WinCustomize.com has just completed a series of indepth articles outlining the strengths (and weaknesses) of Windows Vista. In just a few days, Microsoft will be making Windows Vista "generally available".
With a 5 year gap between the release of Windows XP and Vista, the pressure is on for Microsoft to deliver a worthy successor to Windows XP. Have they succeeded? Are you going to upgrade to Windows Vista? And if so, how soon? Tell us what you think.
In the meantime, check out the article series to get the whole story of Windows Vista in action.
View: Windows Vista: A Guided Tour
With a 5 year gap between the release of Windows XP and Vista, the pressure is on for Microsoft to deliver a worthy successor to Windows XP. Have they succeeded? Are you going to upgrade to Windows Vista? And if so, how soon? Tell us what you think.
In the meantime, check out the article series to get the whole story of Windows Vista in action.
View: Windows Vista: A Guided Tour
have patience reviewers
I've now configured the bulk of the OS and now it's basically reduced to just occasional software installs that bring these up, or apps/games that don't use a good user-oriented model of storing data, which I hope is something that'll improve and not really a Microsoft problem. If they followed that model, it wouldn't just minimize the UAC prompts, but be better for other reasons too, like configuring and saving user profiles and have the app configurations stick.
I also recommend users to follow the (actually pretty old) recommended paradigm in Windows as well as Linux, and work in a user-oriented fashion with as much of your personal data as at all possible stored under C:Users. Yes, music, videos, documents, all that sort of data. This should be as much of a given as a Linux user is primarly working in his/her home directory and not creating stuff in /root/Music.
The reason being that UAC doesn't pop up at all when doing file management there, because the point of it is only to request admin privilegies for machine-local changes, such as changes to C:/Program Files and so on, not user-local changes.
Another suggestion I have for UAC is to perhaps disable the delete file prompts if you do that a lot. Because you'll get a confirmation by the UAC prompt anyway, except if you're working in C:Users, and in that case you won't see a prompt at all if you simply press "Delete", and only if you press "Shift-Delete", but then only a single prompt. And in the case when not seeing a prompt, your file will still be stored in the Recycle Bin.
Last edited by Jugalator on 26 Jan 2007 - 09:21
Not to mention it feels like Stardock is marketing it's product under the guise of a review.
Here is few I came across
Pathetic.
The "tour" totally misses the breadcrumbs navigation and complains about explorer tree...WTF! If you want further proof...read where he whines about Windows Mail/Calendar/abook. And for your own sake, stop saying Mail is just renamed OE. IT'S NOT. It now has a standards based storage. Go watch channel9 video. Funny thing is...he says it's the same old thing and then says it "now" looks like Mail.app (from os
Stardock, I know you support neowin and all, but this just sucks.
You are complaining that an article from a Windows Customization site talks about how gadgets and skinning have been available for years?
WinCustomize users already have this stuff. Not acknowledging that would have been crazy IMO.
The other thing, I totally agree with the article author about Mail. It's very derivative of Outlook. I can't believe you're saying it isn't. It's like saying that Office 2007 is "totally new" because it has some new features over Office 2003.
The important thing though is the article doesn't just praise and crap on Vista in vague ways. He states why he thinks something is good or why something is bad and leaves it up to the reader to decide whether it's something they can live with or not.
Of course, you friggin' idiot; it hasn't retailed yet.
I'm not sure how he can at all complain that Vista Ultimate is "not more complete".
Jeez, it's by far the most complete Windows edition Microsoft has ever released.
It's like a Windows XP Pro + XP MCE + XP Tablet PC Edition, all in one, with several new bundled apps and features as the cream on top.
I just spotted this getting posted over here and wanted to address a few misconceptions/issues brought up in this thread about the Touring Windows Vista series I wrote for WinCustomize.
The bulk of the article was written early in December right after Vista reached RTM status and I had access to a "final" build. The rest of the month, in between other job tasks, was spent refining, editing and fleshing out points in the larger article. So a lot of it was written based off what was known and being talked about right after RTM. The Windows Ultimate extras not being packaged until later, and the inclusion of DreamScene (Animated Wallpapers) were not widely known when I wrote the bulk of the article.
To a few specific points:
1. It's not an OS review really. The closest I come to a review-like evaluation is in the conclusion where I'm putting forth my opinion. The article was meant to walk through the OS and some of its bits and pieces for those who have not played with a beta or RC and to acquaint them with a few of the changes and new features. I would have approached a review much differently.da
2. I stand by my annoyances with UAC.
3. My issues with the Vista Extras not being available was because when I wrote the first portion of the article way back at the beginning of December, there had been very little press on them or mention that they weren't going to be available at RTM. When someone hands me something they're calling the RTM build, I was under the assumption that it would come complete with the features that I would receive on commercial release. It was a touted feature, it wasn't there in the "final" build, I felt that that aspect of the OS was not "complete"
4. Promoting our products... I wrote the articles for WinCustomize. I mentioned WindowBlinds once. I mentioned DesktopX once. In fact when I mention DesktopX I also mention Konfabulator and Apple's Dashboard. On a customization site, it makes sense to at least briefly address such things as the UI and gadgets since it's such an important aspect of Vista.
5. "But you missed XYZ!" This was never an all-inclusive, exhaustive look at Vista. That was not my goal, I even said several times that I wasn't going to hit all the points and would just be skimming the top. If there's some favorite feature of yours I failed to cover, feel free to sit down and write your own article on it. Each section I covered could have easily turned into it's own 20-page article. I had to draw the line somewhere.
Commenting has either been disabled on this article or you are not logged in. Click here to login or register, its free!
Note: Anonymous commenting is disabled in order to keep the quality of responses to a high standard.