Whirlpool

After 4 months of Vista hell I've finally wiped the pc and re-loaded XP.

I was wondering how many others have done the same thing.

Romuleus writes...

After 4 months of Vista hell I've finally wiped the pc and re-loaded XP.


I'm running Vista on another HD and haven't touched it for 6 months or more.
Just too much headache with other software so sticking with Xp for a while.

Loaded Vista twice in my system, don't like it.

You should see how vista perform in the intel t2030 notebook, shocking, worse than 486 I'd say.

Anyway, most of the programs I have do not work properly under vista.

Tones on whirlpool and other forums are all the time mentioning they are upgrading
away from XP . Just use search you will come across no shortage of people posting
vista doesnt work with software yet XP reinstalled and everything works again

Ive tested out a few of the Vista beta builds , and saw it was crap
and reading a lot of the news about it . Recommending everyone to stay with
2000 or XP and dont downgrade to Vista .

Vista is a repeat of Windows ME

To get even better performance from Windows 2000/2003/XP
create a custom Nlite ISO of your windows disc and use it to reinstall

weres the vote option . I never installed Vista Retail and laughing at all the
people that did and bought a new pc with it on without reseaching first
then went back to XP

Vista probably was the worst OS failure Microsoft ever had (especially thinking about that price tag) - even ME was not that bad.

Then the X-box drama 'forgetting' a vital heatsink. Microsoft seems to have very serious problems in the quality control department.

Comparing Vista to ME? ...at least Vista doesn't BSOD 3 times a day like ME did...

And tafed00d ...don't spit out the same rhetoric about Vista..particularly when you have only tried beta builds.

Tropo59 writes...

Microsoft seems to have very serious problems in the quality control department.

There have been times during the last 4 months where I actually wondered if MS did ANY QA with Vista. Seriously.

tafed00d writes...

I never installed Vista Retail and laughing at all the
people that did

so you've never tried Vista (beta's dont count) and you're laughing at us? Other way around sunshine.

ditto
Actually I liked it for a while till I found out how many
of my programs wouldn1t work.
When I went back to XP it all seemed so quick and easy.

Dual-booting isn't an option?

I use Vista Ultimate for almost everything, bar heavy CAD work and gaming. I keep XP Professional for that. Best of both worlds.

It really ticks me off when people bash a product that they have not tried, or only tried beta or release candidate builds of.

Of course it's going to have bugs you dimwits! That's why it's been marked as such!

Get the final release, try it for a month; THEN compare it to Windows XP or ME. Granted, Vista has it's teething problems; but nothing as serious as ME.

I've seen at least 100MB worth of updates this week flow through Windows Update, which I see as a good sign; Microsoft is finding and fixing things.

Choose your words carefully before posting on a public forum. Your very likely to get flamed for making such accusations.

I haven't found any software that doesn't work and I haven't had the operating system crash at all.

The performance isn't great and there are a few bugs that irritate me:
- second monitor completely loses the mouse when my notebook sleeps, have to hibernate / waken to bring it back
- webcam only works a couple of times and then I have to restart before it works again
- if you select a file and rename it, it automatically re-sorts the folder but where the file used to be remains the selected index, so then if you shift and click to select a bunch of files it selects the wrong files

Aside from that, I see a lot of potential with Vista. There's room for improvement specifically with performance but the underlying product is pretty solid and I expect it'll improve significantly throughout it's life.

No operating system or software gets everything perfect, there's always more than can be done to improve or fix it.

Have both XP and Vista running on my PC at the moment, in a dual boot setup.

I must say all my hardware and peripherals work fine under Vista (PC is about 12 months old).

I installed and ran the compatibility programme supplied by the Windows site. It was correct in assessing some programmes would have issues, such as:

Nero 6 - I am trialling Ashampoo 7.01 as an alternative. Seems ok apart from long filenames lengths being shortened (same as "drag & drop" does)

Acronis True Image 9.1 - There supposedly is a workaround but I continue to look for another imaging programme

Daemon tools - updated to new version and importantly installed new SPTD file to make run. Otherwise ok.

Partition Magic 8 - Still working on that one

Hope this helps!

Had no issues at all with Vista Home Premium on this pc.

(AMD athlon 64 3200+, 1GB RAM, Radeon 9250 gpu)

Im pretty much in the same boat as most of the above.

Vista works well for pretty much everything, issues off the top of my head are just

Random BSODs in BF2
System Crash in DOW DC exp.

So for that reason like the others i have XP dual booted.
Most games work, heck if i wasn't in the GA BF2 comp i wouldn't bother with dual booting XP.

Only other rant is this, driver certificate thing under X64? its easy fixed using "VistaBootPro" but without it some of my programs wont install.

Apart from that its Vista all the way.

Gaza writes...

Partition Magic 8 - Still working on that one


I Hope your not trying to make it work.. wait until they realease a version that works. If you get it to work and you try do some partitioning your probably going to end up screwing your system. It cant read Vista Partitions properly.

Acquired Vista.. installed and deleted within 3 hours.

Now on PCLinuxOS

tafed00d writes...

Ive tested out a few of the Vista beta builds , and saw it was crap
and reading a lot of the news about it . Recommending everyone to stay with
2000 or XP and dont downgrade to Vista .

Vista is a repeat of Windows ME

So you have no experience with the final Vista release yet you constantly spout dribble like "Vista = ME" and recommend that everyone avoids Vista?! Nice work...

with people going on about building "the best" system, best hardware, cooling, performance.. it makes no sense to me why youd upgrade to an operating system that uses up half your system resources just to boot up?

then again maybe im missing something, i havent really researched it.

installed Ultimate version, seemed to work OK on my PC. However went back to XP for 2 reasons only:
My Canon Scanner is not properly recognized by Vista (and never will be)
My Digital TV cards will not be upgraded to run on Vista.

My sole reasons for not keeping Vista

Jezebel writes...

then again maybe im missing something, i havent really researched it.

There is no "maybe" about it, you are definitely missing something

Jezebel writes...

state a fact or point of view or dont bother replying. thanks.

I clearly stated the fact that you are definitely missing something, as I said, there is no "maybe" about it. This was in reference to your claim that Vista requires half your system resources to simply boot up, in case that wasn't obvious to you.

Jezebel writes...

then again maybe im missing something, i havent really researched it.

u are. do a bit of research on Vista memory management

Dechah writes...

I clearly stated the fact that you are definitely missing something, as I said, there is no "maybe" about it. This was in reference to your claim that Vista requires half your system resources to simply boot up, in case that wasn't obvious to you.

a lot of people post on this forum because they dont know everything about everything. ive read a lot of reviews about vista saying that it requires a significant amount of system resources to run compared to XP. whether the assumption was wrong or right, responding to a post with derogatory monosyllabic responses is unhelpful and rude.

Some things I've noticed between Vista and XP. When overclocking my ATI X850 in Vista, it never really gets hot when under the pump (DX10 versus DX9 card maybe?). In XP gets hot very quickly, though runs a lot quicker. Framerates in Flightsim 2004 are about half in Vista to that in XP. I like XP and I like Vista. I just like they way things work, run and happen in XP more than Vista at the moment.

When I upgrade my hardware, I'll blow the dust off my Vista Ultimate sitting in the draw and load it and probably will love it. I just think it got released a little bit too early. Hardware and driver vendors weren't given enough time. My two cents worth.

From my experiences Vista runs a lot faster then XP ever did on my laptop. I have a few problems with my drawing tablet, wireless, and a couple small things. Other then that, works fine. :)

Jezebel writes...

responding to a post with derogatory monosyllabic responses is unhelpful and rude.

First of all, you need to learn what monosyllabic actually means, secondly, I thought removing the doubt you expressed in your original post about "maybe being wrong" was actually doing you a favour. We all could use less doubt in the world

In my experience it work fine, no problems. It is even more stable then XP. It just takes some time getting used to.

Tidge writes...

Acquired Vista.. installed and deleted within 3 hours.

Well, at least you didn't make a comment about it. 3 hours is not enough time to get to know any OS.

Vista's fine.. I run home premium 64-bit and all my programs run fine.

vista has its pros and cons. just like any operating system/software/game/computer part.

i used it for about a month on my pc, as my main OS with no dual booting.
only went back to xp because i screwed up my install by messing with windows itself.

for me, there were a few cons that annoyed the crap out of me.
however, overall, it was a good experience.
given time, and updates, i believe it will be just as good, if not better, than XP.

from the general consensus of people hating vista, i almost wonder how many people were actually around and using computers (age wise) when XP first got released in 2001, as it had many teething problems also.
pretty much the same as whats going on with vista.
was a move from dx8 to dx9, drivers were a pain in the ass, software was a pain in the ass, and virtually all the problems being experienced now with vista, is a mirror of the teething problems of going from win9x to xp.

in fact, alot of people back in the day wouldnt touch xp without sp1 or sp2.

people forget the past way too quickly.

darktranq writes...

i almost wonder how many people were actually around and using computers (age wise) when XP first got released in 2001, as it had many teething problems also.

i bought the xp retail upgrade the day it was released, and didn't have any problems, except for the bpa cable login client not working - that was easily fixed by downloading bpalogin.

I upgraded to vista in january and since then have had quite a few problems from printers not working, dodgy wireless connections and some software not working.

that said, i cbf uninstalling and going back to xp.

darktranq writes...

in fact, alot of people back in the day wouldnt touch xp without sp1 or sp2.

I was one of those people; and with Vista, I am the same. Half of my programs and drivers don't work under Vista, and its as slow as a dog to run in comparasin.

I did try it for about a month, but decided that due to the problems, and the fact that I need my laptop to be 100% for work, that waiting for Vista to catch up is not worth it.

My 2cents.

Voyager

I haven't had one program cause an issue with vista yet. And I use a large range of progs.

Thing that would be interesting is to see people who have issues with Vista post their computer specs.

Most of the negative posts about vista in this thread are just FUD which was the same FUD we got when XP came out.

Now i have to look forward to the same people posting FUD about 64bit when the push to move everyone over to it comes.

Vista has been nothing but a headache for me, even though I came into it with an open mind. My Windows Experience Rating thing is 5.0, so my PC doesn't exactly suck. I just hate the limited permissions in Home Premium (can't load the group policy MMC snap-in, which I used for customisation in XP Pro), and don't get me started on UAC (had to click 'continue' 4 times to make a new empty folder in Program Files).
It started not reading my USB devices properly not long after I saw this video, so now I'm running Ubuntu 7.04 w/ Beryl and loving it.

Sirikan writes...

Now i have to look forward to the same people posting FUD about 64bit when the push to move everyone over to it comes.

They should be making the 64-bit decision now, not later.

Vista 64 is the way forward. In 12 months time, the question won't even be asked. 32-bit computing is almost dead.

to equal HDD's (120GB), one running XP, the other Vista..

XP HDD = 55GB free Vista HDD = 12GB free.. I haven't touched XP for so long that I'm transferring files from Vista onto that HDD! But for some reason, I don't want to wipe XP all together.. although I think a sysyem clean up is in order..

Protocol writes...

They should be making the 64-bit decision now, not later.

Exactly. I am already on the 64bit version of vista and it works fine. Just wish Microsoft released 64bit only when releasing Vista. Would have made life a lot easier. Only one set of drivers.

Vista 64 is the way forward. In 12 months time, the question won't even be asked. 32-bit computing is almost dead.

Well i had to upgrade as 32bit won't support all of my hardware properly. What we need is a killer app that is 64bit only. :)

Protocol writes...

32-bit computing is almost dead.

2009 ..AFAIK MS will dump support for future OSs to be 32bit.

The M575...you're doing something wrong if your harddrive is that full ...running a 200GB as my boot drive ..20GB of installed apps and I still have 135GB free ..

btw always remember that Vista will take 15% of the harddrive space for restore information.

THE M575 writes...

to equal HDD's (120GB), one running XP, the other Vista..

XP HDD = 55GB free Vista HDD = 12GB free.. I haven't touched XP for so long that I'm transferring files from Vista onto that HDD! But for some reason, I don't want to wipe XP all together.. although I think a sysyem clean up is in order..

Did you post this in the right thread?

yer, but I don't think I finished writing what I wanted to say.. lol.. basically, I installed it thinking I wouldn't use it, but clearly, I use it MORE than XP (haven't used XP once.. ) lol.

tafed00d writes...

Vista is a repeat of Windows ME

Yes Vista is to Windows XP as Windows ME was to Windows 98SE.

That's better The M575 ...makes a hell of a lot more sense ;)

After 2 beta version & a release candidate I have retired my AMD64 3400+ PC and bought a Mac. Bill Gates Vista blows. If I need window I run XP in VMWare.

Nebby_99 writes...

It started not reading my USB devices properly not long after I saw this video, so now I'm running Ubuntu 7.04 w/ Beryl and loving it.

Beryl looks like a half-baked rip-off of the Vista and OSX GUIs designed by uni students as part of final year project. Flames, floppy windows?! I'm waiting for "Mavis" or "Cecil" because I've heard they will be better...

Hey.

Vista lasted about a week of mine.
I really disliked the reworked lay out of everything.
Plus a few bugs in the OS drove me mad.

I personally am waiting for SP1 before I will move to Vista.
I was the same with XP when it came out, installed it for a month and then gave it the boot till SP1.
But XP didn't really shine till SP2.

The only thing that bugs me most about Vista is all the "anonymous" Information it collects and feeds it back to Microsoft.
I rather not have my OS sending my usage and system stats back to Microsoft.

I will make my mind up about Vista once SP1 comes out....

Cyas.

Bearman writes...

Beryl looks like a half-baked rip-off of the Vista

You're kidding, right?

I think you have it the wrong way round. I've been using Beryl on ubuntu for a year and it rocks. Very CPU and memory friendly, stable, genuinely saves time and is nice to look at.

BY contrast Aero looks cheap.

Don't bash Vista without providing a reason/s.

If you have a 512mb/1024mb of ram Vista will most likely run slow on your system. Remember when XP appeared in shops it came with a 128mb memory stick or was it 256mb.

With each new operating system you will need better hardware. What are you going to do when the new Windows OS comes out and it requires 4gig or ram? Stay with XP?

Best advice I can give is look at your hardware, see if manufacturers released drivers for Vista and if your current software works in Vista. Then install Vista, use it for at least 3 months and make your mind up.

I myself installed Vista Ultimate in Nov on my 2 year old PC and tested it for about 2 or 3 months. I couldn't be happier. Now I have Vista Business activated and running.

My scanner is the only thing that doesn't work on Vista, that's because HP chose not to support hardware older than 5years.

All the software I use runs on Vista as well. Alcohol, Nero, Visual Studio, Adobe products, PowerDVD and what not.

Also people waiting for SP1, don't kid yourself.

tafed00d writes...

I never installed Vista Retail and laughing at all the people

U only used a Beta Vista? We're laughing at you mate.

ArnStar writes...

U only used a Beta Vista? We're laughing at you mate.

lawl.. indeed! never had an issue with vista! except for Joost.. but thats all fixed ;)

Bearman writes...

Beryl looks like a half-baked rip-off

Mate. it's not even half-baked. Only 20% baked. It's not even a version 1.0 product!

happily running vista ultimate 64 bit with no issues at all.
the system starts up and shuts down faster than xp did, and overall runs faster.
the $55 ati x1300 series card knocks the score from 4.5 to 2.8, however runs aero and does everything I need and want it to.

Apart from waiting for x64 driver support and maturity, it does a pretty good job in the general consumer segment, although not exactly an improvement over xp yet it gives a good insight into the various platform, api and interface changes planned for its successor.

At present I mostly use it for the purposes of compatibility testing as most of my tools and work revolve around 2k3 and *nix.

EDIT: They've fixed it now. It was linked to this page for a minute or two: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shit

LOL!

Check this wikipedia page. It's supposted to be vista.

haha.

won't llast long!

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_vista

??

'I love Vista, wouldn't go back'.

:D :D :D

I won't use Vista as long as Nvidia refuse to support full screen video in clone mode. There are other software issues, most of which can be rectified. But there is no way to do what I want short of buying an ATI card, something not even considered an option.

I've often thought of going back to XP but it would be too much of a hassle.

And also, Vista looks spectacular - so it stays!

Romuleus writes...

After 4 months of Vista hell I've finally wiped the pc and re-loaded XP.


Mark my words, you will go back to Vista one day :)

And what exactly was hell about it?

By the way, I dual boot Ubuntu Linux and Vista. Tried that?

Romuleus writes...

You're kidding, right?

not at all.

I think you have it the wrong way round. I've been using Beryl on ubuntu for a year and it rocks. Very CPU and memory friendly, stable, genuinely saves time and is nice to look at.

BY contrast Aero looks cheap.

Beryl is very "gee whizz" with flames and floppy windows that are great for demos but not useful in the long term. It's the fluffy dice and rear-spoiler of the OS world.

I dual boot

Gopt vista ultimate and XP running..

I love the look of vista, but games are too slow in it as are watching hi-def .mkv files so i keep XP for that, when i get a nerw rig im sure everything will be good...

Parko writes...

love the look of vista, but games are too slow in it

Why are games slower in Vista?

My son plays BF2142 Demo on Vista. You mean it would run faster on XP?

Interesting poll!

So far it reads you have a 50% chance to face trouble and go back to XP!

I have a dual boot - Vista/XP.

So far my observations are:
- Vista = new OS so be prepared to fork out some money for upgraded hardware
- 1gb is not sufficient for Vista - I got "out of memory" error messages when I had photoshop and dreamweaver open in Vista which never happened with XP. Another 1gb ram solved this issue.
- poor driver compatibility - Nvidia

Other than that, it is quiet good.

Whilst I love Vista the stupid Wireless drivers are crap so I am getting lag issues. Normally for browsing the net this wouldn't be an isse but I play BF2 and and form of lagging is bad. So I now have both systems dual booting with XP and keep checking every week for updated wireless nic drivers.

IMHO Vista is all good. Its just the slack arsed venders not pulling their fingers out getting proper drivers written.

Tried Vista Basic and Ultimate it installed good , found all my drivers for my hardware with a bit of google...but I was expecting a bit more from this OS I can't put a finger on something specifically but I still wait to be impressed by it .... don't forget the aero 3D desktop I think we should make a poll of how many ppl actually are using this feature on the daily basis ... umm ?The extra security ... pop ups ( eg. Are you sure you want to run this ..... ) are annoying,Windows Vista file system such as system wide file search , file organization, file tagging, and virtual folders.
Are something new for the Windows OS family but Apple’s Mac OS X has similar features years ago and it is simpler to use.

I use WinXP 32 and 64 bit and I can say on the same hardware with 2Gb RAM win XP 64 does the job as well as Vista Ultimate so I will stick with XP 64 bit for a while longer ... the idea of 4Gb of RAM instead of 2Gb doesn't make any difference yet as most of the games and medium applications don't use all that RAM any way .

At least we as computer literate people know how to buy and build a computer system and get a copy of XP still. I work in a computer business and we work in pre-built systems, particularly from IBM. Now near all of the IBM systems avaliable, except maybe one, come with vista business, and I downgrade them all. You ever seen vista try and run on a on-board intel graphics chip? Takes about half and hour for vista to do its "checking your system for best performance" thing.
And for those who have having a lot of compatibility issues with vista, your too right. In a business environment vista is just plain crap, too much incompatibility and problems when using a Windows Server 2003 network. It can work, but a lot of problems do arise.

As for me, I installed a copy of vista ultimate on a separate hard drive. Funny enough though, it works and found all the drivers it needed, except the sound and I needed proper drivers for my video card (GeForce 7800). In my optinion, if you have a graphics card that is within 2 years old and over 1 GB of ram you should be fine to run vista, but to do anything is vista is another story.

I only installed vista so I could play Halo 2 because I couldn't wait for the xp version :)

vbmadmin writes...

don't forget the aero 3D desktop I think we should make a poll of how many ppl actually are using this feature on the daily basis ... umm ?

I don't use that much myself but I really like the new alt-tab previews, the bread-crumb view in Windows Explorer, the new Start Menu etc.

The extra security ... pop ups ( eg. Are you sure you want to run this ..... ) are annoying,

They can be annoying but will siginificantly reduce malware infestations. Keep in mind that the fundamental changes to Windows security in Vista are far more extensive than UAC.

Are something new for the Windows OS family but Apple’s Mac OS X has similar features years ago and it is simpler to use.

...yet they are still waiting on features like "Time Machine, while Vista has it right now. Curiously, one of the new OSX GUI is Vista-like transparency.

BTW, is Vista coming with any other skin(s) than that black (default) one?

I finally got to try Vista extensively on my new laptop that I got on the weekend and I don't think it's anywhere near as bad as people are making it out to be.
After turning UAC (the annoying security feature) off and exiting Windows Sidebar, it just felt like a faster XP with a few more features.
That said though, I haven't really tried any gaming on it and won't even bother since it's using Intel graphics.

The only thing tempting me to purchase Vista for my gaming PC is DX10, and even that seems to be quite herrendously supported by nVidia/ATI.
What was all that fuss about DX10 running faster than DX9?

Bearman writes...

They can be annoying but will significantly reduce malware infestations. Keep in mind that the fundamental changes to Windows security in Vista are far more extensive than UAC.

Bearman do you possibly work for Microsoft?? It seems like you defend Windows and Vista vehemently!

As for my view, i did initially like Vista but sata drivers and slow high def MKV file playback pushed me back to XP, it now seems fresher and more responsive than before. Ill eventually return to Vista but for the meantime its XP all the way ;)

nDrg writes...

Bearman do you possibly work for Microsoft?? It seems like you defend Windows and Vista vehemently!

No, but you are right about the defence part. I think that Vista is a solid platform that bodes well for the future of Windows. People dismiss Vista out of hand due to incompatibility issues etc, but that's something that will get better over time. As more third-party developers find there way around Vista, we shall see some excellent apps that make the most of the new features implimented in Vista. Currently, there's nothing out there that really takes advantage of it.

Have they fixed it so Vista recognises EAX on my Xi-Fi card? If not, then screw Vista...

sosaria writes...

they fixed

Creative, right?

sosaria writes...

Have they fixed it so Vista recognises EAX on my Xi-Fi card? If not, then screw Vista...

You mean have Creative released EAX drivers/software for Vista? Yes they have...

us.creative.com/support/...type=3&x=29&y=10

Bearman writes...

No, but you are right about the defence part. I think that Vista is a solid platform that bodes well for the future of Windows. People dismiss Vista out of hand due to incompatibility issues etc, but that's something that will get better over time. As more third-party developers find there way around Vista, we shall see some excellent apps that make the most of the new features implimented in Vista. Currently, there's nothing out there that really takes advantage of it.

I have to agree with you there, i have no real grievances with Vista, if my SATA PCMCIA card worked then it would be my main OS, however as nearly everything i do is based around it then its a definite no no for Vista at the mo. However the apps and programs that will emerge over the next year or so could be very interesting!

I do agree that there is no software yet to take advantage of vista :( ... so we will wait and see.

If we look back in time win2k started like Vista with a lot of issues for drivers and it became a very stable OS but when XP came out ..... different sorry win 2K died before it's time for the majority of users as most of them went from 98 or ME to XP.
If MS comes up with a new OS in beta in the next 2 years then Vista was just a money making software and the need to bring something new to the market which is sad.

P.S.( I did had the bad experience of purchasing a laptop with Vista Basic pre-installed and the laptop came with 512RAM, it was the slowest thing I ever seen running I don't know how they allow manufacturers to ship Vista on some of the laptops, It took 4 seconds to delete a shortcut from the desktop :( .. I ended up buying another 512RAM to make it run but still slow because the same version of laptop doesn't come wit XP any longer)

choC. writes...

What was all that fuss about DX10 running faster than DX9?

You are not going to see any benefit until you have a DX10 card, obviously.

Bearman writes...

They can be annoying but will siginificantly reduce malware infestations.

I don't think it will...most people see a box on a screen and click OK. I work in an organisation where most of the employees don't understand computers, they use them much in the same way the use pen and paper.

So with UAC on or UAC off, they will still click on yes when they can get a free smiley face as an attachment to their emails.

Hey I just went from Vista Ultimate back to XP after a month of frustration. Just got over all the little niggly things that Vista has:

- SD card slot caused freeze when card is put in
- internet extremely slow - would have bottlenecks as well
- startup extremely slow - cud make a cup of coffee in between and it would still be loading (i had no startup items either)
- performance overall was no where as fast as XP.
- then theres the default driver issues with hardware, which wont ever be supported with vista.

Back to XP now and I can really tell the difference in terms of speed and performance.

sam-melb writes...

I don't think it will...most people see a box on a screen and click OK. I work in an organisation where most of the employees don't understand computers, they use them much in the same way the use pen and paper.

So with UAC on or UAC off, they will still click on yes when they can get a free smiley face as an attachment to their emails.

Corporate desktops are usually pretty much bullet-proof, regradless of UAC. However, UAC will make some difference for home users. Even if only half of them use UAC correctly then that will be a significant reduction in malware. UAC also has the added benefit of forcing developers to write their applications to run without admin privilages...which is a very good thing.

In any case, UAC isn't really a malware boundary, it's just an easy way of allocating admin level rights as need.

I don't have Vista and have no plans to buy it after seeing I would need to upgrade some hardware. IMO my PC works fine with XP and I think Microsoft were stupid to stop selling XP :P

Have it on my 2nd pc - slow as a dog on 512mb ram;)...Not willing to try it on my other pc with 1gb ram. lets be honest - if you have a new PC or recently upgraded its fine, but theres lot of ppl out there who neither want to fork out the extra $$ to upgrade (plenty of pc's work fine with winxp etc without having to upgrade) or go through the hassle of finding x driver to work with x device with vista.

AusLeo writes...

IMO my PC works fine with XP and I think Microsoft were stupid to stop selling XP :P

Yeah they could just keep selling XP forever, and never improve anything.

I'm one of these people that like to jump into new technology, and a new O/S is no exception.

When XP Pro was released I bought a new PC, installed and used it. I really enjoyed it, and was fully aware that there will be a 'breaking in' period while drivers/software etc come up to speed.

I'm fully aware drivers etc take time to be upgraded to suit a new OS.

So it has been somewhat of a letdown with my Vista experience.

I went out and bought a new PC, installed Vista Ultimate, and frankly while Vista is very pretty, I am going back to XP Pro.

Now I'm not saying all this after using it for a couple of weeks. I have been using Vista for about 3 months now, and frankly I'm disappointed with it.

So on the weekend I have backed-up up all my data ready to do a reinstall of XP Pro.

Just so everyone knows it's not the specs of my pc, here are the components:
Intel E6420 2.13GHz
4gb Ram
8800GTS 640MB video card
2 x 500gb sata drives.

Rhino writes...

Now I'm not saying all this after using it for a couple of weeks. I have been using Vista for about 3 now, and frankly I'm disappointed with it.

What in particular is disappointing. Everytime I use XP now it's like stepping back in time compared to Vista.

Bearman writes...

What in particular is disappointing. Everytime I use XP now it's like stepping back in time compared to Vista.

Ditto that.

The killer app I love in Vista is the search box on the Start Menu. Anyone can now hit the Windows Key (or click or Start), and type in part of the name of the program they want to run, or an email they want to find etc. and it will be there instantly.

The only problem I've had with Vista was some HP Print and Scan drivers not working, otherwise I couldn't be happier with it.

One feature of late that I have appreciated is its ability to auto detect external displays and TV's. Quite handy for hooking up a laptop to watch movies on your TV. =)

Bearman writes...

What in particular is disappointing

I've got home movies that Vista will play on one day, and not the next, yet there has been no change in configuration. I've never had this problem with XP

It does not like my USB HDD, which works fine on every XP PRO machine it gets plugged into.

MY TV card which is 'Vista Certified' will not work, and this is after updating drivers (and don't get me started on trying to uninstall said drivers).

Don't get me wrong, Vista is very pretty and I do like the search function, but it's just a lot of little things that get me frustrated.

I'm hoping SP1 fixes a lot of things cause I can see a lot of good in Vista.

ADSL 2 Burwood Please! writes...

Have it on my 2nd pc - slow as a dog on 512mb ram;)...Not willing to try it on my other pc with 1gb ram. lets be honest - if you have a new PC or recently upgraded its fine, but theres lot of ppl out there who neither want to fork out the extra $$ to upgrade (plenty of pc's work fine with winxp etc without having to upgrade) or go through the hassle of finding x driver to work with x device with vista.

ive been hesitant to upgrade because id read Vista had poor resource management. apparently, after reading comments on this forum and doing a bit more research myself i discovered its not so much 'poor' resource management as it is it requires MORE resources to run well, but manages your system a lot better.. not to mention addons and extra memory boost type stuff that isnt available for xp.

i think ive actually been convinced its worth a try. especially on a new pc or for anyone that upgrades on a fairly regular basis. manufacturors are already racing to bring out vista compliant drivers and vista specific hardware.. i dont see the point in paying for copies of XP that are well on their way to being out of date unless there are real issues with Vista.. which from what i can see.. there arent.. unless youre still running a 386.

Rhino writes...

I've got home movies that Vista will play on one day, and not the next, yet there has been no change in configuration. I've never had this problem with XP

update either your dvd drivers or your dvd drive to a vista compliant machine.

im starting to think that the problem with vista isnt vista, its people purchasing vista without first researching that their machine and software they use regularly is vista compliant.

Ive had Vista Ultimate for nearly a year now.

Pros.
- New technology, getting in before the market does to understand and familiarise myself. Assurance that you wont need to update for a long time.
- More stable than xp, it would exit elegantly when encountered problems whereas XP would need a cold boot
- Faith in the security system. Products that people have found loopholes for in xp cant be used in Vista (Since its relatively new, hackers havent had much time to find loopholes)

Cons
- Biggest gripe (personal): Its given MS the opportunity to implement new security features that force users to acquire upgrades via their extortionistic prices (e.g codecs, WMP, and other tools that were found for free in xp)
- The stupid versions. Theyve done a ninja increase in price. Lots of functionality that you take for granted is not available anymore unless you fork out monstrous amounts for ultimate/premium edition.
- Slower: Resources are chewed up by the new gadgets that you dont need.
- Incompatibility issues: waiting for developers to update

heres a question.. does vista have an option for "classic" interface, as XP does?

surely so. wouldnt that eliminate a lot of the resource usage issues that people complain about? just turn off the sparkly 3d crap that you dont need. ive never been one to 'customize' desktops with wallpapers and custom buttons and crap. how much time do you sit there looking at your desktop? i dont.

Jezebel writes...

surely so. wouldnt that eliminate a lot of the resource usage issues that people complain about?

actually, I have read more than one report of people turning off Aero, and the system running slower than usual..

THE M575 writes...

actually, I have read more than one report of people turning off Aero, and the system running slower than usual..

Well yeah makes sence. Aero you get your video card doing more work where basic it is mostly your cpu doing the work.

In answer to the original question though yes you can go to basic mode like in xp but aero eating lots of resources isn't entierly true. It is not just fancy graphics it is using DirectX to render your gui instead of GDI which makes it a hell of a lot more efficient.

aal04 writes...

Its given MS the opportunity to implement new security features that force users to acquire upgrades via their extortionistic prices (e.g codecs, WMP, and other tools that were found for free in xp)

so you buy Vista but it only works with your credit card inserted into the pay slot - nice move! Thanks for the warning!

Tropo59 writes...

so you buy Vista but it only works with your credit card inserted into the pay slot - nice move! Thanks for the warning!

pretty much everything extra is a money grab. Especially unnecessary features like Dreamscene that are hardly worth the price tag. I run Vista business (from the MS partner kit) and it's fine for everything I need, not worth spending any money upgrading pointless features.

But as I said earlier it's up to Nvidia to fix their drivers to support Full Screen Video using Clone as that is the 1 reason I'm not using Vista currently.

aal04 writes...

Cons
- Biggest gripe (personal): Its given MS the opportunity to implement new security features that force users to acquire upgrades via their extortionistic prices (e.g codecs, WMP, and other tools that were found for free in xp)

Please explain. WMP is still free and comes with more codecs than XP. In fact Vista includes a DVD playback codecs by default...you have to use third-party software or buy a codec pack in order to play DVDs in XP.

- The stupid versions. Theyve done a ninja increase in price. Lots of functionality that you take for granted is not available anymore unless you fork out monstrous amounts for ultimate/premium edition.

Which functionality is missing? Home Premium is about the same price as XP MCE.

- Slower: Resources are chewed up by the new gadgets that you dont need.

Turn off the gadgets you don't need?

I have Vista on dual boot but never use it.
I find Vista too user-friendly and as a result too restrictive.

Tropo59 writes...

so you buy Vista but it only works with your credit card inserted into the pay slot - nice move! Thanks for the warning!

That's utter bollocks!

i guess a lot of reviewers have no idea what theyre on about then, because thats not the way ive heard it described

it seems to make more sense, assuming you have a graphics card with enough processing power and memory to handle it.

Bearman writes...

That's utter bollocks!

discuss that with aal04! - I just summarised what he wrote

Reaper writes...

pretty much everything extra is a money grab

huh? i havent had to pay $1 extra since purchasing Vista.

mysticƒ!RE writes...

I find Vista too user-friendly and as a result too restrictive.

the fact that u dont know how to turn off those 'user friendly' features shows how much u need them.

Rhino writes...

It does not like my USB HDD, which works fine on every XP PRO machine it gets plugged into.

meanwhile, I had a USB HDD that rarely worked under XP and works fine under Vista. 99.9% of the problems people refer to are caused by incompatible hardware or poorly updated drivers.
I'm not quite sure how people expect it to work? MS should wait for all software companies to make compliant drivers before releasing a new windows? Its the job of the 3rd party software vendors to pick up their game (i'm still looking at u nvidia!)

Bearman writes...

Beryl looks like a half-baked rip-off of the Vista and OSX GUIs designed by uni students as part of final year project. Flames, floppy windows?!
Sure, it's excessive. Stuff like the floppy windows is impractical but makes the whole desktop seem more tangible to me. More importantly it runs on my 3-4 yr old laptop, whereas the more conservative (but equally impractical) Vista Aero clunks on my 6 month old desktop. If you ask me Vista rips a lot more off MaxOSX than Beryl does. Unless you count the icons at the top in that vid. They don't seem to be a standard feature of Ubuntu or Beryl though. It's more innovative, more efficient, and about 1000 times more customisable. Not to mention free.

I got an express upgrade of vista from Medion, so all I paid for was postage. Have installed it on a secondary Hard Drive and hardly used it yet. booted to it a couple of months ago to get rid of some spy ware in XP, that's been about it.

Some stuff in Vista is a lot harder to navigate to that in XP such as changing the view options in explorer, plus that whole security thing just like in the Apple ad, lol :).

Nebby_99 writes...

Stuff like the floppy windows is impractical but makes the whole desktop seem more tangible to me.

There's actually a video of a floppy Windows style interface in an early version of Vista (Longhorn). MS tested it in terms of the user interface and dumped it because it didn't add anything to usability.

More importantly it runs on my 3-4 yr old laptop, whereas the more conservative (but equally impractical) Vista Aero clunks on my 6 month old desktop.

The more fancy Beryl features will choke on an old notebook. It's a vastly different graphics subsystem at work in Aero compared to Beryl. As soon as you start to add similar levels of funtionality, Beryl requires naturally more resources.

If you ask me Vista rips a lot more off MaxOSX than Beryl does.

Yet the next version of the OSX GUI will have...wait for it...transparency! Yay.

They don't seem to be a standard feature of Ubuntu or Beryl though. It's more innovative, more efficient, and about 1000 times more customisable. Not to mention free.

It's certainly customisable and free but not particularly innovative unless you count the flames.

lisalisa writes...

Mark my words, you will go back to Vista one day :)

mark my words !!! i wont be thats for sure, not for a while longer.
i have vista ultimate in my drawer waiting for SP1 to arrive, if it ever gets here.

for me and what i do in my business vista was just a load of crap and there aint nothing better than good ol XP Pro right now.

i always say if it aint broke dont try to fix it, or update it with something that was never going to work properly in the first place.

i think personally vista will never take off the way MS wanted it to, and i reckon MS will create another new OS to replace it and vista just might turn out to be another windows ME.

but guess what, i just might be wrong :)

MediaFire writes...

i think personally vista will never take off, i reckon MS will create another new O