Vista RC1 issues - why buy it? 1

[jward52]

No, I'm not rushing to the store to buy Vista because I'm not impressed with RC1 for these reasons:
1. The SoundMax digital (onboard) audio on my Dell Dimension 4600 will not work in Vista, even with an XP driver.
2. The Adaptec ATA133 IDE Controller card works fine in XP but not in RC1 (dual-boot setup on 2 HDDs).
3. Too many posts on the web concerning DRM issues. This alone would keep me from buying Vista! Mandriva Linux?

Comments? Cures?

Jim

 

[Nelviticus]

Firstly, you can't buy RC1.

Secondly, I see so many questions in various forums saying "why should I buy Vista when I don't like <insert feature here>" and the answer to all of them is "you shouldn't." If you don't like Vista, don't buy it. If you like it, buy it.

Thirdly, driver issues will resolve themselves one way or another eventually. Either the manufacturers will release Vista-capable drivers, in which case you can use that hardware, or they won't, in which case you can't use it with Vista.

Nelviticus

 

[Sympology]

The same happened with XP, some drivers took months to come out.

Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004

 

[jward52]

I meant "why buy Vista," obviously. Niether response mentions the DRM issue I'm hearing so much bad news about...

 

[smah]

There have been a lot of improvements since RC1 (Aug '06)

 

[jward52]

Please name the improvements! And what about the DRM scheme disabling drives/peripherals/etc. that don't conform to the MS version of content protection? I use XP most of the time, choosing "Earlier version of Windows" at boot up. Another negative is that RC1's MediaPlayer10 will not allow ripping MP3s at any higher rate than 192k. Boo hiss!!! I have had RC1 since last August and I'm not impressed enough to spend the money.

 

[ArizonaGeek]

I can address some of the DRM questions. I've been using the release version of Vista Ultimate since the beginning of December. I rip all my CDs to MP3 and I get new CDs all the time, I have over 65,000 MP3s and several hundred albums ripped since I installed Vista. I've ripped DVD's to AVi and WMV, and I've copied them to other disks. I've created and burned my own videos from a video camera. So far MS hasn't stopped me from doing what I want to do.

Media Player 11 rips MP3s as high as 320kbps in Vista but I think Media Player mostly sucks anyway and use another 3rd party app. If you are using Media Player to rip music, I gotta say, there is a whole new world out there you are missing.

There have been LOTS of improvements with drivers and functionality since RC1 most of which you wouldn't notice right off. I read somewhere, I think there were over 200 new features with Vista.

I have a home built PC as well as a Dell Dimension 8400 with Vista Ultimate, and a Dell Optiplex 360 running Longhorn Server with no driver problems at all. In fact on my homebuilt PC it was far easier to install Vista than XP, I spent 3 days on the Abit forum trying to get XP installed. Popped the Vista disk in and I was off.

So far out of the tons of software I run on a daily basis I have exactly one that won't work. And it is more a product built for Windows 98 so it is no surprise it wont work. However I am running some software put together in 1997 with no problems. So I guess it isn't so much a problem with MS but with the software companies who wont upgrade/update their software. Especially knowing Vista was being released and in beta for a year.

If you have anything specific I am sure there are people here than can help.

Cheers
Rob

 

[Nelviticus]

If you've already decided not to buy it why are you asking people to come up with reasons why you should? I'm a bit confused about what you're after. It seems like you're looking for a Vista evangelist to argue with.

It's a bit like asking "why should I buy an Aston Martin DB9 when it only has two doors? I want four!". If you want a four-door car don't buy an Aston Martin DB9. Vista has heavy-handed DRM protection; if you don't want heavy-handed DRM protection then Vista is not for you.

Nelviticus

 

[smah]

As with many others in the next few weeks, it seems that some people are just complaining for the sake of complaining.

As for what's changed since RC1, start here and work down.

 

[jward52]

Thanks for the post, Rob! Valuable insight, indeed. I have always been an MS Windows user and my current profession is based on the knowledge gained from years of studying MS & PCs and the schooling, a.k.a. A+ certification. The problem is, I've been reading so many negatives about Vista that I have reconsidered buying it. My initial post was intended to see what other users of Vista could say to convince me to buy it, to tell me why I shouldn't base my decision just on my RC1 experience. The geek in me is still interested in Mandriva Linux (if I can ever get the right time for a decent download rate), as a friend suggested doing 3 OS's on the Dell. Hmmmm...

 

[linney]

Vista and More: Piecing Together Microsoft's DRM Puzzle

http://www.computerworld.com/action...ewArticleBasic&articleId=9005047&pageNumber=1

 

[ArizonaGeek]

My initial post was intended to see what other users of Vista could say to convince me to buy it, to tell me why I shouldn't base my decision just on my RC1 experience.

I have seen a lot of negative press about Vista. Most of it seems to be nitpicking. Like, hardware requirements. Most hardware sold in the last 2 years should install Vista with no problems. Use XP till you buy a new computer it is that simple. It will be 5 years before Microsoft sunsets XP.

There are a few things I don't like about Vista, it can be very intrusive for one, in fact a friend called me last night about ready to reinstall XP until I walked him past some of the quirks of it. But overall I am pretty impressed with it.

I really enjoy most of the features despite some of its flaws. XP had it's own flaws, Linux has its own, Mac has their own you just gotta pick what is right for you. I will say if you do upgrade you will want either Home Premium or Ultimate editions. You'll miss a lot of cool stuff if you pass on those.

By the way, service pack one for Vista will be released with Longhorn server (July is what I last heard) it will upgrade the kernel to the Longhorn kernel. If you are hesitant wait till the summer, by then most of the bugs will get worked out and you can get SP1.

Cheers
Rob

 

[smah]

Most of the technical posts on the internet are negative. That's just the nature of the beast. Rarely does anyone post "Everything's working great" even though there are many more without problems. A perfect example is the MS public Internet Explorer newsgroups. Within a couple of weeks after IE7's release, there were hundreds of post with problems. What wasn't mentioned however, is that there were millions of users without problems.

 

[jlockley]

I have xp64 with the option to upgrade. XP 64 is giving me a run for my money (the driver issues, and I need my drivers pretty much now, not in a few months - plus some install questions).

It won't cost me anything but time to upgrade, so I am sitting here seeing what you all have to say to decide when and how to go about it. I am listening for things like "absolutely stable" and "better search options, bolean search on desktop" and "the file system is set up so that you can cross link related documents with a mouse click" (I made those up) rather than "It's got a lot of cool features" and "It looks really neat", which is about all the good news I hear.

I imagine that was the purpose of the initial inquiry. Obviously people don't say..get, it works...but knowing that I can control start and have a better overview of running services and their connections or can control behaviors without certification would be welcome info.

 

[jward52]

I think I'll wait for SP1, which Rob says is coming in July. We'll see if MS gets it out on time. That's about the time RC1 will time out, right? Or is it June-something? My techie friend says never get a new Microsoft OS in its first year. He might be right about this one. Remember 95a? Ugggh! Thanks for all your posts!

Jim

 

[ArizonaGeek]

See I cant say much about the 64 bit since I dont use it. However the 32 bit is absolutely stable, the search features are way faster, file transfers between two Vista machines are super fast. Microsoft actually did something smart, when it transfers files between two Vista machines (or between Vista/Longhorn server) it does this calculating transfer time, when it does that it probes your bandwidth and dynamically sends packets based on bandwidth. XP/03 and previous use a static set (4 byte packet size I think) in the Vista machine your packets can be as big as 1mb. A 1 gig transfer between and XP machine and a Vista machine might take 5 to 10 minutes, on an Vista to Vista transfer might only take a minute or two tops. If I had a gigbit connection across my network I could get ya better speed on it.

The gadgets feature with the bar on the side is pretty handy, I keep my clock there, CPU speed, temprature of where I live plus where my parents live, and people are making all kinds of gadgets. If you are into news or have a business you can do stocks or RSS feeds. There are ipod controls, calculators and other stuff. Pretty neat little toys. The Business Desktop Deployment to deploy Vista and Office 2007 so far sounds awesome. One image (instead of like 20 Ghost images I have for each type of machine) and you load all drivers for all your machines in one folder, you configure your Office 07 and Vista to your specs, connect the PC via PXE and push out the image in about 5 to 10 minutes.

Some things I don't like or wont use, but probably would be helpful to your average everyday user would be things like an actual firewall. It works with Defender and actually does packet detection and tears it apart before it passes the firewall, it just doesn't block incoming requests. As we all know a trojan horse on ones computer by passes the old Windows firewall since it is an actual request going out asking for incoming connections. No more. I hate that every time something installs and it asks you if you want to install, and my biggest pet peeve is, I don't like not being an actual admin on my machine even though I am in an admin group. I understand the logic of it, heck I am in IT and have seen the mindless things users can do. But as an admin I am not a fan. But I've figured work arounds and am generally quite the fan of Vista.

In the business world one thing I am running into even today, in XP if someone wants to install a printer or some basic plug in that is used for work, they need to be a local admin. Super user wont cut it. Well, in Vista they can be a regular ole user and still add printers, and add web plugins (that dont require a registry entry) but my registry is safe from prying eyes and my GPO's since they arent an admin.

Were these the type of things you were looking for jlockley? I don't really mean to sound like a Vista evangelist, honest! I am a Unix and Mac guy (well, I was at one time anyway) and for me to actually be excited about a Microsoft product, any Microsoft product says a lot. For all the things I do (music recording, ripping and mixing, video editing, picture editing) I haven't found anything that makes me say "Screw this I am going back to XP"

For the record, I'll keep my iPod and they can keep their Zune!

Cheers
Rob