Alas poor Vista, I knew it well
Mikey 10 comments
Windows Vista, despite now being a permanent blemish on Microsoft's record, is not a bad OS. Sure it had issues early on, with things that should have been trivial but instead being a nightmare - copying files over a network comes to mind. And some things weren't Microsoft's fault, like the early lack of driver support.
Now Windows7 is on the horizon which Microsoft made available to the public in beta form last week. After a few weeks of full time use I can state with certainty that Microsoft are finally on the right track. So far I've had zero crashes, boot times are lighting fast, the overall performance is significantly improved, Vista drivers work fine, all my applications work, games play great, the eye candy and UI has improved, and there are a bunch of really cool new features, like the 'Libraries' which I now simply can not live without.
So with a new OS that even in beta form running this good, what does that say about Vista? Is Vista the new Windows Me? Probably, and it's also in this authors humble opinion a good reason to give Windows7 to Vista owners at a fair cost. Call it a "thanks for buying our unfinished donkey, now here's what you really should have gotten for your money in the first place" fee.
There are plenty of blogs out there saying that Windows7 should be absolutely free to all Vista owners, many of them without even having tried the new OS. But I disagree. There is plenty to get excited about in Windows7, and certainly some things that were never intended to go in Vista. It's a very polished OS and hard to believe it's a beta product, but it's still a new OS and has enough new features in it to make committed Vista users consider never going back (including myself) after having put the Windows7 beta through the paces. But I do think Vista owners should be compensated in the form of a reduced cost. Will it happen? Bill Gates will switch to Mac before that happens.
If you haven't tried it yet, and you can spare 2.5gb and a blank DVD, you will be pleasantly surprised. Based on my experiences this past few weeks I have already decided that Windows7 will be my new OS of choice in favour of Vista. I just hope the price is right.
EricVonZipper
Thursday 15th January 2009 | 08:56 PMAgreed.
I am not a Windows fan, though I do use a legit copy of Windows Vista Ultimate from time to time; yes $700 odd coins. Microsoft are on the right track with Windows 7. They are starting to understand.
Will I upgrade my Windows Vista computer to Windows 7 Ultimate/Galactica/Whatever it's going to be called? Perhaps. Charge me $149 or around that, and i'll be there. I will purchase several copies at that price. MS will also break every damn software sales records if the price was around that figure.
The possible changes to Word and Notepad are a major concern. These two applications are fantastic as they haven't suffered from feature bloat.
No doubt the "Australian" version of Windows 7 will cost more than "X Country" version, just like Vista did. If this is the case, and it's over $149, forget it. I'll stick to Fedora, or at worst Ubuntu.
Let me play around with it for a few more weeks. Then I may be in a better position to comment.
Jack
Thursday 15th January 2009 | 09:15 PMI had a similar experience to Rodney, within 10 - 15 minutes of use I got a blue screen during the middle of watching a video in Windows Media Player. Although, I am aware it relates to my graphics cards and should probably be fixed once it has better driver support. Other than that I quite liked Windows 7.
It'll be interesting to see how the public take the release though. I can only picture angry consumers once they find out Vista is now obsolete, especially after spending all that money on upgrades or new machines (let alone on Vista itself.)
Rodney
Thursday 15th January 2009 | 09:33 PM...in response to this comment by Jack. I should say, in fairness, that I haven't turned my back on Windows 7, despite my mention of a poor start. Vista, for me, had a shocking start. I mean really bad: https://rustylime.com/show_article.php?id=535
But I stuck with it and now quite like it, for a Windows desktop. I prefer it to XP. I recalling not liking XP when it came out and I even recall preferring Windows 98 for a while, when 2000 came out. I always eventually came around to the new one, in the end.
So far I like a lot of what I see in Windows 7. I write off my bad start to it being a Beta. As long as they throw away the insane activation nonsense and so on.
Incidentally - to Eric, I paid $110 Australian for Windows Vista Ultimate 64bit (OEM). Where the hell are you getting charged $700?? Don't buy any IT products from chain stores, man.
...in response to this comment by Rodney. I wonder how it will happen this time. They sure botched it with Vista activation at the start.
Altoid
Thursday 15th January 2009 | 10:44 PMI too am very impressed with Windows 7 (or Se7en, as some call it). It certainly looks like a major step up from Vista. I've had the beta for about a week now, and I have had some problems with drivers and games, but these are all due to software and hardware support, not the OS. One of the first things any user will notice is the increased speed and perkier performance. Simply put, it blows Vista away. Less RAM is consumed, processes happen faster, and best of all, it's even shinier than Vista.
So at least it's not simply Vista with a new coat of paint. This is the real deal. And once it gets released to the public, the adoption rate for this OS will probably be quite high. As regards the issue of price or even releasing it for free, I can't really see that happening. Don't get me wrong, if Microsoft wants to give me a free upgrade to Se7en, I'll be glad to accept, but this is a huge corporation we're talking about, and they're in the business of making (more) money.
I think the basic version of Windows 7 may be released as a trial or a relatively cheap upgrade for current Vista users, something to get a good chunk of the market hooked on this fast and shiny OS. This way, more consumers would make the transition without having to do it. When buying something as expensive as an OS, the more it looks like a "choice" from a consumers perspective, the better they feel about the decision to buy it. Even if they were suckered into it with a no frills starter pack.
Oh, and if anyone knows how to get Asus mobo drivers to work with 7 (P5q-e mobo to be precise), let me know ;)
...in response to this comment by Altoid. "...if anyone knows how to get Asus mobo drivers to work with 7 ..."
This is the first Windows OS I have installed where I didn't need to install my motherboard drivers. ASUS as well. I've heard the same thing from many. IN fact, I didn't have to install any drivers - not even for my video card. The supplied nVidia drivers even work better than the latest from nVidia's web site.
Jake Farr-Wharton
Friday 16th January 2009 | 07:47 AM...in response to this comment by Mikey. That is impressive Mikey.
I must admit, I've been extremely reluctant (to the point of recalcitrance when pushed by games and IT consultant brothers) to go with Vista, I've seen too many fatal crashes on my brother's high end systems to justify moving from XP... though I suppose that makes me somewhat of a looser. I have the Vista lisence disks and have even inserted it a couple of times after bad XP crashes due to vulnerability, but I'm still reluctnant.
Bob
Friday 16th January 2009 | 07:56 AMI'll just keep using my Vista Home premium thankyou. I have had no problems with Vista at all, maybe lucky I guess. Vista's failure is due to the ongoing negative media coverage - not the OS. I don't understand half the problems that people come up with when using Vista. I think the majority of the faults are due to the old machines that it is being run on. People have to understand that software developers design for the latest hardware devices with a chance that it may run on older machines with a few upgrades. The business it to get the user to keep upgrading, too keep the whole works turning over cash. Oh and one last thing - if Microsoft had jumped from Xp to Window 7 you would still have ended up with the same problems that any new OS has when starting out. Windows 7 is only running well because it can handle Vista's drivers etc. LetÂ’s face it - it is a clever way of upgrading people from XP and Vista to a new version of Vista. A version that everyone had to like because again - the media says you have to like it!
EricVonZipper
Friday 16th January 2009 | 11:21 AMRodney. I recently discovered my local store will pan off any OEM software to me, at cost.
I jumped on Vista as soon as it was released. The $700 I paid wasn't a concern. I'm in a job that requires me to have almost every damn OS out there installed on my computers, so I needed it, and quickly. Of course, this is before I found my OEM dude.
My biggest love, at the moment, for Windows 7 is the way it works with Solid State Drives. I've replaced the hard drives in two of my desktops with SSDs. I also own a notebook that runs Solid State Drives. Having unnecessary read-write cycles on SSDs is paramount.
Rodney
Thursday 15th January 2009 | 08:53 PMI, on the other hand, managed less than 15 minutes of Windows 7 before crashes numbers 1 and 2. Crash 1 came when I tried to change the power settings from balanced to high performance and crash 2 came when I tried to use the built in crash reporting tool, like any good beta tester, to report crash number 1.
That said, I don't really mind Vista...