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Microsoft Withdraws Vista's Kill Switch
l-ascorbic writes "In what they are calling a change of tactics, Microsoft has removed the controversial 'kill switch' from Vista in SP1. This feature is designed to disable pirated copies of the OS, but had led to numerous reports of it disabling legitimate copies. It will be replaced with a notice that repeatedly informs the user that their OS is pirated. '[Microsoft corporate vice president Mike Sievert] added: "It's worth re-emphasizing that our fundamental strategy has not changed. All copies of Windows Vista still require activation and the system will continue to validate from time to time to verify that systems are activated properly." Microsoft said it had pursued legal action against more than 1,000 dealers of counterfeit Microsoft products in the last year and taken down more than 50,000 "illegal and improper" online software auctions.'"
"We do not a piracy problem with Windows."
If made____you____bitch
Did this____kill____switch
How 'bout__a______pitch
In a_______fine____triptych?
Burma___________Shave
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
I think a lot of users would be happier if they withdrew Vista entirely. I know I'm scrambling to see if I can upgrade my system to XP. Darn gaming addiction...
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
They probably hope that pirates will make Vista popular and that a fraction actually will buy Vista in the end ;-)
Nifty. Instead of crippling itself, Windows will keep popping windows up like the delightful direct message spam of yesteryear. I wonder how difficult it will be to get a legit install with a bug up its ass properly validated.
I guess this is one way to get Vista's adoption rate to go up. Just let it be pirated!
It's worth re-emphasizing that our fundamental strategy has not changed.
i.e. We're still gonna bend you over. The big guy named Bubba is still employed with us, but now we've taken away his lube.
i got erroneously locked out of my new laptop because of this. does this mean it will unlock? i think not. (but hope so). luckily i dual boot ubuntu so MS can kiss my ass. the only reason i kept the vista install is because it's legit and i have no setup disc to reinstall it later. (recovery partition my ass)
(1.21 gigawatts) / (88 miles per hour) = 30 757 874 newtons
OS/X : Hereround 155$. Probably nicest user interface, at least at Panther level very stable, rock solid foundation (BSD) a real shell and real scripting. Oh and it gives me fanboy privileges.
Vista Ultimate: ~700$. Nothing really to offer, exept maybe this floating waterfall background, which must eat a ton of resources. Requires activation, abuses 30% of my resources for Hollywoods satisfaction. Oh: And by default I'm a criminal software thieve pirate.
I'd wager that if i really chose option three I must be a blistering idiot, too.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
...until they start counting all pirated version of Vista among those "happily" using it in order to inflate their numbers.
A blog on ZDNet has this interesting bit:
This is software explicitly designed to make your computer less useful. It does nothing else for you. Why would "improving its back-end systems" ever make me trust it the least bit more?
Look, they can trot out lousy policy after lousy policy, but so long as they own the file formats, all else is moot.
Hence the ramrodding of OOXML, which, while painfully boring, is really under-reported in the geek press, like most imortant issues.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
Maybe the notice should just contain a link to Ubuntu? =] "An error has occurred and Windows was detected on your drive. Please format disk and install Linux. Download Ubuntu here"
Just so you understand.
If I install a new motherboard in my PC that is not piracy.
If I format my old hard drive and install Vista on a new PC I built that is not piracy.
If I have to call to take down that nag screen then you must hire enough people that I never have to wait more than two minutes to get the nag removed. You must also offer a world wide toll free number so I can call no matter where I am and you must keep that number staffed until the sun goes nova or you go out of business.
Only then will any type of "activation" be acceptable.
Never mind OpenSuse is working just fine as is Ubuntu. Or maybe I will just buy a Mac.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
You pay a couple hundred dollars per client. You pay several times that per server. Then you have to buy CALs to let the clients and servers actually communicate. It's getting ridiculous, and it reminds me of when it was Novell's game to lose: the difference between the $500 server package and the $5000 server package was a license file with a different number in it. It's not as if Microsoft isn't covering its profit margin by the price of the OS alone, is it?
I'm not suggesting MS is doing anything wrong by, god forbid, charging for their software, but this sort of expensive buy-in is pretty much the opposite of the rampant piracy which pretty much ensured MS a place in the OS game to begin with.
CALs in particular annoy me, as do arbitrary price differences between versions.
Before anyone says it, I'm not a "linux on the desktop FFE" guy, I'm a "choose the OS for the applications you want to run" guy. Which means for a lot of server applciations, you've got some real choices, and for user applicaions, you've either got two and a half choices, or in some cases, only one.
Just like a beta, Vista is still full of bugs. Just like a demo, it has a lot of nag screens & unnecessary steps in order to make you install the "full" version (XP).
...isn't this one of Vista's most popular features?
Without that kill switch customers will be left with a slow, buggy OS.
What stops MS from turning the switch back on at any future date? Although MS may have "turned off" the kill switch, it remains a feature of the system as long as MS auto-update can make changes to the OS without the user's consent.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
I suppose they realized that it would be just a matter of time before someone outside of Microsoft discovers a way to use the kill switch. And then every Internet-connected computer running Vista will die instantly. Hmm... Doesn't sound like such a bad idea after all...
Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre.
Excellent Microsoft, keep destroying the wide spread use of your own OS, frustrating your end users, and alienating the next generation of system/software engineers.
We'll be that much better off.
One of my XP machines pulled down a WGA update from Windows automatic updates yesterday.
Have they also somehow altered WGA in XP?
Microsoft knows it is not worth stealing so why generate the ill will with people who actually purchase vistawful to begin with.
I was hoping finally the corporations would wake up to the onerous requirements MSFT is placing on them, making them jump through so many hoops like a trained monkey and finally decide to become less independent on MSFT. Now the computer will continue to work, but with a few more nagging messages. Given the amount of nagging dialogs that most users don't understand who routinely press OK to continue and get on with their work. It will merely accustom the users to higher levels of pain and raise the tolerance levels. Is there any wonder people hate computers?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Windows has always added some kind of protection, it has always been cracked, and only legitimate customers have suffered. Same goes for any other piece of software.
Crackers will remove this and continue to spread Vista as if nothing happened. Only the silly twits that bought Vista are going to end up dealing with this.
They just don't learn."we've got trenchcoats and bad attitudes" - John Constantine, HellBlazer
Or might the lower piracy rates for Vista be due to other reasons, say pirating XP instead.
the more they over-think the plumbing the easier it is to stop up the pipe
Anyone shed any light on what "improper" copies are?
Are these the legitimate after-market sales that we hear them going after? All power to 'em if they're going after illegal sellers, but you gotta worry when a corporate like MSFT starts going after "improper" things..
Sell me something, and sod off would be my preference.
--Q
...a Linux CD.
:)
Hasta La Vista, Billy!
Vista was the first m$ OS I'd actually owned since Win98 - it came on my new laptop. I even went through the setup procedures (see Vista setup/3+hrs | Linux/1.25hrs *with xtra apps*), but I haven't used it since, nor will I ever.
Why? Linux runs much faster, and with much better software and extras, than Vista does on this 'native' Vista system (haha). No point in using the substandard OS variety.
"...there are some things that can beat smartness and foresight. Awkwardness and stupidity can." ~ Mark Twain
Obsolete? I guess you must mean Apple selling proprietary/closed stuff is obsolete then too, no? Last spasms of a failed regime?
Ok, so I gotta say, this is too much vista hating in the comments. I think the community should be congratulating MS for backing off of their anti-piracy campaign a little bit. They are changing a feature to help users, like the legit users who are having issues with this. I agree that they should do away with more of it but hey, you have to start somewhere. This isn't like an article just saying they are thinking about it, they are going to implement it. Doesn't that deserve a bit of praise?
Just to keep the record straight, I am not a windows fanboy. I am typing this from a macbook and I have no intentions of going back to windows anytime soon. If anything I am a mac fanboy but seriosuly, the majority of the other posts I have seen are just bashing vista in such an offtopic manner that it bothers even me.
http://greenobyl.com/ please.... think of the children!!
Whoah you must be the Goatse guy to pull numbers of that size out of your behind ;)
This is the sig that says NI (again)
I'm sorry, what business model should they use instead? Give everything away for free and hope that people paypal them a donation for their efforts? Build a business model off of paying for support? So they can have a market cap of 3.8B like Redhat instead of 300B? Are YOU going to hire / feed / clothe all those folks from Microsoft who get laid off or who's jobs get sent overseas?
IF the piracy reminders affect legitimate users, then that's one thing and an issue they would need to fix. If its only going after the people who aren't activating Vista, then good for them.
If you don't like it, them, and their business practices, then just STFU and "buy" something else. And if you hate Microsoft because you think they are a money grubbing, evil, capitalist company - then wake up to the real world. That's what business is about - making as much money as you possibly can, however you can do it, and make yourself and your shareholders rich. If you can't stand that idea then go buy yourself a farm somewhere in the middle of nowhere and milk some goats for a living - because you can't escape it in today's modern life.
Microsoft's not any more or less evil than any other large-cap corporation out there. The whiners better just face up to that fact and move the hell on. You are getting tiring to listen to.
I sig, therefore I am.
Microsoft said it [...] [has] taken down more than 50,000 "illegal and improper" online software auctions.'
So that means that Microsoft have been getting perfectly legal auctions taken down because they deem then "improper" then.
No, you're comparing Apples and oranges -- Apple sells complete computers (hard and software), so their model is not obsolete so long as it remains non-trivial to copy a Mac. MS is basing their business model on software which can be easily copied and downloaded.
Caveat Utilitor
God dammit, I only just got the cottonwool and KY out of my hair from last time.
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
...with quality? Somehow piracy doesn't seem the biggest roadblock to Vista sales right now.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
People can bitch about the apparent tunnel-visioned business model that they adopt with WGA. The fact of the matter is that if the tables were turned and Apple were the most dominant and pervasive OS, there would be similar tactics employed. You bet your life that Apple would hunt you down with their 'iCanDoNoWrong' activation software. It's just that way it is, being a monopoly, good or bad.
Microsoft is in business to make money and do the bidding of its shareholders, period. If one accepts that fact, then expect that they have to do something to protect their interests because it does affect their bottom line. Again, /. people might not care but then again, it's not your bottom line, on the line.
Not so many years ago, Steam arrived on the scene in the PC games world. Everyone moaned and complained. Groups formed to try and find ways to circumvent it (and I suspect they still do). Everyone said it was organised spying because the software had to 'phone home', nobody wanted to activate their game on-line. Now, Steam does a whole lot more than just phone home, it's practically Borg! Yet, I don't really have a problem with it. Maybe Microsoft could use their model instead? It certainly doesn't treat legitimate customers as potential criminals as far as I can see.
I accept that WGA is just plain wrong, wrong, wrong. However, if one accepts that there is a global piracy problem for Microsoft to deal with, how would /. people solve it? Don't bother to chime in 'Make it free' or 'Make it Open Source and then I'll pay for it' or 'sell it for peanuts because no-one will pirate it then' - yeah, right. Business is business.
Technet Plus Direct
Every version of Vista, Office 2007, Server Platforms, et all.
$350
Actually $250 - use Promo Code TMSAM04 for the discount.
Disclaimer: Yes, Vista licks balls. But if you actually want it, there's the cheapest path.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
What's he using, a 5 year old version of Nero?
Because THEY are the ones who are part of the friggin' botnets that kill my bandwidth, cause ISPs to block MY mail server, etc. Windoze users have a VERY real impact on my ability to use the bandwidth I am paying for thankyouverymuch.
If they are able to be killswitched by ANYONE, then they SHOULD BE.
I was saddened to hear this. What better way to expedite the industry switching to a kindler, gentler OS than for the market leader to start turning off their own user base en masse?
(As basically everyone else is talking about Vista in general, thought I would too.)
I just upgraded my main machine last month (from athlon 3000xp / nforce2 / 2G ram / 6800gs, to core2quad q6600 / nforce 680i sli / 4G 800Mhz ram / BFG 8800GT) I felt I was reaching XP's limits on what I wanted, namely:
- can't access 4G ram, or higher. Maxes out around 3.25G
- can't run DirectX 10 (this is the total killer, for games)
- also, I'd have to reinstall if I wanted XP-64, so may as well go the whole hog
I use my PC for gaming, and music production (Cubase, etc). Over the last few weeks I've been painstakingly contacting the manufacturers of every peripheral/software I use, ensuring I won't lose the use of anything I currently am used to. That takes care of the driver issue.
The other main issues seem to be memory (4G should be enough for now), and general resource usage. I've looked into it a bit and found a bunch of services that are useless for me and will speed things up when disabled (ReadyBoost, Search index services for example) - but to be honest, this was always the way with any Windows installation - msmsgs, anyone? A bit of tweaking will always be necessary.
Right now, it seems hard for me to find something that doesn't work under Vista, and the new device driver stack, directx 10 and expansion to 64 bit seem worth it to me. Anyone been through a similar upgrade recently and have a story to tell?
Oh, ye of higher moral values. So I assume you work on your own farm, generate your own power, sew your own clothes, grow your own food, and hand built that computer you are using to type up your comments on? No - I didn't think so. You are just a part of the problem and the machine as the rest of us.
Do I wish that everyone had enough to eat, that there was no "want" in the world, there wasn't any resource shortages and no disease? and that everyone could go off and do whatever the hell they wanted all the time? Sure I do! But as much as I'd love to be off drinking, gambling, and cavorting with supermodels all day, I'm also a realist and realize that that is a fantasy world.
Capitalism isn't a religion - its a fact of life. It always has been. People need stuff, other people make and sell stuff. If you don't like that - then don't participate. (And you will very likely starve to death or die of disease.)
I don't get how Microsoft is "exploiting resources." They built a product, they can charge whatever the hell they want for it, and its their right that people aren't stealing it. Period. If you don't like the product, don't like the company, think they beat midgets with bats to make them right the code, or whatever your personal stick up your butt is with it, then JUST DON'T BUY IT. If you, and the legions of haters out there are so damned smart, then your lack of market share should make the product tank, will force Microsoft to go back to the drawing board and write a product a little more to your liking. In the meantime, shouting "YOU GUYS SUCK!" from every mountaintop is just pissing everyone else off and makes you look like a sheep that's joining the bleating crowd of the anti-Microsoft "religion."
I sig, therefore I am.
Well, they haven't pissed me off yet. I'm running Vista Ultimate 64 bit, and other than some driver issues at the beginning (which were resolved fairly quickly) things have been great. The only time I had any real trouble with it was when one version of iTunes kept bluescreening the system, but even that's been fixed now.
As far as I'm concerned, it's not a mistake. All I see are a bunch of lemmings who would rather bitch and moan about the "big bad evil company" than actually look at the product logically and thoughtfully.
I sig, therefore I am.
"It said efforts to tackle piracy had seen numbers of fake copies of Vista at half the level of XP, the previous Windows operating system." Where is the link? They have added anti-piracy controls, piracy is lower, therefore, anti-piracy controls work. WRONG. What about demand? IMHO piracy is lower because nobody wants this piece of sh!t, free or otherwise.
Some of the major things I advise computer consultants to look for in an initial IT audit with a new computer consulting prospect or customer are up-to-date software licenses. Surprisingly in the small business arena, pirated software can be a big problem (particularly with micro small businesses that have between 1 and 10 employees). They think they can escape the radar because of their very small size in the grand scheme of things. However, we've seen in recent years that people can and do get caught - both home users and business users - when they use pirated software in their daily lives. It seems interesting that Microsoft would change the way it handles piracy issues with Vista. While I don't personally use Vista, from what I have learned and seen about the software package's many problems in just its first year or so of existence, I wouldn't be surprised if there were real issues surrounding the disabling of legitimate copies.
Microsoft claims that its next-generation operating system is more robust at preventing counterfeit attempts. A more accurate story might mention that no one wants to counterfeit the bloated package of crippleware that is Windows Vista.
hating their customers to merely treating them as an irritant. Leopard FTW!!1!1!!
I wonder how many people bought a new PC that has Vista pre-installed, and they hated it so much they downloaded a pirated copy of XP to install over it?
We bought my wife a new laptop last year, and there was no way I was going with Vista. Luckily, you could get one through Dell Small Business with XP on it. I run Kubuntu, and I have an old Win2k machine if I need it. But for my wife, and especially on a laptop, I wanted XP. I've still never seen Vista in person, but I really have no reason to either. I only use Windows when I have to.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Actually I think their Shareware-ish approach is a good idea. By not reducing the functionality and simply nagging the user they will get a wider adoption from pirate geeks who usually are responsible for recommending systems to average users. Maybe they've come to finally realize that widespread piracy is bad, but no piracy is worse.
-nB
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Freedom of speech anyone? Most people are used to MS business practices and it wouldn't hurt too much to show them the world, where evil things are done in lesser extent.
That's what business is about - making as much money as you possibly can, however you can do it, and make yourself and your shareholders rich.Al Capone pops in my mind. He did a good job of making himself rich. I am pretty sure we are better off without him and his kind.
I'm sorry, what business model should they use instead? Give everything away for free and hope that people paypal them a donation for their efforts?They should keep the business model, choke up and die. And one will be responsible for the starving high class employees.
Seriously, if they are evil, they deserve bad things (natural or mob type). In those cases, goading is ok.
Cheers!
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
I'll tell you right now that Vista is a waste of time if you're wanting a better gaming system. I ran both 64bit and 32bit for a time to see what Dx10 was all about.
A few months later and I'm back to XP for my gaming setup. At first Vista seemed nicer than XP (cleaned up interface, etc) but after a while the annoyances start to wear on you. Horrible surround sound support, random applications crashing, and incredibly slow bootups every once in a while were just too much for me to handle. Never mind that hardly any games actually gain anything from Dx10.
For now I'm sticking with XP for the games that I can't play in Linux.
I'm using Unlocker 1.8.5
It shows me which application is keeping a file lock, it lets me close the application, or even delete the file from the dialog and I'm using Windows XP SP2.
We are Turing O-Machines. The Oracle is out there.
Microsoft says it removed the kill switch, but I don't believe it. They've lied before, and I don't trust them anymore. If they'd actually be honest and tell us the kill switch is still there, but disabled, I might actually believe them. However, I think it's still there (and enabled), but needs to be told manually to do its dirty work.
Okay, now you refer to copying a file as "stealing". Therefore you are probably delusional due to your irrational faith in capitalism and there is no point trying to discuss this with you. What can I say? Game over, get well soon.
Caveat Utilitor
What a wonderful change! So now, I can be standing in front of a couple of hundred people, and instead of spontaneously "phoning home" and then going into drone mode, my laptop will start screaming at the audience, inaccurately, that the guy giving a PowerPoint presentation on Business Ethics stole the operating system he's using.
If I was ever stupid enough to install Vista and this happened to me, I swear to God there'd be legal consequences. Another marketing triumph from the tools at Microsoft, and another reason why my next OS will be Linux.
Pirate this, you cretinous half-wits!
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
I'm laughing at you MS fanbois who wasted your modpoints to mod me down for speaking the truth. Y'all astro turfers disgust me, eat truth!
Caveat Utilitor
Oh... the Apple Mac "I'm a Mac and I'm a PC" commercials are going to have a hay-day with this one!!
*grin*
Kris
Remember when Windows were washed, mice were trapped and UNIX guarded the harem?
Are there any notable games yet for DirectX10 only? So far many games have not been made for DirectX10 because the market of users who have it is too small (at least this is what was said by Valve and others in the past).
:)
There are several VERY notable games that look far better under DirectX 10. Crysis, Bioshock, Lost Planet, and likely anything good released here-on in. My point is I now have the graphics power in my rig, I may as well use it!
DirectX9's directplay does not work in my experience under Vista.
According to wikipedia, that's been deprecated and replaced by Live since 2004. I personally don't know of any software that uses it.
A lot of 32bit software just does not run under 64bit Vista. I would suggest you try running a trial version of the 64bit Vista version first before committing.
That's what I was looking in to. I've found I have one piece of hardware (albeit 6 years old) that has been discontinued by the manufacturer and won't have Vista 64 drivers, though it runs fine under 32 bit. I'll be looking to see whether I can run it in some sort of compatability wrapper. I will be using a trial on another HD first though, of course
Now now, that's WinXP. Vista is an (kind of) attempt to solve such issues, it's a GOOD thing. :)
A lot of comments will be about how poor Vista is as software. This diverts from my main criticism of MS. I don't mind that MS put a kill switch in Vista as they have a right to protect their interests against pirates. My criticism of MS is that if they employ such tactics, they had better be right the vast majority of the time. Otherwise this is a rather poorly executed idea that can only get the ire of legitimate and loyal customers. Apparently this feature like many other features of MS software was rushed out and tested on customers before it was ready.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
I built a vista pc for fun, let it sit for 90 days of the network, moved the mouse and low and behold it was a brick, the os had been disabled since it could not call home.
So there went that test... and PC
-- I am the NRA, enough said...
another reason why my next OS will be Linux
Why not start now? You can cut your dependency on anything MS makes right now - I had to start this because the uncontrolled "phone home" features have the potential to unknowingly put me on the wrong side of the law re. client privacy. I'm presently using a mix of XP and Linux. Linux where possible, XP where unavoidable (I'd really love mobile phone companies to ^%$£ stop using Outlook as an essential component of data backup and sync).
Having said that, I use where possible Outlook Express for that (because I don't use it for email anyway) because I haven't used any MS Office in over two years.
It's unfortunately not yet possible to fully ditch MS (see the above for an example of what a lack of open standards does) but I'm working on it. There is NO server left running Windows, which is a nice start.
It may be time to examine how OpenOffice automation works too..
Final remark: "legal consequences" re. the piracy tool? You must be joking. I suggest you examine the EULA, where you agree to sign away all your rights and sacrifice your first born in exchange for nothing at all. I'm not even sure such a one-sided contract is legal, but it appears MS gets away with it.
Insert
There's no question that you should use the right platform for the right job. Personally I deal with databases. Since this is very server based software Linux/Unix is definitely the best plaform. If you're doing graphics design you don't necessarily want a laptop, which is good in databases. And yeah, that's simplified...
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
I tried Vista, and took weeks wrestling to get drivers to install and work for things. In the end I had to go back, why?
Because in XP you can have a video card with two monitors present to the system as one very wide monitor. In Vista you can't and there is a very blunt statement from MS about that fact that their display architecture will never support that. Until they do I can't game the way I like to in Vista, so I stay with XP.
I'm a fiscal conservative, it's a pity we don't have a political party anymore
"A lot of 32bit software just does not run under 64bit Vista. I would suggest you try running a trial version of the 64bit Vista version first before committing."
Being a user of Vista x64 since febuary, would you care to point out this "lot of 32bit software"?
I havent found one item that does not work due to it being Vista X64. Now on XPx64 on the other hand I got this crap all the time, but I havent had it on Vista X64.
Back to the topic on hand, the only problem I can see that you will get is if anything relies on DirectSound. DirectX10 dropped the DirectSound Hardware layer and now does it through emulation Via Vista's new sound layer. The only problem I had with this was the Audigy 2 soundcard having real issues running with some games. Creative would not own it and said that users would have to buy ALchemy to bring back functionality. However what Creative DIDNT tell you is that every other sound card MFG, and all onboard sound systems work perfectly under Vista, but thiers doesnt.. Not a big deal for me, but as a Cubase user that may be you major bugbear.
The days may be numbered when an I.T. manager recommending a Mac or Ubuntu would get "laughed out of the office"....
Today, yeah, most of the time, that's still correct. But how much of that is legitimate, and how much is just incorrect perception, perpetuated by people with no guts to attempt REAL changes?
I know as "network manager" of the company I work for, I put a Linux-based web proxy/filtering solution in place, the first month I started. I didn't really ask for permission first. I just re-used some old hardware that was sitting around, and since it cost nothing in software licenses, there was no budget approval required. For the last 2 years now, it's done it's job quite well, with almost no maintenance required.
Sometimes that's how you get changes started. You don't go around "recommending" something potentially controversial. You just implement it in a limited fashion, after making sure it's going to perform as intended. If all goes well, nobody even notices the change -- but the device sits there, justifying itself with its own good performance each day. Eventually, it will be realized it's part of the environment, and it will become a "given" that it's not only a "good choice", but probably a "best choice" because it has worked so well.
I do see this happening with Macs as well. Just last weekend, I did some computer work in an office, and noticed they had new Apple iMacs in the conference rooms, in the break room, etc. The offices themselves were still all using Windows boxes, but I'm sure the iMacs got put in due to their lack of spyware/virus issues, in all the places where they'd have a "low impact" on the day-to-day operations. Give them a couple years, and if they don't suffer massive hardware failures or something unexpected, they'll have silently proven themselves -- and somebody is going to start asking "Why don't we have some more of these around here?"
I guess this is one way to get Vista's adoption rate to go up. Just let it be pirated!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ATeLDM1H4M
Pirating XP or Win2K is far more profitable than pirating Vista; from a pirate's point of view... I mean, a bloke willing to pirate Vista and save money is not gonna blow it all in high-end h/w for running it! Pirates are cunning and smart, much smarter than the folks at Redmond.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
"- can't run DirectX 10 (this is the total killer, for games)"
It's not a killer if the games don't require it.
Wait until there is a game you absolutely want to play that requires directX10.
Historically, waiting longer is better for most OS.s The only exception was 2K
With Vista as it is right now, having 8 Gigs is not going to be a significant noticeable jump from 4 G on XP.
I thought XP was a 3G limit? IF this is the case, then I highly suggest you make 1 gig a RAMDisk and locate the page file there. You will notice a difference.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Until they completely pull DRM out of the kernel, I will never support the corporate adoption within our enterprise. In a perfect world, the DRM should only activate when "Premium Content" is being played. However, if we are copying gigabytes of .mp3 voice recording files (recorded phone calls to customer service, etc.) Vista just bogs down and stops. "It won't do that", we were promised last year while Vista was being readied for release. "It shouldn't do that" we're told when we encountered the problems, but it doesn't matter, Because. It. DOES.
With today's computers and today's work environment who DOESN'T work with or Manipulate multimedia content at some point? How could we possibly rely on an operating system that treats all multimedia content as special requiring extra inspection attempting to verify that I'm not trying to circumvent some nonexistent copy protection.
Windows Vista truly is the longest suicide note in history.
Good security is based upon reality and common sense. Common sense is a function of having common knowledge.
Windows 3.1x calc: 3.11 - 3.10 = 0.00
- Freelancer (Microsoft claims this is supported under Vista)
- Continuum
- The GIMP
- SyncTERM (crashed as you tried to connect anywhere)
- Spybot Search & Destroy (kept crashing)
That's about all I can remember off the top of my head.DirectPlay is a issue, particularly if the application in question uses DirectPlay's socket system (experienced with applications I had written not working under Vista).Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
With Crysis the snapshots did not look 'far better'. In some instances like the 'paradise' pictures on that page, I actually preferred the directx9 shots.
With Bioshock the snapshots did not look so 'far better' either and even articles pointed it out.
I also looked at Lost planet and the same pattern occured (some cases I again preferred the dx9 renderings).
I don't really think the slight 'improvements' in the games Vista is very justifiable.Generally software does not advertise what networking stack they use.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
How do you think Micro$oft got their domanence to begin with? They turned a "blind eye" to piracy of the early versions of Windows so OS/2 would get knocked out of the playing field. Guess what the gamble worked then and I'm sure it will work now. They are seeing no one in their right mind wants Vista - so they now want to again turn a "blind eye" to piracy of Windows to -try- to get more Vista installations. Problem is the majority of people are just happy with XP. What would break MIcro$oft is if the game manufactures said screw Vista and kept programming the games to work fine under XP. Then pretty much there would be no desperate need to upgrade to Vista - leaving virtually dead - just like Micro$oft BOB and Windows ME. All the gamers out there should be contacting the game companies and tell them they don't want Vista games - stick with XP compatable games.
The Truth is a Virus!!!
I'm sick and tired of people trying to argument that pirating is not stealing. Get real, copying a copyrighted file for which you do not have a license is stealing. Let's have a look at the many definitions of the verb "to steal" and see if one of them apply:
1. to take (the property of another or others) without permission or right, esp. secretly or by force.
Will ya look at that. The very fucking first definition. Pirating is taking a intellectual property and copying it without permission. Case closed.
After 3 days without programming, life becomes meaningless
- The Tao of Programming
While I understand that this does not designate a paradigm shift in the way Microsoft is dealing with piracy, I believe that perhaps they may be beginning to realize how much piracy (not counterfeiting) aids in product ubiquity. Think about it: How many of us are not running Vista not only because its a pain to deal with incompatibilities, but also because with those incompatibilities is the piggyback of having to deal with a more annoying WGA than in previous iterations. How fast would XP have been adopted had the existing WGA been baked in and we all knew we would have to fight DLLs, etc. every month. So in a sense, people like me....geeks in the industry and geeks that people look to to recommend what to buy, what to purchase, and what to stay away from are avoiding the newest flagship product. Furthermore, think of how much of our "learning" in the industry was done on software that was easy to acquire? I'm not sure I know many autodidacts with limitless bank rolls to download, test, and learn enterprise level software. Piracy in this sense positions students and self-taught individuals to understand more of the positions they seek. Once in those positions, they then have the background knowledge to be able to recommend and purchase the very products that they were using in the past. I am beyond the days of needing to fear my downloads because I wanted the latest and greatest. I have a copy of Vista at home gathering dust because even though I want to learn the cutting edge, I am not willing to deal with asinine issues like large file transfer crashes or DRM like HDCP that is meant to "protect" me. I am willing to be a little forgiving if your software is rushed to market and you need to run a few patches to fix it. I am not alright with the dinosaur division of Microsoft turning our industry into a learning divide of have's and have not's. I apologize in advance if this creates flames, especially considering I am abbreviating my own diatribe on the difference between individual piracy and mass counterfeiting.
It is disapointing that Microsoft removed the 'kill switch'. To me that sends a clear message that they will not fix their Windows Genuine Advantage/Windows activation system to get lower false positives and instead just made it less annoying for users.
It is my belief that they had a large amount of false positives that made many users stop using Vista all together. The fact Microsoft does not fix the false positive problem but just makes it 'less annoying' (such as now it just refuses to install application updates - non security related, microsoft office, free applications from Microsoft) is not very encouraging about the quality of their products.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Unless you're one of the very, very few people who are capable of sitting down and writing their own fully-functional OS and all the applications for it (if such a person actually exists), you're pretty much always going to be at the mercy of somebody else. The trick is in evaluating and choosing whose mercy you want to be at.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Fine. Answer this: where is the value in a $400 OS that doesn't do what the purchaser wants, when OSes that DO are free? OSes that have tamer sysreqs and similar functionality?
Don't tell me to get a life. I'm a gamer; I have LOTS of lives!
b) That is a problem with his version of Nero, not Vista. OS upgrades tend to break compatability with older software, be it in Ubuntu, OS X or Windows. Well, yeah, and this is certainly true on Linux. I remember the living hell I had to go through when Linux dropped the ide-scsi driver, and I suddenly needed to swap out all my CD burning programs...
But how do you figure this is a problem with the application? I mean, don't get me wrong, here, I don't endorse backwards compatibility if it interferes with progress - but isn't the basic problem here (in both cases) that the underlying OS made some design changes which the application writers couldn't have predicted or planned for? Their API was basically pulled out from under them by a change to the OS. Doesn't that make it the OS's fault, regardless of whether it was changed for a good reason?
Bow-ties are cool.
Because PAE is a modern reincarnation of LIM EMS--i.e. "expanded memory". Expanded memory, not extended memory, allowed even an IBM XT from 1983 (or even an original IBM PC from 1981) to address as much as 32MB of RAM, provided your DOS-based app could use it. It was a (necessary) hack then and PAE's a hack now...
Oh, and Vista does have the ~3.2GB problem... See this M$ KB article.
Windows 3.1x calc: 3.11 - 3.10 = 0.00
If you have an apple and I take it without your permission that is stealing because I deprive you of that apple.
If you have a file I can see on the network and I copy it you will probably never know it happened. Therefore, no theft has occurred.
These are the simple facts of life, no matter which socio-economic-political ideology you choose to subscribe to. Therefore, one can eassily conclude that people who believe as you do have chosen poorly and have lost. I do not pay taxes to assuage the feelings or recoup the "damages" claimed by incompetent proponents of unnatural ideologies, period. Go get a sustainable business model! Where is the sense of personal responsibility in your "capitalist" foolishness? Get real! The USA is already a socialist state for corporations, and a feudalist state for humans, what more do you people want?
Now please leave me alone and go get yourself an education.
Caveat Utilitor
Freelancer does work (in fact its installed on my system complete with mods for Starwars ships etc)
Spybot search and destroy also works (Again installed and running on my system)
The Gimp has always been flakey at best under windows. It was unstable on windows XP, or I always had some odd crashes with it..
I have yet to see a game work becuase of the lack of Directplay implementation.. and lets be honest here, how many AAA titles use(d) Directplay
What about those who wish to use their computer without a network? MS is just assuming that everyone with Vista will always be connected whenever the OS needs activation? Didn't that already happen with XP & bit MS in the butt?
Mod points are a dangerous tool. Abuse them wisely.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
True, Microsoft is making progress and improving their latest OS. Similar to the problems XP had early on, they will eventually be tweaked to a state that a majority will find workable.
That said, however your good experience may not be typical for those running it. For example, I've run Vista business on my main machine two separate times for a total of perhaps six months. I am simply not happy with it. I experience random hard locks that are difficult to trace. The Event Log doesn't catch what's causing these, and updating all drivers & the bios has not solved the problem. I play WoW occasionally, and have suffered numerous issues with it. Ranging from files occasionally becoming corrupted to complete loss of the WoW folder itself. The biggest headache for me were the random crashes that would occur after 15 to 60 minutes of play (if it hadn't happened by then, I could continue playing that session without worry). The file corruption and entire loss of the folder required the use of Xcopy to keep a copy of the entire WoW folder elsewhere which could be partially or wholy copied back to my install folder when the need arose. Copying the whole folder through Explorer caused problems of it's own. Winamp had issues as well as iTunes. I ended up just sticking with WMP for my music.
After some of the random hard locks and after the reboot, windows would display an error message for perhaps half a second about being unable to verify the product ID and would then shut down. Rebooting normally at this point would activate the kill switch and I'd be stuck. Rebooting with F8 and selecting the Previous known good configuration option would bring me back to a workable desktop (though I'd have the This Copy Of Windows Is Not Genuine message at the bottom right of my screen until the next reboot). Memory tests all pass, and XP does not suffer any of these symptoms. Whether driver or OS issue, I am still unsure.
I have given Vista what I consider a fair shake. Perhaps SP1 will help things. I will definitely try it.
No doubt there are some who are just bitching for the sake of it. But I'd appreciate it if there were less generalizations about all the lemmings who hate it just because it came from Redmond. I cannot be the only person experiencing these issues, and the market reaction with many attempting to move back to XP from Vista reinforces my opinion. I have used it and believe I've given it a fair chance. It simply doesn't suit me, not yet.
I'll believe in corporations having personhood when Texas executes one... - advocate_one
Business is about making money, but by keeping your customers happy. Microsoft has done everything in their power to piss off their customers and make the world hate Vista. That's not good business. Wake up to MS' endless mistakes. It's ok to like Apple, since they're doing the complete opposite.
The OP was correct, actually. Business is about making money. It just so happens that keeping your customers happy is a good way to make more money so most companies try to go that route.
BD Phone Home!
Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.
I had a very rewarding vista experience the other day.
Windows Vista + goodbye-microsoft.com
(paraphrased dialog with computer)
vista: I see you are trying to connect to the internet. The internet is full of boogeymen. Are you sure you want to connect?
me: yes
vista: I see you are downloading a progam. Programs can be dangerous. They can be full of nasty things. Maybe you would like to go back to your sandbox and play with some of your toys instead. Are you sure you want to download?
me: yes
vista: Oops! the progam is attempting to run now! I'm pretty sure you didn't want to do that! That progam is from the internet. You don't know where its been. Why don't you go back and play with the shiny new interface while I hide all of your files and programs to protect you from yourself?
me: I know what I'm doing. run that program.
vista: Oh No! That program is going into the registry! It's going into the bootloader! It's TOUCHING me in my SPECIAL PLACES! Please stop this! I can give you all kinds of shiny trinkets for you to waste your time with.
me: escalate authority. force override. proceed with execution.
vista: AAAAAGGGHHH! WHAT'S THAT YOU'RE HACKING OFF? IS IT MY TORSO? IT IS! MY PRECIOUS TORSO!
me: Hahahaha. (reboot)
debian linux: thank you for accepting one of our free tanks.
friends don't let friends teleport drunk
Uh, no. If you don't run your accounts as local admin, UAC prompts for a password.
Oh and one more followup to the UAC thing:
UAC Doesn't call out on a whim: Its when you do admin-based functions on your machine, such as
modifying files owned by another user to which you have no rights (hmm, sounds like you need sudo for this)
adding/removing programs
lots of 'system' level settings in the control panel
Regedit will even run without UAC prompt, and lets you access HKLU
That is an incorrect assessment. Have the laws of physics changed? No. And neither has the definition of theft. It is you who are the dinosaur bleating about how unfair your impending extinction is.
No, that is most certainly not what I said, that is what you said. Presumably because it served your desire to spew rhetoric rather than have an actual debate. Go on already with your irrational sputtering of insane ideas. I'm done with you. You are neither rational nor honest.
Caveat Utilitor
The ONLY thing of value on Vista is DX10, and yet the hardware support for DX10 hasn't been good.
I'm sure soon enough we would have figured out how to disable it for ourselves anyway.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I have never mentioned theft. "Stealing something" and "theft" aren't synonyms, no matter how hard you wish for it to be. Stealing something is taking something that you shouldn't. Theft is depriving someone of something he owns.
Piracy is not theft. Piracy is stealing. Learn what words mean.
After 3 days without programming, life becomes meaningless
- The Tao of Programming
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Microsoft's Mike Sievert? That makes him microsievert!
If you take the common distributions, they all have the framework (but Ubuntu may leverage it the best).
Can you tell me honestly that Windows makes installing software easy intrinsically? Let's use the plugin example...
I browse to a flash site without a plugin install. *Firefox* helpfully points me to where to install it (note, Windows did not help me and Firefox had no Microsoft provided framework to assist/hook into). Adobe provides me a binary to run and install (retrieved through firefox) that takes after itself (presumably at least registering itself with the add/remove programs, the *one* interaction with Microsoft framework related to installs. You install it, it's done, and is now fixed at that version without manual effort to keep track of bugfix/security issues, and almost entirely without any help from microsoft, and instead the applications fending for themselves in a non-standardized way. This was the way it happened to work for a Flash plugin, but installing a java run time environment is different, which is different from installing a Valve game, which is different from installing an id game, which is different from installing Pidgin, etc etc.
Now, look at ubuntu. If you don't use the OS method to install it first, you browse, and firefox *asks the apt repository* for something appropriate and has the apt framework install and package manage it. This means any updates to flash plugin are tracked, and by the single update manager that tracks the whole platform. The framework is there to do so much more and help out application providers rather than leaving them to reinvent the wheel in many different styles and frustratingly different ways.
Another point is that people are *way* too quick to judge the general usability of Linux based on too wide a sampling of distributions. Gentoo has an audience, but it's not going to be a random non-technical person (unless it's a build from a friend/relative that's set in stone or actively maintained). By the same token, commercial apps wouldn't have to support umpteen different distros, support Ubuntu LTS releases and CentOS/RHEL and the rest can sort themselves out (hey, it's better than the current situation of people trying to eek by with Wine and running completely outside the parameters planned for/supported by the software vendors).
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
one plausible reason for the decreased number of "pirated" copies of vista is that it's so bad that pirates don't think it's worth the time to hack. from personal experience...vista is a royal pain and if i had a choice when buying a new computer, i'd take ubuntu or xp or even win2k over vista.
Is it 5:30 yet?
Do you think that folks don't understand that MS is a business, and their legal responsibility is to make money by any legal means necessary? Are you suggesting that ./ers are mildly retarded and don't understand the legal atmosphere of contemporary capitalism?
Of course MS will try to extract every last dime they can. The questions are: 1) are their methods efficacious and 2) should they be accepted socially and/or legally? For point 1, the fact that MS thinks this is the way it can maximize profits doesn't necessarily true - stupidity is just as common among CEOs as among janitors. For point 2, your motto of "business is business" is completely irrelevant - if IBM is working in Saudi Arabia and they believe that they can maximize profit by using slaves, "business is business" would dictate that they should. That would obviously be abhorrent (and don't start whining that that's different - of course it. It's an analogy.).
So please, don't use trite cliches and childish simplifications and believe that you are being clever. Not everyone has the mental faculties of a slightly impaired rhesus monkey.
1b. 'Intellectual Property' and actual property are so different as to make them incomparable, firstly actual property can be assigned a real value (usually the cost it would require to replace) which is usually determined by how scarce it is, intellectual property has no real value and its scarcity (or lack thereof) is defined artificially by whoever derives a benefit from it. Not to mention that the value of an idea or concept are impossible to accurately value unless you realise them.
1c. Rights are defined differently in different areas and are not the same when referring to real property or intellectual property, for example I can grow and sell potatoes, but my rights extend only to the potatoes up to the point of sale, I can't prevent you from selling them as chips to the public (a derivative work) or using them to grow more potatoes (copying). If I were selling a song or a book then I would have additional rights to that book even after you purchased it. As such rights in both fields are different.
Now as I said, I find the violation of copyright for the purposes of distribution reprehensible, I think it is probably more serious than 'stealing' (although less serious than piracy), but I would deem ripping a song so that it can be used on an MP3 player, or backing up DVD's so that they can be recovered if your 3 year old trashes them as reasonable acts (you would presumably consider both as stealing).
Equating a copyright violation with stealing is disingenuous and in my opinion rather stupid, there is too much difference between the two to make them easily comparable, a massive breach of copyright can be carried out with little or no preparation or skill and can cause significant losses without the recipient or the rights owner of the copied items being aware or concerned.
More importantly it is almost impossible to accidentally steal something (because you didn't realise you were doing it) in a manner that leaves no one out of pocket; the average person thinks that it is OK to rip the contents of a CD they own and place the contents onto an MP3 player, of course if copyright infringement is considered stealing then that person has stolen x number of songs, after all the MP3 player would now contain unlicensed copies, that person would be unlikely to realise that they had done anything wrong.
Anyone stealing Windows Vista for one are just plain stupid. If they want a real OS they have a choice. Linux will provide them with an abundance of features that all levels of people can use (not just the zealot). But frankly to get caught stealing it when there's essentially a fast, easy DVD that they can download that will give them virtually undetectable Vista Ultimate install is just plain incompetence.
I don't condone stealing. I'd rather these people not purchase Windows at all since the better OS is Linux.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
You are delusional. I suppose statistically speaking, that makes you normal in today's USA. Still, I prefer honesty and reality. The "system" you rationalise is dishonest and false. It really is just as simple as that, no matter how many straw men you build or how emotional you become.
Good Lord, where did you go to school -- the Ministry of Truth?
Caveat Utilitor
Can you say splitting hairs?
Okay Microsoft has been convicted of abusing it's postion as a monoply and as such should be under government oversite until it's business practices fall in line with federal law.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
From TFA on MSNBC: "Users with a high tolerance for irritation can put off switching to genuine software indefinitely, but those who relent and buy a real copy of Windows can do so at reduced prices -- $119 for Windows Vista Home Premium, half the regular retail price."
So, pirate Vista, call M$ and confess your sins, and get your valid Vista for 50% off. If I had bought Vista for full price, and then saw that those who stole it were getting it now for half that, I'd consider handing out the torches and pitchforks to the peasants in preparation to storm the castle.
This is just more evidence that M$'s marketing people aren't evil, they're just dain bramaged. This could only be topped by their rationalization for it. Watch for that, it should be enormously entertaining.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
Ripping a song to put it on an MP3 player is fair use. You have (implicit) permission to do so, and is therefore not stealing. Same goes for backing up stuff to keep the original away from your 3 year old.
However, let's not divert this conversation towards music, because music is not what this is about. The topic at hand here is software and piracy. There is no such thing as "fair use" when downloading a copy of Windows, or Photoshop, or what-have-you with the intent of using it for what it was designed.
You download Windows/Photoshop and use it without a license? Then you took something to which you are not entitled, you stole a copy of Windows/Photoshop, it doesn't matter whether Microsoft/Adobe is deprived of the copy or not.
After 3 days without programming, life becomes meaningless
- The Tao of Programming
I really wish Microsoft makes Vista impossible to install for pirates.
This way, the millions and millions of 'pirates' would be forced to switch to another OS (Linux !) and the world would be a happier and safer place for everyone.
Seriously, though, I think 'piracy' has been one of the key elements in windows OS domination. Millions of computer enthusiasts from around the world installed pirated versions of windows and started to use it as a development platform (especially in Eastern Europe, India, China, with piracy rates in the 80%+ range). This led to lots of apps being developed for windows, and lots of new windows users as PCs became more and more accessible.
Today, young developers and users are becoming used to software freedom - bittorrent, linux, apache, php, firefox (and thousands of others) tell them that it's cool to be open, it's cool to build a free software universe and it's uncool to be closed and restrictive.
I think Microsoft should tolerate if not encourage piracy if they want to survive the growing competition from OSS and web-based software. This way they can 'buy' a little more time before being eventually forced to make all their desktop apps free and open sourced.
PS. As I was writing this article, my other box, which runs Vista, has miraculously shut itself down. That's probably because of the continuous swearing that I laid upon it because of the new file association architecture in Vista, which requires me to rewrite code in my app. That sucks.
First off, fair use doesn't exist everywhere, so for most people making a duplicate of a song, like any other work subject to copyright is an offence.
Secondly, you can state that taking a copy of something is stealing if you wish, that doesn't make the assertion valid, making an unauthorised copy is a violation of copyright, it is not stealing. My previous post covered most of why think that, and you have ignored most of it, but the point you took up is fairly important part of it. It does matter that the owner of a copy or the rights holder is not deprived of a copy, it makes the violation of copyright harder to spot and changes the way in which the victim of a breach of copyright (if you can use that phrase) feels the impact of the copying, this in turn changes method used to reclaim damages and the way in which damage can be assessed.
Copyright violations are wrong, they are illegal, they are not and should not be deemed as theft/stealing.
Here are some other things you could define as 'stealing',
Tax evasion (Deprives the state of cash so is stealing from the tax payer)
Littering (Costs the community money to clean up so is stealing from the community)
Insurance Fraud(Costs the insurer money so its stealing from your insurer)
In fact you could almost define every violation of the law as stealing in one way or another (less rape, murder and some traffic offences) but that doesn't make it accurate or right, call a spade a spade, that way people know what you mean.
Why "or even win2k"? I'll take win2k over XP.
For now I'm sticking with XP for the games that I can't play in Linux.
You were doing fine until that last bit, there..
In any case, yeah, DX10 is a non-issue as it is. Never fear, thought, since Vista is crammed down new pc shopper's throats 9 times out of 10, you'll start seeing those DX10 -required games sooner or later. Maybe Xmas 2008 already?
What's purple and commutes? An Abelian grape.
Piracy is both theft and stealing. Copying is not stealing, theft, or piracy. It can be cheating as in being the 5th Ace of Diamonds in a pack of cards, but that is about it.
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
It's almost *certainly* either in the main repository or another repository not too hard to add. Either way, it's a matter of how things are abused/not used, rather than rather the platforms in question provide sane frameworks that can be used correctly.
The biggest pain in my opinion are the commercial companies that simply don't "get it" and use InstallAnywhere for Linux as well, or some other relatively braindead process that's more like Windows than Linux. Non-free commercial applications so far have not 'gotten it' at all (though there are so few of them), but even then, it's not really much harder than Windows. (Though try following suns instructions on installing linux for java rather than repositories, and that is rough...)
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
I've heard that this is funny, (proper use of triptych, or not) but frankly, I don't get it. I see a rhyme. I see a bunch of words highlighted by blanks. I don't, however, see where anything is funny. Perhaps there is some cultural thing I'm missing. Please help. Please explain.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Fross, my setup is somewhat similar, and though I stopped considering myself a computer whiz a few years ago, I can tell you what I've learned through the experience. First, my system:
C2D E6420
ASUS P5N32-E SLi Plus mobo (hybrid chipset incorporating a 650i and somethin else i can't remember... dual 16x PCIe!)
4GB DDR2 800MHz RAM (currently OC'd to 1066 to match FSB. OCZ Reaper series looks funny but good stuff!)
Vista 64
2x eVGA 8800GT in SLi
What I've learned:
1) SLi on these cards is just as buggy in Vista 64 as it was in Vista 32, but no worse as far as I can tell: lots of program crashes, display adapter not responding and restarting, and occasional BSODs. I haven't been able to decipher if it is the drivers, the cards, or even worse, my funky mobo. These problems get worse as the games get more complex. WoW has no trouble, but I'm lucky if Crysis runs for 15 minutes.
2) In non-SLi, even under Vista 64 with modest overclocking, the cards are as solid as a rock.
3) It seems that moving from vista 32 to vista 64 and 4GB RAM, loading times have actually slightly INCREASED. (It's also worth noting that my $7000 3D CAD workstation at work takes longer than I would expect to load things. It's running XP x64.) No clue why this happens, but once games are loaded, they are smoother, probably due to the crapton of new memory available.
4) Not smooth enough to say I got a huge benefit from upgrading from 2GB of memory. Crysis WAS playable with 2GB after all. Vista eats up tons of memory at idle but I believe it offloads as much OS stuff to the swap file as possible while you're playing full-screen games, so games actually run much better than you'd think. Just don't try to alt-tab!
5) You may already know this but in case others dont (I didn't): Microsoft will tell you (and is correct in the fact that) Vista 32 can utilize 4 GB of memory. What they don't tell you is that the limit INCLUDES the memory of every other component in your system, INCLUDING your video cards. When it was all said and done, with my SLi setup, Vista32 only saw 2.5.
6) As a whole, am I disappointed in Vista's performance for gaming? Absolutely not. HL2:EP2, TF2, Bioshock, CoD4 to name a few ran exceptionally WELL in Vista even with only 2GB memory. Even Crysis was playable on High. In my own experience, Vista manages its bloat impressively well. Contrary to popular belief, Aero does NOT cripple your gameplay on recent graphics cards. On full screen games, it gets turned off automatically (and quickly). For an even better example, I play WoW at 1680x1050 in full-screen windowed mode (it makes sense if you play) to make alt-tabbing faster and easier. WoW will fully render with NO drop in fps when I use flip 3D, with the Aero UI remaining as fluid as could be in the process. I don't care who you are, that's impressive. Vista has it's issues, and I can see how it would absolutely cripple an older PC, but with modern hardware it's definately not as bad as people make it out to be. So far, I have not experienced a single issue which makes me regret moving from XP. All this coming from a pessimist.. Sheesh.
7) I will point out that if you have a Creative X-Fi sound card, Vista's new sound system will go to war with it. I'd imagine older cards would be even worse. I can't help but blame Creative though... If I can get 64 bit Vista drivers for my 6 year old printer which work just fine, then why can't Creative muster some appropriate drivers for its FLAGSHIP LINE?
Fross, you're going to need to go 64 bit to take advantage of your memory. Whether you go XP 64 or Vista 64 is up to you, but I can tell you that Vista wasn't all bad.
I don't know about you, but I haven't played any 3D games lately where I stare at a static image for 2 minutes. The shader effects are what REALLY set DX9 and DX10 apart, and screen shots don't really do shader effects justice. I assure you, there is a notable difference.
It's also worth noting that at least when I bought it, the 64-bit DVD only comes in the box with Vista Ultimate. For all other editions, you'll need to either have MS ship you the disc via snail mail for 10 bucks, or find some place to download the .iso.
The latest version of Nero is horrible compared to the older versions, why would I want to upgrade?
...you will probably never know it happened. Therefore, no theft has occurred.
If I murder you before I steal your wallet, you will probably never know it happened. Therefore, no theft has occurred.
I have the model up of your botherboard (P5N32-E SLi, with the 680i chipset), so I'm waiting to go SLi in time... hopefully delay it until it's sorted out, I know a few people with SLi problems.
I got a decent boost going from 2G ram up, but I turned off my page file. I like to alt-tab (and, playing WoW too!), and that made the system much, much more responsive. For some reason XP dumps tons of stuff to swap even when it has more ram available than it knows what to do with.
I've since found out my midi box would have problems under Vista 64 (not 32 though) so I may just give it a trial on a separate partition and see how it copes. Thanks for the very descriptive post though!
You can't do it. 32 bit XP and most versions of 32 bit Server 2003 can only address a total of 4GB for all memory. This includes the location of hardware addresses and video memory so you can't use it for a ramdisk or any other purpose. The OS has mapped other stuff below 4GB to be sure various poorly written drivers and applications can see it. It doesn't matter how many processors you have (there was a 2GB per 32 bit processor address limit some years ago) you still can't get to 4GB. The MS Server 2003 Enterprise version will let you address the full 4GB and more since it maps it differently. The ridiculous thing is 32 bit Vista still has this problem of not being able to address more than 4GB of which less than that is going to be real memory.
Of course with the 64 bit versions you don't have that same arbitrary 4GB for absolutely everything limit. I ran a beta of 64 bit server 2003 with no problems other than a lack of drivers for cheap and nasty hardware. The 64 bit drivers are of course written to address more memory.
Actually, I would suggest holding on to the search indexer, for at least a while - it's pretty good about running when you don't even notice, and instant search is a feature that makes so much difference, it's hard to explain. From simple things like finding programs in a few keystrokes (I haven't expanded the Programs list in weeks at least, now - sometimes I got for months without doing so) to instantly filtering your mail and web history to find the message/page with the text you're looking for to hitting Google, Wikipedia, Dictionary.com, or any of a wide number of other services using Start++ (Google it, it's a fantastic powertoy for Vista's Start menu search).
As for my upgrade, it was well over a year ago, and I can't stand to use XP anymore. Like you, I did a clean install, but all the programs I still want to use (and a good many I don't use any more, but used to) all worked out of the box, though a few stored data in their install folder (Bad developers! No donuts!) so I had to change the access permissions to those folders so I didn't need to run them as Admin each time.
All hardware works just fine. Back when I first upgraded I had to use XP drivers for some things (I still do, for the Ext2 Filesystem driver to access my Linux partitions) but they worked fine. By six months ago, all the commercial drivers were labeled for Vista and available on Windows Update. Of course, x64 did complain at bootup about that Ext2 driver, but thankfully it needed only very infrequent reboots (I'm using 32-bit again now; my system isn't nearly as great as yours and I didn't feel x64 was worth the risk of a hassle. I may upgrade later, though.)
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
Did you move the file within the same hard disk? Have you tried to copy a large file from one hard disk to another?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
The danger of pure Application Directory strategies (ala OSX) is that there is *still* no mechanism for automated updates in a centralized fashion regardless of application vendor if the vendor hooks into something. Hence my caveat that Windows kinda fell into the trap by being somewhat AppDir oriented (but half-assing enough to have the worst of both worlds).
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
As I said, support one or two (say Ubuntu LTS and RHEL/CentOS), with a license permitting repackaging of the binaries, but not leaving the company on the hook for support. If it's truly a commercial endeavor without redistribution, forget officially catering to 100% of the linux base, and focus on select pieces that target a great share of it. The problem when people talk about 'Linux' vs. 'Windows' is that is way too vague. 'Linux' has the bad reputation of being hopelessly diverse as to not even be worth it. It's simply a detail you don't *have* to sweat. Just because 3% of your possible market runs Gentoo, doesn't mean they won't rpm2cpio your rpm and run it anyway, writing their own build script, and they won't necessarily expect support if you set the record straight up front. Even worst case scenario, by targeting two you almost completely meet the needs of 70-80% of the Linux market you'd reach otherwise, which is 70-80% higher than 0% when you refuse to take a stand. My whole point is that you offer up your yum and apt repositories, and anyone not in a supported distribution can fend for themselves. The problem with being somewhat distribution independent by packing it up as a tarball/installanywhere, is that you are being neutral by being a huge pain in the ass to every distribution. It's no harder for a Slackware box to install stuff stored in an rpm than it is for it to run the Java installer you wrap your crap in, so just pick a technology or two and the rest of the world would cope.
As to the library going out of style, OSS is a good example. ALSA at least to me *still* provides the audio interface needing by legacy apps. I can still start Quake2 commercial binary and have sound work. Though ABIs of libraries have moved on, legacy copies of the libraries and interfaces continue to coexist. Device node and syscall interfaces have been pretty stable and standard and consistantly maintained as legacy. For libraries, the distribution better make concessions, or else it's the distribution's fault for not provided adequate 'compat' packaging.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
a moment:
"Microsoft has removed the controversial 'kill switch' from Vista in SP1. This feature is designed to disable pirated copies of the OS, but had led to numerous reports of it disabling legitimate copies."
But the next line was so hilarious I realized they still are out to lunch:
"It will be replaced with a notice that repeatedly informs the user that their OS is pirated."
I just couldn't stop laughing.
Keep at it Microsoft, you may no longer be relevant in operating systems, but you sure are entertaining to watch!
Excelsior!
I don't know the meaning of the word 'don't' - J
As one of the posters said below, malware writers don't care about your data or your life. They only ask themselves how efficient their next virus or worm will be to reach their goals, whether it be using the resources of thousands of zombie-PCs, or threatening a large corporation with a massive breakdown of their IT infrastructure. Happened in a Orange/France Telecom R&D center 4 years ago : all PCs down for a whole monday morning. 1200 people suddenly locked out of their PCs. Fortunately the coffee machine stood up and running that day... ;-)
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
But copying a proprietary application without authorization is piracy.
Definition of piracy :
2. the unauthorized reproduction or use of a copyrighted book, recording, television program, patented invention, trademarked product, etc.
After 3 days without programming, life becomes meaningless
- The Tao of Programming
Not just a straw man, a drama queen straw man!
Caveat Utilitor
Update: It turns out all the trouble was due to a BIOS setting. Turning off "SLI BROADCAST APERTURE" made the instability go away entirely.
It turns out that hardly anybody knows what the setting even is or does, and I have no noticable drop in performance by having it disabled. One comment did say that it allows your graphics cards to operate in SLi even in the absence of an SLi bridge, but I haven't been able to confirm this. I haven't even seen a bridge-less SLi capable card since the 6800.
If anyone actually knows what the setting does for sure, i'd love to know.
Where did this definition come from? (I don't mean the website/'dictionary'.) Every common use I've ever heard of using piracy was more of the rape and pillage until our dear media companies started using it as a synonym with copying and it still seems to be only those have a secondary financial gain (of an original product) using it in that manner. Most original creators I've spoken to, don't use it in that manner. Sure, language is fluid, but this is more of a stupid business buzz word than a evolution of a word. And yes, I hate the substitution of Google for search. It however is an evolution of a word.
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
Well the intention was a joke, albeit a not-so-funny one.
Feh.
Oops. I apologise then, you know it can be hard to tell sometimes -- and actually it was pretty funny, but there are so many people these days saying such things in earnest.
Caveat Utilitor
I think the tag you are looking for here is [Citation needed], but let me whip out the bibliography then...
piracy. Dictionary.com. Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law. Merriam-Webster, Inc. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/piracy (accessed: December 06, 2007).
It's not just some random website, it's a Merriam-Webster dictionary.
Nope. From MW's definition (emphasis mine) :
2 a : the unauthorized copying, distribution, or use of another's production (as a film) esp. in infringement of a copyright <software piracy>
You don't need to be seeking monetary advantage to be infringing copyright. Downloading Photoshop from a website with the intent of simply using it is copyright infringement, and so it is piracy.
A single word may have several meanings. There are many words in the English language (and other languages too) that have more than one meaning, and the context in which the word is used is usually sufficient in letting the reader know what meaning the word has. When using the word piracy in a context where we are talking about software, licensing and copyright, one can expect the word to not mean robbery on the high seas. In this context, piracy is about people taking copyrighted stuff from the Internet without paying for it.
After 3 days without programming, life becomes meaningless
- The Tao of Programming
Yeah, and piracy is being hi-jacked to another meaning. Piracy didn't have that meaning until the ... okay, some bloke named Alfred Tennyson seems to have coined it. Stupid git.
I apologise, I was mistaken. I understood it to be the workings of the PR department of MPAA
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
It didn't change the feel of the game, like a vast graphical improvements in other games have (like playing Freelancer with minimum settings, then getting a new rig, being able to set it all to max).
I'm annoyed that you got me to waste my time on this.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.