Vista Review - My personal Expirance upgrading to vista

[russellharrower]

here is the review i did for vista to get all my latest reviw join my twitter - http://www.twitter.com/russellarrowr or http://www.qiptechmedia.com

Over the last 5 years Microsoft has been coding and designing their new Vista format. It may look 'WOW' as Microsoft advertises. But - lets take look at what it really takes to install the upgrade version of Vista! We went to a National retailer 'Dick Smith Electronics' and brought Vista Home Upgrade - the version the sales assistant told us we needed. It cost around $175.00 AUD. Back in the office we tried to upgrade an Acer Aspire 1640Z laptop from XP to Vista, but it would not accept the code. I waited 3 hours for it to install from XP to Vista. Nothing happened. So I restarted the computer and did a 'clean install' of Vista. It wiped everything from the harddrive. Everything gone. All programs, document, pictures everything gone! A technician from Microsoft advised me that many people are experiencing the same problems as I had, while trying to install Vista. He said many people are booting from the CD instead of installing Vista from XP. I wondered why Microsoft has allowed people to boot when the computer boots? The Microsoft technician had no answer. Apparently Microsoft did not think this one through - in spite of 5 years design! Secondly: Why is Vista so heavily focused upon families? After hours of wasted hassle time trying to install Vista - I don't think it was worth the effort.

My recommendation - stay with XP or go Mac.

- Review By Russell Harrower - http://www.qiptechmedia.com/newsstorys/13022007/Vista/

[Oberon]

<rant>I don't even have to go through the pain to know it's not worth it. It's a new M$ product after all. I like the idea of it, appreciate that it's all .NET, and it's pretty enough. But having a computer that doesn't really work anymore isn't worth it. :P I mean, has there been a recent version of windows that worked exactly as promised at release?</rant>

There's just too much wrong with Vista right now to bother upgrading, not to mention the sysreqs for it! I can happily run BSD on a P133 laptop with 32Mb RAM. Try doing that with Vista. ;)

[moonlit]

All together now...!

I hate fa... never mind.

[VaKo]

Oh there's a surprise, people who don't know what there doing can't make Vista work. Or the perennial "but i can't install it on an coal powered computer, it sucks!!". Try putting [stock] Ubuntu on you P133 with 32Mb of RAM... you can't? Oh, well aren't we all shocked.

[jollyrancher82]

There's just too much wrong with Vista right now to bother upgrading, not to mention the sysreqs for it! I can happily run BSD on a P133 laptop with 32Mb RAM. Try doing that with Vista. Wink

Stop living in the 90s, welcome to 2007 where computers have 1GB+ RAM, 400GB+ hard drives, and 3Ghz+ CPUs.

[Fruitpastles]

My computer only has 256MB of RAM, everything else on my computer meets the requirements, so until I can get the money, or persuade my mum to give me it, I'm not getting a RAM upgrade or vista.

Plus it costs twice as much over here in the UK. :evil:

[Oberon]

Wow..Who knew you guys were so hostile!:P I didn't think I'd get flamed on my first few posts. lol. I was just saying!

I don't think Vista's really stable enough yet to bother upgrading. The old machine comment was just the point that I don't have to worry about whether the machine I'm looking at is really new or powerful or loaded with memory to install *nix on it. I wasn't trying to be snotty about it. I have a new machine capable of running Vista quite nicely (and currently runs XP), but am not planning on upgrading anytime in the near future.

[SomeoneE1se]

Wow..Who knew you guys were so hostile!:P I didn't think I'd get flamed on my first few posts. lol. I was just saying!

I don't think Vista's really stable enough yet to bother upgrading. The old machine comment was just the point that I don't have to worry about whether the machine I'm looking at is really new or powerful or loaded with memory to install *nix on it. I wasn't trying to be snotty about it. I have a new machine capable of running Vista quite nicely (and currently runs XP), but am not planning on upgrading anytime in the near future.

it's not you who's getting flamed it's vista (you picked a bad first topic)

[VaKo]

Wow..Who knew you guys were so hostile!:P I didn't think I'd get flamed on my first few posts. lol. I was just saying!

I don't think Vista's really stable enough yet to bother upgrading. The old machine comment was just the point that I don't have to worry about whether the machine I'm looking at is really new or powerful or loaded with memory to install *nix on it. I wasn't trying to be snotty about it. I have a new machine capable of running Vista quite nicely (and currently runs XP), but am not planning on upgrading anytime in the near future.

I used the beta versions myself, and in all honesty found it was about the same as XP performance wise on my test hardware (Pentium M ULV 1.4Ghz, 648mb DDR, 40GB IDE). The driver detection was a lot more robust that XP. Overall the difference between XP and Vista is about the same as the difference between 2K and XP IMO. So in all honesty, Vista won't come into its own for some time, but it is a better OS than XP.

As for your assumptions about *nix compared to Vista, its like comparing a tractor to a sports car. They do different things. Your not going to be watching HD content on a old *nix based system anytime soon, and your not going to be using Vista as a headless server. Because old computers work great with *nix, and Vista is going to be a major HD content platform. I don't understand the "either/or" approach people have. I like windows, but I also like BSD, linux and unix. They all fit into different places in the IT world, do different things and work along side each other.

Having said all of that, I won't be using Vista until SP1 myself, and the DRM troubles me somewhat. And the oldest working machine I own, which is just shy of a decade old, has 1GB of RAM.

[Oberon]

I used the beta versions myself, and in all honesty found it was about the same as XP performance wise on my test hardware (Pentium M ULV 1.4Ghz, 648mb DDR, 40GB IDE). The driver detection was a lot more robust that XP. Overall the difference between XP and Vista is about the same as the difference between 2K and XP IMO. So in all honesty, Vista won't come into its own for some time, but it is a better OS than XP.

As for your assumptions about *nix compared to Vista, its like comparing a tractor to a sports car. They do different things. Your not going to be watching HD content on a old *nix based system anytime soon, and your not going to be using Vista as a headless server. Because old computers work great with *nix, and Vista is going to be a major HD content platform. I don't understand the "either/or" approach people have. I like windows, but I also like BSD, linux and unix. They all fit into different places in the IT world, do different things and work along side each other.

Having said all of that, I won't be using Vista until SP1 myself, and the DRM troubles me somewhat. And the oldest working machine I own, which is just shy of a decade old, has 1GB of RAM.

I can't say I disagree with anything you've said. :) That'll teach me to be a bit more explicit when I post. heh I wasn't trying to do a direct comparison between windows and *nix. You're right..Apples to oranges there. I actually use both. BSD for working and serious stuff (and mail/web servers), and windows for games and media. So, I"m not really an either/or person either, though it must have seemed so. Sorry about that!

[KoR_Wraith]

Stop living in the 90s, welcome to 2007 where computers have 1GB+ RAM, 400GB+ hard drives, and 3Ghz+ CPUs.

No they don't.

http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html

And that's people who play games - so that'll be the top average of the market.

[jollyrancher82]

Stop living in the 90s, welcome to 2007 where computers have 1GB+ RAM, 400GB+ hard drives, and 3Ghz+ CPUs.

No they don't.

http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html

And that's people who play games - so that'll be the top average of the market.

How many of those were bought in 2007? And you can't exactly call just the survey from the Steam website a reliable source. Not everyone who uses Steam submits their computer specs, not everyone with a computer uses Steam, and not every computer user plays games.

[adiosk8]

<rant>I don't even have to go through the pain to know it's not worth it. It's a new M$ product after all. I like the idea of it, appreciate that it's all .NET, and it's pretty enough. But having a computer that doesn't really work anymore isn't worth it. :P I mean, has there been a recent version of windows that worked exactly as promised at release?</rant>

There's just too much wrong with Vista right now to bother upgrading, not to mention the sysreqs for it! I can happily run BSD on a P133 laptop with 32Mb RAM. Try doing that with Vista. ;)

well part of the reason that it took so long is that they couldnt do it all in .net and they had to re-write like 80% of the code..

[KoR_Wraith]

How many of those were bought in 2007? And you can't exactly call just the survey from the Steam website a reliable source. Not everyone who uses Steam submits their computer specs, not everyone with a computer uses Steam, and not every computer user plays games.

Probably very very few were bought in 2007, but the fact is that they're used in 2007 - and that's what matters.

It's reliable in as far as all the results are completely honest of those who submitted. Also, as I said before, these are people who play games and so are likely to have above average PCs, so I would have thought that don't play games would actually have lower specs than those listed.

[jollyrancher82]

How many of those were bought in 2007? And you can't exactly call just the survey from the Steam website a reliable source. Not everyone who uses Steam submits their computer specs, not everyone with a computer uses Steam, and not every computer user plays games.

Probably very very few were bought in 2007, but the fact is that they're used in 2007 - and that's what matters.

It's reliable in as far as all the results are completely honest of those who submitted. Also, as I said before, these are people who play games and so are likely to have above average PCs, so I would have thought that don't play games would actually have lower specs than those listed.

When I say 'welcome to 2007' I meant computers that are bought in 2007, which is what Vista is aimed at. Vista isn't aimed at 5-6 year old computers. Technology moves on, so should people, and stop complaining about requirements.

[SomeoneE1se]

How many of those were bought in 2007? And you can't exactly call just the survey from the Steam website a reliable source. Not everyone who uses Steam submits their computer specs, not everyone with a computer uses Steam, and not every computer user plays games.

Probably very very few were bought in 2007, but the fact is that they're used in 2007 - and that's what matters.

It's reliable in as far as all the results are completely honest of those who submitted. Also, as I said before, these are people who play games and so are likely to have above average PCs, so I would have thought that don't play games would actually have lower specs than those listed.

When I say 'welcome to 2007' I meant computers that are bought in 2007, which is what Vista is aimed at. Vista isn't aimed at 5-6 year old computers. Technology moves on, so should people, and stop complaining about requirements.

How many copies of vista do you think Microsoft sells? They make the most sells from OEM, so they don't need to worry about computers more then 2-3 years old because only geeks and people who know how to upgrade computer(for the most part) will be installing Vista them selfs.