Closing the Door to Microsoft Vista

[Julius Caro]

Vista works fine for me. Although there are some things I really hate about it, for me it's no worse than XP.

[BigBoy]

GM is literally going bankrupt. Even if they wanted to deploy, it would suck if they said "we won't do it because we are in bad financial crysis".

So - while I am not surprised (I am sure they skipped versions before too) - I'd also take this with a grain of salt, knowing that they must be trying to cut costs anywhere they can. It just makes sense you will not invest into IT as much.

[eth3l]

You have no idea how true that is. I know because I work for a company that provides hardware, software, network solutions to dealerships. I will leave it at that. Don't believe me? Ask any GM dealership.

Could not agree more.

If MS releases 7 in 2010 Vista will never be accepted. XP gained such a crowd becasue it was THE OS for 7 years; an eternity in computing years. Considering it lasted so long and stayed relevant is important to its loyal following but should not detract from what is good about Vista and errors that can only be blamed on bad drivers from hardware manufacturers.

[Foub]

Go lookup the word "fact", I think you confused it with "opinion"...

Well, in that case it is the opinion of a majority of its users that Vista is another Windows ME..... Only a very small minority, like you, don't want to see this. Some are just in too much denial to accept the facts and will blame everything except what is truly at fault here and that is Vista.

[necrosis]

Speaking of pet peevs like the "Microsoft Vista" thing:

The thing that erks me the most are these idiot home users that post in threads like this stating "Vista is fine for me!". They have ZERO clue how software and hardware upgrades work in a cooperate environment.

This isnt your little e-mail checking, porn surfing, MySpace posting box in your office. We are talking about 100, 500, 10,000 computers running heavy software that BUILD CAR'S.

[abcdefg]

What confuses me is that people expect a fancy new system wtih extra features, but without greater hardware requirements. Am I the only person who finds that irrational? I guess it's just bashing for the sake of it.

How can something like Compiz Fusion pull these new tricks without hogging your computer?

People don't complain about the latest games requiring more graphics processing more etc so why the complaints about an OS? Also, hardware is getting cheaper all the time. In a year or two it won't cost all that much to build a system that can run Vista well.

I'm complaining about some games that clearly take more than they are supposed to. NVIDIA the way it's meant to be played. :x

Why should I pay for new parts so that someone else can make more money than is fair? Artifically making OS slower so that OEM partners can make some money.

I will proudly continue to STEAL that kind of software. It looks that this time M$ pushed it too far.

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Well, in that case it is the opinion of a majority of its users that Vista is another Windows ME..... Only a very small minority, like you, don't want to see this. Some are just in too much denial to accept the facts and will blame everything except what is truly at fault here and that is Vista.

Get real - it's the vocal minority who make the "Vista = ME" crap up!

Some are just in too much denial to accept the facts

Yeah, and some zealots will fan the flames without even a basic understanding of what they are talking about!

[JimmyT]

According to all "cry-babies", Windows 95 had bags, Windows 98 was crappy, Windows ME was the biggest mistake, Windows XP was just eye-candy yet 98SE was better, and Windows Vista sucks big time.

So, according to many people, Microsoft's only good OS is Windows 98 SE and Windows 2000. Ok...

I might still run Win2000 on my enterprise, but I'd never use Windows 98 in year 2008!

Bugs happen, evolution happens, get over it and go along with it. Bugs will get fixed, so if a company doesn't want a new OS now, they're either waiting for the OS to be more stable through service packs, or they don't have the money to buy every new OS, and they always skip a version.

[JimmyT]

[double post] delete please.

[Julius Caro]

Vista is hardly like ME. And those who say that, have either not used vista, or not used ME. ME sucked, and ME was released months AFTER another infinitely superior operating system by microsoft was already released.

[macf13nd]

Making fun of Vista is a hobby for people who don't actually understand anything about tech, like Mac users and 15 year olds.

Are you implying that all the Mac users out there do not understand anything about tech?

interesting hobby you've got yourself there. :rolleyes:

[Eric Veteran]

It's unbelievable that this piece ended up on the front page. Did you post news that corporations weren't immediately upgrading to NT 3.5.1, NT 4, Windows 2000, and Windows XP as well?

Edited May 15, 2008 by GreyWolfSC

[CelticWhisper]

This really is much ado about nothing. Someone earlier said that large corporations do not upgrade quickly. This is oh-so-true, and in fact I want to expand it to large "organizations" and even small businesses. The last place I worked still had about 50 486s running MS-DOS 6 as mainframe terminals. We didn't upgrade them because there wasn't a reason to - people needed mainframe access and the DOS towers provided it.

Likewise, when I worked at a local-government institution we skipped plenty of software upgrades (Office 2000 -----> Office 2003, some kept 2000, some kept 97, few used XP) because we didn't need them or because other IT directives took priority.

GM not upgrading to Vista is bad for Microsoft. However, remember that it's not GM's obligation to do what's good for Microsoft; it's GM's obligation to do what's good for GM. Yes, there are improvements to Vista that XP doesn't, and likely never will, have to offer. However, there has to be a cost-benefit analysis for rolling out an expensive upgrade like Vista to a COLOSSAL company like GM. Consider how many PCs they have, and the cost of doing a company-wide upgrade. Even with a corporate license, we're talking beaucoup bucks.

That doesn't even take into consideration unforeseen problems, training time, and other abstract issues like that. Vista is bound to be problematic. Not because it's Vista, because it's something different than what was running before. People need to adjust, software needs to be updated, etc. And people who think everything that ran on XP will run flawlessly on Vista are kidding themselves. Yes, most of it (probably 95% or more) will, but c'mon, we're a bunch of IT guys on this forum. If anyone knows Murphy's Law all too intimately, it's us. Sh*t always breaks, and it takes time and effort to fix, and it costs productivity while it's broken. Huge infrastructure upgrades are not the thing to do when your corporate bank accounts are hurting.

Believe me, they wouldn't be upgrading to Ubuntu 8, Windows 2008 Server, Solaris Whatever, or anything else right now either. They have software they need, and regardless of whether or not it will run on Vista, they know for a fact that it runs on their current configuration and they're going to stick with it.

Also, one thing I noticed above that I wanted to clear up - Someone with a 4-year-old Mac is actually in a pretty good position to upgrade to Leopard. It runs on my 7-year-old G4 surprisingly well. I suspect it has to do with the homogeneity of Apple hardware and the fact that coding an OS for the Mac is a little like coding console games - you know exactly what you're coding for and have a better time optimizing than when you have to address a broad range of hardware.

Though when the next Mac OS comes out it'll probably leave my G4 behind. At that point...PPC Gentoo, baybeeeeeee. A glutton for punishment is me.

[xpgeek]

Agreed, this is hardly news.

[C_Guy]

Alright! I hope we get a Front Page news article about every corporation that doesn't have competent enough IT staff to implement a new operating system from Microsoft. Like this story, the commentary will degrade into a comparison to Windows Millennium Edition and....Macs???

You just have to wonder what GM could possibly have to gain by admitting their incompetence. Their IT staff seems to mirror their product quality very well.

[+Steve B Subscriber²]

There is nothing wrong with Vista, it seems GM has a poor IT department if you ask me.

Yeah, I second that or its GMs computers are just flat out old. Any modern PC can run Vista but, its people and some companies that run that absolute basic of anything. Now, if they would've kept their computer hardware updated, then Vista would've been fine. I don't see how waiting to Windows 7 will help them. They still will have to update the hardware.....

[alsheron]

This is NEVER going to end is it? Never ever.

It's a CLASSIC example of if you're told something enough or hear it enough, you start to believe it.

The truth is, Vista is fine, runs fine, works fine, and is the same as Windows ever was. Now, how do I get a big full stop or period to fill up this entire screen or put and end to this nonsense?

[solardog]

GM, upgrade your friggin computers... or just shut your doors and end it already. Holy friggin crap, why the 'F dont you have current tech? Vista runs flawlessly on new hardware...much better than anything I've experienced before it.. I absolutely hated Vista until I built my new system. So you're gonna wait until Win7? You probably wont even exist at that point.

[Gabe3]

epic fail?....why does it runs flawlessly on 3 of my home computers since RTM.

[Brony]

Microsoft Greedy division :0

Common sense :1

[CelticWhisper]

It has nothing to do with competency. It has to do with GM having a current working configuration and not wanting to spend the money for Vista --AND-- Windows 7, opting to just wait for Windows 7 instead.

"Competency" is not defined as "ability and invariable willingness to purchase and implement every Microsoft product released."

[bobbba]

This really does not mean much for GM or Vista.

It's perfectly understandable to skip Vista just like it was to skip XP.

While I happily use Vista I don't think it's a great product and MS could have done far better it's nothing like the disaster that many are proclaiming it to be.

[stevehoot]

While I have little issues regarding Vista X64 I will say from a business point of view I see little reason to move to Vista.

1) They most certainly are not bothered about a prettier GUI

2) They have no interest in DX10

3) They certainly don't fancy the cost

4) They don't like how Bitlocker is a Ultimate extra and isn't included in Business

I could go on, but for the average user Vista is OK, I game alot and I like Crysis so Crysis 64bit in DX10 is lovely, for those who enjoy older games, and those whom are set up and familiar with their systems then wait for Windows Seven, Vista isn't all that.

Um, BitLocker is NOT an Ultimate extra. It's part of what is included with Ultimate, and companies like GM will have some sort of Enterprise agreement. E.G. they get Vista Enterprise which is volume licence only. That includes BitLocker.

There's a number of things that IT Deparments that fully use the Windows ecosystem realise are big advantages that you only get with Vista. There's this thing called security that coroporate IT takes pretty seriously. The enhancements in Vista give it a much more secure approach throughout the OS. In particular UAC and IE7+ protected mode.

The guy who said that administration is bad in Vista is either a moron, a troll or a liar. Vista uses GPO's. The same GPO's that Windows 2000 and XP use. However MS have ADDED (not removed) a number of extra GPO's to provide additional management.

Aero, DX10, Photo Gallery, MCE are consumer technologies aimed for the consumer. However the new GPO's, UAC, mobility centre, BitLocker, NAP, Integrated search, faster boot ups / sleep are reasons companies like Commerical Airlines, Bank of America, Shell and other huge organisations are taking Vista up and deploying it as I type this up.

I don't blame GM for not jumping onto Vista. Thankfully where I work we have a 3 year hardware lifecycle (then it's auctioned off to staff) and we don't go for the very, very cheapest Dell we can get when we replace them. We also ensure that all applications (from Office through to our multi-million pound ERP Oracle system) are certified to run on the current version of Windows. MS have not changed anything regarding Vista in terms of compatibiltiy compared to XP other than to enforce the standards specified in 2002 regarding development on the Windows platform. (I wouldn't expect many Linux users to expect applications to install into /etc or /lib for example.) If GM are running an application that is not written for the operating system (Windows, not a specific version.) then they'll have the same problems with Windows Seven, Eight and Nine.

Oh and 1Gb of RAM, a P4 2.6+ and a 40Gb HD is more than enough to run Vista for a office clerk. I had my main Media Centre PC running Vista Ultimate on 512Mb, 1.3Ghz Athlon and a couple of knackered IDE disks!

[ZZzzzzzZZZZZ]

Everyone here knocking vista its not all that bad. Eventually when migrating to windows 7 you will still need to upgrade your computer hardware.

Thing I like about vista is its less susceptible to malware, trojans.

Also those fo you who have waited and installed windows xp SP3 you have just opened loppholes.

[soldier1st]

vista is a good os but xp is getting old and if GM cant run vista they either have bad IT people or have they ever heard of compatability mode and running an app in admin mode?if not they need to get there heads bashed in and stop blaiming vista for there problems.