Windows XP or Vista?
There are two main types of Windows users in the world. Which kind are you:
Windows XP or Windows Vista?
The recent news that testers at Devil Mountain Software found Microsoft’s beta of Windows XP Service Pack 3 to be 10% faster than XP SP2 has pushed me over the edge.
I honestly find no advantage to Windows Vista, and there are some downsides. For example, no matter what Vista advocates say, Vista requires Vista-level hardware. Pentium M/Centrino single-core notebook hardware just doesn’t run it well. Pentium 4 desktop hardware runs it better, but usually that class of hardware needs a video upgrade. I’ve personally seen instabilities with the shipping version of the Vista code: applications freezing, Windows services slowing to a crawl, even OS crashes. I’m not saying everyone is having these problems, but I see no real improvement over Windows XP. While the architecture of Vista is a little better, Vista adds a lot of overhead to support quite a bit of new and sometimes questionable functionality. Vista is a lot more complex than Windows XP. It’s probably more secure, but it still needs a raft of third-party security software and hardware. I don’t trust its anti-malware protection or its firewall. And it doesn’t have an onboard antivirus product.
I have five Windows Vista installations. I’m reducing that number to two, one of which will be in a dual-boot with XP. The Windows Vista installation I have on my main Windows machine was a Vista upgrade install, and it’s the least stable. That’s why it’s getting fresh dual-boot clean installs. The other Vista machine I’m keeping stays in the office, where I don’t use it frequently. If I need other Vista boxes for testing, I’ll set them up as I need them.
The rest of my Windows hardware will shortly revert to pristine Windows XP installations. Windows XP is a mature operating system that’s not trying to be something that it’s not. The user experience is better than Vista’s. There’s no “reduced functionality mode” that will inadvertently trip when Microsoft’s WGA/SPP servers have an outage again.
I hope to test a later release of Windows Vista Service Pack 1, but based on my hands-on use of the first widely distributed beta code and performance testing also conducted by Devil Mountain Software, Vista SP1 is no faster than the original shipping version of the OS. Devil Mountain’s report of XP SP3 being faster than SP2 is very intriguing, though. I’ve been using XP for more than six years, and I’d be perfectly happy to continue using it for another six if Microsoft continued to support it properly.
Until they build something better than Windows XP, I see no reason to switch. As it is packaged today, Windows Vista is not that OS.
Microsoft needs to release a new version of Vista that doesn’t stratify the features (why does CD and DVD burning happen only on the Home versions of the OS, for example?). It needs to unload some of the crap it padded Vista with. And it needs to rethink the user experience with respect to functionalities like UAC and SPP. Enterprises aren’t buying Vista because it offers very little advantage for them, and end users aren’t clamoring for it. Of all companies, Microsoft should know that end-user desire for an OS has a huge effect on how rapidly it’s adopted. The company seems to have forgotten its roots.
I have no doubt that Microsoft could turn Vista around if it wanted to. But it would have to own up to the idea that, with its Vista product and business strategy, it’s been wrong-headed in a number of ways. I’m not so sure that the current management, as Bill Gates continues to edge toward the door, has the technical vision to make the right choices.
Update: Vista SP1 Dumping the ‘Kill Switch’
Microsoft is showing one or two small signs of coming around. First it admitted that the WGA breakdown last August that caused thousands of Vista users to wind up being pegged as software pirates when they couldn’t activate their copies of Vista was, in fact, an “outage.” The company had denied that terminology earlier. Now, Microsoft is eliminating reduced functionality mode — more commonly referred to as Vista’s “Kill Switch.” This change will be implemented by Vista Service Pack 1, which is expected to ship in the first quarter of next year.
Bottom line, though, this is a welcome change, but it doesn’t materially change the user experience at all. Most of us will hopefully never come face to face with reduced functionality mode. And until we actually test what Vista does instead of the kill switch, I’m not prepared to embrace. The Windows Vista RC1 that I’m looking at now still has the kill switch in it.
December 1st, 2007 at 9:53 PM
I’m primarily an OSX user but I do user XP in a virtual environment and I’ve already had client, friends and family start coming to me with Vista issues. While XP is not my favorite OS I don’t hate or Microsoft but I feel they have made some big mistakes in regards to Vista. I hate all the seperate versions. I thought the whole point of XP was to merge the “best” of Windows 98 and Windows 2000 in a code base they was more unified. I can understand selling a Home and Pro version of XP but they went over the line with the 8 version insanity of Vista. One thing I like about OSX and almost every other OS besides Windows is you only have one or two at the most versions to worry about. Thanks for what you have written and what you are saying is confirming what I am telling current XP users.
December 2nd, 2007 at 8:22 AM
I have been using Vista for about 2 weeks now and here are my comments.
I like it except for the bugs, and UAC. I am running it on a cheap Compaq laptop and it seems to run decent enough. I also just found that when you go to rename a file, only the filename and not the extension is highlighted, I like small things like this.
Here is my list of bugs or strange things that I have seen.
1. I tried to change my password, Vista told me that it couldn’t, but it had changed it anyway.
2. I tried to connect to a wireless network at a friends house, vista told me that that the network had no connectivity or something, but I was able to surf just fine
3. Twice now After the system rebooted from a blue screen, the window popped up saying that you can find more information by looking at the log files, or you may go online for more information. I click the button to go online and the window just goes away and never comes back.
4. UAC – this is useless for the majority of users, most of my family and friends don’t have the PC experience that I do and they are going to freak out when this alerts start coming up and they have to decide what to do. I really don’t think that this is a OS for less knowledgeable users. I am afraid of getting calls all of the time asking me if this or that is OK.
I plan to build a new desktop PC soon and I really need to decide if I am going to Vista or stay with XP.
December 2nd, 2007 at 9:26 AM
Hey, I’m curious SomeRandomUser, did you install Vista as an upgrade of XP, or did you clean install it on your Compaq notebook?
Also, by the way, I liked that highlighting the first part of the filename too. I wrote about that feature in one my reviews of Vista last year. There are actually quite a few little niceties like that in Vista.
But as you noticed, it’s not as reliable and the kinks aren’t as well flushed out as they should be for an OS that took over 5 years to create.
December 2nd, 2007 at 11:27 AM
Scot,
Vista was preinstalled on my Compaq F730US notebook
December 2nd, 2007 at 11:57 AM
Wow. Interesting. This is the kind of stuff I’ve been hearing about (more than seeing myself). No way should you be seeing the little problems you’re seeing on a clean-installed version of Vista.
December 2nd, 2007 at 2:22 PM
I purchased a new Dell laptop last May (XPS M1210). Vista Home was preinstalled on it. I also find the User Account Control to be very annoying as there is no option to tell the system to remember that you trust a certain program. I got the Dell because it was the only ultralight laptop I could find that I could get with a graphics card that I knew could handle Final Fantasy XI online. Now every time I want to log in to FFXI, I first have to tell the UAC to allow the program.
I also have had the issue with the popup that says you can find more information that then disappears without giving you the log file or an online link. I’ve had the bluescreen a few times since getting the laptop, and I get that message after restarting Windows normally. The first time it happened, I went through the Windows repair option, and it found nothing wrong with my computer, so ever since, I’ve just restarted normally.
Vista does look nice, and most of the time I have no problems, but I don’t think it was really ready to be sent out to the general public. However, I hesitate to wipe my laptop and install a version of XP that can handle the dual core setup (does a version exist?) as it will then take most of a weekend to reinstall FFXI along with all of it’s updates. *sigh*
December 2nd, 2007 at 2:55 PM
Sounds like we’re all seeing some similar issues.
One thing that might be an option for you. It is possible to turn UAC off entirely. Frankly, I got to that point on all my Vista machines, since I’m the only one who uses them. Here’s how:
Choose Control Panel > User Accounts and Family Safety > User Accounts, then click Turn User Account Control on or off.
– Scot
December 2nd, 2007 at 6:10 PM
Thank you for reminding me about turning UAC off. I remember now that you mentioned it in the newsletter but back then I was not yet annoyed enough to turn it off. Since I also am the only one who uses my laptop, that will work for me, too.
December 3rd, 2007 at 11:46 AM
My experience appears to be substantially less than others. My usage of Windows in any version, is mostly influenced by what we are using at a work, a small University with a similarly limited budget.
The first killer has been that despite all of the advance warning, Novell (the folks who make our network system software) didn’t have a network client ready when Vista was released. They have since come up with one, but it’s only good for WinXP and is *still* doesn’t provide network printing functionality. This is the major hurdle stopping us from adopting Vista.
We have a wireless network with hotspots across campus and many students this year cam to campus with Vista laptops. They reflect the kind of problems you folks have experienced, but for most of them this is their first Windows expreience, and so they don’t know there is any other way to work windows other than being endlessly irritated by popups! And most of them just click whatever button they can to get rid of the popups. I’m certain that will produce problems for us down the road. If nothing else, it should handily drive *more* users to the Mac!
My university, due to budget contraints, is riddled with older computers whose hardware certainly won’t even meet the MS minimums for running Vista. So no go there as well. Perhaps someone with deep pockets from the corporate world could tell us how they’re doing.
As for myself, XP works great (my favourite of *all* windows versions ever) and does so on older hardware. As a professional I am able to meet the security needs of XP and frankly don’t see *anything* in Vista to attract me. Hell, that Aero garbage is a nuisance and not even remotely attractive in my mind.
As for the fancy little items like renaming files etc., I too find some of that functionality attractive and see that it is already being implemented in some newer releases of software. Additionally, there are now several packages that will let XP adopt some of those Vista features, proving in my mind that there is very little of substance in Vista worth pursuing. Why a whole new OS just to modify the interface…..silly MS!
December 3rd, 2007 at 11:48 AM
Doh..a corrections. The Novell client works for Vista and XP.
December 3rd, 2007 at 6:12 PM
I found another super strange feature or bug or whatever Microsoft calls it now.
I made some changes to startup programs using msconfig.
Upon reboot, Vista told me that some startup programs were blocked. What it was blocking was the actual msconfig utility that was trying to remind me that I had made changes, in other words Vista was blocking part of itself from running.
I really can’t believe all of these small problems, I really can’t. Microsoft has been making operating systems for years. What went wrong?
December 3rd, 2007 at 8:28 PM
What went wrong, in my opinion, was that Microsoft lost its user focus. The attention to detail was all about covering them on security and making money on anti-piracy measures and deals with third parties related to DRM. Microsoft used to make products with features that end users wanted. They don’t do that any more; now it’s an OS by Microsoft for Microsoft. They are taking their customers for granted.
I never would have entertained the idea of trying a Mac if Microsoft had continued doing what it used to do — add software content that people like to use. It’s clear now I wasn’t alone.
I still think Microsoft could wake up. But it it’s going to require a massive reprogramming of its management team.
December 4th, 2007 at 5:38 AM
It’s so sad. Five years in the making & what have they got to show for it.
I spent my hard earned cash on an OEM home premium, what a waste.
I have installed it several times but each time I revert back to XP after just a few days. I don’t think I’ll be visiting Vista again, at least not until SP1 comes out, then I may give it another shot.
Encoding to DivX/XviD/H.264 is about 25% slower than on XP, the search just stops indexing for no apparent reason. I could go on and on and on.
The only thing that has any value in Vista is probably better security.
December 4th, 2007 at 10:06 AM
I have Vista SP1 beta running, and I hope to get a newer build soon. It’s more of the same. It’s mostly just a bug fix/security roll-up. There are new things, but they won’t apply to most people. It’s not faster. I don’t find it to be more reliable. My current assessment of Vista SP1 is that it’s a marketing service pack — mostly a roll-up aimed at trying to get enterprises to feel like now that the first SP is out, it’s OK to buy.
December 4th, 2007 at 1:52 PM
I completely accept every ones’s opinions on OS’s used, but I think we all need to look at things in perspective instead of Vista bashing. Are there kinks that need ironing out. Yes. Is the UI more user friendly in Vista than XP. I would say Yes. I’ve been running Vista Ultimate on a dual core AMD machine with 2gb ram since summer. I use my PC for web use, media use, and the office applications. So far, it has not missed a beat. On the flip side I have friends who have used Vista and had problems, but the same can be said for XP as well. I know enough people using XP that have had problems.
I remember when XP first came out and people were bashing that, saying it’s no where near as good as Win98, or 2000. XP users try going back to a 98OS machine now and see what you think. It’s only when you look back that you appreciate the changes that have been made in the present. The same I think will be said of Vista. XP has had a chance to mature, and develop. Vista is new, and has not had that chance yet.
I for one love Vista, and find using an XP machine quite boring now, but then again that’s just my opinion.
December 6th, 2007 at 2:39 AM
My Vista has been sitting pretty much idle for about 1 year. I jumped from Win98 to Vista – didn’t want to run XP. In short I hate it. I want some DOS programs to run that use full screen and Vista won’t let them. I tried all the normal ways to make them compatible and couldn’t. MS advice is to switch back to an XP driver. Got the driver, haven’t tried the switch yet. One other option might be a virtual machine but I’d rather not go that route. I also want something apparently no one else in the civilized world seems to care about – I want the ability to see files unsorted. As they would appear with the DOS command “DIR” – not alphabetical. I’ll skip the lengthy reasons but that is what I want. Vista actually prevents a file manager that does show them unsorted from working properly!
I find so many things, for instance the search feature, is sooo complicated compared to Win98. The indexing is terrific though. And even the start menu (in classic mode) is more complicated than Win98. I move a program out of alphabetical order and it will not stay put – next bootup, there it is alphabetical again. I know I could prefix the name with a number to force it to stay where it is most convenient but why should I have to?
I want all files and extensions showing – so I get desktop.ini and folder.htt showing up on my desktop. Doesn’t work like that in Win98.
I personally, have no need for hardly any of the security that Vista provides. I have been from one end of the net to the other and have never had a virus infect me. I run my Win98 “wide open” and am very careful about emails. I use a firewall on my Win98. I do check via pattern files manually from time-to-time to see if I picked up any virus. I got rid of Spybot because it never found any malware, other than a few cookies that I forgot to erase before running it. And I had Spybot for years and also had Ad Aware – just not needed.
I don’t like Aero. I don’t like the sidebar.
While the things I am complaining about are different than most, it leads to the same conclusion that I don’t like Vista. Currently, I am just sticking with Win98 and am relatively happy about it. If I can’t get the few DOS programs to work, I will probably get rid of the Vista machine. It is not a love affair with DOS but rather that I cannot find equivalent Windows apps that work exactly the same way as those few DOS programs I want.
December 6th, 2007 at 3:17 PM
I upgraded from factory installed XP Professional to Vista Ultimate on my laptop. It has a Centrino 1.5 Pentium M chip and 1 GB of RAM and have had absolutely no problems whatsoever. The system has been very stable and it seems to boot substantially faster than my desktop which had XP Home installed when it was purchased.
On both I am running Windows Live One Care which, along with the WGA tool, seems to delay the booting process substantially by “calling home”. My XP Home desktop seems to be affected more negatively which for whatever reason boots slower than my upgraded-to-Vista laptop.
Like many, in the beginning I played around with the “toys” on Vista, Dreamscene active wallpaper, sidebar, etc. but have since disabled all thinking they used too much RAM. Don’t particularly care for Vista’s constant pop-ups when making any system changes trying to protect me against myself, but there is probably a way to disable those which I have not taken the time to discover.
Just a word about MS as they seem to be everyone’s favorite “kicking boy”. I attended the Vista release party Feb/07 in Seattle with Bill Gates and about 2000 other folks. As an attendance gift we were all given a full copy of Office 2007 and Vista Ultimate. I did not realize that the copy of Vista Ultimate was just a trial version, actually the last Beta release with an expiration date so installed it on my work laptop. When I discovered what it was, I griped a bit in a letter to MS about now having to do a complete reinstallation back too XP Professional and complaining that I would not have installed it had I known what it was. The very next day after they received my letter, I had the full retail version of Vista Ultimate sitting on my desk which they had delivered by courier to my office for no charge whatsoever and which when I installed it elimatied the complete reinstallation problem I was facing. How’s that for “customer” service. I have received the same quality customer service with Windows Live One Care which I have had since the beta versions.
All in all I have no gripes about Vista, but in all honesty have serious questions whether the upgrade from XP Professional would have been worth the cost had I purchased it for full retail.
December 6th, 2007 at 3:29 PM
I have to admit that I was very skeptical when I bought my toshiba laptop with Vista pre-installed. Unlike many other users, I liked W98 mush better than XP and till use a computer with W98 completely problem free.
To my surprise, I have found Vista to be compatible with 99% of my old software (except of course MS Office and other Microsoft programs). Vista has been fast and reliable.
December 6th, 2007 at 4:07 PM
Sorry Scott, but I’m one of those strange people that don’t fit the common mold.
I am forever fiddling with my systems – adding or removing memory, changing video cards, trying a new mother board etc. Because of this I am constantly doing battle with Microsoft’s “WGA”. The hassle just isn’t worth the effort. In fact, it has driven me to completely abandon Windows entirely for my day-to-day busy work. I bit the bullet and installed *Ubuntu*! It is stable, it doesn’t hassle me and the learning curve is almost fun. I installed a removable hard drive tray in my computer. I have Windows XP on one tray, Windows ME on another, and an interesting plaything called “flyakite” overlaying Windows on a third drive/tray. To go from one system to another, I just pop out one tray and replace it with another. I tried Vista early on and, as many did, found that much of my hardware was not compatible with Vista – so goodbye Vista. Maybe this makes me an “odd-ball”, but at least I’m having fun!
December 6th, 2007 at 5:04 PM
I can not understand the business about the cost of hardware for a good Vista experience.
I just replaced a Dell Dimension (4100?) PIII desktop with an XPS 710; and an Inspiron 8000 laptop with an XPS M1710. In both cases, I paid less for the well equipped Vista machines than I did for the other machine about 5 years ago.
I mean, you know, if you want to compare my computers with sub-$1000 machines at Best Buy or Circuit City, then I think that you are just not serious.
December 6th, 2007 at 5:15 PM
I purchased a Dell Dimension E520 in the Spring of 2007 and it initially was installed with Vista Home Premium. I didn’t like what I saw in Vista initially but decided that I needed to learn it and I needed to use it for awhile before using it completely or getting rid of it. At the end of 4 months, I couldn’t take it any longer. Vista was horrible. I had lots of problems with it and did not like any part of it so I removed it and installed XP-Pro sp2 and have been an extremely happy camper ever since. Vista was too power-hungry and its files had been rearranged into some horrific mess of consolidation that left me wondering what the heck Microsoft was thinking about when they created Vista. I firmly believe that Vista is just an advanced version of Windows-Me. I’ll stay with XP.
December 6th, 2007 at 5:17 PM
I run a variety of OS as part of my support for my students.
My latest acquisition of a Dell laptop with Vista Home had me running for advice on how to speed up Vista once I saw how many of the resources were being consumed even before I opened any software. Thanks to a number of sources I’ve stripped Vista down so that the response time is reasonable, but I’ve ended up with a system close to an XP OS!
I suspect that I’ll be giving the advice to students once they start switching after they discover that processing large files can be surprisingly slow.
I’ve inserted a 1GB stick into a USB and set it up as a ReadyBoost, but I’m not sure that this has any significant effect. Several sites advise this approach but no-one seems to quantify the benefits or to suggest ways of testing these.
December 6th, 2007 at 5:25 PM
I have two cheap Celeron-based laptops (Compaq and Toshiba), which came with Vista Home Basic pre-installed. I wanted to install XP on them, but after upgrading RAM to 1.5 GB decided to give Vista a try, and so far I do not have any issues with either of them. Almost all apps and drivers seem to work, (I download the latest Vista-compatible drivers from the manufacturers’ Web sites and had to find a workaround for one older Logitech WebCam). I expected to see issues other people are describing, but so far it was all good. Maybe I do not use the same types of apps, but Office 2007, ICQ, DivX player, Firefox with tons of extensions, Photoshop Elements, Digital Image Suite, Windows Media Player, and a number of other commonly used apps work well. I’m rather satisfied with the performance, but I have not done such tasks as DivX decoding or encoding. I would agree with many comments about way too many editions, questionable changes (certain things are harder to do in Vista, although some are easier), etc. Overall, I think Vista is a marginally better OS. Personally, I like it better than XP, although there is a lot of room for improvement. Thanks to OS X, maybe Microsoft will be more receptive to customers’ needs. BTW, funny, I already submitted similar comments two two articles this week (eWeek and PC Magazine); it’s like everybody decided to discuss the same topic at the same time.
December 6th, 2007 at 5:51 PM
Remember vista is brought to you by the same company that brought you windows M.E . to hit the marketing scare hype of the of the W2K bug and sell a bata xp as an operating system why m.e had system restore and other vaporware.
Well vista came out with supposed security features.Genuwhine to them advantage on steroids. And the major feature inhancement
DRM!!! Yes MS cowtoeing to the riaa and movie Cor-pirates
Made this the the major new item!! How to lock out your system from doing any thing usefull. Unless they say you can and they won,t lol.
Well i tried vista on a newly build but not out of the newest top of the line parts. duel core intel 2 gigs of ram.
installed vista
then loaded security apps
Then loaded poser
bryce
daz studio
Carrara
Hexagon
And proceeded to use them like i would have in xphome.
Found vista used far more resources and ram then i wanted as i needed all avalible ram for graphics programs.
Well i used this vistaM.E for all of 2 days. And installed xp pro
Which with xp pro installed all the graphics apps work fine.
I need a computer to do a lot more then run a freakin OS!
December 6th, 2007 at 6:04 PM
I couldn’t agree more with Scott about XP being “mature” and I am looking forward to SP3. I don’t know if any of you folks has been in the market for a new computer lately, if you have you will find it difficult to find a XP machine, at least at the “brick & mortar” stores. The manufacturers have done a great disservice by forcing Vista like they have in my opinion.
Of course it is easy enough to by a copy of XP and get rid of Vista but that is additional expense.
XP works great on my Core 2 Duo, ATi X1400 notebook and will continue
to be my OS of choice, along side Ubuntu 7.10 and PCLinuxOS 2007.
Thanks for your take on the matter.
December 6th, 2007 at 6:21 PM
I have been using and working with Vista for more than 2-1/2 years, living with it from Beta 1 through RTM and now to SP1, I have it on 3 machines and in no case do I have the troubles I hear being discussed all the time. One machin is my wifes new HP with Home Premium and two machines are running Vista Ultimate. One which is single language and one hich is dual language equipped. All have run smoothly and faultlessly for over a year. Everyone doesn’t like UAC I am well aware of that, you should have been involved when it first appeared. It works well now. Everyone is so used to running as pure administrator mode, that when they don’t have those privaledges without a reminder of what they are doing, it upsets them and they turn off UAC.
You cannot run Vista on a shoestring of memory and it doesn’t work well on slow processors. For those folks, I say stay with XP until it is no longer supported. That’s coming soon by the way.
Being fair, I don’t think Vista can be equated to ME either. That comment just isn’t a fair judgement of Vista. Those that want to stay with XP, do so and wait for Windows 8 sometime in the future.
December 6th, 2007 at 8:36 PM
I only finally switched to XP about 2 years ago. Whenever I tried it before that, I found I had small issues with it working differently from Windows 2000 that I didn’t like. When I finally switched I had no idea what my issues had been with it previously and get on with it fine.
I expect a similar experience with any eventual upgrade to Vista, I can’t see it happening for several years yet at least.
December 6th, 2007 at 8:36 PM
On the two machines I described above, I have never had a lick of trouble, all of my ol periferals installed rom their CD’s with all the bells and whistles. That’s HP 5150 and 5650 In Jets, HP 4400 Cse scanner, Epson 3670 scanner. All of my applications installed fine, except for one recalcitrant paid mp3 recorder from High Criteria, who can not seem to figure out DirectX. I can still edit with it and easily replaced the recorder with Freecorder, which works just fine in Vista.
So, like peteki above, I just do not understand all of the complaining. My machines are not slow, I have no problems.
December 6th, 2007 at 9:47 PM
I’ve been using Vista Ultimate since April 2007. Like everyone knows it’s a resource hog. This forces people buy new computers to support it. I didn’t have any hardware problems like I did with Windows XP. All my printers worked and even an old PVR works fine. I haven’t tried my Old Camera yet.
I liked the new GUI. I don’t get excited about the Aero Stuff. I don’t care for the right pane that’s automatically installed. I don’t care for the new security setup and some other things about it. I got rid of the UAC right away. There are different menus to get familiar with and so on. I went onto the web and did a search for Vista Tweaks. I had found about 6 sites and I started applying the ones that I wanted. This took about half a day. I like to view my folders in Explorer by list view and I haven’t been able to save this view setting in Vista, I was successful in Windows XP. In Windows XP, I was able to go into any folder on my computer. Under Vista I kept getting denied entry until I found out to right click on each folder and going to the security tab and setting it to allow all use. This happens even under Administrator Login. You can’t change the background color in explorer. White is all that’s available.
I liked the way Vista automatically sorts items in my “All Program Menu”. In Windows XP it puts it at the bottom of the Menu Category and then I have to sort it. I’ve had problems on a lot of Windows XP Computers, losing the Quick Launch Bar and then I have to reset it. I haven’t lost it on any Vista Computer yet. Once you get to using the Quick Launch Bar, it becomes a pain when it disappears. I did a search on the web for a fix and none of them have worked.
All of my programs have worked except the Windows XP Powertoys WallPaper Changer. So I found an utility program made for Vista that had one in it. The wallpaper changer gets disallowed at start up until you click on the icon in the toolbar tray to allow it. Again I did a search on the web and it seems that there are a lot of start up programs that the Vista developers don’t want to run at start up and they won’t give a work around. But I found a Windows 98 wallpaper changing program that works fine.
All and all Vista is a change, but so was Windows XP when it came out. I’m going to be using Vista because we’re going to be forced to for support issues. But I think that Windows XP Pro is still really good and does run faster on machines with less than 2 GB of Ram.
December 6th, 2007 at 10:13 PM
People, if you truly scan the comments and concerns stated here, it appears to be a case of mixing apples and oranges. An example of this would be the experience a man has with 1GB of ram using Vista Ultimate on a 1Ghz processor with 40GB of hardrive space with a 2 score by Vista. This man checks emails and does very little video or gaming and states he never has any issues and loves Vista more than any other OS. I am exaggerating but we have so many levels of users, testers, gamers, experimenters and techies Now Scott, you have to be fair in your approach. You do a lot of testing and intentional attempts to break info structure to truly see how good it is. Is this really a vision of what users see? I read all the concerns but some of these are built on code use, user error, installation error, hardware, etc. This goes on and on. The only way to truly know what is wrong or write is to have groups of users with similar setup, hardware and software configuration attempting to utilize different Operating Systems. Feedback from this group can tell you something. Just a thought. However, Scott, I do not want to make the mistake by assuming you are speaking of your experiences when testing. If you are using under regular ‘user’ conditions and have these issues within these comparisons, than several of my points are not valid.
December 6th, 2007 at 11:00 PM
BTW, I should have mentioned that on my 1.5 Pentium M, 1 gig laptop running Vista Ultimate that I referred to in earlier comments, my major use is with Adobe Photoshop CS2 and all Office 2007 programs. Do no gaming but have had absolutely zero problems either with major hardware compatibility or using any applications.
Have a very difficult time understanding any problem in Vista with “msconfig” mentioned here and am very skeptical that it is truly a Vista OS problem. I frequently configure start-up to keep startup as lean as possible and never a hint of a problem running msconfig I also allowing Aero to run and still with only 1 gig of RAM usning Ultimate, have noticed no slow down and zero problems with the OS but then I had zero problems with XP Professional as well. Both are so light years ahead of any Win 98x based OS that in my view there is no comparison whatsoever. It is well worth the bucks for either XP or Vista to get rid of those old blue-screen-of-death programs if one’s machine can possibly handle them. Have never once seen a blue-screen-of-death on either XP or Vista.
December 6th, 2007 at 11:58 PM
I have Vista running on two HP computers and my own runs XP. Personally I think Vista is a piece of crap and not ready for primetime. I have another machine (an old Dell 4100, 900MHz, 256K Ram) running Ubuntu and it works great for surfing, it seems faster than the Vista machines (the both have 2 Gb memory). It is a pain to install programs under Vista, perhaps that is the price to pay for security. I see no advantage to Vista over XP.
The two Vista machines are used by my daughter and two grandsons. I had my druthers in this, I would convert them all to Linux.
December 7th, 2007 at 1:50 AM
I have run a clean install of Vista PRO on my ACER 4402 laptop, upgraded the ram to 2GB. Had no hardware recognition issues with laptop. Peripherals and add on software about 50/50.
But when I realized my desktop with 512mb of ram running XP Home was out performing the Vista setup (ac powered, not battery), I then switched my laptop to dual OS with XP PRO on the primary partition and Vista PRO on the secondary partition.
I enjoy the eye candy of Vista, but I am not willing to sacrifice performance. The primary reason I keep Vista handy is to help friends and customers with questions.
December 7th, 2007 at 3:57 AM
Use FreeBSD -> desktopbsd.net
December 7th, 2007 at 5:26 AM
sekirt wrote: “I want some DOS programs to run that use full screen and Vista won’t let them. I tried all the normal ways to make them compatible and couldn’t.”
There’s a freeware DOS emulator called “DOSBox” that might do the trick. I’ve used it with XP, but I understand it runs with Vista too.
December 7th, 2007 at 6:14 AM
I to had problems upgrading XP to Vista ( Asus A6KM with ram installed to 2gig ) but the clean install worked. My rant would relate to Microsoft’s so called user support. They monitor their forum site but will not react / reply to basic bugs such as the rundll.exe ongoing drama quite a lot of us are experiencing. Another bug is that explorer will crash at any odd times, usually related to a Vista operation directly. ( Right clicking a desktop shortcut to even one of their own programs will do it.)
That being said, I appreciate that a lot of manufacturers are not updating their drivers suitably, my money is on them holding off in an attempt to sell more product. Drivers, or rather the lack of them, are usually the culprits for instable performance but I’m still enjoying Vista ( Ultimate ) better than I did XP. Just don’t go the Vista way until you have broadband.
December 7th, 2007 at 8:36 AM
I run XP on my laptop and Windows 2000 on my home PC, and I find that they both do what I need.
When XP came out I didn’t see enough benefit in upgrading my W2K installation, and thought I’d wait for its successor. Now Vista is on the shelves and, from what I’ve read so far, it’s a less attractive option than XP. So, I’ll probably just wait for the launch of Vienna before upgrading. Unless Linux has become a more attractive prospect by then.
December 7th, 2007 at 10:43 AM
This is long so bear with me.
Just thought I would share my thoughts about Vista and MS customer support. I own a small tech support business focused on personal and small business customers. I have been using Vista since late Beta on my main machine. I have 6 other computers all running either XP pro or Home (all with legitimate licenses). My Vista machine is nicely equipped with a performance rating of 4.9. So I have plenty of hardware horsepower. I also have a 4 gig readyboost usb drive installed.
The Vista machine is much more responsive than the XP machines. Programs such as IE and Outlook launch almost instantly (readyboost?) The new search feature works very well. I don’t use gadgets or the new Windows switcher. I tried them but I just don’t find them useful and they take up a lot of resources. The networking control panel is excellent and wireless support is much better than XP.
I’ve had quite a few compatibility problems with CD burning software, Quickbooks, an expensive CAD program, an HP laser printer and numerous other smaller applications. I managed to get them all working but it was a time consuming struggle. Check the compatibility of your software/hardware before you buy. I couldn’t believe HP took so long to come up with a driver for my 1022n printer!
In the business, I’ve helped many people switch to XP on their new brick and mortar laptops/desktops. Some of the newer models were designed from the ground up for Vista so XP drivers are not available on their websites. It can be time consuming to dig up drivers at each of the components manufacturers sites. Some of the model specific utilities on laptops simply aren’t available for XP. Before buying from Best Buy, etc. check the mfg website for XP drivers/utilities. Otherwise, buy a Dell and specify XP.
If you’re willing to invest the time to solve compatibility and have plenty of hardware horsepower, Vista can be a better experience than XP. But is it worth it? If I wasn’t “in the business” I probably would be running XP. The hassle simply isn’t worth the return on investment (time & money wise).
Regarding MS disregard for customer needs, I’d like to share an experience I had just yesterday. I have a small business client who had 3 counterfeit copies of XP (out of 20 computers). I encouraged them to purchase new licenses for those machines. They bought new licenses and asked me to update the 3 computers. I followed the MS process and changed the product key on the first computer. Then went to Activation, but auto activation failed. I used the phone to talk to MS support to get activation ID manually. I’ve done this many times in the past without issue. Upon reboot, I was prompted to activate again, then went to activation window and was informed that activation was already completed and then I was logged off. I was in a loop and couldn’t log on the the machine.
Anyway after 3 hrs with MS and 9 different handoffs, I went from their WGA, to Activation, to Tech Support to Professtional Tech supportl. Each time, I first got a customer support screener who asked me the same questions I had answered countless times before. I was finally told I would have to pay $259 for profession tech support. I had to argue with two layers of management to finally get to someone for free who actually wanted to help me. Only one of those 9 people had English as their first language. Many of them were very difficult to understand.
I’ve still not solved the problem but the guy promised to call me back this afternoon. We’ll see. I can’t wait to see what problems I have with the other two machines that need to be updated.
Last night, I downloaded Ubuntu and I will be looking into a MAC machine for my personal use. I’m done with them.
December 7th, 2007 at 11:47 AM
Microsoft has lost sight of who their customer is. It appears to me that Microsoft acts as if the Video Producers and Music Producers and and their desire for DRM and other types of copy protection are their real customers and not those of us who purchase a computer with Vista on it or purchase a copy of Vista to install or upgrade our computer. This shows again in Microsoft’s implementation of WGA. Microsoft may need to have some form of copy protection because of piracy, but you do not make it in a form that punishes the customers who follow the rules and try to use only legal software.
December 7th, 2007 at 8:02 PM
I never upgraded to XP because of WGA, but use it at work. In the past six months I have bought three low-end laptops (1 Acer and two Compaqs) all of which came preloaded with Vista. Paid $400, $350 and $450, two Pentium Ms and one early dual core. I updated all to 1.5 GB. I can’t say I have any issues with any of them but I not doing anything but web and e-mail. I can’t say UAC bothers me. Linux has always prompted for root passwords and Ubuntu now doesn’t even give you an option to sign on as root. It just prompts you for the admin password whenever you try and do something which requires admin rights. My feeling is that UAC is good for the millions of non-tech users in the world. My daughter has one of these laptops and hasn’t complained at all. I did try the parental controls – worthless. The kids would be constantly coming and asking for a password to do just about anything. I know you like you Mac Scott, but to me they are just way, way overpriced and they don’t offer any low end models for the millions of people who aren’t doing anything special with their computers. That’s just not their market. My next laptop will be the new Asus eee. Simple to use and perfect for travel. Got an offer today for one for $350. By the way I’m securing my browser with the Zone Alarm Force Field beta. It’s a bit buggy with Firefox but OK with IE.
December 7th, 2007 at 8:07 PM
I recently bought two HP/Compaq laptops for my sons.
They came pre-installed with Vista.
The first thing I did was to install XP on them (never even booted them into Vista), even going thru the pain of finding drivers via HP support to get them complete.
I’ll never go to Vista if I can help it — I think I’d go MAC instead. XP does just fine and there’s no way a $500 laptop has the horsepower to make Vista run the way it should.
bv
December 8th, 2007 at 7:30 AM
Thank you tichtich,
I was aware of DOSbox and neglected to mention it. Actually, I forget why I rejected using it – maybe I will take another look at it.
December 8th, 2007 at 11:52 AM
I’ve run Vista since the betas, built a machine to run it, and have had a great experience with it. I should also acknowledge Microsoft gave me 2 copies to testing it (32 bit and 64 bit versions). I run a dual boot with XP Pro and while I’m at home rarely even consider using XP. I have to use XP at work as that is what my employer provides.
I would be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge a small love-hate relationship though. It’s probably with Microsoft overall as they really shot themselves in the foot with Vista. I like the Aero interface but they could have easily made it available to XP users as I think it is truly one of the few differences with the opeating systems.
I find Vista Ultimate to run well, it is stable, and some of the new toys are nice. That said, I have yet to upgrade any other machine here in the SOHO setup (3 desktops, at least 2 laptops) Im running.
I have run various versions of Ubuntu and other Linux distros, but can’t really make the break as I am pretty tied in to Microsoft with work. The Macs look inviting, but as another poster stated they are way too much money for not much better of a product.
December 8th, 2007 at 10:58 PM
Re: Windows or Vista, check THIS out:
http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2007/12/vista-sucks.html
Also:
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/edwardbaig/2007-12-05-mac_N.htm
December 9th, 2007 at 3:40 AM
arnie I agree with your comments about microsoft. They are dividing the world into two camps. The very few who get free promos, and the rest. For the rest they either get a cut down version with their new computer, a overly espensive cut down version, or left with XP.
In New Zealand Ultimate retails for about $900. In reality the only way those who are not rich can get fully functional (Pro) versions, or often any version at all of ANY MS program (except consumer programs, eg photo albums) is to get academic versions. Vista academic is home premium for $200, which is OK.
(I bet that coperations are going to tell MS what versions they will take and will not pay any more for it.)
I am one of the lucky few having won a copy of Ultimate (and office 2007 pro) for free in a PC magazine competition. However I belive that I need to choose on computer to test it on, and then am stuck with that computer, with only one? change of computer. So do I choose the laptop or desktop? Both of these will probably be replaced in the next few years anyway.
(PS. the Australians got no free vista DVD’s at all, beacuse the head of MS Australis thinks they will all rush to buy Vista anyway beacuse it is so great.)
As an average user I would use the media features and aero of the home ed. But the really useful stuff I guess is in the business ed. And locking down a laptop Hard drive is only in the ultimate. So If you are going to be asked to upgrade from a perfectly good operating system like XP then you need enough features to merit it, at a upgrade price that merits it. I don’t even think Ultimate is available in upgrade?
However they have widely marketed the idea that you buy one copy of the media, then you just buy more product keys at a much cheaper price. Despite the advertising they only do this in the USA, and not in New Zealand!!!! There is no real reason for this and MS NZ want to offer this!!!!
Way to shoot yourself in the foot for no reason. Hence my problem, what computer do I test it on?
Maybe scott you can see if you can get a sensible answer from MS on why the delay in selling extra product keys outside the US, and when they plan to allow it to happen?
December 10th, 2007 at 6:20 PM
I actually like Vista, especially being able to access programs or control panel applets simply by starting to type in their names in the bottom of the start menu.
However…
1. It IS slower than XP.
2. It is not as stable as XP.
3. I actually like Linux (Ubuntu 7.10) better than both MS products. No file fragmentation. Better multi-tasking. I still need to use Windows now and then for things like Voice Recognition, etc. Too bad the commercial software community will never support an open-source product like Ubuntu. I think it would really give MS a run for its money if they did.
Right now, I’m triple-booting all 3 OS’s and spend most of my time in Ubuntu. Says something right there…
- Jack
December 12th, 2007 at 7:27 PM
There are quite a few features about Vista that I like but I rushed installation without realising that it was incompatible with all my other software including my all-in-one printer.To make matters worse Windows Live One Care causes my computer to crash and when I seek support from Microsoft they tell me to uninstall all other anti-virus and anti-spyware programs. It is a shame that your comments about Vista come so late. Nevertheless keep up the good work.
Antipodes
December 13th, 2007 at 8:09 AM
Actually, my warnings about Vista came pretty early, including 20 Things You Won’t Like About Vista at Vista Beta 2 time, and my full-fledged review, A Hard Look at Windows Vista, which went live a few weeks before Vista shipped. You’ll find both on Computerworld. My comments about Vista in the newsletter have been pointed for quite some time.
The recent story was merely the result of my first year of testing with the final version of the code. I believe in long-term testing. But, as you can see, I didn’t bother doing any sort of review of Vista. I went right to the point: Windows XP is better for me, and I’m now uninstalling Vista from some of my machines. I see no reason to test it further.
– Scot
December 13th, 2007 at 5:01 PM
My son purchased Vista Home Premium on a new OEM machine at the start of the year. Its an AMD 64 bit 2 CPU. He plays mainly games (eg Cossacks, Age of Empires) that aren’t cutting edge, and has been plagued by software incompatibility (and compatibility mode hasn’t helped) (eg Sync toy fails, and in Home Premium the Sync functionality is disabled ! huh).
I agree totally with your comments about UAC – there is no halfway house – its either on or off – and has no learning mode.
Combine that with software vendors lack of support for Vista, and especially 64 bit Vista, and I feel pretty bad about not recommending to him (he saved the money) that he stick with XP.
Plus setting it up to run on a home (ethernet cabled) network with XP machines wasn’t trivial. Its hard to recommend it jill average computer users.
I actually think the UI is a huge learning curve to, despite many new features.
December 15th, 2007 at 12:21 PM
I am still on XP Pro and Home XP. I had no problems with Win 98 (not to the degree that some people talk about) once I finally managed to tame it, and know it well. In fact, visitors would come to my place and express shock at the speed of my older computer with Win 98. My P2 seemed to be running rings around their costly new P4s. Go figure. Ok, realistically I was not coding any DVD movies on my P2 (not unless I let my computer do this overnight whilst I slept.) And look at all the junk I dropped off along the way. I wonder if that is possible with Vista?
My first major peek at Vista came yesterday when an elderly resident in my building invited me to see a brand new acer laptop he had been given by a hospice. The first noteable and troubling item was a window that was in the center of the desktop screen that would not terminate, finish, disappear or close. Apparently Vista had never managed to load a driver or something. And this was on a new computer which came pre-installed with Vista. I tried to rectify this for my acquaintance. I am very good with computers… and it wasn’t going to happen. The problem looked errily familiar. I had seen it in every Windows system I had ever worked on. I was suspecting that the driver installation menu could not terminate because Vista was blocking the driver installation. The driver had probably installed at some point in the game but WIndows for some reason had made the driver disappear from it’s own view to ‘protect’ Windows. Catch 22.
I rapidly showed my friend how to log onto the net utilizing wireless, he was delighted at this. Still the driver install hogged our desktop view. Finally, with a sigh, we decided to shutdown the computer for the day. It would not shutdown, with taskbar, or in the conventional sense. The driver install lockup dialogue was somehow preventing WIndows from accomplishing this task. I reluctantly held in the power switch and waited for the inevitable cold shutdown which, thank the Hoove, actually worked. Geez.
My friend is in a hospice because he is dying from cancer. I can probably figure out how to fix his driver problem, but Scott is right… It just shouldn’t be there. Not everyone has forever and a day to work out their Windows bugs, excuse me in including this kind of rude barb at Windows, which I still find easier to use than Linux. If not for that I surely might have migrated at some time in the past to one form or other of that system.
Finally, I think that Apple is doing a great job of using advertising to point out Windows design flaws and wonder how much of these comments might be coming back in response to that. Advertising can be very… persuasive… and effective!
Personally, I had enough of this ’software expiration policy of design’. I sometimes believe that the only reason a basic system hasn’t been installed on an integrated chip, which would probably eliminate a multitude of problems, is that in present terms it would have to at least function with the simular reliability as a vcr…. And under present terms and conditions Microsoft would had been sued, and probably have been out of business, a long time ago if it was hardware and broke down like this. If your vcr played for one hour one day and stopped functioning several times during the day, would you not take it back and ask for your money back? If it’s clock showed the time in one moment and the happy face of a hacker in the next, would you be standing at the refund desk at Walmart asking to trade it for a more reliable product?
Obviously, we like the idea of being shade-tree mechanics, or this little experiment would never have lasted so long.
December 15th, 2007 at 12:49 PM
Reply to Dionisiog:
Fwiw, I’ve been a magazine editor for most of my professional life (except for a short stint in the film/video production industry two decades ago). But my father a was Madison Ave. ad exec who taught me about the reach and power of advertising (TV, radio, and print). In many ways, he instilled in me the bedrock of cynicism required by journalism for success, a way of thinking that boils down to this notion: question everything.
The point of telling you about my father is that the Mac is not all about advertising, while Apple’s advertising is very definitely a reflection of how Mac users view their Mac experience. Apple isn’t so much trying to address its own weaknesses. Many ads do this, they outright lie to you about how the product doesn’t have a weakness, when in fact, it has exactly that weakness. Apple is using another advertising tactic: To convey the word-of-mouth, grass roots, common experience shared by most Mac users. For comparison, look at Toyota ads, which use the same tactic: “Ask someone who drives one.” Although the styles of Toyota and Apple ads are very different, the tactic is the same.
So, based on my experience, I suggest you give the Mac a serious try before you guess at why it’s never died off and why it’s enjoying a renaissance of late. Hardened Windows users (and I did this for years) tend to scoff at the insistence of Mac mavens that the Mac just works, dismissing it as so much eye wash from the cult of the Mac. But the claims of superior reliability are absolutely true. I’m not saying the Mac doesn’t have issues. What I am saying is that it has significantly fewer issues than Windows PCs — even when working in a Windows-oriented business environment. My very conservative estimate is that, for every 10 problems that force Windows users to stop everything else and fix something, the Mac has one such issue. (I’d be willing to bet that many Mac users would disagree with me, saying that the frequency of stop-everything Mac problems is far smaller than that.)
This was the Mac’s primary selling point for me. It’s not that the Mac’s legendary ease of use makes it so special. It’s that the excellent combination of strong reliability and ease of use in one package is absolutely compelling. When you look at the competition, Linux and Windows, each has one of these two attributes; neither one has both. It’s important to note that Apple didn’t have the reliability aspect until the advent of OS X, which incorporates a Unix variant as the core of the operating system.
About your initial Windows Vista experience: Not everyone has these problems with Vista. Many people who buy new Vista machines have very good initial experiences, but unfortunately, it’s not the first time that I’ve heard about a brand new machine booting up with a driver error. I have to agree, that’s pretty pathetic. My initial scorn, though, would be more reserved for Acer in this case than for Vista itself. If an OEM PC maker can’t pick a driver that works, what can it do? That’s really the largest value add an OEM computer delivers to Windows — since it’s integrating the hardware, it should ensure that the hardware is fully supported by the driver hardware installed in the OS.
I wonder whether these machines might not have been donated to the hospice because there was an issue of some sort that Acer or some value-added reseller either couldn’t or wouldn’t resolve.
December 19th, 2007 at 9:43 AM
I’ve turned off UAC in Vista Ultimate but then I get security popups that tell me UAC is turned off. It doesn’t seem like I’ve gained anything there. Is there any way to get rid of the security reminders that I’ve turned off UAC?
BTW, this is running on an old (as computers go) 1.4GHz machine with a 128MB video card. It’s no speed demon, especially with Vista, but it runs okay and so far I don’t recall any BSODs or lockups.
January 12th, 2008 at 2:07 PM
Jonathan, I’m not familiar with the pop-ups you’re referring to telling you that UAC is off. I don’t get them on any of my machines. HOW did you turn off UAC? There are several ways, actually. But Microsoft has built-in UI for doing it, and that method does not throw off pop-ups of any sort. It’s not that I doubt your experience; it’s that I think the people here can help you improve it if you tell us more.
February 11th, 2008 at 12:31 AM
Scot, I just purchased an Acer laptop with Vista Home Premium. Then I found this forum. Can or how does one downgrade to XP Pro? I am still in my 14 day return period if I need to go that far. Use is for my college student child. I will be system admin and support for her and have XP on a couple of other systems and some knowledge to go with. Appreciate any response.
February 17th, 2008 at 11:48 PM
UAC is a total pain. Just one query might be ok but it runs 3+ levels deep. I agree with Jonathan that having turned UAC off in the Control Panel, I get a taskbar nag from the Notification area with a red shield. Only way I see to get rid of it is to turn it on again.
I read your warnings, Scot, but thought that after about a year and on a new build high spec PC, it couldn’t be that bad. Ohps. I have so many (maybe) minor issues still lurking round your forum looking for answers. Setting up a home network was a horrid experience. Does MS not understand that when it says Vista Home Premium, a dialog box that says “Contact your network administrator” shows a depressing lack of clarity of thought? You are that man! How many places do you need to check to share a folder?
I have a number of outstanding irritations with Vista. Number one right now is that an OS designed not to be turned off, 2 or 3 times a day forgets how to connect to the ISP’s server hence the web or e-mail and needs rebooting. All the rest of the XP PCs on the same network smoothly get on with life.
February 18th, 2008 at 9:45 AM
Xpsp3 is another ms bust. Based on what I’ve read about sp3, it will install all previous updates that were blocked or not installed in sp2. The problem I have with this is that there is at least 1 update in sp2 that caused alot of systems alot of trouble…kb927891. Ms is aware of the problem yet it still wants it installed. Duhhhhh!!!
Another feature of sp3 that I don’t understand is that IE6 is the default. Ms claims that IE7 is the best, is more secure than IE6 and is less troublesome than IE6 too. So tell me, why would ms put IE6 into a new service pack that is supposedly alot worse than IE7?
I tried IE7 but it crashed darned near every time I tried to surf the net. It also left out some important add-ons that I used previously in IE6 that are still not available. I’ve had far fewer problems with IE6 than I had with IE7. I wonder…does ms ever check out their updates before releasing them fully to the public? I think not!
Being in the computer repair business, I have worked on many systems with Vista. Most of my Vista customers constantly complain to me about how much they hate Vista. Some have totally removed Vista and installed XP whereas others want to but cannot afford the price.
Many of my friends and customers have called me to help them buy a new computer. After I show them the differences between XP and Vista, they always opt for XP. Some of my customer’s kids that have told me that Vista is great have never used anything but Vista. Many of them have gotten me to remove Vista and to install XP. Of those that installed XP, they now tell me that Vista was a stick-of-mud plagued with constant problems and they’re far happier with XP than they were with Vista since they have now been able to use them both.
Why does Ms keep creating new operating systems other than the money issues? Perhaps they ought to look at MAC and see why they’ve been able to stay in-the-game for so long. I’m growing tired of learning a new OS every couple of years. Perhaps it is high time that I get a MAC!!!