I am a software developer and have to have a windows based system to run a few windows only programs (otherwise, I would probably use Novell's linux). I just got a new computer quad core zeon 2.5ghz w/ 8 gigs ram and vista 64 bit. It is extremely fast, I can run many demanding programs on it at once and it never swaps to disk. I really love it so far. I was skeptical like you and almost went w/ windows xp (boy am I glad I didn't). I understand your opinion, but what is really going to make it for Vista, is the 64 bit version. More than half of the new systems going out with windows now are using 64 bit Vista and Ram is cheap. If you listen to the tech media, you will think that vista is dying, but if you are watching what fedex and ups trucks are delivering, you'll know it's not. When word gets out how smooth 64 bit vista is with lots of ram, there will be no stopping it.
Loren Heiny
· 1 year ago
As a developer I also use Vista 64-bit on a MacPro (desktop) with 10GB RAM and it runs extremely fast and reliably. The one drawback I have to this set up is that the baseline MacPro doesn't include WIFI and if you want to add it you have to have Apple do it. Other than that, it's a great machine. Drivers work. Performance is solid. The question is on the notebook side whether the performance and resources will catch up with Vista. With Intel's push now around Atom processors and the popularity of machines like the EEE PC, XP may be better timed than Vista.
Randy
· 1 year ago
I mostly agree, but with a couple of notes, especially with item 2. Vista was crapified just to play Blue Ray movies, which how many people use? I think a lot of the extra time required to ship Vista was probably spent getting all the DRM working.
Item number 4 is in the past and has no significance today.
Personally, after maybe 10 years of playing with Linux, I have switched full time to UBUNTU. Until now, I have always run into some sort of show stopper, where I had a task I could not perform under Linux.
Now, many of the tasks I want to perform are easier with Linux, the programs are written for users, not by people trying to sell me stuff I don't want. It is so much faster, and I have more control. Its not perfect, but I have only dual booted into Windows maybe twice in the last 2 months, each for a short time.
My suggestion is to buy a Mac, if you can afford it, otherwise I highly recommend UBUNTU Linux.
Artur
· 1 year ago
Im using it for over a year now and I like it. My next PC will have Vista too. There are little stuff I prefer to XP like search and security. Mac OS X is not an option, I like gaming and cant afford two pcs.
Cheers
Josafat
· 1 year ago
For that argument to hold you have to believe that XP will be around longer than Vista.
Also points 5 and 6 kinda contradict the whole thing. If the operating system does not matter why choose a PC based on which operating system is included.
Brett Nordquist
· 1 year ago
While I run Vista on my work and home machine, I generally agree that there's not much reason to run it over XP. The integrated search works well, but that's not a reason to spend $100's on a new OS. I'm happy to see so little excitement over operating systems because I believe they should remain in the background and let me get on with my work with as few interruptions as possible. Unfortunately, Vista's default settings pester the crap out of you until UAC is turned off. Vista wasn't built with power-users in mind. But now that most of what I want to do is available via the browser, I'm happy to let the OS fade into the background.
Abhishek Mishra
· 1 year ago
a day will come when linux will be popular... very popular... so popular that malware, and virii writers too will shift to it from windows. Now for windows you've got some solid security companies doing security research. and again microsoft itself a giant in itself making fixes to add to the smoothness and security.. so who will be doing this work for free for the users of the large distribution of linux? who would have the time to do so much work without any pay? and sometimes security involves some serious thinking... will people be ready to do it on their own...?
Cthulu
· 1 year ago
For free??? Ubuntu, Redhat, Mandriva, SUSE - the 'large distributions' certainly pay developers.
As for the so called free distros, developers are already working for free, and of course would welcome your donations.
mikepk
· 1 year ago
I mostly agree with your assessment. When I initially heard all the moaning and groaning about Vista, I assumed the issues were overblown, the tech elite casting echo-chamber judgment. Then I had the "pleasure" of using it and I was really quite surprised at how bad it was. The security "nagging dialogs", random UI changes for seemingly no good reason, the perception of general bloat and slow speed, and the lack of compelling new features really surprised me. Most of my Vista using colleagues say the initial negative reaction gets better over time, but like you said, few *love* Vista.
I disagree, however, with the notion that the OS is now at it's feature Apex and that future OS releases are for tweaks and maintenance. There is still lots of room for innovation, both from a user facing and developer standpoint. The object store file system that was supposed to be in Longhorn could have been truly innovative. The "Core" services in later OSX releases were quite useful to developers. I think we're also on the cusp of some new UI paradigms. Physics simulated, touch-based, UI's that mimic and extend real world behaviors I think will start to appear. These UI changes will occur very slowly, the MacBook Air's support for more OS gestures using the trackpad is an example of this "priming" for this new kind of UI.
The truly innovative OS's of the future will be a lot more like blank slates, where the OS and applications will "disappear" from the forefront and the things we're dealing with, documents, photos, maps, etc... will take center stage. The best example of this is the Perceptive Pixel demonstration videos. Those are highlighting the touch display, but what's more interesting to me is that the there is almost no notion of an OS framework around the manipulated on-screen objects. We're a long way from a real usable OS that could follow this model, but it's where I think we're heading.
Brian Heys
· 1 year ago
Vista has the smell of death only in the sense that Windows Me did. When the next generation of Windows comes out, Vista will probably be replaced, and swept under the carpet just as silently.
My laptop runs Vista. Originally, it was the 64-bit version, but I asked HP to send me a replacement 32-bit version instead, as 64-bit wouldn't work with any of my existing peripherals. Since then, I've been running 32-bit Vista just fine - for almost a year now.
That's it - It's fine. Not great, not amazing ... just okay.
Brit
· 1 year ago
"I think Microsoft is in bed with Hollywood, and when they improve an OS they're adding more locks and security cameras for the entertainment industry to control us and spy on us"
I don't know if you're referring to something specific here, but I agree 100%. Just try getting Netflix's 'Watch Anywhere' to work on a custom built computer with a nice graphics card. Apparently, DRM software in Vista can tell Netflix (and subsequently Hollywood) whether you are watching their content in 'too high quality': http://britg.com/2008/06/25/netflixs-drm-turned...
Jim Roepcke
· 1 year ago
You said: "I was having a bunch of problems with XP, one of which was related to the fact that it came of age before wifi did."
Microsoft doesn't deserve a free pass on crappy wifi integration.
It's easy to forget how long ago wifi came about, but in fact 802.11b took off in summer 1999 with the introduction of the first Apple iBook. XP came out in fall 2001, so Microsoft had plenty of time to integrate wifi into the OS and the help text.
Jim
heavyboots
· 1 year ago
@Artur: "Mac OS X is not an option, I like gaming and cant afford two pcs."
Apologies if you know this already, but if not FYI you can install and boot Windows XP (SP2) on any current Intel Mac using the Bootcamp Utility in Leopard. We've got a MacBook with a 2gb Bootcamp partition on it here at work solely for doing Internet Exploder website testing. You could easily make a games partition, particularly if you have a copy of Windows XP laying around from your previous PC...
ampressman
· 1 year ago
I boot my Macbook Pro into Windows Vista for one purpose only - to play the latest version of Civilization that never came out for the Mac. p.s. I got my copy of Vista marked down 80% at a CompUSA store closing sale...
lemon obrien
· 1 year ago
strange you had problems with xp wireless; it's probably a driver/installation issue with the wireless card/component.
i think vista is already dead.
mickysoft abandoned the desktop by creating C#; it needs to do what apple did when moving from 9 to X. except mickysoftt has nothing new.
xp/vista sucks not just b/c of malware; but that is a good case; it sucks because the os is sooo jimmy-rigged together.
and for your information dave; not much is being done through "just" a browser.
like hybrid cars, we're creating hybrid apps.
check itunes for example.
and; if you check apple's os/x developer's list; it has tons of action going on. so, like me, most developers are using macs with vmware; and are either porting to os x, or just using vmware as a dev environment.
The assertion is that Vista's security has been pretty thoroughly broken. Read it yourself...
Brent Ashley
· 1 year ago
Hi Dave!
I think you should load up eeeXubuntu on your eee instead of windows. It is a Linux distribution specifically bundled with all the eeePC drivers. You can even install it onto a 4G SDHC card and still boot into Windows from the SSD when you want to.
I have used it with great success as a media machine. The Amarok music player even recognizes when an iPod is plugged in and connects to it smoothly.
It won't be long before you don't care to boot up on the Win partition any more.
David Terei
· 1 year ago
I understand your argument that Vista is a dead OS, even microsoft seems to be trying to get rid of it asap and move onto windows 7. I don't understand why this is a problem so much though? I'm very OS agnostic now, both in terms of which MS OS or using Linux or Mac. I use all three regularly (home = xp, vista, work = mac, linux). All the apps I use are cross platform and easy to change between platform with.
I use vista since I purchased a new laptop about 5 months ago and quite like it. It does have problems but the main issue I think is that it offers few compelling reasons to upgrade to it over XP. However I do prefer it over XP, its just not worth the hassle or money to change to it unless you are reinstalling your OS anyway.
Darren
· 1 year ago
I think there might be great improvement in operating systems. Just not ones based on the same concepts from the 60's and 70's. Completely breaking away might make for an exciting revolution, but it won't happen with Windows or UNIX compatibility.
jobol
· 1 year ago
My first disqus comment. As I mentioned on FriendFeed, I agree that there really is no need for new OSes. Linux is a good example, it has just a version number that keeps incrementing. It'll probably always be called Linux. An exception might be if MS makes a complete rewrite, perhaps a windows-less OS, is it the promise of Midori?
Dave
· 1 year ago
I feel that it is a shame that they (Microsoft) just cannot spend a bit more time fixing windows xp, instead of bringing out a new windows version's like vista that need more and more fixers and patch's.
I have been getting used to ubuntu and found it to be very good so far.
Assuming the usage rate is consistent around the world… 1.46 billion * 17.85% = 260 million Vista internet users
The actually user base would be significantly less (i.e. 180 million as per MS sales) than the above number only if for some reason, Vista users surf the internet WAY MORE than all other OS's to skew the percentage up to 17.85%. It’s probably more likely that that some Vista users don’t use the internet much because it’s for work mostly. Hence there is likely more than 260 million Vista users.
Hitslink logs statistics in the “rich” (and more regulated) nations. Here Vista adoption is probably held back a little by expense. So that could mean that Vista adoption in other “poorer” (Gov’t don’t give a crap) nations is much greater than 17.85% since you can like buy it at the local fruit shop for like $1, etc.
I don't really know what the markup of it is but let's assume that they make $100 off each license on average (which is a conservative estimate wouldn't you say?).
If my math is correct, that's $18 billion dollars as of the last public sales figures. If my math is correct again...that's TRIPLE the initial costs!
Of course they likely spent a little more after-market like for Jerry Seinfeld and stuff like that but I don't think it’s anywhere near $12 billion dollars.
And Bill Gates says that's the best billions he has spent. Phht, can you relate to that???
Fritzo
· 1 year ago
I know I'm late to this conversation, but I just had to add something:
The reason you were having an issue with not being able to see your wireless adapter on your Eee PC had nothing to with WinXP. There's a switch on that PC that turns the wireless card on/off in order to save battery time. If it wasn't showing up, you had it "off", so Windows didn't know it was there. Once you turn it on, the wireless icon will show up and you can continue on your merry way.
So, this was more of a "I didn't read my owner's manual" than "WinXP didn't tell me what to do" problem.
Konrad
· 1 year ago
Dave, this is a really ill thought out piece in many ways but I will just point out two.
While XP had big problems with malware Vista has much better security and is in fact the most secure OS around as proved recently by Dino Dai Zovi at MacBook Pro Hijack.
Also points 4 and 6 plainly contradict one another.
Brian Baldridge
· 1 year ago
Could Vista fail? How do you define failure?
Vista is the second most popular OS in history. Right after XP.
dotcoma
· 1 year ago
How (in the world) do YOU define success? I seem not to understand how something that doesn't work well, that has huge issues of every kind (compatibility, security etc), that people don't want, that people keep on dissing in favour of a 7-year-old OS (XP), that people "downgrade" to XP etc - can be defined as a success. Especially when it took something like 6 years to put out this crappy OS, and probably more money than was needed to land man on the Moon...
djsonic
· 1 year ago
I may be naive and green on the issue but from what I have seen, Vista is more stable than XP. Granted, the media and public perception has not been so welcoming on the OS and on Microsoft. Some people say that Vista can be equated to Windows ME, does anyone think that Windows 7 will be the new XP?
livewire120v
· 1 year ago
If windows 7 is the new XP, I am through with microsoft. I do not know where people get the XP kick because all I did was fix my (and everybody elses) BSOD, BSOD, BSOD. Sorry, I had a flash back. I have 3 systems with Vista and no problems. This was MS last chance with me and they pulled it off. I have no problem with going to Linux if MS screws up, just not Apple. Yuk
Bill
· 1 year ago
Your point that there is nothing but silence coming from MS is demonstrably incorrect. Check out blogs.msdn.com, blogs.technet.com, and channel9.com for starters. Channel 9, Scoble's brain child, is especially good - several very long videos drilling into the core archetecture of the system. The two blogs.* sites host several thousand employee blogs.
dave
· 1 year ago
Everyone has their a point of view. To you Microsoft seems very noisy and in touch with bloggers. To me there is silence. Neither view is right or wrong, or invalid.
All Comments
Item number 4 is in the past and has no significance today.
Personally, after maybe 10 years of playing with Linux, I have switched full time to UBUNTU. Until now, I have always run into some sort of show stopper, where I had a task I could not perform under Linux.
Now, many of the tasks I want to perform are easier with Linux, the programs are written for users, not by people trying to sell me stuff I don't want. It is so much faster, and I have more control. Its not perfect, but I have only dual booted into Windows maybe twice in the last 2 months, each for a short time.
My suggestion is to buy a Mac, if you can afford it, otherwise I highly recommend UBUNTU Linux.
Cheers
Also points 5 and 6 kinda contradict the whole thing. If the operating system does not matter why choose a PC based on which operating system is included.
Now for windows you've got some solid security companies doing security research. and again microsoft itself a giant in itself making fixes to add to the smoothness and security..
so who will be doing this work for free for the users of the large distribution of linux? who would have the time to do so much work without any pay? and sometimes security involves some serious thinking... will people be ready to do it on their own...?
Ubuntu, Redhat, Mandriva, SUSE - the 'large distributions' certainly pay developers.
As for the so called free distros, developers are already working for free, and of course would welcome your donations.
I disagree, however, with the notion that the OS is now at it's feature Apex and that future OS releases are for tweaks and maintenance. There is still lots of room for innovation, both from a user facing and developer standpoint. The object store file system that was supposed to be in Longhorn could have been truly innovative. The "Core" services in later OSX releases were quite useful to developers. I think we're also on the cusp of some new UI paradigms. Physics simulated, touch-based, UI's that mimic and extend real world behaviors I think will start to appear. These UI changes will occur very slowly, the MacBook Air's support for more OS gestures using the trackpad is an example of this "priming" for this new kind of UI.
The truly innovative OS's of the future will be a lot more like blank slates, where the OS and applications will "disappear" from the forefront and the things we're dealing with, documents, photos, maps, etc... will take center stage. The best example of this is the Perceptive Pixel demonstration videos. Those are highlighting the touch display, but what's more interesting to me is that the there is almost no notion of an OS framework around the manipulated on-screen objects. We're a long way from a real usable OS that could follow this model, but it's where I think we're heading.
My laptop runs Vista. Originally, it was the 64-bit version, but I asked HP to send me a replacement 32-bit version instead, as 64-bit wouldn't work with any of my existing peripherals. Since then, I've been running 32-bit Vista just fine - for almost a year now.
That's it - It's fine. Not great, not amazing ... just okay.
I don't know if you're referring to something specific here, but I agree 100%. Just try getting Netflix's 'Watch Anywhere' to work on a custom built computer with a nice graphics card. Apparently, DRM software in Vista can tell Netflix (and subsequently Hollywood) whether you are watching their content in 'too high quality':
http://britg.com/2008/06/25/netflixs-drm-turned...
Microsoft doesn't deserve a free pass on crappy wifi integration.
It's easy to forget how long ago wifi came about, but in fact 802.11b took off in summer 1999 with the introduction of the first Apple iBook. XP came out in fall 2001, so Microsoft had plenty of time to integrate wifi into the OS and the help text.
Jim
Apologies if you know this already, but if not FYI you can install and boot Windows XP (SP2) on any current Intel Mac using the Bootcamp Utility in Leopard. We've got a MacBook with a 2gb Bootcamp partition on it here at work solely for doing Internet Exploder website testing. You could easily make a games partition, particularly if you have a copy of Windows XP laying around from your previous PC...
p.s. I got my copy of Vista marked down 80% at a CompUSA store closing sale...
i think vista is already dead.
mickysoft abandoned the desktop by creating C#; it needs to do what apple did when moving from 9 to X.
except mickysoftt has nothing new.
xp/vista sucks not just b/c of malware; but that is a good case; it sucks because the os is sooo jimmy-rigged together.
and for your information dave; not much is being done through "just" a browser.
like hybrid cars, we're creating hybrid apps.
check itunes for example.
and; if you check apple's os/x developer's list; it has tons of action going on. so, like me, most developers are using macs with vmware; and are either porting to os x, or just using vmware as a dev environment.
you think about your desktop stuff again;
The assertion is that Vista's security has been pretty thoroughly broken. Read it yourself...
I think you should load up eeeXubuntu on your eee instead of windows. It is a Linux distribution specifically bundled with all the eeePC drivers. You can even install it onto a 4G SDHC card and still boot into Windows from the SSD when you want to.
I have used it with great success as a media machine. The Amarok music player even recognizes when an iPod is plugged in and connects to it smoothly.
It won't be long before you don't care to boot up on the Win partition any more.
I use vista since I purchased a new laptop about 5 months ago and quite like it. It does have problems but the main issue I think is that it offers few compelling reasons to upgrade to it over XP. However I do prefer it over XP, its just not worth the hassle or money to change to it unless you are reinstalling your OS anyway.
I have been getting used to ubuntu and found it to be very good so far.
OK here’s some rough calculations:
17.85% of internet users are Vista
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/report.aspx?qpr...
1.46 billion internet users
http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm
Assuming the usage rate is consistent around the world…
1.46 billion * 17.85% = 260 million Vista internet users
The actually user base would be significantly less (i.e. 180 million as per MS sales) than the above number only if for some reason, Vista users surf the internet WAY MORE than all other OS's to skew the percentage up to 17.85%. It’s probably more likely that that some Vista users don’t use the internet much because it’s for work mostly. Hence there is likely more than 260 million Vista users.
Hitslink logs statistics in the “rich” (and more regulated) nations. Here Vista adoption is probably held back a little by expense. So that could mean that Vista adoption in other “poorer” (Gov’t don’t give a crap) nations is much greater than 17.85% since you can like buy it at the local fruit shop for like $1, etc.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_sof_pir_r...
Hey, if you include ALL of Asia? 500 million Vista users??? ;)
Vista - a $6 Billion Dollars Operating System
http://news.softpedia.com/news/Vista-a-6-Billio...
I don't really know what the markup of it is but let's assume that they make $100 off each license on average (which is a conservative estimate wouldn't you say?).
If my math is correct, that's $18 billion dollars as of the last public sales figures.
If my math is correct again...that's TRIPLE the initial costs!
Of course they likely spent a little more after-market like for Jerry Seinfeld and stuff like that but I don't think it’s anywhere near $12 billion dollars.
And Bill Gates says that's the best billions he has spent. Phht, can you relate to that???
The reason you were having an issue with not being able to see your wireless adapter on your Eee PC had nothing to with WinXP. There's a switch on that PC that turns the wireless card on/off in order to save battery time. If it wasn't showing up, you had it "off", so Windows didn't know it was there. Once you turn it on, the wireless icon will show up and you can continue on your merry way.
So, this was more of a "I didn't read my owner's manual" than "WinXP didn't tell me what to do" problem.
While XP had big problems with malware Vista has much better security and is in fact the most secure OS around as proved recently by Dino Dai Zovi at MacBook Pro Hijack.
Also points 4 and 6 plainly contradict one another.
Vista is the second most popular OS in history. Right after XP.
I have no problem with going to Linux if MS screws up, just not Apple. Yuk