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The "Vista-Capable" Debacle Spreads To Acer
N!NJA writes in with a Register story on a lawsuit filed against Acer for selling Windows Vista on an underpowered notebook. Of course anybody can sue for anything; it will be interesting to see if this action goes forward in the courts. "With a lawsuit filed Wednesday in San Francisco, California, two residents of Fostoria, Ohio seek damages and relief from the world's third-largest computer maker after purchasing a sub-$600 Aspire notebook that included Windows Vista Premium and a gigabyte of shared system and graphics memory. In its official "recommended system requirements," Microsoft recommends that an additional 128MB is required to run the Premium incarnation of its latest desktop operating system. ... Microsoft says that the Premium, Business, and Ultimate editions of Vista will run on 512MB systems — with certain OS features disabled. In the beginning, Redmond called these 'Vista Capable' machines, and it's facing a separate lawsuit over this potentially misleading moniker."
Guys, I know Vista has way too many versions, but is it really that hard to remember that it's Windows Vista Home Premium (and for that matter, Vista Home Basic), not Vista Premium and Vista Basic?
--- Mr. DOS
Is there anyway we could please let this meme drop? It's getting really old. Seriously.
My blog
According to Acer this laptop ships with 1GB from the factory. And according to NewEgg upgrading to 2GB would be about $9.99 plus $2.99 shipping or going to 4GB would be just under $40.00. How the hell did she spend $157.40 on an upgrade that maxes out at $40 in parts and $30 in labor?
Vista does run reasonably with 872MB available to it as long as you stick to basic applications. OpenOffice, Firefox, Windows Media Player and etc. all run well enough. Crysis, Fallout 3, Photoshop CS4 and Visual Studio will run like dogs, if at all.
Vista capable is just like a DOT highway safety rating, just because your Kia is roadworthy doesn't mean that it will compete with a BMW for either performance or luxury.
My God! It's full of eval()'s.
That's what the "turbo" button is for.
So the humankind hates computer geeks, scientists and any people that look smart. They just want to kill you on a very painful way and not have to call you to install another desktop manager.
Fine. Be that way. Just don't come cryin' to us when Brawndo doesn't actually have what plants crave.
Let q be a radix > 1. I am in ur base-q, killing 10 d00ds.
I *just* bought an HP HDX-18.
* Windows Vista Home Premium with Service Pack 1
* Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad Processor Q9100 (2.26 GHz)
* 4GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)
* 1GB Nvidia GeForce GT 130M
* 500GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
* 18.4" diagonal High Definition HP Ultra BrightView Infinity Display (1920x1080p)
* Blu-Ray +/-R/RW with SuperMulti
The Vista experience meter gives it a *THREE POINT EIGHT* on the usability scale.
If this less-than-a-year-old, Quad-core 2.26GHz, 4Gb System RAM, 1Gb VRAM, 5400RPM SATA HD system can't rate better than that, then why bother with Vista at all?
I sure as hell didn't.
I swapped the original drive for another 500Gb 5400 RPM SATA drive, installed Ubuntu, and haven't looked back.
YES I tweaked Vista to run better, I spent two days doing exactly that, and it really, honestly didn't make enough of a difference.
I shouldn't have to turn off half the OS in order to make a machine (especially one with specs like this) run like it's supposed to.
While I think your idea of bringing back plus packs is a GREAT idea, as it would cut the bloat without having 400 fricking versions of the OS, there is another idea from that time I believe they desperately need to bring back as well: The WinNT/Win9x divide. Remember how if you remember how if you wanted a HOME OS you could actually BUY a home OS, and if you just wanted to get your work done there was an actual business OS? Now they put out the same bloated as hell, multimedia choked, bling bling to the top, I want to be OSX so damned bad it hurts OS and just cripple a few features for the home market.
That is NOT a business OS. A Windows business OS is a fugly, plain, low resource using, backwards compatible OS with minimum bells and wells and good GPO management. That is why to this day I still say Win2K Pro was the best business OS MSFT has ever made, and frankly everything since then has been downhill. There wasn't any added themes support or multimedia bling bling junk in the Win2K of goodness. Nope, just fugly Grey solid as a rock business goodness. Of course that is why you have tons of sites that show you how to turn Win2K8 server into a workstation. It is because ever since Vista all the business user(one of the most lucrative and largest markets MSFT has) has gotten from MSFT is the finger. It is also why infoworld is declaring Win7 is going to be yet another dud to the enterprise and SMB markets.
That is why I am making this prediction: Win7 is going to be another dud. MSFT has seemed to forgotten that folks want to use at home what they use at the office. That is why I have many customers that still insist on Win2K or WinXP, because that is what they use at work and that is what they want at home. The only good I foresee coming from Win7 is that they may finally fire that damned monkey Ballmer. He has had the company hopping from one boneheaded idea to another like they have ADHD, and his Apple and Google envy is frankly dragging the company down the toilet. If folks wanted an Apple they would BUY a bloody Apple! But of course I'm not the only one that thinks the best thing that can happen is Ballmer be given his walking papers. Bring back the plus packs and for the love of Deity bring back actual Business OSes. Because the shit they are shoveling now sure as hell don't cut it.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.