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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.'"
Anyone using this malware? Does it have anything we need?
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
as this happened with xp-64, didn't it?
also, by that logic, linux is a trap
Focus your fire on that unsupported hardware!
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
I read the article earlier today, and while I thought it was very well written, I couldn't help but feel disappointed that the single most loathable feature of Vista, wasn't even mentioned, not even in a perfunctory way.
I know I am a minority, but for me Fair Use is a big issue. Sadly, Vista has completely opened the doors to DRM on the desktop. Well, not on mine.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
I'm waiting to see if the reporter writes a 2nd article, one titled, "Microsoft Cancelled my XP key and now I'm stuck." Of course with the BBC footing the bill for it, it's not likely that he'll be bothered by such tiny problems like a normal person doing an upgrade would be. Of all the reasons I won't be installing Vista for a long time, the fact that it's a one way trip is among the top 10. In general key activation, WGA, and all the associated crap means I won't be shelling out any money to Microsoft for a long time.
Why do I get the feeling this was posted solely to let people use "itsatrap" as a tag?
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
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.
Every time there is news like this the fanboys shout 'you shoulda known' and
'get new hardware'. I have a better idea. Let's call Vista not an upgrade but a wholesale replacement of your computer and many of your applications. Most of your data will work in the new system but that's about it.
No - Vista is barely less of an upgrade than switching from XP to a Mac.
Really need to stop whining.
If you are adept enough to try "many trial and error tweaks to Vista's TCP/IP settings" you are adept enough to do a little research before going out to get the newest thing.
Vista won't recognise my C64 tape drive either! Those MS bastards! It's a conspiracy, I tell you!
Its going to take them a while to get the kinks out. Not to mention its going to be slower and some hardware might not have drivers. Besides DX10 I dont know why id buy this. And this PC isnt going to be able to run DX10.
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
Vista runs fine in VMWare with less resources allocated to it than that. It isn't snappy, but it runs. Memory and processor specs have nothing to do with the fact that the supported hardware list, that is, the number of devices with available drivers, is smaller on Vista than on XP. Hell, as far as I can tell it's smaller than on Linux. Between the devices that are no longer supported vor one DRM reason or another, and the fact that manufacturers aren't interested in providing drivers for older devices, but would rather sell you a whole new device instead, Vista hardware support is a joke.
This guy is talking about how his network and sound cards don't work. How does that have anything to do with his processor and memory? What does Microsoft think they're trying to pull with this? Are they really so convinced that they're untouchable that they think they can throw away one of the few things they had bragging rights over?
As far as office suites go, how is Open Office not good enough?
What kind of 3rd party apps are you looking for? I haven't found Linux lacking in this regard, but then again I'm mostly using it as a server.
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
To a degree, the points made in TFA are to be expected. Heck, even a bunch of MS's own software is incompatible with Vista (big boys like .NET Framework 2.0 and SQL Server 2005, last I checked). There have been alot of changes, and it seems unrealistic to expect companies to roll out new drivers that are 100% right off the bat.
That being said, there seems to have been a huge jump in paradigm from XP to Vista. Even though I know I'll be modded down for this, I like XP. I've installed the operating system with faulty RAM, and it STILL worked great after I replaced the chips. Its driver support is just awe inspiring, and about the only driver I have to manually set up on a fresh install is my sound and video card, and for the most part it was like this at release.
Vista? You need up to date hardware and specific drivers. Not just 'decent' or 'good' hardware, but edging on unnecessary from the point of view of what I would expect my family to spend on a PC. A day just to get onto the internet? How many technical and monetary hoops are we expected to jump through? I've experienced similar problems with learning Linux and finding drivers, but in that case there were forums and community solutions. Vista leaves the users at the mercy of third party companies.
I don't see myself going to Vista, in all honesty. Two steps forward, three steps back.
Rule for Idiots: If you bought your computer earlier than 2006, then don't install Vista.
Interesting! Does this mean that we might start seeing Windows customers agitating for open hardware specs so that interested parties can pick up the ball dropped by the vendor and write their own drivers?
...Just like the Linux guys have been doing for the last <*cough*> years?
Oh, wait. You have to be "certified" by Microsoft to write a usable Vista driver. Never mind...
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
If you don't mind paying a lot of the things you ask for will run under crossover.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Of course, I don't entirely agree with that. It seems that the more we say Vista sucks, the more it sells and takes potential marketshare away from Linux, which we keep saying is so much better. Maybe people think we have no idea what the fuck we're talking about?
I propose that we turn the tables. Let's start seeing articles about how goddamn great Vista is and how Linux sucks more eggs than the Easter Bunny's Dyson. Just for a month or so, let's try it and see what happens.
And remember, in Redmond, your computer crashes Vista. Or is that Soviet Russia. I don't know anymore, my head hurts.
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
DRTFA, because it's slashdotted, but how good can the reviewer be? Why on earth would Vista require new router firmware. The router doesn't care what it's connected to. It doesn't touch the OS of the computers connected to it. If you're installing a new OS, and as part of the process you THINK you need to update your router firmware, you've got bigger problems than a crappy OS--you're an idiot!
As others have said. Enough of this crap. We all know it will take vista a year or so before it is truly ready... but the drivers are not MS's doing. The hardware vendors want you to buy new stuff so they don't support the old. MS has given them the tools to make the drivers, they just don't want to do it.
Frankly on a lot talk on this drivers issue is from people talking out of bopth sides of their mouth. People who blame the hardware manufacturers for a lack of Linux support seem to be the ones to blame MS for what is the hardware manufacturer's responsibility. You want to upgrade cause you like the tech, well go on-line and see if your old hardware is supported, and that includes printers and other peripherals. To not do so is just stupid. When I build a Linux box, I make sure the components are supported befire I buy them.
This is the same as the PS3 stuff. I have a Wii, I like it a lot. I will never buy a PS3. But enough of that stuff too. It is killing the variety of stories available on this site.
Getting the OS to run, maybe? P42GHz and 768MB of ram is a perfectly fine non-gaming machine, and any OS demanding more is retarded in my book. Anyway, even Vista should run - maybe not 100% smooth - on that setup.
MOD PARENT UP. All this loathing seems to be jealousy by the Linux fanboys. -- Linux User at Work, Windows Vista User at Home
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Okay, it's bad for the poor people who have to buy new hardware because they can't get vista drivers for their existing stuff.
But it means a good load of ebay bargains for those of us running open source operating systems with support for just about everything built in.
I haven't actually noticed the bargains happening much yet, but they will come. Just like last time shortly after Windows XP came out. Second hand USB stuff was going for next to nothing on ebay.
-- MartinG To mail me: echo kewyjlcxyzvjfxbqwh | tr bcefhjklqvwxyz
What does any of that have to do with the problems he had? Oh, that's right, next to nothing. If you read the article it said that once he had things running it was nice but Vista still had a ton of problems. The only thing on that list that caused him problems was the SB Live which caused three "unidentified hardware" type errors. A search showed him that the card would never work under Vista (no drivers planned) so he got a new one. The graphics card he upgraded before the install because he knew that it was not enough.
But he ran into problems with his PDA (running Windows Mobile), his web-cam (which the update advisor said would work fine), TCP/IP, etc.
Try reading. You learn things. Like what his problems were, or that he fixed the problems with that configuration.
You don't need a 3.x GHz dual core processor to run Vista. While he'd do better with a full gig, that computer (upgraded the way he did) should run Vista without a problem.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Did we actually manage to Slashdot the BBC? I finally got to it, but boy, it was slow.
Sounds to me like he's got quite a hodgepodge of hardware there, and it got more exotic and strange as he added things to deal with the problems he was having. So while it's not his fault that his machine evolved in that manner over the years, it's no surprise that a four-year-old machine with a bunch of random hardware added will have problems with a bleeding-edge OS.
I guess the moral of the story is that if he wants it all to work together, a new machine might have been the better choice (and if my pounds-to-dollars conversion is right, not a much more expensive one). Too bad about his PDA, though.
Frankly, if he's such a gadget geek, I think he probably could have (and in some ways, did) predict this result. We all want the latest toys, but this method of upgrading (all at once, he popped in a new video card and upgraded the system to a brand-new OS instead of a clean install in a few months after all the driver woes could be worked out) is rife with peril.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
You must be new here.
"...today consumers have been conditioned to think of beer when they see a bullfrog..."
Considering that Microsoft says a 1 GHz PC with 512 MB RAM will run Vista, he probably expected a working system.
I think Vista uses more RAM to display a window than my OS/2 Warp system used to run half a dozen apps (I had 8 MB of RAM on an AMD 486/40).
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Then he blames M$ for Creative's lack of support. Creative is terrible. They were part to blame with the VIA KT133 chipset compatibility problem as well. Instead of working with VIA, they dumped the blame on VIA, screw the customer. Windows 2000 is another. It took creative almost a year to release working drivers for many of their sound cards on Win2k.
I concur. This guy has no one to blame but himself, since there's a link to the Vista upgrade adviser tool right on the Vista homepage. Why, if you're at all tech-savvy, would you perform a major OS upgrade without checking to see if it'll even run on your hardware? The answer: because you're an idiot.
"Once online, Creative's website told me that my sound card was a write-off. No Vista support would be forthcoming.'"
I've been preaching this for a while now - Vista isn't at fault here - the hardware manufacturers are! Stick it to them - they have had 6 years to prepare for the launch. It's also been over a year and a half that Vista has been availble from MSDN and such.
I can't even do an "oblig"!!! The article title already did :(
Thanks to Windows Vista, I lost my job, my wife divorced me, my dog was brutally raped and murdered, I've been diagnosed with brain cancer, and I no longer find myself interested in sexual activity. I wish I had read the warnings on Slashdot prior to trying Vista. Thank you Slashdot for spreading the truth about the horrible contagion known as Windows Vista.
What a load of FUD.
"The Brady Bunch is back...working homicide"
Umm, at least a baseline support for that hardware? For a company so prided on backwards compatibility, Microsoft sure has given the finger hardcore to a lot of people when it comes to Vista.
For comparison: I have an Apple iMac G3 400MHz with 768MB RAM and a 40GB disk happily running OS X 10.4. This machine also has a (nonupgradeable) 8MB ATI video card. Note that this computer, at this moment, is almost 8 years old, and runs Tiger like a champ. Sure, I don't get all the cool effects, but the key is I didn't have to do a damn thing to make it work, it just did, and it doesn't even attempt the effects it can't handle. I can browse the internet, use iTunes, type in Word, Excel, Pages or Keynote, check my email, and even watch DVD's. And you know what? It runs 10.4 FASTER than it runs 10.3. Given, it's still a bit slower than OS 9, but given the added capabilities of it and it still being useable in OS X, that's a pretty damn good trade-off.
I hate sigs...
1 Day? Windows is for suckers, buy a Mac.
Linux as a whole might take some blame if an older version worked with the hardware (say in kernel 2.4) , but a newer version (say kernel 2.6) didn't. This does happen on occasion, but it is generally fixed-up by either an OSS developer that wants to use the hardware, or the vendor (such as the Nvidia binaries).
Remember, Vista is purported to be somewhat of an upgrade/improvement over XP. That means that people expect it to do what XP does, and more. It's still MS windows, just a newer, shinier, bulkier ones.
So if your winmodem worked in 2.4.x and not in 2.6.x, you might have a legitimate gripe at linux. Generally such things come out in the next-version bugfixes, but issues do happen where a particular newer version does not like certain hardware, or the source-code for modules doesn't compile and no newer-version source is available. If there never was support for your winmodem in the first place (note, WINmodem is a good giveway that it's not non-windows friendly), then the blame rests somewhat on the manufacturer for not providing a driver, or at least specs for such. In the case of winmodems, the software pretty much is most of the product, so the manufacturers guard it fairly closely.
If you buy a Vista box from any of those manufactures now, it runs just fine. This guy didn't bother to check hardware compatibility. He is a complete moron for trying to run Vista on hardware that is not supported. Period.
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.
Or was I just lucky? I loaded the free beta on a new hard drive for a while to see what was what. Internet access just worked upon first bootup. My Audigy worked, though I may have had to install drivers, I don't remember. The only serious problem was that the NVidia drivers on my 7900GT were lacking. Switching resolutions had about a 1 in 3 chance of corrupting the screen, forcing a cold reboot. But that's certainly fixable. It's probably even fixed now.
But did I like Vista? No, not really. It was very pretty. And Aero was kinda neat. But once you dive in a few screens you start to notice that most screens and control panel applets look exactly the same and do the exact same thing. There were nice things: The Recycle Bin works across network shares now. It correctly alphabetizes roman numerals. But as fas as any huge "OMG!" feature, no.
That said, though, this article really seemed like FUD unless, as I said, I got lucky.
probably
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
...and more like "as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced!"
Slashdot? Oh, I just read it for the articles.
I just installed Ubuntu Edgy on a 400 MHz Gateway G6 with 256 megs of RAM. I had to go into the command line twice to get all the extra 1998 hardware working, and the responsiveness felt just a tad sub-optimal.
Ubuntu Edgy is just a few months older than Vista. I wonder how Vista would have fared?
Step into a huge movement. Don't Tread In Me.
Since I know we have more of the CS, IT crowd than gamers here...
Vista's problems have been mentioned, directly, But another massive issue is the way that Microsoft is beginning to work with game developers. First, it's the 'Games for Windows' tag, and treating the PC like a console in terms of branding. Second, the games for vista is going to slowly force pretty much every gamer on the planet to switch to vista, or try to. Granted, gamers tend to have the rigs that can handle it, at the bleeding edge... But, then there are many casual gamers who buy into the back end of the technology curve. I and many others have absolutely no desire to use vista, but in a year or so the number of playable games will begin to dwindle as titles come out for vista only.
It's bad enough that my friend is punished for running windows 2000 on her gaming rig because many games intended for XP or Vista won't run on the system.
The forced obsolescence thing is la real nightmare in that respect, and it's stupid that many bleeding edge games will be 'Vista/XBOX360 exclusive' titles, and that much of their user base, the reluctant windows users called Gamers, are being hooked into the new software.
I've been running Vista at work for a few months now, since Beta 2, doing compatibility testing. I have thus far not managed to run in to its DRM. This is because I don't have any DRM'd media. It turns out there are not evil DRM gremlins hiding on my system, trying to steal my media. All the video I shoot and edit works fine, my OGG/FLAC collection works fine, etc. Yes, if I were to get an HD-DVD or Blu-ray drive and try to play movies I'm sure I'd have to contend with the DRM. Well, I'm not so there's not really a concern there.
Basically to me Vista's DRM doesn't add any value, but it doesn't interfere with my work in any way. Thus I really just don't care. I don't see any way it it hurts my fair use. Please remember that the HD formats are encrypted anyhow, it's not like Vista does anything with that, and the decryption tools that have been released run fine on Vista. Maybe I'll encounter a problem with it at some point (that's why I'm testing it, to see what the problems with supporting it will be) but not yet.
It seems to me that "DRM" has become a poorly defined scare word for many people. They throw it around without knowing what it really means, just that it is bad and that you should hate it. I agree that DRM is not a useful technology, but let's be straight about when it does and doesn't matter. Vista does not have DRM gremlins that try to eat your media. Your unDRM'd media does not stop working, the tools for creating it do not stop working. No, video output is not degraded, I get full resolution in everything I do (since all the media isn't DRM'd) despite lacking an HDCP monitor and video card.
If it doesn't affect you, not likely to make it in to a "thing that didn't work for me" article, is it?
Which is that you will have problems with Vista. It may not be MS's fault, but the problems are real.
As I have been saying all along, installing Vista this soon is foolish. It needs to get out of its infancy. Fortunatly for MS, they can get millions of Dell/Gateway customers will beta test for them.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
That's the difference, you dont' mind paying, and you are windows user. I do mind paying, and thus am willing to learn "how" to use linux apps. Neither way is correct, or incorrect, simply different... Personally I have no issue with my fonts under linux, they look just fine. But then, I'm partial to monospace anyway...
... 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."
So, what you're saying it's kind of like installing an oddball wi-fi card on Linux. Except without the option of reading hundreds of pages of obscure documentation until you've transformed yourself into a mutant linux hotplugging guru.
In a nutshell, the differnce between getting things working in Linux and Windows seems to be this. Linux is like being parachuted into the wilderness with a hammer, forge, and load of pig iron. Windows is like being parachuted into the wilderness with an impressive looking knife that snaps in two if you don't use it very, very carefully.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Because Microsoft mucked about so much with the audio drivers to get DRM working to their satisfaction, the sound in my game suffers from a 1-second delay on some Vista systems. Just today I got a note from a Vista user that after they upgraded their OS, text entry doesn't work in one particular part of the game. I understand there will be headaches in any upgrade cycle, but that doesn't mean I need to like it.
Because I write software for multiple platforms, I need to use it. It simply isn't a realistic option for me to say that I don't support Vista. Vista, for me, means absolutely nothing more than more time and effort spent hunting down bizarre, OS-specific bugs and the expense of a testing environment.
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
He did check hardware compability. Using the Microsoft-provided tool to do so.
So stop lying just so you can insult people. Perhaps slashdot needs a "-10 Blatent Liar" mod option.
So is this about right for typical end users such as myself?
- wait at least one year after a new release of operating system
- if you can't do it yourself, pay someone else to evaluate your existing pc to see if an upgrade is possible and if it is possible, to make sure you get exactly what you need
- make sure the person you pay for evaluation has no stake in selling you a new pc
- if an upgrade is not possible, secure your old system as much as humanly possible and ride it until using the old system is no longer possible, plausible or just plain insane (like one of my friends using Windows 95 until last week and my cousin switched her over to Ubuntu)
- when all else dies by a new pc
- find something useful to do with your old pc (donate it, etc.)
Is the Vista delivered on floppies? Did he mean "disc" or do the British spell "Digital Versatile Disc" differently from the people ruled by a king who can't pronounce "nuclear"? (Oh, I'm so mean.. He's just folksy! :P )
IT'S A TRAP
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.
You're telling me Vista needs 1GB of RAM and 3Ghz just to display windows on the screen and surf the web? OS X does much more on much less.
"Sufferin' succotash."
Nobody's forcing you to read it.
And nobody said you're forced to use Vista. They're just posting opinions for those who are interested and want to discuss it.
"Sufferin' succotash."
I'm not sure what lies you've been reading about UAC, but it conditions users to always say "Yes" to security prompts. This is a very terrible idea and in this situation the criticism is well deserved.
"You are about to open the Control Panel -- allow or deny?"
"You are about to open the Program Files folder -- allow or deny?"
"You are about to modify user preferences -- allow or deny?
"You are about to open attachment pzxyTrojan.exe -- allow or deny?"
Allow.. allow.. allow.. allow.. allow..
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..
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.
I tried Vista Ultimate as a 30 day trial on a separate partition. I didn't do much research or anything driver related, I just ran the compatibility test and installed it. The only thing that didn't work properly was my sound... poor generic MS written driver that lacked 5.1 surround sound anything and no support from manufacturer. After about 5 days of use, well, the USB ports on my motherboard failed. I'm sure it wasn't a Vista caused problem but maybe it was. After booting up my XP partition and the USB ports still not working, I went out and got a new mobo for $45. I could have bought a PCI USB hub but the mobo was only an extra $15. Of course, after swapping mobos NEITHER of my windows installations worked. After reinstalling everything and diving into Vista for my full 30 day trial, I came to the conclusion that Vista is a piece of crap and I am soooo glad I didn't pay anything for it. There is not a single feature in there that a normal computer user would find more useful than in XP. All the average user would have to talk about is the fancy GUI, they couldn't tell you anything else special about it. My suggestion: Don't pay for Vista unless you get it when you buy a new computer.
Installing Windows XP over 98/ME was an even bigger nightmare.
Installing 98 over 95, ME over 98/95, XP over 2000, or 2000 over an earlier release wasn't always a picnic either.
Personally, I wish Vista came with safe disk-repartitioning software and recommended users shrink their XP partition and install Vista clean in a new partition.
Or, in the alternative, that it could be "rooted" in a subdirectory, so you had c:\vista\windows, c:\vista\Documents and Settings, c:\vista\Program Files, etc. Obviously this wouldn't work with every single file but if done right it would eliminate a lot of confusion and it would leave the XP installation intact and bootable.
In either case, it should include free migration/copy software to copy software installations from the XP environment to the Vista environment, and optionally copy all users and their files and registry settings. With enough smarts, registry settings and files that contain directory information can be modified to point to the "new" copies of the files.
Of course, this kind of sophisticated, one-time-use software won't ever be free on Windows, it's just too complicated and error-prone to give away. However, the disk-repartitioning software already exists and should've been part of Vista's installer.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I'm no fan of Vista and I'll be staying with XP for as long as possible because the upgrade just isn't that great.
However, some of what he's complaining about is more the 3rd party hardware sellers' fault than Microsoft's fault. They want you to throw away that 3-4 year old printer or sound card and buy their latest products, and they want to save on labor costs, so they don't write the drivers for their older stuff. I hit this wall with an HP printer - an LaserJet/Inkjet 820CSE - and XP. I had to throw out much of the functionality of the printer (two-sided printing, etc.) just to get the printer to work because HP offered no XP drivers. HP said, "We don't support XP for this printer." "Why not?" "I'm sorry, but we just don't. We can't keep up with all the printers we've made." We all know they could keep up, but it wouldn't make as much $$$$$ for them.
I've posted this before without many responses: I see a lot of UAC complaints on Slashdot but very little on details as to what the person is doing to garnish so many prompts. So here's my proposal to Slashdotters: If you've seen more than 5 UAC prompts in one day, what were you doing to cause them? Is it a scenario that most users (i.e. my parents) will encounter, or something relegated to some obscure realm such as debugging?
If you're debugging an app installer or a networked service that requires admin privileges and accesses file shares, then sure UAC is a pain. So disable it. But from what I can tell, UAC prompts are not an issue for most users. Also, nitpick: The prompts don't stop everything; they merely put up a fullscreen UI that requires input before proceeding.
1. Wait for SP1 ...
2. Wait for SP2
N. Wait for SPN
N+1. New version of Windows, GOTO 1
Wonder if that GOTO will give any of the old timers nostalgia attacks
You are so right. And I had a Speak and Spell that included a voice synthesizer, and that ran off 2 C cell batteries! Vista sure does suck! Microsoft is stupid!
Why do I have the feeling that this whole story was written so that for once the "itsatrap" tag guy could be relevant?
You drank my drink, you drunk!
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.
sound blaster cards should all be compatible with the age old soundblaster drivers. the emu10k1 (sblive) is compatible with adlib and sb16. there should be no reason why the sb16 drivers cannot be applied for this audio card. if vista doesnt support sb cards then they're really shooting themselves in the foot as it's probably the most standard of things out there.
Why UNIX?
linux... it is almost certain to run on the next. Unless it's 15 year old hardware.
;)
I'd say "especially" if it's 15 year old hardware
I wonder what Microsoft has to say about "Total Cost of Ownership" now...
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
It's a........trap.
And I didn't even have to pay for Vista to do this!
It's not wasting time, I'm educating myself.
Except that, Vista appears to ship with LESS hardware support out of the box than even XP did. I would fully expect that hardware bought since XP was released and far before Vista was released should be supported out of the box in Vista, especially things such as sound and video cards from major manufacturers.
The biggest problem is Microsoft wants total control over the driver stability and quality control, but yet wants nothing to do with the development of said drivers. This forces the device manufacturers to decide whether it's worth it to put in the extra effort to develop a driver that works, or deal with pissed off customers that can't use a 1-3 year old SOUND CARD in their computer with Vista, that worked perfectly fine in XP.
I hate sigs...
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
Bill Gates claims Vista will "wow" its users. As in, "Wow, does this suck" or "Wow, WTF happened to all my data?"
Maybe I just got lucky, but I installed Vista on my Laptop, and had full hardware functionality within a day: Sound worked, 3D games worked, even my printer worked. It wasn't very good at managing power use, though.
the fanboys shout 'you shoulda known' and 'get new hardware'. Let's call Vista not an upgrade but a wholesale replacement of your computer and many of your applications. Most of your data will work in the new system but that's about it.
The BBC author concludes the same thing, and that's what sucks. He says to wait and get Vista pre-installed. Doing that won't fix his webcam or his pocket PC. Those and his old computer, which is twice as nice as anything I have, will become more toxic waste. What has he gotten that he did not have? Nothing but a prettier interface and a false promise of better security. Upgrading non free software is like that, difficult, costly and unnecessary. Replacing everything only marginally decreases your difficulty because you then have to purchase, install and relearn the new interfaces for all the programs that actually do your work and play. When you are through with that, you can begin the long and non transferable process of making your desktop comfortable and retrieving the old data that your masters allow you to keep. The fanboy part of this equation is thinking you need non free software to begin with. The author's conclusion is basically, M$ at any cost.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
I have tons of other issues why I won't be installing it for real on anything I have, but I wanted to see what all the fuss was and how much of a learning curve would be needed for the network settings. (I work for an isp and get stuck doing tech support sometimes)
I'm not anti-social, I'm anti-idiot.
Uhh, considering that my laptop runs at 1.2GHz, has 1GB RAM and runs a fancy desktop with flying 3D windows and even more eye candy than Vista, I would think a 2GH machine should be fine...
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
I had two of these 4 year old 80 gig drives. I slapped on in a USB case and brought it into work, and the other was a backup drive on my Vista desktop at home.
/. that Vista is the suck, and it causes all sorts of problems. It must have transmitted a spike or something through the internets to get at the other drive just to make sure it failed. I'm sure of it! Vista is a giant conspiracy to force us to replace hardware! /snark
Well, a month after i installed Vista the drives failed! Both of them. The one at work, connected to my XP laptop, and the one at home as a backup drive.
It's obviously Vista's fault. I read somewhere on
Is Vista a Trap?
;)
geez... I wonder what the slashdot crowd thinks.
Seriously though, good thing it's not on Ask Slashdot
Never mind. Imagine how much more difficult and costly it would have been if he'd been installing Linux. I mean, he'd have had to buy all new hardware, since Linux doesn't have many drivers, and Linux is so expensive for Red Hat.
Stick Men
Perfect - First you bitch about what's wrong with windows, then you complain when they change things. Of course it's perfectly reasonable to expect mere mortals to create an operating system that is compatable with about a bazillion different peripherals before it's released. Let's just agree that you will never have anything positive to say about Microsoft and leave it at that, shall we?
Sometimes the cost of new technology is letting go of old technology. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. Take a look at Apple's leap from OS 9 to OS X. Cut loose the shit and move on to something worth having. Problem is, in my opinion, Windows XP is pretty good to begin with. I'm not really willing to turn loose of a fully functioning OS and hardware for a few system enhancements and several hundred dollars in new unnecessary hardware. I can't imagine what it'd be like for an enterprise installment of thousands of Vista workstations. Microsoft themselves have even got to be hurting from that upgrade.
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
I very, VERY highly doubt that that machine originally came with 768MB of RAM. I'd be willing to bet cold hard cash that you upgraded it at some point, in which case, no it's not an 8-year-old machine: it's a {insert number of years ago that you added the RAM}-year-old machine.
Granted, I love macs (typing this on a shiny new 24" IMac with a 2.33GHz core duo proc and 2GB of ram), but be real here.
"Feel a glory in so rolling / on the human heart a stone" --E. A. Poe, "The Bells"
Granted I did a clean install of Vista, rather than an upgrade, but I've already been running Vista for more than 30 days without activating it. With a simple DOS command, you can run Vista for up to 120 days without activating it (slmgr -rearm). I figure I'm gonna wait a while before I shoot myself in *that* foot by activating! I imagine the author of the article did the same thing.
What's really funny is that right now, Linux may support more PC hardware than Vista. Time to share the pain, Mr. Gates!
"My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right." --Senator Carl Schurz (1872)
I started using vista @ beta 2. I stopped using it after a couple days - poor video card drivers, etc.
I'm waiting for my free copy of Ultimate in the mail - thx microsoft!!
Internet connectivity is AWESOME. I use wireless, and it can be a pain to find a driver on a fresh install without having a cd around. Vista has many wireless card drivers built in - no bloated software to install and INSTANT internet connectivity.
Everyone complaining about UAC - I dont get it. You can disable it when you are setting up your computer. After that, it is rare to see it in everyday use. And it may just stop that program from installing in the background that ends up making your squeaky clean install muddy.
DRM - never had any problems - dont have DRM-infested files.
Interface looks great, too. Speed is not a problem (Core2 w/ 2GB RAM, x1900xt)
He upgrades to Vista and his webcam and soundcard don't work. In his situation, I'd be a bit miffed too.
How the heck does Microsoft expect me to keep my coffee hot without it, huh?
"My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right." --Senator Carl Schurz (1872)
Most people will think it's Microsoft's fault that it doesn't work. Creative can make the most expensive card only work on Vista, so when you upgrade you have to buy that one, or else no fancy sound. Vista is a screwfest. Microsoft screws you when you upgrade with price/configuration/etc. Other companies screw you since they have to spend more to work in Vista, passing that cost on to you, the consumer. Everyone gets screwed except Microsoft. Guess what? If I can't use XP anymore, I guess I'll move back to a unix OS. I hear good things since I last had Linux on my machine. If my job requires me to have Vista at home, then they can buy it for me, cause I'm not doing it.
Causing Chaos Everywhere,
Nik J.
The strange world of a loner, in a populous city, drowning in society
I would like to see ms actually say if you have this computer: motherboard XXX, chip set NNN, controllers XXX, video card NNN, XXX amount of ram from this vender, DVD drive from XXX, and a XXX GB hard drive from NNN. Then if you have a bunch of problem you have a point. Ms is not selling hardware (beside the xbox) so it gives basic requirements.
Apple has a very small hardware list that they support. They do not have to worry about a huge selection of different hardware being used with their computers. They are selling the hardware. They better test it all beforehand. Since Apple has said in their license that OSX can only be used on approved Apple branded hardware. I cannot legally run OSX on anything but an approved apple branded computer. If apple opened up its software for all to use, would everyone have a perfect install? Some people will have perfect error free installs to be sure. But I think there would be a large number of people blaming Apple and/or hardware vendors for OSX not working perfectly on their computer.
The big problem with the author is he's british... well that and he's trying to install a brand new OS on obsolete hardware. His machine was hot stuff about six years ago. He's on the same page as people who loaded Windows XP on a K6 333, or Windows 95 on a 25mhz 386SX. Yeah it's gonna suck, because the machine sucks! There's no sense in supporting ancient hardware, at least not from a business standpoint.
:) It would be a trivial matter of adding the Dell ID to the standard drivers, literally a one-line fix, but they don't.
There's also the brands involved.. He doesn't say what his graphics card was, but anyone who's had the misfortune of owning a Sound Blaster in the last decade has dealt with the homicidal wrath of Creative Inc. They're really good at selling overpriced DACs, but they equally suck at writing stable drivers for the damned things. What's even better is this guy has a Dell OEM Sound Blaster... anyone who's ever touched those things knows they're different. They have exactly one difference: the device ID. Why'd they change it ? Some retarded form of lock-in I guess, because it's a nightmare getting them to work anywhere else. Anywhere except Linux that is
Performance-wise, his PC even after upgrades is still puny. A Willamette P4, 768mb of PC-133, and a hard drive that probably sucked the day it was born. I could also write a horrible review of Vista if I tried hard enough to find an ancient PC like his. Or I could run it on a well-specced year-old system like an Athlon 64 or an Intel Core and get rather excellent results.
Don't read me wrong, I don't use Vista because... well... I don't care about the eye-candy! Really there's not much more about it. Vista is to XP what Beryl is to kwin. But if I wanted Vista, I would have no problems running it on my current machine (I've tried the MSDN betas, they ran fine). The problems are all these broke-ass tinkerers who like to "play" with computers. They don't have any real use for a PC other than downloading music and lounge on Myspace and Lavalife. They don't have a budget so their machines are a patchwork of whatever they bought off of Craigslist. I don't call that a serious computer user.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Remember, Microsoft said exactly the same thing about XP and 2000 that they do about Vista, and that they have about every single version of Windows except pehaps 1.0: "Faster, more secure, more personalized, better than ever before!"
And we say exactly the same thing we've always said: "Bloated, incompatible, too invasive, look at that WGA!" XP has the same privacy issues, 2000 had worse (if possible) compatibility issues.
But around SP1 or SP2, XP became livable, arguably better than 2000. And probably around SP1, 2000 became stable enough, and was obviously a HUGE upgrade compared to 98 -- so huge that if they hadn't done it when they did, Linux probably would've taken over.
So, we're going to have the same thing happen here. I predict that in roughly 2 years, around SP1 or SP2, Vista will actually be better than XP. But it isn't yet -- too much stuff isn't compatible, and the "beta" was a laugh; if you buy it now, you are their gamma testers.
Smart people stick with XP, and let the rest of the world test and debug Vista for us.
Me? I'll keep dual-booting XP and Linux (Ubuntu here, Gentoo at home).
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
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
Yes, I did upgrade the ram - with old memory laying around from a PC I no longer used (it was just normal PC100 SDRAM). And as for that, that memory is about 7 years old (came from a PC I got in 2000).
Big thing to remember here though - the original iMacs were *built* to have the RAM upgraded (and that was about it, if you were lucky you can also put in an Airport card, since it's right next to the memory). You don't even have to take the case off or have a screwdriver, the memory slots are accessible via a coin-turn lock door on the bottom. Literally, power down roll it over, turn a coin, pop the memory in, close the door, and turn it back over and back on.
Now, one thing I did upgrade that isn't a "normal" upgrade was the hard drive - it shipped with a 13GB one. While this is big enough to run Tiger, I figured I had the extra one (also from my PC) laying around and ready to put in.
So the answer is, I am being real. For this iMac, Apple *expected* users to upgrade the ram, otherwise they wouldn't have made it so easy or have provided 2 slots. The point of the matter is, I can run a 1.5 year old operating system on an 8 year old computer with minimum upgrades, and have the video card, sound card, network, DVD-ROM, firewire, USB, external video port and more work out of the box with no additional drivers.
I hate sigs...
I just got this alert/email from my ISP - ATT&T...
...
"AT&T and Yahoo! have been working closely with Microsoft to update our familiar software applications to support the Vista operating system, including AT&T Yahoo! Instant Messenger, AT&T Yahoo! Photos, the AT&T Yahoo! Portal, and our Web-based e-mail service.
In this spirit, our teams will continue to work to deliver compatibility with other familiar applications which will be temporarily impacted for customers who upgrade to Vista, such as the AT&T Yahoo! Tool Bar, AT&T Yahoo! Browser and the AT&T Yahoo! Online Protection Suite. While our teams remain dedicated to restoring your ability to manage and customize the online protection suite on a Vista PC, we encourage you to learn more about the embedded Windows Security Center, part of the Vista operating system and similar to the AT&T Yahoo! Online Protection Suite, to help keep your PC up to date with the latest security patches and alerts."
TEMPORARY IMPACT...
RESTORING YOUR ABILITY
WTF????
Why is my internet service being impacted by an upgrade to my OS?
Even though they have a very small hardware list to support (comparitively), they still provide the drivers for the older hardware with the new software, which is the point I'm trying to make here. For Vista, Microsoft gutted out a ton of drivers that shipped with XP, and in doing so alienated a LOT of relatively recent hardware, and to make matters worse, they didn't put in much effort to get drivers for hardware released since XP. If I had a relatively recent computer, say, purchased since XP was released, and it is hardware CAPABLE of running Vista (CPU, memory, disk), I would very much so expect for all of the hardware if it was all name-brand stuff (Creative, NVidia, ATI, etc) to work out of the box.
The thing that makes it even more pointing at Microsoft, is that ATI, NVidia and Creative have all moved to unified drivers for their hardware, making the number of individual drivers to be verified for Windows to be much lower. The primary difference here (as you hinted at) is that Microsoft provides incredibly vague "requirements" for their software, in an attempt to make it less scary for the average consumer. What this results in, is that if a basic requirement of Vista is "Sound Card", and I have a 3 year old sound card that works fine (I mean really, at best they're hooked up to a mediocre set of computer speakers for most people), but yet it doesn't work in Vista. Who's fault is that? Is it Microsoft's for not clarifying the *actual* supported hardware, or is it the device manufacturer's for not providing drivers for the new operating system?
I hate sigs...
... A single app in 2007. and we're just talking about image browsing.. not something fancy ...
... My professors sometimes send out home-work and papers in word or visio ...
.doc, .vis, .ppt, et cetera. I also have to send assignments as email attachments, and so I have to make sure that they are compatible. I have never once had a problem switching between MS Office and OpenOffice.org. I do keep a small partition on one of my computers with Windows XP installed, just in case problems ever do crop up, but that isn't a fault of Linux or FLOSS. As you said, the lock-in is purely Microsoft's doing.
... when rendering small fonts it just seems blurry. not as sharp and pretty as in windows ...
... Not to mention the horrifying ordeal i had to go through just to set-up my legacy atheros card ...
By no means is there a single application that excels for image browsing. Personally, I prefer Gwenview, and don't see how it "sucks completely" at all, but c'est la vie, I suppose. Anyway, there are plenty more that work perfectly well:
DigiKam, F-Spot, et cetera.
I'm a student at USC, and I get homework, papers, and other things that are
That is completely subjective. I don't notice much of a difference between modern fonts in Linux versus Windows TrueType. To each his own.
I can't relate to your wifi issues either. I had a bit of trepidation concerning wireless when I installed Kubuntu 6.10 on my new laptop, just because of all of the horror stories that I've heard about wireless support in Linux. I was pleasantly surprised, though. Kubuntu automagically detected my internal wireless, and the only thing required of me was to type in the WEP key. Wireless support is getting very close to being ubiquitous in most distros now.
I realize that you aren't a troll, and neither am I flaming Vista. On the contrary, I believe that Microsoft has finally done some things right with this version of Windows. UAC, no matter what the Slashbots may think, is a step in the right direction. "Protected Mode" for IE7 is another Good Thing (TM).
Nonetheless, I still believe that the bad outweighs the good. Vista's DRM implementation, WGA and license restrictions, overpricing (in my opinion), the company's continued attempts at lock-in, proprietary code, disdain for open standards, and a host of other reasons keep me away from Windows.
By the way, maybe you should test drive more "user-friendly" distros. Gentoo is great, and Portage rocks - only second to the original FreeBSD Ports system (again, in my opinion), but it doesn't have the "just works" mentality that K/X/Ubuntu, Fedora Core, Mandriva, and yes, even SuSE (for now) possess. That just isn't its MO.
What it all boils down to is the nature of FLOSS, which is evolution - getting better and better over time. We've been witnessing it in Linux for the past fourteen years, and I am nothing but optimistic about the future.
"We may face a scorched and lifeless earth, but they're accountable to their shareholders first."
I'm decompressing from a week with XP alone.
.mac
My iBook's hard drive gradually went kaput.
While arranging the repair, I ran an Ubuntu LiveCD on it and a flash drive.
Wow, even when not in a bind.
While it was on its round trip to Apple, I had to make do with another portable.
Toshiba Portege 2000, 512, XP Pro - should be decent, so here goes:
Spend an entire afternoon getting it to do what I need, which is pretty modest:
- Install a real browser (fFox) and a real mail app (tBird),
- and office (OOo), iTunes and Picasa.
- Protect it from the hordes (Grisoft).
- Add a few conveniences and an actual calculator from this century (Yahoo Widgets)
- Print on the three printers I use at work and home (2 trips to HP, one to Canon).
Are we there yet? Nope:
- Dial down XP so it performs faster than my other possible backup, my trusty PowerBook 1400/266 running OS9.
For a week I felt like Ginger Rogers - doing everything backwards in high heels.
The iBook is back, and once again I feel like Fred Astaire.
10 minutes in the comfy chair outside the Apple store and I had user, web, mail & docs back in play thanks to
Another 20 minutes back in the office, and music/photos/movies were restored from an external drive.
Half a day to get the XP usable, half an hour for the Mac.
My new found order of preference for an out of the box OS?
OSX, Ubuntu and a distant third, XP Pro.
I'm not sure I'm up to wrestling with Vista.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
I humbry lepolt youl ellol in sperring. It shourd be: "Frawress Victoly". Prease be mole calefur in the futule!
Prov 9:8 Do not rebuke mockers or they will hate you; rebuke the wise and they will love you.
Please save me from these idiotic FUD articles on /.!!!!
Sucks for him. My internet, both wired and wireless, and both my sound cards worked right away in Vista. Funny thing is, Creative doesn't even have drivers for XP for my sound card anymore.. But Vista has them built right in.
...but I had Vista running on a VMWare virtual machine in under 30 minutes on my laptop. Connecting to the Internet was a snap. OK, so it was a clean install, it was on a VM, so the hardware issues weren't that complex, and I didn't put it through rigorous paces, but really, is it as diffucult as people make it out to be?
My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!
> It's about time to give up on PC gaming, especially with the beauty, convenience and
> comfort of today's powerful consoles (both of them).
When I can mod my games and load new/free content as easily as I can on the PC, I'll buy a console again. (Anybody got an ETA on that?) Other than that, the ease of use, bang-for-the-buck, and robustness of consoles makes them the obvious choice.
Ask me about my sig!
http://msdn.com/xna
You have NASA's WorldWind installed under Vista?
What did you do when the installer wanted to load DirectX 9.0c? Did you install 9.0c over top of Vista's 10? If so, what happened? What version of DirectX are you running now under Vista (please check)...
Installing WorldWind under Vista is a big unknown for me because DirectX v10 does not have managed DirectX, but do you lose DirectX10 functionality if you install DirectX v9.0c on top of it (which _does_ have the managed .NET DirectX interface)????
If you lose v10 functionality, then once a f__king again, Microsoft does the old bait and switch API deal, where people get hooked on a shiny new Microsoft API, and then MS abandons the API for something else. Managed DirectX is an example of this, and Vista makes the problem even worse by not supporting this now legacy API. This leaves developers holding the bag of Microsoft dumped crap again and again. I'm getting sick of it
X360 games allow for modification (at Microsoft's discretion) and due to the online nature of both of the new consoles, patching games and adding mods are as simple as downloading a file. Some PS3 games (like Ridge Racer 7) have downloadable special races and Blast Factor has a multiplayer online pack.
With hard drives and online capabilities in these consoles, the lines between consoles and PCs blur even further. It's up to the vendors and developers as to which directions you as a consumer can take, which is limiting, but at least you know the stuff will work as expected.
I feel like death on a soda cracker.
I think this explains it pretty well:
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Schadenfreude
Yes, it would. That's what they're trying to do with the 360, in fact. Although that still doesn't address why Vista needs so much hardware just to display windows on the screen and surf the web.
"Sufferin' succotash."
He should tell that to ATI... My 8500DV won't power-up in my VIA system, but it works in my SIS system. Ditto for an NVidia PCI videocard. No rhyme, no reason, just screwed.
Many problems with RAM and CPU upgrades... Most people can't figure out setting hard drive/CD/DVD jumpers...
So, yeah, I guess if there's anything else in your system left, upgrading it won't be very hard. Otherwise, consult your local geek before you start, and risk doing serious damage.
Everyone should know by now that Microsoft has NEVER been able to handle upgrades worth a damn. Though I know of many that have tried, I haven't seen a single successful upgrade from any version of Windows, to any other.
Am I crazy? Did I miss something? Or is the rest of the world perhaps stupid? From Windows 2000 and on, backwards driver backwards compatibility was built-in, and it's not unusually for Windows to select (by default) a driver for a different Windows version, before the one you would expect (signed/unsigned issues). Has Vista stopped this? I can't imagine there would be any problems with something as simple as soundcard drivers.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
http://www.trikaliotis.net/cbm4win.shtml
Try actually checking the vendor sites to varify? I guess you also believe the nice time estimate windows gives you for file download time too...
Vista has certainly trapped a media hype.
Improve security - buy alternatives
l
Stop feeding the monopoly. A competitive environment is good for all users. A mono culture is bad for security. The major PC OEMs will drag their feet becuase they are looking to save pennys even if it costs computer users hundreds of extra dollars in the long run
SUSE preloaded
http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS7778908329.htm
eComStation preloaded
http://www.curtissystemssoftware.com/preloads.htm
Don't you know? You're always supposed to wait for the x.1 version before you buy Microsoft stuff. The first version is hurried and the x.1 version has lots of bug fixes (not that all are fixed or new ones introduced, but it's always better than the x.0 version if you have to use it).
Computer users have to use their purchasing power.
Improve security - buy alternatives
Stop feeding the monopoly. A competitive environment is good for all users. A mono culture is bad for security. The major PC OEMs will drag their feet becuase they are looking to save pennies even if it costs computer users hundreds of extra dollars in the long run
SUSE preloaded
http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS7778908329.htm
eComStation preloaded
http://www.curtissystemssoftware.com/preloads.htm
For myself the only thing that warrants a move to Vista is DX10 of course. -but with all the nonsense surrounding vista, it seems that microshaft would bite the bullet & release dx10 for XP. -or suffer more loss. Otherwise i think even the nubs will be switching to mac or even linux if things stay as they are.
i think at this point everybody here agrees vista is a pain ATM..
Kill your TV
Microsoft has decided that Vista will work only with Pocket PC 2003 and higher.
*boggle*
Just...
*boggle*
I guess microsoft has finally decided they've knocked Palm down far enough they can quit coddling their Pocket PC customers and go back to business as usual.
I kept thinking the same thing as I read this:
The same problems would exist if he had switched platforms entirely.
Take this passage, which was written in the context of XP-to-Vista:
Now consider moving from XP to Mac OS X, or Fedora, or Ubuntu, or Suse. You'd still have to acquire and install your apps, transfer %USERPROFILE% to ~/, and re-learn the "floor plan" of your new environment.
Anything above and beyond an in-place upgrade is going to require some heavy lifting.
This sig intentionally left blank.
My wife bought a new HP running vista a couple of weeks ago; she loves it for the most part: media center, dvr capability, all shiny and pretty. However, the lack of hardware support is maddening; her new quickcam wouldn't work on vista (conflicted with the hauppage tuner card), but miraculously the microsoft lifecam worked fine...hm. Funny, HP doesn't even have drivers for the current-model officejet we bought with the HP PC...sigh. Also, I got a bsod this AM trying to do something really tricky, like look at a .jpg. The allow/cancel popup really is maddening, though...the apple commercials got it right. There are some programs that require 4 or 5 confirmations.
My debut novel AMITY now available: http://jeremydbrooks.c
Before you install ANY new OS, you should gather all the drivers for your machine BEFORE you install. Use your common sense and do your homework, and you wouldn't have had any of these problems.
And what software would they run on those "alternatives"? Not all the stuff they can run on Windows that's for sure. It's not consumer inertia that keeps Windows at no.1, it's because the no.2 et al cannot run a large proportion of the software and hardware that the users want to use. This isn't the fault of the "alternatives" but there isn't a lot that can be done. Unless you're trying to claim that users are so stupid as to never consider realistic alternatives.
with hardware stated to work with Vista by the manufacturer.
Not only do you not read the article, it seems you don't read people's posts either. Why do you bother then?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Due to the issues I have had in the past with upgrades, I don't bother to do just software upgrades. Here are my reasons;
That old hardware was fine for running some stuff. An upgrade to just the software leaves the system in an unstable state with not all features hardware or software supported in most cases. Most of my systems are running the original OS on them with the exceptions where the usefullness of the new applications outweighed the loss of the old applications. For example, upgrading from Windows 98 and 2K to Ubuntu is a great move. I lose the upgrade patch cycle, endless security upgrades and AV upgrades and instead get a stable machine for web applications.
I still have my Windows 95 laptop. It is useless for online use and is a sitting duck. It still makes a great MIDI workstation sitting on my synth. It has no USB. It is at it's maximum capacity of EDO memory at 72 Megs. Upgrading the software would be a bad mistake.
More modern hardware gets Linux upgrades. It is relatively pain free. It provides stability and security with lots of new features. I don't have to spend a lot of money to find out if it won't work and needs a hardware upgrade to get it going. Too bad Vista does not have a free Live CD for testing old hardware.
I'll get a new purchased OS when it comes on the new hardware. Then it is up to the vendor to make sure everything is working and compatible. It saves a lot of headaches. I have not seen any reason to spend the money at this time.
The truth shall set you free!
Sure, research would tell you that 512Mb and a crappy graphics card is inadequate for Vista, but it's quite enough for any other modern OS.
Maybe I'm just some old fart, but why on earth should I *need* more? Windows 98 required 32Mb RAM to run apps, browse the net, email, etc, without being too sluggish. Vista now needs (32*32=1024) 1Gb, 32 times the RAM, to do basically the same job. Do you do 32 times more work? Are you 32 times more productive? No, of course not.
My crappy 2.8GHz 512Mb box (plain Ubuntu, since you ask, and no tweaking; what Joe Public gets out of the box is fine) works as a desktop PC (granted, usually only two users at a time, but that's twice the simultaneous users a typical Windows PC would have), database, webserver, and more, without ever breaking into a sweat. Granted, I don't play games, but it sounds like the OP wasn't complaining about app performance, but the ability of the OS itself to cope with such a config (presumably without running any services on top of that).
Man got to the moon with 20Kb RAM. If an OS needs 1Gb just to exist, that's got to be a pointer to a fundamental design issue.
I've got a 128Mb 433MHz Celeron box, which runs Xubuntu quite happily, also. So it seems that I could run 8 of those for the RAM needed for a single workable Vista install.
None of this points to Vista being a bloated steaming PoS? Are you sure? If it worked 2, 5, 10 years ago, why shouldn't it work now? The only significant change in the life of the PC was the 80386 CPU; other than that difference, I've got an IBM XT upstairs with 256Kb RAM. It can do word-processing and other office-based functions.
There is no arms race.
"My PC is bigger" is a concession to badly-written software, not an advertisement for it.
Author, Shell Scripting : Expert Re
"Microsoft has decided that Vista will work only with..." This is the core of the entire problem.
boycott slashdot February 10th - 17th check out: altSlashdot.org
how the words are HTML and not an image
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
I can show the moderators what a sense of humor is! Come on, folks - you take yourselves too seriously...
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
I'm sorry but you can criticize Microsoft for a lot of things but compatibility isn't one of them. If anything their obsessiveness with backwards compat is what has caused them so many problems. It's one of the downsides of being the dominant provider of operating systems - everyone has software and hardware for your platform. Now they have a new OS which has a significantly improved driver model - but still supports huge numbers of "legacy" devices - and this guy is abusing them because his silly porn-cam doesn't work?
i'm just getting pretty sick and tired of hearing people vista complaints.. haha.. i mean, if your computer sucks ass, then why try installing Vista? i've experienced this situation from several clients.. they think they're computer is capable of vista, and of course it's no where near close, and they waste $200+.. it takes some simple information gathering to determine whether or not your computer is capable of it.. and if it is, and Vista still fucks off on you, than there's something wrong with your computer, and it simply shouldn't be running Vista.. done.. end of story..
despite the things Vista has copied off of OSX, the OS still works.. and I might add that it works quite well on a computer that is meant for it.. we all know how MS plays the game by now.. new OS, new computer, or upgrades..
this shit has gotten so much negative news coverage it amazes me that people haven't figured it out yet..
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
I was talking to a friend of mine the other day about the aspects of this problem.
..without risk, without sticking your neck out, that's immoral."
I hope someone reads this, and takes away the basic reality of what's happening.
Microsoft has between 60 and 70 thousand employees. Who enjoy great benefits including salary. They receive between 45 to 60 thousand job applications per month. Many people who work there are quite excited and satisfied to have a great job working with a company that makes between 13 and 14 billion dollars in profit annually.
So enjoy the simplicity of what I have to say. The Microsoft Windows operating system was introduced almost 15 years ago and has enjoyed 10 or so versions since that time w/ numerous subversions and revisions. Microsoft is a huge infrastructure company with tens of thousands of partners who contribute global solutions that seemingly could meld together to revolutionize the world over.
So how is it, given all these attributes and experience can a company who mainly specialize in a single core product spend an entire 5 years to release a product that only works on half of all PCs? A product that has people screaming incompatibility, refund, and not to mention curses in disgust at their wasted money and disappointment. Where have peoples minds gone? And why can't people tally the obvious facts of the matter?
Why do the local news consumer revenge reporters go after Joe Sixpack down the road for ripping off some poor ol' lady, when Microsoft is stealing money on a daily basis with software that doesn't work and sports a 'no refund policy'. How can it be that the minimum requirements are met or exceeded, but the performance is far below stellar, whereby you actually pay again (for an upgrade) to have an improved 'Vista Experience'.
Truly, Neanderthals would be able to see the strange injustice in these matters.
"When you rob someone legally..
-Sean Connery from 'Family Business'
Paint features updated toolbar icons and default color palette. Also, unlimited undo levels and a crop function have been added.
I am totally psyched!
Who cares about Ackbar? When I hear the word "trap", I think Firefly:
Wash: "Inara...nice to see her again."
Zoe: (beat) "So...trap?"
Mal: "Trap."
Zoe: "We goin' in?"
Mal: "Ain't but a few hours out."
Wash: (confused) "Yeah, but...remember the part where it's a trap?"
For comparison: I have an Apple iMac G3 400MHz with 768MB RAM and a 40GB disk happily running OS X 10.4. This machine also has a (nonupgradeable) 8MB ATI video card. Note that this computer, at this moment, is almost 8 years old, and runs Tiger like a champ.
No G4 runs OS X "like a champ". I have an iBook G4 that has probably 3 times the raw performance of your iMac and I'd describe 10.4 as "barely adequate" on it.
This is unfortunately harsh, but kinda true. I installed Vista retail on a brand new self-built machine, worked perfectly bar the 'beta' 8800gtx drivers, which still worked fine for me. The install was faster than XP as well.
:)
That said, idiots should be allowed to use computers as well, just not write articles. A bad workman always blames his Windows
The original, 1998, iMacs were a bit more difficult to upgrade the memory and you couldn't add an AirPort card. One slot required you to unscrew the bottom of the case and remove the HD as I recall. The second slot was under a daughter card. I've done them both and that's why my mum's original iMac runs Tiger.
My 2002 G4 800 iMac has picked up more RAM, AirPort, bigger HD and dual layer DVD burner. Even that only needed a screw driver, thermal paste and an hour or so.