Microsoft is hard at work trying to battle the public and businesses’ perception about Windows Vista. They already published a whitepaper named “Five Misunderstood Features in Windows Vista“, detailing some of what they believe are misunderstandings. Now, they also published a document wit five reasons to deploy Windows Vista – and why you shouldn’t wait for Windows 7.The five reasons are your usual marketing speak concerning Vista; stability, security, productivity, mobility, and so on. However, there’s also an interesting chapter on Windows 7. The gist? Moving to Windows Vista now will ease the migration to Windows 7 once it’s released.
There is no need to wait for Windows 7. It is a goal of the
Windows 7 release to minimize application compatibility for customers who have deployed Windows Vista since there was considerable kernel and device level innovation in Windows Vista. The Windows 7 release is expected to have only minor changes in these areas. Customers who are still using Windows XP when Windows 7 releases will have a similar application compatibility experience moving to Windows 7 as exists moving to Windows Vista from Windows XP.
Here we have Microsoft reiterating that Windows 7 will not contain any massive changes, and that it will build on top of the foundations laid by Windows Vista, improving them. Interestingly, the recent rumours concerning Apple’s next release seem to point at the same route: stabilisation and optimisation. Assuming those rumours hold any water, we might be looking at some sort of truce between the two competitors.
Probably not meant as such, but interesting nonetheless, as it gives the rest of the market (like Linux, BSD) the time to catch up – or move ahead – on the desktop side of things.
Microsoft has been defending Vista quite a lot recently. They keep releasing these announcements and brochures that explain why you are wrong if you avoid Vista, or why Vista is better than XP or why it is better than Linux or or..
During the first year of Windows XP, updates were
released 26 times. Through a combination of a month-
ly release schedule and decreased vulnerabilities,
Windows Vista needed updates released only nine
times in its first year.
Why compare Vista to when XP was released? Well, to make the numbers look good. They are probably hoping people will not notice they are not comparing to XP SP2/SP3 which is more or less just as secure as Vista nowadays. XP has always supported users running as non-admins too, and in all those years that XP has been around people have come up with various kinds of 3rd part software to remedy the shortcomings in XP or to improve some features even more. There really isn’t anything there that Vista provides that isn’t possible under XP too.
Bitlocker? Well, do a google search. You’ll find dozens of apps for XP that allow for harddrive encryption, either partially or fully.
Gartner stated
that “organizations actively employing power management functionality can expect to save $38.3 thou-
sand per year compared to unmanaged ones (based on the number of new machines).†In addition, “total
PC power consumption per year for a well-managed 2,500 PC strong organization is 50 percent lower than
for an unmanaged one†according to the same Gartner Report
Well duh. But XP does support power-management, too.
There is also talk about the Windows Search. I have never used it nor seen it in use, but I imagine the Google Desktop search and similar are more or less just as good for those people who need such features.
I dunno, I don’t run a company nor do I work as an administrator, but I get the feeling there really isn’t any specially good reason for companies to migrate to Vista. I hear the remote deploy features are better, but is that good enough of a reason? Most companies have everything needed for XP already in place, any additional software, everything has been tested and proven during all those years Vista was in development..
I do not like Vista for its resource usage etc.
BUT
Vista has a lot of security features XP SP3 can only dream of ( Protection against buffer overflows, protected mode brower etc. )
It still sucks, but it is not that bad. You have to be fair.
Why did you get modded down? wtf? I modded you up
Windows Desktop Search is available for Windows XP as well. And is pretty nice.
They want you to buy Vista now AND Windows 7 then.
Of course they want you to do that, they are a profit making organisation, their only target for existence is to make a profit for their shareholders.
mah, the way some people around here talk, you think Microsoft are out to aid them in some way to reach computing nirvana.
I dont recall saying it is wrong or unexpected.
So does Apple
I had to buy Leopard because these fun new programs and even Safari wouldn’t work on Panther.
It’s business.
Edited 2008-06-05 10:14 UTC
you still used panther?
so you did skip Tiger? And that’s comparable, other than doing exactly what MS doesnt want you to do?
You missed the best one
Tiger was more feature/stable than leopard is yet, and certainly much better than Panther
But with Vista, how can you do a repair install?
I work in a computer shop that mainly does service.
If a PC with XP is bluescreening and restarting I can often find a way to fix it sometimes, sometimes all it takes is a repair install.
With Vista I can never fix it because it repair tool says there is nothing wrong.
I have seen this many times. Often I can’t find a minidump file.
What are techs meant to do?
The repair tools changed. There’s enough information on it out there on the web.
Still haven’t had anything work though.
Imagine a laptop that works find and has SP1. I uninstall CA antivirus and then install the CA Internet Security Suite.
I get a STOP = c000021a
I can’t even boot safe mode. I thought safe mode is only meant to load just windows.
For some reason there is no system restore available and no minidump.
Backup and reload is the only course of action. (Imagine customer whining that they need there precious computer now).
One month old laptop and the only thing I did was uninstall and then install a program. How dodgy is that?!
If it was XP I could fix this.
Edited 2008-06-05 10:20 UTC
You’d use the Vista Recovery Disc (can be made with Vista SP1, or neowin made it available for download) – it’s the replacement for the Recovery Console, same as you would do with booting onto an XP CD and dropping to the command line. From the recovery disc, you can try automatic repair, or use the command line to clean up.
I know you are running a repair shop and trying to fix others computers.
I am one of two people on our university campus who have “caged the beast”, read as “Vista”, as a virtual machine and run it from there.
Since I am the Linux and OS X person, I run the caged beast with VMWare Fusion. On my 2007 model iMac it runs at the speed of a regular PC install.
I had installed Vista onto a PC and it ran for about four months before the partition crapped all over itself and would not repair itself even after running chkdsk from the install DVD.
Now with a virtual Vista back up, all I need to do is copy it over from the external backup drive and I’m back on the road. I have little time to be down, especially, just re-installing Vista because of MicroSlop silliness.
Okay, where is the coffee?
Edited 2008-06-05 12:03 UTC
That is the scenario I am fearing. It is beginning to happen a bit to regularly. Two PC in two weeks.
The time it takes to backup and reload is crazy. Customers don’t do and simply don’t care to learn how to do backups.
To the other poster earlier about creating a Vista Recovery Disc. I work in a PC shop. I have heaps of Vista disc, even an image on my techy.
Something is really broken in Vista if it falls over for no reason. I think it can only mature, but I think Microsoft may have released something over engineered.
They only really needed to enhance XP not create Vista.
I think that is what Windows 7 will be, an enhancement to Vista.
//On my 2007 model iMac it runs at the speed of a regular PC install. //
With the major caveat of “depending on the software I’m running.”
Still, sounds cool.
mind!dagger said…
So what you’re saying is enterprise level tools are required to maintain your OS in working order?
Please….think…about that for a minute while contemplating the various costs of Windows these days….
–bornagainpenguin
I am not shy in saying I absolutely despise Microsoft and its so-called operating system. Even today, its latest and greatest in Exchange is loosing calanders for absolutely no reason other than some process fires off and looses it. I believe they call that a feature set. I run Vista because I must access tables and a host of other items that were built to support Microsoft products.
a repair install doesn’t actually fix the problem of the blue screen it just resets everything for you to do it all again at a later date where you curse windows for not working correctly.
9 times out of 10 the problem is with some driver or update that’s been installed recently.
The reason these features are misunderstood is because a lot of people who think they understand windows don’t actually know more than the step by step process to do the task.
Now that they’ve changed the processes people hate the change. The MS user base is going to kill windows innovation (which they sorely need) by resisting.
I think the installer for vista is their best so far with all GUI menus for tasks we previously had to run from a command line. it has everything you need without having to hold onto cd’s like 98, ghost.
No OS is better or worse if you just take the time to understand why rather than the how.
As a computer store repair tech i’m sure you’ve had a conversation similar to this many times:
“my computer isn’t working anymore! FIX IT!”
“i’m sure i can help, what’s the problem?”
“I don’t know just fix it!”
Edited 2008-06-06 04:36 UTC
It seems to me that Microsoft is using an argument like “People, you might as well buy Vista because Windows 7 is not going to get better than Vista, so don’t hold your breath”.
Companies might just look for other OS-es that do have improvements over Windows XP!
Maybe because Windows Vista introduced alot of changes that will form the foundation for Windows 7; so there aren’t going to be any major structural changes in the next coupld of years. Sure, there will be performance improvements, features being added and so forth. What won’t change will be the basic underlying core of the operating system, that’ll remain the same.
I find it funny when I see people like you, therefore, piss and moan about that given how much flack Microsoft received for changing things too much in Windows Vista; I swear Microsoft is damned if they do, and damned if they don’t.
Such as? where is this mythical ‘challenge to the Microsoft hegemony’ – I’ve been waiting 18 years, and it hasn’t arrived. Apple is too erratic for enterprise customers, Linux doesn’t have a dog show given the lack of applications customers require (not ‘good as’ replacements, they want the *same* applications as they ran on Windows) and Solaris is dying a death of a thousand cuts right now. The changelog so far has been so pedestrian it isn’t funny.
Windows is here to stay until such time that the ‘Windows replacement’ (what ever it may be) can do all what Windows can do – and more, at a cheaper price and more reliably; nothing has come close matching it. Thats not to say that Windows is great – far from it. Its the simple fact that there is no viable alternative.
Edited 2008-06-05 10:59 UTC
They want the *same* application as they run in Windows? Actually, what they want is Windows. Really, the only acceptable Windows replacement is Windows, because that replacement would have to look like Windows, run the apps of Windows (not apps as goos as, but the WINDOWS apps).
The fact is that Many linux distros are cheaper than Windows and can do the same thing and a LOT more and is a viable alternative, but Windows has the monopoly. Linux is the unknown and Windows is the common. To equal Windows, linux would have to be Windows, and even though, if it is not supported by Microsoft, it would not be ‘official’ and people would still think it is inferior. For people to use linux, it doesn’t take just a cheaper and better alternative, it takes education.
And you complain that they are damned if they do and damned if they don’t, but all concurrents would like to be in their monopolistic position.
Please, stop wasting my time and actually read what I post instead of rapidly posting of same random speal you have for your OS of choice. Quite frankly, what OS you run has negliable impact on me.
Errr, wrong. If they or their company relies on zyx application from widget incorporated, they want to be able to purchase the same application from the same vendor but for Linux (or what ever operating system you happen to be setting up as the replacement for Windows).
No, what people want to do is run the same applications from the same vendor, but natively; The operating system doesn’t matter a donkey’s diddle quite frankly. The operating system is merely a platform to run applications.
Surprise surprise, people purchase computers running Windows so that they can have access to all the applications THEY want to run; they don’t want applications you think are good enough, they want access to their applications they want to run. Stop trying to assume because it works for YOUR scenario, it can then be extrapolated over the whole PC world – because it doesn’t work that way sunshine.
And what do you use your computer for? sweet bugger all. Please, have you ever gone into a large business – ever? come on, please, don’t try to compare your two computer network, 1000 word assignments and surfing the net looking for porn, to be anywhere close to what big business use their computers for.
Bull crap. Make it so that I can go down the road and purchase software off the shelf like I do with Windows – I don’t care what ‘trend’ is in the US of A. Most people around the world shuffle down the road, pick up gadgets off their shelf, along with software, and it all works with Windows.
Where is the Linux software section? where is the MYOB for Linux? where is Photoshop Elements for Linux? where is Paintshop? where is Printshop? where is an office suite that doesn’t royally suck? They simply don’t exist for Linux. Again, the end user doesn’t give a sh*t about ‘good enough’ applications, they want the same applications from the same vendors, but native for linux.
Pardon? they’re in a monopolistic position because the competition is so monumentally crap! that is why! Good lord, do you even go out of your home and see how people use computers, I swear the only thing you use your computer for is sending emails, writing up assignments and looking for porn; surprisingly, people use their machines for something a little more interesting than just that.
Edited 2008-06-05 13:21 UTC
Wow, it’s the first time a read a comment from you that actually sucks. A wise person said:
It also applies the other way around, the fact that the alternatives don’t work on your scenario doesn’t mean that it might just work for others. Some people prefers to learn how to do stuff rather how to use apps. If I don’t have X app, I’ll find a way to accomplish my task in another way and go on. I don’t expect everyone to do the same, though.
And regarding your guesses about how does the OP use his computer, you’re just pulling inexistent facts (which aren’t none of your business btw) right from your rear end, so please leave them out of discussion.
Let’s all grab our coffees, please 😛
Like I said, I couldn’t give a toss what the original author wishes to run; the problem is that the person I replied to made the claim that because it worked for him – therefore, it works in all cases. That is what the original poster said. He never once said, “I run Linux, and in my case, it works well”. He claimed that because it worked for him, it could work for everyone. That is what made my fly off my handle – the gross generalisation of end user requirements based off his experience.
For me, I know I’m a freak anomaly within the computing world; I represent, if lucky, 0.1% of the marketplace, therefore, I don’t expect everyone to move to my OS of choice simply by virtue of me having no problems. I know I use my computer(s) in weird and wonderful ways, to expect vendors to bend over backwards to accomodate me would be an example of the highest form of arrogance.
Hmm, its 2:31am, but I might as well.
Alright… so you want an OS with a meager market share (as we are talking about an hypothetical OS that is not Windows, and thus is overshadowed by Window’s current monopolistic position), and that it may allow you to run Photoshop and Illustrator and Autocad and Visual Studio (after all, VS is an important application used in business) on it, along with any other Windows application which you can find on a shelf of Windows applications in a brick and mortar store.
Well, this would require this OS to have full binary compatibility with Windows, replicating all its APIs along with all its bugs. This is a monumental task and it has been already tried, without much success (see WINE and ReactOS).
Alternatively, this would require this OS to have the full Windows developer community behind it, which can’t happen because, not being Windows, it has a very small market share, and thus it is not profitable to develop for it.
Kaiwai, I find your requirements for an alternative OS to be other than ‘monumentally crap’ so impossible meet that one may as well call any engine that isn’t 100% efficient ‘monumentally crap’.
Then why should *I* sacrifice functionality I need, simply so I feel all warm and fuzzy knowing I’m sticking it to the man. Heck, tonight I’m running Office 2007 on Windows Vista, and doing things I could never do on OpenOffice.org, using the bibliography functionality for my university assessment, for example.
Heck, never mind getting the applications like Photoshop over; how about making your applications not suck so much. OpenOffice.org is horrid, and 3.0 is no better. I would have thought that developers out there would have some fire in their belly to improve the experience, but so far the experience has stayed the same and not a single iota of improvement.
Heck, I tried running Fedora 9 on this very desktop, I couldn’t get a stable wireless connection; it kept dropping out every threee minutes, I downloaded (with alot of resuming) of a kernel update. I rebooted, and the same thing kept occuring. So not only are the applications lacking, and the applications there are, are just plain crap – the developers of the operatng system itself are too lazy to fix 747 size holes in reliability. I’m sorry, but a wireless connection dropping every 3 minutes should have been the proverbial elephant in the corner of the room during testing – it should have been fixed then.
Don’t get me started on Ubuntu; good lord, its a buggy mess from top to bottom; broken updates, unstable wireless, buggy applications, flash not working properly (and hanging the browser when it does). Its a friggin nightmare, and people like you claim that Linux is ready for the desktop? christ, people who complained about Vista didn’t experience this sort of frustration.
Heck, heck, heck. Calm down and stop driving this thread into a stupid flamewar. If I wanted to see one of those I would be in Digg now.
Never have I claimed anything about Linux being ‘ready for the desktop’. And never did I talk about Linux in my whole post.
So OpenOffice.org sucks, that is a fact that I won’t dispute –though for me it doesn’t suck because it lack functionality itself–, but it is not exactly useless, even if it is of no use to you. Linux didn’t handle well your hardware? Big deal.
You were talking about how one’s personal experience doesn’t allow one to extrapolate to every possible situation (much less the personal experiences of basement dwelling, porn addicted Linux users stereotypes) and you just did that , mister.
And there is a world beyond that of the desktop. There are these things called ‘servers’, which allow people to do things like host OS discussion sites. Would you believe me that Linux and BSD are quite popular for that purpose?
Also, there is a world beyond your desktop, and Linux –or anything else for that matter– may well be of use in it.
I’ve seen none of the issues in Ubuntu and Fedora that you have on the 3 or 4 laptops and desktops I’ve tried (IBM T60, T41, Dell Latitude 820, Optiplex 755). On a Sony handheld (UX-380N) I tried, Ubuntu works far better than XP, which hung constantly and was unreliable for wireless networks. It goes both ways.
I have no doubt that you did indeed have them, but condemning both projects because ‘it didn’t work for you’ is juvenile, just as you ranted about about when people claim that because it works for them, it should work for everyone.
Oh wow, modded down to 0 without being impolite, unreasonable or even zealotish in any way just for stating the simple truth that you didn’t have those troubles… looks like the Windows zealots doing an extra shift today.
Its a well known fact that Sony create buggy problem ridden hardware, its too bad that there is still a sizable chunk of people out there who still think that Sony equals quality.
My Thinkpad t61p, Windows Vista works wonderfully, same with my old Dell Dimension 8400 desktop (3.2Ghz, 2.5GB memory, and a low end Nvidia 8400 GS graphics card). Yes, there are those who have crappy experiences, but 9/10, is it because of crappy hardware not the operating system itself.
My laptop runs Ubuntu (Its the Dell that has the wireless stability issues) no problems, but having *just* an operating system without the applications I want/need, is a waste of time.
No, I’m stating that these project have issues. Simply sitting around like armchair experts like we see on this forum, spewing hatred against Microsoft’s products whilst ignoring the flaws in their own products, is an example of the pot calling the kettle black.
Look at the number of people here who spew monopolist, anti-competitive and numerous other emotionally drive perjoratives simply to make up for the lack of improvement within the open source world? how about instead of bashing Microsoft products and spamming every Windows story with Linux related drivel – you actually dedicate that time to actually making Linux and the applications that run on it, competitive with Microsoft offerings.
I’m sorry, but when ever I see the pissing and moaning I see on this forum – it is actually a concession by those that they would sooner hate a company or product (which is an irrational idea anyway) than fix the flaws in their own products.
Edited 2008-06-06 00:29 UTC
All of these “problems” are nonexistant if you run Linux on a machine that is deigned to run Linux.
Just as you cannot run Vista well (or oftentimes, you cannot run it at all) on a machine that was not designed for Vista (try running Vista on a PS3 and see how far you get) … so too you cannot expect Linux to necessarily run on just any old hardware.
Having said that … it should be noted that Linux does a far better job than any other OS at running on just about any old hardware. Linux does this feat many many times better than any other OS does.
I could also point out to you applications and areas where Windows utterly sucks compared with Linux … cluster computing is just one example, scalability and portability are other examples, security is yet another, as is networking … but I’m sure you won’t hear a word of it.
Finally … Linux would run any ported-to-Linux version of any application you can name at least as well as Windows runs it, and certainly better than Windows Vista runs it.
The monopoly has suckered you badly if you didn’t realise that.
Edited 2008-06-06 13:40 UTC
I like how you use applications like Photoshop that dont mean nothing to new computer users, you can’t use a few apps like that to make your argument.
It’s not like everyone has a copy of them to do simple photo work, GIMP, F-Spot, Digikam, Krita can do all that no problem. Windows has nothing over linux application wise for the new computer user, but if your talking about software that was never made for anything other than Windows, who’s fault is that?
Lets face it, people have a clear choice now, pay for a Mac, upgrade to Vista and then upgrade to Windows 7, or save money and buy a Linux laptop which will cost less that the both.
Who the hell mentioned Photoshop? I said Photoshop *ELEMENTS*! there is a monumental difference – learn it.
Oh, come on, I’ve used GIMP – it is monumentally crap – and I’ve volunteered to fix the interface up, hell, I created a compete redesign with mock up models and all; guess what happened when I tried to show GIMP developers? I was abused and told to f*ck off. I was kicked and then banned from the irc channel. Yeah, community my ass.
Yeah, and people really moving to Linux *rolls eyes*
Your not very good then at GIMP, have you used 2.5.x?, it has new features already and UI features(single window)
I can produce great artwork in GIMP, http://gnome-look.org/content/show.php/Beautiful+Space?content=7935…
Your running out of excuses already.
Edit: Fixed Link.
Edited 2008-06-05 14:54 UTC
Yeah, and the image is so damn small I can’t see a damn thing. Thank you for providing me with a useless screenshot.
Are you expecting me to fall to my knee’s like Paul as he did on his road to damascus?
No, but it would be kinda nice if you stop whining and complaining and be impolite to people just because they accidentally linked to the thumbnail instead of the screenshot.
GIMP has become quite good these days. It may still not be really competing against Photoshop which costs a couple of hundred bucks… yeah, big deal.
It compares quite well though to Graphic apps in the “less than 100$” field and it kicks the asses of free apps. It isn’t more difficult to use then other graphics apps and it is in many regards as fast and efficient to use since 2.4.
So it isn’t a 1:1 clone of your favorite app and you are too lazy to relearn? Good, then don’t use it, but stop whining about it.
There was an attempt to rework the interface so that gimp looked more like photoshop; it was met with sheer indifference from both devs and users. It seems gimp users prefer the current interface.
But for them to ban someone for a proposal is odd; I’ll have to look around the tubes for a transcript of the event.
It happened quite some time ago; it was on the irc.gimp.org server. I hold a grudge for a long time; especially when I hear the very people who banned me, coming forward pissing and whining over the fact that they can’t attract ‘new blood’ to the development circle.
It seems you can respond with hate and swearing and not get modded down, Obviously the modding system is working great and your attacks are immune to it.
You sound like a Ex Linux user throwing to tantrum because he didn’t get what he wanted, see around the UI GIMP problems and configure it yourself to fit your needs.
There isn’t a single swear word in there; I know you Americans are all puritan about your language (but have no problems going along to hooters and proclaiming capitalism in the same sentence). All I did was write a strongly worded post venting my frustration at the out of touch geeks on osnews.com
Excuse me, I’ve been using *NIX whilst you were still sitting on the sofa watching ‘power rangers’. I made the move back in 1995 – and I can tell you that for 13 years I’ve been a very patient lad. I’ve put up with all the intricities within Linux (I’ve also dabbled with FreeBSD and Solaris).
It has 13 years, and where is the improvement? we’ve seen improvements in the GUI, improvements in the underlying core – but where are the things that make a computer usable, the applications and the games?
Jump to conclusions quick dont you, I’m british.
Well I’m doing artwork and playing games(Eve Online, QWET ect..) and being productive doing the graphics for KDE 4.2 games, video tutorials for GIMP, artwork in GIMP ontop for people to have.
What I’m I missing out on that you claim is so good about Window world and apps?
Mainly the Adobe CS3 Suite. Heavily required in the print industry. I also like some of the recent games for Windows and lament that they are not cross platform but such is life.
Audio on Linux is still needing to evolve but at least they are getting there and did I mention, Apple is as worse if not moreso than Microsoft as a coporate entity? Only difference is the size of the market each have.
Don’t even mention Gimp and Scribus for Graphic Design. From my experience supporting Vista and OS-X both need 2 Gig of ram to do their stuff. Only Linux Desktops can run well in smaller memory footprints or older version of NT based Windows.
Gimp is on the cusp of going through a serious, major upgrade in capability:
http://www.gimp.org/release-notes/gimp-2.5.html
http://gegl.org/
For serious document layout on Linux, perhaps Tex / La Tex is the go, and maybe Lyx to give it a GUI:
http://www.lyx.org/
That’s one thing I’ve always wondered about: who are all of these photoshoppers people keep talking about? I know of two people that use it; one’s a graphics design student, and another makes whatever printable media for our department. Aside from that, I know of no one that actually uses it.
Not saying no one does because I don’t know them, just curious as to where they’re all hiding.
Did you have a bad day or something?
Actually, I’m an IT professionnal and I’ve seen quite a few networks already, but I don’t mind your assumptions. A lot of people actually want to download porn and don’t like to download virii as well.
Anyway, I politely disagree with you. for a start, MS Office and Photoshop reportedly run very well under Wine and Crossover.
I see you have had a bad experience with Fedora and Ubuntu, but you didn’t try Mandriva. This one has a very good hardware support, the best IMO. Maybe the problem is that you don’t know linux very well but you can use Windows fluently.
In most businesses I’ve seen they use Windows to stay compatible with customers and suppliers. It’s the monopoly sustaining itself. There is nothing that seems able to break it. Price and quality is not enough. You’ve got to convince the whole chain to migrate all together, including customers and suppliers.
If you use office to its max potential, OO.o is not a replacement. If you a business application developer, there is no linux story for good enterprise development platforms (that include a decent smart client story).
Why would it make sense for a company to move off of the best groupware/productivity platform out there, especially if they have custom software built for windows that will take more time and be more difficult to rewrite on linux?
Linux has a phenomenal infrastructure story (although with 2k8 ms is really catching up), but its business story really isn’t there yet
It seems to me that Microsoft is using an argument like “People, you might as well buy Vista because Windows 7 is not going to get better than Vista, so don’t hold your breath”.
Maybe just a tad cynical. Microsoft will change if forced. There’s no doubt, though, that when it comes to Vista, Microsoft botched a number of things. Two things stand out when it comes to business.
Backward compatibility: A lot of software for particular businesses won’t run on Vista, and companies now face the prospect rewriting old software. They may get to it eventually, but more likely, companies will keep older versions of Windows around forever just to run the old software.
Microsoft is caught between the proverbial rock and a hard place here. Backwards compatibility hampers the introduction of new features and results in spaghetti code, yet businesses demand it. Hindsight indicates that Microsoft might have been better off making a cleaner break with Vista, while introducing a compatibility emulator, much like Apple has done. They might still be able to do that in Windows 7, although they aren’t making much noise in that direction.
Weight: My newest machine uses a Celeron running at 667 mgHz, along with 512 meg. of RAM. Yup, it’s a eee-PC. It runs Debian with KDE. It runs them well. Everything is nice and responsive. My second newest machine is an Intel Celeron based desktop with 1 gig. of RAM. The first can’t run Vista. The second would run it poorly. I bought these, because they were cheaper than Core 2 Duos with 2 gig. of RAM and higher powered GPU chips. I could afford the latter, but why bother when I don’t need such a machine?
My wife works for a large company. A majority of the machines could run XP, although most are still on 2000. This is a company with tight margins, layoffs, and faced with the need to make significant capital improvements in non-IT related areas. I am sure both the IT department and the corporate bean counters are asking why they need such powerful machines to do word processing, e-mail, and act like glorified dumb terminals. Vista simply isn’t a very good business OS, because a year and a half after release it still makes unreasonable hardware demands.
The oldest machine I maintain is a Celeron based system purchased in early 2002. It came with Windows XP pre-SP1. It never ran very quickly, and never connected to the Internet. SP-2 would have slowed it further, so it was never installed. It now runs Kubuntu Hardy, which runs well, if not quickly, under 256 meg. of RAM. I could try to bump up the RAM, but frankly, it runs well enough when Firefox and OpenOffice are open at the same time. That’s all the person using it needs.
Companies might just look for other OS-es that do have improvements over Windows XP!
They might, but in the next five years, I see companies hanging on to older versions of Windows for dear life. Perhaps after that, they will contemplate a change, but those numbers will be small if Microsoft addresses the two problems I have mentioned.
A good product speaks by itself. When a company insist to release whitepapers all the time trying to convince customers why they product are in fact good, it’s because something is truly wrong with it.
Or there is something that is “perceived” to be wrong with it, like Linux is to technical compared to Windows.
The biggest problem with Vista, is that people don’t like change, and in some ways (UAC for example) Vista is a huge change over XP. Change scares people.
People don’t like change for the worse. Like taking more resources without giving me any tangible advantages. Or un-streamlining network connection UI. Or making my browser (IE and Firefox) UI hang for several seconds on the initial attempt to connect to a site. And this is with current updates on a new and capable hardware (Samsung Q70 laptop) with all so called “eye candy” turned off. Security improvements? Come on, I haven’t had any security problems with XP SP2/3.
True, people don’t like change, but it has to be more than that. Sure, there are a lot of people staying with Windows XP, rather than going to Vista. If I weren’t a Linux user, I’d still be using XP, too. On the other hand, there are also a lot of businesses switching to OS X or Linux, or trying them out in smaller sections of their network to see how they go. If it were all about not liking change, then people and entire companies wouldn’t be moving to a totally alien platform, rather than the at least minimal familiarity of Vista.
Or there is something that is “perceived” to be wrong with it, like Linux is to technical compared to Windows.
The biggest problem with Vista, is that people don’t like change, and in some ways (UAC for example) Vista is a huge change over XP. Change scares people.
****I have no idea why that posted twice****
Edited 2008-06-05 11:18 UTC
And that’s why you’re not in sales or marketing.
@kawai
Yes we all know, windows forever!
In the past they said similar things about a lot of OS’s for example CPM80 and where is it now ???
Nothing, absolutely nothing, will last forever, not even MS. It may take time but in the end some other system wil start flourishing, it could be linux but it could easily be something completely different. For now I stick to linux, run my entire business on it and like the idea of “the community”.
I think Syllable has potential. That, or Haiku. In a few years, Syllable might mature to the state Linux is in now; then we can look at it as a possible future OS. BeOS fans might go flooding to Haiku once it starts getting stable releases out. If they do, Haiku might completely eclipse Linux in popularity, and blindside Microsoft and Apple. Be Inc. might even come back from wherever it’s hiding and make a new version of BeOS, once they see the success of Haiku. Or they’ll take the fashionable route, and litigate for a living.
Be Inc is completely defunct. That won’t ever happen
The only one that could possibly litigate is Access. And I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t ever bother since Haiku is not based on BeOS source code and it doesn’t have “BeOS” in its name anymore 
I could be wrong, though…
The SCO did it with Unix offspring for years, until someone actually stood up to them. I wouldn’t put it past some original owner of Be Inc. to revive the company just to sue Haiku for making a clone of their OS.
This stuff from Microsoft is entirely aimed at the corporate market, although Tom’s summary doesn’t make that clear. It’s all about Vista for business. If Vista starts to come loose in the corporate market, then all sorts of other things start to wobble too: the opportunities for upselling, license lock-in for years over hundreds or thousands of desktops, sales of server products predicated on Vista clients, and of course sales of Microsoft’s latest version of Office. None of this applies to the consumer market.
In many ways, Microsoft is reaping the consequences of the many delays to Vista. XP was around for so long compared to previous Microsoft OSes that it became entrenched, with a host of perfectly good third-party enhancements. So the stranglehold was weakened, giving opportunities for Google, Open Office, Linux et al. Now, Microsoft is finding that reapplying the headlock is much harder than might appear.
like I’m waiting for a bloody stool.
Quote from Microsoft’s PDF:
Oh, I see. Maybe I should wait for Windows 8, after all… 😀
Edited 2008-06-05 12:56 UTC
My 5 reasons NOT to install Vista:
– file explorer does not have toolbar anymore
– no 3D sound in game
– no horizontal span mode for dual screen
– “vista capable” laptop = $2000 email machine
– file copying*
*File copying seems solved by SP1, and vista capable is partially Intel fault. Still left 3 which render Vista useless to me.
PS: I agree that Vista has some cool features but productivity NO WAY ! How removing all navigation, copy, paste, properties, etc.. buttons from file explorer is helping productivity ?
Can’t you enable the toolbar? And it should have 3D sound once companies get off their ass and release proper drivers for their soundcards, right? Or is there some weird technical problem blocking it?
No, there isn’t 3D sound because it isn’t supported by DirectX anymore. The reason behind that is that you could have used it to break out of the encryption chain for DRM when it comes to audio. I’m not sure if this was meant to protect music, it seems more it is intended to prevent you from ripping movie audio… which is kinda an dumb reason if you ask me.
You still can get 3d audio with OpenAL.
Microsoft said that they intended to build a new API for 3D sound sometime in the future, but i don’t think they gave any timeframe. I don’t think it is too much of a binding announce and i don’t think it makes any difference at this time, since game developers intending to offer Hardware accelerated 3d audio use OpenAL now anyway.
ah, ok. That is pretty annoying. I wish DRM would just die
Causes more problems than it supposedly solves.
Nope toolbar is gone… there is few icons/shortcuts but not customizable and mostly useless junk like “burn” … compare how many times you burn a CD to how many times you move, copy or delete a file… staggering lack of vision.
For the life of me I cannot make any sense of it. I beg any MS engineer to tell me how does that help the user…
And yes OpenAL will re-introduce 3D sound but games need to be rewritten so may be by 2010 we will get back to the sound effects we are used to since 2000.
So… you actually used those Copy, Move and Delete buttons?
Aren’t keyboard shortcuts easier for that (or even the right click menu)? I’m a bit surprised you’re missing THOSE specific features – I haven’t seen anyone using those buttons actually
heh, yeah, only time I have ever used those buttons are when some program is being weird and won’t work with the keyboard shortcuts…
I’ve learned that the Microsoft product is the one generation old OS. One has to wait a couple of years for 2 or 3 service packs and hardware prices drop to have OS running properly. So the best MS OS is XP now. When the release 7 it is going to be Vista, probably.
When XP arrived (year 2000 or 2001) there were complaints about memory requirements and activation. But people were more enthusiastic about computers and more obsessed with new technology then. So, they embraced XP.
Today a computer is rather common piece of equipment and people just expect it to serve its purpose, like toaster, for example. That’s why Vista met a cold reception. Majority of people are better served with XP, and they don’t need to upgrade the hardware.
I think it’s more along the lines of the fact that XP really was a huge step forward in many major ways. It brought the (relative) stability of the NT kernel to the masses, displacing DOS once and for all, while still having excellent backwards compatibility with Win9x programs. Add on to that a more trustworthy filesystem, and all around it was a massive leap forward.
Uh… I would say Vista’s flaws are the reason for its reputation, both in terms of software/device driver incompatibilities and the pointless and the confusing moving of options in the Windows GUI–many of which I believe made more sense in previous Windows versions, and in general, very little of it should have actually been moved. Don’t fix what ain’t broken… but apparently Microsoft is grasping at straws to come up with “new features,” and I guess they’re desperate to make that bullet list as long as it was promised to be before the *real* features started dropping like flies.
Really, is there a good reason they broke up “Display Properties” and put EACH tab in a *separate window*? And that’s just one example… Vista’s UI is littered with braindead crap like this. Don’t even get me started on the Control Panel… and where’s the defrag tool in Administrative Tools, and why the hell does it give virtually NO info as to what it’s doing other than the obvious fact that it can take hours to complete?!?!
How it’s supposed to be “easier,” “more intuitive,” or any of those other catchy buzz phrases Microsoft’s PR department spews with every new Windows release, I will never know. This is one release they truly took several massive steps back on and barely offer anything new and interesting.
we all know that hardware changes and improves over time, but the when the bloke at microsoft business says you need 2GB RAM and 2GHZ processor just to run the OS comfortably to run apps, then im sorry even in 2008 that’s far to steep.
Ive run vista on and off since the beta’s and it’s the memory usage and hard disk thrashing that has really put me off. Yes i know Vista pre-caches however it doesn’t return the memory, which is evident from vista thrashing the hard disk under heavy use. And when it’s not under heavy use the hdd thrashes as the indexing is in my opinion poor.
//ve run vista on and off since the beta’s and it’s the memory usage and hard disk thrashing that has really put me off. //
Have you run it since SP1? Much lower memory footprint and HDD thrashing is almost non-existent. This, on a 3.5 year-old P4 system.
I was sent this White Paper, as I manage a network with XP systems at the moment.
In my opinion, End users are looking for the following when upgrading:
1) Faster
2) More Features
3) Ease of Use
4) Reasonable Cost
5) Backwards Compatibility w/ existing hardware or software
They didn’t find that when using Vista.
As an anecdotal example, one of my engineers (a guy that still does paper designing, as CAD is still a challenge to him), took a class on 3D modeling software. He recently purchased a Vista laptop for the class, intending to use it with the class to start.
He struggled to get the software working, because Vista wasn’t being cooperative. Not only that, just finding things to set options in Vista was confounding him. it took him an hour or 2 just to get things set correctly for the software to run, let alone what he struggled with once the software did load.
He found that the software actually ran slower in Vista than it did the XP laptop his partner brought in, with similar specs.
Vista hasn’t provided a “faster” experience. In the White paper, MS is touting the “File Copy” improvements over XP, but one feature isn’t going to make up for overall sluggishness. On new hardware mind you…
Vista didn’t provide significant feature upgrades that XP couldn’t do.
XP can do everything Vista can do, and for the few features that Vista has, can be done with 3rd party software.
Vista didn’t provide ease of use. MS changed practically every aspect of the UI in Vista (save for Desktop Icons and a Recycle Bin). My users that have Vista are lost; they’re constantly asking me where this function and that function are. Why? Because MS hid those features in menus that frankly didn’t make sense to me when I saw them. This is supposed to be easier?
While Vista was preinstalled on most over the shelf machines, buying it outright presented a confusing list of options and price points…it was a lot easier when there was a business version and a home version.
Last but not least, the strangest one of all. Backwards compatibility has been the mainstay of MS software for years. Suddenly major vendors can’t get their software running on it, hardware isn’t recognized, and drivers are non-existent save for internal MS drivers. For someone that cherishes backwards compatibility, MS really didn’t make this compatible with anything (I’m aware that SP1 does take care of some of this, but the first impression is what sticks…)
In other words, Microsoft failed. This White Paper is to defend the 5 years of development, and defend the model they’ve been using for customers to buy the OS. Their product is junk, and they know it.
Users are getting smart. They’re consulting people like myself, and they’re getting wise to paying for something, and getting little in return.
it all depends on your hardware. I work at a software shop where we all have core 2 duos with sata harddrives, 4 gigs of ram and 20″ monitors. vista business flies on our machines, and sp1 cleared up any issues we were having due to bugs/compatibility.
I agree that there is no reason for a company with a more typical hardware story to upgrade, but for those of us using modern gear it is a hell of alot more pleasant.
Don’t wait for Vista SP1. Wait, scratch that. Don’t wait for Windows 7. What’s next?
The problem with Vista as I see it, having supported it for a little while now is not really the stability, but the speed. It’s not dog slow, especially with SP1. But it definitely is a bit slower than XP on identical hardware. That has to be fixed.
Microsoft doesn’t have to worry. I won’t wait for Windows 7. I am very happy with Linux…!!!
I all seriousness, Windows XP is a fairly stable OS and if Windows 7 will be all it is advertised to be, I don’t see why someone won’t just wait.
Edited 2008-06-05 16:24 UTC
Vista suffers from a serious HDD performance issues.
HDD never stays idle for 5 minutes; Just check “perfmon.exe” and expand HDD section and order read byte/s in a descending order; and your will see what I mean.
Everytime, HDD is accessed the system become unresponsive. It is not the CPU usage that is dangerous but HDD usage is the most dangerous thing for performance.
Not only this but CPU performance degrades by HDD Calls, the so called I/O Wait execution cycles.
The programs I have noticed using HDD were not essential for OS to function, and MS must stop them by defaults.
Why you should move to Vista now…
1. XP stinks. Yes. You probably already knew that, but it does. It’s the most bug ridden awful product we ever produced. You would be better off living in a hole in Iraq than to use XP. It stinks. Can believe anyone deployed it. Yuk!
2. Vista simply smells a whole lot better. Unlike XP, which we never intended for actual use, Vista is designed for every user device from your 4-way power sucking desktop, to those cutesy turtle like notebooks that everyone is buying. And with Vista, you won’t have to worry about people watching videos or playing games on their low end notebooks. Vista is engineered to make those things nearly impossible. Vista will eliminate this security risk and potential loss of work productivity.
3. Vista is prettier. Let’s face it. First and foremost in the minds of your employees is how good an interface looks. Remember Windows 1.0? Wow, what a stinker that was. Windows 3.0 brought you 3D widgets on top of that already impressive platform and it sold like hotcakes!! But Windows 3.0 is yesterday’s news. XP added lots of glowing to stuff and productivity soared! Vista makes things flip and fade… you’ll absolutely fall in love with it. Primitive interfaces decrease morale and makes everyone want to go job hunting. Don’t let those good employees leave. Install Vista instead.
4. Don’t make us kill you. Lastly we really don’t want to get mean about making you move to Vista. Please let 1-3 be your guide…. this step is only if you’re not totally convinced yet. If you do stay with XP, you “might” get infected with an ugly virus. It might happen just as we drop support for XP. I said “might”. Also, if you don’t switch, you “might” end up with a higher annual bill to Microsoft. You never know.
Seriously, kaiwai, just shut the f–k up!
Your constant senseless favorite OS flip flopping automatically disqualifies you for having any authority.
#1 – Improves the Security of PC’s and Confidentail Data
Let’s be honest, in terms of a MAJOR desktop breach there has been ONE on XP – Microsoft Blaster. How did that come about? Oh yeah, the legacy microsoft messenger applet that has NO ****ING USE OR PLACE ON A DESKTOP Machine.
Apart from that, what are the #1 and #2 vulnerabilities and entry points on Windows? Easy Answer: IE and Outlook. Wait, those aren’t actually part of the OS ‘really’ – even when Trident (The IE rendering engine) is shared, local files are rarely a problem – it’s the garbage internet aware crapplets that are the problem. Solution? Don’t use IE or Outlook – meaning XP is generally as secure as Vista for 99.99% of users who are smart enough not to use that RUBBISH in the first place.
#2 – Unlocks the potential of Mobile PC’s.
Uhm, how exactly. I mean, if the user is a ****tard and starts sharing folders then yes, it’s a problem… But seriously what in this entire section is more than ‘marketspeak’? It says a bunch of things, but doesn’t say HOW it does them. Why doesn’t it say how? Because so far as a laptop is concerned it DOESN’T DO ANYTHING NEW!!! Don’t know where these alleged ‘savings’ they rant on and on about come from – but really this whole section is a bunch of nothing.
#3 – Makes you more productive.
Pure and simple BULL. Goof assed eye candy, stupid animations that slow down actually getting stuff done and rearranging everything to require retraining – this does NOT promote productivity.
The big thing they tout is searching – frankly, if you have to resort to search more than once a week, you aren’t very productive in the first place. I suppose for the dimwits that don’t realize it’s not a good idea to dump all their files in one folder it’s useful, but for anyone who bothers to be ORGANIZED this is utter rubbish.
I’ve never had a search on XP be ‘too slow’ – What I find too slow is clicking on something and not having my desired action take place until some goof assed animation finishes.
“Higher level of functionality” – in what regard? Again, this section doesn’t say WHAT’s more functional. Lockups, forced reboots, applications crashed/not responding that the task manager thinks are just fine – I’m not seeing functionality here.
“Less Downtime” – My own experience with Vista has been nothing BUT downtime and headaches. The internet is buzzing with people complaining about stability issues, crashed and problems the likes of which even ME never saw. Again, this is just bullshit claims with nothing to actually support it.
Reason #4 – Speeds rapid deployment.
In terms of installing the OS to multiple machines, true. In terms of user conversion and hardware headaches – utter bull… and being most mass purchase business machines COME with the OS installed, is this REALLY a concern?
Reason #5 – Reduced support and management Costs – Again, complete and utter bull since you end up looking at retraining, more user calls, and stability issues that result in thousands of dollars spent on labor… Case in point in the past three months I’ve helped four companies reverse migrate FROM Vista due to stability issues.
In summary, it’s nice to compare it to the start of XP, because frankly it wasn’t this bad. You want this bad, it’s called Windows ME.
Edited 2008-06-05 18:00 UTC
Please, please don’t wait until we get our act together.
Really, we really care about you. We’re an honest company, who only has had your best interests in mind. Monopoly is such a harsh word. We never screwed over Stak electonics for thier disk compression, never ripped off Novell for their network drivers, never ever ripped off Apple’s streaming code and their logo. We never made Word look like Ami-Pro, and never ever made Excel work like Lotus 123.
We’re just misunderstood. The problems with Vista, is that people just don’t understand it. Wait, it’s our marketing department’s fault. Wait, wait, we expected RAM prices to fall to nothing, and we wanted to annoy you until those wonderful days when you would just click on anything were back again.
You see, it’s really our computer, and all the content you make on it, like the EULA says. You will do anything to stick with us don’t matter what we do. It’s okay with you if we use half of the processor for running DRM, and the remaining 49 percent to run updates.
Please, please don’t judge our operating system on performace, or hardware requirements. Or the fake glare on the GUI, or the ugly squares and circles that encrust our GUI.
Please, please buy ANY and all pieces of $hit we throw over the fence at you. We’re short of cash.
Wow, you are an idiot. Nevermind that there isn’t a company on this planet that hasn’t ripped off of anyone else, your argument that MS rips off others falls completely flat on its face when you look at the kind of crap coming out of the FOSS community. It’s all good to rag on MS when they make a feature similar to another company’s feature, but don’t dare criticize the FOSS community for putting out free software that rips off commercial software ideas.
Vista works just fine.
“Vista works just fine.”
No OS that needs the kind of beefy hardware that Vista needs could even *remotely* be defined as “working fine”…
Look at this video that shows how Vista (Longhorn) is working. Vista is far far far away from this Microsoft video:
http://www.downloadsquad.com/2006/11/07/windows-longhorn-concept-vi…
What is it with MS and the stock photos of people in semi-hip business attire peering intently at the TV-typewriter? You’d think that PDF came off the HP website or something.
In a related note, I am bummed that CDW and Citrix have both dumped the babe who was on both of their front pages for a month or two…I really don’t know how she managed to work at both datacenters simultaneously, but she did make me want to apply for the position of the guy in the chic square-framed glasses…
The reason Vista is failing as an XP replacement is also largely why Linux is failing as a Windows replacement, at least in the eyes of the average tech-ignorant user.
People know how to do something, like install a program, on Windows XP and don’t want learn/relearn how to do this. Even if Vista just throws one or two extra message boxes at the user during the user’s installation “experience”, this is enough to throw off the average non-techie user. Forget that Linux presents an entirely new way of installing programs with it’s own unique set of difficulties.
People just want things to work, with as little hassle as possible. Every time they run into a problem installing flash, installing drivers, correcting screen resolution, opening an email, installing and playing games, editing Word documents, etc. etc. it pushes people away. Vista presents various challenges to the users in this respect, and Linux more so.
People want to be able to walk into a store, buy software and install it on their PC without any hassle or “hacking” or emulation to do so. They just want it to work.
The key to the OS market is the same as in the console gaming industry, the success of a plat form is in the software it supports. People don’t want alternatives to software they have on Windows, they want the same or MUCH BETTER software. The platform with the most software, and the best software, wins.
Linux is vastly superior to Windows technology and performance wise, but I don’t think this has anything to do with people’s choice to go with one over the other. To most people there IS only one choice for the same reasons I mention above.
I reread the quote a few times . . . before I thought that the word compatibility should have the prefix in-. I don’t think it is a good idea to minimize compatibility between Vista and Windows 7.
“It is a goal of the Windows 7 release to minimize application compatibility for customers who have deployed Windows Vista since there was considerable kernel and device level innovation in Windows Vista.”
hmmm
Daws
To all of those who are whinging about Vista yet fawning over OS X: do any of you actually remember how many problems there were with OS X 10.0? Not to mention all the false-starts that lead to it (Rhapshody / Copeland / Taligent / Pink, anyone?).
Maybe Microsoft should have sold the Longhorn betas as the Vista final release, then slowly parceled out annual $150 glorified service packs that did nothing but fix bugs/add features that should have been dealt with LONG before release.
Seems to have worked just fine for Apple.
Edited 2008-06-05 23:48 UTC
God there are a lot of haters here.
Vista ain’t perfect but it sure isn’t the dismal mess of an OS that seems to be the main thread on this forum. Only thing that shits me about Vista is that OEM’s are pumping it out without SP1 so when I setup systems for clients I’m twiddling my thumbs waiting to get that happening. More money but very annoying for me.
As for backwards compatability, sure some older Adobe products mightn’t work on Vista but all their current stuff does. Them aside, I have not had an issue on client systems that couldn’t be fixed with the compatability settings provided with Vista and this includes x64 which I reccommend and programs including Point of Sales Systems and MYOB Version 7.
To the tech guy seeing increasing problems with his clients Vista boxes – learn to set it up correctly and keep crapware (security suits) off Vista. You don’t need them just a good antivirus which really isn’t needed as well if Vista is properly setup but protects other computers in a mixed network. When your clients machines are setup and running then take a Restore Point Snapshot so that if things do go haywire and need to be fixed you have a great starting point.
Vista System restore is a great tool for trialing software and drivers and having a decent fall back is the system goes belly up. My only issue with Vista was having decent Video drivers and that took Nvidia almost a year to deal with (that and my XFX card having a crap bios which I changed). Since that, my home workstation for Graphic Design and Audio ahs benn running SOLID.
For alternatives, start supporting OO. Open Office Beta 3 is looking great and when it comes out in September, start pushing that as an alternative to Office 2007 less the $500 MS tax. Once you get people moving their office suite to something that is cross platform, you can then down the track move their underlying OS.
Personally I’m looking forward to Haiku but I’m not letting go of Vista soon as there are apps that I need on it for my work and my only real alternative at this stage is OS-X and I’m not substituting one corp greed tax for another even though I don’t mind the OS.
Don’t Wait for it, Says Microsoft
Read it like this — Don’t Wait start migrating to Linux, Windows 7 is not going to be far different from Vista!
OK Microsoft. I won’t wait… Instead I will run Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard.
BTW, Windows Vista Ultimate (64-bit) runs quite nicely on my Mac Pro with all 16 GB of RAM being recognized. Quite snappy…
Edited 2008-06-06 11:15 UTC
Before SP1 I could honestly say that Vista was a bit bloated but OK. I didn’t have a BSOD for 18 months. Enter SP1. To make a long story short, I’ll probably be migrating back to XP SP3 or Windows 2003/SP2.
I’ve had one BSOD since SP1 in a few short months. I have ECC memory. I used an nice utility, kdfe.cmd, a front end to the Windows debugging tools to find a reason for a BSOD.
REFERENCE_BY_POINTER STOP 0x00000018 0xBAD0B0B0
I noted that “BAD0B0B0” reminded me of DEADBEEF. It was. No ECC errors logged, but something was wrong with memory.
Folks, we have the makings of a serious bug.