So...WHY DO YOU HATE MICROSOFT !?

[gxsaurav]

woops, sorry, deleting it

 

[aryayush]

Umm... what had you posted?

 

[tarey_g]

The only thing I lack in terms of Vista's out-of-the world requirements is a DirectX 9 based graphics adapter/card.

The dx9 card is not compulsary , u can use vista without dx9 support too . The next gen gui is not forced , u can use vista very well with older cards. Vista gui doesn't just do simple tranparency , it uses the effects like the frosted glass look which uses the 2.0 shaders, and many things which i have no idea of , maybe some 3d artist in the forum will be able to tell. This opens a whole new playground for the skin and theme makers ,and i am sure how awesome results are the wincustomize ppl and community gonna produce with vista.

 

[Ethan_Hunt]

Isn't Vista supposed to be backward compatible via DX9.0L update for older machines?

Personally I have no qualms with this company or it's products as such.In fact it's the only OS which I have tried out in my entire Computing life cycle.Never gave a hand at Linux but since people have begun to tag Ubuntu as a more friendly version will see if it is worth the reviews it has got.Until then XP is a standard.

 

[gxsaurav]

DirectX9L

DirectX 10 will run DirectX 9 apps in software mode, as it is not compatible directly with DirectX 9, however those running a DirectX 9 graphics card with vista will be running DirectX 9L which is basically a layer between DX10 & DX9 on DX9 Hardware

U will loose at max (according to MS) 5% performance in thos mode, it won't affect that hard, so it is hardly anything to worry about

With Vista, the Whole UI is a 3d layer, anything is possible. This same is done with MacOS X Quartz & Linux XGL

 

[aryayush]

Given the speed at which Microsoft's operating systems run, it does sound like something to worry about if it will be further reduced by 5%.
However, if you do not have a decent machine with at least a mid-range graphics card and 1GB of RAM, do not upgrade to Vista. It offers little beyond the obvious eye candy. The live search is cool, but Google Desktop Search does a better job and is faster. It is not as well integrated with the system though.
If you do not have the hardware muscle for Vista, just install Google Desktop and Windows Media Player 11 and you have almost all the new functionality in Vista.

 

[abhishekkulkarni]

This same is done with MacOS X Quartz & Linux XGL

Hmm , interesting ..

Am going off the topic here , but is Linux XGL the base for Mandriva 2007 ?

Just read a few moments ago that Mandriva 2007 has a 3D desktop environment called 3D Cube , analogous to Vista's 3D flip ..

 

[Yamaraj]

If you do not have the hardware muscle for Vista, just install Google Desktop and Windows Media Player 11 and you have almost all the new functionality in Vista.

Yeah, right! Just like installing an Aqua theme on XP to have all new features of OSX.

I hope you weren't serious. Vista has a completely rewritten networking and audio stack, improved I/O, scheduling and memory management. It also has improved threading, Windows Installer 4.0, system restore, speech recognition, scripting and font support. Not to mention the new shell, search facility, IIS7, DX10, new firewall with IPv6 support, user-mode (ring3) drivers, virtualization, NX support, SMB 2.0, stack and head overflow detection and prevention, new apps and games.[*]

Good luck having these new/improved features on WinXP with a couple addons installed.

[*] - *en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windows_Vista

 

[rollcage]

for --- BSOD

 

[escape7]

I am neutral towards them.
P.S. : To people who crib, if u don't like it don't use it ~simple~

 

[aryayush]

I hope you weren't serious. Vista has a completely rewritten networking and audio stack, improved I/O, scheduling and memory management. It also has improved threading, Windows Installer 4.0, system restore, speech recognition, scripting and font support. Not to mention the new shell, search facility, IIS7, DX10, new firewall with IPv6 support, user-mode (ring3) drivers, virtualization, NX support, SMB 2.0, stack and head overflow detection and prevention, new apps and games.[*]

Good luck having these new/improved features on WinXP with a couple addons installed.

I am sure you must have used the first release candidate of Vista Ultimate? I have so I do know what features are new and what aren't.
After you install Vista, the first thing you will notice is of course the improved GUI and Live Search. Then you will notice Windows Media Player 11 (if you haven't already used it on Windows XP), Photo Gallery, Internet Explorer 7, Mail, CD/DVD burner and the new games (and new look of the older ones). In this whole list, only the Photo Gallery seems worth updating. You can get WMP and IE for XP also, though why someone would want to use IE is beyond me. Windows Mail is just a rechristened and stripped down version of Outlook Express and I would prefer Outlook Express any day. What was the need to remove the calendar and task scheduling features? Just so that you get customers to pay for Micrsoft Office? And I bet you won't be using the included CD/DVD burner quite that often, there are much better options out there. And don't get me started on the new games. Have you seen them? Okay, the face-lifted versions of the older games look quite good but the new games are just so crap. Make a cake? Even my little sister got bored of it.
These were the new apps. And the new features include a re-designed Control Panel. I don't know who is coming up with the ideas for the design of the Control Panel, but that guy seiously needs to take a lesson or two about interface design. Thank God there is the feature of being able to search the Control Panel, otherwise you could end up wasting a few minutes everytime you want to find some control.
Other than that, there is the Live Icon feature which is not applicable for your documents, pictures, videos or music - the folders it would have been most useful for. And even for folders that it does apply to, it only shows two previews. I found it serves no other purpose than merely being eye candy.
And do you like the extremely obtrusive UAC restrictions? I am sure that if they haven't improved it in the final version, many users are going to permanently turn them off, resulting in an even more insecure system than Windows XP - because they will tend to have a false sense of security.
And why doesn't 'Connect to' directly show you your connections in the start menu like they used to in XP? Why do have to go to the additional trouble of staring at a windows, selecting the desired connection and then hitting 'Connect'? And if there is only one connection, why isn't it selected by default so that you can just hit return as soon as the window opens?
Why can't we select a default view for all our folders? The default view is 'List view' in most folder and if you want to take advantage of Vista's high resolution scalable icons, you have to open every folder and manually do so. Why can't Microsoft simply add an option to do some setting for all folders at once? Why can't MS be intutive in at least some of the things it does!

As for the features you mentioned, such as 'a completely rewritten networking and audio stack, improved I/O, scheduling and memory management. It also has improved threading, Windows Installer 4.0, system restore, speech recognition, scripting and font support. Not to mention the new shell, search facility, IIS7, DX10, new firewall with IPv6 support, user-mode (ring3) drivers, virtualization, NX support, SMB 2.0, stack and head overflow detection and prevention' - all of these are changes to the back-end that MS has done and we have to take their word for it. It's great that they have done all these things to improve their software and that it has made Vista quite stable (yes, it is much more stable than previous versions of Windows), but you do not notice them in general usage.
And anyway, I am nor implying that Vista is not worth upgrading to or any such thing. I am always in favour of having the latest and greatest, which is why I tried the RC1 release the day after it was made publicly available for downloaded - even though I am not a Windows user. I was just saying that if you do not have the moolah to upgrade youtr hardware to include a semi-decent graphics card and 1GB of RAM, using XP will be a much better option than struggling with Vista. I used the word struggling because I installed Vista on my PC which has 2.66GHz Intel (single core) processor, 512 MB of DDR 400 RAM and an XFX GeForce 6600GT 256MB graphics card, and it was dreadfully slow.

 

[gxsaurav]

I am sure you must have used the first release candidate of Vista Ultimate? I have so I do know what features are new and what aren't.

If U know what features are new in vista other then just the applications, u wouldn't be saying this

Windows Mail is just a rechristened and stripped down version of Outlook Express and I would prefer Outlook Express any day. What was the need to remove the calendar and task scheduling features?

Have u ever used Outlook 2003? The features u are telling about were never in Outlook Express, calender & task scheduling were never in outlook express, they were only in Outlook. Windows Mail is a modified version of Outlook not stripped down, better not use a vista....when u don't know how to find "Whats new"

And I bet you won't be using the included CD/DVD burner quite that often, there are much better options out there.

Customar is always free to install whatever application they want. People whine when a feature is not included, they again whine when a feature is included

And the new features include a re-designed Control Panel. I don't know who is coming up with the ideas for the design of the Control Panel, but that guy seiously needs to take a lesson or two about interface design. Thank God there is the feature of being able to search the Control Panel, otherwise you could end up wasting a few minutes everytime you want to find some control.

Look again, the options are given in catogaries, that is how it is made

Other than that, there is the Live Icon feature which is not applicable for your documents, pictures, videos or music - the folders it would have been most useful for.

Live Folders, update themselves on the fly, don't understand what u r talking about?

And do you like the extremely obtrusive UAC restrictions? I am sure that if they haven't improved it in the final version, many users are going to permanently turn them off, resulting in an even more insecure system than Windows XP - because they will tend to have a false sense of security.

It's upto the user to decide, emabling UAC is better anyway for noobs, for power users who knows how to use the OS, they won't need UAC

And why doesn't 'Connect to' directly show you your connections in the start menu like they used to in XP? Why do have to go to the additional trouble of staring at a windows, selecting the desired connection and then hitting 'Connect'? And if there is only one connection, why isn't it selected by default so that you can just hit return as soon as the window opens?

Something i filed as a bug, i agree with u

Why can't we select a default view for all our folders? The default view is 'List view' in most folder and if you want to take advantage of Vista's high resolution scalable icons, you have to open every folder and manually do so. Why can't Microsoft simply add an option to do some setting for all folders at once? Why can't MS be intutive in at least some of the things it does!

Just set a folder, the way u want it to look like, now go to tools->folder option ->View tab-> Apply to all folders

Now all the folders everywhere look just the same

As for the features you mentioned, such as 'a completely rewritten networking and audio stack, improved I/O, scheduling and memory management. It also has improved threading, Windows Installer 4.0, system restore, speech recognition, scripting and font support. Not to mention the new shell, search facility, IIS7, DX10, new firewall with IPv6 support, user-mode (ring3) drivers, virtualization, NX support, SMB 2.0, stack and head overflow detection and prevention' - all of these are changes to the back-end that MS has done and we have to take their word for it. It's great that they have done all these things to improve their software and that it has made Vista quite stable (yes, it is much more stable than previous versions of Windows), but you do not notice them in general usage.

Does it matters, there are many things running in all the OS , behind the curtains, it does matters but is transparent to the user

 

[tarey_g]

^^ agreed with gx.

 

[Kiran.dks]

@aryayush..

I think you have NOT studied Vista properly. Most of the quotes you made doesn't make sense because it is not true. gxsaurav pointed out all the flaws in your review.

But still I see many advantages which you just never discussed! Why didn't u review advantages? Finding flaws is easier, but except few, all were not at all justified. Rather than simple GUI features which you pointed out, there are several other aspects in Vista.

Here it is.....!

1. There are many security based features that are implemented in Vista. One among those being security change w.r.t users. User Account Control and users now run in a 'protected' mode. Any system change like that of malware intrusion prompts you with a warning from Windows Security that needs user approval.

2. One more important security update being that of firewall. Unlike Windows XP, which is a One-way inbound firewall, Vista's firewall is a two-way firewall means protection from both inbound and outbound traffic.

3. Third security enhancement includes BitLocker drive encryption. One can apply group policy settings using User Account Control that prevent data transfers to removable devices like flash drives and CD's.

 

[ray|raven]

It is said that Vista doesnt start installation unless it has 15gigs of free hard disk space.
If someone could tell me the sudden increase of space requirements over its predecessor which took atmost 2gigs means that vista has somany new features?

all i can say is that an OS that installs 15gigs of files is either badly coded or rarely uses any of those files.

 

[mediator]

^^ Vista uses DX9 and high end graphics. So 15 gigs may mean large number of high quality image and video files. I dunno much about VISTA but it may have some large number of applications too just like Linuxes have. Bad coding is also a reason though as u said, I've also heard from some sources that MS C++ compilers generate some unnecessary code leading to large output files. Dunno how true it is.

Neways VISTA delay is good for me. Most of mah friends upgraded their PC's to latest duo cores. Huh now quad cores will be the trend n I'll be showing them off. Just have to wait for prices to fall and VISTA isn't out yet !!

 

[ray|raven]

@mediator
Vista comes with the highly awaited DX10 also known as Windows Graphics Foundation.
the release candidates and beta versions contain a modified version of DX9 to produce the 'Aero' effect.

 

[aryayush]

Have u ever used Outlook 2003? The features u are telling about were never in Outlook Express, calender & task scheduling were never in outlook express, they were only in Outlook. Windows Mail is a modified version of Outlook not stripped down, better not use a vista....when u don't know how to find "Whats new"

Oh, my bad! You are right and I made a mistake here. And rest assured, I won't be using Vista.

Customar is always free to install whatever application they want. People whine when a feature is not included, they again whine when a feature is included

No one is whining about including a software for burning CDs and DVDs. I am merely saying that you are likely to use Nero or Roxio anyway, so XP will suffice for the job too.

Look again, the options are given in catogaries, that is how it is made

I find this amazing that you did not find the new Control Panel messy and wrongly designed. There are two-three options that open up the same dialog box. Instead of one 'Mouse' button, there are three links which open up the same dialog box. And the grouping is also wrong is many cases. If I want to change the settings for 'Windows Slideshow', the last place I would look for is 'Hardware and Sound'. And a search for slideshow does not yield any results either. User Account Control is clearly supposed to be a security feature, right? Then why doesn't the security tab in the control panel have the option of turning it on or off? You have to go to user accounts, select a user and then turn it off. I had to use Windows help to find it and I don't think anyone would think of looking for it there. They have just taken the control panel from Windows 98 and made almost everything a two-or-three click affair from the one-click job it previously was - and that is never a sign of good interface design. Maybe you like it but I haven't met many people who do.

Live Folders, update themselves on the fly, don't understand what u r talking about?

I was talking about Live Icons. These icons show a live preview of what is inside the folder.

It's upto the user to decide, emabling UAC is better anyway for noobs, for power users who knows how to use the OS, they won't need UAC

Oh, is it? Then why does the OS keep sending me periodic reminders that my computer is not safe because the UAC controls are turned off? Why is it so deeply hidden into the settings? Even in standard procedure (when you know where the control is), it takes six clicks and a restart to turn it off. Why do we need to restart the whole system!

Just set a folder, the way u want it to look like, now go to tools->folder option ->View tab-> Apply to all folders

Now all the folders everywhere look just the same

OK. Thanks for the info! I had asked it on Vista's official chat room and no one seemed to know how to do it. But I still find this implementation a bit funny. I mean you first set the view for one folder and then go to folder view options, which in itself takes three clicks, and then select apply to all folders. It is not the most obvious thing one would do. The options for setting the view of one folder and then applying it to all must be in the same dialog. Something like this:

*www.tachypic.com/thumb/2733.jpeg

 

[gxsaurav]

I find this amazing that you did not find the new Control Panel messy and wrongly designed. There are two-three options that open up the same dialog box. Instead of one ...............

Ok this would be a personal choice, so better leave this

I was talking about Live Icons. These icons show a live preview of what is inside the folder.

Wait a sec, live folders do show it, what happened to your Vista installation? In my case, Vista RC1 does shows thumbnails of what’s inside a folder, although I disabled this feature as I don't like it

Oh, is it? Then why does the OS keep sending me periodic reminders that my computer is not safe because the UAC controls are turned off? Why is it so deeply hidden into the settings? Even in standard procedure (when you know where the control is), it takes six clicks and a restart to turn it off. Why do we need to restart the whole system!

Well, yeah....this is how u do it I guess. Even in other OS security features are hard to shut down, just cos they are supposed to be turned on. Security centre informs u that UAC is disabled, cos this is its job, it's supposed to tell u, if your system lacks something in security...in this case disabling UAC does means reducing the security. Like is said, Power users will disable both UAC & security centre, but vista is supposed to be for all of the users out there even those with less knowledge of computer OS or new users

I mean you first set the view for one folder and then go to folder view options, which in itself takes three clicks, and then select apply to all folders. It is not the most obvious thing one would do. The options for setting the view of one folder and then applying it to all must be in the same dialog. Something like this:

This depends from OS to OS, in Windows u have the option to customize the folder individually or all at one go, it's in Folder options. The image u posted below is the same implementation but in Mac, I don't find anything funny here with any of these OS, don't know about U. All windows users know where this option is...it's even in the control panel of Vista

 

[aryayush]

Well, yeah....this is how u do it I guess. Security centre informs u that UAC is disabled, cos this is its job, it's supposed to tell u, if your system lacks something in security...in this case disabling UAC does means reducing the security. Like is said, Power users will disable both UAC & security centre, but vista is supposed to be for all of the users out there even those with less knowledge of computer OS or new users

OK, so basically, if UAC is turned on, it will bug me everytime I want to install some software, download a file, run any executable, change the time, or whenever it feels like popping up and saying hello. And if it is turned off, it will still bug me every half an hour or so, begging me to turn it on. The whole world knows that UAC is the biggest mis-iplemented security feature in Vista and I can give you links to various reviews if you want me to. I am not saying that it cannot be improved in the final version, it most probably will. But at present, i.e. in the release candidate 2, it is very intrusive.

Even in other OS security features are hard to shut down, just cos they are supposed to be turned on.

I do not wish to start an OS vs. OS debate here but I am just showing you this screenshot because you mentioned 'other OS':

*www.tachypic.com/thumb/2742.jpeg

You need to check/uncheck 'Require password to unlock each secure system preference' to enable/disable security akin to UAC on Vista - and it needs just three clicks and no restart from the desktop to do so.