vista or no vista[?]

colm · Post by **colm** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 1:08 pm

I do admit I take my time. I forgot when I purchased xp. what year was it...

Anyway, babblers aside, I forced myself in great mind stressing pain to sift through happy go lucky purty desktop seeking bloggers without a fact to see if it is time for me to evolve.To find a crazy thing called "facts" about vista.

I am disappointed with a few things xp, and do know I have a dx10 vid card. Since the dawn of directy x upgrades, I have yet to conclude why even tech gurus claim it is for gamers only. Bizarre.every dx upgrade is a miracle for me and video anything. Anyway, that is the first plus to add to a reason to buy vista.

The second fact is upon install,I read that there is something in the core of the vista system that knows to determine your pc actual perfomance. If anyone hasn't noticed: Xp does the same exact things on all systems...WHY?
The question unanswered is: Does vista know I have an "old" giant sitting here waiting to actually work rather than gain a world record in longevity?
I am eyeing vista premium full with sp1. I need a pros advice, the best of bloggers make me vomit. Facts, anybody have them...Not a sales pitch, not a : "oh it looks purty" I need the hard facts.
My system is way over the minumum requirements, I won't even mention what it is. The dx10 has me itchy to make a big os change, and I need a yay or nay from a silent building pro. If I need to mention specifics of my pc, you do not get the point of my own integrity.

Matija · Post by **Matija** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 1:39 pm

No Vista.

edh · Post by **edh** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 2:15 pm

No Vista. What exactly does it accomplish that Windows 2000 couldn't?

It's such a large change from 2k/XP with little gained that a shift to Linux would be a much better idea.

Matija · Post by **Matija** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 2:19 pm

Unless he's a masochist - no Linux, either

plympton · Post by **plympton** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 2:29 pm

You haven't said what you want it for, so I doubt anyone can give you good advice.

For me, Vista was more stable for my HTPC, and I thought it would have a ecosystem of HTPC add-ons (false). Vista Media Center is a real PITA to configure and tweak, even worse than MCE 2005. For an HTPC, it's marginally better, though kinda required for OTA HDTV at this point.

IE 7 blows. The new UI sucks. I don't see any of the "pretty" stuff - what's all the hooplah about Aero? Getting remote desktop requires ultimate, and VNC marginally works. A lot of the tweaking utilities still haven't made it to Vista yet - anything that touches low-level has had a tough time getting ported.

Wait for Windows 7 at this point - not worth going to Vista right now, unless (as it sounds) you just want a project to tinker with.

-Dan

ddrj · Post by **ddrj** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 2:48 pm

I love my vista, but if I were you, I would save my money and wait till Windows 7 comes out, which supposedly is more stable than xp or vista even in it's beta!

http://arstechnica.com/journals/microso ... sta-and-xp

danielG · Post by **danielG** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 3:49 pm

Vista is better than XP. Vista is a lot more stable and less vulnerable to virii. Vista also seems not to suffer from bit-rot like XP does. However, it is a bit slower than XP and Aero is a terrible user interface, making Vista seem slower than it is. Setting the UI to Windows Classic makes Vista feel snapier.

Truth is, Vista reminds me of my Windows 95 days. There is always something that never works the way you want it to. Vista doesn't feel finished.

I'd wait and buy Windows 7 instead. From the beta impressions I've been reading, it should be better than both Vista and XP. Windows 7 should come out this year.

evermooingcow · Post by **evermooingcow** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 4:30 pm

Windows 7 is sounding like it will be one of Microsoft's better products. "Faster and more stable" was something unheard of for Vista during its beta stage.

Greg F. · Post by **Greg F.** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 5:19 pm

Vista has worked better for me than XP.

hybrid2d4x4 · Post by **hybrid2d4x4** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 6:34 pm

plympton wrote:You haven't said what you want it for, so I doubt anyone can give you good advice.

I couldn't agree more.
Also, Microsoft's idea of "minimum requirements" are completely useless (to be fair, so are almost everyone else's). XP's requirements are 233Mhz CPU and 128MB RAM, but you won't tolerate, let alone enjoy your experience on such a machine. Unless you built your machine fairly recently with "current gen" parts, your specs are very relevant to what kind of experience you can expect.

As others have said, Windows 7's beta is out ("accidentally"), so there will probably be a Release Candidate in the next few months. For your average user, there's nothing really wrong with vista, but 7 deserves more of your attention.

speedkar9 · Post by **speedkar9** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 6:57 pm

colm wrote: I am disappointed with a few things xp, and do know I have a dx10 vid card. Since the dawn of directy x upgrades, I have yet to conclude why even tech gurus claim it is for gamers only. Bizarre.every dx upgrade is a miracle for me and video anything. Anyway, that is the first plus to add to a reason to buy vista.

....The dx10 has me itchy to make a big os change, and I need a yay or nay from a silent building pro.

Switching to Vista just for DX10 is useless. Not much games properly support DX10, and most effects make games run a bit slower.

For me, I've been running Vista since it came out, and it has worked well for the basic web browsing, drafting, and occasional games. I have to say it feels much stabler and faster than XP on my machine. I use Vlite to take care of the bloat however.

xan_user · Post by **xan_user** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 6:58 pm

Stick with XP for now, and see what Win7 brings to the table. Don't buy into the fast paced new OS cycle, only we as consumers can break that ugly trend. (5 year minimum on "new" OS releases please!)

There are some nice mods you can do to xp and make it more 'purdy if thats all you need.

Dont forget to account for how much you might need to spend on upgrading other software and hardware to work with flashy Mojave, 'er I mean Vista...No was it longhorn?...

josephclemente · Post by **josephclemente** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 7:13 pm

If the system is way over the minimum requirements, does that mean you are running well over 3 gigabytes of RAM? If so, I'd say get Vista 64 bit.

danielG · Post by **danielG** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 2:57 am

hybrid2d4x4 wrote:(...) Also, Microsoft's idea of "minimum requirements" are completely useless (to be fair, so are almost everyone else's). XP's requirements are 233Mhz CPU and 128MB RAM, but you won't tolerate, let alone enjoy your experience on such a machine. (...)

[offtopic]
One of my father's PCs is a Pentium II 233 MHz with 160 Mb of SDRAM. I've installed XP on it a few months ago and I must say it runs rather well. I certainly wasn't expecting it to do so.

Unfortunately, what does not run well is a modern anti-virus. Grinds the system to a halt. But it couldn't run modern anti-virus in Windows 98 either.
[/offtopic]

ACook · Post by **ACook** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 4:57 am

which AV have you tried?

Norton/Symantec can bring any system to its knees...

and I recently switched from AVG to Avast, cause since v8 AVG has gotten less snappy.

Nick Geraedts · Post by **Nick Geraedts** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 8:29 am

danielG wrote:One of my father's PCs is a Pentium II 233 MHz with 160 Mb of SDRAM. I've installed XP on it a few months ago and I must say it runs rather well. I certainly wasn't expecting it to do so.

What's your definition of "rather well"? If it's rather well considering the system specs, then fine. If it's rather well in that it can handle simultaneous web browsing and email reading, then I'm impressed.

Back to the original topic - I'd recommend Vista. There are several key changes under the hood that improve performance on modern systems (believe it or not) and security. I'm using it on all of my personal use PCs (except netbook - doesn't have the graphics "oomph" needed) and I haven't had any serious issues with it yet.

danielG · Post by **danielG** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 10:40 am

Nick Geraedts wrote:What's your definition of "rather well"? If it's rather well considering the system specs, then fine. If it's rather well in that it can handle simultaneous web browsing and email reading, then I'm impressed

"Rather well" means that PC is just as usable with XP as it was with Windows 98. Not as snappy, but you can have AutoCAD R14, Word 97 and Firefox open at the same time without slowdown. However, if you open three or more webpages simultanously, it gets slow.

@ACook: I tried Avast, AVG and Bit Defender. The most usable was AVG, version 8. But all made the PC have a 5 minute boot time, so it's running without any AV.

xan_user · Post by **xan_user** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 10:40 am

Why not try the "leaked" beta of win7...?

and give us a review...

m^2 · Post by **m^2** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 10:58 am

Beta versions are meant for testing, not for using. Using betas is asking for troubles and in case of OS you can screw a lot.

sjoukew · Post by **sjoukew** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 11:03 am

My windows Vista runs faster than my windows xp (dual boot), vista never crashes, always works,is 64 bit

. So for me it is Vista

But I wouldn't buy Vista now, if you are going to buy, I would wait for windows 7.

protellect · Post by **protellect** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 11:06 am

I really like xp 64 bit

never crashes, either. 8GB of Memory <3

Riffer · Post by **Riffer** » Mon Jan 05, 2009 11:52 am

ACook wrote:which AV have you tried?

Norton/Symantec can bring any system to its knees...

and I recently switched from AVG to Avast, cause since v8 AVG has gotten less snappy.

Noton 2009 has been completely rewritten and is really fast. I couldn't beleive it when I did the upgrade. You can also turn on silent mode for a temporary performance boost (e.g. Gaming).

I do agree that AVG is a dog. I had it on a Vista install and it was brutal.

vista or no vista[?]

vista or no vista[?]

What do you want it for??

Re: What do you want it for??

Re: vista or no vista

Re: What do you want it for??

Re: What do you want it for??

Re: What do you want it for??