like me that you'd think.
And what we do is go and download an evaluation copy of Windows 2003 from Microsoft and use that to build our AD environment.
(Or we grab a volume-licensed copy from work, but I'm assuming you want to keep the discussion within the realms of legal.)
Regarding the insulting moniker "hobbiest", my main problem is that it downplays the need that the average home has for enterprise class storage, user and resource management, print management and distributed computing.
That's because the need in the average home for those things is zero.
We don't call electricians who work on their wiring at home or plumbers who work on their plumbing at home, "hobbiests". In fact we tend to praise them as being self-sufficient and skilled. The same metric should be applied to the IT guy who sets up enterprise class centralized storage (Global Network Block Devices or iSCSI), hardware assisted virtualization or paravirtualization (Xen + AMD SVM or Intel VT) and centralized application serving (persistent remote desktops using VNC or NX protocols).
The difference is the need in the average home for electricity and water is acute. The "need" in the average home for enterprise-class storage solutions (which most certainly are _not_ based around roll-your-own GNBDs or iSCSI targets) and virtualised servers is next to nothing, at best.
Re:I'll Answer This Later by spirit+of+reason · 2007-01-30 13:56 · Score: 1

The age of the standalone PC is long dead, but MS doesn't seem to get that.
Isn't Windows Home Server supposed to be their product to accomodate this change? It sounds like they might be getting that.
However, I'd keep with Linux anyway. If a free OS does the job well for you, why change?
Re:I'll Answer This Later by jaypaulw · 2007-01-30 15:45 · Score: 1

is it just me or does this seem a little "tin hattie"
Re:I'll Answer This Later by networkBoy · 2007-01-30 17:13 · Score: 1

sure it is. But as it sits now I have no need to upgrade to vista, and based on some of the DRM stuff I would not be surprised to find something along those lines happening.
-nB

--
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Re:I'll Answer This Later by CDarklock · 2007-01-31 09:24 · Score: 1

Yeah, the price has been going up. When I signed up, it was $99. It's still a hell of a bargain; they've added a lot of software to it since the early days.

--
Microsoft cheerleader, blue flag waving, you got a problem with that?
Re:I'll Answer This Later by Blue+Stone · 2007-02-01 11:16 · Score: 1

I'm still waiting for them to implement -1 PEDANT. :)

--
Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility. - Ambrose Bierce

Still happy on my old stuff by Marillion · 2007-01-30 05:19 · Score: 1, Interesting

Launch? What launch?

Seriously, I have a KVM hooked up to "one of everything" (Linux, Mac, XP) When there is a piece if functionality I need that requires Vista, then I'll think about it. Not before

--
This is a boring sig

Re:Still happy on my old stuff by Nos. · 2007-01-30 05:23 · Score: 2, Interesting

I think a lot of people feel that way. The first thing I can see that may "encourage" me to go to Vista would be some fabulous new game that looks better in, or requires DX10. Other than that, I don't have a reason to upgrade. I'm actually picking up a new box in a few weeks, and I'll be getting a copy of XP with it. That will be my first box with XP. My Windows workstation at home is 2000, and has been for at least 3 years.
Re:Still happy on my old stuff by Mondoz · 2007-01-30 05:49 · Score: 2, Interesting

To me, Vista seems quite a bit like the current state of the next generation DVDs. Most people don't need them or get any benefit from them, but the media companies are really pushing to re-sell the same stuff to people that they already have.
People already have most of what's in Vista, they really don't need the upgrade, but MS would have you believe it's so much better that it's actually worthwhile to get... just so they can re-sell the same stuff to people that they already have.
There's no real need for this stuff, but they're trying to create a market there anyway.

Personally, I've never gone beyond W2K. I still don't see a compelling reason to "upgrade"

--
/sig

Wait for sp1 by Joe+The+Dragon · 2007-01-30 05:21 · Score: 1

I have a free copy of vista and I am thinking about waiting for sp1

Re:Wait for sp1 by lonechicken · 2007-01-30 05:25 · Score: 2, Interesting

I have a free copy of vista and I am thinking about waiting for sp1 So do I. MSDN tempts me to install lots of stuff early, but Vista wasn't one of them. Too much of a potential pain to go back if something goes wrong.
Re:Wait for sp1 by Joe+The+Dragon · 2007-01-30 05:45 · Score: 1

I only have the 32bit one can I use any time upgrade to get Ultimate 64?

Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by xzvf · 2007-01-30 05:22 · Score: 5, Funny

I drove by the local Best Buy and Circuit City and didn't see any lines.

Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Planky · 2007-01-30 05:32 · Score: 5, Funny

No, I was in my car... checking for lines...
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Dmala · 2007-01-30 05:40 · Score: 1

I had to laugh when I heard about the whole "midnight release" thing. I mean, I can sort of see the excitement of getting the hottest new console or game like that, but even if Vista were every bit as good as it's cracked up to be, it's still just an operating system.
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:15 · Score: 0

I just heard a radio news item about a local CompUSA - a dozen or so waiting for the store to open to get the new Vista. Not even close to the Windows95 frenzy.
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by abigor · 2007-01-30 06:19 · Score: 1

I take it you weren't around when Windows 95 was released? There were lineups at midnight.
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by westlake · 2007-01-30 06:38 · Score: 1

I drove by the local Best Buy and Circuit City and didn't see any lines.
drive by Amazon.com and the picture changes, with Vista Ultimate Upgrade at #3 and Vista Ultimate full version at #8 in sales (1:30 PM ET January 30).
sales are even stronger in Canada and the UK, with Vista Ultimate Upgrade #1 at Amazon.ca.
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by DimGeo · 2007-01-30 06:47 · Score: 1

Went past the company store on the way to work. The line was quite long. All MS employees. Looks like I'll have to wait a few days...
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:05 · Score: 1, Insightful

Actually, I would not have been surprised. The city I live in, Syracuse, NY, had no laptops for sale this past weekend. All of the XP machines were sold out and the stores were under quarantine from Microsoft not to sell Vista machines until the 30th or face a $100,000 "fine" from MS. This was according to a Circuit City sales person. There was a poor sap in Circuit City that was looking at them and complaining to said rep how his laptop broke and he couldn't buy one this weekend because no one could sell laptops.

Yes, MS is a monopoly.
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by laffer1 · 2007-01-30 07:52 · Score: 1

Well you're not going to see gamers running to get vista. It doesn't play very many games. I've got Vista x64 Ultimate (technet) installed. Until today, you couldn't get a beta driver from nvidia to play any opengl games. The support was so slow that Enemy territory wouldn't run without freezing on the intro. As of today, if you download the 8800 beta driver it will also support some of the older cards. (7300 GS PCIE in my case) ET then ran and I got kicked for a missing system call by PB while connected to my own server.

I'm hoping Microsoft and game companies will both release updates to fix gaming problems. WoW works, but you have to manually run the update with admin rights last I checked. I don't play WoW that often.

If you are a gamer, don't bother with vista just yet. Stick with XP. ATI/AMD appears to be ahead on vista drivers if you need to buy a new card and use vista.

As for cpu spikes and things, my system is using about 4% cpu and 30% physical ram right now. I'm running firefox, xfire, windows live messenger, steam, and windows defender is on. This is a pentium d 805 with 2.5GB DDR2.

--
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 09:24 · Score: 0

Which company store was that? Apple?
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Some_Llama · 2007-01-30 09:25 · Score: 1

"Went past the company store on the way to work. The line was quite long. All MS employees. Looks like I'll have to wait a few days..."

But if you are an MS employee and you didn't show some kind of Vista support (like omg i'm installing it right now) wouldn't that look bad on you as an employee? Could these people be chalked up more to show than actually "needing" Vista?

I'm not trying to troll, just curious, from what I have read on the MS blogs it seems to be the case?
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Dutch+Gun · 2007-01-30 10:40 · Score: 1

Honestly, I think part of the lack of excitement is that operating system development is stabilizing. The technology is reached a threshold of predictable evolution rather than generational revolution, and that's just not quite as exciting to watch.

Windows 95 was a pretty big leap from 3.1. And think of the leap from command-line OS's to the first Macintosh (Lisa doesn't count - no one owned one of those). It's pretty much the same with any technology you can think of. As the technology matures, the differences between generations becomes much more subtle - at least to the end-user - and hence a bit less exciting/dramatic (revolutions are the exception, I think).

I believe operating systems are fast approaching this threshold level of maturity. Office applications pretty much reached this point a few years ago (what else does a word processor need?). Video games are among the most technologically demanding of applications, and so still have not reached this point.

--
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Trogre · 2007-01-30 10:53 · Score: 1

And here I was with a stack of Ubuntu CDs ready to hand out to anyone who bothered to turn up.

--
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by DimGeo · 2007-01-30 11:12 · Score: 1

I'm new here, so they'll understand my apparent disregard for common sense. Actually, I've been using the x64 RTM on my main dev machine for quite some time now and it works well. Haven't tested any games, since I haven't installed it at home yet. If gzdoom doesn't behave... I doubt I will be using it for gaming :P .
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by Sj0 · 2007-01-30 14:53 · Score: 1

Video games are among the most technologically demanding of applications, and so still have not reached this point.

Look again. There might be more impressive shaders, but most of the really big and amazing things are already out there.

--
It's been a long time.
Re:Anyone stand in line to buy Vista at midnight? by sfe_software · 2007-01-30 17:36 · Score: 1

I had to laugh when I heard about the whole "midnight release" thing. I mean, I can sort of see the excitement of getting the hottest new console or game like that, but even if Vista were every bit as good as it's cracked up to be, it's still just an operating system.

I remember when Windows 2000 first came out. I lived in Kissimmee, FL at the time, and there were in fact lines outside the local CompUSA et al that night. February 17, 2000 IIRC. I rushed out later that day to get a copy.

However the difference is that Win2k was the first "consumer" Windows OS based on the NT kernel, and at the time you either had 98, 98SE, or worse yet ME. NT4 didn't support most games or multimedia applications. Win2k finally combined the stability of NT with the widespread support of the 9x line.

XP wasn't such a big deal, being not much more IMO than 2000 with some visual "enhancements". It wasn't a "must have" upgrade in the beginning. As a Windows software developer I had no choice but to "upgrade" but for most there was no really compelling reason to rush out and do so right away.

Vista, to me personally, is similar. Most of the new features are simply eye-candy, thus requiring newer and faster hardware, but not really adding much to the core. I will end up picking up a copy soon, but not because I feel I need it - but because I have to ensure my software products work well under the OS that will, soon, be the default on new computers my users may purchase...

As far as there being bugs and viruses popping up immediately after the official release, I doubt anyone is very surprised by this. Bugs often hide until a product is introduced to situations previously unencountered; and virus authors presumably will wait for the final release, for maximum effect...

--
NGWave - Fast Sound Editor for Windows

I'll stick with Internet Explorer by andy314159pi · 2007-01-30 05:22 · Score: 5, Funny

I prefer the Internet Explorer to the Vista. And If I have to buy a new Vista then I hope the fucking drinkholder doesn't break on the first day I use it.

Re:I'll stick with Internet Explorer by 32Na · 2007-01-30 05:30 · Score: 1

Man, it's a ripoff: the new ones don't even come with drinkholders!
Re:I'll stick with Internet Explorer by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:36 · Score: 0

whoever modded the O.P. offtopic needs to develop some sort of sense of humor.
Re:I'll stick with Internet Explorer by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:05 · Score: 0

That's not a drinkholder. You're supposed to put your dick in it.
Re:I'll stick with Internet Explorer by WeblionX · 2007-01-30 06:20 · Score: 1

Only the smaller ones, but those come with pancake holders instead.

--
(\(\ (=_=) Bani! (")")
Re:I'll stick with Internet Explorer by nytes · 2007-01-30 14:26 · Score: 3, Funny

My Macbook doesn't even have a drink holder! It just has a slot to store my credit cards.

--
-- I have monkeys in my pants.

it's been by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:22 · Score: 1, Funny

What's the launch of Vista been like for you? Unimportant.

Re:it's been by MS-06FZ · 2007-01-30 06:15 · Score: 1

I don't know, I think it could be an event we'll remember forever, and tell our grandkids about - like how my parents' generation remembers where they were when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon (and that other guy didn't). We'll look back and say, "I remember where I was when Microsoft released Vista..."

--
---GEC
I'm but the humble pupil, seeking to snatch the scratchbuilt pebble from the master's fully articulated hand

No Way! by Robber+Baron · 2007-01-30 05:24 · Score: 3, Interesting

Are you supporting it in a business environment? No way I'll be deploying this anytime soon. We've only just managed to get the kinks ironed out of XP.

For one client who is a medical service provider, I'm pretty sure that the "rights" that M$ has awarded itself via Vista's EULA are at odds with the requirements for keeping clients' medical records confidential. So until someone can provide assurances to the contrary, Vista isn't coming anywhere near their facilities.

--

You're using her as bait, Master!

Re:No Way! by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:03 · Score: 0

No way I'll be deploying this anytime soon. We've only just managed to get the kinks ironed out of XP.

I've gotta ask: What took you so long? XP has been out for over five years. And pre-release versions prior to that. I understand that companies need some time but five years is a little long. Especially given that people were faulting Microsoft for taking five years to get a new OS out the door.
Re:No Way! by bill_mcgonigle · 2007-01-30 06:23 · Score: 1

For one client who is a medical service provider, I'm pretty sure that the "rights" that M$ has awarded itself via Vista's EULA are at odds with the requirements for keeping clients' medical records confidential. So until someone can provide assurances to the contrary, Vista isn't coming anywhere near their facilities.

I thought Microsoft's right to remote access went into XP SP1? There was HIPAA uproar at that time. Everybody stepped into line subsequently.

--
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Re:No Way! by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:38 · Score: 0

"What took you so long? XP has been out for over five years."

Not surprising. Some companies wait for SP1 before deploying or wait several years so the initial security problems are somewhat ironed out and testing is completed. I just got XP at work only a couple years ago. This is a very large company with name recognition. I think it's foolish for any business to immediately get any new OS release from Microsoft. Their history speaks for itself.
Re:No Way! by LordSnooty · 2007-01-30 08:10 · Score: 1

It would seem so. This article (dated 2003) even mentions concerns in the banking sector. But it all seemed to blow over.
Re:No Way! by bill_mcgonigle · 2007-01-30 08:57 · Score: 1

But it all seemed to blow over.

Yeah, it's not like there's another choice but to accept their terms...

--
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)

2008 by Conception · 2007-01-30 05:24 · Score: 4, Insightful

We got a business copy to play with, and I decided we aren't going to deploy it until 2008. Untested, not significantly better than XP and as such, not worth the time and money to retrain techs and users.

Re:2008 by jimstapleton · 2007-01-30 05:31 · Score: 5, Funny

slow down cowboy! 2008? Isn't it a bit risky to go that fast?

Note: as much as that may read like sarcasm, it wasn't. I'm quite serious.

--
34486853790
Connection too slow for X forwarding? Try "ssh -CX user@host"
Re:2008 by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:21 · Score: 0

Since your post is without sarcasm, it only suggests ignorance. If it had been sarcasm I'd have laughed. Alas, no laughter from me :(
Re:2008 by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:32 · Score: 0

Honestly, who here would have updated Win98 if the OS had actually been stable. The day MS produce a stable, secure OS is the day their OS business dies. So where's the business case to actually fix the problems?
Re:2008 by baggins2001 · 2007-01-30 15:49 · Score: 1

I know of one major company with 40,000 employees that made the announcement company wide that no computers with Vista were to be installed until 2009. It was specifically directing to people who were buying equipment to make sure they told their vendors that equipment that ran with Vista was not to be purchased. The specifics of why I don't know.
I do know that some of our vendors were still in test last year for versions of software that would run on XP.
We were offered a free copy of the $20,000 software if we would participate in their beta test. We said no thanks.

--
He who said 1,000,000 monkeys on 1,000,000 typewriters would eventually type the great novel, never saw an AOL chat room
Re:2008 by baggins2001 · 2007-01-30 15:53 · Score: 1

This also happens to be the year after they are scheduled to facilitize their new manufacturing facility.

--
He who said 1,000,000 monkeys on 1,000,000 typewriters would eventually type the great novel, never saw an AOL chat room
Re:2008 by aibrahim · 2007-02-01 11:35 · Score: 1

Honestly, who here would have updated Win98 if the OS had actually been stable. The day MS produce a stable, secure OS is the day their OS business dies. So where's the business case to actually fix the problems?

No, its just the day that Microsoft has to actually start innovating their OS product.

As to the business case, I'd suggest MSFT employee morale. People there would often like to be on more "exciting" projects involving new development. This is not practical of course due to the massive load of bugs in the system.

The real issue is that MSFT needs to kill the Windows product and start over. Not tomorrow or anything, but like in 2015. Vista should be the last system with a Windows heritage. MSFT should work to squish all the bugs and make sure the system is easily virtualized.

In the meantime they should start work on an entirely new OS. One without all the backwards compatible cruft. One that integrates some of the things they had to cut out of Vista in its core. I think some of the core concepts in Plan 9 are ready for wider deployment. Core integration of a relational file system, with extensive support for metadata is essential, as the number of files and objects in a system jump into the millions. So is core support for distributed computing. You should be able to plug a computer into the LAN and have it close to instantly available to applications on "your" system for storage, computation and human interfaces (display, audio, keyboard etc.).

--

Don't post innacurate information
If you do, I swear by my pretty floral bonnet I will end you.

Our utility company said NO by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:24 · Score: 0

We run a large multistate utility with several thousands of users scattered all over the country. Our department said there is nothing there they need. If the new PCs come with Vista, most will be rerolled to XP until otherwise deamed.

Also being discussed at the BBC by Zebadias · 2007-01-30 05:25 · Score: 1

Have your say at bbc.co.uk

http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?thread ID=5388&&edition=1&ttl=20070130172218/

Re:Also being discussed at the BBC by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:39 · Score: 0

Judging from the thread at the bbc, this cant be good for M$.

Vista Launch by PoconoPCDoctor · 2007-01-30 05:25 · Score: 0

I went to a MS Vista/Office/Exchange launch event. The presenter, a Michael Murphy, demoed Vista, Office 2007, and Exchange 2007. Each demo took a little less than an hour.The biggest takeaway I remember is his prediction that all software would be delivered in 5 years - ala Google Office.

Also, it's all going happen on a little portable device - the end of computing as we know it. So gather those motherboards while ye may, for the times, they are a changin.

Nice black launch t-shirt, though.

--
"Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair" - George Washington

Windows Vista - The Cow Starts Now! by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:25 · Score: 3, Insightful

I watched the Vista introduction video this morning. On most of the stuff they demoed I was thinking to myself, "I've had this on Mac OS X for a few years now."

A few things I see Windows/Vista as being ahead of the game in are:

1) Microsoft Office 2007 (The Mac version will no doubt be way behind the Windows version in both UI and feature parity.)
2) HD Home Theatre/Media/IPTV (Apple TV has potential, but it's not quite there yet)
3) Gaming (I personally don't care much about gaming)
4) Enterprise - Active Directory, Exchange, GPOs, SharePoint, etc. (I wish Apple would tackle this)

What do you all think about Vista or it's introduction video? That family lady was sure proud she invented the "burn to cd" button ;)
Video: http://www.microsoft.com/events/executives/billgat es.mspx

Re:Windows Vista - The Cow Starts Now! by Shawn+is+an+Asshole · 2007-01-30 06:18 · Score: 1

Microsoft Office 2007 (The Mac version will no doubt be way behind the Windows version in both UI and feature parity.) Are you sure about that? Office 2004's GUI (OS X) was way ahead of Office 2003's GUI (Windows), IMHO. Here's a screenshot (that's Jessica Alba in the background...).

--
"It ain't a war against drugs.it's a war against personal freedom" --Bill Hicks
Re:Windows Vista - The Cow Starts Now! by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:29 · Score: 0

Excuse me... Are you sure that OFFICE 2007 requires NT VISTA 6.0 to run?

Methodologically, development of MSOFFICE always takes place on the previous (stable) release of NT, never on Beta NT.
Re:Windows Vista - The Cow Starts Now! by NeMon'ess · 2007-01-30 08:07 · Score: 2, Insightful

On most of the stuff they demoed I was thinking to myself, "I've had this on Mac OS X for a few years now."

As true as that may be, Vista has them now, and it's going to be harder to get people to switch to OSX.
Re:Windows Vista - The Cow Starts Now! by Udo+Schmitz · 2007-01-30 08:08 · Score: 1

What do you all think about Vista or it's introduction video?
Haven't seen it. I found this sad, sad picturedepressing enough for one day.
Re:Windows Vista - The Cow Starts Now! by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 12:41 · Score: 0

I can feel the smug just emanating from this post
Re:Windows Vista - The Cow Starts Now! by drsmithy · 2007-01-30 14:01 · Score: 1

I watched the Vista introduction video this morning. On most of the stuff they demoed I was thinking to myself, "I've had this on Mac OS X for a few years now."
Ah, I remember thinking the same thing when OS X was released...

What I like about Vista by rsilvergun · 2007-01-30 05:26 · Score: 3, Insightful

is the memory tester :). I can't tell you how many OEM 98 boxen I've upgraded to XP only to have the install blow up due to bad RAM ( XP copies the contents of the CD into ram before coping it to harddrive). Wasn't there a /. story years ago about some major OEMs getting caught selling bad RAM because Windows 98 had that quirk where it wouldn't use the top 20% or system RAM unless you hacked the registry?

--
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Re:What I like about Vista by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:42 · Score: 0

Just thought I'd point out that pretty much every other operating system has had a memory tester built in. If I reboot the box I'm typing this on and interrupt the boot loader, one of the options is memtest. If I boot from any Linux LiveCD released in the last five years, one of the options is memtest.
Re:What I like about Vista by Volante3192 · 2007-01-30 05:44 · Score: 2, Informative

is the memory tester...

That's not an reason. Just pull off a freeware tester. I've used http://www.memtest.org/ using the bootable CD
version on a few occassions and had it pick up problems on two seperate occassions.
Re:What I like about Vista by |/|/||| · 2007-01-30 05:58 · Score: 2, Informative

Here's a link to the MS memory diagnostic tool, which doesn't require vista. It extracts to a bootable CD image. Pretty handy to have around if you think your RAM is causing problems.
As for this whole vista release thing, it's nothing but a disappointment in my view. As many others have pointed out, it's only a matter of time before a really useful piece of software *requires* vista. I'm in a situation right now where I'm going to have to go from 2000 to XP in order to use some new software.
Note that I don't think OS upgrades are necessarily a bad thing - in fact they're usually a *good* thing. The problem that I have with the newer versions of Windows is all of the crap that MS is slipping in behind the scenes. Sure, I'll buy a new OS with better stability (they've come a long way since Win98) better multimedia capabilities built-in to the OS, etc. Forced DRM, product activation, "Trusted" computing, and gestapo paperwork checks in order to download patches? No thanks. Hopefully by the time XP is no longer supported, I'll be able to do everything I need to on Linux.

--
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Re:What I like about Vista by Doctor+Crumb · 2007-01-30 06:01 · Score: 1

so they put in a copy of memtest86?
Re:What I like about Vista by Windowser · 2007-01-30 06:14 · Score: 0, Troll

Or just boot Knoppix and type "memtest" at the prompt

Knoppix : the first tool you need when you have to support PCs

--
Avoid the MS tax, always buy I.B.M. PC's (I Built-it Myself)
Re:What I like about Vista by celtic_hackr · 2007-01-30 07:25 · Score: 1

Here's an idea.

Download a Linux LiveCd (any distro, really), for free. That'd be whole LOT cheaper (in more ways than 1). Use it to test any "new" RAM you buy and return the defective ones from where you bought it. then go buy from someone more reputable.

If you have problems with RAM going bad on you, try to turn down your OVERCLOCKING some. ;')

Hint: If you can cook steak on your CPU, you've probably overclocked your system too much!

I've got an old (ok ancient) XT board, with a whopping 640KB of RAM. All of the chips are still good except for one. That memory is going on 26 years old. I bought them new. Yeah, I'm an OLD F***ER, but hey, my memory still works (mostly).

As far as Vista goes, I'll go back to using my version of Windows 1.01 before using it. Or maybe, I'll write a chroot wrapper around a VM, and make Vista think it's running live.

Oh, wait, that would break the license agreement. Therefore, I'll have to get a stranger to install it for me and click on the click-through agreement.
That would probably violate the license agreement also. But then since I wouldn't be a party to the agreement, but just the owner of a physical product, I wouldn't be bound by the agreement. Theoretically speaking of course.
Not sure how a judge would like that. But it would be a good test of the limits of the license. Sadly, we seem to be stuck with authors forcing these licenses on us. Like the BSD and GPL licenses also. Imagine what it would be like to go to a used bookstore, if books had these licenses in them?

Clerk: "I can't sell you this used Psychology textbook unless you agree to participate in an experiment of Lot#37, or the latest Lot# experiment. Do you agree?".
Student:[blank look]
Re:What I like about Vista by Mex · 2007-01-30 08:54 · Score: 1

Wow. If that's all it takes to impress you, then I guess Vista is worth 400 dollars for you ;)
Re:What I like about Vista by WuphonsReach · 2007-02-04 15:56 · Score: 1

Memtest86 / Memtest86+ are not very good at finding memory issues. They work, but only in cases where the memory is completely bad (an actual failed section).

What they don't do well is find RAM that is marginal, overlocked or misclocked. Because the only way to find such issues is to load the system down (CPU *and* RAM simultaneously). And Memtest doesn't do much with the CPU.

For real RAM testing, try running Prime95 in torture test mode for a few days. (Folks have been doing this for about 10 years now.) If you can manage to run Prime95 for a few days without any errors, you can call your system stable.

--
Wolde you bothe eate your cake, and have your cake?

Lacking innovation by jeichels · 2007-01-30 05:26 · Score: 1, Insightful

Though I have not used it yet, my sense of what I have read from others is lack of innovation and more concern in general for the media companies then the end users. Putting in an OS things that would degrade media quality is a bit shocking to me personally. People have complained over unnecessary security degrading machine performance towards games, etc. The people I know tend to want to stay on XP for as long as possible because they feel they would like the more chances of viruses then that they have invited a Big Brother into their home.

http://jobbank.com/ - the job bank. Search jobs, post resume, post job, career tools.

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jobbank.com - Search jobs, post resume,

Re:Lacking innovation by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:33 · Score: 0

the job bank. Search jobs, post resume, post job, career tools.

Please keep advertisements in your signature, so that they can be filtered out by people that don't want to read them. Thanks.
Re:Lacking innovation by AlexMax2742 · 2007-01-30 06:23 · Score: 1

You're pretty much on the money there. I got Vista a couple of days ago through MSDNAA, and while Vista is certainly not bad, I just can't beleive it took them five friggin' years to deliver what is essentially a pretty version of XP. Remember how XP introduced the "Friendly" Control Panel that was essentially a front end over the same Control Panel we've been using since Windows 95? Well, they've used that mentality and copied it to other things, like display driver properties, and Windows Explorer (which now has twice as many useless sidebars I'l never use). I was actually looking forward to Monad, but they didn't bother to integrate it into Vista, so because it's not a standard part of the package, it's probably never going to be seriously used until the next version of Windows Server.
As far as completely new things go, the User Access Control is a pain in the butt, and I disabled it within 5 minutes. The only thing which took me a shorter time to disable was the desktop widgets engine, which was useless since you had to be looking at the desktop to use them. Why didn't they take a cue from Mac OS X or Yahoo! widget engine and allow me to bind a key to have widgets pop up, I'll never guess. Aero sure is pretty, and the fact that the windows are semi-transparent even with video going on in the background is neat, but stylisticly it looks a little cobbled-tgether, especially with programs designed for earler versions of Windows (which is to say pretty much all of them), and I much prefered my themes for XP overall. (By the way, if anyone can find the last version of the Extensis theme, I would be greatful. The author seems to have nuked it from his deviantart page and I can't seem to find it anywhere else).
The drivers also have a long way to go. I'm using nvidia drivers from the first week of January, and I'm getting model spiking problems where I previously had none, in pretty much all of my games (and I am pretty much positive that it's not a hardware or heating problem). Supposedly recent beta drivers fix it, but they're not final yet. Also, the drivers for my VIA Envy24 chipset sound card are a little flakey, as the sound tends to stutter under high CPU load where it previously worked just fine, though I suspect it might be the fault of Vista's draconian DRM scheme. Speaking of which, I haven't run into any direct problems with Vista's DRM scheme, and don't plan to, since all of my media is inherantly unprotected (Musepack encoded CD-rips and DVD's watched with VLC).
Overall, it's OK, and worth going for if you're buying a new computer, but if you already have a computer with XP on it, then I'd stick with XP unless you can get it for free through MSDNAA or through other means. Vista is nothing too special, and defeniatly not as groundbreaking as OS9 -> OSX was.

--
I'm the guy with the unpopular opinion
Re:Lacking innovation by archen · 2007-01-30 07:00 · Score: 1

As far as completely new things go, the User Access Control is a pain in the butt, and I disabled it within 5 minutes.

I am severely tempted to do that myself, but having done the same thing in XP I'm now forcing myself to use the defaults - because when you sit down at a foreign pc that's most likely what you're going to have to deal with. After a week of trying to adjust things (and get Vista to work with Samba roaming profiles) I'm not sure it's even worth the effort.
Re:Lacking innovation by ChronoReverse · 2007-01-30 07:03 · Score: 1

There's a good reason for the sound stutter. MS removed hardware accelerated sound for some stupid reason.

Anyways, it could possibly be a driver issue, but we'll see.

Vista release by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:26 · Score: 0

was nothing spectacular or special to me or any of my friends/co-workers. Been using it since beta and have not been terribly impressed with anything. It is no more a new OS than WinME was to Win98. Some new eye candy, a lot of bloat and HUGE hardware requirements just to be able to do anything with Aeroglass on. Just more of the same in a new package with a new name. It almost makes me sad to see that MS has spent over $6 billon to bring this to market.

It only just now launched?? by kahei · 2007-01-30 05:26 · Score: 5, Funny

Wait, I've been hearing about Vista on Slashdot twice a day for the last six months (at least that's how it feels) and it only just now launched?

I cringe at the thought of the barrage of Slashdot articles that will inevitably ensue!

Feb 1st, 5am: Vista failing to meet sales targets?
Feb 1st, 9am: Vista crash ruins breakfast for millions
Feb 1st, 6pm: Vista's first day: an in-depth analysis on some blog-type thing
Feb 2nd, 1:30am: Vista! Vista! Vista!
Feb 2nd, 8am: Vista still available after several days
Feb 3rd, 1pm: Vista 'ate my hair' claims Sacramento teen
Feb 3rd, 5pm: What's wrong with Vista? Six beardy Unix guys have their say
Feb 3rd, 11:30pm: Vista vs MacOSX -- a Mac fan comments
Feb 4th, 8:15am: Vista a flop already, say pundits
Feb 4th, 9am: Poll: Is Vista inadequately covered on Slashdot?
Feb 4th, 9:45am: Ten things fatally wrong with the Vista shutdown menu

*panic panic*

--
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.

Re:It only just now launched?? by ZachPruckowski · 2007-01-30 05:34 · Score: 1

Yeah, basically. The fact is that Windows is the largest operating system by a 15-to-1 margin over its closest competitors. When Joe Normal looks at a PC, he sees Windows. Therefore we're going to get a lot of tech stories on the subject. I mean, if the 10 o'clock news can cover it, we're going to see a lot of coverage in tech circles.
Re:It only just now launched?? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:34 · Score: 0

Hi, I'm from Slashdot. Want a job?
Re:It only just now launched?? by Brian+Gordon · 2007-01-30 05:35 · Score: 1

Don't forget: Feb 5th, 9am: No games yet announced for DX10 platform Feb 5th, 10am: Still no games requiring DX10 Aug 7th, 2pm: Barbie Vacation Adventure announced requiring DX10, first customer hesitantly orders Vista
Re:It only just now launched?? by Conception · 2007-01-30 05:39 · Score: 1

Well, it's been available to businesses. It just launched in stores.
Re:It only just now launched?? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:53 · Score: 0

Feb 4th, 9:45am: Ten things fatally wrong with the Vista shutdown menu

Actually, there are only eight options in the shutdown menus, two of which are dupes (Is Taco working at Microsoft now?). You do still go to START to stop the computer though.
Re:It only just now launched?? by Goaway · 2007-01-30 05:58 · Score: 1

You do still go to START to stop the computer though.

As silly as this is, it's still better than Ubuntu where you select "Quit" in order to not quit.
Re:It only just now launched?? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:59 · Score: 0

Funny?

Who modded it funny? This is the most insightfull post in this whole article!

Oh to answer the question in the original article, I won't be updating to Vista, but wait patiently for Gnome/KDE to clone the features in the next several version.
Re:It only just now launched?? by Goaway · 2007-01-30 06:00 · Score: 4, Funny

What's wrong with Vista? Six beardy Unix guys have their say

You understand Slashdot better than anybody should have to.
Re:It only just now launched?? by andy314159pi · 2007-01-30 06:01 · Score: 1

You do still go to START to stop the computer though.
I always shut my computer down my unplugging it at the wall. The firemarshall instructed me to do this so that it doesn't attack me while I sleep.
Re:It only just now launched?? by IflyRC · 2007-01-30 06:44 · Score: 1

I'm sure the 10 o'clock news won't have the same angle on the story as slashdot.
Re:It only just now launched?? by soft_guy · 2007-01-30 06:48 · Score: 1

The fact is that Windows is the largest operating system by a 15-to-1 margin over its closest competitors. We'll see if it stays that way. Vista has a lot of stuff in it to screw the user. It is also being marketed in a very incompetent way (for example: too many versions of Vista creating confusion). Plus, it is not getting good press. It would not be surprising to me if Vista fails and by fails I mean that most people will stay with XP and a larger minority moving to MacOS X or Linux resulting in marketshare loses for Microsoft.

--
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
Re:It only just now launched?? by Quiet_Desperation · 2007-01-30 08:51 · Score: 1

Dec 31: Vista takes over OS world because the computer buying decision for 99% of the corporate market is in the hands of, like, seven IT guys who have a big interest in job security.
Re:It only just now launched?? by caluml · 2007-01-30 10:35 · Score: 1

It would not be surprising to me if Vista fails and by fails I mean that most people will stay with XP and a larger minority moving to MacOS X or Linux resulting in marketshare loses for Microsoft.
I think I heard the same thing when XP came out.

--
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Re:It only just now launched?? by ChronoReverse · 2007-01-30 10:44 · Score: 1

So I start a shutdown of my computer. Rather silly nitpick anyways.
Re:It only just now launched?? by soft_guy · 2007-02-02 10:36 · Score: 1

I think I heard the same thing when XP came out. I didn't. At the time I was working for a company that supplied technology to large 3rd party developers to help protect them against Microsoft (I don't want to go into specific because its just too jackass...), but major third parties were scared shitless by XP. They were convinced Microsoft was just going to come and take everything they had.

The same is NOT true with Vista.

--
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score

Wait and see... by Gaspo · 2007-01-30 05:26 · Score: 1

I work at an office supply store, and people have been asking about it a good bit. We'll see what happens, but for now, I'm going to hold off on migrating. I tried RC1 and RC2, and they just didn't seem worth it, in the long run. I'm going to reevaluation in 6-9 months, and see where things stand at that point.

This launch... by igny · 2007-01-30 05:26 · Score: 3, Funny

upgrades the DRM status from the DNF to the DOA.

--
In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. - Yogi Berra

Re:This launch... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:18 · Score: 0

What is wrong with people on Slashdot. Some idiot decided that DRM in Vista was a big deal, now everyone bitches about it non stop. Let's review the big deal about vista DRM:

What you can do:
* Rip a CD
* Copy a CD
* Play a CD/mp3 at full quality
* Rip a DVD
* Copy a DVD
* Play a DVD at full quality
* Play a BluRay/HDDVD at full quality on your monitor

What you can not do:
* Play a BluRay/HDDVD at full quality on your HDMI output

Oh my god! It's the end of the world! I don't even have a BluRay/HDDVD drive, and I don't have a HDMI output. If I had both of these on a linux box, I would still not be able to play the content. Even then, I would need an HDTV to plug into my computer. WHAT IS THE BIG DEAL!?!?!?!?!

People on slashdot make it sound like all drivers and apps on Vista need to be digitally signed by the MPAA/RIAA and they also have remote access to your hard drive and can delete whatever content they like. Also, you have to pay a fee for each mp3 or CD you play on your computer even if you already purchased it legally. If you try to go around any of these protections you loose your vista license and the cops will be alerted. Also, no 3rd party apps will be allowed, and you are no longer able to compile binaries because the exes are not signed.
Re:This launch... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 09:00 · Score: 0

... all drivers and apps ... need to be digitally signed by the MPAA/RIAA and they also have remote access to your hard drive and can delete whatever content they like. Also, you have to pay a fee for each mp3 or CD you play on your computer even if you already purchased it legally. If you try to go around any of these protections you loose your vista license and the cops will be alerted. Also, no 3rd party apps will be allowed, and you are no longer able to compile binaries because the exes are not signed.

Shhhh ... I'm pretty sure you're violating your NDA by giving away Microsoft's trade secrets for the next version of their OS.

Not for me... by s31523 · 2007-01-30 05:27 · Score: 4, Insightful

Sounds like there is a lot of "overhead", and by overhead I mean fairly useless crap to support eye candy. I am a software engineer. I need my PC to run applications, with the machines resources dedicated to my compiles, debug session, code searches, CASE tools, etc. I don't need a search agent running, a little animated doggie, crazy OS graphics, monitoring software for unauthorized content playing out of my audio port, or any of the other "features" of Vista.

In my opinion, M$ should dumb down Vista. It sounds like they spent a lot of time revamping their kernel and they should have released (or should release) a lean version with, as the Nissan Xterra commercial says, "everything you need, nothing you don't".

I just wish more of my development apps ran under Linux.

Re:Not for me... by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF · 2007-01-30 05:52 · Score: 2, Informative

Sounds like there is a lot of "overhead", and by overhead I mean fairly useless crap to support eye candy.

Actually, what happened is about 4 years ago someone realized that most of the time fancy graphics processors are sitting idle, so someone decided to offload some of the basic UI functions to it saving CPU use. They also realized they could add "eye candy" that was cool looking and in some cases actually useful, as in providing visual clues to the user about what the OS is doing without any real cost in currently used resources. Not all "eye candy" is useless. Now Windows has caught up in adding this stuff, but it is only available if you have a sufficient video card, in which case it isn't really using much in the way of resources that are normally constrained.

I am a software engineer. I need my PC to run applications, with the machines resources dedicated to my compiles, debug session, code searches, CASE tools, etc. I don't need a search agent running...

I find the realtime indexing and search in OS X quite useful for finding the right file or function call in large builds. It's also nice for finding that preliminary design doc I was e-mailed months ago that was never checked in but which contained more useful info than what is. The fact that I can hit cmd-space-"GRE tunnel redundancy"-enter and have it open a PDF file that might be in my e-mail or in a CVS checkout, or I dropped in a folder somewhere is really useful, to me anyway.

...a little animated doggie...

I haven't seen a doggie anywhere but MS Office, and I think it is gone from there too. Certainly I've not seen it built into Vista. Is there such a thing I missed?

...crazy OS graphics...

So long as it is not using my bottleneck resources, some nice graphics that mentally mark where a Window has minimized to, is useful. Not all the graphics are, but some are. It seems like a net win though.

...monitoring software for unauthorized content playing out of my audio port...

I'm not sure how exactly the DRM monitors output, but I agree in principal...

...or any of the other "features" of Vista...

Well, there are a few nice additions in Vista, including some of the items I listed above. There are also a lot of anti-features designed to benefit MS at my expense. All in all, it seems like about a draw. The expense, especially for running in a VM will keep me using Windows XP for my Windows needs, for the foreseeable future. That doesn't mean all the features are useless, however, and as they say, you shouldn't knock 'em till you try em. I never would have suspected the searching feature on OS X that MS cloned would get used, but it does, every day. It often happens that a new feature does not sound useful until I use it, then I can't imagine living without it.
Re:Not for me... by drinkypoo · 2007-01-30 05:58 · Score: 1

I haven't seen a doggie anywhere but MS Office, and I think it is gone from there too. Certainly I've not seen it built into Vista. Is there such a thing I missed?

The doggie shows up the first time you search for files (or anything else from Explorer) in Windows XP, and the second time and so on as well if you're not smart enough to turn him off. Or if for some perverse reason you don't want to.

--
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Re:Not for me... by Traa · 2007-01-30 06:13 · Score: 2, Insightful

I just wish more of my development apps ran under Linux.

Now there is a painfully honest line that explains a lot.
Re:Not for me... by Fatalis · 2007-01-30 08:56 · Score: 1

They're talking about Vista.

--
Deus est fatalis
Re:Not for me... by drinkypoo · 2007-01-30 10:08 · Score: 1

They're talking about Vista.

Actually, I don't think the OP was talking about Vista. I think he was making generalizations about how annoying Windows is.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:Not for me... by mangu · 2007-01-30 10:45 · Score: 1

I just wish more of my development apps ran under Linux.

The last time I said that was when I used Visual C++ version 4. Then I discovered kdevelop and never looked back.

Only dumb hackers release something now by ZachPruckowski · 2007-01-30 05:27 · Score: 1

A smart hacker wouldn't release a virus now, because there's practically no market share for Vista at the moment. I have a feeling that any Vista viruses are gonna be waiting for it to affect more computers.

Migration to Vista will be slow, because business users just finished their XP SP2 migration, and home users are going to be reluctant to pay even $100 or so for an upgrade, because that's a 15-20 percent of the cost of a new PC. Gamers will see reduced performance for now under Vista, and so the only people who will grab Vista are non-gaming enthusiasts, developers, and people who get it delivered on their PCs.

Re:Only dumb hackers release something now by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:53 · Score: 0

A smart hacker wouldn't release a virus now, because there's practically no market share for Vista at the moment.

<joke>Microsoft announces backward compatibility for all 2000/XP viruses. They even setup a tech support team to assist with any problems should a virus be found incompatible.</joke>

As for the launch, I haven't seen anything that can't already be done (if I wanted it) on MS Windows XP. The news reports are all running the "Wow" factor that Bill Gates pushed in some of the demos but it really seems unimpressive. I'll stick with XP & 2003 for my MS Windows requirements and Solaris and Linux (RH) on my servers (that don't require MS only software).

Jim
Re:Only dumb hackers release something now by pilgrim23 · 2007-01-30 05:55 · Score: 1

On the other hand...a REALLY smart hacker would be looking close at the soft underbelly of Vista NOW and release something so smooth, so slick and so undetectable that it gets absorbed into the base VISTA install (next patch, MS dweeb says "What's this? Oh it has the stamp of our Bangalore office, who KNOWS what THEY are doing! It is probably ok and the company is so damn big who can tell..."). Vista goes on its way release after release, patch after patch, and finally, when saturation occurs; Trigger day follows..
I can think of about a dozen similar scenarios. But then I DID here Steve Balmer on a talk show describing the advanced security of Vista... The term "Bald Faced Lie" came to mind...but I would never say that...

--
- Minutus cantorum, minutus balorum, minutus carborata descendum pantorum.
Re:Only dumb hackers release something now by ZachPruckowski · 2007-01-30 06:13 · Score: 1

If a hacker was that smart, there would be little anyone could do about it. If a trusted source of code is compromised silently, that'd screw over MS, but also Apple. Linux might fair better (and certainly would in theory), but that assumes that anyone notices the hole.

Comedy Central Ad by Red+Weasel · 2007-01-30 05:27 · Score: 1

All I know Is that the Comedy Central Spot was hell. Every 3 minutes they would stop and show a REALLY lame Microsoft add. If that is there idea of a "good" marketing I'm dreading the superbowl.

--
..which just shows that the human brain is ill-adapted for thinking and was probably designed for cooling the blood-T P

Re:Comedy Central Ad by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:35 · Score: 0

Is that why I missed 'Scrubs' last night? I guess I'll go back to hating MS again...

Vista, why arn't you good? by Holy69 · 2007-01-30 05:29 · Score: 3, Informative

I've been using Windows Vista for about a month now and I have found it to be more problems then a big worth while upgrade. Vista seems to be a extreme large resource hog that even with my 1 gig of DDR2 ram and a Pentium M 2.0 processor, it still runs somewhat slugish. As time has gone by and the more I use the OS I have run into countless software conflicts, video driver issues, and many other problems that just should not exist in an operating system that has been in the making for so long. Aero, although looking attractive, still poses problems that in the long run should just not exist. If your going to copy Apple, at least make the system itself work properly.

Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by Tony+Hoyle · 2007-01-30 05:45 · Score: 1

Try running XP under VMWare within Vista.

XP runs faster... even with the disadvantage of a virtual machine.

The crazy thing is since both OS's are basically using the same display then vista *could* be much faster.. but it isn't.

Que announcements of crazilly fast processors and large memory motherboards so everyone can get their speed and usability back..
Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by zlogic · 2007-01-30 05:47 · Score: 1

Imagine how it runs on my Celeron M 410 1.4 Ghz with 512 megs of RAM!
I migrated back to XP and I can actually use more than three programs without waiting hours after I move the mouse and something happens on the screen.
Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by jaguar5150 · 2007-01-30 06:00 · Score: 1

And you are basing your opinion on an RC version of the software? While I understand that RCs are supposed to be just what their name implies, there are certainly some fixes between an RC and actual release. Drivers are also not the responsibility of Microsoft. I have not had a look myself at any version of Vista, but at least try the release and obtain some release versions of drivers and fully compatible software before forming your opinion.
Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by Shawn+is+an+Asshole · 2007-01-30 06:27 · Score: 1

You do know that Vista and Office 2007 were released to businesses in November, right?

--
"It ain't a war against drugs.it's a war against personal freedom" --Bill Hicks
Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by maxwells_deamon · 2007-01-30 06:34 · Score: 1

Yes, The released version is faster by a visible amount over the betas/RCs on the same hardware.
Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 09:24 · Score: 0

Vista seems to be a extreme large resource hog that even with my 1 gig of DDR2 ram and a Pentium M 2.0 processor, it still runs somewhat slugish... If your going to copy Apple, at least make the system itself work properly.
OS X did not work properly until 10.2 was released 17 months (and an additional $129) after 10.0 was released. OS X was a sluggish resource hog until version 10.2. Expect Vista to "work properly" within 17 months, but with free updates.
Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by jaguar5150 · 2007-01-30 11:19 · Score: 1

I did not. Thank you for clarifying that. I apologize for my naiveté :)
Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:19 · Score: 0

If your going to copy Apple, at least make the system itself work properly.

Apple patented that part.
Re:Vista, why arn't you good? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 18:06 · Score: 0

Well ya, what do you expect from beta software?

Re:First Post! by neoform · 2007-01-30 05:29 · Score: 0, Offtopic

it wasn't the "lameness filter" that caused you to not get first post..

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MABASPLOOM!

nobody waiting at Wal*Mart by green+pizza · 2007-01-30 05:29 · Score: 0, Redundant

I was at my local Wal*Mart last night around midnight and I didn't see anyone waiting for the electronics department to cart out the Vista display.

The world seems different by Alien54 · 2007-01-30 05:30 · Score: 4, Funny

Sort of like all the colors are in HiDef, slightly oversaturated.

and everthing looks slightly puffy

like it's bloated, or slightly over-inflated

Almost like the world has been redone in the Microsoft Cute Theme.

Can Steve Ballmer look Cute? (Now that's an image ....)

Will let you know when I see more....

--
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"

Re:The world seems different by bdonalds · 2007-01-30 07:23 · Score: 1

"It's the meers."

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The most important thing to do in your life is to not interfere with somebody else's life. -FZ

compatibility issues? by 192939495969798999 · 2007-01-30 05:30 · Score: 1

I would be waiting at least until we know that the major apps don't have some compatibility issues at large... Mac OS 6-7, for those who don't remember, introduced a slew of incompatibilities, so many that I generally booted back and forth to run various apps.

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stuff |

Re:compatibility issues? by Beer_Smurf · 2007-01-30 06:20 · Score: 1

Are you comparing Vista to an OS released 16 years ago?
"Vista, nearly as few incompatibilities as System 7!"
Re:compatibility issues? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:25 · Score: 0

Yeah, but that was years ago. In software terms that was AGES ago. We are in 2007, if you haven't noticed. Introducing a new OS without any NEW, must have features and a zillion bugs is only something a monopoly can get away with.
Re:compatibility issues? by 192939495969798999 · 2007-01-31 00:46 · Score: 1

It's a comparison of XP->Vista versus OS6->OS7, so I am not comparing the systems themselves to each other, just the awkward upgrade/transition.

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stuff |

Vista by LiquidFiend · 2007-01-30 05:31 · Score: 5, Interesting

I've been using Vista at work for just over a month now. I personally like the sidebar, not that it's anything that I couldn't have downloaded seperately anyway, but I enjoy having the CPU usage meter right on the side, along with a calender, the weather and a currency converter. I do not have Aero installed since this computer would not handle it, nor would I want to use it even if it could. The operating system itself has not crashed on me, and it has run suprisingly smoothly. I've got everything I need for work installed without a problem. There is one thing that drives me absolutely mental though ... in the windows explorer there is no "up" button, and back does not do the same thing, and yes, I am aware that I can just hit backspace, but when I'm in "mouse only" mode, this does not cut it.

I like the added shortcuts (ie windows key+0-9 to launch quick launch programs) but I hate having to use the "search" method in control panel to find the things that should be in the obvious spots. Also the defrag is terrible, while the command line version is significantly better, I would still like a visual display of what is going on.

All in all though, it has worked for me quite well at work, however it will be a long time before I would use it at home, it's simply not worth the money IMO.

Re:Vista by Tony+Hoyle · 2007-01-30 05:48 · Score: 3, Informative

that drives me absolutely mental though ... in the windows explorer there is no "up" button, and back does not do the same thing, and yes, I am aware that I can just hit backspace, but when I'm in "mouse only" mode, this does not cut it.

Backspace doesn't work (it doesn't go 'up' and more). They've tied it to the back key.

There's no way to go to the parent directory in vista that I know of other than clicking on the address bar & editing it.. which is hell for me (in keyboard only mode).
Re:Vista by Dilly+Bar · 2007-01-30 05:52 · Score: 2, Informative

The no up button caught me by surprise as well. There is something that gives you the same functionality (and actually a bit more). If you look at the address bar that usually shows the path of the files, you can click on a folder name and explorer will take you that folder. The nice thing about it is that if you want to jump to a folder up more than one, you can do that.

Confusing at first...
Re:Vista by LiquidFiend · 2007-01-30 05:53 · Score: 2, Informative

Sorry, you are correct, the backspace button does not go up. The keyboard shortcut is "ALT + UP"
Re:Vista by PygmySurfer · 2007-01-30 06:01 · Score: 1

but I hate having to use the "search" method in control panel to find the things that should be in the obvious spots.

Agreed. There are FAR too many applets in the Control Panel now. They need to merge some of the applets together. There also seems to be a mix of old-style and new-style applets, so some things feel really out of place.

I think the worst part has to be when I want to do something Networking-related - there's like 5 different applets to pick from, and I never seem to find the correct one.

I sometimes find myself hunting for the right Preference Pane in OS X even, yet the System Preferences are much better organized than the Vista Control Panel.
Re:Vista by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:14 · Score: 0

I always use Windows Explorer with the folder list and "details" (ala Windows 3.1 File Manager). From what I've seen, this mode is FAR less functional in Vista than in any previous version of Windows.

- The entries in the folders list are bigger, so you can't see as much at one time.
- There's "favourite locations" section or something above the folders. It's useless to me and it takes up a lot of space. I couldn't figure out how to get rid of it.
- You can't hide the IE-style "address bar" (or can you?) which means you have even less space to work with.

As someone with a LOT of files on my disks, this is something I use every day. In fact, I usually have two or more explorer windows open at any given time. This alone would prevent me from switching. Er... I mean upgrading.

But it's very pretty!
Re:Vista by Windowser · 2007-01-30 06:30 · Score: 1

I personally like the sidebar, not that it's anything that I couldn't have downloaded seperately anyway, but I enjoy having the CPU usage meter right on the side, along with a calender, the weather and a currency converter. <snip> The operating system itself has not crashed on me, and it has run suprisingly smoothly. I've got everything I need for work installed without a problem. There is one thing that drives me absolutely mental though ... in the windows explorer there is no "up" button...

Until that part, I thought you were describing my KDE desktop, but then you said you don't have the "up" button.
I'll stick to Konqueror, thanks

--
Avoid the MS tax, always buy I.B.M. PC's (I Built-it Myself)
Re:Vista by gEvil+(beta) · 2007-01-30 06:37 · Score: 1

There's no way to go to the parent directory in vista that I know of other than clicking on the address bar & editing it

alt-D, type ".." hit enter?

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This guy's the limit!
Re:Vista by revscat · 2007-01-30 07:09 · Score: 1

I sometimes find myself hunting for the right Preference Pane in OS X even, yet the System Preferences are much better organized than the Vista Control Panel.

This may help: open up System Preferences and type something in the search box in the upper right, e.g. "zoom".
Re:Vista by Altus · 2007-01-30 08:46 · Score: 1

I have never had to use that feature before but its pretty damn cool. Thanks.

--
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
Re:Vista by sponga · 2007-01-30 08:47 · Score: 1

They have the Vista Home Premium version available for $120 or $100 with some other FAR(Free After Rebate) computer case, powers supply and some other toys with it at CC, CompUSA, FRY's. I am gonna get my money's use out of this system unlike last time where I had to buy XP a little late after pirating it for so long and wanting to get my updates seamlessly without the annoying(?) WGA bugging me about my illegal copy.

Vista is very stable and has run flawlessly on my AMD 2.4 w/ X800GTO 256 and 2 GB ram; I am a gamer and notice every hiccup and FPS that goes wrong. I can tell you that there is no performance hit while doing other activities and using it fine like I did with XP but a little more organized in some areas.

The premium is the one to get as it includes the Windows Media Center and I know I will have a use for that in the future; also all the other little gimmicks which the novelty will wear off on some but for others might find useful such as the speech recognition.

Agreed for us power users it is a must to see what is going on during defragging and having a solid bar that doesn't even give you a time estimate of when it will be finished or how sloppy your partition is right now is not very welcoming.
I hear that it auto-defrags by itself while running the system but with the amount of file swapping I have going my network home here it does get scattered. Maybe a third party will step up with a nice program or get smart to add something for more detail.

Just to backup the guys claim about CPU usage here is another screenshot. In fact it runs better than my XP machine and networking now works a lot more seamlessly when transferring stuff.
http://i108.photobucket.com/albums/n24/spongaweb/c puusage.jpg
Re:Vista by TheGreatOrangePeel · 2007-01-30 08:57 · Score: 1

or if we didn't have enough keystrokes already, F6 and '..'
Re:Vista by ChronoReverse · 2007-01-30 10:49 · Score: 1

Likewise there's something similar in Vista. (Top right is always a search box).

Of course, if you know the item you want to start, you can could press Windows=>"item"

MS did try to organize everything a bit. But everyone (including myself) tends to immediately switch back to the Classic Look for the Control Panel (and for good reason I say).
Re:Vista by jez9999 · 2007-01-30 10:58 · Score: 1

But, if you're mentally navigating a directory structure and know that you want ../../section2/ and don't want to idle your time locating it in the list on the left...?

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== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Re:Vista by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:29 · Score: 0

If you are in mouse only mode: Just click on the name of the parent folder in the address bar.

If you are in keyboard only mode: ALT+UP ARROW

For a comprehensive list of keyboard shortcuts in Vista you can take a look at:

http://shellrevealed.com/blogs/shellblog/archive/2 006/10/16/Do-things-faster-with-Keyboard-Shortcuts .aspx
Re:Vista by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:59 · Score: 0

Actually "Left Alt" + UP.
I'm sure there was many a meeting to decide that ALT should have different functionalty depending on what side of the space bar it is.
Re:Vista by Frogbert · 2007-01-30 13:10 · Score: 1

If I remember correctly, look in the path bar, if you click on the level above where you are at, then it goes to that directory automatically...don't think Vista has an option to re-enable the "Up" button that is in XP. I could be wrong, though.
Re:Vista by Dilly+Bar · 2007-01-30 15:10 · Score: 1

Yeah, I think that is a fair point. Each level in the hierarchy is separated by an arrow as a visual separator so you can just guide your eyes to two levels up. After I learned how to use it, I don't feel like it takes any more time than clicking the up arrow twice. And it does seem faster for very deeply nested folders.
Re:Vista by justthinkit · 2007-01-30 17:03 · Score: 1

I enjoy having the CPU usage meter right on the side

In XP I run Task Manager with "Minimize on use" and "Hide when minimized" -- this puts it in the system tray with an icon that shows % utilization -- and I save the 30% cpu loss due to that handy dandy digiclock.

Vertical toolbars blow because they take up many times more screen space that bottom or top ones -- words (in English anyway) have to be displayed horizontally. No getting around it.

I think Vista will be the most hated MS OS yet. In fact I'm off to register www.VistaSucksTheMost.com this instant.

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I come here for the love
Re:Vista by PygmySurfer · 2007-01-30 18:01 · Score: 1

har, thanks :)

I know the search is there, but I hardly ever use it.

I think there's just a lot of things that could be combined, say for example Sharing and Network, or Appearance, Desktop & Screensaver, Dock, etc.. its not nearly as bad as XP, let alone Vista, though.
Re:Vista by soulhuntre · 2007-01-30 18:22 · Score: 1

You're kidding right?

The "breadcrumb" bar in explorer makes this much, much easier. Look at the example below.

parent1 > parent2 > parent3 > folder

To go to parent1, 2 or 3 just click on them. Thats it. To see all children of any folder in order to navigate simply click ont he arrow next to the folder and it will show all the children of that folder.

Honestly, it could NOT be any more convenient.

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--> Fight tyranny and repression.... read /. at -1!
Re:Vista by The-Ixian · 2007-01-30 19:20 · Score: 1

I was just thinking the exact same thing. Obviously the new interface takes some getting used to, but it is much more convenient once you get the hang of it.

--
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.

It's Ok. by Laoping · 2007-01-30 05:31 · Score: 4, Informative

Well I have been using it for about 2 months. I am a developer and have it on my laptop, so I got it from MSDN.

It's pretty good. Nothing too wrong with it, I have had some issues with drives and a few program not working but that is to be expected. I guess I would say it you get it for free or if you get a new computer it's worth it. The instant search is the coolest "New" feature. It is prettier to look at. One thing I do have to say, I bring my laptop home, my wife, who is a non-technical person like it a lot. She likes the pretty interface, and instant search.

It does have a few annoying prompt screens, and they changed the control panel again, so I can't find anything again :)

I give it a good 7/10. I would not actively avoid it or pursue it. Is it better than Xp, probably, worth spending money on, probably not yet.

Re:It's Ok. by UltimApe · 2007-01-30 07:14 · Score: 1

Attention, attention! free beheading! - and you can't complain because its free!

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"Infecting minds with my own memetic virus, one post at a time." Ultimape
Re:It's Ok. by dbIII · 2007-01-30 13:02 · Score: 1

The instant search is the coolest "New" feature

All of heard about it so far is from people restricted to only Microsoft platforms and from people not technical enough to read this site. What extra features do you get from the new MS search compared to the old and how does it compare to the user unfriendly find and grep on cygwin or *nix?
The animated desktop background thing was certainly something I saw a decade ago (the atlantis screensaver as the desktop background on an SGI machine) but obviously the shiny stuff is going to get more press - what else comes with the "ultimate" version that would be useful in an office environment?
Re:It's Ok. by Nasarius · 2007-01-30 22:44 · Score: 1

What extra features do you get from the new MS search compared to the old and how does it compare to the user unfriendly find and grep on cygwin or *nix?
Vista's search feature is indexed, so the appropriate comparison would be to slocate. Vista attaches a shiny GUI and the ability to search through some metadata. It doesn't even find strings in the contents of a Word file in the Documents folder, so it's not as useful as Google Desktop.

Unfortunately, it's still better than KDE. KDE4 (see Tenor) should do everything Vista can and more, but it won't be out for a few months at least. Give me a fast search feature in Konqueror and I'll never want to use anything else.

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LOAD "SIG",8,1

"What's the launch of Vista been like for you?" by Virak · 2007-01-30 05:32 · Score: 1, Insightful

Utterly irrelevant. I haven't used Windows for years, and Vista isn't going to bring me back; if anything, it's pushed me further away. They spent half a decade on a new OS, and all they've got to show for it is higher requirements, a shiny new UI, features other OSes have had for a very long time, and DRM. While I'm sure that the average computer user is in awe at the additions Vista brings, anyone who uses a non-Windows OS is laughing, saying, "We've had that feature for n years, and it's better done, too."

Re:"What's the launch of Vista been like for you?" by melikamp · 2007-01-30 07:17 · Score: 1

We've had that feature for n years, and it's better done, too.

I beg your pardon, Vista is yet to be outdone in the video-scrambling department; although even that feature they borrowed from others: in this case, The Sims. And what other system is as good at phoning the home office to report your hardware state? GNU/Linux still has a looooong way to go.
Re:"What's the launch of Vista been like for you?" by ad0gg · 2007-01-30 08:52 · Score: 1

What features have other major os's had before windows?

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Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
Re:"What's the launch of Vista been like for you?" by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-31 00:00 · Score: 0

I'm sorry, are you serious?

Pretty much everything. Although Ready Boost is an interesting idea.

Windows Defender isn't an anti-virus program! by carlcub · 2007-01-30 05:33 · Score: 1, Offtopic

It's no wonder that it didn't detect 80+% of the viruses. Defender is an anti-spyware program. You still need an anti-virus program on Vista.

XP is too great by gl9 · 2007-01-30 05:33 · Score: 1

So, why switch? The only thing that bothered me about XP was the recent fiasco involving popup messages on the desktop saying that my copy of Windows was not authentic (when it really was). So, taking that as a sign of things to come, I decided to avoid Vista, which I think was still called Longhorn at the time. In addition, I hate DRM and all DRM-supporting platforms. That's it.

Re:XP is too great by deep_creek · 2007-01-30 05:59 · Score: 1

I completely agree and also have no intentions of ever getting Vista for home use. XP x64 works like a charm for me. The last two PC's I've built for friends have Ubuntu. I don't see me ever having to worry about it at work either. The company (2500+ employees) is just now moving very slowly towards installing XP. IT says they are not impressed with Vista or Office 2007. They are still pissed about IE 7 breaking things. One IT fellow actually told me that the only reason we're not using Ubuntu/Linux is M$ Office.

Drama and security by ettlz · 2007-01-30 05:34 · Score: 3, Funny

From the BBC:

Windows Vista is "dramatically more secure than any other operating system released", [said] Bill Gates.

Meanwhile, in other news, several open-source developers in Calgary, Alberta were admitted to hospital for treatment of coffee burns and choking injuries caused on by an acute attack of the giggles.

Re:Drama and security by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:57 · Score: 0

Besides, you have to pay the top rate, and be running 64-bit, to get most of the security improvements in Vista anyway. Price gouging - if Windows customers need these security improvements then they *all* need them, not just those who have $400 to spare. All Leopard customers will be getting all that's to be had from their vendor for their $120.

And some of these are of dubious benefit, anyway. What user with any sense would care about running ActiveX in a sandbox? Just don't run it AT ALL. As Robert Vamosi says Address Space Layout Randomization is nice, but that's about all that's worth having. His article is entitled: "That $200 Windows XP service pack called Vista":

http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-3513_7-6689143.html
Re:Drama and security by dzfoo · 2007-01-30 06:04 · Score: 1

I think he meant "released by Microsoft", not in general.

-dZ.

--
Carol vs. Ghost
...Can you save Christmas?

It Was Delicious by ReidMaynard · 2007-01-30 05:34 · Score: 1

I Had the Vista Mixed Grill for Lunch

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-- www.globaltics.net

Political discussion for a new world

Re:It Was Delicious by PoconoPCDoctor · 2007-01-30 05:56 · Score: 1

Hmmm..makes me think of the Fergilicious song - \

Vista-licious!

C'mon Bill G. and Steve B. - ante up and make this the Vista Theme Song - like "Start Me Up" in 1995!

On second thought, don't.

--
"Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair" - George Washington

Had to buy a computer anyway by G3ckoG33k · 2007-01-30 05:34 · Score: 1

I had to buy a computer anyway. Three of my computers went down in November. So, putting one Debian together from the leftovers still won't play my children's large collection of Windows-based games, in part inherited from me.

So, forgive me, I'll buy Vista.

Re:Had to buy a computer anyway by CrackedButter · 2007-01-30 05:46 · Score: 1

Why not buy a mac and install windows on it?

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Jonathanjk.com
Re:Had to buy a computer anyway by JustNiz · 2007-01-30 06:08 · Score: 1

Because OSX that the mac comes with already is way better.
Re:Had to buy a computer anyway by G3ckoG33k · 2007-01-30 09:55 · Score: 1

The reason? Because any performance penalty like that could be had over linux just as well well, and then just as bad, albeit with literally 15000+ additional programs for free.

Vista launched? by jimstapleton · 2007-01-30 05:35 · Score: 0, Troll

Sorry, I was busy not giving a damn.

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34486853790
Connection too slow for X forwarding? Try "ssh -CX user@host"

Maybe for "office applications" by green+pizza · 2007-01-30 05:35 · Score: 2, Insightful

I certainly see the value in web-based "Web 2.0" AJAX" applications. I use gmail on a daily basis and I've tinkered with the online office suites. But there is just no way a web-based application is going to be able to deliver the power needed to video editing, 3D game playing, or even serious photo manipulation. An online version of Photoshop might be interesting, but imagine the back-end server horsepower required to apply filters to 12+ Mpixel images to hundreds of users at the same time, wowzers!

I think there will be a split in the computer world.... small, dirt-cheap devices with integrated graphics running lots of web-based applications.... and traditional motherboard+video card+fast local storage PC for more CPU/Graphics intensive applications.

Side note: if MS sees the future as web-based applications, then why does Vista prefer to have a DX10 graphics card?? Why didn't they start with XP and then slim it down into more of a web-deliverable package? Maybe move the traditional XP desktop & taskbar into an AJAX platform, make the whole desktop a single fullscreen IE7 window so it could be accessed literally anywhere. I think MS is facing the same split I mentioned above.

Re:Maybe for "office applications" by drinkypoo · 2007-01-30 06:04 · Score: 2, Insightful

An online version of Photoshop might be interesting, but imagine the back-end server horsepower required to apply filters to 12+ Mpixel images to hundreds of users at the same time, wowzers!

Well, that's the way an idiot would write it. Meaning that Microsoft's photo editor will do it that way. But it would be more intelligent to just deliver the application across the web in pieces as you need it, and have all the parts run on your machine. They might all communicate with one another through the server, though, aside from exchanging large image data chunks which would be done on your end.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:Maybe for "office applications" by photomonkey · 2007-01-30 06:12 · Score: 2, Insightful

Yup. I can see how a Palm-like internet appliance could eventually replace laptops for those who work mostly inside the productivity suites, but for anyone outside the cube farm such a device simply wouldn't work.

I'm a professional photographer (stills), and not only do I need a fast desktop to handle everything I do (and soon, I'll be expanding into video), but I also require a pretty high-end laptop for field work.

And certainly I'm not the only professional who will be tied to a traditional computer for much of what I do for a long time: graphic artists, programmers, modelers, researchers, draftsmen, engineers, mathematicians and, of course, those who can't see those damn little Palm screens.

I already have a portable Internet appliance (albeit a pretty expensive one) in the form of a Treo 650. It's great for making sure I can send and receive phone and data on the go, but it's pretty slow and not worth much beyond its telephone, DUN and email capabilities. The tech, even for rendering websites (especially AJAX-flavored) on mobile devices is still a long way off.

What I do see happening is again a splintering of the OS makers as the portable internet appliances become popular. Sure, the key players will stay involved, but we might see the advent of Linux as a popular desktop/palmtop OS. Others like Sony, Nokia or IBM might become involved. I mean, let's face it: PalmOS and Windows Mobile do what they need to kinda-sorta, but pretty much suck at anything beyond the absolute basics.

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Installed it a month ago by geighaus · 2007-01-30 05:35 · Score: 2, Informative

- GUI is beautiful. OSX pales in comparison. - UI has been revamped with all those subtle improvements. Liking it. There are a couple of bugs / annoyances (like disappearing folder view after deleting an item), but overall it is a great improvement over XP. - While some effects (taskbar window preview) are of a novelty value, they serve no real purpose and do not improve your productivity. - Same applies for the Alt-Tab windows preview. Nice, but I prefer the version with program icons. - Some changes are not so nice and confuse the hell out of me (like the redesigned network connections). - Pirating it is a pain in arse. Possible, but you have to go through hoops to get it working. Don't think it is unpiratable as MS claims. More like Vista is employing the security by obscurity principle here (considering the level of complexity and clutter of the OS). - Aero performance is ok on AMD x2 3800 with 1gb of memory and a nvidia 6 something graphic controller. - UAC is way too annoying. Had to turn it off on the - Got hit by spyware (something that never happened in XP with no antivirus installed). What's even worse I had no idea how to defend against it. Wiping all the spyware from the hdd, it just kept finding a way into my computer. As the result, had to reinstall the whole thing altogether. Now seems to be working fine. - Built-in firewall is too confusing and gives a green light to the OS components (god knows what communication takes place between my computer and microsoft). 3rd party firewalls for XP do not work under Vista. - Boot manager got screwed several times with no apparent reason. - Ultimate Edition extras are not worth it. Overall, I like the feel of Vista, but it makes an impression of a raw product. Oh and I absolutely have no idea why it takes 7.3GB of diskspace.

Re:Installed it a month ago by ivan256 · 2007-01-30 06:21 · Score: 4, Insightful

Built-in firewall is too confusing and gives a green light to the OS components (god knows what communication takes place between my computer and microsoft).

A firewall that you can't block IE with is completely useless, as any program on your system can use IE to do its dirty work for it.

Call me when you can uninstall that crap and replace it with ZoneAlarm.

GUI is beautiful. OSX pales in comparison

OSX has bash, and Vista still has the crappy ass DOS CLI. Game over.
Re:Installed it a month ago by tapo · 2007-01-30 06:37 · Score: 1

Oh and I absolutely have no idea why it takes 7.3GB of diskspace. Because it copies the entire DVD image onto the machine, should you ever want to install a feature and not have the Windows disc on hand.

--
"Joy is contagious," he said, peering into the microscope.
Re:Installed it a month ago by KermodeBear · 2007-01-30 07:06 · Score: 2, Informative

OSX has bash, and Vista still has the crappy ass DOS CLI. Game over.
I thought that Vista was supposed to launch with the Monad shell, but it seems that it has been delayed. FWIW it seems like it will be a lot better than DOS.

--
Love sees no species.
Re:Installed it a month ago by pilbender · 2007-01-30 07:09 · Score: 0

I don't get it. You say "great improvement over XP" and then you rip it to shreds. You've made a great case to *not* use it. I like your commentary. Your post is very informative, but I know I won't be trying it out after reading your post and several of the others!

--
Fresh horses and more whiskey for my men.
Re:Installed it a month ago by *SECADM · 2007-01-30 07:09 · Score: 1

> OSX has bash, and Vista still has the crappy ass DOS CLI. Game over.
Vista has the same cmd shell that has been shipping since MS moved to the NT line in win2k. It is NOT the DOS shell and has very little similarity to it other than the aliased command names. You can find a lot of things you want from a unix shell, if you care to look (albeit with strange name/syntax at first, if you are used to the unix commands)
I do agree that it is not as good as bash. However there are a couple of things you can do to make it more powerful, for example getting the MS unix subsystem (as oppose to the win32 subsystem), getting cygwin (you know where to get that), or getting monad.
But let's be frank, most users don't really say "game over" when they install vista and type "bash" and see that it's not there.

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sure I'll have a sig.
Re:Installed it a month ago by LearnToSpell · 2007-01-30 07:12 · Score: 1

Which is fantastic, and one of the reasons why I preferred ME over 98 (yeah, I know...). It's so nice not needing a disc nearby every time you change/install/uninstall something.

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Haida Manga
Re:Installed it a month ago by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:19 · Score: 0

A Mac user is now favorably comparing Mac's OS to Windows, because Windows is just a pretty UI but Mac has a hard-core command line interface. Has Hell officially frozen over?
Re:Installed it a month ago by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:37 · Score: 0

Ok let me get this straight, you been running it for a month. In that time you had to reinstall since it
got owned, the firewall and security is crap, takes up a ton of space, you lost control of your media but
"you like the feel of it?"....I bet you you like the feel of a hot man member penetrating your orifices...
Re:Installed it a month ago by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF · 2007-01-30 07:49 · Score: 1

A Mac user is now favorably comparing Mac's OS to Windows, because Windows is just a pretty UI but Mac has a hard-core command line interface. Has Hell officially frozen over?

I don't know if you noticed, but as of about 4 years ago Linux guys, old-school UNIX guys, security guys, and scientists of all stripes started migrating to OS X in droves. It used to be a person working on a mac laptop at the bar was probably a graphic designer. Nowadays they're just as likely to be a penetration tester or a physicist. Not everyone has moved over, of course, but the CLI on OS X gets a whole lot more use than the one on Windows, I imagine.
Re:Installed it a month ago by MSFanBoi2 · 2007-01-30 08:09 · Score: 1

Holy out of touch with the real world. PowerShell anyone?
Re:Installed it a month ago by Jonsey · 2007-01-30 08:11 · Score: 1

PowerShell/Monad is downloadable from the Microsoft Website:

For x86: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?fa milyid=C6EF4735-C7DE-46A2-997A-EA58FDFCBA63&displa ylang=en

For x64: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=79517

It's out-of-box, but works very nicely.

[yes, I work for Microsoft]

--
I assert that my comment is only my opinion, not that of any employer, past, present or future.
Re:Installed it a month ago by frogstar_robot · 2007-01-30 08:25 · Score: 1

Which is fantastic, and one of the reasons why I preferred ME over 98 (yeah, I know...). It's so nice not needing a disc nearby every time you change/install/uninstall something.
It wasn't necessary to endure ME to get that feature. What I used to do (working from memory here), was to boot into DOS from CD, partition and format the drive and then create the following directory structure:

mkdir windows
mkdir system
mkdir cabs (this could be slightly wrong but the general procedure is how it went).

I would then copy the entire Win98 install CD to the cabs directory and start the install from there. A little ways into the install you got a scary question about installing into an existing Windows directory. I would just ignore and install anyway. The "existing Windows directory" was empty except for the contents of the install CD. That location with the cab files would be written into the registry in various places. The upshot is that a Win98 system installed that way did you wanted: You could make changes to the system without ever needing the CD. 98SE was polished and debugged compared to ME. I wouldn't wish that turd on my worst enemy.
Re:Installed it a month ago by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 08:32 · Score: 0

I believe PSH reached 1.0 after Vista features had been frozen, so it didn't make it. Instead, its a seperate download and comes bundled with the new servers (e.g. Exchange). I wouldn't be surprised if Vista users magically found it installed later on due to automatic Windows updates.
Re:Installed it a month ago by 3choTh1s · 2007-01-30 09:01 · Score: 1

Both OS X and Vista can have a new CLI. Vista can have PowerShell/MSH http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_PowerShell. Game is just getting started.
Re:Installed it a month ago by rkd2110 · 2007-01-30 11:13 · Score: 1

GUI is beautiful. OSX pales in comparison

OSX has bash, and Vista still has the crappy ass DOS CLI. Game over.

Explain me how this has ANYTHING to do with GUI?

Or maybe you are being a linux fanboy without even reading what you are responding to?
Re:Installed it a month ago by edschurr · 2007-01-30 12:52 · Score: 1

Ironic that you suggest installing ZoneAlarm is reasonable, but because Vista doesn't come bundled with a good shell it's automatically disqualified from comparisons. Besides PowerShell and Cygwin, which have been mentioned, there are unix utilities ported natively to win32 and there are new shells, at least one of which is implemented in Python. PowerShell may even be more powerful than bash, because the last time I checked it there was a huge list of commands available. (Still, it seems to be one abstraction too high for no reason).
Re:Installed it a month ago by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 19:23 · Score: 0

If you've got a trojan on your system it doesn't matter what method it uses to connect to the outside world. It can disable your shitty software firewall in any case.

Zonealarm is just another example of false security. When a custom built trojan gains root privileges on your system, it's game over. Nothing will save you.
Re:Installed it a month ago by rojer_31 · 2007-02-03 05:03 · Score: 1

OSX has bash, and Vista still has the crappy ass DOS CLI. Game over. PowerShell (aka Monad) for Vista was released on Jan 30, 2007. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_PowerShell/

Breakfast? by sczimme · 2007-01-30 05:36 · Score: 1

Feb 1st, 9am: Vista crash ruins breakfast for millions

I'll be safe: my toaster runs NetBSD.

:-)

--
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.

Re:Breakfast? by kennygraham · 2007-01-30 05:44 · Score: 1

I'll be safe: my toaster runs NetBSD.

and this whole time, i thought the humanoid cylons were pretty advanced. but NetBSD?

Tried a demo in the Best Buy by avalys · 2007-01-30 05:36 · Score: 4, Interesting

Best Buy had a Vista demo station set up yesterday. They were using what looked like a brand-new demo machine, with Vista branding on it and everything.

When I tried to turn up the graphics settings, I got a warning saying that the highest setting would result in severely decreased performance. When I tried to open the Media Center application, it crashed.

I looked around in the Control Panels, Start Menu, and Documents folders, and tried out IE 7, and was amazed at what a disaster the interface was. The cheap eye candy looked tacky and ran slowly, the "Flip 3D" feature was next to useless and an obvious failed clone of Expose, and I still found old Windows 3.1-style dialog boxes and icons littered throughout the system.

More than anything else, the interface was confusing, overly busy, and disorganized. I'm sure a power user would find what they're looking for eventually, but I got a headache just thinking about my parents, secretary, and other casual users trying to puzzle it out.

Frankly, I was amazed at how horrible it was. It seems like an early Beta release, at best - and not a very promising one, at that.

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This space intentionally left blank.

Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by Drakin020 · 2007-01-30 05:40 · Score: 1

You were using a Best Buy computer...What did you expect?

--
The greatest revenge in life is massive success.
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by mordors9 · 2007-01-30 05:47 · Score: 4, Funny

Your IP has been logged and forwarded to our Civil Litigation division. Please cease and desist from any further spurious comments on our fine product.---Microsoft WatchDog Division
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by david.given · 2007-01-30 05:56 · Score: 2, Insightful

Frankly, I was amazed at how horrible it was. It seems like an early Beta release, at best - and not a very promising one, at that.
To be fair, that was a publically accessible demo machine, and they never work properly, regardless of what operating system they run. It was probably also loaded with some god-awful OEM version of Vista, too.
Still don't want to touch it, though.
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by sharkey · 2007-01-30 06:15 · Score: 1

the "Flip 3D" feature was next to useless and an obvious failed clone of Expose

Heh, Flip3D only works on "windows", not on "dialog boxes". Just like the Taskbar, it doesn't show everything you are working on.

--

--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by SandwhichMaster · 2007-01-30 06:56 · Score: 2, Insightful

An M$ rep came to demo Vista at my company and had similar problems too. While trying to show us the new features there was an akward pause followed by "...well, at least it should work...". If a demo doesn't work under ideal conditions, how can I trust it to work under normal abuse?
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by bigforearms · 2007-01-30 07:07 · Score: 1

I've gone to several Best Buys recently and played with their Vista machines (I was actually doing it to demo the 24 inch monitor they seem to only ever have connected to the Vista machine though).

I couldn't properly demo the monitor on any of them because a) they had their highest-end, only 1080p capable monitor hooked up to their showcase Vista computer but didn't have any 1080p content on the computer, b) even the lower-resolution video clips they had on there were very choppy, and c) they have the computer somewhat locked-down to prevent screwing with the graphics settings.

The salesman said it ran choppy because they were using their Vista demo unit to test out all of their anti-virus and security apps. I'd imagine that isn't the use corporate envisioned when it rolled out a high-end display computer designed to showcase Vista.

So, yeah, shenanigans like that, plus the really poorly designed demoing software may have led to 90% of the obnoxiousness you see.
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by Vellmont · 2007-01-30 07:24 · Score: 1

That's interesting. I've had an experience very different than yours with running Vista. I've got hardware that's 4-5 years old, a video card that's probably 3 years old (ATI 9600XT), and I've had good performance with it. The AGP bus isn't supported by Nvidia (original NForce), so I don't expect good gaming performance, but Aero runs speedily.

I actually like the interface. It does take some getting used to, but I like it a lot better than the crappy XP menus. The search function is great. I don't know if the flip-3d feature is useful or not, but I haven't really had 10 applications open at once. I can see how it might be.

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AccountKiller
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by Keebler71 · 2007-01-30 07:46 · Score: 1

Let me get this straight... you are forming an opinion on Vista based on the performance of a demo at Best Buy that you began mucking with. Do you think by chance that someone before you might have also played with system settings and messed things up? Would you let a 12 year old kid play with your system settings on your home computer?

--
"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance." - Thomas Sowell
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by SteveXE · 2007-01-30 12:58 · Score: 1

Tell me; how small is your brain?

I bought Vista today, used some Tax return money. It was time to format XP again anyways so why not right?

Yes they did change the interface around but ive used it maybe 2 hours total and ive managed to locate everything I need. Did you expect to turn it on and find...XP?

Im sorry, i mean I understand alot of peoples gripes but 80% of them are still filler crap to make people feel better. The only performance change I have noticed on my PC so far is FASTER downloads on newsgroups...amazing!

Didnt have any crashes either. I also found flip 3d to be mildly usefull and the new design of the startmenu takes some getting used to but once your there its a better system. I will pray for you tonight and hope you get some more smarts in that head of yours. If your a XP user and you have major navigation issues in Vista you probably shouldnt use a computer ever again.
Re:Tried a demo in the Best Buy by sessamoid · 2007-01-30 13:52 · Score: 1

I bought Vista today, used some Tax return money. It was time to format XP again anyways so why not right?
That's a stirring endorsement of Microsoft operating systems, right there. That sure makes me want to upgrade to their newer, version 1 OS right away.

--
"No, no, no. Don't tug on that. You never know what it might be attached to."

Seriously comon... by Drakin020 · 2007-01-30 05:37 · Score: 3, Insightful

Ok so I know im gana get trolled for this but I have to speak out

In the meantime, what is your impression of the OS? Have you had a chance to use the retail version yet? Are you supporting it in a business environment? What's the launch of Vista been like for you?

Are you seriously going to ask that here at Slashdot? Thats like asking a liberal "So what do you think of Bush?"

As for me what do I think of it? I think it has a lot of bells and whistles perhaps a lot of home users might like. But for more hardcore computer geeks such as myself it may not be needed. I am looking forward to trying it however I do not support the whole DRM thing. I will be open minded, they did good with 2000 and XP.

--
The greatest revenge in life is massive success.

Re:Seriously comon... by JustNiz · 2007-01-30 06:05 · Score: 1

>> Show me what Linux can do for a business, and I'll show you how Microsoft does it 20 times better.

Thats a very contentious (and incorrect) sig.
Now you've blasted Vista maybe you should change it.
Re:Seriously comon... by ciggieposeur · 2007-01-30 06:41 · Score: 5, Informative

Show me what Linux can do for a business, and I'll show you how Microsoft does it 20 times better.

My business is molecular modeling.

I need to do a lot of coding in C, C++, F77, and F90, along with some csh, ksh, bash, and perl scripting. I need to test the same code on my PC that runs on the 128-way SMP boxes in the high-performance computing facility, so I need compilers that support a POSIX-ish C api and MPICH, and I'll also need good (scriptable) connectivity ala ssh, scp, and rsync. Oh yeah, one of the data centers uses Kerberos. I also need reasonable data analysis tools like Matlab (though Octave will do in a pinch) and Maple. I need visualization tools like PyMOL, viewmol, vaspview, and GaussView, but also an X server so I can run beefier packages like Cerius2 directly off the big machines. I need to be able to write both small reports for quick printing and large (50+ page) papers with lots of mathematical formulas and endnotes/footnotes, and of course I need to output PDF. I also need virtual desktops to keep my workflow organized: desktop 1 is development, desktop 2 is remote terminals, desktop 3 is data analysis, and desktop 4 is general purpose desktop. Finally, I need to be able to back up my work easily, preferably with just a simple file copy, and all of my file formats will need to readable for 20+ years.

So far my needs are met at near zero cost with Debian Linux plus two commercial packages (GaussView and Maple). I have ssh, scp, rsync, perl, csh, ksh, bash, gcc/g++, g77, gfortran, MPICH, MPICH2, X11, LaTeX, Emacs, Octave, KMail, and OOo. And as a nice bonus with Debian my PC both plays DVDs (and ignores the UOP flag allowing me to skip directly to the menu) and browses the 'Net with ease, and so far I have had no problems with viruses.

I'm very interested in how a Microsoft solution will be 20 times better. Please tell us more!
Re:Seriously comon... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:51 · Score: 0

Best. Post. Ever.
Re:Seriously comon... by gemada · 2007-01-30 06:57 · Score: 1

you mean it is like asking a sane person "so what do you think of Bush?"
Re:Seriously comon... by mobby_6kl · 2007-01-30 07:06 · Score: 1

Yep, this article is what we in the industry call a "troll".

In general, I'd say Vista is ok. I've used it for about a week now, and apart from the horrible NVIDIA drivers, everything's been fine, and I'd probably switch to Vista when the situation with the drivers improves.

I don't think you'd be supporting DRM by using Vista any more than by using MacOS or an iPod. Shit, even my ancient Creative Zen supports WMA DRM, but I never have to deal with it because I don't buy DRM content.
Re:Seriously comon... by misterhypno · 2007-01-30 07:44 · Score: 1

Okay, in response to your sig line - virus protection. SHOW me how Windows does THAT "20 times better" than Linux.

Elucidate, by all means!
Re:Seriously comon... by yodleboy · 2007-01-30 08:02 · Score: 1

ok, if you got your Zen to work in vista, i want to know how. this has been the one thing that has pissed me off since i upgraded. i can't get anything to see it... might be because i did the playsForSure firmware upgrade...
Re:Seriously comon... by mobby_6kl · 2007-01-30 08:50 · Score: 1

Yes, my Zen works with Vista. It seemed a little slower than usual, but I only uploaded a few files.
I didn't do the PlayForSure upgrade so all this might not even work for you, but you could give it a try.

The trick was in using not the latest drivers, which seem to do nothing in Vista, but whatever version is in the JB3MV2_PCWDRV_US_1_30_03.EXE file (my guess -- 1.30.03 ;) ). You should be able to download it here. It probably won't install properly when the setup asks you to plug in the player, so do a manual driver update and point it to "\Program Files\Creative\Jukebox 3 Drivers". It should find and install the drivers and the explorer plugin/browser. Let me know if you have any problems.
Re:Seriously comon... by Trogre · 2007-01-30 11:22 · Score: 1

damn! pwn3d.

Someone mod this guy up.

--
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Re:Seriously comon... by ldj · 2007-01-30 14:44 · Score: 1

Hehe, excellent response! I was thinking somewhat along the same lines, but I couldn't have said it better.

It seems that those who use such outlandish sigs don't realize that the sig alone will often negate the value of their opinion in the eyes many, if not most, readers.

--
Open Source: I'll show you mine if you show me yours.
Re:Seriously comon... by t35t0r · 2007-01-30 15:43 · Score: 1

My business is supporting guys like you who do molecular modeling. We work in a Linux, Mac, SGI, and some WinXP systems shop. No one does their work on Windows except for when they need to build their presentations and write their papers in MSOffice. With that said, everything you said can be done in WinXP (e.g. with cygwin). I think MSI and Gaussian sell the apps you need in Windows flavors.

I would stay away from Vista because it doesn't do opengl in a window without going through a directx layer. It also doesn't support hardware stereo in a window, which all modeling apps that do hardware stereo require.
Re:Seriously comon... by t35t0r · 2007-01-30 15:45 · Score: 1

scratch gaussian ..it doesn't work on winblows ..there's always Titan Schroedinger.

Vista release by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:38 · Score: 1, Interesting

The company I do IT for is in no way intending to upgrade to Vista any time soon. Yes Vista has more functionality... at a price. More system processes now run when compared to a default installation of XP. A lot more. So the adverse of more functionality is a slower system. What kind of functionality you ask? How bout the new parental controls! I did enjoy the 3d scrolling with alt-tab through running applications, that was neat, but at a cost. And... the indexing service just needs to be shut off. Why the heck do I want a service running that constantly checks on files and folders so that they load faster when truly its just leeching system resources full time?

OK OK, why don't i just go out and buy a new dual core or quad core pc and just stfu? I could... but a manufacturing company with 150pcs doesn't intend to upgrade just to meet the needs of Vista. In the future it may be possible. But it would be a gradual process over multiple years I would estimate.

What about games and DirectX 10? by Hiigara · 2007-01-30 05:39 · Score: 1

I'm in the process of building a new computer for video games.

What is the capability like for PC games? How is the performance? Is DirectX10 ready yet? How about drivers?

I order the operating system Friday. Should I go with XP or Vista?

Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:47 · Score: 2, Funny

Jesus dude, everyone knows "order the operating system Friday" means "do i torrent XP?"
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by Tony+Hoyle · 2007-01-30 05:52 · Score: 1

Go with XP. Games are slower under vista, and not as well tested. Most game companies don't yet officially support it either.
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by ZachPruckowski · 2007-01-30 05:53 · Score: 4, Informative

You're in a bind. Drivers and speed issues with games are a mess for Vista right now, but a decent bit of that might be sorted out by year's end. And while there are no current DX10 games, they'll be coming within the year. So the answer is: XP for games now, Vista by the year's end.
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by ShannaraFan · 2007-01-30 05:54 · Score: 2, Interesting

I downloaded and installed Vista from MSDN over the weekend, I've only tried two games so far. On the exact same machine, under XP, I could run Civ4 and Neverwinter Nights with full graphic details enabled, no problems. After installing Vista (fresh install, reformat, etc), Civ4 continues to run (you have to download the latest patch) without issue. Neverwinter Nights, on the other hand, is EXTREMELY choppy, even at the bottom end of the graphics settings.

Overall, I'm not greatly impressed. Lots of shiny stuff, and it "feels" new, but I just really don't see any improvement over XP.
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by A+Name+Similar+to+Di · 2007-01-30 05:55 · Score: 5, Informative

I've been poking around for a while trying to ask the same questions. There's a fairly good write up at Tom's Hardware on performance differences. Tom's hardware is typically pretty even handed in their benchmark reviews (IMHO), they'll often use a demo or script for a video game and run it a few times to get a solid number.

As you can see, the difference is small but present (favoring XP for games) with the notable standout of Unreal Tournament 2004, however as the reviewer notes, this has a lot to do with the current driver support.

As far as I can tell, I think in the long run when games start making use of DX10 and such, we'll see some nice results, but in the short run games will be better run in XP.

If you need a Windows OS (and I just built a gaming computer myself, so I'm in a similar boat) some stores will sell XP with a free Vista upgrade. That's what I purchased, that way I can use XP for a few months (while Vista figures out what it's doing) and upgrade when I'm good and ready. I'd list where I purchased from, but I'd hate to have my post be construed as advertising, suffice is to say you should be able to find some offers via google.

Hope that helps.
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by PortWineBoy · 2007-01-30 06:01 · Score: 1

I'm actually not sure if you are trolling or not...but in case you aren't... For gaming you want to stick with Win XP.

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this sig deleted by another sig
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by JustNiz · 2007-01-30 06:02 · Score: 1

For DirectX 10 you need compatable hardware, the nVidia 8x00 series is the only currently availble DX10 GPUs.

Games performance generally under vista is significantly slower than XP. Vista will also make it less likely that you could re-use any older cpu or memory you currently have and still have a fast machine.

There aren't any DX10 games out yet (but there will be soon). Most if not all will still work on DX9. Unless you really have a burning desire to trade overall performance, freedom from DRM, and saving lots of money just for small extra DX10 twinkles, I'd stay with XP.
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:08 · Score: 0

Pirate 2000 and wait 3 months to see how Vista turns out once the dust settles and the first round of patches are out. We can't really judge it yet. If you feel the need to switch then, buy it.

I wouldn't normally advocate copyright infringement but it seems to be the most reasonable option here by a long way. Paying for WinXP might get you something you'll want to upgrade in 9 months when DirectX 10 games are out, paying for Vista will certainly be paying for headaches. Using Linux as a temporary measure means you'll be playing nothing but Quake 4 and FreeCiv for 3 months (mind you, I've been a Linux-only gamer myself and it's OK for a while).
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by drinkypoo · 2007-01-30 06:28 · Score: 1

The article you link says that Microsoft dropped support for OpenGL. This is puzzling to me, because the only support Microsoft has ever provided for OpenGL was software OpenGL, and it was provided mostly to run screensavers and to say that they supported it. OGL support comes from the video driver. Are they forcing manufacturers to drop OpenGL or something?

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by A+Name+Similar+to+Di · 2007-01-30 06:44 · Score: 3, Informative

No... I think there's some confusing language in the introduction of that article. Vista will support OpenGL ICD's and nVidia and ATI are already working on these. Apparently there was some question about the issue at first, but this is now old news from almost a year ago. I think what the article meant was that currently nVidia and ATI do not have the vista drivers for it. Correct me if I'm off base on this one, but that's how I read it.
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by jkroll · 2007-01-30 07:18 · Score: 1

As far as I can tell, I think in the long run when games start making use of DX10 and such, we'll see some nice results, but in the short run games will be better run in XP.

Since MS has made the decision not to support DX10 in XP, I doubt that any games will require DX10 for about 2 years or so. Until then, the games developers would probably be limiting their target audience too much until the majority of their target audience has gone through a computer upgrade cycle.
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by A+Name+Similar+to+Di · 2007-01-30 07:26 · Score: 1

Since MS has made the decision not to support DX10 in XP, I doubt that any games will require DX10 for about 2 years or so. Until then, the games developers would probably be limiting their target audience too much until the majority of their target audience has gone through a computer upgrade cycle.

True, but the gaming enthusiast in me hopes that while some games might not /require/ it, some might have some additional support for it. Similarly, some games have additional features if you have a PhysX card but still don't require it, I'm hoping that some games tack on the bells and whistles that DX10 supposedly has for early adopters :P
Re:What about games and DirectX 10? by WuphonsReach · 2007-02-04 16:03 · Score: 1

And while there are no current DX10 games, they'll be coming within the year. So the answer is: XP for games now, Vista by the year's end.

I find that overly optimistic.

While some game companies may release DX10 games this year, there's no way in hell that DX10 will be required for any titles until 2009-2010. Not unless the game company wants to sabotage their sales. While gamers tend to upgrade quicker, I'd still be surprised at faster then a 25-30% uptake per year.

--
Wolde you bothe eate your cake, and have your cake?

Best Buy Says... by autojive · 2007-01-30 05:40 · Score: 1

I heard a comment while listening to the news on my radio from a Best Buy manager early this morning in which he stated that today will be like the release day for the Nintendo Wii with sporadic availability of Vista in stores for months to come. Somehow I doubt that people will be lining up and fighting for copies of this operating system like they did for Windows '95. The Hype Machine(TM) has started.

--
I wish my lawn was emo, so it would cut itself.

Re:Best Buy Says... by Zephyros · 2007-01-30 06:01 · Score: 1

Not to mention that pressing a CD is a lot different from (and far cheaper than) assembling a console. Wonder how much Microsoft paid him for that good press.

Good deal? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:41 · Score: 0

From TFA:

Consumers who purchased new computers with Windows XP since November are entitled to a free or discounted software upgrade.

I'm not eager to upgrade any XP computer to Vista... even if the upgrade were "free for a limited time", I really don't think I would take the risk.

counterpoints by green+pizza · 2007-01-30 05:44 · Score: 1

1) Mac Office 2008 will most likely match or even exceed Win Word/Excel/PowerPoint 2007. From the screenshots I saw from the Macworld Expo, it seems that the Mac version has both a traditional menu bar *and* a Mac-styled "ribbon" tabbed tool bar. For some users, the combination of UI elements will be a plus over Win Office 2007. But that's where it ends. Mac Office does not have Access, Visio, or a fully-featured Outlook application. These are major shortcomings.

2) I would like to see someone add on these features to VLC or MPlayer so Mac/Linux/BSD users can enjoy these features too. And being based on VLC, there would be even more codecs supported. A man can dream. For now there are some Front Row bolt-ons from El Gato to add DVR features and I've seen some other Quicktime layer & Frontrow application plugins that are slowly adding features. Maybe Apple will get back to its multimedia roots and give us an awesome Front Row 2.0 in the near future. A man can dream

3) MS will own the Gaming world for many years to come. I don't see this changing anytime soon unless more gaming studios move to OpenGL, which just isn't going to happen anytime soon.

4) Windows Enterprise integration is very lacking in the Mac world, even with the awesome DAVE package. There are some open source packages to improve some of these limitiations, but they're still huge stumbling points. I too wish Apple would throw a small group of talented enterprise programming gurus after this problem. Parallels + Windows + Outlook running on top of Mac OS X is NOT the answer.

Re:counterpoints by drinkypoo · 2007-01-30 06:07 · Score: 1

MS will own the Gaming world for many years to come. I don't see this changing anytime soon unless more gaming studios move to OpenGL, which just isn't going to happen anytime soon.

Actually, I do; Both Nintendo and Sony's systems support OpenGL (I would assume there is another graphics method on PS3 as well, but what the hell do I know?) Point is, if you want to write a game to be portable to the maximum number of platforms, then OpenGL is your best choice. Oh sure, that leaves you out of the Xboxes, but it gives you the other two systems. Anyone who wants to bring their game to PS3 or Gamecube will be using OpenGL. I agree that it's not MUCH of a bump, but it's a step in the right direction...

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:counterpoints by Peganthyrus · 2007-01-30 06:30 · Score: 1

1: Lately I've been seeing people prophesying doom and gloom for Mac Office because it will no longer support Visual Basic macros. It will, I believe, support Applescript and Automator so all-Mac shops can make Mac-style complicated semi-programmatic stuff - but if your job requires you to exchange programmatic Office documents with Windows users, you'd better raise some issues before the company decides to switch to Office 2008.

I don't use Office in my personal or professional life, aside from the very occasional client sending me reference material in Word format, so I have no sense how big a problem this really is.

--
egypt urnash minimal art.
Re:counterpoints by cayenne8 · 2007-01-30 08:00 · Score: 1

"Mac Office does not have Access...These are major shortcomings."
Actually, I think that is a point in its favor!!!
Now, if only they'd ban that abomination Access, that masquerades itself as a database...the world would be so much better. At the very least, it would keep a mgr. that has not knowledge of RDBMSes from creating a one table application that is not normalized, and becomes the dept. standard....which in turn becomes too large to use and then has to be redone painfully so that it can run properly on a real RDBMS....normalized...extracting key information from user filled free form text fields (with embedded hard returns...etc).
Not that I've experienced that...I just hear about such...yeah, that's it...no complaints here...

--
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Re:counterpoints by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 17:12 · Score: 0

PLAYSTATION 3 ISN'T STANDARD OPENGL AT ALL.

Making a game for the PS3 is like writing a new back-end for your 3D engine. It's absolutly not code once, compile everywhere. Too much custom crap is included in the APIs.

For a direct comparison, writing a DirectX game is already like code once, compile everywhere on PC + Xbox 360.

PS3 and the Wii are not worth the pain writing for. Let the suckers write for them if they want. The real men will write for the Xbox.
Re:counterpoints by drinkypoo · 2007-01-31 03:39 · Score: 1

PS3 and the Wii are not worth the pain writing for.

PS3 I can see, but the Wii? It's bog-standard. One CPU, one GPU. Straightforward layout. It's just slower than Xbox, which means some games will not be suited to it (or vice-versa.)

Nice FUD.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"

Guardian article is FUD by Quastor · 2007-01-30 05:47 · Score: 0

"We want to make sure that users understand the system's limitations," said Gerhard Eschelbeck, a spokesman for Webroot, "and caution them that Microsoft's anti-virus programs may not fully protect them."

In testing, the company said, the new Windows Defender program failed to block 84% of viruses - including 15 of the most common pieces of malicious code.

This is the biggest piece of FUD I have seen in a long time. Microsoft doesn't have their own anti-virus program. Windows Defender is a malware/spyware detector, not an anti-virus program. Even if you have it turned on, Windows' Security Center will still tell you you're at risk because you don't have anti-virus software installed. This is like expecting Ad-Aware to fully protect your computer against all the trojans out in the wild.

Also figuring that Webroot is the creator of Spy Sweeper, it's no wonder that they'd want to spread FUD about a direct competitor's FREE product.

Re:Guardian article is FUD by miro+f · 2007-01-30 12:08 · Score: 1

Microsoft doesn't have their own anti-virus program.
actually Windows one-care contains anti-virus software. so that's not true.

the rest of your comment is true however, but I find it interesting that defender did block 16% of viruses... I think the problem is the idiot who ran this test didn't know the difference between a virus and other malware (rather than knowing the difference and just thought defender was an anti-virus program)

--
being vague is almost as cool as doing that other thing...

A short answer and a long answer by sczimme · 2007-01-30 05:48 · Score: 1

For one client who is a medical service provider, I'm pretty sure that the "rights" that M$ has awarded itself via Vista's EULA are at odds with the requirements for keeping clients' medical records confidential. So until someone can provide assurances to the contrary, Vista isn't coming anywhere near their facilities.

Short answer: no worries, as Federal legislation trumps the MS EULA.

Long answer: the medical service provider is bound by law not to disclose - or expose - patient information. Even though the service provider controls the machines, it does not 100% control the information therein: Uncle Sam has some say here. Essentially the government would have to grant exceptions to healthcare legislation to allow MS to do their thing. I find this very unlikely.

I am not a lawyer, but it seems [on paper] that MS could revoke the license under these circumstances; whether they *would* is another issue.

--
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.

Re:A short answer and a long answer by lurker4hire · 2007-01-30 06:08 · Score: 5, Insightful

The problem isn't the EULA, although that is a problem of course, the problem is with the technical measures implemented in the software to enforce the EULA.

Unless medical organizations can be 100% assured that installing Vista will not put them at risk of violating the law with regards to patient confidentially (and proper maintenance of medical data for that matter) they cannot install vista.

Having your data sent to MS is a stretch, but having Vista accidentally deleting your app with important medical data stored in the program folder (bad practise but it does happen) because it thinks it is "bad" is a distinct possibility. Heck, doesn't the EULA specifically mention technical measures to delete "illegal" "non-licensed" media? What if the measures incorrectly identify a very high res movie of an echo exam as an illegal movie and deletes it? Who has to pay for the re-exam at that point? the patient? the hospital?

anywho, no enterprise in their right mind will "upgrade" to vista before 2010, if ever...

l4h
Re:A short answer and a long answer by Beer_Smurf · 2007-01-30 06:09 · Score: 1

Vista may be not be legal to use in any medical related function under HIPAA.
Can anyone provide a better assessment of this?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_Insurance_Port ability_and_Accountability_Act
Re:A short answer and a long answer by steveo777 · 2007-01-30 06:38 · Score: 1

I work in health care and, thus, am very well aware of HIPAA compliance. I haven't had time to review Vista's EULA, but I can attest that if there is anything stating that MS has the right to look at or control the information contained or transmitted to or from any licensed computer that Vista will be prohibited from the health care industry.
HIPAA is extremely strict about releasing patient information. People loose their jobs just for viewing information without a 'business need to know'. After some news anchor was in the clinic I work for about 20 people lost their jobs because they checked his file to see why he was here.

--
This sig isn't original enough, it's time to come up with something witty...
Re:A short answer and a long answer by ShaggyBOFH · 2007-01-30 10:59 · Score: 1

Honestly, don't you think M$ did _some_ research into issues like this? I'd imagine they know what the law requires and what software the medical industry uses.
Oh god...did I just defend Microsoft?

--
--- Just say no to negativity.
Re:A short answer and a long answer by Trogre · 2007-01-30 11:05 · Score: 1

Are there any jurisdictions where EULAs are actually legal? If you've paid for the software without having signed any condition-of-sale agreements with the vendor then the product is yours to do with as you please within the bounds of copyright law.

This makes EULAs about as enforceable as novelty "go directly to jail" cards.

--
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Re:A short answer and a long answer by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 13:09 · Score: 0

Honestly, don't you think M$ did _some_ research into issues like this? I'd imagine they know what the law requires and what software the medical industry uses.

There's knowing and there's doing. First off, there's no indication that MS has any more respect for the law than GWB. Second, it wouldn't be them breaking the law. Third, a high percentage of public sector and quasi-governmental deployments are already illegal for one reason or another (inadequate security, privacy violations, dangerously unfit for purpose etc.).

Without wanting to harp on an issue, voting machines are an excellent example: Many, if not most, states using DRE voting machines are operating in direct violation of their own electoral legislation either because the machines themselves don't meet requirements or because they are used in illegal ways.

Hmmm.... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:48 · Score: 3, Funny

Vista will still peg your processor at around 30% most of the time

I can imagine needing to run Vista on a Beowulf cluster to get decent speed.

Re:Hmmm.... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:53 · Score: 1, Informative

Beowulf Clusters, by definition, are Linux operated, you frakking poseur.
Re:Hmmm.... by John+Hansen · 2007-01-30 06:09 · Score: 1

What are you talking about? Obviously the poster was referring to the ability to run Windows Vista within a virtual server running on a Beowulf cluster of Linux computers.

If you have no idea what the f*** I just said, don't be hard on yourself. I think I just confused myself.
Re:Hmmm.... by mstahl · 2007-01-30 07:51 · Score: 1

*whoosh!!*
Re:Hmmm.... by Excelsior · 2007-01-30 08:42 · Score: 1

I can imagine needing to run Vista on a Beowulf cluster to get decent speed.
Hmm, but as the story goes, when Beowulf meets the beast, both end up dead...
Re:Hmmm.... by Sku-Lad · 2007-01-30 11:38 · Score: 3, Funny

Thanks for the Spoiler Alert!!! Now I might as well not even read Beowulf! Oh, well, The 13th Warrior is on tonight. I love that movie!
Re:Hmmm.... by Sj0 · 2007-01-30 13:52 · Score: 1

What if I'm not confused, and I was instead wondering if a virtual server could be easily parallelized, then I decided that although different components could be turned into seperate execution threads, you couldn't likely separate the most time-consuming tasks enough to justify running a single 8x box, let alone a Beowulf cluster with a latency between nodes far greater than the communication buses the separate components would physically have access to with physical hardware, thus destroying any speed gains from emulating such subsystems on a dedicated CPU?

I'm worried. Please answer.

--
It's been a long time.
Re:Hmmm.... by PeolesDru · 2007-01-30 15:59 · Score: 0

Grendel gongan, godes yrre bær.
Re:Hmmm.... by RPMentley · 2007-01-30 18:14 · Score: 1

The second I figure out how to do that, I'm totally trying it.

--
Documentation: Instructions translated from Swedish by Japanese for English speaking persons.

Well somebody has to! by nathanlang · 2007-01-30 05:48 · Score: 0

I see few answers to the 'have you used the retail version yet' question!

I've used the beta and I'm installing the retail, because unfortunately I work with clients who are going to be asking about it and wanting software to support it, so I'd better be ready.
So far the main difference (I haven't got past the installation yet) seems to be a canny install screen saying 'upgrade may take several hours to complete'. Remember good old Win '98, which could be installed in less than an hour? Seems like minutes have gone out of fashion in Redmond.

One thing about the upgrade is reassuringly familiar: 'expanding files' halts at 21% for a couple of hours before moving on. Currently (3 hours later) it's 'Completing Upgrade', which has been at 36% for the last 30 minutes.

...

...

37%

...

...

Finally, Windows got as good as Mac OS X by Stormwatch · 2007-01-30 05:49 · Score: 1

Mac OS X V10.0, I mean...

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Circumcision is child abuse.

Re:Finally, Windows got as good as Mac OS X by ZachPruckowski · 2007-01-30 06:18 · Score: 1

Let's be honest here, 10.0 blew chunks. 10.1 was the first real OS X release. Vista is at least as good as 10.2, and maybe even 10.3. It tries to be a 10.4 imitator, but some of the copied features are just too poorly copied. Flip 3D sucks compared to Exposé, and Sidebar != Dashboard. It also requires about 3 times the resources. I mean, if Tiger had just launched, this wouldn't be half bad, but Leopard's on the horizon.
Re:Finally, Windows got as good as Mac OS X by bill_mcgonigle · 2007-01-30 06:28 · Score: 1

Vista is at least as good as 10.2, and maybe even 10.3.

Except for the whole security thing. And UNIX core.

--
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Re:Finally, Windows got as good as Mac OS X by the_humeister · 2007-01-30 06:39 · Score: 1

Uhm, Mac OS X V10.0 was utter crap. The UI was really slow, software-based, and it crashed much more often than a unix-based system should. It wasn't until 10.2.x that it actually started not sucking.
Re:Finally, Windows got as good as Mac OS X by ZachPruckowski · 2007-01-30 06:44 · Score: 1

Correct. I was talking "user features". Not underbelly. I'm not disputing the importance of the UNIX core and the security features (those are two big plusses to me), but insofar as the OS features Joe Normal would use, Vista = 10.3
Re:Finally, Windows got as good as Mac OS X by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF · 2007-01-30 06:50 · Score: 1

Uhm, Mac OS X V10.0 was utter crap. The UI was really slow, software-based, and it crashed much more often than a unix-based system should. It wasn't until 10.2.x that it actually started not sucking.

I think that is sort of the point he was making.

Midnight release by green+pizza · 2007-01-30 05:49 · Score: 2, Insightful

I had to laugh when I heard about the whole "midnight release" thing. I mean, I can sort of see the excitement of getting the hottest new console or game like that, but even if Vista were every bit as good as it's cracked up to be, it's still just an operating system.

You haven't been to a CompUSA or an Apple Store when an update to Mac OS was about to be released, have you? There was even a line for Mac OS 8.5 at CompUSA in 1998! The longest lines I ever saw were for Mac OS X 10.3 (and rightfully so, IMHO).

Re:Midnight release by WinterSolstice · 2007-01-30 05:58 · Score: 1

I was in line for 10.3! That was awesome (and a needed update).

I plan to be in line for 10.5, but just because I'm sort of in the habit of it now :)

-WS

--
An operating system should be like a light switch... simple, effective, easy to use, and designed for everyone.
Re:Midnight release by soft_guy · 2007-01-30 06:44 · Score: 1

I went to a really fun party for the launch of 10.2. I got a T-Shirt and there was food and I met some cool people and I bought a copy of Jaguar and I had a good time.

--
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
Re:Midnight release by Omestes · 2007-01-30 07:05 · Score: 2, Informative

Hooray troll feeding:

From 10.2 to 10.3 was quite a leap, not a mere upgrade, as was from 10.3 to 10.4, which added metadata, better internal databases, more core functions, spotlight, dashboard, etc... By all intents and purposes a major release. Yes, the GUI is pretty much the same (albeit slightly more schizophrenic), and the actual user experience is pretty much the same, but that is somewhat the point, not having to relearn an OS every new version, keep it similar. And no, 10.3->10.4 does not equal an upgrade, its just how Apple's branding works (yes, I do think its idiotic). Think of 10.4 as OS 14, if you want.

10.5, on the other hand, seems mightily like an upgrade, adding software features, and not decent internal features. Sure versioning is nice, yes virtual desktops are good to finally have native on a non-KDE/Gnome desktop. But there is nothing as big as, say, Spotlight.

--
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
Re:Midnight release by shawnce · 2007-01-30 09:04 · Score: 1

10.5 has many more core features being added to it then we saw with 10.3 and even 10.4 .... a lot is going on under the hood.
Re:Midnight release by Paulrothrock · 2007-01-30 11:06 · Score: 1

Well, Steve did say that the stuff he previewed wasn't all that's in Leopard, and that they're playing their cards close to their chest. Who knows, maybe we'll see some really innovative stuff.
I still prefer the Apple development model over the Microsoft development model. Steady releases with new features and enhancements and time to work the bugs out over the course of a few years sounds better than on gigantic release. Who knows, maybe Vista would have had WinFS if they had imitated Apple.

--
I'm in the hole of the broadband donut.
Re:Midnight release by WinterSolstice · 2007-01-30 11:12 · Score: 1

Noooo - waiting in line because they give away cool crap :)

In the 10.4 line, the girl in front of me got a 17" laptop. I got some neat loot too. It also wasn't midnight, but 5pm or so.

-WS

--
An operating system should be like a light switch... simple, effective, easy to use, and designed for everyone.

Why???? by Archangel+Michael · 2007-01-30 05:51 · Score: 1

I have a simple question ... "WHY?"

Why should I consider Vista over WinXP, other than marketing drone speak. I have yet to see a COMPELLING reason to upgrade. Not even one. I have seen all sorts of compelling reasons NOT to.

Mind you, most of the press is hyping Vista as the latest greatest, and it might be. Mind you, the best of the features that Vista provides is the backup and enhanced restore points features, but what does that say about the OS in general, where such things are actually designed into it?

--
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.

Steep curve, but I'll never look back! by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 05:51 · Score: 0

I've done this two years ago. Got fed up with XP, had no money for a Mac.

As I already used a lot of 'unixy' programs (LaTeX, gnuplot) the transition didn't lose any functionality, but the learning curve was steep!

Now I have a workstation tailored exactly to my needs and it needs very little maintenance. Solid as a rock and, yes, configuration is actually simpler than Windows once I got the hang of it. There's nothing to hold me back now.

Do miss the games though... ;-)

Re:Steep curve, but I'll never look back! by jimstapleton · 2007-01-30 05:58 · Score: 1

So far, most of my games like Wine :-)

I just got a new desktop, installed windows on a fat partition on SATA-1, flipped the boot order and put BSD on SATA-2. Gonna use windows for installing apps, and Wine for running them.

--
34486853790
Connection too slow for X forwarding? Try "ssh -CX user@host"

Can Ballmer look cute? by spun · 2007-01-30 05:52 · Score: 5, Funny

If by cute you mean "slightly puffy like it's bloated, or slightly over-inflated" then, yes, yes he can look cute.

--
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton

Re:Can Ballmer look cute? by fred_sanford · 2007-01-30 08:33 · Score: 1

"slightly puffy like it's bloated, or slightly over-inflated"
well, that can be cute.

My impressions by norminator · 2007-01-30 05:53 · Score: 3, Insightful

I had one of the Vista RC's on my laptop, and just updated to the release version of Ultimate through the company's business copy. It runs like molasses on my P4 which runs XP and Ubuntu Edgy flawlessly. Shutting down takes forever, and logging in takes even longer if I'm not hooked up to the company LAN. I'll probably keep Vista on here for a while, but the next time I decide this laptop needs to be wiped and redone, I'll do it with XP.

One annoying issue I've been having, which I just figured out the other day, was sometimes when I would power on, I would get the "Resuming from hibernate" message, even though I hadn't remembered hibernating. As soon as it was done resuming, it would say "Shutting Down". I finally realized that sometimes after I hit shutdown, I unplug the AC adapter, then close the lid. For some reason, Vista doesn't know any better than to try and hibernate even though it's in the middle of the shutdown process (did I mention shutdown takes a long time?). So I had to change my power settings to not hibernate when the lid is closed on battery or on AC power. Also, I don't care for "the new sleep" (haven't there been versions of sleep since '95, and none of them work right?). At least, I don't like the idea on my laptop. Maybe it would be fine for a desktop. But I don't want the default shutdown option on my laptop to but it in a low-power state. What if I don't use it for a week or two, then suddenly I need to use it on battery?

The power settings are an interesting change, indicative of the rest of the change in the user experience. They have a simple, general set of power settings, then there's an advanced button that throws any possible power option at you. I think the idea is OK, but the presentation makes it feel overwhelming. I think they want to make everything "simple", but they do it in a way to try and draw attention to how simple it is, which ends up making it more complex when you actually have to do anything. I can't really put my finger on it, but I don't like their attempts at simplicity.

I don't see any compelling reason to use Vista for now. It amazes me that for 6 years Apple has made Mac OSX run faster with each release (at least, that's my understanding, I'm not a regular Apple user), and in the same time frame, Windows has gotten much, much slower. It's crazy to think that this laptop was a pretty fast, new machine when Vista was halfway through the development process. Just think about that: When they started showing off developer previews, the computers they were using to preview Vista back then would hardly run it today. I really do think Microsoft (and its customers) would do a lot better by having smaller releases, much more often, and for a much smaller upgrade price. That way they would stay on top of features, security, and performance better.

Just my 2 cents.

Re:My impressions by ender81b · 2007-01-30 06:56 · Score: 1

Shutting down takes forever, and logging in takes even longer if I'm not hooked up to the company LAN.

That's not exactly abnormal -- is the PC trying to contact network resources on start/shutdown? Scripts on a network drive perhaps? Trying to join a domain? XP (and Vista probably is the same) would only time out after 120 seconds..
Re:My impressions by glesga_kiss · 2007-01-30 14:38 · Score: 1

One annoying issue I've been having, which I just figured out the other day, was sometimes when I would power on, I would get the "Resuming from hibernate" message, even though I hadn't remembered hibernating. As soon as it was done resuming, it would say "Shutting Down". I finally realized that sometimes after I hit shutdown, I unplug the AC adapter, then close the lid. For some reason, Vista doesn't know any better than to try and hibernate even though it's in the middle of the shutdown process

I've had that problem on three different brands of laptop on win 2000 and win xp. It's not a new Vista issue. IMHO, hibernate takes far too long to be a lid-close action, especially if you have a lot of RAM to page to the disk.
Re:My impressions by jpardey · 2007-01-30 15:48 · Score: 1

That's one nice thing about Vista. It will show us all that windows XP wasn't that bad.

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I have freaks! I did something right...
Re:My impressions by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 17:19 · Score: 0

About the hibernation...
http://windowsvistablog.com/blogs/windowsvista/arc hive/2006/12/08/windows-vista-power-management.asp x
While Hybrid Sleep can be used on a laptop computer, it isn't as applicable to laptops for a couple of reasons. First, a desktop is vulnerable to power loss, while a laptop can of course run on its internal battery. A laptop can also detect or even wake up from standby when the battery is low so Windows can save everything to the disk before the battery is completely drained -- and remember, in the sleep state all the battery needs to do is to refresh the RAM, which takes very little power. Also, mobile users want a grab-n-go usage model, so taking extra time after the laptop lid is closed spinning the disk to write out a potentially large hibernate file could be a problem. Lastly, after a laptop has been in sleep for a while, the system will wake up and immediately go into the hibernate state. This state uses absolutely no power, so even the minimal battery drain used in standby is removed. If the system is in this power state when the user wants to use the system, then the system state is restored from disk. So basically... close the lid and stop trying to micromanage the power-saving mode of your laptop! :)

Business Environment? LOL by CrazyTalk · 2007-01-30 05:56 · Score: 1

Vista isnt even on our radar - heck, we are still running SQL Server 2000 and developing VB6 Apps. I'm sure we won't move to Vista until we have to because XP is no longer supported. I have a feeling that a lot of companies will plan their release schedule that way.

Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating System by Dr+Kool,+PhD · 2007-01-30 05:56 · Score: 5, Funny

I waited several hours in line on the night before release to be one of the first to use Windows Vista. I must say that Vista is an amazing operating system. It is hands-down the best product that Microsoft has ever put out, and probably the best operating system that the world has ever seen.

Why upgrade from XP? There's so much new in Vista that your head will just boggle. From new Internet Explorer 7 to desktop search features to a virus / spyware scan utility that eliminates the need for Norton, Vista is on the cutting edge of technology. Another thing that impressed me is the improvements Microsoft made to the little games that come with the OS. Solitaire, Minesweeper, and all your favorites are back with improved graphics and game play along with newcomers like Chess and Hold'Em. Did I mention the the Aero desktop environment is the worlds first 3D desktop?

Windows Vista is more than just an incremental upgrade, it's on a whole new level compared to XP. Congratulations to Microsoft for releasing an amazing product. They spent $6 billion and five years on this operating system and it really shows.

Did people camp out to get it? by lrohrer · 2007-01-30 05:57 · Score: 1

So where are the pictures and stories of people camping out to get the first copy?

On a more serious note, Micr$oft waited to release this OS until as many of their corporate customers signed "upgraded site licenses". They have a built in 3 year market. No Risks. It is better than being a utility company but not quite as good as the government racket.

CS Students get your Free version to test out by ookabooka · 2007-01-30 05:57 · Score: 2, Interesting

Just wanted to remind fellow CS student slashdotters that your school is most likely part of the MSDN Academic Alliance, and you can get all sorts of microsoft stuff for "free". The only stipulation is you can't use it for for-profit stuff. In any case its a great way to get legit keys to use so you can get the updates "legally". I'm downloading the DVD of Vista right now, I'll prolly install it on a separate partition just to get a feel for it, but I'm gonna stick with XP for a little while.

Linky for the lazy like myself :-D Though you'll have to talk to your CS dept. about how to obtain login information.

--
If you are about to mod me down, keep in mind that this post was most likely sarcastic.

Its not bad... by trogdor8667 · 2007-01-30 06:00 · Score: 2, Informative

I got a free copy of the business edition, and I installed it over XP Pro 64bit. To be honest, it runs much more quickly than XP 64 (less CPU usage, programs appear to start more quickly).

However, Microsoft did a presentation here on Vista, and I have to disagree with a lot of their reasoning for "improvements." Users want more security, and, in my opinion, UAC is more annoyance than security.

Our presenter said the new start menu and search came from research that said most people use their keyboard to move around choosing programs, not the mouse. Ok, the search feature IS nice. However, if you do use your mouse on the start menu (and most people I know do use the mouse here, sadly), its harder to use than the menu in XP. My favorite thing when it comes to this, is that everywhere, Bill Gates has said that everyone will be blown away by the Vista Search the moment it comes out of the box. My computer is basically a brand new top of the line system, and it took it 12+ hours to index my almost empty hard drive. While it is doing this, it gives you a message telling you to try the search later. So much for it working immediately out of the box.

Now, one place I have to give Vista props is the look. Vista looks nice overall; I didn't know my $30 graphics card could show images that crisp. Aero isn't bad either.

Vista has not crashed yet. The only problem I've had is with Visual Studio 2005; it likes to complain a lot, but it runs.

Anyway, those are my two cents on Vista. I had no idea if I'd like it, but its honestly not half bad. I'll still stick with my MacBook Pro for most stuff, though.

Re:Its not bad... by BalkanBoy · 2007-01-30 10:49 · Score: 1

Microsoft released a service pack for VS.NET 2005 for Vista - perhaps that might solve the issues you are having? Wild guess, but worth upgrading if you (or anyone else) haven't already...

--
'A lie if repeated often enough, becomes the truth.' - Goebbels
Re:Its not bad... by trogdor8667 · 2007-01-30 16:10 · Score: 1

When I attempt to update VS 2005, it tells me there is no current update available; I either already have it, or its not showing up, but I do appreciate the information.

Duh by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:03 · Score: 3, Interesting

Beowulf Cluster Computing with Windows

Re:Duh by 'nother+poster · 2007-01-30 06:12 · Score: 2, Informative

Damn, you beat me to it AC. Beowolf is an architecture of using a server node to manage (usually) multiple processing nodes to "maximize the speed" of processing using commodity HARDWARE, There is no particular "Beowolf" software.

Start Button: by norminator · 2007-01-30 06:03 · Score: 1

You do still go to START to stop the computer though.

It's only a Start button in the Windows Classic interface... In the Vista or Aero interfaces, it's a little Windows Logo Bubble. (WLB)

Re:Start Button: by sharkey · 2007-01-30 06:12 · Score: 1

Hmmm, the tooltip says "Start" if you hover over it.

--

--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.

Medical records on workstations? by iceperson · 2007-01-30 06:04 · Score: 1

Your clients keep medical records on workstations? Perhaps they should look into replacing you with someone who can explain to them the problems associated with that.

Re:Medical records on workstations? by Barny · 2007-01-30 09:47 · Score: 1

A lot of small clinics will only have 1-10 computers, in that sort of environment you usually just drop a good raid card in one of them and a bevy of HDD and it is now the "server" as well. It is likely that they would be storing client info on a machine with a workstation OS in this case. Even if they do have it on a separate server, the data still has to go to the workstations eventually, and then it is at risk.

Truth be told this could be a problem with windows XP as well, all it takes is for one person to hit "send data" after a program crash and there's a breach of patient information.

--
...
/me sighs

Vista Rocks! by Bluesman · 2007-01-30 06:06 · Score: 4, Funny

I love when Microsoft comes out with a resource hog OS.

It just means that when I buy my next low-end PC, the hardware will be incredible just so it can run Vista, and FreeBSD will run like a dream on it.

I think we all owe MS a great deal of gratitude for pushing the envelope so that decent OS's can make use of commodity hardware that ten years ago was unimaginably fast.

--
If moderation could change anything, it would be illegal.

Re:Vista Rocks! by ZachPruckowski · 2007-01-30 06:22 · Score: 1

This is so very true. If it wasn't for Vista needing a GB of RAM and 128MB of video RAM to do what my low-end mac laptop has been able to do for 2 years, who knows where the hardware would be today?
Re:Vista Rocks! by wjeff · 2007-01-30 07:14 · Score: 1

so true, I haven't really thought about it before, but my primary two workstations are both about 5 years old, and were bought used from Windows upgraders, wooo wooot!!! I'm finally gettin' new computers! Thanks Microsoft!

--
my old sig is obsolete, and I haven't come up with a stupid enough new one yet

don't know about Vista... by freeradica1 · 2007-01-30 06:07 · Score: 2, Funny

...but I queued up at midnight for dapper drake.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by WinterSolstice · 2007-01-30 06:09 · Score: 1

That was one of the best posts ever :)
I wish I had mod points!

-WS

--
An operating system should be like a light switch... simple, effective, easy to use, and designed for everyone.

CNN Is Running A Quick Poll - Will You Buy Vista? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:12 · Score: 0

Check the CNN website and vote your hearts out. ;-)

Review inc. by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:14 · Score: 0

Like:

- Aero

Aero looks nice, runs without issue on my laptop.

(yeah, thats it..)

Dislike:

- UAC

This is just poor implementation. You are nagged like crazy even if you are logged in as an Admin user. Why?? If you break down and disable UAC, 1. You must reboot, 2. 'Run as' is completely disabled, so limited users will never be able to execute administrator tasks, you MUST switch users to admin to take care of these things. Middle ground should be... no nags while logged in as Admin, but allow Limited to still use 'Run as'.

- Drivers

Vista claimed to have properly detected and installed my network card, but I couldn't connect to my access point until I installed the Intel drivers (2915abg). Vista drivers are still crude for the most part, not Microsoft's fault.

- Video strangeness

I have no idea why, but playing fullscreen video in any other application but WMP requires way more processing power than it does in XP.

- Startup time

45 seconds with Vista, 20 seconds for XP.

- The new control panel menus

Control panel is now a tangled web of options, you're not sure if the last menu you were looking at is the same one as the one you're about to open as you search for how to get the normal freaking toolbar back in explorer.

Neutral:

- Performance

UI was slightly less responsive than the classic windows shell but that is to be expected, it was still usable and I didn't feel the difference was bothersome.

- Application compatibility

Most of the applications I use work fine in Vista. Anything that had issues either hadn't been updated in a long time or only had issues as a limited user.

---

Vista is long gone from my laptop now, but those are my first impressions from 3 hours or so of tinkering.

Can anyone confirm that you can't play DVDs without CSS that are somehow detected as commercial? I thought I saw a screenshot of such a thing but forgot to test this.

Re:Ripped off! by Technician · 2007-01-30 06:14 · Score: 1

...but I queued up at midnight for dapper drake.

Dude, pay attention. That's like staying up to midnight for Windows XP or ME. It's been out forever. Did you mean Edgy? Or maybe the release of Feisty Fawn?

--
The truth shall set you free!

Breadcrumb address bar by norminator · 2007-01-30 06:14 · Score: 1

There is one thing that drives me absolutely mental though ... in the windows explorer there is no "up" button, and back does not do the same thing, and yes, I am aware that I can just hit backspace, but when I'm in "mouse only" mode, this does not cut it.

You don't need an Up button anymore. The address bar lists each parent folder as a separate button. You just click on the parent folder you want. Next to each of those folder buttons is a small triangle. If you click that, you get a opop up menu with a list of child folders within that parent folder. I actually sort of like the new style better (Gnome has been doing it in a similar way). You don't have to hit up 3 times to go up three folders, you just click on the folder name that you want. But I guess if they didn't make it obvious enough for you to know that's how to use it, they definitely should re-examine the way they display those folder names, maybe make them look like they're actually buttons.

I can understand that the Up button was in some ways more usable, because it's always in the same place in relation to the address bar. After you've used that button, you don't have to read anything to use it again, or search for the icon, because you know it's there. With the Breadcrumb method, you do have to read the folder names to find the one you want, so in a way, it is a little more annoying. But if you're going Up more than one level, I think it is easier and faster.

I for one welcome our new Vista overlords by WillAffleckUW · 2007-01-30 06:14 · Score: 1

But wonder why it took them four years to implement a Windows version of the BSD-based Mac OS that uses ten times the memory and four times the graphical power to do the same thing?

Sorry, I've given up. The only reason I have a WinXP box at home is to play the Sims on it, and I'm not shelling out $2000 to replace my $500 laptop when I could buy a Mac laptop that does the same thing for $1000.

--
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by goaty_the_flying_sho · 2007-01-30 06:15 · Score: 1

So, your OS needs a virus scanner?

I also fail to see how it's the first 3D desktop. OSX and Xgl/Beryl have been out for a while, dude.

Ericsson will make the switch now by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:15 · Score: 0

Telecommunications giant Ericsson will switch to Vista worldvide on all workstations in Q1 this year.

The more things change .... by twitter · 2007-01-30 06:15 · Score: 1

Can Steve Ballmer look Cute?

No, but even if he looked good, he'd still be that asshole talking about "fucking killing" people and companies.

Windoze, like it's makers, is more like it's caricature each day: bloated, buggy and controlling. In most ways, the more things change them more they are the same.

--

Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

Re:The more things change .... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:29 · Score: 0, Troll
twitter, please read this carefully. Following this advice will make Slashdot a better place for everyone, including yourself.
- As a representative of the Linux community, participate in mailing list and newsgroup discussions in a professional manner. Refrain from name-calling and use of vulgar language. Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer. Your words will either enhance or degrade the image the reader has of the Linux community.
- Avoid hyperbole and unsubstantiated claims at all costs. It's unprofessional and will result in unproductive discussions.
- A thoughtful, well-reasoned response to a posting will not only provide insight for your readers, but will also increase their respect for your knowledge and abilities.
- Always remember that if you insult or are disrespectful to someone, their negative experience may be shared with many others. If you do offend someone, please try to make amends.
- Focus on what Linux has to offer. There is no need to bash the competition. Linux is a good, solid product that stands on its own.
- Respect the use of other operating systems. While Linux is a wonderful platform, it does not meet everyone's needs.
- Refer to another product by its proper name. There's nothing to be gained by attempting to ridicule a company or its products by using "creative spelling". If we expect respect for Linux, we must respect other products.
- Give credit where credit is due. Linux is just the kernel. Without the efforts of people involved with the GNU project , MIT, Berkeley and others too numerous to mention, the Linux kernel would not be very useful to most people.
- Don't insist that Linux is the only answer for a particular application. Just as the Linux community cherishes the freedom that Linux provides them, Linux only solutions would deprive others of their freedom.
- There will be cases where Linux is not the answer. Be the first to recognize this and offer another solution.
From http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/docs/HOWTO/Advoca cy
Re:The more things change .... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:36 · Score: 0

Can Twitter look Cute?

No, but even if he looked good, he'd still be that asshole claiming that everybody who doesn't suck Richard Stallman's dick is an astroturfer.

Twitter is more like his caricature each day: deranged, paranoid douchebaggery. In most ways, the more things change the more they are the same.

Debian, it is. by Toon+Moene · 2007-01-30 06:17 · Score: 1

So let me see, if Debian has a three year release cycle the world is coming to an end, but when Microsoft has a five year release cycle, we should evaluate the results ?

No way, Jose.

Debian testing can be upgraded with the frequency *you* want, at a convenient time to *you*.

I'm doing this now for about six years.

Of course, me going back wouldn't be to Microsoft Windows, but to NeXTStep.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by Ant+P. · 2007-01-30 06:21 · Score: 1

YHBT, HAND.

Haha same slashdot different day by Charcharodon · 2007-01-30 06:22 · Score: 1

Substitute in XP in for Vista and all the comments would have the same tone and probably the same comments made during XP's launch.

Here are the typical responses I expect to see here.

Too expensive...
Too demanding on the hardware, why doesn't it work perfect on my five year old computer?...
Blatently copies Apple...
Apple does it better (even though it's a blatent copy)... Does too much, bloatware...
Doesn't do enough, were is support for my win95 aps...
Microsoft suxs, Bill Gates is the Devil...
Apple is cool, Steve Jobs is God...
Security is to restrictive, I don't need a baby sitter...
Won't protect me from myself, where is the security?!...
Too much of it is automatic, why I can't I just manually type in registry info?...
Plug and play doesn't work, why can't the OS do everything for me?...
OMG the hackers will have viruses, why doesn't it include better protection...
Fucking monopoly, they included better protection and are driving out the little guy...
Who gives a crap about gaming, Apple is better is every way...

Blah blah blah blah. :)

Personally I'm looking forward to getting my new machine that I'm building set-up with Vista. The last of the parts and the OS disc should reach me over here in the UK by next week. :D

Re:Haha same slashdot different day by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:38 · Score: 0

You are absolutely correct. I didn't use XP, and I won't be using Fista either.
Re:Haha same slashdot different day by Charcharodon · 2007-01-30 06:55 · Score: 0, Redundant

You are very cool and Froody, and you smell great.

For the 1st time, I'm considering Apple by geoffrobinson · 2007-01-30 06:22 · Score: 1

Is that an appropriate reaction to Vista? I'm not sure. But it seems that Vista is just an incremental change with unknown problems I don't feel like being bothered with a year from now.

--
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.

VMware / Xen compatable? by nmos · 2007-01-30 06:22 · Score: 1

So does anyone know if Vista is compatable with the current version of VMware or maybe Xen? I don't have a dedicated Windows machine but I do like to keep images of various OSs around for support/testing purposes.

Re:VMware / Xen compatable? by Constantine+XVI · 2007-01-30 07:17 · Score: 1, Troll

It is. Just disable Aero, or you will have the illusion of running Vista on a Pentium 133mhz

--
"I think an etch-a-sketch with an ethernet port would beat IE7 in web standards compliance."
Re:VMware / Xen compatable? by EzInKy · 2007-01-30 11:46 · Score: 1

So does anyone know if Vista is compatable with the current version of VMware or maybe Xen? I don't have a dedicated Windows machine but I do like to keep images of various OSs around for support/testing purposes.

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA HOME BASIC
*4. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system.

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA HOME PREMIUM
*4. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system.

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA ULTIMATE
*6. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system on the licensed device. If
you do so, you may not play or access content or use applications protected by any Microsoft digital,
information or enterprise rights management technology or other Microsoft rights management
services or use BitLocker. We advise against playing or accessing content or using applications
protected by other digital, information or enterprise rights management technology or other rights
management services or using full volume disk drive encryption.

--
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.

Best Buy is full of crap. by norminator · 2007-01-30 06:23 · Score: 1

I heard a comment while listening to the news on my radio from a Best Buy manager early this morning in which he stated that today will be like the release day for the Nintendo Wii with sporadic availability of Vista in stores for months to come. Somehow I doubt that people will be lining up and fighting for copies of this operating system like they did for Windows '95.

Especially considering that fact that it is available as a download... If Nintendo could have produced Wiis as downloadable software, there sure wouldn't have been many lines at stores. And I'm sure that most people who have an existing computer to install Vista on, and are really eager to get it, will be the type of people to have a broadband connection and a DVD burner.

And to the moron manager that said that: Since when does telling potential customers that they'll have to camp out for several nights in January/February to maybe get a copy of a piece of software encourage people to come to your store?

Re:Best Buy is full of crap. by kennygraham · 2007-01-30 15:36 · Score: 1

Since when does telling potential customers that they'll have to camp out for several nights in January/February to maybe get a copy of a piece of software encourage people to come to your store?

It's the whole "but you'd better buy now!" thing. It works. If they don't get it now, they might be the only person on the block who doesn't have it! Oh no!

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by cashman73 · 2007-01-30 06:23 · Score: 1

How much did Bill Gates pay you to post that? Did you get a free trip to Redmond, or something?

Re:2008, HE's Right. It's not that far away. by DRAGONWEEZEL · 2007-01-30 06:24 · Score: 1

Corporate OS from MS usually lags behind the consumer market. I would bet that Late 2008 wouldn't be that bad but 01/01/08 would be WAY too early.

I am kind of curious to see what the adoption rate is going to be. I for one have no reason to upgrade other than to support random people who have it. (Nobody right now) I may obtain a premium in July, but probably not.

I just can't recommend it to clients until application support is verified from the rest of the world. If just one thing doesn't work just right, I'll get phone calls till 2am from all sorts of folk.

--
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.

The ideal Vista virus by kimvette · 2007-01-30 06:24 · Score: 1

Will be one which appears to "upgrade" hardware more than twice to the OS by marking device drivers as having been upgraded, resulting in activation being voided and owners being notified that they exceeded allowed number of device upgrades. This will quickly bring one of Windows' licensing defects to notice by Joe Sixpack and mainstream media, and they will realize that Microsoft is abusing their monopoly position by effectively revoking your right of first sale.

--
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50

Re:The ideal Vista virus by DbZeroOne · 2007-01-30 16:21 · Score: 1

That is an INCREDIBLE concept!! I laughed out loud!!
I'm going to get started on that right away!!
Now let's see... Google... search for "How to write a virus"...

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by drinkypoo · 2007-01-30 06:25 · Score: 2, Insightful

I also fail to see how it's the first 3D desktop. OSX and Xgl/Beryl have been out for a while, dude.

Besides the fact that YHBT (HTH, HAND) Beryl is a big pile of crap right now. I mean it's beautiful, and I enjoy using it, but I have to jump back to metacity in order to play Oolite because Beryl takes over my 3d card, and resizing windows from the bottom in truglass seems to be broken (or is that by design? I can't seem to find out) and it's just unreliable in general.

On the plus side, due to the way X11 is designed, at least the Expose-clone works. :)

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"

Re:CNN Is Running A Quick Poll - Will You Buy Vist by cashman73 · 2007-01-30 06:26 · Score: 1

Wow! 20,077 'no' votes to '677' yes votes! I think we slashdotted the CNN poll! /not surprised at the results

Re:Seriously common... by MS-06FZ · 2007-01-30 06:26 · Score: 4, Insightful

Are you seriously going to ask that here at Slashdot? Thats like asking a liberal "So what do you think of Bush?" ...Right, 'cause we all know that The Liberals are inherently incapable of answering a question like that in a reasonable manner. There won't be any meaningful thought, there will only be Liberal Bias, because The Liberals hate America.

Or maybe it's possible that, among a group where the prevailing opinion is anti-Bush, or anti-Windows, individuals will be able to engage in rational discussion - and even if they've already formed the opinion you expect of them they may have very good, logical reasons for having done so.

Or maybe they're all just sheep. Baaaa! I think what I think because a man on TV told me to!

--
---GEC
I'm but the humble pupil, seeking to snatch the scratchbuilt pebble from the master's fully articulated hand

Since you asked.... by hawkbug · 2007-01-30 06:27 · Score: 5, Informative

I've been running Vista since the RTM was released. I'm running Vista Ultimate x86. I have a dual core AMD Athlon system on an Nforce4 motherboard with 2 gigs of RAM. I'm not interested in trying betas or release clients at this point in my life, I've got more important things to do with my time. So when the RTM came out, I decided to use it on my primary workstation in a dual boot environment. I have nothing good to say about Vista actually - and lots negative. I use my workstation for the following things:

1) Email, web surfing, word processing - all the basics.
2) Video editing with tools like Adobe After Effects, VirtualDub, DivX, etc.
3) Web development - I have a version of ColdFusion dev installed, which is supposed to work with IIS.
4) Database development - SQL Server 2005.
5) Local network administration for the windows network here in the office - Active Directory, Exchange management, etc.
6) Linux server management, I only need an SSH client here.
7) Backup DVDs to either my iPod or for backups for our car.

While I may not be the prototypical end user, I think most of the stuff I do would be common and stuff that Microsoft would make sure was ready - ESPECIALLY their own tools. Here is a list of the tools that don't work are aren't stable on Vista:

1) Exchange 2003 System Manager, won't even install. It uses IIS6 for some stupid reason, and IIS7 (despite what it says) is not backwards compatible.

2) Active Directory - as a result of no Exchange tools, you don't get the exchange based tabs to administer basic email properties of user accounts. M$'s solution is to RDP to a server. Nice.

3) Windows Live Messenger - crashes all the time, mostly when you go to exit the program. It's annoying as hell.

4) SQL Server 2005 - You get a warning when it installs about how it won't work, but I did it anyway. It's mostly functional, but you still have the occasional system freeze, etc. Good times.

5) Since none of my 3rd party DVD making apps seem to want to work with vista, I tried Windows Movie Maker. After opening a raw avi movie file straight from my video camera, movie maker decided it didn't want to work. It just hung and after a failed attempt to kill it with task manager, I had to reboot. I tried again with exactly the same results. WTF?

And those are just the Microsoft products that don't work, which seems completely idiotic to me. You would think with an OS in development for 5 years, you'd iron some of that shit out with your own software. Now for the 3rd party apps:

1) Nero - I use it for CD and DVD burning like everybody else. For whatever reason, everytime I move my mouse over an mpeg or avi file in windows I get a RunDLL32 stop error and windows freaks out. This only happens after installing Nero. I'm running the latest verison as well, straight from Nero.com as of yesterday. If you do anything with videos, windows throws up these errors. Makes video editing impossible.

2) iTunes 7.0.2 - basically, nothing about iTunes works for more than 5 minutes. You can't burn cds, so that's bad. Then if you leave it open for 5 minutes, eventually the user interface freaks out and starts blinking in parts and removes the colors, etc. Then if you minimize it, you'll never get it back without restarting or manually killing it with task manager.

3) Firefox - about one out of every 10 times I open up Firefox, I get the blue screen of death with a MEMORY_MANAGEMENT error. This only happens on one of the workstations I put Vista on, the other doesn't have this same issue despite the fact that it's the same hardware exactly. Very strange.

4) Nvidia drivers - using the latest nvidia drivers from their website as of yesterday, my machine becomes completely unstable. Windows Explorer crashes every so often. I had to roll back to the default microsoft drivers for my Geforce 7600GS.

Now if all that isn't bad enough and reason to stay away, here are my gripes about the OS itself:

1) It's slow as he

Re:Since you asked.... by myz24 · 2007-01-30 06:52 · Score: 1

Sounds like you have bad ram, to me anyway.
Re:Since you asked.... by DiscoOnTheSide · 2007-01-30 07:08 · Score: 2, Informative

Are we using the same RTM? I've got it installed on a AMD A64 3200+ with 1.5GB of ram and a Geforce 6600GT 256MB.

Not sure about the Exchange stuff, didn't try to install it.

Windows Live Messenger - I've had no such problems.

Nero 7.5 - Works just fine. Burns CDs, DVDs, without a hitch.

iTunes 7.0.2 - While I do get ONE graphical glitch from iTunes, it fixes itself quickly and works fine. When you first open the program it's window is nothing but flat black. Maximize and minimize the window and it redraws it properly.

Firefox 2.0 - Works just fine.

NVidia drivers - Graphical system was buggy BEFORE installing the latest version, afterwards made it incredibly stable.

---

I find the interface to be quite snappy. The "shiny"(tm) shouldn't bog your system down at all due to its sitting on your 3d card, not your system.

The only major quibble I've had is the driver for Broadcom wireless cards currently sucks. Every once in a blue moon it gets a bug up its ass and does a cycle of connect/disconnect until you reboot. Flaky drivers are to be expected with a new OS however...

Not trying to say you're lying, just that maybe you got an incredibly buggy install.

Hell World of Warcraft averages 5 fps more on my vista box than on XP. I've always stuck to OS X for my "fuck around on the internet" and IM usage... Windows was just games, that was it. Now Microsoft has finally made a Windows that I feel is comfortable to sit down and use for whatever I need. Yeah, yeah. Some things changed. It happens. If it didn't change people would be bitching "What did they do then with all that time!?"

Apple at least has the balls to say "Ok, listen. We're changing it. Deal with it. Oh, and if your computer is more than X years old...we won't even let you install it." This I feel is needed for an easier path forward. Vista really needs to start cutting off the tail end of it's legacy support... just little by little... I've always felt that Windows was weighed down by it's legacy... if they said "Ok, nothing made before XP is working with Vista..." it'd be a decent start.

Meh, went on a rant there, but I see too many people saying they used it and it sucks and assuming that's the "experience" for everyone. Buggy installs happen. Happens on Mac, happens on Windows, and to a limited degree, Linux can get it too, as I've learned with Gentoo.

It actually is the best attempt they've done so far. XP made them look like they weren't even trying. Vista at least shows there is some effort to it.

--
Viva La Revolucion! Buy a Mac!
Re:Since you asked.... by hawkbug · 2007-01-30 07:59 · Score: 1

"Windows Live Messenger - I've had no such problems."

I downloaded a new version today, seems to work better. Back in Nov when the RTM came out, the version that got downloaded from the shortcut that *shipped* with Vista was incredibly buggy, especially when closing the app.

"Nero 7.5 - Works just fine. Burns CDs, DVDs, without a hitch."

I never said I couldn't burn things without a hitch - but after Nero is installed, install Divx and move your mouse over a divx encoded file or just a straight mpeg file. You'll see what I'm talking about, it's happening to everybody with nero installed that does video editing. I think I may have just found a hack fix however:

http://www.hostingforum.ca/windows-vista/170502-re -windows-host-process-rundll32-has-stopped-working .html

"Firefox 2.0 - Works just fine."

You're lucky. I'm not alone with this problem. Google "vista firefox MEMORY_MANAGEMENT" and you'll see what I mean. Most people report the problem with Vista in general before RTM was released, but you'll find the occasional post like mine with RTM. Like I said, it's only happening on one out of my two boxes with identical hardware. This is very disturbing to me - it could potentially be a hardware issue that XP never caused, but maybe Vista is just using so much memory it happens to find the back part of my RAM, who knows.

"iTunes 7.0.2 - While I do get ONE graphical glitch from iTunes, it fixes itself quickly and works fine. When you first open the program it's window is nothing but flat black. Maximize and minimize the window and it redraws it properly."

What video card do you have? This is not at all what I see, I have that Nvidia Geforce 7600GS, and once it glitches out, there is nothing you can do to fix it. Minimizing it screws up everything - when you try to click the mouse no it to maximize it, it slides over the top of the other buttons on the start menu, and you can never maximize it again. Task Manager or reboot are your only options. I'll try to take a screen shot and post back here. I've noticed it happens more times on my second monitor than on my first - I have a dual monitor set up, maybe that has something to do with it.

"Buggy installs happen. Happens on Mac, happens on Windows, and to a limited degree, Linux can get it too, as I've learned with Gentoo."

I disagree strongly here. I freshly formatted two systems to install this. No upgrades. There should be no bugs here, I followed the same process with both.
Re:Since you asked.... by hawkbug · 2007-01-30 08:01 · Score: 1

Nevermind my question, I see your part about the 6600GT - I have no idea why you don't see what I do with iTunes. iTunes is the buggiest app by far on Vista for me, both systems.
Re:Since you asked.... by man_of_mr_e · 2007-01-30 09:22 · Score: 2, Informative

While I don't doubt you that you've experienced this, all i can say is that some of your problems were real and have already been solved, some of them are not common and you seem to be the only person i've ever heard with them, and some are definately legitimate.

I've not seen nany problems with Live Messenger since RTM. SQL Server has had a publicly available beta patch available for quite some time (along with Visual Studio). DVD and other apps have always had a lot of trouble with new versions of Windows, because the API's change (usually for the better, to provide functionality that those apps used to have to do themselves). iTunes... well, Apple has always had trouble writing decent software for Windows, so that doesn't surprise me. I don't use it. Firefox has a couple of dozen known bugs that effect Vista. I have a nVidia 6600GT that has worked well for ages under Vista. Even with the newer Forceware drivers.

As for performance, it's been pretty fast for me. Both on my P4M laptop with 512MB and on my Dual Core 2GB desktop.

As for the default view, i'm not sure if i understand. XP has worked exactly the same way for me, left to right for folders in icon view. The desktop has always been top to bottom. Or are you referring to open and save dialogs? Those work more like normal explorer now and exhibit the behavior you are talking about.

The start menu i guess is personal preference. I like it, but then I use the keyboard most of the time, and I find it easier to get around in.

--
If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
Re:Since you asked.... by Serious+Callers+Only · 2007-01-30 10:59 · Score: 1

iTunes is the buggiest app by far on Vista for me, both systems.

Gates heard mumbling to the tune of that old MS saw about Lotus :

Vista isn't done, till iTunes won't run.
Re:Since you asked.... by StikyPad · 2007-01-30 12:24 · Score: 1

XP made them look like they weren't even trying. Vista at least shows there is some effort to it.

So you were running Windows ME until now? Granted, XP is functionally very similar to Windows 2000, but Win2k was intended for a corporate/enterprise networked environment. Anybody who tried to use it for games in the first few years should remember the horrible problem with drivers, and some drivers still don't work properly with Win2k to this day. XP was a monumental improvement on 98/ME.

--
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
Re:Since you asked.... by e40 · 2007-01-30 16:30 · Score: 1

I was thinking the same thing. He should check out http://www.memtest.org/.

$400 seems like a lot to pay for Solitaire by tenzig_112 · 2007-01-30 06:28 · Score: 4, Funny

REDMOND, WASHINGTON- With the launch of their newest solitaire engine, Vista, Microsoft hopes to bring the art of single player card games to a whole new level. Gone is the flat green background, replaced by a seductive green-to-dark-green gradient. The "play" and "quit" buttons are pleasantly shiny like beads of glass, softly inviting you to click them. Even the diamonds, hearts, spades, and clubs all have a sexy updated look. After poking around Vista for a few hours, it's difficult to imagine stacking sequential cards of alternating suits with anything less.

Even harder to believe is the steady stream of bad reviews for Vista. After five years of waiting, it would be understandable if some members of the press felt that Vista should represent a bigger jump from its predecessor than it does. For instance, they point to Microsoft's original promise that all versions of Vista would feature a common 64-bit architecture- but that makes no sense at all since the game only has 52 cards. It seems fairly clear that anyone talking trash about Vista just hasn't played it.

Excerpt from ridiculopathy.com Somehow I don't think this is serious.

Re:$400 seems like a lot to pay for Solitaire by igorthefiend · 2007-01-30 09:48 · Score: 1

Well, they've ruined Minesweeper with the fancy new graphics. My times are down by 10-15 seconds on expert. Back to XP for me. :p
Re:$400 seems like a lot to pay for Solitaire by Night+Goat · 2007-01-30 14:50 · Score: 1

Excellent article! I'm going to throw my Apple laptop into the trash. No solitaire? What is the point then?

I don'tr know about a midnight launch... by g051051 · 2007-01-30 06:29 · Score: 1

But I was just at my local Fry's store in Alpharetta, GA, and there wasn't a single person looking at the Vista stuff, and the locked display case was completely full, like no one has actually bought any copies yet. I didn't even know it was launch day until I saw this thread.

And I just upgraded to XP by mauriatm · 2007-01-30 06:29 · Score: 1

Later agreed. I dual boot between Windows 2000 and Linux where I'm in linux about 90% of the time. But the irony is that ONLY NOW am I upgrading to XP. Not because I really wanted to (as 2000 still meets my needs) but rather because I got an MP3 player that required Windows Media 10 to sync and hence I require XP.

When it comes to operating systems, things typically boil down to the least common denominator. People still hang on to old stuff if they can't get something to work in the new system, or in my case it was the opposite. I really wanted my MP3 player to work, so I switched. Chances are that some game or some hardware will probably push the upgrade, but as far as I can see, I just don't see that killer product ... yet.

Although, this is the true bliss with spare partitions and dual/triple booting. I still have a spare 20GB partition that I called "Future Vista" about 6 months ago, when I re-partitioned everything.

--
Linux Resources

Re:And I just upgraded to XP by Mad+Merlin · 2007-01-30 15:44 · Score: 1

...because I got an MP3 player that required Windows Media 10 to sync and hence I require XP.

Why wouldn't you get an MP3 player that simply acts as a USB mass storage device? Even now, the cost of buying a new MP3 player that doesn't use some proprietary interface would be less than that of a copy of XP.

--
Game! - Where the stick is mightier than the sword!
Re:And I just upgraded to XP by mauriatm · 2007-01-30 15:52 · Score: 1

Why wouldn't you get an MP3 player that simply acts as a USB mass storage device? Even now, the cost of buying a new MP3 player that doesn't use some proprietary interface would be less than that of a copy of XP.

You assume that I was the one who selected it for myself. It was a gift, and a very nice one at that.

Even software cost for XP, although too high, is still manageable. Luckily, I never paid for my Windows 2000 or Windows XP. Microsoft gave them to me for free - back when I was in college (along with Visual Studio and countless other things). I regret I didn't know to use Ebay back then.

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Linux Resources

meh by blindd0t · 2007-01-30 06:30 · Score: 1

Not that they necessarily count for much, but I'll post my thoughts because I can

As a developer, the biggest change we have had to deal with is the UAC feature. As we /. folk are aware, this limits permissions even for an administrator. As a component vendor, we simply have to keep our customers informed of how to deal with this when they set up their installers, but this really is not a big deal
The UI is OK, and the feel of the animations is pleasant and familiar to me from playing with Compiz and Beryl. However, I really don't care for how the "glass" blurs out window contents of windows underneath the active window. When you have a window full of text underneath it, it can make the title bar look strange, and just a little difficult to focus on the text of the title bar initially. It's a quirk I don't particularly care for, and I know I can turn the glass off if I choose.
As far as how nice an environment it is for development; ask me again later when I can comfortably use Visual Studio 2005 in Vista - when Service Pack 1 Update for Vista is not a beta any longer (some time this quarter).
I haven't tried it out as a web development environment yet (using IIS and MSSQL 2005), so I still have to evaluate that... Any input is welcome, of course!

Overall, my opinion of Vista is rather neutral. I welcome the new APIs, though I cannot use many of them because of our need to provide backwards compatibility beyond just Windows XP. I find it to be more aesthetically pleasing than Windows XP's default theme, but as a developer, I'm sorely disappointed that so many development tools are not compatible with the new version of the OS. Clearly, I can still write code for Vista while I'm not using Vista, but many people who use tools other than VB6, FoxPro 9, and Visual Studio 2005 will find a good reason not to upgrade to Vista (or a good reason to look into virtualization software like VMWare).

Come to think of it, I'm not really a Borland guy, but has anyone tested old versions of Delphi, C-Builder, etc..? I'm curious to know what versions of Borland's products, if any, no longer function on Vista.

No, M$ is going down. by twitter · 2007-01-30 06:30 · Score: 2, Interesting

From the Gaurdian:

The company has already felt the ill effects of launch delays: last week it announced a 10% drop in earnings for the six months to December.

I doubt anyone trotted out last night to give M$ money and that's a sign of things to come. It's safe to predict that 99.99999% of Vista sales will be OEM installs. The low price of new computers combined with the high price of Vista will kill over the counter sales. For the price of new software that won't work well with what you have, you can buy a computer with the same. For the immediate future, forcing Vista will hurt computer sales because no one wants it. As the price of computers continues to decline, M$ is going to have trouble gettin money out of OEMs. The margins don't allow it. The end of the M$ monopoly is here.

--

Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

Re:No, M$ is going down. by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:42 · Score: 0

KOOK ALERT
Re:No, M$ is going down. by pilbender · 2007-01-30 06:50 · Score: 0

I couldn't agree more. I can't think of one thing to look forward to in the M$ release.

I was laughing this morning because my work computer (which runs XP, and is my only Microsoft system) locked up on boot up. Only the power button would work. A couple of days ago I got the blue screen of death. I get something really *nasty* like this at least once a week for no apparent reason. So when my computer locked up this morning I thought... "Great, they don't even have the last system working yet and now we're going to have to start the process of even getting to this point all over again."

It's so painful when they have an upgrade. I'm only comforted by the fact that the general public is starting to react the same way. Conventional wisdom is now says to wait for a major Service Pack or 2 before upgrading. People are getting smarter but it's been a slow and painful process!

--
Fresh horses and more whiskey for my men.
Re:No, M$ is going down. by westlake · 2007-01-30 07:00 · Score: 1

As the price of computers continues to decline, M$ is going to have trouble gettin money out of OEMs. The margins don't allow it. The end of the M$ monopoly is here
Walmart.com has thirty OEM Vista systems on sale beginning at $498 for a Vista Basic laptop. Vista-Preloaded Computers Thirty times it's OEM Linux selection.
Re:No, M$ is going down. by dedazo · 2007-01-30 07:30 · Score: 0, Troll

But he's not a kook.
He is, actually. He's one of those people whose insane hatred of a company probably affects them physically and psycologically in ways we could hardly imagine. There are literally thousands of those offtopic "I'm feeling especially hateful today" posts in both of his Slashdot sockpuppet accounts.
Note that the message in some (some) cases is not the issue - it's the deranged messenger. Unfortunately he's accumulated enough "karma" here that he's allowed to post at +2.

--
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
Re:No, M$ is going down. by twitter · 2007-01-30 11:53 · Score: 1

Walmart.com has thirty OEM Vista systems on sale beginning at $498 for a Vista Basic laptop. Vista-Preloaded Computers Thirty times it's OEM Linux selection.

That ratio will change when the $100 GNU/Linux laptops are considered normal. At that point the $500 Vista box will be something for specialists with legacy data they are unable to extract.

--
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by CrossChris · 2007-01-30 06:32 · Score: 3, Insightful

If you really believe that Windows Defender eliminates the need for antivirus and anti-malware applications, you're in for a horrible shock. We connected a "Vista Ultimate" box to the 'net, and it lasted 23 minutes before it was totally trashed. The "firewall" doesn't work, Windows Defender is useless, and there are endless ports open by default to the outside world.

Why do you think Dell are shipping all that "anti-virus" software pre-installed on their machines. It's because they want to minimise the "first day service" calls.

It's a real disaster, and hopefully will signal the demise of Microsoft.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:32 · Score: 0

flamebait mods should be +1 sometimes :-)

Running Vista Enterprise by OnceWas · 2007-01-30 06:33 · Score: 1

I have been running Vista Enterprise for a month and a half (it was released to software assurance customers in early December) on my personal laptop.

Pros: It's a nice visual upgrade, things are smoother, Aero is pretty, the integration between it and Office 2007 is tight, but otherwise, it's not a sea change. I find the most interesting improvements are in the laptop features, with a quick wake from sleep - you actually have to dig to find the shutdown command. It's very stable.

Cons: Disk thrash: 1.25 gigs of ram is just enough. Readyboost - didn't notice any huge improvement with a 2-gig USB key set to cache the page file. I will try again with an SD or CF card. Strange activation errors - I don't have an activation server, so I don't know if my copy will eventually partially shut down. A general dumbing down of the dialog boxes: twice the dialogs for the same net result. I am already blindly clicking on OK.

I won't be recommending an upgrade from XP to Vista (and Office 2007) for any of my clients until the the market hits critical mass, meaning that they start complaining about being unable to open .docx files, and want all their desktops to look like their new laptops.

--
Laugh while you can, monkey-boy.

Idiots by QuoteMstr · 2007-01-30 06:34 · Score: 1

Idiots at my school keep asking about Vista, and are eager to install it. Fools. Don't people know it's a bad idea to install any new piece of software right away?

I am going to be sooo rich... by Hepneck · 2007-01-30 06:35 · Score: 1

I was first in line at Best Buy last night. I bought 5 copies, and now they are all on Ebay for $1500 'Buy it now'. Then I am going to buy a PS 3 on Ebay. Vista=Free PS3!!!

--
You may all go to Hell and I will go to Texas - Davy Crockett

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:37 · Score: 0

You work for Micro$oft, don't you.

Better or worse than Linux? by Remus+Shepherd · 2007-01-30 06:40 · Score: 1

I'm in a similar boat -- ready to upgrade to a new gaming PC. But in addition to Xp and Vista, I was considering Linux as a third alternative. I know very little about it these days (my last Linux box ran Slackware back in 1995) but if Linux gets DX9 or DX10 support I'd consider going that way. Any articles out there making this kind of comparison?

--
Genocide Man -- Life is funny. Death is funnier. Mass murder can be hilarious.

Re:Better or worse than Linux? by A+Name+Similar+to+Di · 2007-01-30 06:57 · Score: 1

You know, I'm not a Linux expert (I wish I was). I've installed Ubuntu 6.10 as my third alternative as well ;) That said, I'll tell you what "I think I know" and if some actual Linux guru wants to jump in and get you up to speed, I welcome it (since I'd like to learn a bit more myself).

Directx is closed-source software developed for computer games on MS products. That said, I'd doubt that MS will develop a Linux version. There is some software (like Wine) that attempt a compatibility layer to run Windows programs. Wine has some compatibility with DX9 but as far as I can tell, it's not 100%.

I hope to get my games running in Linux, but I have a lot to learn myself on the issue, hopefully someone might be able to fill in a bit more for you ;)

5 years in the bugging by monjici · 2007-01-30 06:44 · Score: 1

5 years of new code, I wouldn't touch that before SP1... maybe SP2.

Re:2008, HE's Right. It's not that far away. by aonaran · 2007-01-30 06:44 · Score: 1

Considering we are midway through an XP roll out that started in 2006 I agree, 2008 is very optimistic for some industries.
We are a municipality in Canada, and between training, and more importantly vendor certifications on 3rd party software (stuff that is more on the industry specific or custom level) we only got the go ahead to move to XP just in time to get it underway before MS pulled 2k support out from under us.

They qualify that statement. by twitter · 2007-01-30 06:46 · Score: 1

The same article qualifies that promise:

"It's crucial for corporate reputation and revenue that Vista proves more secure and stable than XP,"

I'll further qualify it for Mr. Gates. In the M$ world, "proves" means you convince people it's true more than it means make it so. If actual performance is what's important, they are gonners.

--

Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

Re:They qualify that statement. by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 08:14 · Score: 0
twitter, please read this carefully. Following this advice will make Slashdot a better place for everyone, including yourself.
- As a representative of the Linux community, participate in mailing list and newsgroup discussions in a professional manner. Refrain from name-calling and use of vulgar language. Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer. Your words will either enhance or degrade the image the reader has of the Linux community.
- Avoid hyperbole and unsubstantiated claims at all costs. It's unprofessional and will result in unproductive discussions.
- A thoughtful, well-reasoned response to a posting will not only provide insight for your readers, but will also increase their respect for your knowledge and abilities.
- Always remember that if you insult or are disrespectful to someone, their negative experience may be shared with many others. If you do offend someone, please try to make amends.
- Focus on what Linux has to offer. There is no need to bash the competition. Linux is a good, solid product that stands on its own.
- Respect the use of other operating systems. While Linux is a wonderful platform, it does not meet everyone's needs.
- Refer to another product by its proper name. There's nothing to be gained by attempting to ridicule a company or its products by using "creative spelling". If we expect respect for Linux, we must respect other products.
- Give credit where credit is due. Linux is just the kernel. Without the efforts of people involved with the GNU project , MIT, Berkeley and others too numerous to mention, the Linux kernel would not be very useful to most people.
- Don't insist that Linux is the only answer for a particular application. Just as the Linux community cherishes the freedom that Linux provides them, Linux only solutions would deprive others of their freedom.
- There will be cases where Linux is not the answer. Be the first to recognize this and offer another solution.
From http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/docs/HOWTO/Advoca cy
Re:They qualify that statement. by ettlz · 2007-01-30 08:37 · Score: 1

Who mentioned anything about Linux?
Re:They qualify that statement. by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 10:45 · Score: 0

That guy follows Twitter around and leaves that as a reply to all his posts.

Unfortunately for the rest of us, he's never read it.
Re:They qualify that statement. by ettlz · 2007-01-30 12:27 · Score: 1

Wow. That dude really needs to get a life. And that's coming from a Slashdotter.

My thoughts on Vista by cashman73 · 2007-01-30 06:46 · Score: 2, Insightful

Well, I have a pretty new computer (as of October, 2006), so hardware compatibility is not an issue for me to upgrade at all. Will I be rushing out to upgrade to Vista? I have no plans to, no.

Am I also going to slam it as a completely useless, worthless, and ridiculous product? Despite the enormous temptation to do so here on slashdot, no, I won't do that, either. ;-)

If we look at Micro$oft's history, they've admittedly had quite a few crowning moments back there. The upgrade from Windows 3.11 to Windows 95 was big. It was a huge step at the time, and I'll admit, I was pretty excited about that back then. A much more user-friendly OS, the death of DOS (well, not really, but sort of),... I was even fairly excited about Windows 98, because, while it wasn't great, it did include a lot of little improvements to Windows 95 that made things run a lot better and smoother. Windows 98 was great until Windows 2000 came out, which made things a lot better. But 2000 still wasn't perfect, particularly in the arena of gaming, so 98 reigned for a bit longer in some areas.

I don't even think I should even give the dignity of even mentioning Windows ME, which, if there's any OS out there that deserves to be slammed more than any other, that's the one. I pity all the fools that were suckered into that,...

Windows XP was another crowning moment in Micro$oft's history. I really can't find anything wrong with this OS. They've merged the NT core of Windows NT/2000 with the legacy, gaming, and "home-use" aspects of 95/98. I have yet to see a BSOD in Windows XP. It runs all of the applications I need (well, except for a couple of molecular modeling apps that seem happier in linux ;-) ... It doesn't seem to be too much of a memory hog, at least not annoyingly so. The interface is decent, who really cares about some fancy eye candy; computers are there to get work done, not stare at graphics all day long while fancy-shmancy moving things dance all over the screen gobbling up RAM,...

So right now, I really see no reason to upgrade. Sure, I'll probably eventually get Vista, but it'll be in about 3-5 years when I buy a new PC that has Vista pre-loaded. Unless, of course, I opt to go for a Mac, which I almost did last year when I bought this computer, except that they're still a little pricey for the 17" and larger screen notebook models,...

Re:My thoughts on Vista by dbIII · 2007-01-30 13:35 · Score: 1

The upgrade from Windows 3.11 to Windows 95 was big. It was a huge step at the time, and I'll admit, I was pretty excited about that back then.

So was I initially - then disappointed and that is when I moved to use linux mainly becuase I was to cheap to buy OS/2 for a home computer. Even back then MS Windows 95 was a big steaming pile in comparison to the alternatives. Later versions of Win NT including Windows2000 are a completely different story. I disagree with you on XP and generally use Win2k instead - it can almost always run the same applications and on the same hardware with less overhead.

Windows Expert Edition by Ullteppe · 2007-01-30 06:47 · Score: 2, Insightful

The part I don't get is that MSFT launches twenty different flavors of Vista, but not a "PowerUser" edition or an "Expert" edition. This version would have all those annoying "help" features turned off by default and would be configured out of the box to run with as little overhead as possible. What about helping your fellow nerds a little, Microsoft developers?

Re:Windows Expert Edition by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:58 · Score: 0

That sounds like a group policy applied to one of the existing versions...

Yeah... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:51 · Score: 0

But does it run on GNU/Linux?

Just buy OSX by mindtrance · 2007-01-30 06:52 · Score: 1

You can install the windows programs that you *must* have to do your job, and it doesn't eat the processing power up. It looks better and performs better than Vista. Make the switch.

Memory Testing by Prien715 · 2007-01-30 06:54 · Score: 3, Informative

In OS memory testing is mostly useless in my experience.

1) You have to boot up your system to use it. Much of the time I've seen bad RAM, your system won't boot as the OS uses too much of said bad RAM.

2) If your system has had a virus and/or the OS is corrupted, you're not really isolating the problem as you're still testing the OS + hardware.

I've found Memtest 86 to be a better solution since (1) uses its own OS (freeDos, very small memory footprint, so it WILL boot) (2) doesn't rely on the system having on OS so it can be used with system corruption/viruses/with a hard drive (if you're building a system) and (3) is free (can download/use on as many systems as you own without needing to buy an OS license to check you memory)

Why is the Vista tool so good again? (Am I missing something?)

--
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.

Re:Memory Testing by ChronoReverse · 2007-01-30 07:01 · Score: 1

You should do your homeword; the memory tester in Vista is like that too. The system reboots to do the memory test.
Re:Memory Testing by Prien715 · 2007-01-30 10:03 · Score: 1

Homeword?

My point was if you can't boot, you can't do the memory test. If you can't boot, how can I click somewhere in Windows to reboot and do the test? Since the test is still done using files on the hard drive how is it immune to viruses/system corruption?

It seems like my cricism is still valid.

--
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
Re:Memory Testing by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:26 · Score: 0

The mem test is also an option in the boot menu.
Re:Memory Testing by Zone-MR · 2007-01-30 12:01 · Score: 2, Informative

No - it isn't. You can launch the memory tester from the F8 bootloader menu.

First Blue Screen Of The Year...? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 06:55 · Score: 0

The Prize for "First Blue Screen of Death I've seen this Year" goes to Windows Vista for blue screening during install with some weird message about USB Drivers.

Admittedly, my WinXP Box isn't much more stable, but at least I've *learnt* what causes it to lock up.

(Before the Linux fanpeople start ranting about how much better Linux is, the last time I tried a Linux LiveDVD it entered a loop:

Restart Computer -> Load Linux from DVD -> Crash -> Restart Computer [etc]

)

--
The Insane Raving Lunatic

Re:First Blue Screen Of The Year...? by DragonTHC · 2007-01-30 07:03 · Score: 1

If you worked for me, I'd fire you.

Since you've clearly displayed that all software crashes on your computer, it's the computer, stupid!

or, it's you.

I have never had XP crash on me on my computer. My hardware is stable.
I have never had Linux crash on any machine.
I have never had vista crash on me either.

since all three ran on this computer, I can only assume that your hardware is screwed up.

you probably have an AMD processor and the cheapest power supply that you could find.

--
They're using their grammar skills there.

I doubt it. by twitter · 2007-01-30 06:56 · Score: 1, Troll

Three of my computers went down in November. So, putting one Debian together from the leftovers still won't play my children's large collection of Windows-based games, in part inherited from me. So, forgive me, I'll buy Vista.

When you see the cost of buying a new computer with Vista on it, you might think better of buying a $200 used system or a sub $400 fire sale XP machine, to play those Windoze games. You might even buy a game console. For the price difference, you can have both.

--

Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

Never. I Fucking Well Refuse... by saudadelinux · 2007-01-30 06:57 · Score: 0

...to use an OS which, stitting there idling, needs 1GB of RAM to be happy.

--
I didn't think the house band in Hell would play this badly.

Re:Never. I Fucking Well Refuse... by sottitron · 2007-01-30 07:49 · Score: 0, Offtopic

So you won't run OS X 10.4? Honestly, its the same. You could run Tiger on 512MB, but its P A I N F U L L Y S L O W
Re:Never. I Fucking Well Refuse... by gsslay · 2007-01-30 07:58 · Score: 1

Never? Interesting line you're drawing there. What's so unacceptable about 1GB that was ok for 64KB, 640KB and 10MB?
Re:Never. I Fucking Well Refuse... by Therin · 2007-01-30 08:44 · Score: 1

You could run Tiger on 512MB, but its P A I N F U L L Y S L O W
Not in my experience. I have a powerbook (G4) with 256MB in it, and it runs Tiger nicely. I did find that when I loaded it up with Safari, Firefox, a few terminal sessions, and X that it got sluggish, so I threw in 512MB more and at 768 it's very happy with that set of tasks.

What are you doing on 10.4 that fills 512MB to the point of pain?

--
John 17:20
Re:Never. I Fucking Well Refuse... by sottitron · 2007-01-30 08:56 · Score: 1

Just like to point out: you don't have a Powerbook with 256MB in it, you had one of those. Now you have one that has 768MB which is more than 512MB - the painful amount I was talking about. Try running iTunes, iPhoto, or iMovie and then fire up Dashboard or Spotlight. After that, start any program and you might as well go out and get a coffee, because Tiger is no slouch when it comes to eating up RAM.
Re:Never. I Fucking Well Refuse... by Simon+Garlick · 2007-01-30 13:02 · Score: 1

My Macbook came stock with 512MB and Tiger ran FAST. No problems or slowdowns at all.

Disclaimer 1: I disabled Dashboard, that thing sucks memory like you wouldn't believe.
Disclaimer 2: I have since gone up to 1GB to run virtualized Windows XP simultaneously.

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PGP Key ID 0xCB8FF658
Re:Never. I Fucking Well Refuse... by Therin · 2007-01-31 04:48 · Score: 1

OK more details - I had the 512MB stick out for a while, after the machine was on Tiger. I don't have many dashboard widgets enabled, it's a 12" screen after all. And I was running iTunes regularly, with Safari and Firefox, and it was fine at 256MB. Maybe you had something else chewing through memory on yours, or a really greedy widget on your dashboard?

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John 17:20

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by PenGun · 2007-01-30 06:58 · Score: 1

Fishin' without a hook again ... ;).

You should be watching CNBC right now by gelfling · 2007-01-30 07:03 · Score: 2, Informative

They are reporting that Vista is incompatible with virtually every online game out there. They go on to add that for the most part all in-pace device drivers today will not run on Vista either nor do working drivers exist nor will ever exist for most 'older' hardware. They conclude that much 'older' software will never be made to work or work right either.

Now you have to understand that CNBC has been a MS corporate cheerleader from way back. Now I understand why Bill Himself has been pimping this out on TV personally. This looks like it could be a hellacious scary train crash.

Re:You should be watching CNBC right now by yodleboy · 2007-01-30 08:22 · Score: 1

i wonder if these people are using the same Vista i am. i am really worried that there are a couple of baboons installing and testing for the media these days.
4 year old HP scanner , no vista driver support, used XP drivers and LO! scanner works...
2 year old Canon digital camera, no vista driver support, used XP drivers and LO! camera works...
2 year old Canon digital camcorder, no vista driver support used XP drivers and LO! camcorder works...
Sony/Ericsson walkman phone and music transfer/sync app, no vista driver support, installed anyway and LO! phone works.

you see a pattern here? i have more examples if needed.
and another thing. if you installed vista on a laptop, you are mental. XP barely runs right on a typical corporate issue Dell laptop (1yr old, 1.5GB ram). between logging on/off of domain, startup /shutdown scripts, network connections, etc. xp takes from 5-10 minutes to boot/shutdown. don't base your opinion of vista on a laptop install until you run it on hardware made for it.

Warning: Rant enclosed. by Overzeetop · 2007-01-30 07:05 · Score: 1

Why in the world does MS keep chansing the damned "pretty, shiny" mac crowd with an OS that I have to use to get work done? That's not meant as a slam to Mac fanbois (though I know you'll take it that way) - pretty-shiny has it's place, it just happens to get in the way of business.

I say "have to use" because I have applications that run under windows. Only. Oh, I suppose I could try them under emulation, if I wanted to pretend I was doing my work in a pool of molasses. Even with a decent computer, some of my apps use so much horsepower when fully configured that I've had to scale back to get the computer to react as fast as I can work (I do CAD, I do structural analysis; yes, I can operate a 3GHz CAD machine faster than the AutoDESK UI can keep up.)

When are we going to get a real business edition that strips away all the superfluous fluff and provides a basic platform for business. I don't want more stuff in the business version, I want less. Less graphics, less "help" (incessant indexing, promiscuous wifi, 40MB printer drivers [okay, not all their fault], a dozen places where apps can start from at boot), less obfuscation of the basic components. How about starting with all the ports closed by default. You really don't need all that stuff for a business setting - we can open what we need. If you feel there's a critical need to dumb it down, give us a nice GUI with the ports shown and the description. Use the "verified" leverage you have over driver developers to whittle down the driver bloat and be transparent with the system resources (like the aforementioned ports).

Make it better, not just prettier. There's a reason that the Dodge Sprinter is a popular business van - and it's not because there's so much space to put the subwoofer.

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Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?

::HUGS:: by night_flyer · 2007-01-30 07:06 · Score: 1

I'm hugging my Windows 2000 box

--

Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...

Vista will learn lessons the hard way.. by GregPK · 2007-01-30 07:07 · Score: 2, Interesting

I say this with over 15 years of successful retail experience... Microsoft is failing to capitalize on what made previous versions of Office and Windows Successful... That is retail.. In the past with windows 98, 2000, xp, office 2000. They gave much of the retail sales People a copy of said software and even gave it to the Microsoft field representatives who used it and showed trainings on it every day at retail... I call these people the seeds of Microsoft sales and products... They got free copies while early in their careers and always remember Microsoft with a kind heart and thus recommend and use it wholeheartedly... My family members who just happen to be IT managers at large banks... Are asking me that question... Should I upgrade?? At this time I'm very iffy about it. Plus, lacking a full product to play with.. I'm not inclined to recommend this product especially with the way Microsoft has been treating their overworked retail team and Retail lately. Eighty percent of decisions are made at retail and Microsoft is severely lacking at retail this year. Everything literally getting barely done in the 11th hour when they've had over 6 months to work on it and forcing those under them to work down to the wire to finish what could have been done with a higher attention to detail and fixing mistakes made up the chain but can't because of a lack of the ultimate premium called time.. At retail I'm seeing bad things.... All little stuff that's not reminiscent of the Microsoft I once knew. Who was detail oriented, Well planned, well executed, every time. I suspect Microsoft will learn their lessons from this... Its been too long since they launched a product... and these old lessons will come back to bite them and many of them know it just not the right people.. -Viken L

The short answers to the 4 questions in the topic: by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:08 · Score: 0

1. Yawn
2. No.
3. No.
4. The OJ Simpson trial

Less rebooting my ass. by Vellmont · 2007-01-30 07:09 · Score: 2, Interesting

One of the features of Vista I was looking forward too was less rebooting. The driver model is vastly different, so driver replacement should (in theory) result in no reboots. There's also a manager that's supposed to handle services better, so there's another area where reboots should be lessened.

Unfortunately, I haven't really seen much change in the number of reboots. I uninstalled fax and scan manager along with installing the new games. Reboot. I installed a new beta driver for my video card. Reboot. I installed the updates that came though today. Reboot. Not a great track record MS.

I've also been unfortunate enough to have a motherboard that has AGP drivers unsupported by Vista (nforce). So the video card runs on a PCI-PCI driver at reduced performance. Some may argue that this machine is "too old" to expect support for it. Maybe, I've got a video card that supports Aero, 1 gig of RAM, and a speedy HD, so the rest of the hardware is up to snuff. I guess you can put the blame for this one on Nvidia, as it's not Microsoft's responsibility to write drivers for the AGP bus. Aero is speed enough, I'm just not expecting good gaming performance with no support for my AGP bus.

So that's the bad side. The upside is that the new interface is pretty usefull. I really like the search function, no hunting around for different apps, or hidden control panels. The menu structure seems a lot more intuitive. The sleep function actually works! I haven't seen sleep/suspend actually work properly on a non-laptop running Windows before. It'll certainly save me some money on electric bills. I'm also glad to see they ditched the stupid IE interface for Windows Update. Ugh, that POS was nothing but trouble. It CONSTANTLY broke on my various windows machines. Hopefully this new non-IE based Windows Update will work properly. I also like the Aero theme. I'm quite glad the decided to ditch the Fisher-Price themed XP. I could never figure it out, and was a major reason why I never bothered with XP. I know you can switch the theme to Windows 2000 (and I did), but XP was actually less reliable for me than 2000.

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AccountKiller

Re:Less rebooting my ass. by stubear · 2007-01-30 08:44 · Score: 1

Many reboots in Windows 2000 and XP were unnecessary and were nothing more then self-imposed "suggestions" by the software developer built into the installer routine. I also don't know if I'd consider a reboot caused by a beta driver indicative of the way things work in general.
Re:Less rebooting my ass. by Vellmont · 2007-01-30 09:01 · Score: 1

Many reboots in Windows 2000 and XP were unnecessary and were nothing more then self-imposed "suggestions" by the software developer built into the installer routine. I also don't know if I'd consider a reboot caused by a beta driver indicative of the way things work in general.

And if that were my only data point, I'd agree with you. Unfortunately all the other reboots I encountered were from Microsoft software or updates that's an integral part of Vista.

As far as the unnecessary reboots, I'm sure that's true, but it doesn't help much. How are you supposed to know if you "really" have to reboot or not? I tried the whole "don't reboot even when the software tells you too" before, and it only caused me problems. Eventually I ran into some piece of software that screwed up my Windows install when I eventually DID reboot the machine later. Which software was it? Who knows.

The software devs don't put in reboot suggestions just for fun. They put them in because it leads to less problems for them, and the end user.

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AccountKiller

Re:2008, HE's Right. It's not that far away. by archen · 2007-01-30 07:11 · Score: 1

Using vista business right now as a test, I can say I'm not planning on migrating much of anything away from Win2k. XP didn't see much of an improvement as far as I could tell. So Vista seemed like a possible upgrade point (been 7 years after all). But having used the Vista Beta I figured service pack one would be a necessity. Now that I'm using Vista business I'm honestly not planning on upgrading at all. Win2k has til 2010, so I'll planning on fence sitting until MS releases whatever comes after Vista, or I am forced into disaster with Vista.

Hopefully Office 2007 uptake wont force my hand before then.

Been Using Visio/ Office 2007 Since Friday by N8F8 · 2007-01-30 07:16 · Score: 3, Informative

Summary: 10% more usable OS. 35% more usable Office.

I upgraded a Compaq Z2615US 14" notebook (Semtron 1.8ghz, 128mb ATI 200M video, 1GB RAM) to Vista Business 32bit.

Aero Eye candy aside, I feel like I'm making fewer clicks and finding things easier. The sideshow doesn't have any really compelling widgets/gadgets yet (the weather gadget only show the current weather). The system feels more responsive. Had a few software compatibility issues (Visual Studio 2005 and Adobe 8 Reader installer). Office 2007 is simply wonderful. Finding things is much easier and the application seems to load a lot faster than previous versions of MS Office. Office PDF export is a separate download.

I installed a lot of third party stuff like XAMPP Lite, SciTe, Filezilla, Firefox etc without any big problems.

I ordeered the 64bit DVD and will probably reinstall everything when it arrives.

--
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power

Macs do get faster by SuperKendall · 2007-01-30 07:17 · Score: 1

I thought I'd confirm one part of that, each release of OS X has improved performance even on older hardware. I have an old Powerbook 667MHz that still runs great and is used daily, and my mother uses InDesign for desktop publishing work on a Powermac G4 500MHz!

Of course advancements in software render some of these OS speed advancements moot - for photo work I do, some of the newer programs like Lightroom run terribly slow on this older hardware. I have to give Adobe credit though for seeming to offer a good speedup with CS3 on pretty much any Mac hardware though, I think that should work pretty well even on the older macs (though some of the more advanced filters will be slow, there's only so much you can do with a task that simply requires a lot of computer power).

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"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley

Re:The short answers to the 4 questions in the top by wjeff · 2007-01-30 07:17 · Score: 1

Damn, i never need mod points when I have them, and never have them when I need them, +1 Funny in spirit.

--
my old sig is obsolete, and I haven't come up with a stupid enough new one yet

Sidebar? Available separately, as parent mentioned by gardyloo · 2007-01-30 07:21 · Score: 1

I personally like the sidebar, not that it's anything that I couldn't have downloaded seperately anyway, but I enjoy having the CPU usage meter right on the side, along with a calender, the weather and a currency converter.

I'm not entirely sure what the sidebar includes in Vista (not having tried it myself), but it sounds eerily similar to this: http://www.desktopsidebar.com/, which I've been using (and loving) for about the last four months on an XP installation.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by pilbender · 2007-01-30 07:26 · Score: 0

Nice Troll. This gets my vote for Troll of the year! I have to say... being marked as Funny is appropriate. People, please don't bother refuting this one! Laugh and move on...

--
Fresh horses and more whiskey for my men.

Vista will learn hard lessons by GregPK · 2007-01-30 07:26 · Score: 1

I say this with over 15 years of successful retail experience... Microsoft is failing to capitalize on what made previous versions of Office and Windows Successful... That is retail.. In the past with windows 98, 2000, xp, office 2000. They gave much of the retail sales People a copy of said software and even gave it to the Microsoft field representatives who used it and showed trainings on it every day at retail... I call these people the seeds of Microsoft sales and products... They got free copies while early in their careers and always remember Microsoft with a kind heart and thus recommend and use it wholeheartedly... My family members who just happen to be IT managers at large banks... Are asking me that question... Should I upgrade?? At this time I'm very iffy about it. Plus, lacking a full product to play with.. I'm not inclined to recommend this product especially with the way Microsoft has been treating their overworked retail team and Retail lately. Eighty percent of decisions are made at retail and Microsoft is severely lacking at retail this year. Everything literally getting barely done in the 11th hour when they've had over 6 months to work on it and forcing those under them to work down to the wire to finish what could have been done with a higher attention to detail and fixing mistakes made up the chain but can't because of a lack of the ultimate premium called time.. At retail I'm seeing bad things.... All little stuff that's not reminiscent of the Microsoft I once knew. Who was detail oriented, Well planned, well executed, every time. I suspect Microsoft will learn their lessons from this... Its been too long since they launched a product... and these old lessons will come back to bite them and many of them know it just not the right people.. Also, to anyone who has a clue of foresite they will know that Vista is not the final product... It is the start stage for a series of products still in development... All that research for features to be added to vista hasn't ended yet.. They just didn't put it in there yet.. Its still coming being worked on... and there is no shortage of add on's in little groups of projects being worked on.. -Viken L

Vista? No! by FredDC · 2007-01-30 07:28 · Score: 1

On my home machines I have banned any windows system for good since the beginning of this year, I installed Linux on my machines instead. It's highly unlikely I'm ever going to install vista at home. At work however I might come in contact with it, but hopefully not much as we're moving our server applications to Linux machines. Client applications however will probably remain windows based as we can't force our clients to move away from windows. But I'm not really involved in the development of those applications so I should be able to stay clear of vista and I couldn't be more pleased! Learning how to use Linux was one of the best things I ever did!

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09 f9 11 02 9d 74 e3 5b d8 41 56 c5 63

Amazing. I can't buy a Dell or HP now with XP by rcb1974 · 2007-01-30 07:29 · Score: 1

So I just went to the Dell and HP websites. They don't allow me to choose between XP and Vista. The only option is Vista. What kind of crap is that? I'm purchasing for a small business, and don't want to have to jump through any extra hoops to buy PCs online that run XP. I tested Vista. It isn't compatible with all of our software, so I don't want it. I do want XP though. Is Microsoft forcing OEMs to sell PCs with Vista and not XP because they want to make their Vista sales numbers look good? Microsoft reports is 2007 1Q results: "We sold x million copies of Vista in Febuary 2007. People must love it!!"

MS Vs. Nintendo by donut1005 · 2007-01-30 07:30 · Score: 1

You left out the obligatory: "Wii still outselling Vista"

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3A 4E 22 05 C1 83 0B 7A
It's random, but my posting it here is probably considered illegal to someone.

Anyone who says "Vista UI is beautiful" by melted · 2007-01-30 07:37 · Score: 1

Anyone who says that "Vista UI is beautiful" should be automatically banned from commenting on the subject because they (like Microsoft) have no taste. Personally, I find Vista UI horrific, transparency notwithstanding. Office 2007 has what I'd call beautiful UI.

Vista regarding Business by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:44 · Score: 0

I have a 251 user, 200 workstation and 21 server network. I am the ONLY IT person for my company. Vista is the furthest thing from my mind.

Vista does not function well with BST Enterprise 8.1, it also does not do well several of our other software packages. Unless it starts playing nicer with programs in the future... forget it. Don't get me wrong... it looks great and has some great functionality/features, but for the office. No thanks right now.

MW

No Problems by darrenkopp · 2007-01-30 07:45 · Score: 1

I've been running Vista Retail for over 3 weeks and haven't had a single problem. Flawless install, flawless visual effects, flawless uptime. Try before you judge.

Re:Amazing. I can't buy a Dell or HP now with XP by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:45 · Score: 0

You can, however, but PCs with no OS and put whatever you want on them.

Try Linux.

Look again by PCM2 · 2007-01-30 07:46 · Score: 1

Thank you very much for the screen shot of your task manager. OK, so your processor is only 1% used. I also see that Vista is using 1.08 GB of your RAM, and that you only have 30MB of your 2GB actually listed as "Free", after the caching is done. (I assume you took this screen shot after a clean boot, with no user applications manually launched.)

Your observations about RAM seem a little contradictory. On the one hand, you assume I have no applications launched. On the other hand, you note that the system is using 1.08GB of RAM. Do you really believe Vista uses that much just on boot-up?

If you re-read my post, you'll notice I said I had Thunderbird and some other apps running. I don't remember exactly what they were. But try looking at the Uptime on the screenshot. Or if you want, here's another screenshot.

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Breakfast served all day!

Re:Look again by PCM2 · 2007-01-30 07:53 · Score: 1

(Oh, and before anybody posts about it, the "Hot Chicks with Douchebags" tab in my Firefox window isn't what it sounds like. ;-)

--
Breakfast served all day!
Re:Look again by Sj0 · 2007-01-30 14:13 · Score: 1

Are you sure? I mean, I haven't clicked the link, but it sounds like some sort of pretentious blog or webcomic.

--
It's been a long time.
Re:Look again by PCM2 · 2007-01-30 16:08 · Score: 1

Well, you've got me there.

--
Breakfast served all day!

Vista --tried hard but not good enough. by chmoder · 2007-01-30 07:46 · Score: 1

I am a MSDNAA member and have had Vista Business edtion for 11 days and I have notesed nothing but huge requierments for such little improvement.

1) First thing I notesed XP with new look, and win 2000 networking.

2) I have managed to use 1.06 GB of ram with just IE 7 FF6 WMP 11 ATI Catalyst and Messenger.

3) I read something about the 30% of your CPU thing -- it's true. I have Pentium D 930, two 3 GHz.

4) Hard to install some programs --AVG, games run worse, the translucency and "3D" stuff is nothing compaired to XGL.

5) Much needed apps such as windows Calender, Mail, Meetingspace is cool.

6) I like the new look i guess. Still 7 years after XP and this is what they give us.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by egandalf · 2007-01-30 07:52 · Score: 1

I'm finding difficulty finding the words for this. Either the poster is a total MS-freak, to the exclusion of logic itself (which could imply on MS's payroll), or he/she is a truly fantastic satirical writer and I must tip my hat. Okay, 3D desktops available before Vista: Xgl/Beryl, OSX, SphereXP, 3DNA, Project Looking Glass, TopDesk, Madotate, etc. And many other Vista features are freely available. I think what this achievement really shows, is exactly what MS is capable of, given $6 Billion and five years. Personally, I'd like to see what other distros and package developers could do with that amount of money and time, like Ubuntu or Gentoo. I use three computers, XP on all three (I dual boot linux, but honestly spend most of my time in XP, sorry /. crowd) and I see no reason to "upgrade" to Vista. MS games? No thanks, I play real games. Norton? Haven't used it in years, there are too many free alternatives for me to make that mistake again. Aero window effects? Free cheap software does the same thing if you want it. I'm even using a Vista theme in XP right now. It's not so bland as the classic desktop, yet it doesn't make me feel like playing with tinker-toys either. You're right in one thing though. Vista is amazing. If when you say amazing you are in fact meaning that the product inspires awe. For I am in awe of how little innovation, how much copying, and how much political teabagging went into the development of Vista. Will I ever use Vista? Probably. I admit it freely. Such are the strictures of my job and life, or the extent of my ignorance of other product offerings, that I'm still somewhat tied to Microsoft. I'll pay my dues to the overlord and I'll accept my punishment for being a computer user. However, I sincerely hope that when that time comes, I'll be able to run it in a VM, behind a nice Linux firewall, away from all my files and with a moderate degree of separation from my hardware. Enjoy your Vista, and I'll endure mine.

--
Those who have telepathy have no need to RTFA.

Vista's Final Footprint by Nom+du+Keyboard · 2007-01-30 07:53 · Score: 1

So what is Vista's final memory footprint? Some betas were weighing in at 800MB, which is completely Insane for an OS, especially given that XP could easily fit in 250MB, and often 200MB. And 2K Pro at ~150MB.

--
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."

Re:Vista's Final Footprint by ChronoReverse · 2007-01-30 10:59 · Score: 1

Vista's memory footprint is enormous. The 512MB minimum is there for good reason.

I question the limits you mentioned for Win2k and WinXP though.

WinXP can be stuffed under 96MB easily. Win2k can be stuffed under 64MB and probably even 32MB. (all assuming no other programs running yet of course).
Re:Vista's Final Footprint by Nom+du+Keyboard · 2007-01-30 12:24 · Score: 1

I question the limits you mentioned for Win2k and WinXP though.
I don't question your figures at all. I simply mention that even the average user with a reasonable compliment of services running in a production environment can easily meet the memory targets I've given. I didn't see any need to go in search of the smallest Windows footprint ever that can still run Solitaire.

--
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."

twitter the prophet by dedazo · 2007-01-30 07:54 · Score: 0, Troll

It's safe to predict that 99.99999% of Vista sales will be OEM installs.

Like Windows 98, ME, 98SE, 2000 and XP before it.

high price of Vista will kill over the counter sales

Like... XP before it?

For the immediate future, forcing Vista will hurt computer sales because no one wants it.

Who is this mythical "no one"? You?

going to have trouble gettin money out of OEMs. The margins don't allow it.

Reality sucks, doesn't it?

The end of the M$ monopoly is here.

But wait, didn't you say this when Windows 95 came out? And then with Windows 98 and 2000? And then again with XP?

I guess it's kinda like predicting "the year of Linux" every year, isn't it? Your track record with prediction is 100% wrong so far, but then again you seem completely detached from reality anyway. Constantly harping that "M$ is going down" on Slashdot will not actually cause that. Hopefully some day you'll realize that.

--
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo

Re:twitter the prophet by twitter · 2007-01-30 12:13 · Score: 1

An annoying pest asks:

didn't you say this when Windows 95 came out? And then with Windows 98 and 2000? And then again with XP?

No, I did not. I was shocked by the poor quality of XP when I first had to use it. At it's release time, however, I was taken in by all the NT mumbo-jumbo about stability and security of the best Windoze ever. Not taken in enough to purchase or use the garbage because I had moved everything to GNU/Linux by then, but I was hopeful they had paid more than lip service to improving their junk.

Vista is colossally bad that it's going to suck them down. Mosberg cursed it for weeks, Dorvak and is rooting for Linux. Could it be more over for them? This quarter's 10% downtick will be followed by many more once the fanboy sales squirt is over.

--
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Re:twitter the prophet by dedazo · 2007-01-30 12:23 · Score: 1

An annoying pest

Don't ever stop linking to that, please.
I was shocked by the poor quality of XP when I first had to use it. [...] I was taken in [...] Not taken in enough to purchase or use the garbage because I had moved everything to GNU/Linux by then

So you really never used it in any meaningful way, but you think it's "garbage". Well, that pretty much defines 100% of your comments about it. I guess ignorance is a virtue as far as you're concerned, eh?
Vista is colossally bad

Another OS you haven't used, but it's "collossally" bad. Of course.
Mosberg cursed it for weeks

I can find enough positive reviews out there, and I'm sure you can too. Myself, I'll wait to use the RTM version to form an opinion. Wait, you used to post your snide remarks about how it "sucked" whenever Slashbork posted another negative "review" of a release candidate. Yes, I remember now. You just knew it was going to suck, didn't you.
BTW, do you usually find yourself agreeing with Dvorak, or is this just a one-time thing? And do you normally rely on troll rag hacks to tell you what is good or bad?

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Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
Re:twitter the prophet by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 17:11 · Score: 0
twitter, please read this carefully. Following this advice will make Slashdot a better place for everyone, including yourself.
- As a representative of the Linux community, participate in mailing list and newsgroup discussions in a professional manner. Refrain from name-calling and use of vulgar language. Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer. Your words will either enhance or degrade the image the reader has of the Linux community.
- Avoid hyperbole and unsubstantiated claims at all costs. It's unprofessional and will result in unproductive discussions.
- A thoughtful, well-reasoned response to a posting will not only provide insight for your readers, but will also increase their respect for your knowledge and abilities.
- Always remember that if you insult or are disrespectful to someone, their negative experience may be shared with many others. If you do offend someone, please try to make amends.
- Focus on what Linux has to offer. There is no need to bash the competition. Linux is a good, solid product that stands on its own.
- Respect the use of other operating systems. While Linux is a wonderful platform, it does not meet everyone's needs.
- Refer to another product by its proper name. There's nothing to be gained by attempting to ridicule a company or its products by using "creative spelling". If we expect respect for Linux, we must respect other products.
- Give credit where credit is due. Linux is just the kernel. Without the efforts of people involved with the GNU project , MIT, Berkeley and others too numerous to mention, the Linux kernel would not be very useful to most people.
- Don't insist that Linux is the only answer for a particular application. Just as the Linux community cherishes the freedom that Linux provides them, Linux only solutions would deprive others of their freedom.
- There will be cases where Linux is not the answer. Be the first to recognize this and offer another solution.
From http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/docs/HOWTO/Advoca cy
Re:twitter the prophet by NtroP · 2007-01-31 03:27 · Score: 1

So you really never used it in any meaningful way, but you think it's "garbage".
Wait a minute. This is the response Windows users give to OS X and Linux all the time. Somehow it's perfectly reasonable then...?

--
"terrorism" and "pedophilia" are the root passwords to the Constitution
Re:twitter the prophet by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-31 04:11 · Score: 0

I've installed (or tried to install) several flavours of Linux including Ubuntu and I think it's garbage.

Does that make you feel better?
Re:twitter the prophet by dedazo · 2007-01-31 07:14 · Score: 1

Unlike twitter here, you will never find me claiming something is "garbage" without having it tried first. And I think Linux and OS X are perfectly fine operating systems with certain strengths and weaknesses, just like Windows.
twitter actually hates "M$", so by definition he must also midlessly hate and deride everything they do or say. To him it's a religious or emotional issue instead of a simple technical one.

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Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo

OMFG! Microsoft is toast! by sottitron · 2007-01-30 07:55 · Score: 1

All over the internets - in every single tube, in fact - there are pictures of Vista sitting on store shelves next to empty displays for Apple's OS X. I was going to buy 10 copies to sell on eBay today, but obviously nobody wants this OS. NOBODY is buying it!

Linux on belgian TV just after Vista launch by lord_rob+the+only+on · 2007-01-30 07:55 · Score: 1

For the first time, I've watched a report about Linux on belgian national french-speaking public TV (RTBF) in the evening news, just after the report about Vista launch. The world is more and more becoming aware of the alternatives and I'm happy for that :).

Don't be silly by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 07:59 · Score: 0

You agreed to MS managing you and your media when you installed it and agreed to these outrageous restrictions.

Pretty dumb to agree to it and then get mad when the other party does what you agreed to.

Seriously.

Get Windows XP, Buy a Mac, Get Linux. Cripes, it's not like Vista is the only choice.

To answer the questions asked by frdmfghtr · 2007-01-30 08:00 · Score: 1

In the meantime, what is your impression of the OS? Have you had a chance to use the retail version yet? Are you supporting it in a business environment? What's the launch of Vista been like for you?

(1) My impression is that it provides inconvenience in the name of security, by constantly asking if you want to do what you just told the computer to do. I have to admit thought that I find the Aero interface at least interesting--I only wish I had a chance to try it out when trying RC2 (my old HP notebook wouldn't support it).

There was a lot of change for the sake of change. All those things I used to do in Win2K or XP--check IP address (without using the command line), looking at other network machines, changing user accounts--with a few mouse clicks turned into an Easter egg hunt ending mostly in frustration. I wiped the drive clean and put XP back on after about a week.

(2) My only experience was with RC2, briefly, so perhaps my impressions are quite different that they would be with the "final" release.

(3) N/A

(4) It came and went without a thought or care, really. My main OS is OS X so Vista really doesn't concern me.

From this former everyday user's perspective, the Windows family hit its peak with Windows 2000, especially in the UI. The least Microsoft could do is provide a UI option in Vista that matches the Win2K interface. I chose Win2K for my Parallels guest OS partially because of the lack of activation nonsense, but also because I find the interface to be much cleaner and easier to use.

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Government's idea of a balanced budget: take money from the right pocket to balance...oh who am I kidding?

Be nice! by TheNinjaroach · 2007-01-30 08:02 · Score: 1

All in all, as far as I'm concerned, this is just the next WinME Ouch.

--
I went to eat some animal crackers and the box said, "Do not eat if seal is broken." I opened the box and sure enough..

Re:Seriously common... by dpilot · 2007-01-30 08:03 · Score: 1

For the recent times, I'd say that the "Linux-biased anti-Windows Slashdotter" is about as common as "The Liberal Media." In other words, the airwaves are full of conservative talking heads who cry out against, "The Liberal Media," but by and large those conservative talking heads are getting most of the airtime. Heck, pretty much until Katrina, the Bush Administration was getting an easy pass by the Media. Liberal Media, my (anatomical part).

Seems like recently, on Slashdot there's a decent amount of discussion about Linux shortcomings, and real (sometimes heated) discussion on both sides. But much of the time when the discussion becomes critical toward Windows, someone decries the "Linux-biased anti-Windows Slashdotter," kind of like Godwin's Law.

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The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by nutshell42 · 2007-01-30 08:10 · Score: 2, Insightful

Congratiulations mods. It's refreshing to see that despite an asshat ratio of 20% (atm) there's still enough brains distributed among /. mods that deadpan jokes aren't automatically modded into oblivion.

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Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage

This USB memory thingy by musther · 2007-01-30 08:12 · Score: 1

Can't remember what they call this feature, the one where you use a USB disk as swap, apart from sounding like a very good way to burn out your USB flash memory, does anybody know if it actually does any good. Thing is, surely Vista will have much faster access to its page file, and therefore using a slow USB connection wont be at all helpful? What is the point in this feature, is it just something designed to sound good to people who don't have a clue? Does anybody know anything about this?

Re:CNN Is Running A Quick Poll - Will You Buy Vist by BlackRookSix · 2007-01-30 08:13 · Score: 1

You must be looking at a different poll than the one that appears on their Vista launch story page. I was just there, and out of three choices ('Yes, immediately.', 'Eventually, but no rush.', and 'I dont use Windows') given, there are only ~12,500 votes total. The answers are at 6%, 78% and 16%, respectively.

Link to the results: http://www.cnn.com/POLLSERVER/results/29818.exclud e.html

So glad I moved to SuSE... by Terminus32 · 2007-01-30 08:16 · Score: 0

...instead of having to upgrade to Vista. *Shudders*

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http://nathanlindsell.blogspot.com/

2008 seems pretty agressive by WebCowboy · 2007-01-30 08:18 · Score: 1

...for a corporate deployment time-line.

Perhaps 6-12 months is enough time for homes and very small businesses to make the move and deal with the resulting issues but that is a tight schedule for a larger enterprise. It could be up to 24 months (beginning of 2009) before Vista is commonplace in office environments and another year after that in more specialised environments such as industrial automation, engineering and so on (which happens to be my line of work). The software I'd use the most in my job crashes Vista before it is even finished installing. Those who develop this software have a time-line of some time in mid (maybe late) 2008 before the full line of software will work and be supported in Vista.

Wide adoption of this software by established customers can sometimes take 1 to 2 years after release, which means Vista won't see the light of day on the plant floor and on engineering workstations in great numbers until 2010--three full years after its release. With every successive release of Windows this cycle seems to be getting longer--The uptake of Windows 2000 in these same market segments was nearly twice as fast (1.5 to 2 years after release), and even XP was adopted more quickly (about 2 to 2.5 years).

I figure that Windows upgrades are a case of diminishing returns as the years pass. Windows 2000 was a significant upgrade in terms of stability and features over NT 4, and coupled with this the application software designed for NT 4 almost always ran without alteration--support for Windows 2000 meant simply doing testing and at most some driver modifications. The investment was relatively small and returns were very good. XP took longer to adopt because from our standpoint all you got was a fisher-price theme, but at least XP support was a relatively small effort as well. In this case, the ONLY reasons industrial users specifically gave for going to XP were to keep in line with corporate IT standards/support and/or because the hardware came pre-installed with XP and/or the timeframe for full support from MS was longer. In other words there were no compelling technical advantages to XP over 2000.

Now we have Vista, and there have been pretty much ZERO compelling practical arguments why Vista is superior in an industrial or technical scenario, coupled with the fact that Vista breaks SO much compatibility and requires so much more computing power than XP to perform well. From an applications standpoint, Vista is the biggest disconnect since the transition from DOS/Win16 to NT/Win32. Although the move away from DOS-era architecture is still by far the biggest revolutionary change in the MS environment it came with HUGE benefits and potential. With Vista arrives some fairly disruptive changes and though they are needed/welcome technically speaking there is little to offer in return from a typical user's perspective.

Power Usage. by antdude · 2007-01-30 08:19 · Score: 1

I bet the power usage will increase costs and heat even during idle times with Vista.

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Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).

Legacy support for crappy apps by Nullpoint · 2007-01-30 08:19 · Score: 1

I work for a small software development company based in Oklahoma City. Our main product is a Realestate appraisal form filling software written (mostly) in VB6. The software is rather complex and has hella' dependency files (Count: 344) which are not installed with windows. Due to the nature of the way that Vista's permissions work the only way our users are able to get the software to work is to change their user privliges. (It prompts the user during install and walks them through the process)

I realize that writing applications this way is inefficient at best, but there are still people out there that use this method.

What about all of the old legacy applications that are no longer updated? Is Vista going to be backwards compatable with them?

As for the user interface and feel.. Well.. I would rather use Windows ME.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by Kildjean · 2007-01-30 08:20 · Score: 1

This osunds like a paid advertisement...

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Nom de dieu de putain de bordel de merde de saloperie de connard d encule de ta mere.

Where is the memory testing? by antdude · 2007-01-30 08:23 · Score: 1

Where is this memory tester? I have not seen it yet.

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Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).

Check his uptime. by Short+Circuit · 2007-01-30 08:23 · Score: 1

Take another look. He's got an uptime of nine hours. I doubt the machine's been doing nothing in all that time.

--
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)

mixed reaction? by mcmonkey · 2007-01-30 08:26 · Score: 5, Funny

Some people say it sucks...others say it blows.

Re:mixed reaction? by gubol123 · 2007-01-30 15:21 · Score: 1

Either way its a bitch :-)

Launch? You mean rollout. It's too heavy to fly. by quixote9 · 2007-01-30 08:29 · Score: 1

But who cares? I use Ubuntu. I already have good security and 3D desktops if I want them. Microsoft: if they were a day late and we were only a dollar short, they'd be doing way better than they've ever done.

RTFM by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 08:43 · Score: 0

there is merely a mechanism for confirmation that you are the currently logged in [super]user.

No.

$ man sudo

That'll clear up your confusion.

What? by Quiet_Desperation · 2007-01-30 08:43 · Score: 1

Vista

Who?

Vista - Works But .... by Programit · 2007-01-30 08:48 · Score: 1

My initial reaction to Vista is disappointment. On the skin its Windows XP with Vista Inspiration installed (New theme)
It runs okay, definitely slower than XP but its okay.
SOund scheme is pathetic.
Definitely some blatant rippoffs from OSX.
Crashes on numerous program, including Office 2003. Obviously not fully compatable.
UAC is a bit of a joke. ("I want to hack this computer", "Press Okay to Continue!" ??)
It works and it looks pretty but it just feels like a XP hack with some XP functionality removed.
No Up Folder Level.
Confusing messages.
Networking is badly implemented.etc
Must turn off UAC to keep user sanity.
Definitely NOT WORTH THE MONEY. Very disappointing.

Re 64 Bit support? by rnmartinez · 2007-01-30 08:53 · Score: 1

I don't think I will make the switch to Vista, my comp is less then a year old and I doubt it would run the pretty version of Vista (I run a Sempron 3000+ with 512 RAM, 250GB HDD, and a Geforce 5200 w/ 256MB - maybe it will do but I keep reading these horror stories and I don't want to pay $150 to find out). What I do hope is that it really spurs 64 bit support, because I could really use 64 bit flash, open office and firefox extensions on my ubuntu box. I know that you can run 32 bit stuff inside of 64, but I think it would be nice to just have a system running all in 64 bit that lets me do everything I am used ot.

Using the CLI by zooblethorpe · 2007-01-30 08:54 · Score: 1

Not everyone has moved over, of course, but the CLI on OS X gets a whole lot more use than the one on Windows, I imagine.

Of course the CLI(t) on OSX gets a whole lot more use -- it's actually effective at getting things moving. Banging away on a CLI(t) that doesn't have any effect gets old after a while.

</p>

--
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."

Re:Seriously common... by Ogive17 · 2007-01-30 08:56 · Score: 1

Or maybe it's possible that, among a group where the prevailing opinion is anti-Bush, or anti-Windows, individuals will be able to engage in rational discussion - and even if they've already formed the opinion you expect of them they may have very good, logical reasons for having done so.
Yes, but those comments rarely get modded up on here. Most often a comment gets modded up because the reader agrees with their stance, not because the post was truely informative or insightful.

--
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."

Re:CNN Is Running A Quick Poll - Will You Buy Vist by cashman73 · 2007-01-30 08:58 · Score: 1

Ok, that's seriously farked up. When I went to it, I clicked on the poll on the main CNN page (www.cnn.com) in the lower right corner. They asked if we planned to rush out and upgrade to Windows Vista, they gave two possible responses, YES and NO. This was about 10 am this morning.

And of course, now, they have an entirely different poll there. They're asking, "Would you anonymously post your deepest secret on a Web site?" WTF? Looks like somebody's having a few fun and games with the cnn.com website today,...

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 09:00 · Score: 0

Feel that? It's the joke flying over your head.

Leopard: A mere upgrade? by buckhead_buddy · 2007-01-30 09:05 · Score: 2, Interesting

Omestes wrote:

"10.5, on the other hand, seems mightily like an upgrade, adding software features, and not decent internal features."

If you think that Leopard sounds only like an upgrade of niche, end-user features, I think you'll be in for a pleasant surprise when it is actually released.

There are some compelling features under the hood that are being added for developers that will make their code less buggy, fit in better with the flash and glitz of Mac OS X, start taking advantage of newer hardware features, and offer more public access to the bits of code that Apple used to develop and keep private for Apple's own apps. Even if Apple doesn't reveal any other compelling end-user features (which I find an unlikely scenario), the ease Apple is making developers lives has already provoked some developers to say that the Leopard upgrade is a requirement for the next major upgrade of their apps. If Apple strikes out and offers no compelling end user features, then the blame will lie with developers as the bad guys who are forcing users to upgrade to Leopard. If Apple hits upon a compelling set of features for Mac users, the upgrade will be a no-brainer for everyone in the Mac community whose machines can run it.

If that's the case, why isn't Apple hyping Leopard up more like Microsoft did for Vista back in mid-2006? Time is getting short if the release is in the spring. My guess is that Apple is waiting for the Vista hype to die down before offering a more compelling set of end user features that will make even reticent Windows XP users want to switch platforms before Microsoft can copy the bullet list into a service pack release. Based on those banners at WWDC and MacWorld that everyone was talking about, I see Leopard as taking aim at Windows users rather than the Mac OS X Tiger community.

I guess we'll see in a few months.

I'm not upgrading from Windows® RG Edition by grolschie · 2007-01-30 09:15 · Score: 1

Windows RG Edition

Make that seven years (for "home" versions, too) by MojoStan · 2007-01-30 09:17 · Score: 1

Subject: I'll Answer This Later

Since XP support is due to last until 2011, I'll let you know how it is in about four years.

Last week Microsoft announced that Windows XP Home and Media Center Edition will receive the same Extended Support phase that XP Professional gets. That means that Mainstream Support for XP will end in April 2009 and Extended Support (which includes free security updates) will end in April 2014 (for XP Home, too).

MS's support lifecycle policy states that "home" and "pro" versions of Windows get a Mainstream Support phase of 5 years after general availability (12/31/01 to 2006) or 2 years after the next product is released (1/30/09), whichever is longer. MS recently added an additional 4 months to XP's Mainstream support phase, which now runs until April 2009.

The support lifecycle policy states that "home" versions of Windows are not supposed to get an Extended Support phase (includes free security updates) like the "pro" versions get, but last week MS added Extended Support to XP Home and Media Center to match XP Pro's support. The policy states that Extended Support lasts 5 years after Mainstream Support ends, so that means XP will be supported until April 2014.

--
TO START PRESS ANY KEY

Where's the 'ANY' key? I see Esk, Kitarl, and Pig-Up...

Re:Seriously common... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 09:17 · Score: 0

The poster only pointed out that there are strong anti-Microsoft biases on Slashdot and this thread is basically a meaningless excuse for almost everyone to trot out their pre-conceived notions (which, duh, has happened). There was no indication of his political leanings; it was a simple comparison (obviously liberals do not like Bush and asking them about him is quite pointless).

So you go off on a set of illogical tangents, assuming his worldview contains ideas about "Liberal Bias" and "Liberals Hating America". Completely preposterous and off-topic.

What's really scary is some idiot moderator tagged this as "insightful". This only confirms the overwhelming biases on this board!

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by dascandy · 2007-01-30 09:47 · Score: 1

I waited several hours in line on the night before release to be one of the first to use Windows Vista. I must say that Vista is an amazing operating system. It is hands-down the best product that Microsoft has ever put out, and probably the best operating system that the world has ever seen. That's not saying much, is it?

Re:Amazing. I can't buy a Dell or HP now with XP by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 09:52 · Score: 0

Last I knew (haven't read the Vista EULA) you could always legally DOWNGRADE your copy of Windows.

ie, PC came with 2k, need NT4 instead, wipe PC and install NT4, you're covered.
PC came with XP, need 2k? Again, wipe and install 2k.

As long as you don't go up you are ok. I don't know how this would effect, say, XP Home downgrading to 2k Pro as the 2k version is a more complete version.

BTW, server licenses work the same. I have 2k3 server licenses but the software that needs to run on them won't work under 2k3 so we downgraded the machines to Server 2k. All nice and legit.

Laptop with 512mb RAM with Vista loaded by eeek77 · 2007-01-30 09:55 · Score: 1

Today Newegg has an Acer laptop, loaded with 512mb of RAM, and loaded with Vista. Soooooo, judging from folks here with credible-sounding opinions and your screen shot, the person who buys this laptop will be screwed, right out of the box. Correct? If so, MAN that would tick me off...

Re:Laptop with 512mb RAM with Vista loaded by daviddennis · 2007-01-30 11:14 · Score: 1

This was something I was afraid would happen.

The requirements for Vista are explained in a bunch of opaque documents on Microsoft's site. Typical consumers - not Slashdot readers - do not even realize they exist.. As a result they will not realize that the computer you're referring to is not even specced properly to run "Home Basic", let alone the Aero Glass effects they have been led to expect.

It's a bait and switch operation which I find disgusting and abhorrant. It's going to leave a dreadful taste in the mouths of consumers and will definitely decrease adoption of Vista and absolutely ruin word of mouth.

The official requirements for Home Basic might be met for that machine but even the basic run of Vista is 450mb (as mentioned elsewhere in this thread). So you can run the OS if you don't want to run any optional extras, like applications.

This might be a good time to consider MacOS X. Any machine Apple makes will run their operating system just fine, quickly and with all features enabled. And a Mac Mini or even a MacBook will be price-competitive with competing machines that can run Vista.

D
Re:Laptop with 512mb RAM with Vista loaded by drsmithy · 2007-01-30 13:42 · Score: 2, Insightful

This might be a good time to consider MacOS X. Any machine Apple makes will run their operating system just fine, quickly and with all features enabled.
No, they won't. OS X is even more RAM-hungry than Vista - Mac Minis and low-end MacBooks and iMacs are still shipping with only 512MB RAM (then subtract another 64MB for the video card).
Both OS X and Vista are usable in 512M for basic, light tasks. Both benefit dramatically from an additional 512MB (>1GB delivers diminshing returns unless your workload is heavy).
Given the price of RAM today and the significant, all-round performance boost it delivers, there's really no reason to have less than 1GB.

Impression? by FridayBob · 2007-01-30 09:59 · Score: 3, Interesting

Mostly I'm just kind of disappointed that we weren't able to release KDE 4.0 or a stable version of Debian etch before this day.

Otherwise, I can't see how the consumers who have bought into Vista so far will have much to cheer about. It'll be a lot slower than XP, since the recommended hardware requirements are so much higher than for XP. Aside from the new interface, its supposedly improved stability and security, Vista is really all about DRM: preventing people from playing protected content, including in cases of fair use. What they get back in return for these heinous constraints is the possibility of playing high definition content on their PCs.

However, that last part isn't going to happen any time soon, at least not legally. To play high definition content on Vista, your graphics card and your monitor both have to be HDCP compliant, but according to this article, which is less than a month old, only two monitors tested last year were HDCP compliant and not a single graphics card. When will HDCP compatibile hardware start to appear? According to the article, many monitor manufacturers haven't even heard of it and can't say anything about it, while the graphics card manufacturers (nVidia, ATI) could do it, but haven't seemed to have found the incentive yet to do so. For the latter it seems to a be a chicken and egg story: no content? no support. And even if the manufacturers do decide to start making their products HDCP compliant, remember what Peter Gutmann had to say about the ridiculous guidelines M$ gives them: they're "fundamentally impossible" to comply with.

The future is also looking increasingly bleak for DRM. Even if Vista does well, it's content protection will not make much difference to the content industry if people can buy super-cheap Chinese media players that play every known file format without any restrictions whatsoever. Hell, only last week we heard that the music companies seem to be thinking about ditching DRM. If so, then Vista will become rather uncool in this respect and M$ will start to play down the protected content issue as DRM begins to disappear from music and movies.

Of course, for M$, the MPAA and the RIAA were never what the DRM was about: they really only added it to Vista for their own benefit. M$ is always looking for ways to milk more money out of its stagnant share of the market. For years now they've had only two options: raising prices and fighting piracy. Of course, with Vista they're doing both. Now all they need is for it to catch on. However, I'm not so sure it'll be that easy. Their plan may backfire on them. Why? I know a lot of people who have remained satisfied with Windows over the years only because they've been able to run so much software on their PCs -- pirated software. If they're no longer able to do that, I'm not so sure they're just going to roll over and start paying for everything they'd like to continue to use. I figure we're about to see the arrival of a new wave of Linux newbies as a result. Perhaps not a flood, but I figure it'll be enough to offset any financial gains M$ planned on making. Most important of all for consumers, M$ will lose market share.

Re:Impression? by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:48 · Score: 0

You can legally (assume US with current laws) play HD content on Linux without HDCP compliant hardware?

Drawbacks of OEM XP + Vista upgrade coupon by MojoStan · 2007-01-30 10:07 · Score: 2, Informative

If you need a Windows OS (and I just built a gaming computer myself, so I'm in a similar boat) some stores will sell XP with a free Vista upgrade. That's what I purchased, that way I can use XP for a few months (while Vista figures out what it's doing) and upgrade when I'm good and ready. I think it's important to note the possible drawbacks of this option (OEM XP + free Vista upgrade). The Vista Express Upgrade program only applies to "qualifying PCs" with XP preinstalled or OEM versions of Windows XP, not retail versions of XP. You were obviously referring to OEM versions of XP. The "free Vista upgrade" is apparently an upgrade version of Vista, which requires that OEM XP to install.

Possible drawbacks:

OEM versions of Windows (which cost much less than retail) do not get phone/e-mail support from MS. I assume this is not a big deal to Slashdot readres because we should know how to use MS's support web pages, knowledge base, and Microsoft Update. However, it's worth mentioning if you're planning on installing it for a novice friend.
OEM versions can only be used on one computer and cannot be "moved" to your next computer. MS has been pretty lax on this requirement for XP (just call them and they'll re-activate for you), but I've read that they might be more strict with Vista (I hope not).
It looks like upgrade versions of Vista will require a previous version to be installed before you can install Vista. Previous to Vista, upgrade versions of Windows only required the user to briefly insert a previous version's CD. If you have a RAID setup, this might mean you need to go through XP's shitty RAID setup before installing Vista (which fixes this RAID issue). Note that, contrary to some news headlines, Vista upgrade versions will allow "clean" installs (format hard drive and start clean).

I'm sure most Slashdot readers would accept the possible OEM drawbacks. The drawbacks of the "upgrade" version of Vista might not be so acceptable. If I was buying now, I'd just get an OEM version of Vista unless they change the "installed previous OS" requirement.

--
TO START PRESS ANY KEY

Where's the 'ANY' key? I see Esk, Kitarl, and Pig-Up...

Re:Drawbacks of OEM XP + Vista upgrade coupon by A+Name+Similar+to+Di · 2007-01-30 10:15 · Score: 1

I think it's important to note the possible drawbacks of this option (OEM XP + free Vista upgrade).

Actually, there's a retail version of XP + free Vista upgrade. Or at least, a number of vendors are selling it that way. I haven't actually tried to use my coupon yet, so I can't say for certain if it will work, but if it doesn't, I'll have words for the vendor.

Also, I followed your MS link but found no mention of requiring an OEM version or not allowing a retail version ("qualifying PC running Windows XP" no mention of pre-installation, etc). Can you link me to the section that mentions that?
Re:Drawbacks of OEM XP + Vista upgrade coupon by MojoStan · 2007-01-30 11:47 · Score: 1

I followed your MS link but found no mention of requiring an OEM version or not allowing a retail version ("qualifying PC running Windows XP" no mention of pre-installation, etc). Can you link me to the section that mentions that? I'm assuming you meant the link to Microsoft's Vista Express Upgrade promotion. That page doesn't mention OEM versions of Windows XP (no manual, reduced support) because they are not intended to be installed by inexperienced users. OEM versions are meant to be installed by "system builders," which includes big builders (like Dell) and individual "builders" (like you and me) that know what they're doing.
So when that page says "Receive an Express Upgrade to Windows Vista when you buy a qualifying PC running Windows XP," they are actually referring to an OEM versions of Windows that was preinstalled by the system builder that built that "qualifying PC." They don't mention OEM versions of Windows because that page was meant for normal retail buyers, not system builders, and retail PCs have OEM versions of Windows preinstalled. They don't mention standalone retail boxed versions of Windows XP because they don't qualify (you're supposed to buy a "system").
My description is pretty confusing. A better description of OEM can be found from this Ars Techinca article: Buying OEM versions of Windows Vista: the facts
Actually, there's a retail version of XP + free Vista upgrade. Or at least, a number of vendors are selling it that way. I'm pretty sure (but not absolutley sure) you're mistaken. Every XP + Vista upgrade bundle I've seen has the OEM version of XP (no fancy box, no manual), not the retail version (fancy box). Some online vendors do not make it crystal clear that they're selling an OEM version, but the product description will reveal it's OEM. Hint: if non-upgrade versions of XP Home/Pro are selling for less than $100/$150, then they're OEM versions.
I hate linking to an example at an online store, but here's one: Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 SP2b w/Upgrade Coupon for Vista - OEM
I like Newegg, but that page for XP MCE OEM does not say anything about the difference between OEM versions and retail versions. It just has the letters 'OEM' tacked on to the name of the product.
I haven't actually tried to use my coupon yet, so I can't say for certain if it will work, but if it doesn't, I'll have words for the vendor. That seems to be a concern to many buyers on that product's Customer Reviews section (one thing I like about Newegg). Retailers are allowed to sell OEM versions of Windows to "system builders" (which includes home builders), but the description on the Vista upgrade coupon seems to indicate that users might have to prove (send receipts) that, along with the OS, they bought a system (motherboard, CPU, hard drive, memory) to qualify for the free Vista upgrade. I know Newegg did not make this clear a few weeks ago, so I expect them to offer refunds or exchanges to early buyers (they have a good reputation for service).

--
TO START PRESS ANY KEY
Where's the 'ANY' key? I see Esk, Kitarl, and Pig-Up...
Re:Drawbacks of OEM XP + Vista upgrade coupon by A+Name+Similar+to+Di · 2007-01-30 13:03 · Score: 1

I hate linking to an example at an online store, but here's one: Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 SP2b w/Upgrade Coupon for Vista - OEM [newegg.com]

I hate linking to stores too, but here's the Retail version from newegg. And if it turns out I can't get the upgrade, I'll be miffed :P I'll find out in a day or two if it's valid. Wish me luck ;)
Re:Drawbacks of OEM XP + Vista upgrade coupon by MojoStan · 2007-01-30 13:59 · Score: 1

I hate linking to stores too, but here's the Retail version from newegg. And if it turns out I can't get the upgrade, I'll be miffed :P I'll find out in a day or two if it's valid. Wish me luck ;) Holy crap! (sorry for cussing) You're correct. I was wrong about "free Vista upgrades" not being available for boxed retail versions of XP. How could I have missed that? Or why wasn't this widely reported on tech news sites? I read tech news daily and I never read about this Technology Guarantee Program (free Vista upgrade) for retail boxed versions of Microsoft Windows XP. The pre-loaded/OEM version of this program was mentioned on every tech news site, but my archive search of Ars Technica and DailyTech returned no results for the retail version.
This is a decent option for some buyers to consider. I don't see any "system" purchase requirements for the free Vista upgrade from retail versions of XP. For about $190/$280, we can purchase retail versions of XP Home/Pro and get free upgrades to Vista Home Basic/Business. This is about $100/$140 more expensive than the OEM versions, but these retail versions can be transfered to your next computer. If you're planning on changing motherboards before the next version of Windows, then the retail price premium might be worth it.
Unfortunately, XP Media Center Edition is not sold in retail versions and XP Home retail cannot get a free or discounted upgrade to Vista Home Premium.

--
TO START PRESS ANY KEY
Where's the 'ANY' key? I see Esk, Kitarl, and Pig-Up...

My experience with 64-bit Vista by rbonine · 2007-01-30 10:23 · Score: 3, Informative

I've been running Vista at home since pre-Beta 2. When the RTM version surfaced on MSDN in early December, I decided to hold my breath and reinstall using the 64 bit version.

Specs: I'm running a stock Dell box, D620 processor, dual core with 1 gb RAM. Video is ATI X1300 with 256Mb, Dell dual tuner card, no-name Web cam, USB external drive, built-in sound.

To my great surprise, all of my applications and hardware worked fine on 64 bit Vista. There was one minor exception: the SyncToy app from Microsoft would not run. Everything else - Office, Civ 4, Diablo II, WinZip, etc - worked great. Some dev tools did require updates - Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Express both had to be patched, although they seemed to work OK before I installed the patches. There is a 64-bit version of IE, but I don't run it, so I can't speak to plug-in compatibility. Most surprisingly, I haven't had any problems with drivers; even my el cheapo Web cam worked perfectly.

Overall, I like Vista. It looks nice and works well. Programs seem to load faster, probably because of the SuperCache feature that keeps commonly-used stuff in memory. The eye candy is OK, but probably not worth the price of admission - the important thing is that it has been rock solid so far.

Things I like:

- The sidebar is nice, although there aren't many gadgets available yet. The ones that are available look good.
- The OS is very, very stable. No crashes at all in almost two months. No "this program is closing" messages that I recall.
- The anti-spyware package seems to work as advertised. I'm running OneCare 1.5 for antivirus, and that works fine too. No problems with security, although I didn't have any under XP either.
- The new fonts are very nice - especially Consolas, the new fixed-width font. Looks great in Visual Studio.
- Boot time and resume from standby time has been much improved.
- No one seems to be talking about the voice recognition features, but they are awesome. It's possible to start Word, dictate a letter, save it, open Gmail, and mail it to someone using only voice commands. Accuracy is very good, and it's pretty easy to use. This is a killer feature that needs more publicity.

Things I don't like:

- Some of the new utilities are very, very dumbed down. NTBACKUP is gone, replaced by the most brain-dead "backup program" I've ever seen. This program is not backward-compatible, so if you have Windows Backup files, you'll have to download another utility from Microsoft to restore files from them.
- The disk defragmenter is also dumbed down to the point of absurdity. There is no status display at all - no disk block diagram, no percentage indicator - just a "please wait, this operation may take several hours to complete" message. VOPT did this better in 1983.
- Existing CD burning software probably won't work.
- The new search indexer searches only a small subset of the directory tree by default. While it's possibly to manually tweak the list of directories to search, there's no easy way to tell it to, for example, index every directory except those that hold temporary files. Non-index searches (in other words, a full grovel through the directory tree) seem to be slower than in XP.
- There is a "Run" box on the Start menu, but it doesn't work exactly as it used to. I have always used it to launch some programs and Explorer windows, and it still does this in some cases, but - for example - typing "D:" won't take you to the root of your D drive - it brings up the first application it can find that starts with "D". Very annoying.

Other observations:

- The ReadyBoost feature (that allows you to use a USB key as swap space) works, but I didn't notice any speed increase. This was with a very fast USB drive (patriot XT).
- The control panel utilities and desktop properties screens have been moved around quite a bit, which may confuse some people at first, but the new order probably makes more sense than the old one.
- There's a lot of FUD floating a

Re:Seriously common... by BalkanBoy · 2007-01-30 10:23 · Score: 1

> individuals will be able to engage in rational discussion

I don't think so. You're expecting too much of Americans.

--
'A lie if repeated often enough, becomes the truth.' - Goebbels

Have your cake and eat it too? by BarlowBrad · 2007-01-30 10:25 · Score: 1

I love how everyone complains about MS pushing back Vista so far and then now that it's finally out everyone says, "I'm not installing it until I have to."

Then the people who love OS X because of how great it looks, but when Vista comes out with similar eye candy complaints come due to needing to upgrade hardware, that it's not necessary or that it's just a straight crib of OS X.

So which is it?

Re:Seriously common... by fatcock84 · 2007-01-30 10:30 · Score: 1

There is a slashdot.org bias against Windows. All that means is people here tend to have unfavorable opinions of MS Windows.

This is a forum to express and discuss (mostly technology related) opinions is it not?

Now if we were to go forth and present our opinions as unbiased news items, as the media often does, then claims of bias would be justified. But as long you own your bias and admit to what you are advocating, then no one can accuse you of trying to be deceptive.

Re:Seriously common... by jonmarkymarc · 2007-01-30 10:38 · Score: 1

...Right, 'cause we all know that The Liberals are inherently incapable of answering a question like that in a reasonable manner. There won't be any meaningful thought, there will only be Liberal Bias, because The Liberals hate America.

Looks like you got it.

I find this really funny by Sycraft-fu · 2007-01-30 10:40 · Score: 2, Insightful

"Users want more security, and, in my opinion, UAC is more annoyance than security."

I seem to hear this a lot, often from Linux types who've been advocating the advantages of su for years. The problem is you don't get security for free. You cannot, barring something like TCPA that takes away your control, have more granular security access without having to deal with that. You want real separation between privileged and non-privileged? Ok fine you can have that, but then you have to provide input to switch, no exceptions. You can, if you want, fudge that but then there's no security benefit. To really provide a technical benefit you have to do it all the time.

It's similar to home security. Suppose you want to add an alarm system to your house to ensure that if someone bypasses the physical security (door and window locks) there's a backup. However, you decide that you don't like entering the keycode when you come in, too much of a hassle. So you wire it up to your lock instead. Well, you just negated a large part of the security benefit. If someone opens your lock via any means, the alarm doesn't work. The reason it's a separate code is precisely so that it's removed from the physical security.

So you just can't have it both ways. Either you want more security features and are willing to put up with the additional requests they make or you are ok with not having them. You can't say "Well I want this prevented but I don't want to do anything to make it happen." Want outbound connections blocked by default (really blocked, no backdoors)? Then you have to answer firewall popups. Want to run as a non-admin by default (real differential privilege levels)? Then you have to answer admin popups.

If you don't take the responsibility then you get feel good security, not do good security. I could design a firewall that "blocks malicious outgoing connections automatically" but then it's not really doing it's job, it's just a rules or heuristics based IDS, and if it fails to notice something it doesn't do it's job, it's not actually checking everything like a firewall that denys until it gets user confirmation.

Voice commands as an exploit by andreamer · 2007-01-30 10:40 · Score: 1

A friend of mine in the computer security industry is on a discussion group with a bunch of hackers who are exploring the exploitation of the voice command feature, which is on by default, as a shiny new way to cause havoc. For example, sending a malicious audio file with rapid-fire commands to turn off firewall, create a new user account, transfer files, etc. Or even just walking behind someone in a computer lab and saying "shutdown confirm" or "close window don't save".

This is all speculative at this point, but I found it interesting!

Re:Voice commands as an exploit by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 13:14 · Score: 0

1) There isn't a "shutdown" command. From my experience with it, you have to go through the start menu.

2) Saying "close that" and then "no" to the save dialog would work, but that is a pretty weak "exploit." I'd punch anyone who stood there giving my computer voice commands, and then punch myself for having speech recognition on in a public place (with other people making voice commands nearby, if this is really in a cluster).

3) You cannot send "rapid-fire" commands to turn the firewall off. You'd have to first navigate to the security center. Oh, and good luck with UAC and voice commands (Hint: No).

I'm almost not sure if you're serious with that post. If I had to guess, I'd say your friend from the security industry works at Symantec, and the "hackers" were twelve.
Re:Voice commands as an exploit by andreamer · 2007-01-30 17:21 · Score: 1

Well, here's a blog post about it.
http://technobabylon.typepad.com/tb/2007/01/can_mi crosoft_g.html
I agree, the punching issue is a pretty serious concern...

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by BalkanBoy · 2007-01-30 10:42 · Score: 1

Dude, that was so funny, I was in tears by the time I read "it really shows" :)... I even submitted your comment to seeononslash. Wonderful humour!

--
'A lie if repeated often enough, becomes the truth.' - Goebbels

And by xant · 2007-01-30 10:57 · Score: 2, Informative

The ability to use sudo su does not undermine the purpose of eliminating the root password in the first place: to make it inconvenient to operate as root all the time. As long as it is inconvenient to operate as root all the time, the elimination of the root password has its desired effect: keeping you from accidentally screwing up your damn computer, and keeping malicious attackers from accidentally screwing up your damn computer because you took a shortcut.

People will naturally do whatever's easier. Ubuntu and OS X made it easier to operate as non-root than to operate as root; Windows (at least as of XP) makes it easier to operate as root than to operate as non-root. Not surprisingly, people run as root on Windows, as non-root on the other two. Not surprisingly, they don't screw up those systems as often and they aren't as vulnerable to attack.

--
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.

Punchline by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:07 · Score: 0

I think you forgot to add the punchline. Let me help you out:

"For me to poop on."

I think Vista needs an enema ... by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:21 · Score: 0

and once it's purged, it'll start looking more and more like UNIX, for those who do not understand it are doomed to reinvent it.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 11:54 · Score: 0

I call total bullshit on this one.... You sir, are a liar.

What's the launch of Vista been like for you? by UncleOwl · 2007-01-30 12:06 · Score: 1

To answer the question - peaceful. Vista (as every other creation of Microsoft) is as necessary for me as a bicycle for a fish. It has been Linux for me everywhere since 2000. For papers, for preparing my courses, for teaching. And for fun too.

Still it is interesting to stand by and see all the mess surrounding its release. Maybe it is wishful thinking, but especially mainstream sources (tech columns in common papers etc) look as if they (at least some of them) have finally learned to take everything coming from MS marketers with a grain of salt. Granted, there is plenty of hype too, but maybe some people have learned something by now.

So I'm moderately optimistic. :)

The $100 laptop by dedazo · 2007-01-30 12:09 · Score: 1

That ratio will change when the $100 GNU/Linux laptops are considered normal.

Considering the fact that an OEM license of Vista Home costs Dell and the like about $40, I'd say you need to explain how the cost of the $500 Vista computer is actually Vista's fault. Go on, I'm actually curious.

Also, there are lots of companies that sell laptops with Linux preinstalled - would you like to point out one that sells for $100? Heck, I'll settle for $300.

--
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 12:24 · Score: 0

Agreed... I have connected several less-"secure" machines to the Internet without any firewall software whatsoever for several hours without any ill effects.

Oclock replacement for MS windows at 30% CPU? by dbIII · 2007-01-30 12:31 · Score: 1

I suppose that's not too bad so long as it is set to a low priority and even set to suspend itself for a while at times of heavy CPU usage or when it is not visable (eg. like the desktop ripples in Enlightenment) - but I would expect it would have to look pretty good if it is running at 30% CPU.

Personally I wouldn't want to run it purely to keep the power consumption for cooling down - but I run my home computer in a room with ambient temperatures above 30C for a lot of the time.

My experiences by GFree · 2007-01-30 12:55 · Score: 1

Vista really isn't as bad as some (many?) people say. I presume a lot of the complaints are made by people who haven't actually tried using Vista themselves, and instead just regurgitate what they read from others. Having said that, it's worth addressing a few points:

* Vista ISN'T slow, it's actually rather fast, sometimes faster than XP, IF (and this is a big IF) you have the hardware to support it. A crappy computer which runs XP OK will not run Vista satisfactorily, but a powerful machine should cut though Vista like butter. I'm a gamer so naturally my hardware is more powerful than the norm, so the sys requirements don't bother me.

* Vista IS compatible with most software. If it isn't, check to see if there's a newer version available which supports Vista. Nero and Alcohol 120% were prime examples for me.

* Vista does NOT have enough to warrant a purchase from XP. If you can get it for free, or otherwise at a relatively cheap price, it's worth it, but full price for Vista is at this stage a waste of time/money.

* Vista does NOT delete your torrents/warez/illegal downloads. That's got to be one of the most stupid pieces of FUD I've read in a while.

Of course, make up your own minds, but please try it first before you make an "informed" opinion. If you really dislike/hate MS and love Linux, fine, good for you, but don't try to come off as a Windows expert either.

Of course there was no midnight madness by patio11 · 2007-01-30 13:00 · Score: 1

When is the last time you saw midnight madness over the launch of what is essentially a mass-market business, home office, and consumer product? Vista isn't aimed at the hard core gamers who love midnight launches as part of their culture. Its not designed to generate massive amounts of passion. Its aimed at EVERYBODY, and lets face it, EVERYBODY includes a large number of people who not only do not care about their computers, they actively dislike using them. But they have to use them, because email, the Internet, and MS Word are three things which are indispensable to modern life for a lot of people. These folks will buy Vista, by the hundreds of millions, and they will get significant value out of it -- their machines will probably be less likely to turn into zombies or unusably infested spyware boxes than they were before. But they'll never throw a party to celebrate an object which for them is just a really expensive toaster. Do you have a relationship with your toaster? No, you use your toaster, it makes toast. Maybe it makes toast really well, but its still just a toaster, a tool for you to quickly get your toast and get on with life.

I sell a software product to an audience which is the polar opposite of Slashdot in terms of technical skills (it makes bingo cards for elementary school teachers). There were no launch parties for it, either, but it has pleasantly exceeded my expectations for popularity. Most people here would probably be askance that I can even ask $25 for it. http://www.bingocardcreator.com/ (Speaking of which, I suppose one of these days I should make the installer program Vista compatible. I'm probably not going to have any early adopter customers but once the new Dells come out who knows.)

--
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.

Re:Of course there was no midnight madness by suckmysav · 2007-01-30 14:25 · Score: 1

Do you have a relationship with your toaster?

Hey that sounds like fun!

"Hi, i'm talky toaster, your chirpy breakfast companion. Would anybody like some toast?"

--
"You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
Re:Of course there was no midnight madness by NFNNMIDATA · 2007-01-30 17:42 · Score: 2, Informative

Pretty sure there were midnight madness sales for win95 and win98. I recall tv news stories and newspaper articles about it at the time. What a time to be alive.
Re:Of course there was no midnight madness by Ubergrendle · 2007-01-31 04:24 · Score: 1

I agree midnight madness = retarded, a sign of a sick consumerist culture. But as a barometer of cultural significance, its worthy of tracking. Here in Toronto, i distinctly remember numerous events for Win95, 98, and XP releases. I didn't even realise Vista was launching this week until I read a slashdot article...and I work in IT.

--
John Maynard Keynes: "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?"

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by mushadv · 2007-01-30 13:30 · Score: 1

but I have to jump back to metacity in order to play Oolite because Beryl takes over my 3d card

There's an option in advanced general settings of beryl-settings called "Unredirect Fullscreen Windows", which tells the wm not to composite fullscreen apps. This should solve your problem, unless of course you're running it windowed.

window xp by Treates2 · 2007-01-30 13:32 · Score: 0

>>> In the meantime, what is your impression of the OS? Have you had a chance to use the retail version yet? Are you supporting it in a business environment? What's the launch of Vista been like for you?

i dont know about you, but i dont have money to throw around for a new operating system, if i did it'd still be a problem moving all my files and such to vista, i've been watching the screenshots (never actually used it), and reading opeoples thoughts but so far i'm still not influenced enough to check it out, and for the old school users who turn off graphics in xp/2000 vista is a freaking nightmare. anyways viva la windows xp, for the next couple-o-years

I went to the CompUSA launch by Lord+Kano · 2007-01-30 13:34 · Score: 1

but not for Vista, for the discounted and rebate items. I picked up a 250GB HDD for $109-30.

Of the 100 or so people I stood in line with, I only saw two talking to the Microsoft Rep.

LK

--
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by broKenfoLd · 2007-01-30 13:55 · Score: 1

Either you are joking, or you are trying to bribe your MS rep into going easy on you during this years true-ups.

VISTA by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 14:06 · Score: 0

Vista: Very Insecure Shit That's Abominable
Microsoft: Most Intelligent Customers Realize Our Software Only Fools Them

Understatement of the day by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 14:13 · Score: 0

What's pegging your CPU at 30% is the rendering of the clock gadget. Sounds silly ...

You've got that right!

It's not the bloat that is the problem by AbRASiON · 2007-01-30 14:44 · Score: 1

I see quite a few comments here saying the bloat is the problem with Vista.
I don't beleive that is the case, I think the problem is it's poorly coded bloat.

I'm as close as to what you'll get as an anti-apple guy, I don't like lots of things about them (let's not go into it) but even I after trying OSX86 for a few days simply can not deny that the OS looks good and yet it performs well too!
(and thanks to osx86, tested on the same hardware!)

Bloat is fine, cluttered (yet useful?) user interfaces is fine, slick little things which look cool all fine if it helps with what you're doing and the system doesn't feel slow and unresponsive.

Now I haven't used Vista, so I can not claim "oh it's bloaty and slow! ugh, screw bloat!" I can simply say to those saying that bloat is the issue, No! bad code is the issue.

I for one, intend to stick with XP absoloutely as long as possible, it does all I need it to do.
Depending on how badly MS push the "evil" parts of Vista will then let me evaluate if I need to take Ubuntu, OSX86, a Real mac or actually using Vista more seriously.

The one thing I want to know... by soupcan58 · 2007-01-30 14:53 · Score: 1

I hope this doesn't make me sound stupid, but is it still possible to move back to XP if I install Vista and I don't like it? I'm planning on getting it from my University, so I just thought I'd ask.

Comment removed by account_deleted · 2007-01-30 14:54 · Score: 1

Comment removed based on user account deletion

The first release I'm really not interested in by BanjoBob · 2007-01-30 16:07 · Score: 1

I remember going to Win95 - a lot of excitement. 98 was a lot of fixes. 2000 Pro was the ultimate and XP was interesting.

The problem is that Vista doesn't have anything in it that interests me. It has a lot that doesn't. There has been nothing I've read that would cause me to spend days backing up, cleaning the drives, installing a new OS and then days installing all the software and peripheral devices all over again so that I can continue to do what I'm doing now.

If there is a reason other than having the latest bells and whistles, DRM, CRM and bloat, Microsoft has been ineffective in marketing it.

--
Banjo - The more I know about Windoze, the more I love *nix

Colossally Bad by twitter · 2007-01-30 16:18 · Score: 1

do you usually find yourself agreeing with Dvorak, or is this just a one-time thing?

When M$ boosters like Dvorak and Mossberg say Vista is bad and curse it for weeks, you know that it's bad even by M$ standards. That's colossally bad and there will be more of this kind of review.

--

Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.

Re:Colossally Bad by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 16:34 · Score: 0
twitter, please read this carefully. Following this advice will make Slashdot a better place for everyone, including yourself.
- As a representative of the Linux community, participate in mailing list and newsgroup discussions in a professional manner. Refrain from name-calling and use of vulgar language. Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer. Your words will either enhance or degrade the image the reader has of the Linux community.
- Avoid hyperbole and unsubstantiated claims at all costs. It's unprofessional and will result in unproductive discussions.
- A thoughtful, well-reasoned response to a posting will not only provide insight for your readers, but will also increase their respect for your knowledge and abilities.
- Always remember that if you insult or are disrespectful to someone, their negative experience may be shared with many others. If you do offend someone, please try to make amends.
- Focus on what Linux has to offer. There is no need to bash the competition. Linux is a good, solid product that stands on its own.
- Respect the use of other operating systems. While Linux is a wonderful platform, it does not meet everyone's needs.
- Refer to another product by its proper name. There's nothing to be gained by attempting to ridicule a company or its products by using "creative spelling". If we expect respect for Linux, we must respect other products.
- Give credit where credit is due. Linux is just the kernel. Without the efforts of people involved with the GNU project , MIT, Berkeley and others too numerous to mention, the Linux kernel would not be very useful to most people.
- Don't insist that Linux is the only answer for a particular application. Just as the Linux community cherishes the freedom that Linux provides them, Linux only solutions would deprive others of their freedom.
- There will be cases where Linux is not the answer. Be the first to recognize this and offer another solution.
From http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/docs/HOWTO/Advoca cy
Re:Colossally Bad by dedazo · 2007-01-31 06:37 · Score: 1

"Cursed it for weeks"? You are too funny. Well, actually not. And are they still "cursing" it now? And again, when they were "boosting M$" you thought they sucked, but now you think they are completely right. Is that how it works?
more of this kind of review.

Wow, I have this one. Does that make me "righter" than you? Or is it possible that some people will like it and some people won't? Oh, I forget - you must "hate" something if you don't like it, so there's no middle ground. And if you hate something, anyone that does not is an "astroturfer" and a "shill" or "troll". Never mind.

--
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo

Re:Seriously common... by BrowncoatJedi · 2007-01-30 16:23 · Score: 1

"Right, 'cause we all know that The Liberals are inherently incapable of answering a question like that in a reasonable manner. There won't be any meaningful thought, there will only be Liberal Bias, because The Liberals hate America."

---Yep, this sums up the knee-jerk, mindless, mealy-mouthed attitudes of the American left.

"Or maybe they're all just sheep. Baaaa! I think what I think because a man on TV told me to!"

---Exactly. For example: John Stewart and Keith Olbermann.

M$ Nemesis by PenGun · 2007-01-30 17:02 · Score: 1

This is the one. They gonna start to tank here. A disasterous vista launch, worse sell through than the PS3 ... I can feel the shift.

OK that's my psychic prediction ;).

XP Control Panel by Anonymous Coward · 2007-01-30 17:09 · Score: 0

The very best thing about XP's "task based interface," as it appears in the Control Panel, is the "switch to classic view" button that immediately removes all the brain-dead, obnoxious, task based crap.

If Vista forces me to play with mystical magical wizards, or makes me guess which task I'm supposed to be performing even more often than XP does, then I'm going out right now to horde every single copy of Windows XP I can get my hands on! At least I still have one running instance of Windows 2000.

Task based interface...ugh. Tasks? How about develop a statistical model of threatened wildlife populations? What!? Windows doesn't have a button for that!??

Tasks are crutch for clueless software designers who don't know how to make their system comprehensible for people to intuit the steps they need to take to accomplish complex goals. From what I've heard about Vista, it doesn't have a much more coherent design. It's just shinier.

I'll pass.

Where's my chainsaw? by DMPilgrim · 2007-01-30 18:39 · Score: 1

Not long ago, the UAC was responsible for opening a gateway to Hell. And now Microsoft is trying to foist the UAC on the entire world. Yep, we're goin' ta hell fer sure now. Well, no, it's more like we're goin' ta BUY hell fer sure now.

Re:Seriously common... by realityfighter · 2007-01-30 19:09 · Score: 1

For the moment, I'm going to guess that 1 in 10 hard core liberals regularly watch Kieth Olbermann. He overdoes his presentation far too much, and often skips over very important points in favor of outright bashing. He uses Murrow's famous sign-off phrase, but in my opinion he hasn't truly earned it. His show is only a tiny bit more elegant in its presentation than Bill O'Reilly's, and only because Olbermann knows how to make a rant sound like a speech. Olbermann appeals most to people who have spent a long time listening to Rush and O'Reilly and are looking for more of the same, in a different ideological package.

Now, talk about Stephen Colbert. There's a guy with the liberal media in his palm! Every night he goes out and proves, for one, that you can use the word "liberal" to insult just about anyone.

--
A strain of paranoid prevention can be worse than the disease, whate'er the intention.

San Francisco New Day Launch... by Taelron · 2007-01-30 19:59 · Score: 1

I attended the New Day Launch conference at Moscone Center in San Francisco, Ca today. I was more impressed with Exchange 2007 than I was Vista or Office 2007. In fact I have no plans to install either for the next two years at any client site. They had demo workstations set up for you to play with Vista and I can honestly say I am less than impressed. The workstations, HP Desktops, were slow to respond. Hitting the windows logo key, you could count to two before the start menu would start to open. I tested this out on 5 different demo PC's to ensure it wasnt just the one or two machines. Always the same results. The Demo machines had a Vista Experiance rating of a lowly 3.1. So I looked at the system panel to see what the configurations were. The Demo PC's with only a 3.1 Vista Rating were Dual Core Intel Xeon 5130 2ghz with 3gb of Ram. If such a machine gets such a low rating, its likely to be 2 years before the PC hardware catches up with Vista. Further promising I'll be in no rush to considering moving to it.

Vista: The ow starts now by Yuioup · 2007-01-30 20:36 · Score: 1

Vista: "The ow starts now"

I'm surprised I haven't seen that slogan posted yet.

Y

Some people even buy into the marketing crap by Askmum · 2007-01-30 21:39 · Score: 1

We will receive new computers at work in a few months. A colleague of mine asked me in a serious way if they would have Vista on it.

I just didn't know how to react. Ridcule him? Ignore him? Or just try to explain to him that having a bad and barely proven OS at home is only an inconvenience, but having it at work is just plain evil and a serious business hazard.

I don't think he understood.

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by drinkypoo · 2007-01-31 03:31 · Score: 1

I flip back and forth between windowed mode and not, so that I can do other things (usually play gnome-mahjong-tile-matching) while I'm out of witchspace fuel and have a bunch of ships in my way so I can't use the jump drive.

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"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"

Bootable linux cds, earning you a troll mod by 3.5+stripes · 2007-01-31 04:07 · Score: 1

since 1997...

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He tried to kill me with a forklift!

Re:Windows Vista Truly is an Amazing Operating Sys by axp_bofh · 2007-01-31 09:25 · Score: 1

Vista is on the cutting edge of technology.
You misspelled "a bad copy of OS X"

Bug(s) in Notepad still present by Alari · 2007-01-31 11:45 · Score: 0

There are still bugs in Notepad.

Open Notepad, turn on word wrap, type a bunch of lines long enough to wrap, then save the document. The cursor will change position, and word wrap becomes broken until you turn it off and then back on, otherwise the document may become corrupted if it is edited.

Yes, that's right, they fucked up NOTEPAD.

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I use Windows... like a two dollar wh.. why don't I just go ahead and not finish that sentence.

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