Is is like all the DRM in every game I buy at the moment ? Is it like the DRM on HDMI connections ? Or the DRM on DVD's ? Or like Macrovision they used to put on VHS tapes to stop you copying them ?

If so what exactly is the purpose of the DRM that Vista is infested with ? does it only allow you to unplug your mouse 5 times before making you buy a new one ?

I just don't understand the statement that vista has more DRM? How, where, for what purpose, surely XP must have it too or the digital content your trying to use would not work…..

If you want to run a modern PC you need Vista 64 –
Want more than 4gb of RAM – Vista 64
Want to use your new fancy graphics card with 1Gb of Ram on board – Vista 64 – otherwise bye bye to some of your system memory
Want to play a DX10 game (Farcry 2 runs faster in DX10 mode BTW) – Vista 32 or 64 but you'd be a moron to get 32.

What amazes me is people talking about install sizes – 750Gb HDD is £65
More amazing is the people who look in task manager and complain that Vista is using their memory. It's called superfetch, it preloads frequently used programs to speed up app launch and yes it works and yes it unloads it if it needs more RAM for a particular app. Also you can buy 4gb of RAM for about £35….

Here's a tip for anyone complaining of boot time – go into your BIOS and make sure S3 or STR is set for the power management. Turn off wake up on mouse / USB. Go into the power management properties in the control panel and change the power button mode to sleep. Say hello to instant on and it uses as much power as your RAM requires. i.e. not much. Typing this on a 3 year old (nearly) vista 64 install.

BTW – I got my start as a UNIX/Java/Perl/Apache developer. There is no way I would ever go back. Yes, they have their strengths and Microsoft does copy from them (PowerShell), but I think Microsoft still has an incredibly talented pool of minds creating innovative products for both developers and end users.

Walter: Sadly most large shops work on a 5year’ish cycle. So its often one OS upgrade maybe every 5 years (how long after a OS comes out before all the computers are able to run it?). I know of business that only moved to XP from 2000 2years ago.

Have a read of http://port25.technet.com/

1. It requires as much memory as basic computers come with these days (1 gigabyte)
2. It has a new driver model that requires new drivers to be written (and most have)
3. It asks me to click “Allow” whenever a program need administrator access.
4. It’s different to XP.

Microsoft has said that Windows 7 will have very similar system requirements as Vista, it will have the same driver model that will require Vista-era drivers, and it will still have User Account Control. And, of course, it will be different to XP. Am I missing something? Why are people waiting enthusiastically for Windows 7?

That’s the case for our company (1000s of PCs in our case), but it will be years before we’ve upgraded all the boxes to the point where they could comfortably support Vista, and honestly there is no compelling reason to upgrade hardware for the OS… it doesn’t allow us to do anything we can’t already do.

We currently have no time frame to move to Vista. I spoke with a coworker at my previous employer (another Fortune 500, with 1000s of PCs) and they are in the same place.

From a business perspective Vista really didn’t bring anything to the table. I’ve seen some people argue security, but I can only assume those are small shops that aren’t able to lockdown their XP installs well enough. We’ve never had that problem.

Microsoft is still too focused on destroying other OSes, instead of improving their own OS.

I will bet you that, once again, corporate bureaucracy will ruin this version of Windows just like it did with Vista.

Windows had an interesting experimental OS in the works. I think it was called Midori. From the sounds of it, this was the way to go. If they went with that I think they’d have a winner.

Windows XP in a corp enviroment is way different to a non domain enviroment. For a start its way more secure as you would expect your uses to be runing as a non-admin user. This alone makes it more secure.

For businesses with 100+ PC’s i know know of a couple that are runing Vista at the moment. Most are waiting untill all there hardware is up above the sweet spot so that they don’t have to support a mixed enviroment.

Razor512: Have you ever run XP 64bit? Its a nightmare. Driver support is limited to the minimum. Its unstable and i hate it with a passion. (i had to support a half dozen clients running it as they needed 8gb+ of RAM). (They have all been moved to Vista 64bit by now).

You can from a root shell apt-get update and apt-get install synaptic

or use smxi script makes the install setup for hardware easier

while windows xp was slower than windows 98 and other older versions of windows, windows xp was inherently faster as it supported multiple CPU cores and also supported more memory

but windows xp 32 bit and vista 32 bit have the same amount of memory support , same cpu support, and overall the same hardware support, the only thing that changed is the system requirements being higher due to the extra bloat

and don’t say any thing about vista needing a high end system to run fast. I am not saying vista is slow, I am saying that on the same hardware xp will be faster

other than eye candy and a few UI changes, vista has almost nothing new and most users will never even use any of the new vista features

windows vista 64 bit and windows xp 64 bit also have the same hardware support

the only new feature that is noticeable to the users is direct x 10 (currently a few groups are working on porting it to windows xp )

and with linux, it would be more popular if it was easier for the average user to use. in the time it takes to install a .tar.gz file through command line in linux, i can install probably 5-6 programs in windows because while the linux user is busy typing away commands, I am just double clicking on my installers.

the reason why windows has thr largest market share was because it was able to avoid the command line use (in windows command line is completely optional unlike Linux where it is needed to do basic things thats only 1 or 2 clicks away in windows

a long time ago when every OS was command line based. only a few people used computers, many found it complicated, others found it frustrating but once Microsoft came out with windows and a GUI, it suddenly became popular and everyone wanted a computer

the general public hates command line, and compared to linux or even the mac OS, windows has the least requirements for command line

I find that with Vista, the outlook on the user is that the user is not an expert and needs an explanation for everything they are doing. This may be true for some, even most, but for me there is a whole heap of text i need to scan through and find the word with the underline which allows me to do what i want to do.

This approach does not cut it when it comes to business, can you imagine how to give directions for somebody to disable a NIC in vista vs XP. XP would be far more direct.

I also believe that users should not be running with administrative privileges, so what if the UAC component is active? If the user is not aware, and lets face it, they shouldn’t need to be, they are going to approve things anyway.

I must admit that one thing Microsoft got right is the direction they have taken with Windows defender. Here we have a product, which based on community input can tell you if the software you are trying to run is trusted.

For the next version of Windows, if they can somehow work on a way to meet the needs of the techie without dumbing things down and also make it possible for a novice user to understand what they are doing they may get my business. Clearly appealing..or trying to appeal to both markets does not work.

I would expect Windows 7 to be a lot more easier to use for the techie, that is the only way I am going to buy it. Assuming, of course, that I haven’t overly committed my business to Linux or OS X by that time.

What i expect from Windows 7 is being light. Vista takes lots of space on installation and memory.

I can only predict what Windows 7 is going to be like, and I think that Microsoft is really going to differentiate themselves from their competitors with this release. The obvious and most talked about feature is touch, and considering that not a single competitor has it in desktop OS form, most consumers will be clamoring to use Windows 7. Even though Steve Jobs said that it doesn’t make much sense, Apple will be quick to add touch to the next version of OSX, if it’s not already in the works.

Then there’s going to be Vista SP2 – we remember what SP2 did for XP. So you’ll end up with a rock solid version of Vista that you won’t want to let go of, kinda like XP.

The thing about Windows 7 is that they can’t over promise and under deliver – they’ve learnt from their mistakes, and this time they’re not promising anything.

JIff
http://www.anonymity.cz.tc

They should also give as much help as is necessary to help publishers and driver writers get the best out of the system and investigate some kind of XP-in-a-window emulator application to allow older software to work.

They could even give it a fancy new name. Windows X or something.

https://www.merge.com/emea/estore/content.aspx?pname=eFilm%20Workstation%E2%84%A2&returnUrl=&productID=108&contentTypeID=4
It would be a very long while before we even think about Windows 7.

I work for a mid size white box computer supplier. As it stands at the moment about %85 of the computers we sell (either in parts or compleat) come with a microsoft OS. Of those systems about 1/3 are shipping with 64bit vista. less then %10 come with XP. Judging by our sales within 6months most will be 64bit with 32bit being the excption.

Based of our service stats, Of the systems we receive for repair about %53 have virus and spyware problems. Of that %53, about %87 are windows XP machines and %11 are running Vista. Of the Vista machines most are minor fixes and and can be cleaned without a reinstall. (its worth noting that almost all of the vista machines infected had User Account Controls turned off). Most of the XP machines that come back have to be reinstalled.
Like it or not Vista is WAY more secure and resistent to viruses then XP.

Almost all of the new hardware we sell nowdays has at least 2gb of RAM (even the mid range has 4gb now) and has no problem running Vista.

It would be my advise that the tech world should stop putting Vista on older machines and then blaming it for running slow. Its like putting XP when it just came out onto a PIII 133MHz and expecting it to run better then 2000/98.
And really, the DirectX 10 issue. We know that games have a 1-2year dev cycle. Its only just now that we are seeing games built on DirectX 10 coming out. You can’t expect it to go faster then DirectX 9 if the game hasn’t been built to take advantage of it.

I’m running Vista x64 with 3gb of ram on a dual core system and its much faster then XP with the way I use my system. On the same computer running XP i would top out with 4-5 copys (each 10+ tabs) of firefox open as well as all the other crap I have running. In Vista i can have that open and fire up a 3d game in a window and treat it just like another app and my computer still runs fine. PS, I have UAC turned on. You just have to setup your system currectly and you get hardly any popups. I get at most one a day.

WTF?

Pray tell what competition Microsoft has in the operating system area other than Linux? — which by the way is free, more secure and of better quality?

If Microsoft went under in the operating system area, software developers would move to Linux and the computing world would be much better off.

I personally use Vista and Linux, Windows XP is getting pretty old and that is why I got rid of it altogether on my laptop.

The only thing I believe will really happen is that Microsoft will take a page from Macs and Linux to improve their own. A bit like Internet Explorer 7 did, they took all the good ideas browsers like Opera and Firefox had and made their own adaptation.