Vista

dave_t

Why do people switch to Vista? I understand if its on a new PC but otherwise I don't see the point. It's crap

Maximilian

Peer pressure. All the kids on Bebo are doing it.

dave_t

Really? I didn't know that, I'm off to get a copy of Vista! haha I really don't understand it though. I'm not gonna start preaching Linux or anything but Ubuntu is something to think about dual-booting with XP maybe. Options are nice

dulpit

Ya that really does confuse me, why spend like €200 odd (more?) on a new O.S. when you could buy a new PC with it installed for like €500...

I'm of the opinion that it's pointless for most users to buy vista in a shop & install it, but if buying a new PC get it with Vista...

Villain

It's crap

Well seeing as you have researched the topic and provided such great detail on why its crap I'd say you probably should be able to tell us why people shouldn't change?

Dorsanty

I switched.

I have a Mac laptop and got really used to it's features like Expose and other ways to quickly flick between windows. So when I went onto my XP desktop I found myself being aggravated by the things it didn't do.

I still think the windows flip 3D is crap in comparison but it's still a cool way to flick and my mouse has a special button to use it. So that's cool.

Also found myself using spotlight on the mac and so I now find myself using the built in search in Vista to find my programs etc.

Only other reason that made me switch is my eventual upgrade to DX 10. I'm currently on a 7900 GT card and was waiting for a good game. I got BioShock from Steam yesterday and now want to see it run on DX 10.

Only problem is I want to wait until Nvidia's second gen DX 10 cards. Meant to be out start of next year the Geforce 9 series. Also PCI Express is meant to become PCI Express II sometime next year. Then there's AMDs Phenom procs which will do proper Quad-core and rumored to use DDR3. Damn this technology chasing.

the_syco

Vista sucks. I know: I support it:D

1GB of RAM with Vista equals 256MB of RAM with XP.

You get the Vista Basic Home OEM version for €89 but that's sh|te.

TBH, get a Dell, and you'll have the option of getting XP on it. Dell put the XP option back on a few weeks after they went over to Vista, as any low end system that would work grand with XP, was slower than a snail superglued to the wall with Vista.

tman

Sure why bother upgrading your OS at all?
I still use 3.1 for workgroups on my new dual core rig with 2GB ram.

(it's €110 for the home premium version of Vista on Komplett btw, that's hardly going to break the bank for people who are building their own pcs...)

Villain

I have Vista Ultimate running on P4 Dell with 1.5gb of RAM and it flys, OK I have disabled almost every seurity function.

BKtje

as any low end system that would work grand with XP, was slower than a snail superglued to the wall with Vista.

You wouldn't play the latest games on a 3 or 4yr old machine and expect it to run, why is it any different with an OS?

Sure why switch to XP when win2000 worked so well, or why even go to w2k from 98se? Each OS jump requires an increase in the machine specs and the ram needed to run it, why would you expect any differently in this case?

Vista has quite a lot that Xp didn't have and all those extra gadgets/visuals/security/ whatever needs extra power and ram.
If you dont want those changes/upgrades then don't switch but if you do...do. Not rocket science.

Capt'n Midnight

tman wrote:

Sure why bother upgrading your OS at all?
I still use 3.1 for workgroups on my new dual core rig with 2GB ram.

Best thing to do is make a RAM drive with a 256MB swap file on it and have the Temp folder there too. And SMARTDRV is a must

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/84388 - make sure you have a decent HIMEM.SYS

also look at
http://www.computing.net/windows31/wwwboard/forum/11762.html

echoindia756

Guys, give Bill Gates a chance, vista rocks in so many ways, everything new has it's flaws. Wait till SP1 comes out, let's see the critics criticise then;)
Personally, I think Vista will be a must for gamers in the near future, why? because it has DirectX 10, which has stunning graphics.
I also like how Vista looks, all this aero 3d, flip whatever it's called, it's cool. I love it, XP is just not the same.

I agree with everyone on the memory, but soon enough 1gb will be old news, 2gb will be old news, 4gb is slowly coming in.

CptSternn

Wow, it's like we have gone back to 2003 in this thread.

'Why should I install XP - it's crap'

The thing is, you really don't have a choice. You could keep running XP, but in 2008 when they stop supporting it you won't have any new patches, fixes, or drivers since they won't be making anymore.

Also, all new hardware will not be compatible. You better stockpile printer cartridges and pray your old XP compatible printer doesn't die.

All new software (like Office) will only work on Vista, so your going to have to find another solution for opening your work documents.

Forget about sites like YouTube and other high-bandwidth sites that use the latest and greatest technology. Ask anyone running WindowsME how well videos in YouTube work. As the web technologies move forward, unless you upgrade you won't be able to take advantage of such advances.

And lets not forget about gaming. ALL new games now require Direct X 10 (well, all of the good games). Overlord, Shadowrun, Bioshock, all the new games that have came out for the past 2 months now require Direct X 10 - meaning you MUST have Vista to play them.

Since the XBox360 is now doing cross platform gaming and it too uses Direct X 10, most all game manufactures are now writing their games to be played on both, but you can only take advantage of this if you are using Vista.

But hey, if you want to hang on to XP and blast Vista, be my guest. I know a guy with on of those Ennis Information Age PC's (P2/233) running Windows98 that constantly tells me thats all he needs to get what he needs done.

...of course he has started going to the local internet cafe to watch YouTube videos that he gets via email since his PC won't even open the YouTube website.

The biggest way to convince people to go ahead and get Vista is this:

How many people reading this are doing it on a PC running Windows 3.11? Windows 95? Windows 98?

Need I say more?

BKtje

but in 2008 when they stop supporting

I was under the impression thats when they stop selling it, not stop supporting it.
They recently announced another 4 more years of support or something iirc.

BKtje

Hmm double post goodness

MartMax

i use Vista just for few good (maybe not) reasons:

first, i got it free from the launch last year.

second, recently upgraded my oldie Pentium 4 Prescott to Core 2 Duo with new harddrive, graphic card, et.c therefore, i thought it was an opportunity to bring it on Vista.

third, it looks nice as an eye candy. all applications and game that i have run nicely or at least they work more than good enuff. surely there are few bogs up and down but bearable.

that's why i use Vista

Marty

Yakuza

echoindia756 wrote:

I agree with everyone on the memory, but soon enough 1gb will be old news, 2gb will be old news, 4gb is slowly coming in.

Unless you have a 64-bit version of Vista or XP, any more than 3GB will be ignored by the OS, as it reserves that upper gig of the 32-bit address space for itself for device drivers etc.

CptSternn wrote:

All new software (like Office) will only work on Vista, so your going to have to find another solution for opening your work documents.

Office 2007 works fine on XP, and you can also download a compatibily pack from MS for Office 2003 to read 2007 documents (or in 2007, save them in "97-2003" format).

Capt'n Midnight

Yakuza wrote:

Office 2007 works fine on XP, and you can also download a compatibily pack from MS for Office 2003 to read 2007 documents (or in 2007, save them in "97-2003" format).

The compabitily pack also works with office 2000 and besides you can get openoffice.

For production use there is NO point in getting VISTA for a machine that is more than two or three years old, because the cost of upgrading the RAM and Video card to get the full benefit out of all the new vista features coupled with the price of a retail copy is very close to an entry level PC with Vista pre-installed.

Fine if you want to learn about it or have a free copy though.

SP1 is due at the end of the year.

Creamy Goodness

capt. can openoffice open the new format in office 2007, .docx ?

juror

dave_t wrote:

Why do people switch to Vista? I understand if its on a new PC but otherwise I don't see the point. It's crap

Unlimited undo in paint!!! ... i'm off to buy it now!

Soundman

Using Vista Business here. Was all against Vista to begin with as a lot of people seem to be. Once I got it with a new laptop I was still a little unsure but it was all down to a botched install on Lenovo's behalf. Once I re-installed it was all sweet. Did a few tweaks which I found online and the usual disabling services taht everyone does on XP and I have a beast of a machine. I'm really liking Vista now.

I do think that the reason so many people seem to hate Vista without properly trying it is just down to a fear of change. A fear of breaking away from what they have grown used to.

There have been 6 or more fixes released in the last 2 months which have also helped the functionality a good deal so at this stage there is no reason to avoid Vista for it's "bugginess" as there is none. Sure there might be a few issues if you are upgrading due to older hardware but it is getting better and there are ways around the software aspect of it too. Running it in a Windows XP Compatibility situation for one.

mathias

My main reason for going with Vista was Media Centre , I was running a HTPC which I built myself using Win XP MCE , mostly as a music jukebox , the album layout in MCE was good , but Vistas is way better , and so is the search functionality.

Vistas Media Centre optimises the layout for a large screen TV and doesnt waste so much of the screen space as XP MCE did. I love the " Wall of music " layout in Album view.

Yes , it was as buggy as hell to start with , but its not now , especially after loading those two major fix packs a couple of weeks ago. I have no outstanding problems with it at the moment.

CptSternn

Yakuza wrote:

Office 2007 works fine on XP, and you can also download a compatibily pack from MS for Office 2003 to read 2007 documents (or in 2007, save them in "97-2003" format).

2007 might work on XP, but does 2007 work on WindowsME? So it would be safe to assume Office2009 won't work on XP.

Most Office packages are backwards compatible for only the last OS plus the current one.

Maximilian

I have to say I really like Vista - to me its a worthy improvement on XP. The multimedia stuff on it is great, it does more than XP does natively, DX10 and it looks great.

I got my copy for free from someone who worked for MS but I can see otherwise how folks would be reluctant to part with the cash. Apart from DX10, there doesn't appear to be anything that you can't do with XP.

Yakuza

CptSternn wrote:

2007 might work on XP, but does 2007 work on WindowsME? So it would be safe to assume Office2009 won't work on XP.

Most Office packages are backwards compatible for only the last OS plus the current one.

You stated it doesn't work on anything *other* than Vista, which is incorrect. I stated that it works fine on XP, didn't mention ME (which is an abomination if you ask me, but that's another thread's work) at all.

A better question would "Does anything work on ME?"

Capt'n Midnight

Cremo wrote:

capt. can openoffice open the new format in office 2007, .docx ?

not yet AFAIK

Word and excel have had the same format for the last 10 years.

The most recent .docx that I've had to convert contained just text, it could have been done on write in windows 3.0

Anyone who sends out documents in the new format better realise that non-technical users won't be able to open them.

Dorsanty

I'm on Vista 32-bit with 2GB ram and a 7900GT card. And proc is a 4200+ Athlon X2.

Got Bioshock through steam a few days ago and nothing but grief. First it couldn't save a game or load the next level. So played the first level 6 times trying to get it to work.

Lots of memory access errors and 2 or 3 low memory issues. WTF?

Anyone else running this game, should I buy a GeForce 8 series? Should I go to 3GB? Not willing to go 64-bit yet under windows. Tried 3-4 times with XP and Vista and it's not worth the hassle of apps and driver hunting.

Please don't tell me my system needs an upgrade. It's only 1.5 years to 2 years old.

CptSternn

Dorsanty wrote:

Got Bioshock through steam a few days ago and nothing but grief. First it couldn't save a game or load the next level. So played the first level 6 times trying to get it to work.

Lots of memory access errors and 2 or 3 low memory issues. WTF?

Anyone else running this game, should I buy a GeForce 8 series? Should I go to 3GB? Not willing to go 64-bit yet under windows. Tried 3-4 times with XP and Vista and it's not worth the hassle of apps and driver hunting.

Similar issues with C&C 3, Overlord, and Neverwinter 2. Did you download and install the latest patch? I know the game only came out last week, but it already has patches. Also, ATI just released a new driver update with drivers specifically for BioShock, I'm betting NVidia has done the same.

All the new games coming out are being released quite buggy these days. It's not an OS issue as much as it is an issue with game companies wanting to meet deadlines and are willing to release buggy stuff and let the consumer update the software on their own if the bugs effect them.

I had similar issues with the games I listed above, I bought them all the day they came out and had to wait as long as a week as in the case of Neverwinter before they patched it so I could even start the game.

Soundman

Dorsanty wrote:

I'm on Vista 32-bit with 2GB ram and a 7900GT card. And proc is a 4200+ Athlon X2.

Got Bioshock through steam a few days ago and nothing but grief. First it couldn't save a game or load the next level. So played the first level 6 times trying to get it to work.

Lots of memory access errors and 2 or 3 low memory issues. WTF?

Anyone else running this game, should I buy a GeForce 8 series? Should I go to 3GB? Not willing to go 64-bit yet under windows. Tried 3-4 times with XP and Vista and it's not worth the hassle of apps and driver hunting.

Please don't tell me my system needs an upgrade. It's only 1.5 years to 2 years old.

Strange. You should be able to play it no problem. I'm running it on a a laptop with:

Vista Business 32bit
C2D T7300 (2GHz)
Nvidia Go7300
2GB RAM

BopNiblets

Vista is better than XP, some cool features like the find as you type through filenames, different sized thumbnails.

It still has some weird kinks like XP did, but nothing too major (826MB in a TEMP folder being one I found recently, lolz)

juror wrote:

Unlimited undo in paint!!! ... i'm off to buy it now!

Paint.NET > Paint!