D--R--M -- they did it to themselves & now it's biting.

My sympathies, M$ :-)

If they manage that, it'll be a first.

Downgraded ?....... or upgraded? hmmm......

A have a laptop with vista pre-loaded. Hate the way that when you press the power button to suspend/hibernate it sometimes cannot find the wireless network point (hidden ESSID - WPA security) when you press the power button again!

Does this happen with XP? If not then maybe I should 'upgrade' to XP! Am I allowed to use my 'un-used' 5 year-old OEM XP licence with a new laptop?

Have they actually said when 'ontime' will be?

Of course by the time I finish typing it probably won't be, but still, it's exciting.....

Anyhow, the first thing EVERYONE should remember is that windows 7 will be based on the vista code base. This means it will be shite. Now MAYBE a lot of vendors will be able to muck about with their drivers so the overall smell won't be quite as repugnant, but it will still be a DRM laden floater.

On the plus side, you don't here vista people crowing over the crappy driver support in Linux any more. <evil laugh here>

Finally, your article was dead wrong on one point. While Linux may be a dubiously creditable threat, and the EU regulators are a real concern, it was done and dusted 5 years ago that there is absolutely nothing microsoft can do that will evoke the anger of the US government. Don't forget they fired the judge who had the honor to side with the persecution in the first trial.

yeah so these are the corporate refresh ones - we dont have vista - is XP as standard - all new pcs get downgraded as per our standard build.

We no longer buy new PCs. We had our Vista experience during an upgrade cycle 6 months after Vista was released. We ended up Craigslisting all the kit for a 20% loss. Now we only buy used equipment with valid XP licenses.

That's good for our bottom line - not so good for our favorite big box maker.

Paris 'cause she's trailer park trash born into old money.

Here's my experience - figures rounded off.

In my company there's 140 computers. 90 XP with Office 2003/2000, 30 Vista with office 2007. Rest are Unix/BSD/Linux/2003 Servers.

Of the 30 Vista, 15 users have requested going back to XP. 10 of these users can't be bothered to learn anything new and like the XP (which they've used a long time now despite the fact we've "gone back to classic view"). The other 5 are more technical, 1 is an accountant who likes to dabble in Excel VBA, he's threatened to resign if he doesn't get XP and Office 2003 because the security stuff and everything new is doing his head in! The others have various (and genuine) issues regarding the existing special applications we use.

We're not a big company and having to learn something new is a huge strain on resources. Vista is just too much stress and strain to support compared to XP. One chap had to spend over 20 hours trying to find an answer to a Vista/office 2007 configuration fault.

Nope, it's too revolutionary for the average user and support. We'll get there eventually, but we don't have the training support many other companies do. If a car manufacturer decided to shift pedal controls in cars after a few years what do you think would happen?

If you must have Windows, a better choice than XP or Vista is Windows Server 2008. After some tweaks, it works fantastically as a desktop machine.

They don't actually need new features. They just need to streamline and simplfy what they've already got.

You've just got to look at the control panel: 52 choices. OS X has 25.

Everything needs stripping back and made to work.

Ditch crap like 'Welcome Center'. Ditch marketing crap like 'Windows Defender'.

And ditch any piracy crap which disables legimate users' machines. Just sell it in two versions: home and business, for £50 and £75.

This isn't the world that MS thinks it is. Consumers are much more savvy nowadays and can see what is and what isn't a good deal. This sums it up: http://i48.photobucket.com/albums/f234/PORSCHER/osx_vs_vista_upgrades.jpg

Why don't they stick to what their good at. Operating Systems.

Let 3rd party players do the add-ons.

Serves you right Microsoft for being dumb enough to build a bloated operating system around DRM. STUPID STUPID STUPID!

The NHS has only just completed upgrading its machines to WinXP

there is no way it has the hardware or the software compatability to even contemplate using Vista for a few years to come.

It was simply a bridge too far.

I know lets turn our ok product into playskool (tm) brand and pretend its a cool(aid) OS... I wonder where MS went wrong?

Question is will Windows 7 (ver 6.1) will work without an onboard powerstation?

incase your wondering:

NT4 = NT4

Win2000 = NT5.0

XP = NT 5.1 << as its based on the NT5 Kernel

Vista = NT6

Windows 7 = NT6.1 << as its based on the Vista (NT6) bloated DRM'd Kernel

XP fine for Me (tm)

wonder how many went to Linux ? higher or lower than XP's 35%

Paris 'cause she's just as cute but more user friendly than the penguin...

All new machines for our customers are either from Dell or PC World buisness, where you can still order them with XP, or with the XP downgrade path when its stuffed with VB.

I still cant believe how crap it is, reapiring them is a lot more painful, there are really no real tools to get the job done like XP, if the OS is really really stable and it doesnt crash, its fine, but its not, so for someone who has to repair the OS for a job, its a pain in the ass, not to mention the stupid long winded, time wasting interface, looking at the networking on Vista is like a maze, it may be stable (according to MS), but at the cost of the users, I dont use Vista even though we have licences coming out of our axxx.

That 30% may be under estimating, I personally downgraded almost all our customers from Vista to XP, either due to their software wont run, or run like a dog even on the latest hardware.

"Am I allowed to use my 'un-used' 5 year-old OEM XP licence with a new laptop?"

Technically OEM versions of Windows are for System Builders. Microsoft will probably frown at you for doing it but I don't think they'll call the lawyers on you or anything.

Paris because she's been downgraded.

"Nope, it's too revolutionary for the average user and support"

this needs fixing

"Nope, it's too slow for any user and support costs go through the roof"

I love Vista,

seriously....

i do!

*runs and hides*

I actually like Vista. Sure at the start I was finding myself switching back to XP rather often, but now I only have XP if I need to use my camera as a webcam. Vista is actually pretty good when you get used to it, I don't think I could go back to XP, it just looks so aincient in comparison, a bit like going back to Win98 from XP.

Of course, the Vista haters will also hate Win 7, simply because the UI will be the same as Vista, and they are happy with their XP interface and pretty much refuse to give Vista a decent chance, may as well switch them to Linux (Suse 11.0 with KDE 4.1 is pretty good!) if they refuse to use Vista 2.

Obligatory "Apple suck" comment here.

Am I the only one that thinks the whole concept of releasing a new OS every few years is past its sell-by date?

The computer market is mature enough now in that people have largely got what they want. Modern OSes are, if anything, overspecced for home use. Unless and until there is a major new must-have innovation that simply won't work with existing operating systems, better to patch the devil you know than dump it all for the bug-ridden unknown.

In the Canadian Forces we buy thousands upon thousands of computers every year, the first thing we do after opening the box is to downgrade to XP. It`s the same story in any part of the Canadian government. So for us it's more like 99.9% of the computers go to XP and the rest is only kept around as a curiosity and not allowed to connect to any network.

I tried Vista SP1 (as a dual boot alongside my existing XP installation) a month or so ago. I found it ok enough, and would've put in the effort to learn to use it full-time, but the graphics chipset on the PC (an nVidia 9100 IGP) wasn't supported so I only got the crappy default driver, which was unusable for playing video etc.

So it's gone. I've now fill the empty partition it left with the latest Ubuntu. And guess what? The IGP isn't supported properly by that either... :-(

XP forever!

We have many many pcs in our organisation. No intention of going Vista - too many incompatibilities. Until a week or 2 ago I shared an office with a consultant who, among other things, ws responsible for Network and PC support for his clients - he's had Vista and Xp on his notebook since he got it 6 months ago.... Still hasn't got the Vista installation stable, despite spending weeks on new drivers, tweaking....

Got a new machine for home, recently - it got XP, the consultant said it was a good decision.... Probably didn't want me bugging him with Vista problems. I didn't want them either. Haven't yet met one person who's challenged the decision to go XP - except on Mac die-hard. And he had no real answer when I said the software I use won't run under MAC and I don't want to waste performance giong through an emulator - same reason as the machine isn't running Linux.

I did notice that MS are actively trying to get guys off XP - SP3 is the start, loading it crashed my WLAN by overwriting the .dlls for the wireless card.... Good move MS - stops me from getting out to support sights to find out what you've screwed up this time.

So they're trying to level the playing fields I suppose... Stops XP users getting too smug. When will these guys get it right.

A thumbs down for Vista and XP SP3.

Yes, my old computer lasted 13 years starting with 95 and 4 gigs, I added on getting win98 and 20 gigs but I finally took the plunge and bought a new computer. On my college campus many of the win2000 computers were taken out for Vista and a few XP's. Lets just say the Vista computers aren't used very often. People would rather cram around the Macs.

On my birthday I received a never been used XP desktop so far I love it. No errors or crashes. No blue screen or stupid Vista death screen. I feel bad for those Vista capable computers that Vista rejected. In time Vista will be forgotten or find itself as the "link" in evolution from XP to 7, kind of like ME/2000 were.

Or switch to a Mac. Microsoft could not even get "Microsoft Virtual PC" to be a true virtual PC capable of running any x86 OS.

I never liked Mozart, especially dislike his operas. Not that I don't like art music, I find Bach amazing, Beethoven revolutionary and bedazzling, Brahms soothing, Dvorak uplifting, Gershwin modern, Bartok mindboggling, Shostakovich awesome, but Mozart is just plain boring. Thanks to Microsoft's OS head honcho it all makes sense now, though.

I'm guessing that the large enterprise user is probably the most important type to Microsoft.

Keep in mind your average enterprise IT manager....

He wants simplicity, he wants security that he can understand and trust, he wants a OS that's going to run office in a stable way whilst making the most of a hardware budget.

He's not going to get that when Microsoft keep piling rubbish in.

Am I missing something?

you know of course that Windows Server 2008 is just Vista, server edition, with integrated Service Pack 1?

I'm happy with the XP interface because it doesn't insist on changing each directories view every time I go in. Honestly, it's like Russian roulette will I get the useful detail view I had last time or will it have the file name as an icon 1/5 the size of my screen and the startags there for me to ignore.

And when I copy a file I want the "date updated" property to be the date the original was updated, not the date the file was copied.

And...

And...

And...

@AC who said "Nope, it's too revolutionary for the average user and support".

That can't be the right choice of word. Too "different" maybe, but I'll go for either too "illogical" or too "frustrating".

Bring back tabs on control panels! Having a different panel for everything that used to be tabbed is deeply annoying.

"the graphics chipset on the PC (an nVidia 9100 IGP) wasn't supported"

Hey, hey hey. That can't be right! Only Linux has a problem with no support for drivers! MS told us so!

I've been using Vista now for nearly a year.

So far I havent seen any evidence of DRM at all impeding my use of my PC. Where is it? How should I find it?

C'mon show me? I also use a Zune that also 'full of DRM' so they tell me but I still havent found any. I've been able to do everything I want to so far.

No one has pinged up a RED card saying I cant.

DRM is a fanboy FUD dream I must assume.

"there is absolutely nothing microsoft can do that will evoke the anger of the US government." .... By Terry Posted Tuesday 19th August 2008 13:41 GMT

Oh yes there is, Terry, should they start to Develop a Secure Trustworthy Transparent Computing Environment with Special Access Privileges Granted to Peer Reviewed [Positively Vetted] Full Personal Disclosure Personnel with Advanced Mutual Intelligence ....... for that would, by Natural Default, leave the US government dancing to Microsoft's tune which would be a SOLO Virtuoso Performance to Set the Future Stage, albeit IT being one of their New-Fangled and Entangling Openly Sourced Compositions .

In fact, if that is not what Windows E7 is all about, that is what they will be up against in another Operating System from the Competition/Opposition/Underground .......thus to render the Efforts another Colossal Failure in Future for Fitness Purpose.

It is certainly something which HyperRadioProActivity would be/could be/is Building across Every Platform for Ubiquitous Selfless Application and therefore Exclusive Executive Administration without the Cowboy Elements pimping Missions Impossible.

I installed XP and Vista on a new PC I built last year (Vista came free w/ the XP MCE 2005 OEM DVD I ordered). I mainly used XP of course as Vista was confusing as hell.

Then after 2-3 weeks I tried to boot into Vista more often, just so I would know about the OS. After a few more weeks I haven't looked back at XP. There's nothing XP can do that Vista can't do better, except of course run on computers with lower specs.

For example someone posted about their frustrations w/ the new Control Panel. Indeed it takes me too long to find what I need (mainly because I never had the patience to read through everything) but that's why there's a search bar nearly everywhere.. if you need to adjust your display just type in "display" and only the display-related control panel options show up.

By the way the Vista install has been substantially more stable than Windows XP, and because I made a computer with decent specifications (cheapest dual core Core2, an NVIDIA 7600GT video card, 2GB RAM 800Mhz DDR2) Vista simply flies. Such a computer can be made for less than $500 USD (including hard drives, power supply, and case).

Admittedly there were many PCs that were being sold as Vista Capable that would have been much better off w/ XP, and Microsoft should be focused on making their OSes more efficient w/ hardware, but it's hardly something to whine about. Rumor is Snow Leopard will only work on Intel macs, and OS X variations significantly raised the bar required for Mac computers (if you wanted it to run well that is).

Having recently come back to Windows, I realise I've been spoilt elsewhere by how transparently things update and upgrade.

The problem, in my opinion, isn't so much the Whole New OS idea, but the Whole New UI idea - I'd be fine with the guts of the system changing completely, so long as when I look for something it's where I expect it to be.

I don't know of anyone who finds the Vista UI easier to use than the XP one (though, admittedly, I've only been asking people who are new to Vista and used to XP). Surely they'd have taken the hint with the amount of people who switched their XP control panels back to classic view?

There are good, strong examples of OSs which manage to be updated without alienating and confusing existing users. If everyone else can do it, why can't Microsoft? Or, rather, why don't they?

I have a very nice XP machine, but the hard disk is full. I've bought a new one which came with Vista Premium. A weekend of pain later, I truly hate Vista. Everything I do is blocked by 'permissions', files are silently not copied, etc. My elderly printer won't work any more, my digital dictation device 'has a known issue'. etc. It's just an utter pain out of the box to use.

Wish I could face the idea of a downgrade. I never realised how good XP was.

This probably won't make it past moderation but regarding an earlier post (hopefully that one did), I wanted to clarify that I love my Vista, and I have Ubuntu 64-bit installed too. Using Ubuntu I realize how a lot of things are closed and handicapped in Vista but the same could be said for many other OSes (like OS X).

And I'm not upset at Microsoft for not supporting my old scanner... it's not their responsibility. Typical of most 3rd party companies my scanner company decided this was an excellent opportunity to boost sales, so when I went to their support website to download the latest vista drivers they told me my scanner would only work on XP and that if I need a scanner to work w/ Vista i should look at their new line. Of course.

I'm assuming that the Vista machines were loaded with either Vista or Ultimate? If so, then bluntly you took a needless loss. You SHOULD have kept the machines and used the downgrade rights which apply to OEM VB and VU editions and downgraded to XP Pro. You'd have had your money's worth in shiny fast kit and still kept the users happy - and yes, we downgrade all our Vista equipped machines to XP Pro via this route.

Microsoft's plan doesn't work: Vista is fine for the average consumer, but not for business.

Business requirements should be more important to Microsoft. Sure they can ditch the market, but why?

Something is wrong in Redmond. Seriously, seriously wrong.

...then Vista is atonal music... you could remove all the notes, and you'd be at peace again.

id say go on microsoft you know you can do it im with microsoft on this one if they make windows 7 compatible like xp and all of xps programs work under windows 7 then i will upgrade to it so come on microsoft you can do it

It's good that customers are voting with their feet and making MS get their sh*t together for the next OS.

Microsoft must be kicking themselves for making XP a decent operating system in the first place. If it had been crap then Vista would have been received more gratefully.

Windows 7 will have to be decent for people to want to upgrade to it. It'll be interesting to see whether they cut the bloat and make it an operating system that people actually want to use.

As a computer engineering student I find it depressing how many armchair OS kernel designers there are here...

And as for the UI, I have yet to hear an argument that it's "bad" that isn't correctable by way of either UI configuration or "user (re)configuration". Ever heard of the acronym PEBKAC?

I really, really, hate to do this, but...

I'm primarily a Mac user. I've been a Mac user since 1984. I use Windows when I have to, and only when I have to.

That said... I have set my Mac to use Apple's Boot Camp, and have a Windows partition on it. I installed Vista on it. Now, Vista is far from perfect (plain Vista had WGA issues and idiot-design issues, Vista SP1 has those, plus issues with Apple's software, gee, it's almost as if _someone_ went and inserted some code to make it work worse on Macs, I wonder who could have done such a thing?) but it's not as bad as some of the Vista-haters make out. Y'all should know that you've gone over the top when a _20+ year_ Mac user starts defending Microsoft...

If Microsoft dumped some of the DRM, got rid of WGA (that thing has told me that my copy of Vista 'may not be valid' three times, and me with the install DVD and 25-digit key right in front of me. Cue screaming call to Mickeysoft 'support', fixing the problem... until next time.) and tuned up the speed a little (Vista, while not as slow as some make out, is noticeably slower on my Mac than OS X is, and this thing allegedly has a 'Vista experience index' of 5.4, God help those with anything lower if this is how a _high-end_ machine behaves...) then Vista wouldn't be too bad. I _still_ wouldn't use it except when I absolutely had to, but at least I wouldn't cringe at the thought of rebooting...

Here's one little piece of DRM nonsense:

http://tinyurl.com/4sp537

"NBC-Vista copy-protection snafu reminds us why DRM stinks"

I've been dual booting XP and Vista for over a year now. Once you get it to stop nagging, there's nothing wrong with Vista on a reasonable spec machine. It's no slower than XP, and actually more stable for me. Not to mention the relief of a GUI that doesn't look like it was made by Fisher Price.

I can see why it's not taken off outside the home market though. We're only just migrating from 2K to XP at work, and the oh so complicated new GUI nearly caused a mutiny. I definitely can't see them chucking around the kind of money to get the hardware up to Vista standards when XP does everything they want.

>DRM is a fanboy FUD dream I must assume.

Try monitoring your network throughput whilst watching a DVD. They may have partially or totally fixed this "feature", but the last I saw about it was MS saying "it's by design, so we won't change it", which tells me all I need to know.

I don't know anyone who has got Vista and kept it - all my friends and relatives have upgraded back to XP, or jumped to Mac or Linux (only the hardcore geeks have gone Linux though - still not quite there). Myself, I have it for basic support testing, but most of the time, I end up saying "sorry, that doesn't work in Vista".

Does Windows Server 2008 do HD playback of any kind? 'Cos that's what Vista's DRM infestation was mainly about under the hood - end to end copy protection for HD content, from ROM drive to monitor, everything controlled and certificated and tamper proof and allegedly cryptographically leakproof.

Whereas a server doesn't need to do HD content, therefore doesn't need HDCP, doesn't need HDMI, probably doesn't need HD-DVD or movie/music BluRay, and can therefore ship without all this embedded DRM nonsense without visibly losing any functionality for server use or even for today's typical (ie non-HD) PC use.

But without the end to end copy protection there's no way the MPAA etc are happy. Which is fine by me.

Marketing involves researching the market to find customer requirements. Implement the requirements and then demonstrate the value of your new product so customers buy it. (Advertising vendors often have a different opinion: any money spent on market research is money not spent on adverts - and might reduce the need for adverts.)

MS selected new features for Vista that are opposed to customer requirements. They implemented some, and scrapped others because they could not get them to work in a reasonable timescale. For the first time in decades MS are now involved in sales (product is cast in stone - convince people to buy it as it is).

In the past, if you bought a computer you had to pay the Microsoft tax. MS honestly believed that people would have to pay for whatever MS told them they had to buy, so customer requirements were irrelevant. As far as I know, Dell still throws a windows licence in the bin for each Linux machine they sell. Asus and Acer now sell Linux machines cheaper than equivalent hardware with windows, so MS now has to compete.

If you want Windows 7 to be any good, try Linux. It is the only way you will get MS to consider doing some real marketing.

the majority of the PCs that I saw were running XP rather than Vista...

Please, M$ forget about outsourced programmers and trying to write an OS, you can't, they can't, you won't.

Do us all a favor please, borrow Apples playbook and shell Windows over a BSD like OS. Hey, they can even find a use for that old XENIX code.

Microsoft has one simple problem. It's actually incredibly easy to solve, assuming that the folks running the show can muster up a little humility.

Microsoft has more and more been trying to push, actually, that's wrong, they're pulling the market now. They have been used to the leadership position that they inherited by default when MS DOS and Windows 3 handed them the PC market on a plate. Increasingly their products are the same old same old. Office is Office and has been Office for damn near 20 years. There is not a hell of a lot that's been added to Office in the last decade that is used by any normal user. Fundamentally speaking Windows hasn't moved the bar in functionality terms since Windows NT4/Windows98/Windows 2K. People spend more time playing games, reading email or browsing than anything else. So what special features of Windows have been added with XP and Vista that helped any of that? Oh, but MS has been pushing users from one version of Windows to the next with promises about productivity, compatibility, extra features, security, and so on, and so forth.

In reality, Windows security is still a target of humor, and no one is using much of that 'new' functionality, unless it's included in their games, email application or Internet browser. Microsoft has been pushing an increasingly reluctant user population to upgrade each time. With Vista, I think they switched from push to pull as users have begun to dig in their heels.

Microsoft stopped listening to customers about a decade ago, and as can be seen from the whole Vista episode, they're still not listening. Instead they prefer to tell us we're too stupid to understand, and then they market to us like we're hungry sea-lions waiting for them to give us the next fish.

So, the simple problem is that Microsoft has an ego problem, they do not listen and they believe that they can dictate to the market. I could run the same analysis on Office with the same result, pure ego.

The solution to their problem is really simple. Show some humility, admit the failure to listen and actually listen to the end users of their products.

We want Windows that is smaller, faster and more efficient, lighter on our hardware and does not interfere with our use of the system that we paid good money to own. I mean come on guys, a simple home PC needs an OS that requires multiple GB of HDD to install and multiple GB of RAM to run acceptably? Futur Windows needs to put a nail in this and lose some weight. It had better be compatible with their own products at very least. If a driver conforms to the Windows Driver Model, then future Windows should not break the driver. The GUI should not require us to all rush out and boost Nvidia's bottom line. DRM does not belong in the OS, remove it. Security needs to be baked in from the start, but security needs not to be intrusive or overly complex. Protecting the OS from applications of any kind would appear to be the way to go. No more allowing applications to operate at the OS level or write to OS files. We had VDMs in NT 3.5 that could run DOS and Windows applications. Why can't we use some level of virtualization to protect the OS from Internet applications?

What is the operating system on Steve Ballmer's PC

If it isn't a Mac! Maybe his chair is running Linux, but that would be guessing.

Downgraded my sister's laptop to XP from Vista recently, everyone who uses it is much happier now it runs at a reasonable pace.

As for the number of people who downgraded to a flavour of Linux from Vista, i'll put money on it being less than 1%.

I'm hearing the Windows Server 2K8 argument touted a lot, but it seems that by the time you've made the 'tweaks' to make it a usable desktop OS you've basically converted it into Vista. Why bother?

No, if you MUST have Windows, try Ev. E. Rest...

No matter how hard I tried to get on with it ... Vista was great at pissing on my cornflakes and that was about the sum of it. If it was a perfume, the advertising would probably be "Vista ... catch a waft of pointlessness".

I hope they get the priorities right for Windows 7 - and ensure that they take all the shortcuts to useful functionality and give them new confusing names rather than provide driver support for hardware that is more than 2 months old.

This kind of debate happens every time Microsoft releases a new OS. When we went from Windows 3.1 to Windows 95, that's all my friends and I talked about and debated. When we jumped to 98, people complained. Let's not even discuss ME, which was so bad that there wasn't even debate about it - the adoption rate was far worse than even Vista. And Windows XP had it's share of complaints, too. Here's the thing, though ... Microsoft knows this, and they don't care. Nor should they.

Complainers are vocal, fanboys are vocal, but the vast majority of the population sits quietly either using the product happily, or awaiting another version in frustration. So don't read all the "Vista Sucks" forums and think MS MUST listen now, because they won't, and they shouldn't. I have disliked every new version of Windows, I am a very late adopter (ever since my experience installing Windows 95 Chicago version on 7 machines that all required reinstalls of 3.1 afterwards), and I wait till the last minute. Eventually, the job or desire for a new machine leads me to no alternative but to use the new OS. Then I get used to it, and they change it again, and I dislike the changes. It's normal. Completely natural for people to prefer that to which they are familiar over that which is new and challenging. But if nobody ever moves the cheese, the cheese will eventually run out.

So before complaining about Vista, think about this: if MS had listened to these complaints in '95, we'd still be using Windows 3.1 ... would any one of us argue that in today's world, 3.1 would be preferable to XP?

Maybe Vista will be like ME and forever considered junk, but it's too early to tell, and we may well be sitting around in 2010 saying "Windows 7 sucks, I am sticking to Vista!".

http://www.sciforums.com/Windows-XP-Sucks-t-6958.html

http://www.salon.com/tech/log/1999/11/15/microsoft_frustration/

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/0,1000000121,2068765,00.htm

Just, briefly, to Anonymous Coward - musicians know that Mozart is one of the great geniuses - his music represents the height of classical beauty - sublime, energetic and every note in the right place. But, after all, music is a matter of personal preference, isn't it?

As for Vista - bought an inexpensive HP Compaq system for a test - and returned within the 30 day trial period. Bought parts, built a PC and installed XP which is the better choice - much for stability and friendly to very old software and hardware.

Vista is a mistake - calculated or not - by MS. The OS will not operate with some older software and hardware, needs new drivers, doesn't work well with hardware manufacturers' software packages - especially HP.

Mac OS X and XP are both preferable to Vista.

Imagine how much money Mr. Gates has made from the MS failure called Vista before the buyers became aware - shame, for shame.

Linux is due for a tryout soon just for the fun of it!

Sorry to point out the obvious - but after using Ubuntu for several months on my laptop I have to say.

XP is crap.

Slow, unresponsive, no decent tools.

We have to buy client software for SSH access, syncing files, a secure FTP client, auto-defragging etc etc etc etc.

Well said, but the solution is more complex than just ditching chunks of old OS code. This is because Microsoft is a hostage to a huge number of programs that users will expect to run flawflessly on any new version of Windows it releases. And these programs, guess what? They use all kinds of OS APIs that accumulated over the years - documented and undocumented. Thus, until Microsoft comes with some really smart solution (something like solaris containers?) that would let Win32 applications run it their own virtual boxes on top of lightweight OS, the core OS is condemned to implement everything that had been implemented in previous versions. Yes, that's bad. Really bad.

>>When we jumped to 98, people complained

Oh, it's "we" is it? Sounds familiar. Is "we" you and Bill, or you and the rest of the MS marketing team?

Windows 95 was incredibly well received, in fact. I worked with a major OEM at the time, and for a pentium system it was the only OS that could take advantage of the speed boost. Side-by-side, Windows 3.1(.1) underperformed against Windows95 on a Pentium (not even the best or even midrange).

Fast forward to Windows 98. Yes, people whined, complained and outright screamed.. at us, the OEM's for "installing that crap". Windows95? Still stable. Or have you forgotten that Windows98 had to be rewrapped and heavily fixed as OEM2 before it got any foothold in the home market? Even then, Windows95 outmaneuvered 98 easily on most platforms, new and old - and that's why most businesses stayed with 95. Or, as most of our clients did; went straight to WinNT Workstation instead of 98; and that was big money back then.

Trickle ahead to Windows 2000. Possibly one of the best OS platforms that MS ever made, even compared to some factors that are exhibited in XP. The joke that was WindowsME probably made W2K cry in it's sleep and caused more irreparable DAMAGE to the W2K potential than anything else.

WindowsXP came along shortly after. Never had any real problems with it outside of some quirky software issues (waaaay less than Vista, even now). Microsoft took a few months of frantic patching to fix some outlying issues, but by and large was accepted within the first few months it was released (and long before it's first SP)

Now we have Vista... 2 Years since it's release date, a full SP released; and it's still the unwanted present that grandad probably unloaded last nights curry on. And that's being nice.

Windows Dev team, "Josh", and heck Bill: we (IT departments, and OEM's everywhere) implore you to make right on the trainwreck that is Vista. Windows7 is based on that joke of an OS? Oh dear..

"What is the operating system on Steve Ballmer's PC

If it isn't a Mac! Maybe his chair is running Linux, but that would be guessing."

Why not ask the good folks over at gizmodo? http://gizmodo.com/384479/steve-ballmers-presentation-laptop-is-a-strange-choice

I know this wont come out of moderation but after reading all these comments this one just really stood out.

First and foremost to all the naysayers out there "I WAS ONE OF YOU!!" Yes yes I know but I have a system that would make peoples eyes bleed from the cost for a gaming rig but needless to say it can run anything out there with every setting maxed (Yes Crysis as well). I resisted for so long on Vista because doing technical support I see the problems people are having and then I get paid to fix them. So for the longest time I didnt want to upgrade. I finally did a month or two ago and ill tell you this, the system is a far cry more stable with vista and runs faster too. Now I saw 1 or 2 people who commented that they havent see any sign of the DRM in Vista TBH neither have I. And yes I watch DVDs and downloaded movies from time to time without a hitch. Music, yup no problem there. Latest and greatest games? Nope no there either. So quit whining if your machine has been upgraded and upgraded or the cheapest out of the box that SHOULD be able to run Vista but struggles with it what the hell did you expect? Maybe spend more then $350 on something besides an eMachine and the system would be half way decent.

Now back to my title.....if you love XP so much and the HDD is full why not but a bigger HDD and add it to the machine? Damn wanker.

REMOVE VI$TA, PUT ON XP.

THATS AN UPGRADE OF HUGE PROPORTIONS IN MY BOOK.

F#$K VISTA AND WIN 7, ESPECIALLY IF ALL WIN 7 IS GOING TO BE IS VISTA WITH WINDOW DRESSING ( MOST LIKELY, GIVEN SCUMBAGS HISTORY OF DELIVERING LESS THAN 1/10 OF WHAT THEY PROMISE ).

The big reason for the resistance to Windows 98 was that it was the edition where M$ started actively cramming IE down people's throats by making the desktop render through the IE engine as a way to make IE a part of the OS rather than a standalone app.

Fortunately, I discovered 98Lite - a program that, with access to a W95 install CD would graft 95's purpose-built desktop code onto 98 - resulting in the combined advantages of 98SE's improved stability, vastly better USB connectivity - and 95's much faster desktop response.

As a desktop.... Yes! much much better. Same as 2k3 over XP. If you want a workstation that works faster than Vista then 2k8 is your boy. End of story. If you want to watch videos, try a Mac or Linux. Want to play a game? 360 (Suckers) or a PS3. Really need Vista? Buy a Mac and run Parallels and 2k8 or if you like slow Vista in coherence mode. Love XP hate Vista, its a dog always will be. If i want to get things done and need an Windows app i use Citrix more and more via my Mac. I stopped supporting M$ by moving to Linux and then a Mac. If and only if that shit hole gov't running the most powerful nation in the world would squash and break up M$ we will get true innovation on the desktop. As for some that the changes were too radical for the masses should stop and play with a Mac. You will find a lot of things similar but just work better. Finder VS Explorer in Vista. Thought VS Not. Before you M$ Fanboys jump all over this guy cool down..... I wish explorer XP navigation and tree view were in a Mac natively. I gave up with MS some time ago; for you M$ fanboys why don't you move on to shit that just works, well most of the time (more than Vista LOL) . I guess for those that can't let go i leave you with this: My HDD is bigger and my GHz is longer than yours. Ohh, your Neon/LED lights rock! Does it work on the girls?

Sending a solid out to amfM, you are right as usual!

Indeed. That is why I mourned the passing of the Windows on Windows and the VDM functionality that Microsoft sto...er...borr...er copied from OS/2. It used to be that 16 bit windows apps ran quite happily on NT without any thread to the OS because the apps were inside a VDM running inside a WOW wrapper. At some point the concepts of virtualization that MS espoused in the early days of NT were forgotten and everything was once again integrated into the core OS forcing the poor thing to consume memory like a half starved super-model consumes Vodka and cigarettes.

To Usama -- First off change your name man! I mean you don't see German naming their babies Hitler do you?

Now, I know you won't like comment, but I'll say it anyway. Vista is not a good operating system. No operating system should consume as much resouce as Vista does! Also, Vista has more flaws then I can add in this brief comment.

Vista's so called security are a laugh. I tried move my folders from -- and UAC popped up. M$ could learn about security from Linux or OSX. I use OSX & Linux everyday, and in both OS I can move my folders without having to go through these garbage permission. Oh, lets not forget that I don't have to worry about viruses + bootlog etc...

Now without a doubt; Vista has some really good stuff -- like osx version of spotlight (search tools), and isync, widget etc.. Not to mention 3d but all in all; it should not consume the amount of rams it does. Also it's network speed is horrible! DRM monitor alone can consume 500MB of rams! Yes Vista has a DRM monitor! That's not counting the HTC mointor (the apps that prevents video card from transfering HD video to non standard Monitors).

Now, most of the stuff you said about Vista is true -- nontheless Vista is a resouce hog. Today's operating system should consume less resoruce not more, this is where the market is heading.

Just so you know my main opearting system are Linux, and at home I mostly use OSX. My notebook came with Vista Premium SP1 -- it's 2gig, 1.8 Dual Core, 200Gig HD. I didn't downgrade to XP/Linux b/c I simply hated like the mass. NO, I gave it a try, but I just couldn't stand it's idiotic interfaces, UAC, slow network connection, and many many other issues! Vista is good for many peole just as Windows ME is for many people, but I am not one of them.

It's funny how all the Windows fanboys seem to be saying that the many Microsoft customers who do not like Vista are dull, wrong, biased etc. The tenor seems to be "Blame the customer if the customer doesn't like the product".

I remember the days when Apple's operating systems was MacOS 7.5. Back then many Mac users switched to Windows and rightly so because MacOS 7.5 was one of the worst lemons in the history of software. It was a stinking pile of dog poo. Back then it was the Apple fanboys who preached that former Apple customers who didn't like MacOS 7.5 and switched to Windows had it all wrong. Back then, it was the Windows fanboys who pointed fingers at the Apple fanboys for blaming customers, they said it was an indication how brainwashed the Apple fanboys were, and they were probably right.

But since then the two seem to have switched sides. It is the Windows fanboys now who are doing exactly the same that they once ridiculed the Apple fanboys for: blame the customer if he doesn't like the product.

Conclusion: if you have to defend a product you are using in the face of large numbers of other customers being utterly unsatisified with it, then perhaps you should consider a sanity check, chance is you have been infected with fanboy disease.

As for Microsoft and their Vista troubles, perhaps they can learn how to deal with this crisis from Apple. They might want to ask: How did Apple manage to get out of that MacOS 7.5 crisis in the mid 1990s?

After several aborted attempts to develop a new operating system themselves, Apple eventually figured that they were not capable of doing this on their own, that they needed to look elsewhere and buy one instead. And then they acquired NeXT Inc along with the NeXT OS which has since evolved into OSX. People may disagree about Apple and their products but there is probably nobody who would disagree that Apple's acquisition of NeXT saved them from bankruptcy. In other words shelving their ego for a second and buy a new operating system elsewhere was clearly a good business decision.

Perhaps that is the lesson Microsoft should learn. Perhaps they should shelve their ego for a while and buy a new operating system elsewhere, just like Apple did with OSX. Another lesson they might want to learn from Apple is how to get rid of legacy code and bloat by breaking native backwards compatibility. Perhaps Microsoft should do the same and offer a "Classic Windows" emulation layer during a transition period, similar to the way Apple did with their "Classic environment" in the early days of OSX.

At least Apple seem to have learned from their own past, that getting rid of bloat once in a while is a good thing, they announced that the next version of OSX will receive a diet. If Microsoft is going to continue on the bigger-fatter-more-bloat path, they may actually make things worse instead of better, they may find that their next operating system will be even less liked than Vista is now.

Our OEM did not have an XP downgrade plan. Toshiba did not support XP for their new laptops. No XP drivers were available. Our only option would have been to buy XP and track down drivers on our own. Toshiba said they would not take XP support calls for our systems.

Now the used systems we buy are Dell.

One NT one 2003 server (I think) bunches of XP machines an ME (which I kinda like) and very possibly a 98 second edition.

(and a very, very sad 95 SP1 laptop.)

No Vista yet.

It isn't the learning curve it is the time it would take to hack into the operating system.

It took weeks to stabilize ME (one of the reasons for keeping this is that we can use it to do things to the server that XP is just not capable of; there is a BIG difference in the command set.).

I am (kinda) starting out on the "play games with Vista" on other peoples machines. I have found a dandy way around some of the security features; but before I would spend money to buy into it I would want to know my way around the registry a bit better.

That would take some slack time at work and right now we don't have any.

I am really not looking forward to windows 7 as Microsoft will probably go into stubborn mode and leave all the bad features of Vista (if you document it, it is not a bug.) while piling on a few more.

But then, Win 7 might make Vista look good. (Hell of a way to run a company.)

Vista needs a decent system to run, no doubt about that. On a high end machine, it'll walk all over XP in gaming performance and feature (but even I will admit the feature's aren't really worth the hassle.)

I, personally, get on well with Vista, and experience better performance than I get from XP with the same reliability. The only crash I've had was down to Creative's dodgy drivers.

This brings me onto something to slap the apple/linux people around the face a bit.

Think a little, if you will, about how much work MS have to put into Windows rather than Apple do, or Linux.

Microsoft. PCs. That's a HUGE amount of hardware combinations they have to cater for - literally tens of thousands more combinations than you get with Apples.

Apple. You get a range of hardware, and don't really go outside of it. The mainboards remain the same, the processors remain the same, the memory and controllers remain the same. Apple, have it very very easy indeed.

Linux: Yeah, it's the same hardware base as Microsoft - but instead of a single (albeit bloated) company, has the support of Open Source and thousands upon thousands of well meaning geeks around the world. Something not work? Someone's bound to have fixed it or done it before.

This isn't a post to point out how great I think Vista is - you love it or hate it. I use what's best for me, and in performance terms, that's Vista. Of course a lot of that is that I'd not want to suffer XP64 for 8gb of ram, it's far worse than Vista for support or compatibility.

I just feel it's worth remembering now and then just how hard MS have to work to make the average PC go.

An avatar to celebrate the open source community though, and everything it stands for.

I'll post the same thing I posted on the linked article page:

Friend spent 1400 on a Dell Inspiron laptop that continues to freeze up running normal, garden variety developer software like Eclipse and Firefox. No games, no office apps. Has shipped it back and forth twice now and they just sent it back as broken as before when he tried to do any work on it. For grins, he loaded Fedora Core 9 on it and it ran a dream as did XP, but he needs Vista Ultimate for testing purposes regarding client side issues.

Mom's Dell Inspiron with Vista Premium she bought in January periodically decides it doesn't know where the wireless network is when the router is ten feet away, does the same thing if you plug in ethernet.

My dual core Compaq shipped with Vista Home (I intended to run Fedora on it) and I played with it for a bit. It had significant problems with with losing DNS or the entire network while hardwired to a router.

People can say whatever they want, but as a person with three empirical experiences to judge by involving three different pieces of hardware (not all of the same manufacturer) that have occurred in the past couple months, somebody in Redmond didn't do their homework.

--Might also add, moving things around in control panel was stupid as hell. There wasn't any reason to do it. Makes setting up networking less intuitive.

hahaha! that's a good one. Toshiba, eat that!

XP is due to be gone by February 2009.

>>"the graphics chipset on the PC (an nVidia 9100 IGP) wasn't supported"

>Hey, hey hey. That can't be right! Only Linux has a problem with no support for drivers! MS told us so!

Its an ATI 9100 IGP - in Vista you can just use the XP drivers for this card, it works fine only thing that doesn't is the control panel widget.

In the Linux world the ATI prop. xorg drivers support 2D only, but work OK - there's a petition actually to get them to include 3D support for this card which is still very common in laptops and on integrated mobos.

Hope this helps...

Zune is coming! (Probably).

"If a car manufacturer decided to shift pedal controls in cars after a few years what do you think would happen?"

Well, providing it would be a safer configuration to move a car pedal, I would be happy letting Darwinism take care of the whining fools who can't cope with change!

MS should maybe make Windows7's UI look and work exactly like XP, but with all the excellent Vista/2K8 gubbins in the background. How about a "Vista technology upgrade" for XP, Microsoft?

Mines the one with the ReadyBoost pockets, the DX10 visor and UAC(Doom) across the back.

Got 2 PC's one that blue screens most of the time and one that has blue screened once or twice and that was mostly my fault. Former is the XP PC and vista seems pretty good.

MSN stopped working as I was not connected to the internet, but not worried about that all too much, rest of the net works fine. But then the PC was built for vista - 64 bit dual core, 4 GB ram, DX10 graphics card, 1 TB HDD etc...

So far am impressed :)

***"But then the PC was built for vista - 64 bit dual core, 4 GB ram, DX10 graphics card, 1 TB HDD etc..."***

All that just to run a bloody desktop operating system. Sheesh!

"And as for the UI, I have yet to hear an argument that it's "bad" that isn't correctable by way of either UI configuration or "user (re)configuration". Ever heard of the acronym PEBKAC?"

Yes, the problem is between the keyboard and the chair. It is all my fault, I realise this now, how could I have been so foolish? When I ask click the button "Apply to Folders" I stupidly expect it to do what I ask and apply my configuration to folders.

How patently ridiculous of me to go to a directory, go to another one and when I return, expect it to look like it did when I was there before.

I've been told (whether it's true or not I've not been able to verify) that vista can only hold a small number of individual folders view preferences. Sounds like carp to me.

I sit with 2 people who babble on about how good vista is "look at the flick3d switcher, see how beautiful it is" yet they still spend time cursing and changing views all day, especially when they've opened a 2 inch square dialog box which has extra large icons in it...scroll...scroll...scroll...scroll...scroll

The PEB the UI programmer's KAC and the tester's KAC not at the end user's who expects things to do what it says on the button/checkbox/whatever!

If its used at home everyone loves it, but you place it in a work enviroment and it just doesn't work, yes my friend who never uses a computer thinks it looks great but ask an IT savy person that has to support it in a 1000+ PC enviroment and they run for the hills and theres no changing this now cause its to late. It was just somple maths in todays economy companies can't afford the cost of vista or the support.

Hey MS heres an idea have an OS that boots your machine to a desk top and thats it, sure have home and buisness where home is more secure for internet browsing and business has the tools for well buisness enviroments but loss all the bloat, its simple and probably would bring the over head costs down. hey gates give ME a job i'll sort it out.

Now deleting that functionality from Vista was _really_ annoying !

I have been avoiding Vista like the plague, but heard yesterday that Vista does provide at least one useful feature that I can't get anywhere else - using F2 to rename a file, no longer selects the extension by default, just the filename. It's this sort of usability improvement that provides real benefit & makes IT literate people consider upgrading, rather than battery sapping 3D Uis.

In the early days of cars there were many user interfaces. Brake pedal on the right, the left, the middle, a hand-operated lever. Gears arranged in any pattern pne could imagine: linear forwards or backwards, grids with a vertical or horizontal axis, mounted on the floor, the dash, next to the door, in the middle ....

I'm sure there were arguments about which was "best". But eventually sanity (and safety) prevailed, and one pattern was adopted as standard for the major controls, so a motorist could safely drive any car without re-learning everything.

It's high time Microsoft (and every other interface designer) realized this. The existing layout, that every user has investyed much of his time in learning, is automatically best unless there is huge and widespread dissatisfaction with it. Evolutionary changes should be small, and only when forced by unavoidable changes to what underlies the interface. (One good use for an interface is to *hide* changes to the underlying code!)

So to Vista. Whether or not it was a good idea to rewrite the kernel, the basic layout of XP's functions should have been kept. (If you must "freshen" the appearance, fine, but don't move my controls around, or change the icons or rename them! ) If they'd obeyed this simple principle, a lot of the initial user hostility would have been avoided. Though I'll also say, what underlies the interface is so crap, that the result would only have been to reveal the second layer of reasons for hostility much sooner!

BTW WIndows server 2008 works and is based on the same kernel, so it is demonstrably possible to ditch the crap and make Windows 7 work OK. I'm not saying that they will, just hoping.

sorry, just had to laugh..

XP for the forseeable future!!!

...from people keen to have a pop at Vista/Windows yet they clearly haven't a clue how an OS is put together, what constitutes a kernel etc.. etc.. I'd be here all week were I to attempt to address each point though.

Yeah OK Vista Looks flashy and has a couple additional things to XP. So what! I recently downgraded after saying to myself enough is enough.

Vista has so many Hardware and Software Compatibility Issues.. FACT.. causing you to constantly implement work arounds. My Microsoft 3mp Webcam didnt work I mean we are talking about a MS product that doesn't work properly on a a MS operating system! ffs.

My Creative XFI card took me Bl**dy ages to get working!

When I first installed Vista I thought this looks pretty good. Now having reached the end of my tether with it, I only have bad things to say about it. Its no wonder people are downgrading! I was so chuffed when i downgraded to XP, it was fast everything installed and worked first time.

Oh yeah and it consumes memory like its going out of fashion!

bang right m8!

*bullseye*

http://www.eupeople.net/forum

can you assume i wrote the same scathing attack at vista i wrote last time? i can't find the text file i saved it to and i cant be arsed to put all that brain effort into it again.

well i suppose i could summarise it, from what i remember the gist was:

i hate vista.

windows ME = shite

windows vista = ME2

windows 7 = ME3

that's about it, innit?

bleeders...I'll stay with XP

mICROsOFT seems to think that changing the names of things every OS will make it more secure...and that is just a joke... and a time waste for their (former) customers.

It is like someone changing the street names every two years to make a neighborhood safer. All it does is get you lost if you do not know where you are going, but if you are familiar with the layout (ie: HACKERS), you do not care.

And what ever happened to "BACKWARD COMPATIBLE"? None of my software or NEW products worked with vISTA, NOT my HP (6 mo old, vista compatible) ALL IN ONE PRINTER, My $300.00 E-Mu soundcard, my Canon LBP Printer (beautiful letter quality), or my sONY MD player, or any of my games...I had to wait 1-2 years (MS says it is the responsibility of the manufacturer to cobble together vISTA code for their products) for mIcroSoft to get around to fixing them, and I'm still waiting for UPDATED DRIVERS for many other products. I smell kickbacks!

Bill, 'cause he says so...

I had Vista Ultimate SP installed on my latest Alienware machine (a little higher specced than your average user's home PC I will admit) and so far I have had no real issues on it apart from uninstall my software firewall and download the "Vista Compatible" version.

Of course I did disable (or set to manual) about 30-35 services, disabled approx 10 startup programs and also switched off: "Security Service", "Windows Defender" and the silly "Sidebar/Widget" app. I thought about turning off "User Access Control" (the program that prompts you for permission to run things) but decided to leave it on for the time being.

The OS is performing nicely at about 400-500MB of RAM being used by it plus my "essential" apps (firewall/anti-virus, messenger progs, proxomitron, etc). I could probably free more memory by turning off Aero (the shiny desktop theme) but I like the look of it and it doesnt really intefere with anything I am running.

It's a nice OS. I like the way things are laid out (its very "mac-like") and how fast the new explorer file indexing is. Predictably my wife oohed and aahed about how "pretty it is".

My only compliant is I do hate this version of the Windows Networking Stack -- it might be "more secure" but its about 25% slower than the version included in XP SP2. Someone else on this thread was complaining about how annoying it was to try to monitor network traffic while playing DVD's or streaming media -- I agree, and thats why I went out and invested in a nice Killer K1 NIC for about $85 (it has its own built-in stack handling and avoids the clunky OS one). Problem solved.

They're shipping with Vista so they can claim the good sales figures.

And people are buying two Microsoft operating systems instead of one.

So they're either:

Corporate customers who are already paying a shedload of money.

People buying machines with the expensive versions of Vista with the downgrade rights.

People buying machines with the cheap Vista and then buying XP.

Kerching!

Over 3000 downgrade out of how many copies sold? Vista has sold over 40 million copies in the past few months (2008) to the tune of what 120 to 140 million copies sold? And it is news that 3000 (give or take) got cold feet...?

To the rocket scientist here, that is a mere rounding error... in terms of 10s of millions of copies sold.

NOT news! Just sensationalism at it's worst... Must be having trouble capturing eyeballs...

"Ever heard of Math?"

Obviously, it is _you_ who doesn't know anything about math. You don't need to poll everyone to get fairly accurate data. About 1000 households is a large enough sample to get representative data for the whole population with a margin of error typically in the order of 2 or 3 percentage points. THAT'S math, pal.

we want XP !!!!

Y'all are nuttier than squirrel droppings. You are like some teenage girl clique devoted to MS bashing. So pitiful.

I've been using Vista since about the time it came out and I've had very few issues, none that aren't resolved. Like all new things, it takes some acclimatization, but I'd have to say it took very little getting used to. The same goes for Office'07. It takes a little flipping through the menus or consulting help files to find out where things went, but again, very little.

Some people mention DRM issues? You must be the worst pirate in history if you are having troubles. Needing more horsepower? Vista runs great on my stock $500 laptop. That's even with the aero interface enabled.

I use XP, OS X and Vista all in production environments performing horsepower-hungry tasks such as high end graphics and video production and if I have my choice of OS, I would just as soon use Vista over others.

Home users like fluff, business users need reliable tools without fluff.

MS could could solve their XP / Vista problems by just having 2 versions of an OS - home and business.

Home would be Vista ultimate...

Business would be...XP pro !

Simple answer to keep both camps quite happy and stem the loss of customers. Best to keep some revenues that was for MS, then focus more on added-value products to sell, on PC or online, rather than faff with new OS every 2 years. Mad or what, especially as linux provide free OS and tools....

I have been using Vista for almost 30 years now and never had any problem.

every time this topic comes up i post this simple fact. here goes again:

i got a dell laptop: dual core athlon processor, 2gig ram, dedicated video card. Tried to run an avi on VISTA .... it broke up.

F.F.S.

VISTA / dotnet as dvelopment platform ... MS are sliding into the ashtray.

I've got a $500 stock Acer Aspire laptop with 1GB RAM, shared memory video card, blah blah blah, and I am ripping, burning, playing and producing video content all with zero problems. I think it must be you that is failing.

Remember XP product activation? Windows Genuine Advantage?

XP just seems better now because Vista is such a load. M$ peaked with Windows 2000. No activation, no WGA, no DRM. XP is just 2000 with a cartoon GUI.

Remember all the advanced features Vista was supposed to have? M$ had to strip them all out to deliver anything. Now it's just XP with Aero and extra suckage.

WTF does Vista do that you can't do with XP or Linux? And don't say "oh, it's so pretty", pretty you can add on to the OS you have. Vista is a solution looking for a problem to solve. Haven't all the real OS advancements already been made? And no, the GUI is not the OS, despite what M$ would like you to think. And what do you really need from a GUI? Fast, intuitive, and consistent? You can't get that by changing the damn thing all around with every new OS. I always run XP in "Classic" mode because that XP start menu is pure crap. And don't get me started about Cisco's web site that they feel compelled to eff up every year or so.........