The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    Why did you downgrade to XP?

    Discussion in 'HP' started by Zcott, Jul 26, 2007.

  1. Zcott

    Zcott Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    49
    Messages:
    142
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    This is for everyone who upgraded to Vista or who bought laptops with Vista as standard. Why did you downgrade?
     
  2. matt_h1

    matt_h1 Notebook Deity NBR Reviewer

    Reputations:
    319
    Messages:
    1,667
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    55
    because xp is faster, less buggy, has better driver support, and cam be made to look just like vista with little effort.
     
  3. derwersei

    derwersei Newbie

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    4
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    What he said except the looks aren't that important to me..

    Let's hope the first Service Pack won't just be some "oh look we got sp1 out, everyone start using Vista now" semi-finished thing :p
     
  4. vassil_98

    vassil_98 Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    133
    Messages:
    1,524
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    55
    I still haven't but will do when my new dv6000z comes...Why, because Vista is not supported in my university
     
  5. Sid1

    Sid1 Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    4
    Messages:
    170
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    i did it because of comfort and compatibility with certain software that i use that can't run on vista. i have vista on my other partition, but i've prolly booted into it twice..just to check it out...but not interested YET lol
     
  6. kev99sl

    kev99sl Notebook Guru

    Reputations:
    1
    Messages:
    61
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    15
    Three letters: DRM. I want to watch what I want to, when I want to without my operating system wasting RAM, processing cycles, and resources playing police. I buy my operating systems to operate, not philosophize about what constitutes fair use and what doesn't ...
     
  7. w_tanoto

    w_tanoto Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    14
    Messages:
    174
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    I have no intention to downgrade to XP, but in near future, I'll buy Windows Vista laptop, and I plan to install XP. I just can't let go of XP yet. Windows Media Player 10 (somewhat, I still need some of its feature, like adding album cover to video)
    Some of my favourite programmes works with XP only
    Faster
    Recording in WAV possible.
    Microphone jack function properly and output sound from attached device (in vista, it does not output any sound from the speaker from a device attached to microphone jack)
    A lot more things.....
     
  8. Jagnew

    Jagnew Newbie

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    5
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    i downgraded to windows xp on my dv6500t and im having a few problems. I can get the sound to work. i think that i used the right drivers but can someone maybe post a link to somewhere that has the right drivers for sure. Also i was wondering if since i bought the tv tuner with it, will XP support it or do i have to have vista to use it.

    thx
     
  9. taktakb

    taktakb Notebook Enthusiast

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    16
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    i would say it is an upgrade instead ;)
     
  10. sgtarky

    sgtarky Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    251
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    I have vista business edition installed on my second drive on my dv8000. it is becoming my main os. I am having no problems with it at all. The only reason I havent switched totally to it , is because I am lazy , I lived in the MCE drive for about 6 months has all the goodies I like to use installed, but I am slowly migrating my crap over.
     
  11. mtor

    mtor Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    41
    Messages:
    1,031
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    0


    driver issues
     
  12. Panama Jack

    Panama Jack Notebook Enthusiast

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    21
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    Let's see...

    Speed and Compatibility.

    Vista is considerably slower and there are many programs from Applications to Games that will not work on Vista. Also, Vista has very few system checks to prevent you from totally corrupting the operating system.

    I had two different XP games and one XP application I tried to install and in all three cases Vista didn't warn me the software was incompatible. It went ahead and installed the software and promptly went to the dreaded BSoD. In the case of the application Vista was so hosed it wouldn't even boot without going to the BSoD even in Safe Mode. So there was no way to even get to a System Restore Point to try and fix it.

    With the two games they caused the operating system to get totally flaky after rebooting from the BSoD and even performing a System Restore Point didn't fix the problem. :p So I ended up having to do a full restore from the recovery DVDs three times. :p

    At that point I said to hell with it and upgraded to XP Pro. It was a pain to find the drivers because HP didn't have any listed for my Laptop. They basically force you to use Vista on their new laptops. But I eventually found compatible drivers on their site and now my laptop runs like a Gazelle under XP compared to Vista. Under Vista the drive light was running constantly when I was trying to do anything because of the massive 700 meg to 1 gig swapfile it was using but under XP the swap file is rarely accessed since it uses around 250 meg while I am working. :D

    Vista is a PRETTY operating system but it is an UNPRODUCTIVE operating system. It's all eye candy and little substance.

    BTW, I bought a Compaq F572US Dual Core laptop and if anyone else has bought the same laptop and they want to change to XP you can get all of the publicly available drivers in a single download from...

    http://www.megaupload.com/?d=7G4Q5BJM

    All of the drivers came from Compaq/HP's site except for the latest Geforce Go 61xx driver.

    The only way I will go back to Vista is if I am forced to kicking and screaming. :D