One finger salute to Vista

[t_r_nelson]

There seems to be a lot of bitching and bashing going on here. But I would like to hear from the Vista bashers who are also gamers, what you're going to do when DX10 is mainstream. You can whine all you want, but DX10 is not going on your XP boxes.

Stop crying about a new product. They'll fix it.

[Yogurth]

Vista is bugfestival at it's best. As MSDN subscriber I used this few days ago:

"d:\boot\bootsect.exe /nt52 ALL /force"

Performance is noticably worse than XP, in everything except for Windows management(moving resizing ....opened windows) and thus providing with false fell of speed, unfortunately.

Indexing is pretty bad, if You love Your Hard Drive. Almost constant HD trashing, it drove me insane.

To think that main UI feature called Aero took 5 years to develop and then shipped doing things like this:

completely reproducable bug(just right click on folder with long name)

Then comes the cramped in features, some of which are all but useless:

Look at what happens when You choose to unhide files, and look how "useful" is status bar, now look at another nice Aero bug in the last line of right click menu.

I will not even try to explain how abominable UAC is, everyone that actually tried Vista knows it.

Then the system wide settings.......phooow this took some serious thinking on how to unmatch every single thing. This will become the postulate of UI inconsistency, not to mention the number of clicks needed to do something You wanted...5 YEARS for THIS......IT industry will shove this right back where it belongs.

Dreadful.

Edited December 22, 2006 by Yogurth

[hambones]

I am a programmer and we develop exclusively for Windows OS's. I have been trying to work under Vista for a month or so now, but am generally unable to do so. Copying large files (~ 200MB) from one HDD to another will give me a BSOD with a Kernal Stack In-page error. My VPN connection drops out all the time, playing video will just plain lock it up and I have to press the reset button. I am a fan of Vista and really want to keep using it as a day to day machine. I know we need some updated NForce4 drivers, and Nvidia graphic drives as well.

There are some driver issues that still need to be resolved, and some other nagging issues learning the new OS, but lets have a little patience while Vista matures.

[bob_c_b]

It is always painful to jump to a new version of Windows right away, and one so complex as Vista even more so. I have it on a spare box at work and so far it isn't too bad, but I won't move my main production PCs at work and home until at least March. That said, I appreciate you guys who live with it night and day making it better for me this spring.

The rest of you, stop whining, this happens with every new Windows release on some level; price of being an early adopter.

[UncleSpellbinder]

Just my 2 cents:

I'm just one of those CPP user/testers. Used Beta 1, Beta 2 and now RC1. Not one crash, no issues regarding apps, much quicker than XP, SP2. Eagerly awaiting January 30th.

[norseman]

(Y) That's how it is! Still, Windows XP runs like a dream on this new system.

Ok now just a thought, but if 1 Adobe Flash plugin can bring Vista's IE to its knees, how many other surprises are there that people will discover?

Time for another bald statement. Vista feels very breakable very fragile. It just doesn't feel solid. I don't feel confident using it at all. So that's one "C" out of "Clear, Confident and Connected" that doesn't fit Vista IMHO.

What is this 'new' hardware you are using? My system runs Vista RTM extremely fast...

There are no HW problems and I have not experience any crash yet...

Did you upgrade or something stupid like that?

[v0ltage789]

This has happened everytime an OS comes out, and well the only one that failed was Windows ME so...I guess we got a what..5 to 1 chance of vista being good? lol.

[dagamer34]

The funny thing is that most people won't realize what they like about an OS until they move on. For example, can you really tell me why Windows XP is better than Windows 98? They both perform the same general functions like browsing the Internet and checking e-mail. However, I don't know of a single person that would prefer Windows 98 over Windows XP. Critics certainly weren't saying that back when XP came out in 2001, but now people think differently.

For the most part, the nice things that average users will appreciate aren't noticed at all. Having better crash detection or security for most people isn't a "feature", but expected of a modern OS. Sadly, tech users just bitch and complain too much.

Go back to Xp if you want; no one is stopping you. But please stop acting like an idiot. Saying that no one should have to pay $400 for an OS is a bad example that only tries to cover up your original argument. Most people will not buy Vista by itself in a retail box. They will get it with a computer. And since costs are subsidized anyway through OEMs, they might pay $100 for an upgrade, which isn't that bad.

Lastly, anyone who has the RTM build now should be an MSDN or TechNet subscriber, meaning they should know enough about computers to realize when a problem deals with drivers or the OS itself. Some people here act like they know neither. Maybe they should have a real professional set their system up FOR them. :whistle:

[Brandon Live Veteran]

I am a programmer and we develop exclusively for Windows OS's. I have been trying to work under Vista for a month or so now, but am generally unable to do so. Copying large files (~ 200MB) from one HDD to another will give me a BSOD with a Kernal Stack In-page error. My VPN connection drops out all the time, playing video will just plain lock it up and I have to press the reset button. I am a fan of Vista and really want to keep using it as a day to day machine. I know we need some updated NForce4 drivers, and Nvidia graphic drives as well.

I'm running an nForce 4 (AMD) with a 7800GTX and I have absolutely none of the issues you mentioned. Granted, I'm using video drivers that haven't been officially released but even with the in-box drivers I never had any problems (just bad performance).

Did you try to install the XP nForce drivers or something like that? All you need are the in-box ones, they're far better off.

[Brandon Live Veteran]

Performance is noticably worse than XP, in everything except for Windows management(moving resizing ....opened windows) and thus providing with false fell of speed, unfortunately.

No it's not. File copying is faster, application launching is faster, media applications have far greater control of resources so they never drop out or skip.

Indexing is pretty bad, if You love Your Hard Drive. Almost constant HD trashing, it drove me insane.

Huh? Indexing has virtually no effect on your disk I/O after the initial index is built. It also backs off on user activity and all indexing happens on background-I/O which means it will NEVER impact the I/O of other applications. If you're discussing experiences with beta versions (in which case, you were probably actually experiencing a bug in SuperFetch that was fixed before RTM) then you shouldn't be complaining about the final release.

If you are running the RTM build, then it's possible you had an application compatibility issue - such as an old version of eTrust anti-virus or another application that was thrashing your disk.

To think that main UI feature called Aero took 5 years to develop and then shipped doing things like this:

<image>

completely reproducable bug(just right click on folder with long name)

I cannot reproduce that in the RTM build. I even made a max-length folder name. You're either running an old build or you installed a namespace extension / IContextMenu implementation that is broken.

Then comes the cramped in features, some of which are all but useless:

<image>

Look at what happens when You choose to unhide files, and look how "useful" is status bar, now look at another nice Aero bug in the last line of right click menu.

Desktop.ini files do not show up if you show hidden files. They only show up if you show hidden+system files which you should never, ever have to do. You certainly shouldn't be running like that normally - and I have absolutely no idea why you're complaining about seeing super-hidden files when you've chosen to display them. Exact same behavior as XP, by the way.

The Details Pane never shows metadata if you don't have any items selected. The Properties item you see is for the containing folder. Showing metadata for the containing folder in the Details Pane was confusing to many users since they didn't have anything selected.

I will not even try to explain how abominable UAC is, everyone that actually tried Vista knows it.

Actually, no. UAC is great. Doing anything that requires elevation should be an extremely rare occurence anyway. Some people seem to elevate things unnecessarily which is a problem that they just need to get over. I watched a friend get saved by UAC the other day when he mistyped a command that would have wiped out most of his system drive (essentially a copy command that wipes out the destination first). Fortunately he ran it from a non-elevated command prompt and it couldn't do any harm. I think the much improved LUA functionality and the reduced-privilege admin accounts (UAC) are among my favorite Vista features.

My complaint is actually about the shell, which adds extra dialogs before the elevation prompts for file operations that I find completely unnecessary. Hopefully we'll be able to do away with those in a future update to the shell.

Then the system wide settings.......phooow this took some serious thinking on how to unmatch every single thing. This will become the postulate of UI inconsistency, not to mention the number of clicks needed to do something You wanted...5 YEARS for THIS......IT industry will shove this right back where it belongs.

I have no idea what you're on about, but the IT industry is loving Vista.

Edited December 22, 2006 by Brandon Live

[Stingray]

This is ridiculous. Everytime Microsoft launches an OS (except Millennium, which really sucked a$$) there come the trolls out of their caves for the bashing. An OS that has to integrate so many software/hardware HAS to be given a few months to mature, so that things fall into place. In a couple of years time it will be praised like XP is being now.

*shrugs*

[Brandon Live Veteran]

Did you read my post? I said MS did not admit that it was a "developmental disaster." But Ballmer said in a public speech that the dev cycle that comprise Vista's creation "would never happen again." That kind of implies that it WASN'T A GOOD THING. Took forever, dropped features, false promises, etc.

No, what he said was we won't have 5 years between releases again.

Everyone knows about the reset - but some people seem to think it was a bad thing. The reset is what saved Vista from being the slow bloated resource-hog that it could have been and actually led to it shipping on a reasonable schedule. Plus it's not like the first 2-3 years of Longhorn was all wasted effort, and it's definitely not like this hasn't happened before. If you paid attention to the industry 10-15 years ago you'd know about Cairo and how basically the same thing happened back then.

[Rogue`]

Been using RTM x64 (tried Ultimate and Business so far) and I really like it, will be buying it once it hits retail, also had zero issues, yea gaming isn't as fast as XP SP2, but at least all my games work (Rainbow6:Vegas ran perfectly fine) :wub:

[Nexx295]

-Applications generally don't run as quick as Windows XP.

True, but most applications aren't optimized for Vista yet.

-File copying from DVD drive to Hard Disk is speed retarded.

The transfer speed depends on your hardware. I copied a DVD (~ 4.5 GB) in about 5 minutes using an S-ATAII hard disk, which in my option is blazing fast.

-Lots of my games don't work or work at what seems is 30% slower than under Windows XP.

There are no games for Vista yet. All games are designed for Windows XP (or older). Setting the compatibility to "Windows XP" might help, but not with every game. I think patches which fix the compatibility issues will be available as soon as Vista is released to the public.

-My wife goes to www.tvpolonia.com and Internet Explorer dies - repeatedly.

I browsed that site a few minutes and IE didn't crash. Do you have any plugins installed? As the site has some Flash elements, this could be the reason. Flash doesn't work properly yet in IE7.

[AMDMEFX-55]

The funny thing is that most people won't realize what they like about an OS until they move on. For example, can you really tell me why Windows XP is better than Windows 98? They both perform the same general functions like browsing the Internet and checking e-mail. However, I don't know of a single person that would prefer Windows 98 over Windows XP. Critics certainly weren't saying that back when XP came out in 2001, but now people think differently.

For the most part, the nice things that average users will appreciate aren't noticed at all. Having better crash detection or security for most people isn't a "feature", but expected of a modern OS. Sadly, tech users just bitch and complain too much.

Go back to Xp if you want; no one is stopping you. But please stop acting like an idiot. Saying that no one should have to pay $400 for an OS is a bad example that only tries to cover up your original argument. Most people will not buy Vista by itself in a retail box. They will get it with a computer. And since costs are subsidized anyway through OEMs, they might pay $100 for an upgrade, which isn't that bad.

Lastly, anyone who has the RTM build now should be an MSDN or TechNet subscriber, meaning they should know enough about computers to realize when a problem deals with drivers or the OS itself. Some people here act like they know neither. Maybe they should have a real professional set their system up FOR them. :whistle:

Your right but I can tell you XP is a much better os then 98 cause for one you have the ntfs file system better support its based off of windows 2000 and much more then I can remember. The way XP came out is the way Vista came people with no brain download it off the net claming MSDN but I doubt it with them how they cant seem to know how to use vista. It only took me a day to get Vista up and runnung on an old laptop.

The reason people dont know how good Vista is because 1 They have an illegal copy but not all. 2 Alot of hardware is not supported. 3 They never had success with XP and going to Vista wont save them. 4 They have a crappy system or built it wrong or bad hardware. 5 Using old programs on Vista not a good idea. Also rule 1 is always to wait after your hardware passis Vista capable test and wait for signed drivers not beta. At anyrate wait till all your favorite programs are supported on Vista.

So I have no problem with Vista I have it running stable no crash for three weeks and most of the time I never turn it off. I myself are wating for better driver for my video card and sound card befor I buy Vista for my desktop. So I hope by the time it is released better drivers are out.

[SYBINX]

Firstly. I am so glad I didn't have to spend money to buy this turd operating system. Sure it was a gift from Microsoft for beta testing, but its a evil nasty product.

-Applications generally don't run as quick as Windows XP.

-File copying from DVD drive to Hard Disk is speed retarded.

-Lots of my games don't work or work at what seems is 30% slower than under Windows XP.

-My wife goes to www.tvpolonia.com and Internet Explorer dies - repeatedly.

I'm not even touching Windows Vista until after SP1 is released.

I have gone out and spent lots of cash and built a Core2Duo PC with 4GB DDR2 and while Vista itself boots and runs ok - application compatibility / Internet Explorer 7 reliability and general quirks mean I'm bidding farewell to vista while giving it a one finger salute.

Sorry to sound a little rude and apologise if it sounds so, but being a "Beta Tester..." you already knew that there would be a compatibility issue with software and you would have to wait for developers to patch or release updates to be compatible with Windows Vista.

As for gaming well forget it at the moment because until developers patch their engines to be compatible with DX10 then you can forget playing games.

[Menge]

i tried vista for the 30 day grace period that the RTM build gave me. so did my dad. bottom line? we uninstalled Vista and won't buy it. Back to XP.

It felt slow and bulky on my desktop (A64X2 3800+ with 1.5GB and GF7600). on my laptop (Turion64 MT-37 with 512MB and SiSM760GX) was simply unusable - always thrashing the HD for memory (yes. i checked that indexing was done).

the new Windows Explorer is simply horrible (no remembering window size? omfg how could they forget that?!)

the only thing i really loved in Vista was the Windows Photo Gallery. which is PERFECT for me. anyone knows of such thing for XP, btw?

[Berto]

I don't understand how so many people out there have so many issues with Vista.

Quick specs here:

Dell Inspiron 9300

1.86Ghz Pentium M (centrino)

1GB PC4200 RAM

128MB Ati X300

80GB Drive

8x DVD Burner (Sony)

6 USB 2.0

Firewire

SD card slot

Apps I am running all the time:

Adobe CS 2 (illustrator, photoshop, acrobat, indesign)

Flash, Dreamweaver

p2p software

iTunes

yadda yadda yadda

Not once have I bluescreened. I've seen significant system lag with huge files due to Photoshop. Not a PC gamer as I stick to my Wii for games. All my devices are automatically recognized and wizards pop up like woodage at a college dorm. My wireless has never let me down, although it's slow moving around from the work profile to my home profile. Aero and Sidebar have increased my productivity. My ram is usually around 40% used when running around online and such. Never had issues with any pages or viewing media online with Quicktime, Flash or anything else you can think of. I dunno, maybe I got a horseshoe up my rear because with all the people I know that have tried running Vista RTM I'm one of the few that have had no issues what so ever, which I guess I am lucky.

Once everyone gets on track with developing for Vista I can see it taking off quicker than Paris Hilton from a nightclub. Until then, yeah, use XP if you're having a ****ty time with Vista. No one out there is pointing guns at anyone to run Vista so early in it's life cycle. It's not to complicated of a decision anyways. :s

[Brandon Live Veteran]

It felt slow and bulky on my desktop (A64X2 3800+ with 1.5GB and GF7600). on my laptop (Turion64 MT-37 with 512MB and SiSM760GX) was simply unusable - always thrashing the HD for memory (yes. i checked that indexing was done).

Those systems should run faster, not slower, under Vista. Clearly you had a compatibility or driver problem - those things should work themselves out once Vista is generally available.

the new Windows Explorer is simply horrible (no remembering window size? omfg how could they forget that?!)

Explorer remembers window sizes just the same as XP (on a per-folder basis). I have no idea where you'd get the idea that it doesn't.

[AMDMEFX-55]

i tried vista for the 30 day grace period that the RTM build gave me. so did my dad. bottom line? we uninstalled Vista and won't buy it. Back to XP.

It felt slow and bulky on my desktop (A64X2 3800+ with 1.5GB and GF7600). on my laptop (Turion64 MT-37 with 512MB and SiSM760GX) was simply unusable - always thrashing the HD for memory (yes. i checked that indexing was done).

the new Windows Explorer is simply horrible (no remembering window size? omfg how could they forget that?!)

the only thing i really loved in Vista was the Windows Photo Gallery. which is PERFECT for me. anyone knows of such thing for XP, btw?

Thats crazy my HP DV5000 GTO runs Vista fine Amd Turion 1.8ghz 1gb ram 40 gb hdd Ati 128mb 200M express. Did you update your bios? HP just released a bios update for all laptops for Vista. Did you disable services you did not need also security center and system restore?

[Menge]

Those systems should run faster, not slower, under Vista. Clearly you had a compatibility or driver problem - those things should work themselves out once Vista is generally available.

glad you can blame it on driver issue - not on the fact that once Vista is booted up it took ~380MB of RAM away from the laptop or anything else. OOB XP works better on the laptop than Vista with all the drivers i could find for it on the laptop. thanks for trying to explain, though.

Explorer remembers window sizes just the same as XP (on a per-folder basis). I have no idea where you'd get the idea that it doesn't.

explorer in Vista does NOT remember window size, man...

- open up windows explorer (no need to browse... just open it with Win+E, for instance)

- resize

- close all windows explorer instances.

- open something else (not explorer) and use it for a while (do anything... open www.microsoft.com in IE or something)

- then go back to windows explorer (Win+E): back to regular size...

it's weird... it DOES remember for some time (if you don't close all instances or do anything else it DOES remember)... but forgets as easily

edit for AMDMEFX-55: as far as i know there were no BIOS updates available specifically for Vista for my laptop (Acer Aspire). i shouldn't have to disable obscure services just to get an OS to work well. if it doesn't work well mostly out of the box (save for driver installs and all) then it shouldn't be running on that box at all, imo. an OS is the BASE of the system. it shouldn't HOG the system. and yes i disabled system restore - that thing takes precious Gigs of HD space from me :p

[ROYGBIV]

Thats crazy my HP DV5000 GTO runs Vista fine Amd Turion 1.8ghz 1gb ram 40 gb hdd Ati 128mb 200M express. Did you update your bios? HP just released a bios update for all laptops for Vista. Did you disable services you did not need also security center and system restore?

Thanks for the BIOS notice. I'm running Vista an an HP Pavilion dv8000 Series laptop, similar in specifications to yours and had no idea about the BIOS update. Going to be updating when I feel like rebooting. Reading the fixes for the BIOS though makes me wonder because it fixes keyboard/mouse issues, when I don't seem to be having any under Vista :p.

Menge: Did you disable Aero for your laptop? It's only 512 MB of RAM and running Aero probably takes up most of it's memory, it's recommended 1 GB of RAM to run Aero. I'm running at around 400 MB of RAm while running Thunderbird, mIRC, MSN Messenger, NOD32 and Firefox. A little high, but it still runs smooth, I haven't noticed any issues besides ones that are more than likely due to the lack of drivers.

[Robgig1088]

It's kind of hard for an OS to truly shine when so many device drivers haven't been officially released. Yes there are problems with the core of Vista, and it will require a lot of work / patches, but they have a decent base to get started with.

heh linux works great and it reverse-engineers half of its drivers :p . and hey, with linux, i dont need 4 gigs of ram to search the internet. heck, i can even run XP programs using WINE (which, might I add, is faster than XP). and using beryl, i have all the pretty effects that vista has and i am using a grand total of 353 Mb of ram (and no PF used :D )

not to mention the fact that IE7 isnt even compatible with the Acid2 test (the devs refuse to make it compatible. one more way Microsoft tries to rule the planet.

and lastly, Microsoft is the most unethical company I have ever bought from. Seriously. Do some research on it if you dont believe me

and these are my reasons to stay away from vista. :D

[Menge]

Menge: Did you disable Aero for your laptop? It's only 512 MB of RAM and running Aero probably takes up most of it's memory, it's recommended 1 GB of RAM to run Aero. I'm running at around 400 MB of RAm while running Thunderbird, mIRC, MSN Messenger, NOD32 and Firefox. A little high, but it still runs smooth, I haven't noticed any issues besides ones that are more than likely due to the lack of drivers.

nah man! Aero doesn't even run on the laptop :p the video card is crap :p

[ROYGBIV]

nah man! Aero doesn't even run on the laptop :p the video card is crap :p

Luckily you didn't try it then ;). When I run Aero on my laptop with similar specifications on an ATi X200M, it' runs smooth until I start to do to much and then it just slows down :p. Running on the good, old, ugly classic theme :p. I'm going to update to 1 GB of RAM soon, just waiting until boxing day hoping to catch a deal. If not I'll just buy normal price :p.