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"Vista Capable" Lawsuit Is Now a Class Action
An anonymous reader notes an update in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reporting that the lawsuit against Microsoft's "Windows Vista Capable" marketing campaign has been granted class-action status. We discussed the company's internal misgivings with this campaign a while back. The suit alleges that "...Microsoft unjustly enriched itself by promoting PCs as 'Windows Vista Capable' even when they could only run a bare-bones version of the operating system, called 'Vista Home Basic.'" In the 2006 pre-holiday season, Microsoft had placed "Windows Vista Capable" stickers on machines to keep the sale of Windows XP machines going after Vista was delayed. Microsoft didn't lose out totally in the recent ruling — the article notes that the judge "narrowed the basis on which plaintiffs could move forward with their claims."
I hate class action suits. They do next to no good for the consumer save for putting a couple (literally) bucks in the pocket, benefit lawyers almost exclusively and in the end make products cost more. I hate Vista, and I don't care for (and therefor do not use the products produced by) Microsoft but this is going to do little good in the long run.
AH! This explains the claim that Vista is faster than XP. All this time I thought it was just marketing nonsense.
Judge granted a class action status to a lawsuit of customers against a company selling an "under a thousand dollars" TV for $999.95
I'd have thought the hardware manufacturers would be the ones who didn't want sales to fall.
I agree that the hardware vendors should also share part of the blame. However, Microsoft designed the campaign, and in addition is responsible for the capabilities of Vista (for all the hardware manufacturers knew, it might get faster before it was released to the general public). Therefore, on the face of it, the case might have merit.
I remember the same sort of campaign when XP came out. The laptop I bought then had an "XP capable" (or something that sounded similar) sticker on the box, even though it came with ME installed and with a voucher for a cheap XP Home upgrade when it came out. After having upgraded it and having seen the performance under XP, I reformatted it and downgraded. Not to ME, but to Win2000, which it still runs fine.
Yes, this isn't entirely new. But that doesn't justify things in any way. In fact Microsoft should have learned from past experience and done things better this time.
1. Honey, should we buy a new computer now?
2. No, Vista is about to come out, we should wait.
3. But this computer over here says "Vista Capable" on it.. we can upgrade when Vista comes out.
4. Ok, let's trust the advertising and buy now.
5. [time passes]
6. [more time passes]
7. [yet, MORE time passes]
8. Honey, Vista has finally come out.
9. You're fucking with me.
10. No really! Let's upgrade.
11. Ok, which of the 400 versions of Vista should we upgrade to?
12. Oh, seems that our machine can only run Vista Basic.
13. Those bastards!! Call the lawyers.
14. Meanwhile, the rest of the world makes it blatantly obvious that *all* version of Vista blow, not just Basic.
15. ???
16. Profit.
This did not really happen.
How we know is more important than what we know.
So people shouldn't be able to make manufacturers and vendors live up to their promises? Of ot saus "Vista Capable", with no limitations, no "fine print", no disclaimers, then it should be capable of running Vista - not some crippled version.
For some reason it still bothers me when people claim to have "downgraded" to Win2k. it's like saying you "Downgrade" from Vista to XP. How can it be a downgrade when your computer runs faster, you have less problems, etc?
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
Recently bought a laptop that came with vita home premium. Look at the "Windows Experience Index", and am getting about 60 percent of what I could be. Brand new laptop, meets all recommended requirements (except video card) for vista ultimate, and I still only get a 60%. I also see computers that are less than a quarter as powerful as that laptop being sold with vista on them. There should be at least a minimum spec increase to certify the hardware as vista enabled. Like you can run XP Pro on as low as a 233 MHz core, with 128 Mb ram, and 1.5 GB of hard drive. It will run, just about as fast as the mold growing in Antarctica. It runs, but you can't do more than idle without it freezing up on you. Therefore, in my opinion, you should change the minimum system requirements so that you could at least open notepad within 5 minutes.
He's just a little sore from having to post quickly between crashes.
Except, only one part of that statement is true....
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
But it is "Vista capable", just not "Full Vista-with-all-eye-candy-features capable".
As much as I dislike Microsoft products, I can't see how they have a basis for this law suit.
Is the machine incapable of running Vista? No, just the flashy bits that aren't a requirement of the OS. Did Microsoft have a separate designation for machines that could run Vista better? Yes, it was "Premium Ready". Is Vista completely unusable because of their system specs? No (or not any more than normal).
It isn't as if they've been sold a "High Def capable TV" that only has 640x480 res, they've been sold the equivalent of a 720i/p TV - it is capable of what is classed as "High Def", just not the really high HD because it is only "capable" of some minimum requirement to be called what it is called.
As a similar situation: Am I capable of running a marathon? Probably. Would I do very good at it? No, because I'm not ready, not trained and not fit enough.
People need to get a dictionary and learn the definition of the word "capable".
Well, 2k is faster than Vista because it has a lot less features. If you don't use any of those features, then sure, ok you can stick with the older stuff. But I personally benefit from Vista features and thus I'm also using Vista.
The whole point of me (and maybe some of us) searching for alternatives (OS/2 etc.) and eventually come to know and use Linux is that I (and perhaps others) find "Windows capable" a lie -- not just Vista.
How many did not feel frustrated remembering an old computer could do things a Windows one could not? How many didn't feel restrained by having a tumor-growth-like GUI posing as OS? In which you have to use an entire application to change OS settings? In which capabilities are not available on a system-wide basis but only in a few special apps? In which implementations were weak because no developer could have access to "undocumented" (i.e., secret) features? In which there were taps permitting eavesdropping by some foreign (i.e. American) institution? In which one had to forcefully pirate an app, not because of money but because there was simply NO simple way of paying (paypal and credit card buying didn't exist then)?
And the most evil one: one situation where one does not want to pirate -- that is, violate copyrights -- and everybody does it, because the software maker clearly benefits from the net marketing, and so the one who wants to abide by the law is actually deemed a fool.
It has been argued over and over that a new Windows version is a way of pushing newer hardware onto customers thus effectively sucking their pocket's money. And you know what?
I think I myself warned about these things a thousand times -- only to be scorned. Now Microsoft could walk free from this, IMO, because they can safely say everyone has been warned about all that.
If you were fooled and misled, it's all your fault. Don't blame the lion if you get into its jail and put your head into his mouth. I actually get angry at those people who complain about Vista; I think it's only fair that they lose their money -- no, they should be fined for wasting public money by using justice after choosing themselves to believe in vendor propaganda while calling us "zealots".
I bought a computer with a "Vista Capable" sticker, which had only 512 MB of RAM. Now, according to Dell, such a configuration is "Great for... Booting the Operating System, without running applications or games".
Which, incidentally, was pretty much all I could do.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
Well, that's just shows that the problem is their version policy, isn't it? The fact that "Vista" is an encompassing brandname for a whole bunch of different OSes with different capabilities makes it extremely hard to say what "Vista" is. As anyone, I'd expect it to meet the requirements to run "Vista Ultimate" with everything on, because it's "Vista".
It's not "just marketing", it is plainly misleading... that's the whole problem. I run Linux on mine anyway, and that was the reason I bought it. The sticker to me meant, "Cheap computer where I can run Linux on". ;-)
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
Not quite.
MSDOS was a clunker, all the way.
Windows 95 (and its' Service Pack, Windows 98), while the first usable OS from MS, was rife with problems
You would not want to go back to struggle with its' drivers, miserable attempts at plug'n'play, and frequent BSODs
For example, '98 seemed to have terrible memory management. When I was using 98 at work, I would frequently have Excel, Wordperfect, e-mail, and AutoCAD open at the same time. One particular job I was working on, a zoo, had particularly large and complicated CAD drawings, including several external references to other trades' drawings, and the exhibit designer's naturalistic fake trees drawn with the detail of every branch and twig. This slowed down my computer considerably, but the real problem was that after I closed the AutoCAD drawing and went back to Excel, I would soon get an error about illegal memory access that would crash the program. It only occasionally caused a BSOD, but it would require me to close all open programs and windows, and restart them. I figure that 98 somehow allocated the same memory to more than one program, and freed it from all of them when AutoCAD closed. More physical memory may have helped, but I never had that problem with XP. In fact, I almost never have had significant problems with XP.
Murphey's fighting Occam, and we're in the stands.