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Is Vista a Trap?
logube writes "BBC has up an article about the trap of installing Vista in your existing desktop. Written by Tim Weber, a self-confessed 'sucker for technology,' this article is a good introduction to the pain and extra money required to get going with the newest version of Windows. See how you can spend an extra 130 british pounds, and still have no working webcam! Says Weber, 'It took me one day to get online. The detail is tedious and highly technical: reinstalling drivers and router firmware didn't work, but after many trial and error tweaks to Vista's TCP/IP settings, I had internet access. Once online, Creative's website told me that my sound card was a write-off. No Vista support would be forthcoming.'"
Directx 10. They could have put out an XP version. (of course that doesnt sell CDs) You will need DX10 for upcoming games. Security updates (there still must be holes). Besides that I say wait as long as you can.
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
Burn the MSDN image, grab RAID drivers for my onboard RAID, put the drivers on my USB key, then boot the Vista install disk. Go through the usual setup with the drivers. Reboot. All hardware is auto-detected and drivers installed except for my Creative Audigy 2 sound card. Pull the drivers from their site and install. Update nVidia drivers while I'm at it. Works great, no problems.
A list of new features: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windo ws_Vista
win98 -> 2000, lots of problems with lack of drivers for older hardware
2000 -> XP still problems with lack of drivers for older hardware (although maybe not as many)
XP -> Vista well, what do you think?
-- the cake is a lie
Thanks, but I don't need anyone correcting me with something that's wrong. Microsoft has full prerogative in deciding what their OS does with regards to DRM. No law mandates the use of DRM, so it's purely Microsoft's choice.
Your "correction" is also wrong in another way: it's not just the music industry that has a stake in Vista's DRM - the movie industry is just as, if not more, interested in that "feature" of Vista.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Except that Linux has had practically universal network and soundcard support for years. Even if the network hardware only has Windows 2000 binary drivers, you could load them with the NDIS module...
It used to be that if you wanted all of your hardware to work, you ran Windows. Looks like the tables have turned.
I'm no longer running it because it wasn't very stable (read: Vista and things like Media Center were not stable from a clean install, not the third party software drivers were unstable), but it's pretty good for games, at least it seems like it will be when driver support is there.
For example, I installed the Beta Nvidia drivers, which while giving me over all worse performance because of a lack of SLI support, did actually give a demonstrable and perceptible performance boost (as promised), even though the drivers were not file.
DirectX 10 is the thing that's likely to get me to upgrade again to it, hopefully by the time it's 'mainstream' a service pack or two will be out.
Wow, completely missed the section of the article where he clearly says he *ran* said Upgrade adviser (which is what led to a Graphics card update among a few other things) but that he later still had problems with unsupported/non-functional hardware the adviser didn't give a peep about, huh? Give you a hint... second part of the article after "A blunt message"... starts with "But this was probably not enough, so I downloaded Microsoft's Vista Upgrade Advisor."
Sheesh.
... doesn't have a single decent image-browser ...
... dc++ client ...
... office suite ...
... Not to mention decent looking fonts ...
Gwenview, Picasa...
Is in production. Check the CVS for latest builds.
I really don't understand why you included this. OpenOffice.org, KOffice, AbiWord; all more than comparable to MS Word.
In Debian based distros, sudo apt-get install msttcorefonts. Rather simple. Other distros have packages of their own.
In short, I'm under the impression that you haven't really tried to use a modern Linux distro for more than the five minutes it took you to stereotype it, say, "This sucks because it's not what I'm used to!", and go back to Windows.
"We may face a scorched and lifeless earth, but they're accountable to their shareholders first."
Sure, so what hardware and software did you have to replace?
Amount I've had to spend in addition to purchasing Vista: $0. I built my AMD Athlon 2700+, 1 GB RAM, Radeon 9800 Pro in 2003 (hardly new). All my software and scenarios work, including:
I'd love to hear other people's experiences, but please include details.
From the article:Uhm, no it isn't, not really. As the author later discovers (but still doesn't realize), getting hardware to work often involves hardware, drivers and OS (and sometimes other software). While we all wish it were that easy, us "expensive PC helpers" have the skills to deal with those cases when it isn't.
For example:Wizards? This suggests that the author does not know how to get to the properties of whatever network protocol (I'm assuming TCP/IP) he's using and configure them directly.You can find out by following the instructions at
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/298837.
I'm not defending Vista, but I also bristle when people devalue and disrespect people in IT/IS. We make things look easy because we're good at what we do.
People who run linux. If it ran on the last version, it is almost certain to run on the next. Unless it's 15 year old hardware. No, wait, most of that works too.
Honestly, who does an OS upgrade and not check for hardware compatibility?
If you RTFA, you'll see that he a) used a Microsoft app that checks your system for Vista compatibility before installing; b) replaced his incompatible hardware before the install with hardware stated to work with Vista by the manufacturer.
Short of having someone lend him the hardware to try it out with Vista, I don't really see what else he could have done to avoid problems...
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
For every anecdote, there's a counter anecdote:
802.11 works fine for me. Try network-manager/knetworkmanager. All clicky-clicky, and even better than XP's network support IMHO
Volume controls? You mean like the Fn+F6/F7 on my laptop that actually change the volume of my machine? Automatically, with no configuration, in Linux, on my laptop?
Bluetooth seems to work fine for me, too.
Video drives, I just did apt-get install nvidia-glx, and they've worked since then. With Beryl, I get 3D screensavers, everything I could want.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
About being certified by MS...I'm not sure where you are getting your information from, but it is wrong.
Want to develop drivers for Vista, Server 2003, XP, W2k, and possibly older MS platforms? Hit the download button from here http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/devtools/ddk/default .mspx/.
Want a kernel debugger and access to the O/S symbol files? Try here http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/devtools/debugging/d efault.mspx.
Need some know-how on passing the Windows logo requirements? Try here http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/whql/WHQLdwn.mspx
How about 64-bit Vista drivers? Well, those have to be digitally signed. Try here for more info http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/64bi t/kmsigning.mspx
Total cost to you: Zero. Well, that certificate for signing the 64-bit drivers costs money, but that's not going to MS.
I understand the general /. attitude towards most things MS, but at least try to get the facts straight before you spread FUD around.
Stay hopeful that the Crystalline Amoeba poops your car out soon
FPSs, MMORPGs and RTSs all suck on consoles. Considering that I'm only interested in those genres and that online play with a fast control scheme (ie. keyboard and mouse) is a requirement for me to even consider playing, I think I'll stick with my PC.
Media Center records all content into the .ms-dvr format which contains DRM. However, since you have Media Center you have either Home Premium or Ultimate; therefor you could use Windows DVD Maker which will capture the video without DRM. Media Center's video capture is for TV shows and some of them like sports broadcasts require DRM. If you use the wrong tool for the job it could see it not working how you except.