We <3 Windows

Actually Im more concerned about Microsoft trying to make up for Vista with Windows 7. So much that most computers you buy now come with it free when it comes out in October. [/Vista Hatred]

Windows 7 is awesome, I don't care what anyone says.

99% of Vista problems are PEBCAK related. The other 1% are 64 bit driver issues.

Krispavera said:

Windows 7 is awesome, I don't care what anyone says.

WHO'S YOUR SOURCE!? [citation needed]

Hopefully it's gonna be more like XP. I didnt do too much research on it as of yet.

Download it, the RC is free. So far it's blazing fast (in comparison to XP and especially Vista). Honestly, I'm not real technical when it comes to operating systems, so I don't nitpick, but everything about it has satisfied me completely so far.

Nomad said:

99% of Vista problems are PEBCAK related.

I'm pretty sure the problem of wasting 10Gb to install just the base OS is not anything to do with me.

superjamie@desktop:~$ df -h
Filesystem            Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda3              20G  3.6G   16G  19% /

And that's with every app I use, a bunch of dev libraries and probably a heap of shit I installed, launched once and never used again.

Nomad said:
99% of Vista problems are PEBCAK related.

Translation: 99% of Vista users are stupid. (Which makes sense; the smart people stuck with XP and will wait for Win7...)

Krispavera said:

Download it, the RC is free. So far it's blazing fast (in comparison to XP and especially Vista). Honestly, I'm not real technical when it comes to operating systems, so I don't nitpick, but everything about it has satisfied me completely so far.

Huh? Download what? I'm pretty sure it hasn't been released yet. Do you have a link to what you're talking about?

Bear in mind that Chrome OS is completely separate to Android.

You can still download the Release Candidate: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/

MikeRS said:

You can still download the Release Candidate: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/

Ah, okay. I thought Krispavera was referring to Chrome OS.

Nomad said:

99% of Vista problems are PEBCAK related. The other 1% are 64 bit driver issues.

The life cycle of a Vista user:

vista is so bad man its so bad man why i gotta use vista


Hey, this isn't so bad. I guess people just thought it was "cool" to bash Vista.


I hate this.

If you've got the machine to run Vista efficiently it is stupid not to. The only people still bitching about it are the people who have had the same computer since 2002. Running XP on brand new hardware is like putting regular gasoline in a Lamborghini.

Windows 7 is not the messiah either, I hate to tell you guys. As much as they've fixed from Vista, they're breaking everything that Vista did well. Everyone always bitches about UAC, but it's the only thing keeping grandma from deleting her sys32 folder because some email told her it was a virus. The only real benefit I can see from Win7 is the better memory efficiency. But with 4+ gigs of RAM it doesn't make much difference anyway.

What I can't believe is that they're still going to be offering Windows 7 in 32 bit flavours. Who in their right mind would be putting Windows 7 on a 32 bit system?! If you're still using a 32 and you want the latest OS, it's really time for you to admit it's time to upgrade.

Let grandma have her system32 safeguard, but don't make me have to run Notepad as an Administrator just to change a cfg in my Program Files folder.

Nomad said:

Everyone always bitches about UAC, but it's the only thing keeping grandma from deleting her sys32 folder because some email told her it was a virus.

Playing with the fabric of space but aiding little old ladies? What is those corporate bastard's mission?

The big reason why I haven't gone 64 bit -- 16 bit applications. I HATE having to use them these days but there are several applications I use a lot that are 16 bit, which either don't have their source released or better altneratives. Running them from within a VM also is very annoying.

Nomad said:

If you've got the machine to run Vista efficiently it is stupid not to. The only people still bitching about it are the people who have had the same computer since 2002. Running XP on brand new hardware is like putting regular gasoline in a Lamborghini.

Frankly, the only problem I have with Vista is the occasional "Do you trust this program?" stuff. I have a fast computer, and Vista has been an obedient servant so far. It's not as slow as people say it is, and if they do say it it's because, like you said, they're probably using slow hardware.

Abyssalstudios1 said:

Frankly, the only problem I have with Vista is the CONSTANT "Do you trust this program?" stuff. I have a fast computer, and Vista has been a PATRONISING servant so far. It's not as slow as people say it is, and if they do say it it's because, like you said, they're probably using slow hardware.

Fix'd

My parents got a new computer with Vista, i tried it and was very very glad i bought a new laptop just before Vista was released.

Said laptop is now on its way out, the fan is constantly going at high speed and it has patches of lag and freezing. I'm very glad it's due to die just as Windows 7 is coming out.


...er, and the point of the rant was it wasn't Vista's slowness that annoyed me so much as it's constant patronisation and irritating "security". I know nothing about computers but even i know that openoffice is not "MAYBE A VIRUS!!11". Also Vista's task manager is launched from a computer-freezing blue screen. Yep, they've turned what was a bug in Windows 98 into a feature of Vista!

deathbringer said:

Also Vista's task manager is launched from a computer-freezing blue screen.

Ctrl-Shift-Esc

Nomad said:

If you've got the machine to run Vista efficiently it is stupid not to. The only people still bitching about it are the people who have had the same computer since 2002.

Lemme see.... is Intel Wireless 3945abg's inability to reliably connect to WPA encrypted routers under Vista but working fine under XP/Linux enough of a reason to install XP on a new Dell Laptop?

If you doubt it, just google it. You'll see it's a problem which has never been entirely solved). And surely there will be others of this kind, too.

The 3000+ gain in 3DMark03 after the "downgrade" to XP was very welcome, too ;-) (Nvidia 8600M GT with 256 MB on board)

As far as I can see, Vista's best aspiration is having _at most_ as many problems as XP, and being able to _at most_ match XP's performance in everyday tasks. It was even declared as "Worst Windows OS for notebooks" in a PC Magazine test, when compared with 7 and XP" ;-)

Nomad said:

64-bit OSes are t3h p4wn 4nd t3h h4x, j00 fux0rz us3 th3m 0r 1 \/\/1|| r43p j00r @$$ w1f @ r@z0r d1ld0!!111!11

Meh. Desktop fully 64-bit CPUs have been around for quite a time, and I'd be all for 64-bit OSes if it wasn't for inferior driver support under windows (yeah, even today, and this is valid throughout all the current 64-bit flavors of windoze) and tons of problems at compile-time with Linux, which relies on source distribution and where using/mixing precompiled binaries is in general a big no-no. Like it or not there's still life for 32-bit OSes. Not a good thing per-se, but it's a de facto situation.

Maes said:

Dell Laptop

There's your problem right there

Nomad said:

There's your problem right there

What are you talking about? The Intel Wireless problem is acknowledged and cross-manufacturer. Even if I bought a [insertyourfavouritemanufacturerhere] that wouldn't change a thing, because Intel has pretty much lowered their pants and bent over to MS on this one and there's only one driver to use, equally buggy for everyone. Stupid Vista won't even allow you to use Intel's wireless manager to overcome the stupid WPA lockout (works like a charm in XP).

Every DX9 application performs better under XP compared to Vista, that's a well known fact.

And, to be honest, you're the first person I've ever seen sustaining that Vista's problems are pretty much all fictional or exclusively user-related.

Nomad said:

If you've got the machine to run Vista efficiently it is stupid not to.

So by this reasoning, if I have the horsepower and gas to spare, it's stupid not to keep my car laden with heavy manure bags and dragging a plank with a boulder on it all the time ;-)

Maes said:

Meh. Desktop fully 64-bit CPUs have been around for quite a time, and I'd be all for 64-bit OSes if it wasn't for inferior driver support under windows (yeah, even today, and this is valid throughout all the current 64-bit flavors of windoze) and tons of problems at compile-time with Linux, which relies on source distribution and where using/mixing precompiled binaries is in general a big no-no. Like it or not there's still life for 32-bit OSes. Not a good thing per-se, but it's a de facto situation.

I'm not saying 64-bit is LOLERSKATESUBERBEST. How many 32 bit processors have been made in the last couple years? How many 32-bit systems do you think Windows 7 Basic is going to be installed on by Dell, HP, Gateway, whatever? It's like selling people cars capable of 100mph with engine governors that don't let them go over 40mph.

Maes said:

What are you talking about?

Obvious troll was not so obvious.

Maes said:

Every DX9 application performs better under XP compared to Vista, that's a well known fact.

Do you have evidence to support this outlandish claim?

Look, I'm not saying that Vista is the end all, be all OS. I just don't understand why so many people bash it with minimal experience with it. Most of the people I've heard bitching about it have only really used it pre-SP1 for maybe a few days before they ragequit and installed XP.

Nomad said:

There's your problem right there

HURR DURR

I did Dell warranty work for over a year, as well as doing contract repairs for several other manufacturers. I've also dealt with corporate-purchase volumes of Dells as a system administrator. Dells are the most reliable and well-made laptops I've had the pleasure to work on, I buy them myself and wouldn't consider many others.

Unless you have years of real-world professional experience to rival mine back up your claims, please kindly stop spreading your trollish FUD and stfu.

It's called sarcasm. Look it up!

Nomad said:

It's like selling people cars with engine governors that don't let them go over 40mph.

Not quite a good paragon, it's more like selling people any technology that will eventually dominate the future, but is currently transitory and awkward, especially compared with something that works just fine, and offers no obvious direct advantages, yet. More like the transition from leaded to unleaded fuel: sure, cities got cleaner over time but the first unleaded cars were underpowered POS that sucked ass.

Nomad said:

PUSHED THE TROLL BUTTON

Careful with that one, mate.

Nomad said:

Do you have evidence to support this outlandish [edit: HAW HAW! -Maes] claim?

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2096943,00.asp

And that's just for starters. Trust me, you don't want the be the one having to prove that he's not an elephant in this matter, but it seems you just did. Good luck reversing that, heh.

Seriously, I never -ever- heard anyone seriously claiming that Vista can outperform XP in gaming, especially in existing DX9 and OpenGL titles. Maybe in DX10-only titles (how convenient, they can't be even compared on equal terms). This doesn't mean it has to have dismal performance, just that it will always lag a couple of steps behind, no matter how well you tune it.

Nomad said:

Most of the people I've heard bitching about it have only really used it pre-SP1 for maybe a few days before they ragequit and installed XP.

I kept it for exactly one day after I verified that the wireless issue wasn't going away anytime soon, which is a bane because I happened to need wireless and WPA.

I personally could have overlooked the (noticeably) lower 3DMark scores and happily had avoided the whole repartitioning and installation procedure, since it appeared to be working just fine for what I needed it for (coding, image processing, number crunching, occasional gaming and entertainment), but that one thing about the wireless was unacceptable for me. And it was SP1 out of the box. If anything, I regret the 60 Eur burden the OEM Home Premium version places on the final price of pretty much any new computer you try to buy nowadays.

Suuure, I could have let it on its own partition, install XP on another and let them share the data but there would be no point in having two near-identically functional Windows installation. From my POV, XP would do everything I needed. BTW, I had chosed this Dell laptop exactly because the manufacturer offered complete support for XP too (while, e.g. HP didn't on a similarly specced model).

Maes said:

Not quite a good paragon, it's more like selling people any technology that will eventually dominate the future, but is currently transitory and awkward, especially compared with something that works just fine, and offers no obvious direct advantages, yet. More like the transition from leaded to unleaded fuel: sure, cities got cleaner over time but the first unleaded cars were underpowered POS that sucked ass.

I don't see what you're saying here. The fact is: the likelihood of Windows 7 being used on a system 32-bit architecture is slim to none. The lower SKUs of Windows 7 being only in 32-bit flavors robs the end user of being able to use their computer to its full potential, however low end the machine might be.

Maes said:

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2096943,00.asp

And that's just for starters. Trust me, you don't want the be the one having to prove that he's not an elephant in this matter, but it seems you just did. Good luck reversing that, heh.

You're acting like the difference is SOOO MUCH. I did ask for a source, but also (and now I feel stupid for it) the "Do you have evidence to support this outlandish claim" is a meme from another forum that in my haste I didn't realize it wouldn't be obviously facetious. :P

Maes said
Seriously, I never -ever- heard anyone seriously claiming that Vista can outperform XP in gaming, especially in existing DX9 and OpenGL titles. Maybe in DX10-only titles (how convenient, they can't be even compared on equal terms). This doesn't mean it has to have dismal performance, just that it will always lag a couple of steps behind, no matter how well you tune it.

I've never claimed that Vista isn't a resource hog. Nor did I claim that Vista can outperform anything. In fact I'm not even really defending Vista from a technological standpoint. I'm just saying it's not as bad as everyone says, and I just don't understand why everyone gives it so much shit.

Nomad said:

I don't see what you're saying here.

I was trying to say that Vista is transitory and experimental technology, much more than XP ever was. XP was built upon a solid base (Windows NT), and proved to be the most stable and secure of Windows OSes ever made, despite the oxymoron of associating these terms with MS ;-)

Did Vista bring any actual benefits to its early adopters? IMHO, no: they were the ones with the lousy task of "getting the rattlesnake out of the hole", by the way it sounds.

And what for? So that in the end, even MS apparently turned its back to it and started pimping Windows 7 instead.

Vista pretty much turned out to be what Windows ME was to 98SE in its time, and that's saying a lot. Sure, it paved the way for 7...but I can't believe it actually brought any advantage to the majority of its users. OK, maybe some Xtr3m3 graphics geek will have cummed over a DX10 rendered scene from a tech demo that couldn't be done otherwise, but that's it. For the rest, it was mostly trouble.

Most people will probably jump from XP straight to 7, hoping to find a better XP and a better Vista. Including myself.

Nomad said:

The fact is: the likelihood of Windows 7 being used on a system 32-bit architecture is slim to none.

On the contrary, they will allow Windows 7 to take over even in niches where Vista just couldn't cut it, and getting more people on the "new Windows" bandwagon. As Super Jamie can also confirm, businesses and organizations are far from being a hardware "1337 h4x0r's" wet dream. If you tell them to burn their 32-bit rigs and move on, they will sack you :-p

Nomad said:

The lower SKUs of Windows 7 being only in 32-bit flavors robs the end user of being able to use their computer to its full potential, however low end the machine might be.

OK, once and for all: 64-bit is better than 32-bit in a "Bigger, Stronger and More" is better than "Smaller, Weaker and Less" fashion, no deny there. But software support isn't there yet. To take truly advantage of a 64-bit OS, you also need 64-bit apps, which are still a minority.

They also impose the need on the developers to make a separate version (perhaps with compilation quirks to deal with), which may just not be worth the effort. Plus, certain types of applications that do mostly IO or byte-level processing aren't very likely to benefit just from being 64-bit (e.g. Word processing, copying files, etc.) Sure, anything involving heavy number crunching does benefit from wider instruction sets.

Maes said:

Vista pretty much turned out to be what Windows ME was to 98SE

QFT

Nomad said:
How many 32 bit processors have been made in the last couple years?

Just about every Atom-based netbook has a processor that's 32-bit only...