Sparda + Vista = Rant

[Sparda]

ok, so, we know vista is coming wather we like it or not. I personaly think it's going to be flop for the following reasons:

• Most people who would ever going to get a computer are happy with there current computer

Nearly 50% of computers in homes and buisnesses only just meet the minimum requierments for this peice of bloatware.

Lots of companies are still using windows 2000 ffs!

Ok, so it's only three reasons, but, they are very big reasons. I fix computers, not for a living but a sort of pass time I get paid for. Now, aproximatly 8/10 customers that i visit are using Windows XP... they are not going to upgrade to vista becasue windows xp alredy does every thing they need it to. They might upgrade to what ever comes out after vista becasue they get the feeling there computer is slowing down (but the slow down is probably windows's fault any way).

So lets say your computer doesn't meet the minimum spec for running vista, what do you do? Go and buy a new computer that can run vista (asuming you don't know how to upgrade your computer) or do you buy a version of windows that will run on your computer which is considarably cheaper then buying a new computer? Ye thats right...

So, lets tackle the last point. Lots of companies are still using windows 2000 because it's either finantialy inviable to upgrade to XP/2003 or becasue there admin says there is no need, the current system is holding out fine. Sure they might upgrade there server to 2003, but it would be so expencive to upgrade all the client to even XP they are simply not going to, and forget vista, they would have to physicly upgrade all the computers simply to get the damn thing running egnoring the actualy cost of the OS it's self.

My rant's conclusion: Vista from what I can see has a very neesh market, and thats people who are buying a new computer and vista comes with it weather they like it or not...

[Sparda]

Microsoft should do with there filesystem as they did with there IP stack... copy it from BSD. So, if you didn't know, the ipstack for windows NT 1 was copied stright out of the Berkeley Software Distribution OS, perhaps modified a bit to work with windows, but it was esentialy the same. (Please correct me if I am wrong) Thats how it remain in windows XP, the IP stack in windows XP is the same IP stack form NT 1, which was taken from BSD.

Any way, lets get to the point. WE all know WinFS has been rewriten like 10 times now right? Well insted of writing a whole new filesystem microsoft should use a Unix filesystem, I am specificly thinking of XFS, for the following reasons:

• It shouldn't be as difficult implimenting an exsisting system as writing a fs from scratch and failing 10 times in a row, so the work load on the dev team would at least be alot lower.

Windows file systems are notroiuse for been extremly fragmented, alot of Unix file systems (paticulaly XFS) have systems inplace to minimize file fragmentation and even defragment on the fly.

It might make microsoft more appealing (at least less bastards) to open source enthusiasts as they would be able to nativly, with there linux/bsd distro, access there windows partion with no problems.

You know it makes sence!

[melodic]

sounds good :P i have yet to use vista but it sounds like a resource hungry hog

[VaKo]

The buisness/corp editions of vista will not include the Areo graphics addon. Thats just intended for home editions. Also, most its quite likely that companies running 2000 on the desktops will not upgrade until they buy new PC's. At which point there going to be buying vista machines anyway.

Admins never like upgrades, because usually they know where the problems are now, and don't want to have to deal with new ones. This is the same if there using XP, linux, BSD, OSX or an OS they made themselves.

Home users: There hasn't been a new version of windows since home PC's became consumer items. Most consumers will stick with XP until something they buy refuses to run on it, at which point they will probally think about just buying a new PC.

"The slowness is probally windows fault anyway"... Or they've just not used a firewall/antivirus/mal-ware solution and have no idea why they should. People do more damage to a computer system simply by using it than by any other method. Just ask anyone who's worked on a tech support line...

Also, re your "WinFS has been re-written 10 times", do you have a citation for that? Its a fairly vauge claim at best.

[Sparda]

Admitadadly saying "rewrite" is not entirly correct, but i refer to the fact that the project that is now WinFS started ages ago, and it's finaly getting off the ground now even though it would probably have been far simpler to use a Unix file system then having many failed atempts at your own.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinFS#Development

[VaKo]

You can learn a lot from failed expriments, how often have you dumped a really cool part of a project because it didn't fit in with the entire scheme of things? How about just taking all the good bits of a unix style filesystem and building on them? As opposed to just copy'n'pasting code...

I know MS is a contempory bogey-man in the world of computers, but there are still a lot of smart people working for them. Not every move they make is automatically a bad one.

[Sparda]

Yes, adding more features is usualy always a good thing. However, when it comes to file systems adding featurs offten means you have to remove others to avoid performance or other such problems.

Take the current system:

Your avarage Unix File system:

Good things:

Fast, Reliable, Fragmentation usualy never happens (either becasue the file system was coded to avoid it or the OS activly thinks about degragmenting as it's writing the files)

Bad featurs:

The permison system is not paticulaly flexible, you can have one owner and one group owner and thats it, but this is in alot of cases adiquate

NTFS:

Good featurs:

Very flexible permison system, you can have as many users or groups as you want asighned to a file (there is probably a limite, but i'v never run into it)

Bad featurs:

Heavy fragmentation present reducese over all performance about a month after lots of writing with no defragmenting

Prone to data loss on shut down (Ever noticed that small file go missing after you just created it and restart windows? Ye, thats how reliable NTFS is)

Personaly i would prefer the less flexible permmisons system if it would improve performance.

[W4RP3D]

Nearly 50% of computers in homes and buisnesses only just meet the minimum requierments for this peice of bloatware.

What are the minimum requierments then?

[VaKo]

Nearly 50% of computers in homes and buisnesses only just meet the minimum requierments for this peice of bloatware.

What are the minimum requierments then?

And how many computers are there with 3.1/95/98/ME still happily running on them? Or machines like that which have somehow had XP shoehorned on to it by an overly enthusiatic "local computer expert"*?

(if you've worked on tech support lines these words will chill you to your very bone)

[Sparda]

None that I have seen have had XP "forced on" to them. They all are running the OS they origionaly came with. The oldest OS that I have seen recently was Windows 98.

[sentinel]

The buisness/corp editions of vista will not include the Areo graphics addon. Thats just intended for home editions.

Actually, as I understand it they will all include Aero except for the most basic home edition.

[VaKo]

The buisness/corp editions of vista will not include the Areo graphics addon. Thats just intended for home editions.

Actually, as I understand it they will all include Aero except for the most basic home edition.

My mistake. But i bet its the first thing thats turned off.

None that I have seen have had XP "forced on" to them. They all are running the OS they origionaly came with. The oldest OS that I have seen recently was Windows 98.

Its something I have seen quite often, people with XP on a machine that has no USB ports, or only USB 1. My flatmate has a 700mhz/256mb machine with XP on it, and another one had a 233mhz/128mb machine with XP on it. Usually somewhere along the line it broke down and someone shoehorned XP onto it.

This is a distinct class of people from those who have anything from 3.1(i had a lady call up asking why her new wireless broadband kit didn't work with a win3.1 laptop) to ME and want support. Its almost like they think they can just keep on patching it and not buy an upgrade.

[jollyrancher82]

99% of PC users are home users. 100% of home users don't care about the insides of the operating system. Aslong as it checks their email, browses websites, and type up the odd text document. The home user doesn't care about the insides.

Everyone should stop thinking the every PC user cares about the insides of Vista. Everyone should stop thinking that Vista is intended to run on todays PCs. Vista is made for PC's which will come out next year, sure it'll run on the really top end PC's this year, but it's not intended to run on a 500mhz P3 with 256MB ram.

I think this is the main problem with "geeks" these days, they don't seem to realised not every PC user is a geek like them. When people come up with new arguments apart from "Vista won't run on my XYZmhz PC with XYZMB of ram", and any other arguments which pretty much only geeks care about, I might just listen.

[Sparda]

Correct TomB, as I said, the only real market (other then people who are stupid enough to want to play Halo 2 on the PC) for vista is new computers, but as I also said, most home users that are going to get a 'brand new' computer alredy have. Computers are now almost as common as mobile phones.

[VaKo]

My point is that is fashionable to knock windows because its "bloated", but it works fairly well on a large varity of hardware including things its not spec'd to run on. Vista will run ok on todays PC's just as XP ran fine on PCs that were built for 2000. There will be some that try and install vista on crap PC's and then complain its slow and unstable. But I think it will turn out to be a better OS than XP in the longrun, and also better than linux for a small time.

[metatron]

Well if you look at the development of Windows over the years it has got better and I think Vista will be better then XP and the operating system that comes after Vista will be better then that.

At the end of the day it does what 99% of the people need it to do and I for one will be installing it on my gaming machine and maybe a Media PC because I want to know what ever I sick in them will automatically be recognised and run with no issues.

For work I will always stick with *NIX because I just don’t need windows for work (besides software testing).

The only thing missing from *NIX is hardware support, don’t get me wrong it has vastly improved over the years, but it is just not there yet.

[VaKo]

Photoshop + out the box wifi support and i'll put linux on a serious machine.

[cooper]

Sparda, I'm sorry, but I think you're wrong. Vista will be a big hit.

It's already a known fact that a lot of the reviewers will be underwhelmed due to the ever decreasing feature set. They're already bitching before the product is even out the door. This, however, will not deter anybody who originally planned to run Vista.

It's just like with the previous versions: Microsoft will find some killer app, and make it critically dependant on Vista features. And I'm pretty certain they'll turn to Office and IE7 for it. Firefox is eating their lunch at the moment, and they simply can't afford to trail any longer, so they're effectively being forced to make IE7 work on XP. And until Vista is actually out there, it'll run pretty well too. Then Vista appears and another host of features will become available. That nagging bit of sluggishness in that little thing of IE7 magically disappears under Vista. Everybody will agree that Vista is better, simply because IE7 runs that much smoother. And those cool extra extensions you've always wanted? You can have them! Just make sure you run Vista.

You and many others out there bitch and moan about the minimum system requirements. Fact is that during the last year or so Microsoft will spend the gross domestic product of a small republic on tuning the *CRAP* out of the sucker. Rest assured, by the time it's released, it will run on pretty much anything out there _at that time_.

Businesses will want to run the latest version of Office because Outlook will have cool new icons, or Word can now be used to write braille. More specifically, people will use the latest version of Office because it's _the latest version_ of Office. And everybody uses Office. Convert one company to Office, and suddenly communicating with them becomes a hassle unless you too use the latest version of Office. And before you know it everybody is effectively forced to use the latest version of Office. Only problem is that it will require Vista.

Vista will be expensive. No doubt about that one. I mean, hey, Microsoft desperately needs to money (there may actually be some truth to that if the EU gets its way, but let's not go there right now). Expect some nice Upgrade versions at a mere fraction of the cost of the full retail version. It'll only be valid for a limited time, and those with a legal version of WinXP will flock to it, for the same reason people will want the latest version of Office: It's the latest version so it must be better. And even if it's not better, it's the version that will be supported for the longest time by Microsoft. And those zombies will be under the impression that they've saved a huge amount of money, when in fact they just got shafted a little less hard.

You mentioned the TCP/IP stack that Microsoft copied out of BSD (and, I might add, modified the *CRAP* out of to keep it going as well as it has). Guess what they chose to replace in Vista? You've guessed it, the TCP/IP stack. They claim it's because in spite of all the work they poured into the stack, there are simply some things they can't do or can't do good enough using the old code. And rather than add yet another hack to make it work a little better, they decided to redo the whole thing. The fact that BSD fanboys are screaming "Theft!" about that one for all those years might have had something to do with it as well, but that's probably just icing on the cake for them since it clearly hasn't bothered them the previous years.

Also, all those fancy schmancy peripherals that only work on Windows? Guess what version of Windows the drivers will be mainly targeted at? Vista, because that one will be around the longest. It makes economic sense to make drivers for that. They can put a big sticker on the box that says "Designed for Windows Vista". Customers love seeing stuff like that. It just screams "Buy me, I can work with the newest version too!". If it _only_ runs under Vista, well, guess you're gonna have to upgrade, now don't you?

If Microsoft expects the uptake is a little slow, they'll make some dumb-ass mistake in the activation of the OS, so they can not only bemoan the rampant piracy that's going on, but all those cheap assholes will still be running THEIR OS. If they have to choose between that and Linux, they'd pick that. If anything to prevent you from finding out that OpenOffice is starting to look pretty good (and yes, it runs on Windows too, but if you're running Windows chances are what you WANT to run is Office).

Vista will be a hit, wether you want it or not, and wether it deserves it or not. As long as the OS is equally capable and stable (*cough*ME*cough*) people will flock to it. And it will be a success. And it will be one because they made something newer. And they're Microsoft, so the newest version must be the best one yet. Right?

[Sparda]

Didn't you just discribe mostly all the reasons Microsoft was taken to caught for Antitrust?

[VaKo]

MS includes more features in a product: ANTITRUST!!!

MS includes less features in a product: Stupid M$!! Linux has it built in!

[Sparda]

I wasn't refering to that, I was refering to the forcing people to buy some thing else just to use another product which they also must buy from them. (unfair buisness practices/Coercive monopoly?)

[cooper]

They're being sued in the EU not because they include features. They're being sued because other companies don't have the same amount of insight into the sources of the OS giving Microsoft an unfair advantage over them.

In and of itself that might not be that big of a deal, until they start entering new markets. Only THEN can you make the case that they're ABusing their monopoly power to get their way.

Or at least, that's how I understand it.

[Sparda]

I know this. I don't understand how the French (Who every one but the french them selvs hate) can bitch about The iPod only work with iTunes when there is a far bigger monoply (i.e. Microsoft products (which you have to pay for) only working on microsofts operating system (which you have to pay for again)).

[VaKo]

Your dreaming... wake up. Why should MS have to make there programs for other OS's? Isn't office on OSX anyway? And where do you draw the line at OS's to support? And should it be free like you suggest? Kudos on the anti-french slander as well, not sure how you got that in but you did.

So MS sells a product, and other products as add on's to the main product? And people like them? The outrage! People, hard work, exchange of money and all. Making a product open source isn't mandatory, there are pro's and con's to that ideal. Office is a good product, and lots of people like to use it. It works well for the job, and is well supported. Open office is good, but who's heard of it, and does it fit into an enterprise level computer system as well as office?

The main problem seems to be that MS ties its products into to the OS very closely, and doesn't let its competitors in to the same degree. Thing is, if it was you, and all that money, would you? Windows needs to be defined as either a product, or a standard. Is it an arena where the public have full access or is it a product that is owned?

Until all our food is free, there will be closed source code and proprietrory standards.

[Sparda]

ahh yes, i forgot that word (don't know about office) was avalable for MAX OS X (be its like twice as expensive). I'm all for paying for software, but only if it's worth the money. (This brings me back to my rant about why I hate buying DVDs) I'm willing to pay for a product, but only if I think it's worth the money. I personaly don't think windows is worth the money I'm supposed to pay for it. It's unstable, suseptable to viruses atc. Now if they made it cheaper (alot cheaper to about the value it's actualy worth) I would probably buy it becasue it's more attractive (and probably faster) for me to have a lagit copy then spend the time it would take to find a copy of windows that worked with out activation or any crap like that.

So lets see and balence out what we have with what I think would be best.

A OEM copy of Win XP Pro is £95, that i was too expencive, for that same price i could buy 3 brand new PC games. I would like the OEM copy to be more like say £40, I'm willing to pay that for an unstable insecure operating system. (if it was stable and secure I would want to pay more. Take this for example, I catch the bus 8 or 10 times a week, been a student I get a half price discount. How ever, the bus service I use is realy excelent, rarly late (regurdless of the level trafic on the roads), they even supplie free newspapers, not that i'm a reading type of guy, but hey, if i wanted it, it's there. Any way, I pay £0.75 for every bus ride to Huddersfield from my cillege and the same price back. Now, if i wasn't paying half fare I would pay £1.50, but becasue of the excelent service I would actualy be willing to pay £2 for every bus ride. Of not every one would see it that way, but i see it like they "You get what you pay for". Now paying and extra £95 (you have to have the 'pro' version becasue it's less anoying/testical sucking then the home version, but it's far from perfect, realy they should have never made the home version and just sold the pro version at a slightly lower price, that way they would make more money per copy and I don't have to be like "arrg, home edition" when ever i run into a problem thats easy to fix in pro but not in home when i run into them at peoples houses) on every computer I build if i want to run windows on it is rediculose given the operating systems problems.

How do you like my rant so far? ^^

I personaly think all the points I have read so far mentioned are are quite valid, how ever, alot of them are more Google type things to do, reducing the price on software?! Who ever herd of such non sence.