Windows Vista

[Ivan Rajevic]

8.04 LTS is out.

 

I use XP SP2 on one machine, Ubuntu on another, and Xubuntu on an older AMD K5 machine.

 

Heh. Already had it installed since Alpha 6 :-)

 

I reinstalled the official release on both my laptops (home and work) after it came out. No real reason for it, except that I wasn't comfortable with patches on top of patches. Old Windows habits die hard :-)

 

Lots of improvements, especially with wireless and power savings (suspend/hibernate). These two were always problematic with Linux. Now everything "just works".

Edited April 30, 2008 by Ivan Rajevic

[Corinthian]

Vista+Norton=Doomsday

 

Had an intern* cry on me yesterday when the files she was working on were deleted by Norton. I tried to look for the missing file, perhaps it might be in Quarantine but then I realized I was looking at a machine running Vista. The whole OS was not helpful. All of it looked confusing. I didn't want to revert it to classic mode since it was someone else's 'puter.** I tried looking for Norton but the said program wasn't helpful at all.

 

Intern said she'll be doing her work (a week's worth) instead at home and will be emailing it to me over the weekend.

 

* - quite pretty.

 

** - the intern asked permission from the "owner"'s computer to use it. He agreed. Later on, he was complaining, saying she shouldn't have used it. She reminded him that she asked permission. The jackass didn't listen to her, just grumbled and told her to leave. What a jackass. Poor girl. Does Vista+Norton make computer users jackasses???

[Ssnake]

McAfee and Norton consistently fail my minimum requirements for security solutions for years now. I simply don't understand their still strong market position in the light of their abysmal performance - signatures being days behind new virus releases, all the packages being years behind full NTFS support, creating a false sense of security, nonsensical default settings, damaging behavior in combination with an unacceptably high false positive alarm rate - I culd go on nad on.

 

This is not primarily a Vista problem, but one of bad software maintenance/development. For the end user however the combination can be fatal, as shown in your example.

[Sandstig]

End the XP license in June? Wat dat mean?

 

Microsoft announced last September that XP would no longer be sold by 2008-06-30. XP Starter Edition would still be sold in emerging markets until 2010-06-30, but that version's pretty limited in comparison. HP and Dell are planning to work around this until 2010 by offering pre-downgraded options on the PCs they sell with either Vista Business or Ultimate. Support (patches etc) for XP SP2 is supposed to end 24 months after the release of XP SP3. Support for XP is supposed to continue until 2014 and Ballmer recently stated that with enough demand they'll continue to sell XP past 30 June.

 

Personally, I've had Vista on this machine since 2007-05 and haven't experienced any major problems. I found UAC's popups annoying at the start (still find Ubuntu's prompts less intrusive), but they seem to have lessened. There were issues with software like PDF Creator and OpenVPN-GUI, but those things are working now. Still no drivers from Canon that work with my LiDE 30, despite Canon claiming to support it, but I've got it working on XSane anyway. I do recall I had a hell of a time getting BF2: SF to work properly, but I blame that more on that particular game and its copy protection methods than on Vista. Agree that some of the changes feel like changes for the sake of change, but I have to admit, the search function works a hell of a lot better, and UAC is a step in the right direction compared to the way user accounts were handled in XP.

 

Ssnake, if you need to test on a lot of Microsoft's operating systems, it might be more cost-effective to get a TechNet Plus subscription. It costs around €150 per year (in Sweden anyway) and you get access to almost all of Microsoft's software (except dev tools) plus pre-release software and SPs. (NVM if you've already got that or an MSDN subscription )

[Sikkiyn]

Ssnake, any plans on making a SB Linux, or has my search missed it if it does exist?

[Corinthian]

My coworker's Vista Basic laptop is in the dumps. Vista boots and upon logging in, all she sees is a green screen and the mouse cursor, and nothing more. We tried booting to safe mode. The only difference is that the screen is black, with the words "Safe Mode" at the border. Tried booting using the "Boot to last known good configuration." Green screen, nothing more.

 

Vista sucks. I told her to buy XP ASAP.

[Sandstig]

What applications does she NEED to run in Windows? If there aren't any, might be worth considering another OS altogether.

[Corinthian]

Practically everything Edward. She's not a techie too and has no patience to try out a new OS. And there would be compatible problems too with the rest of the computers (i.e., Word, etc) even if we say there're programs that convert documents to Word format etc. I think Vista will be reinstalled instead. I tried installing an antivirus BTW in her system (AVG 8.0), but it seems Vista rejects it (installation always failed, even with the UAC turned off).

[Ssnake]

Ssnake, any plans on making a SB Linux, or has my search missed it if it does exist?

No such plans. No discernible customer benefit other than saving the Windows license - no market (would the fraction of Linux users buying SB Pro any higher than the fraction of Windows users? And what's the market share of Linux users that do not at the same time have Windows available?). In short, it'd be a PITA to port a DirectX application to Linux/OpenGL and no discernible profit. I seriously doubt that we could break even with such a move even when not calculating in the cannibalization effects that it would have on Windows sales, and I'm not even remotely talking about a higher return on investment than what the same amount of effort would have in further developing SB Pro for Windows and not just a mere port.

 

Were we to start from scratch, who knows?

[JWB]

Got Vista with a new Dell for B'day from dad. Tried to tell him to get HP with XP but he doesn't listen. That was in Jan 08 and it has already crashed. Took me 45 min. just to get the thing into self repair mode and 15 min later it finally re-booted. Since then I have to enter password twice just to get to desktop. Is there any way I can bypass password sign-in and go straight to desktop after start up?

[Ssnake]

Let's do some testing first. Try to create a new user account and see how often you need to enter the password then to access it. Maybe the process will give aou a hint about what to change with your regular user account.

[Juan Sosa]

I bought a new HP laptop with Vista Home Premium about a year ago. So far I've had no problems with stability or performance. I use it primarily for photo editing and management plus basic web surfing and document editing. There have been times where I've gone without rebooting it for weeks at a time, and only shut it down because I wanted to conserve as much battery as possible while on trips.

 

From personal experience I don't see what all the noise is about. Admitedly, I am not trying to do anything fancy with it.

[DesertFox]

I was just eying a dual core laptop at best buys today......I was trying to figure out how large the windows directory was.

It was still climbing at 10 gigs when I shrugged but even worse it was taking what seemed like forever to actually look at the directory.

[Mike Steele]

I was just eying a dual core laptop at best buys today......I was trying to figure out how large the windows directory was.

It was still climbing at 10 gigs when I shrugged but even worse it was taking what seemed like forever to actually look at the directory.

First item that needs correction:"I was just eying a dual core laptop at best buys today." Best Buy is your first mistake.

[DesertFox]

First item that needs correction:"I was just eying a dual core laptop at best buys today." Best Buy is your first mistake.

 

Well, I just a new (used) laptop so am not really in the market....I was really in there looking at Blue Tooths......

They seem to have them cheaper than anyone else

[5150]

Generally speaking, buying electronics at retail is not the best way to get the best price.

[DesertFox]

Generally speaking, buying electronics at retail is not the best way to get the best price.

 

Where would you go for a blue tooth?

[5150]

A blueberry jaw breaker?

 

What's a blue tooth? That's like asking where a person would go for wireless--well, what kind of wireless? I buy most of my electronics online, and I have no real loyalty to any given store. I search for the best price and that's the place I go with.

[DesertFox]

A blueberry jaw breaker?

 

What's a blue tooth? That's like asking where a person would go for wireless--well, what kind of wireless? I buy most of my electronics online, and I have no real loyalty to any given store. I search for the best price and that's the place I go with.

 

Sorry, Blue Tooth Headset

[Juan Sosa]

I think I jinxed myself with my earlier post. Last night as I got home from a couple of drinks, I decided to check a few youtube videos. Soon after I fell asleep with the laptop on the bed next to me. A little while latter a loud clicking sound woke me up and I saw the laptop winding down.

 

This morning the computer refused to even acknowledge my attempts to press the power button. Thankfully it is still with the one year warranty.

 

The iPhone has been very helpful today.

[Ivanhoe]

I think I jinxed myself with my earlier post. Last night as I got home from a couple of drinks, I decided to check a few youtube videos. Soon after I fell asleep with the laptop on the bed next to me. A little while latter a loud clicking sound woke me up and I saw the laptop winding down.

 

Sounds like you've got the Vista Blues.

[Juan Sosa]

Turns out that I had a case of Vista Blues indeed.

 

The 'Geek' at best buy made me feel the dumbest I've felt in a decade. Turns out that Vista has a bug where for some unexplained reason in some unexplained situations the power supply stops working. You would think it is a hardware issue, but its actually Vista's doing.

 

The bottom line was that all that was needed was to remove the battery, start up the computer and then insert the battery.... I don't think I have started up a laptop without a battery in 10 years. Since my warranty expired 3 weeks ago, HP wanted 400 bucks just to look at my laptop. Thats just insane.

 

All is good now, but I think I'll replace this HP with a Mac soon. I just need to figure out if it is possible to get my Windows license for some of my key software transferred to Mac.

[Murph]

BTW, I installed Ubuntu linux to dual boot my XP laptop, and Ubuntu works great! Other than games, Ubuntu has everything I'll need (Open Offices does .doc files too). No Vista here, not at all. Vista has become the Windows (blow)ME of operating systems.

[Ivanhoe]

This weekend I replaced Vista Home Basic on my laptop with XP Pro. Ahhh! Much better. I snapped up an OEM version of XP due to its inevitable demise, and was increasingly annoyed with Vista.

 

There's no doubt in my mind that Vista is the Me of the 21st century. The boys in Redmond are surely working day and night to bring Windows VII to the game ASAP.

Edited July 9, 2008 by Ivanhoe

[Sikkiyn]

BTW, I installed Ubuntu linux to dual boot my XP laptop, and Ubuntu works great! Other than games, Ubuntu has everything I'll need (Open Offices does .doc files too). No Vista here, not at all. Vista has become the Windows (blow)ME of operating systems.

 

Glad to see yet another in a large list of happy converts.