Question for switchers b/c of Vista hatred...

Can you tell me why Vista is so much worse than XP???

I'm not asking for a comparison to OS X at all. I use XP and have never used Vista, and I'm just wondering why everyone hates Vista so much. Is it because of specialized hardware or software that don't have Vista drivers yet? If so, I'm a pretty basic user, so I'm thinking that shouldn't be too much of a problem for me.

This is what I use:
- MS Office
- Final Draft (screenwriting word processor software)
- iTunes
- Firefox
- iPod
- HP printer

That's about it.

So would I have problems with Vista and find it unbearable compared to XP?

 

Well, there's a lot of things with Vista...mainly, lack of drivers, some games still aren't supported on Vista yet...etc. People mainly dislike Vista because there's nothing wrong with XP. Why should you accommodate around Vista when everything works just fine in XP?

Anyways, I don't think you'll have a problem with Vista, with the peripherals and software you listed. Check with Final Draft to see if it supports Vista yet, and same with the HP printer.

 

thanks for the unbiased answer!

 

I suspect after Vista SP1 is released a lot of people currently in XP will transition to Vista. SP1 will hopefully fix all the major bugs in Vista.

 

I would agree that XP SP2 works for every need I have. I would prolly try to make Vista work for me if I got a notebook with it pre-installed, but it's not my preference. The hardware requirements are pretty extreme, IMO -- and that's a primary violation of what an OS should be. I want my OS to be a platform from which I can launch applications in a user friendly, stable, and fast manner. If my OS sucks up a ton of my resources, I have less left over for what I want to run. Then there's the entire issue of your OS "phoning home to Redmond" incessantly, stealing valuable bandwidth from YOUR apps.

Just my $.02 and not worth much more because come December, Vista looks to be the only OS Microsoft will be selling -- I'd dump my M$ stock if I were you because Apple and Canonical are drooling in the wings for such a catastrophic strategic mistake.

 

Well, yeah, there are a LOT of problems with driver support, and software support with Vista right now. I think a lot of it stems from the fact that many companies spent tons of money on developing drivers and software for the original Vista (longhorn) only to find out, that MS were dumping the new file system and all those companies basically wasted all their money.

And besides, Vista is a hungry OS. You will need more machine to do the same stuff in XP.
Yeah, Vista is okay if you know the software you use is available and all your hardware has drivers for it. But honestly, there is NO real reason to upgrade to Vista. It's prettier and has DX10. Most people I know who use it say it's much less intuitive to use. I'd say stick with XP until SP1 comes out and then see how Vista is.

 

Did you just read my comment in your other thread? LOL

It's hard to articulate why exactly I choose XP over Vista. The main thing to consider is that XP has been around for a while and Microsoft has had time to make it much better than when it was originally released and, of course, it's familiar. People like what they already know.

I don't hate Vista. I just choose to use XP over Vista, for the time being. I think Vista has a lot of really nice features and eventually I'll move to Vista. And really the only reason I use Windows at all is for Gaming and Microsoft Office. When Mac Office 2008 comes out, maybe I'll use that instead of 2007, I don't know yet. There are no issues with Microsoft Office and Vista that I encountered, but gaming in Vista is another story. Vista should handle your needs without incident, and if you learn Vista now, you'll be that much ahead of the learning curve when others finally conform, Peace .

 

thanks. good to know vista should be okay for my needs. too bad it doesn't make my decision any easier, though.

 

Vista is ridiculous. I returned my (very well configured and priced) Dell notebook and am getting a Macbook or Macbook Pro mainly because of it.

There are so many things wrong with Vista but the ones that I can remember off of the top of my head are listed below:

1. I use ColorVision's color calibration tool that loads on startup but Vista would revert back to the default color profile every single time (yes, I did download the Vista version of the software and emailed the company).

2. Even though I had 2 gigs of ram and a 256MB graphics card, the icons within folders would load up in low resolution and then slowly become high res. When running "disk cleanup" I noticed that it actually had a special place where it stored icon images.. XP never had problems loading icons.

3. I installed Nikon's "Camera Control Pro" (for Vista) and it wouldn't run. To get around Vista I would have to go into system registry and try not to screw anything up while looking for a way around the problem.

I got so sick of it. I think that Vista's problems go very deep and won't be fixed until an entirely new OS is developed.
I really liked Windows XP.. never had any problems with it.

 

I had the same problem with the color calibration. I had to make the calibration loader an icon on my desktop that I have to click on after startup to re-initiate the calibration. Minor annoyance, but an annoyance, nonetheless.

Check out the I Love Vistathread over in the Gaming Forum for some more Vista input, it's not all biased, some people are arguing against it.

I use OSX and Vista through BootCamp.

Vista is great, works with all of my apps. I have yet to find a game that will not run on it, (See my 3rd post in the I Love Vista thread for a few of the older ones).

SP1 is silly, it will be mostly made up of all the previous bug fixes rolled into a single patch. Vista works fine now, the ONLY real problem I have with it is the slow-ish network file transfer. That is definitely something that was zippier in XP.

Some people feel Vista is more of a violation than an OS. People who are VERY particular in their dominance over technology don't feel at home using it, but there are others who don't mind trying it out.

You'd be surprised at how far things have progressed in Vista, I'd consider it on par with XP by now, and I would not recommend purchasing a new computer with XP installed. Vista is here to stay. Reports that it is another Millennium Edition are overblown. Listen, I BOUGHT and USED Millennium Edition. They know NOTHING of how bad that really was if they think Vista was EVER that bad.

Besides, most people simply criticise Vista because they see other vocal members of the community doing it. Arguments are made up of hearsay and outdated information.

A balanced, relevant review of the OS cannot be formed based on a week of usage 3 months ago.

To each his own. Use what you like, but don't feel obligated to bash the competition just because you can.

 

StormEffect did you ever try Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory on Vista? Or any StarForce games?

I saw in your 2nd post, some REALLY OLD games. Nice .

Although I don't think jeremy6044 is too concerned with gaming, please correct me if I am mistaken.

 

What?

- MS Office
- Final Draft (screenwriting word processor software)
- iTunes
- Firefox
- iPod
- HP printer

These aren't games? Firefox definately sounds like an FPS. iPod? Sounds like another Wii-style game. MS Office? Must be a new CS:S map.

HEHE.

One track mind, my friend, one track mind. (mine, that is)

The only starforce games I've played on Vista are Dreamfall: The longest journey and X3: The Reunion. Never tried Chaos Theory. I just bought it for my XBOX 1.

EDIT: You could try the starforce patch, I think that could help the issue.

 

HAHA !!! That really made me laugh! You and I think alike... I think . Peace.

 

You know it, dude. :laugh:

 

I made it a point not to buy any game with Starforce or Securom or whatnot on my new system with Vista. Consequently, I ended up having not a single game and wondering why exactly I bought Vista for boot camp anyway since I never used it..

So I went out and bought NWN2 - and spent the next 20 minutes messing with Vista UAC and admin privileges trying to get the damn securom protection to work (keeping in mind that everything on my computer is completely legit and paid for). Aren't the wonders of copyright protection and Vista great? Granted NWN2 is pretty buggy in and of itself, especially the patching and registration process.

 

Ironically, this is one of the primary reasons I bought Vista. I was so sick of having invasive copy protection injected into Windows XP by various games. I'd heard that Vista was a little more violent in dealing with such programs. I like how Vista makes SURE that IT is in control and NOT the software copy protection (like was the case in XP). Being able to virtualize all that stupid securom crap makes me feel safer and actually works better than it did in XP, which would stop working as well after I installed games with severe copy protection, like FEAR. (For instance, my CDROM drive wouldn't work anymore).

 

chaos theory sounds like a game i would like. but then i'd probably like a lot of them. i guess first i need to choose a computer, though, huh.

 

My main reasons for going back from vista were wireless networking, and networking in general. The new stability patches have improved this but that took 6 months. It was crazy that MS could release a OS that wouldn't work well with most current routers via wifi. It would connect then drop off, maybe connect to the router and workgroup but fail to get internet, you would try toggling the wifi, sometimes fixed it, but most times a hard reboot was required, that might have got you 5 min on wifi before it would drop out again. Real pain in the arse.
I also found the new control panel another pain in the arse, sleep mode is still as buggy as every, why can apple do sleep so well but not MS? Also small things like auto switching power profile based on if your running battery of a/c doesn't work (for me). And finally in general, I find it sluggish compared with XP, and the eye candy is actually annoying.
For me unless SP1 for vista does something major, it will remain an inferior OS to XP.
a

 

sluggish? how exactly? isn't it supposed to be quicker since you have to run it on a new c2d computer (as opposed to xp on my 3yr old pentium)?

 

Vista was what made me switch to Mac OS so I'm probably unlikely to be unbiased... but for me the real problem with it was how 'big brotherish' it felt.

You do something. The screen freezes and you get a 'are you sure!???' message popping up (and this can be anything - such as copying a folder). Numerous 3d packages of mine failed to run until I clicked on the .exe/preferences and ran them as an administrator. Even then each time I load them I get a 'we've never seen this program before.... it... could be dangerous!'

I understand that MS had taken a lot of flack about security - but I found vista really hits the home user hard and turned my basic computer user into a far less enjoyable past-time.

Hence the switch

 

Personally I like Vista, I run HP 64bit version and I only had one issue with it.. that was my wifi network but after a bit of hunting it all works a treat now and that's with lots of peripherals such as aging scanners/film scanners/digital cameras/printers/legacy storage devices etc. (had to draw the line on my old 200mb 5.25" Syquest cartriges thoough lol)

For some programs I had to right click on the shortcuts and check a couple of the options on the compatability tab to get them to run smoothly but it was hardly an inconvenience as you just need to apply them once.

UAC is annoyning and yes I did turn it off in the end. I'm still waiting for a nice 64bit firewall (Comodo preferably) but have configured the "Windows Firewall with Advance Settings" quite nicely to do the job in the short term.

Yes it runs better on higher spec machines but that was kind of inevitable.. just like new games run better on high spec machines.. games manufacturers aren't going to make games for a machine that's older than 5 or 6 years old or so.. so it's to be expected that the same would happen with Microsoft and their OS's.

However I can't think of a single reason to upgrade an OS though if your current one works well (aint broke don't fix scenario).