All fine in theory, but some explanation as to WHY would be nice instead of just vague references. I'm almost certain it's got to be related to all the DRM nonsense in Vista. And really, any network performance hit from something so simple as playing an MP3 is a problem, because it makes no sense. Ten year old computers can play MP3's. I'm far more interested in WHY this is happening more than anything else.
That's just making excuses. There is absolutely no need on a modern system for realtime priority on MP3 playback. Even hardware audio apps that hog a lot of system, at best, would probably need no more than "Above Normal".
Your argument would good, if it was something other than ordinary MP3 playback. If your system can run Vista, there is no justification whatsoever for this nonsense.
Since 4 gigabytes of ram is considered to be the sweet spot for Vista, I'm amazed they're shipping it on machines with just 1 gig. A lot of the performance issues are the DRM. Doesn't it check something like 5 times a second?
Gaming drives a lot of hardware sales, but I think more and more people are saying "Screw this" to the constant need to upgrade for games. (Like being forced to have a specific generation or higher of card, despite the game not using the features. Battlefield 2 and it's shaders spring to mind, though I can't remember the exact details.) If gaming upgrades slow down, what better than having the whole bloody OS force the upgrade path.
I tend to be extremely cynical about both software and hardware manufacturers, so your theory wouldn't surprise me in the slightest.
MS has always acted in a way that is prejudicial to consumers. I am continually amazed at the number of people who actually went out and BOUGHT Vista. I don't understand why anyone would go to another MS OS until absolutely forced too. I mean even the best case scenario, Vista was going to be far more bugged and problematic than it's older brother XP. Anyone who goes out and spends $250 on an OS clearly has more money than sense.
I just really don't get it. I'm awaiting delivery of my new Dell this week. It's got Vista. First thing I'll be doing is nuking that and replacing with XP (need it for gaming) and Ubuntu. (Sadly the Linux option is only offered in a few countries. Mine isn't one of them.) I don't even plan to boot Vista.
And people are wondering why game performance is so poor under Vista. While graphics drivers are part of it probably, how much other nonsense like this is going under the hood that people haven't discovered yet?
Oh good grief, are people still peddling that tired mantra. I remember first seeing that on here in 1999 for fucks sake! Surely by that notion we should have won by now...
And people think Digg has the power... We're much better.:)
And why copy protect a demo? Starforce did it too. It's SUPPOSEDLY, if you listen to the party line, to prevent "hackers" from using the demo executable to figure out how to bypass the protection on the retail. Of course my theory is it's to get this shit on as many machines as possible. I wound up with Starforce on my machine from a fucking demo of Xpand Rally I think it was.
The story I mentioned was of a town. Basically WalMart said "we're coming to town". Town businesses said "No! Boo I say!" WalMart came to town. Yes, some businesses DID fold. However, MORE businesses opened up in the "retail park" where the WalMart was located. When said WalMart was on the chopping block, the town begged for it to stay because of all the businesses that had sprung up around it. Retail environment for the town didn't die. It changed. You go to any WalMart, and it will not be on it's own. There will be other retail outlets nearby.
I like the question "How big does a store have to be to be considered evil". That's a very good question.
I've been a victim of such things. I used to work in a gas station. Local supermarket opened one, and basically put our place out of business. A tragic tale... Until your realise that the reason it closed was because my boss, who was a multi-millionaire incidentally, refused to lower the prices to compete. Cutting your nose to spite your face I believe the saying is.
Yes, it's all very well when people say "WalMart killed my business" but there are always two sides to every story.
Playing devils advocate, WalMart do have very low prices, and if you're on a low income, they are a great place to shop. There's always the argument made that they kill local businesses. That much is true, sort of, but there was a story recently about a town that didn't want WalMart, but they opened anyway. Then after a few years, for whatever reason, it closed down, and the town wanted it BACK. It didn't KILL local business. It changed it. Other stores opened up near the new WalMart etc...
Their album censorship is nuts. I've known about since I saw a piece on TV about Rob Zombie's "Hellbilly Deluxe" and it played the regular version, and the WalMart version.
Of course what's interesting is they do this with Parental Advisory stuff. The recent Nine Inch Nails album "Year Zero" has no such label on it, despite having quite a few incidences of the F word on it. I wonder if that got past them?
WalMart are considerably evil. But for many, they are an evil necessity.
In my experience, if you're writing for anything other than a big publication, ANY kind of negativity in a piece will get you blackballed, regardless of whether you sugarcoat it. Found this out through experience.
I realize it was a spurious analogy. Fun though.:) But yes, you're probably right about average users.
The one actual friend of mine who was very excited about Vista... Well he installed it, only to discover his soundcard won't work. Nor are Creative planning on releasing a driver for it apparently, so he now has to dualboot XP to play games.
I mean I'm all for dualbooting, but two different Windows installs? Why bother? I mean he really has no need to run Vista anyway. I think he's mad.
Somewhere in my horrendously badly organized bookmarks I have a page bookmarked that was linked on here I believe, to a guy who got 2000 running on a machine with 32 megs of ram. If I recall the story, even Microsoft contacted him to find out how the hell he did it.
I've had a lot of XP crashes lately. Turned out to be bad ram. When that wasn't an issue I can honestly say, hand on heart, that for me, over five years, XP has been very stable. Certainly far more stable than 98 ever was.
I mean it's no Linux in it's uptime certainly, but I routinely have it up for a week or more (OO-ER VICAR!) and nine times out of ten I choose to reboot rather than a crash forcing me too.
"And users can run it dual-boot if they still need their wondows training wheels."
Or if they actually want to play games... I used Linux exclusively for 3+ years. I went back to Windows because I'm a gamer, and could never get this system to dual boot properly. I use race sims which would require my game to work, my wheel and pedals to work etc... It has nothing to do with "training wheels" and everything to do with functionality. I love games. That is STILL the one arena Linux falls over in. Yes, someone will list a bunch of games that run in Linux, and you know what? Most will suck. It doesn't run the games I WANT TO RUN. rFactor, GTR2, Battlefield 2 etc...
Please don't think I'm a Windows supporter because I'm not (well, read my other posts for this story) but to think that the only reason to keep Windows around is because you're a newbie is flat out wrong.
There's a difference between being a Microsoft supporter, and being a realist about Linux.
I've just bought a new Dell. I see no reason it won't work with XP. I'll be nuking Vista the instant it arrives for XP and Ubuntu.
However, what you say is true. As time goes on, it's going to be harder to find systems that work fully with XP. I mean I've seen it already on earlier OS's. Win 98 will NOT play nice with my laptop. Biggest problem was the wireless outright refused to work.
Of course, the hardware manufacturers aren't stupid. If they see Vista sales are so poor, they're not going to dump XP any time soon. My problem with Win 98, that was last year. So 8 years from release. XP is getting close to that, but the difference is XP sold well and supplanted 98. Vista is tanking and XP isn't being supplanted at anything CLOSE to the same rate.
Well my disdain for it has no basis in experience, rather other peoples experience. However, my disdain for shooting myself in the foot with a shotgun is also based on other peoples experience rather than my own. Doesn't make it any less valid.
While some neophytes might base their opinion on no experience, the fact is I'd bet most of the Slashdot crowd know enough to know where the truth lies in regards to Vista, regardless of whether they've used it or not.
Slashdot Mirror
emailing lies to children
That may be the greatest line I've seen an AC post on here in my eight years reading this silly little website.
All fine in theory, but some explanation as to WHY would be nice instead of just vague references. I'm almost certain it's got to be related to all the DRM nonsense in Vista. And really, any network performance hit from something so simple as playing an MP3 is a problem, because it makes no sense. Ten year old computers can play MP3's. I'm far more interested in WHY this is happening more than anything else.
That's just making excuses. There is absolutely no need on a modern system for realtime priority on MP3 playback. Even hardware audio apps that hog a lot of system, at best, would probably need no more than "Above Normal".
Your argument would good, if it was something other than ordinary MP3 playback. If your system can run Vista, there is no justification whatsoever for this nonsense.
Since 4 gigabytes of ram is considered to be the sweet spot for Vista, I'm amazed they're shipping it on machines with just 1 gig. A lot of the performance issues are the DRM. Doesn't it check something like 5 times a second?
Gaming drives a lot of hardware sales, but I think more and more people are saying "Screw this" to the constant need to upgrade for games. (Like being forced to have a specific generation or higher of card, despite the game not using the features. Battlefield 2 and it's shaders spring to mind, though I can't remember the exact details.) If gaming upgrades slow down, what better than having the whole bloody OS force the upgrade path.
I tend to be extremely cynical about both software and hardware manufacturers, so your theory wouldn't surprise me in the slightest.
MS has always acted in a way that is prejudicial to consumers. I am continually amazed at the number of people who actually went out and BOUGHT Vista. I don't understand why anyone would go to another MS OS until absolutely forced too. I mean even the best case scenario, Vista was going to be far more bugged and problematic than it's older brother XP. Anyone who goes out and spends $250 on an OS clearly has more money than sense.
I just really don't get it. I'm awaiting delivery of my new Dell this week. It's got Vista. First thing I'll be doing is nuking that and replacing with XP (need it for gaming) and Ubuntu. (Sadly the Linux option is only offered in a few countries. Mine isn't one of them.) I don't even plan to boot Vista.
I have a 486 DX/100 here. In Linux I can play MP3's and use another console window. Mp3 would occasionally skip but was solid 99.9% of the time.
And people are wondering why game performance is so poor under Vista. While graphics drivers are part of it probably, how much other nonsense like this is going under the hood that people haven't discovered yet?
LOL! Post of the year!
Then they laugh at you...
Then they fight you...
Then you win...
Oh good grief, are people still peddling that tired mantra. I remember first seeing that on here in 1999 for fucks sake! Surely by that notion we should have won by now...
And people think Digg has the power... We're much better.:)
And why copy protect a demo? Starforce did it too. It's SUPPOSEDLY, if you listen to the party line, to prevent "hackers" from using the demo executable to figure out how to bypass the protection on the retail. Of course my theory is it's to get this shit on as many machines as possible. I wound up with Starforce on my machine from a fucking demo of Xpand Rally I think it was.
you saw, you conquered?
All I can say is near my local WalMart, yes, there are big chains, but there are also a good number of smaller non-chain restaurants and shops.
The story I mentioned was of a town. Basically WalMart said "we're coming to town". Town businesses said "No! Boo I say!" WalMart came to town. Yes, some businesses DID fold. However, MORE businesses opened up in the "retail park" where the WalMart was located. When said WalMart was on the chopping block, the town begged for it to stay because of all the businesses that had sprung up around it. Retail environment for the town didn't die. It changed. You go to any WalMart, and it will not be on it's own. There will be other retail outlets nearby.
I like the question "How big does a store have to be to be considered evil". That's a very good question.
I've been a victim of such things. I used to work in a gas station. Local supermarket opened one, and basically put our place out of business. A tragic tale... Until your realise that the reason it closed was because my boss, who was a multi-millionaire incidentally, refused to lower the prices to compete. Cutting your nose to spite your face I believe the saying is.
Yes, it's all very well when people say "WalMart killed my business" but there are always two sides to every story.
Playing devils advocate, WalMart do have very low prices, and if you're on a low income, they are a great place to shop. There's always the argument made that they kill local businesses. That much is true, sort of, but there was a story recently about a town that didn't want WalMart, but they opened anyway. Then after a few years, for whatever reason, it closed down, and the town wanted it BACK. It didn't KILL local business. It changed it. Other stores opened up near the new WalMart etc...
Their album censorship is nuts. I've known about since I saw a piece on TV about Rob Zombie's "Hellbilly Deluxe" and it played the regular version, and the WalMart version.
Of course what's interesting is they do this with Parental Advisory stuff. The recent Nine Inch Nails album "Year Zero" has no such label on it, despite having quite a few incidences of the F word on it. I wonder if that got past them?
WalMart are considerably evil. But for many, they are an evil necessity.
In my experience, if you're writing for anything other than a big publication, ANY kind of negativity in a piece will get you blackballed, regardless of whether you sugarcoat it. Found this out through experience.
As the old saying goes, when you make something idiot proof, someone just builds a better idiot.
I realize it was a spurious analogy. Fun though.:) But yes, you're probably right about average users.
The one actual friend of mine who was very excited about Vista... Well he installed it, only to discover his soundcard won't work. Nor are Creative planning on releasing a driver for it apparently, so he now has to dualboot XP to play games.
I mean I'm all for dualbooting, but two different Windows installs? Why bother? I mean he really has no need to run Vista anyway. I think he's mad.
That would have made a MUCH better headline for the article. In fact yes, the whole towel analogy makes Louderback look like the failure.
Oh I wish I had mod points. You deserve more than a meager +2 for the chuckle you just gave me.
You're a troll and will probably not reply, but please, what can Windows 95 do that Linux can't? Aside from crash far more regularly that is.
Somewhere in my horrendously badly organized bookmarks I have a page bookmarked that was linked on here I believe, to a guy who got 2000 running on a machine with 32 megs of ram. If I recall the story, even Microsoft contacted him to find out how the hell he did it.
I've had a lot of XP crashes lately. Turned out to be bad ram. When that wasn't an issue I can honestly say, hand on heart, that for me, over five years, XP has been very stable. Certainly far more stable than 98 ever was.
I mean it's no Linux in it's uptime certainly, but I routinely have it up for a week or more (OO-ER VICAR!) and nine times out of ten I choose to reboot rather than a crash forcing me too.
"And users can run it dual-boot if they still need their wondows training wheels."
Or if they actually want to play games... I used Linux exclusively for 3+ years. I went back to Windows because I'm a gamer, and could never get this system to dual boot properly. I use race sims which would require my game to work, my wheel and pedals to work etc... It has nothing to do with "training wheels" and everything to do with functionality. I love games. That is STILL the one arena Linux falls over in. Yes, someone will list a bunch of games that run in Linux, and you know what? Most will suck. It doesn't run the games I WANT TO RUN. rFactor, GTR2, Battlefield 2 etc...
Please don't think I'm a Windows supporter because I'm not (well, read my other posts for this story) but to think that the only reason to keep Windows around is because you're a newbie is flat out wrong.
There's a difference between being a Microsoft supporter, and being a realist about Linux.
I've just bought a new Dell. I see no reason it won't work with XP. I'll be nuking Vista the instant it arrives for XP and Ubuntu.
However, what you say is true. As time goes on, it's going to be harder to find systems that work fully with XP. I mean I've seen it already on earlier OS's. Win 98 will NOT play nice with my laptop. Biggest problem was the wireless outright refused to work.
Of course, the hardware manufacturers aren't stupid. If they see Vista sales are so poor, they're not going to dump XP any time soon. My problem with Win 98, that was last year. So 8 years from release. XP is getting close to that, but the difference is XP sold well and supplanted 98. Vista is tanking and XP isn't being supplanted at anything CLOSE to the same rate.
Well my disdain for it has no basis in experience, rather other peoples experience. However, my disdain for shooting myself in the foot with a shotgun is also based on other peoples experience rather than my own. Doesn't make it any less valid.
While some neophytes might base their opinion on no experience, the fact is I'd bet most of the Slashdot crowd know enough to know where the truth lies in regards to Vista, regardless of whether they've used it or not.
nneonneo: Wow, that was a hell of a read and, I'm sorry to say, very funny:) Though I imagine you were anything but laughing.
So I assume you're back on XP now:)