This laptop has the same specs, with the exception of the CPU (Celeron M 1.86G), and performance when booting/running Vista is almost exactly what you describe. (For more detail, see my post "Vista setup/3hrs | Linux/1.25hrs with xtra apps" ( http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=305299&cid=20707761 ).
I do plan to upgrade* hardware somewhat, but as it stands, I will only use the Vista install on this machine for 2 things:
1) Occasionally checking how websites render under Internets Exploder (not often - takes too long to get there...), and
2) To be able to replace the disk image if ever needed for a warranty claim.
In short, on this "Basic" machine, Vista is slower than slow, not even really feasible for use; yet Linux flies along, even when running Beryl w/only 64M RAM allocated to video.
--
*It's not needed for my Mepis install, but I plan to add another gig of RAM, and get a better wireless card (the Broadcom chipset causes problems, easily fixed with a Belkin Cardbus that uses an Athero's chipset). For about $75 total (including shipping), I'll have a machine that should work for me for the next several years.
The parent to the above was correct - there is an 'Aero Theme' that can be enabled for Vista Basic, but no 'Aero Glass' transparency or 3D effect/desktop like Beryl.
Bought a new Acer laptop yesterday, one which came with Vista Basic. I've been MSFree for 8 years, but I'll leave it on there, since I can use IE to check websites during development. Thought I'd see what all the Aero buzz was about, too - though I had my doubts aboutit running very well, what with only 512M RAM.
Setup of the win partition of the laptop - how it *should* be done (remove all extra crap - trialware and Norton etc, turn off unnecessary services, install FFox/AVG/ZA/etc) - took _over 3 hours_, and this is with the OS ***pre-installed***, and even more amazing - without doing any MS updates... This is still a bare bones OS at this point in time - no office/productivity/fun software, nothing but the basics, a bare minimum. And it won't even let me try Aero - for some reason (might need more RAM, or a better vid card/chipset, or both, or more).:rolleyes:
Then I partitioned the drive, installed Mepis 6.5.02 + an additional 225M of updates and my favorite/needed apps (graphic, code, & video editors, etc), and that whole process took just a little over 1.25 hours, with no reboots at all. Wireless (Broadcom chipset) worked right out of the box, as did proper video resolution, sound, touchpad, etc etc. I've got more software than I'll ever use, and as a bonus - the Beryl 3D window manager works just fine, and is quite impressive.
Funny that this story got posted, one of my searches today was checking to see if I could downgrade the win OS to XP. But the more I think of it, the story of my experience just yesterday only hammers home what I've known for the last 8 years:
MS Windows pretty much just sucks, for me. In every way imaginable.
My experience with Vista underscored just how much Freedom I have had these past 8 years, and how much that means to me.
It is blindingly obvious that this guy got exactly what he was looking for.
The police *followed him in* - so he wasn't even supposed to be there, or had been causing a disturbance outside prior to entering.
Nonetheless, he was allowed in to ask his question - which he wouldn't do without first pontificating (loudly and insistently) on subject matter that we won't ever know if it was really related to his question. (Want to lay odds that said question goes through some serious editing and revising while he rests in the cooler?)
At any point in time after the police asked him to cease and desist with his disruption of Sen. Kerry's rally/talk, he could have quit screaming, could have stopped exacerbating the situation, could have acted like a normal, sane person, not some kook lunatic fringe idiot.
He wanted to be tasered, or in some way publicly treated like a criminal - that was obviously his intent, and then when it happened, he whined like a little wussy.
Actions, meet consequences.
He'll get his 15 minutes, and maybe a leg up on some political conspiracy commentary that he obviously wants to make.
What a fucking idiot.
Sure, mod me Troll, but this guy - he's a meatspace Troll. Geesh, what a fob.
Mr100, I don't think that what you are proposing is really that logical at all, and I think the evidence you are asking for is staring you in the face.:)
Why? Because they're scammers, they could probably care less about 'eater and other sites *just as long as their revenues stay up, or increase*. These scammers will take incredible punishment to their pride if they think there is a chance they'll get money by doing so. Look at some of the reverse scams that have been pulled by 'baiters when the site(s) come back up, and you'll see solid evidence of just how true this is.
They're ONLY in it for the money, their is no "higher purpose" to the scams they pull. They don't care about 'face', or pride, or anything except getting the vics money as fast and as much as they can. Trust me - I've baited, and I've seen and played upon the scammers greed myself. It is extremely evident.
Therefore, to me at least, it follows that they would only devote resources to doing something like this to the 'eater and others if those websites and what they do have been in some way an interruption to their revenue stream.
"Odd way for the author to phrase it. I don't think there's a cause and effect here." - mr100percent
So if the scammers, whatever their ilk, didn't do (or pay to have done) this DDOS attack by the biggest botnot in existence, then... Who Did? And... Why?
The stated goal of a scambaiter is not just to get some sort of a prize from the scammer, it is primarily to deprive the scammer of time and resources they could/would otherwise spend on victims (source: 419eater.com).
Since the scammers had to spend *something* on this attack, that same "something" cannot be spent scamming victims.
Mission Accomplished. And a great example of Cause and Effect. Though perhaps a bit more effect than anticipated.:) BTW, the 'eater has been the victim of DDOS'es before this one, though this might be the biggest such attack to date; they recovered quicker before, and IIRC there weren't as many other sites taken down simultaneously. To me, this big an effort on the part of the scammers shows that the 'eater and other such sites are very much a thorn in the side of the scammers.
Even if this is solely an action by the controllers of the Storm botnet to publicly 'flex their muscles', it is keeping "Storm" (or part of it, at least) busy and away from 'innocents/ignorants', and that fits right into the goals of the anti-scammer sites as well...
Slashdot Mirror
I've been having customers call with all sorts of odd problems since the 'stealth' updates, in particular Firefox quits working.
It even happened on my Vista Basic, post-last-update.
WTF, micorSoft? Trying to get those IE numbers up or something?
Thank Deity that I use Linux for my work and personal computing habits...
This laptop has the same specs, with the exception of the CPU (Celeron M 1.86G), and performance when booting/running Vista is almost exactly what you describe. (For more detail, see my post "Vista setup/3hrs | Linux/1.25hrs with xtra apps" ( http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=305299&cid=20707761 ).
I do plan to upgrade* hardware somewhat, but as it stands, I will only use the Vista install on this machine for 2 things:
1) Occasionally checking how websites render under Internets Exploder (not often - takes too long to get there...), and
2) To be able to replace the disk image if ever needed for a warranty claim.
In short, on this "Basic" machine, Vista is slower than slow, not even really feasible for use; yet Linux flies along, even when running Beryl w/only 64M RAM allocated to video.
--
*It's not needed for my Mepis install, but I plan to add another gig of RAM, and get a better wireless card (the Broadcom chipset causes problems, easily fixed with a Belkin Cardbus that uses an Athero's chipset). For about $75 total (including shipping), I'll have a machine that should work for me for the next several years.
The parent to the above was correct - there is an 'Aero Theme' that can be enabled for Vista Basic, but no 'Aero Glass' transparency or 3D effect/desktop like Beryl.
http://www.ghacks.net/2007/05/13/enable-vista-aero-in-windows-vista-home-basic/
Haven't yet tried this, but will - and will update w/results when I have.
Bought a new Acer laptop yesterday, one which came with Vista Basic. I've been MSFree for 8 years, but I'll leave it on there, since I can use IE to check websites during development. Thought I'd see what all the Aero buzz was about, too - though I had my doubts aboutit running very well, what with only 512M RAM.
:rolleyes:
Setup of the win partition of the laptop - how it *should* be done (remove all extra crap - trialware and Norton etc, turn off unnecessary services, install FFox/AVG/ZA/etc) - took _over 3 hours_, and this is with the OS ***pre-installed***, and even more amazing - without doing any MS updates... This is still a bare bones OS at this point in time - no office/productivity/fun software, nothing but the basics, a bare minimum. And it won't even let me try Aero - for some reason (might need more RAM, or a better vid card/chipset, or both, or more).
Then I partitioned the drive, installed Mepis 6.5.02 + an additional 225M of updates and my favorite/needed apps (graphic, code, & video editors, etc), and that whole process took just a little over 1.25 hours, with no reboots at all. Wireless (Broadcom chipset) worked right out of the box, as did proper video resolution, sound, touchpad, etc etc. I've got more software than I'll ever use, and as a bonus - the Beryl 3D window manager works just fine, and is quite impressive.
Funny that this story got posted, one of my searches today was checking to see if I could downgrade the win OS to XP. But the more I think of it, the story of my experience just yesterday only hammers home what I've known for the last 8 years:
MS Windows pretty much just sucks, for me. In every way imaginable.
My experience with Vista underscored just how much Freedom I have had these past 8 years, and how much that means to me.
Time to make some more donations...
2 bits of advice, that is:
1) Place foot in mouth.
2) Shoot self in foot.
---------------------
Come to think of it, if they'd have had Darl do that, they might still be a "going concern".
---------------------
Good Riddance, to ya' and yer scurvy pox of a lawsuit!
It is blindingly obvious that this guy got exactly what he was looking for.
The police *followed him in* - so he wasn't even supposed to be there, or had been causing a disturbance outside prior to entering.
Nonetheless, he was allowed in to ask his question - which he wouldn't do without first pontificating (loudly and insistently) on subject matter that we won't ever know if it was really related to his question. (Want to lay odds that said question goes through some serious editing and revising while he rests in the cooler?)
At any point in time after the police asked him to cease and desist with his disruption of Sen. Kerry's rally/talk, he could have quit screaming, could have stopped exacerbating the situation, could have acted like a normal, sane person, not some kook lunatic fringe idiot.
He wanted to be tasered, or in some way publicly treated like a criminal - that was obviously his intent, and then when it happened, he whined like a little wussy.
Actions, meet consequences.
He'll get his 15 minutes, and maybe a leg up on some political conspiracy commentary that he obviously wants to make.
What a fucking idiot.
Sure, mod me Troll, but this guy - he's a meatspace Troll. Geesh, what a fob.
ratsfleeingship ;)
Couldn't have happened to a better company.
Let's just hope that Darl etc get some jailtime before it's all said and done with...
...as seen yesterday in that hot video. :/
-----------
Informal poll: Raise your hand if you are surprised that microSoft did/does sneaky updates like this.
What? Noone? Noone at all???
It's expected, by now, and accepted. Sadly.
Same old, same old -and one of the many reasons I've been mS-Free for 8 years...
OK, I'm sold!
Which repository is it in?
Mr100, I don't think that what you are proposing is really that logical at all, and I think the evidence you are asking for is staring you in the face. :)
Why? Because they're scammers, they could probably care less about 'eater and other sites *just as long as their revenues stay up, or increase*. These scammers will take incredible punishment to their pride if they think there is a chance they'll get money by doing so. Look at some of the reverse scams that have been pulled by 'baiters when the site(s) come back up, and you'll see solid evidence of just how true this is.
They're ONLY in it for the money, their is no "higher purpose" to the scams they pull. They don't care about 'face', or pride, or anything except getting the vics money as fast and as much as they can. Trust me - I've baited, and I've seen and played upon the scammers greed myself. It is extremely evident.
Therefore, to me at least, it follows that they would only devote resources to doing something like this to the 'eater and others if those websites and what they do have been in some way an interruption to their revenue stream.
As before, YMMV. Have a good weekend!
"Odd way for the author to phrase it. I don't think there's a cause and effect here." - mr100percent
:) BTW, the 'eater has been the victim of DDOS'es before this one, though this might be the biggest such attack to date; they recovered quicker before, and IIRC there weren't as many other sites taken down simultaneously. To me, this big an effort on the part of the scammers shows that the 'eater and other such sites are very much a thorn in the side of the scammers.
So if the scammers, whatever their ilk, didn't do (or pay to have done) this DDOS attack by the biggest botnot in existence, then... Who Did?
And... Why?
The stated goal of a scambaiter is not just to get some sort of a prize from the scammer, it is primarily
to deprive the scammer of time and resources they could/would otherwise spend on victims (source: 419eater.com).
Since the scammers had to spend *something* on this attack, that same "something" cannot be spent scamming victims.
Mission Accomplished. And a great example of Cause and Effect. Though perhaps a bit more effect than anticipated.
Even if this is solely an action by the controllers of the Storm botnet to publicly 'flex their muscles', it is keeping "Storm" (or part of it, at least) busy and away from 'innocents/ignorants', and that fits right into the goals of the anti-scammer sites as well...
Of course, YMMV.