How would you change Windows Vista?
By Evan Blass 
posted Aug 19th 2007 12:51PM
posted Aug 19th 2007 12:51PM
You can probably tell by now that we're no Vista proponents, and having run the new OS exclusively for almost six months at this point, we're actually about to "make the leap" back to XP. But we're not willing to give up on Redmond just yet, and the beauty of all these service packs and "Patch Tuesdays" is that some of our suggestions could conceivably be incorporated into a product that's already hit the market. So, what does Microsoft need to do to make Vista (and its price points) more palatable (short of re-releasing it based on the WinFS file system)? Loosen up the DRM restrictions? Toss the controversial WGA? Put all possible features in a single SKU like certain other companies? Well come on, we're positive that there's no shortage of suggestions out there, so let's hear 'em!
after the sudden change to vista, i ACTUALLY like it. I've gotten rid of the useless crap my computer came with, and it finally got better, it crashes less, but the major things i would chnage is this: 1. the areo thing, it looks stupid, you really don't need it. 2. 3d flip, for that same factor. 3. add an xp theme, royale theme. 4.turned off the "start-up" center. 5 make on verison of the os for all systems with built in mpeg 2 encoder. 6 give everyone office software. and finally add a "full restore" programs on a seperate disc to let you pick what programs you want. there are alot of suggestion i have but, i just don't have a lot of room or time.
IPX Support - anyone who LANs old school games needs XP
General Stability improvements
General driver support improvements
XP Start menu as an option
Plain and simple:
New system/hardware = Vista runs smooth.
Old system/hardware = Stick with XP.
Not sure why so many people are upset by this. I, for one, am thankful they are finally ditching support for older hardware. It's just making restrictions for us that have good hardware...
And for all you legacy users thinking Windows 7 will be what Vista was suppose to be, think again - it still wont work on your POS machine - so get real. Either upgrade your hardware, or stick with XP. Plain and simple... XP is still supported, so why are you complaining about an operating system that your POS machine can't handle? if you're that upset, run Linux...
I've been running Vista for a looong time on an AMD system. It's never crashed - not even in beta. The only issues I ever had with the operating system was a graphic card driver from Nvidia - but I was using an older graphics card. Upgraded to an 8600 on the release date of Vista, and I've been running great ever since...
However, with all the above said, I'm NOT impressed with Vista... To be honest, I think they should have waited another year or 2. It bothers me that a lto of things are STILL the same. I wish they would have cut ALL legacy hardware... And WTF is Vista BASIC? All Basic is doing is allowing copanies liek Dell sell POS computers with crap graphics cards - BAD MOVE MICROSOFT!
Microsoft SHOULD be cutting all this legacy crap. All they are doing is allowing computer manufacturers like Dell, build computers with crappy on-board video that can't handle AERO..
Get Rid of the folder system & make it into a tagging system... so that we can have a file in as many places as we want by applying multiple tags to each file, without having to make a copy of it to that folder!!!
This thing called, “ WINDOWS V I S T A “ is & was, the worst thing that technology has ever come up with. Should have kept the “ WINDOWS XP “ that everyone still uses and has to this day. My family and friends has the XP set-up and never has any problems. My father purchased the VISTA and has had it for about 2-yrs but with-in the 2-years, he is going on the 3rd tower.
TOWER -1 - HARD DRIVE WENT OUT, JUST SHY OF ONE YEAR.
TOWER - 2 - THE MOTHERBOARD BURNED OUT.
TOWER - 3 - SO FAR NOTHING YES.
(( I JUST WITH THAT PEOPLE WOULD STOP TAKING THINGS AND CHANGING THINGS THAT WORK. EVERY TIME THINGS ARE CHANGED THINGS GO WRONG ))
W H A T A S H A M E
Like Grandfather always said: WHY FIX SOMETHING THAT IS NOT BROKE.
everthing
Did they even see what the operating system looks like when you switch into the classic theme? It's the ugliest thing I've ever seen.
Too much wasted whitespace in menus and the explorer (I'm all for clever use of whitespace - emphasis on: clever). Down with those grandma-style ginormous icons. Bring back the "+" and "-" on the explorer tree.. those fading micro arrowheads are just too slow ang counter productive (at least make them static).
Did you just write that for attention? Have you tried Vista?
I'll agree it has some compability issues, many of which are bening worked out.
I'll also agree that if you have a garbage computer, you will not like how it performs. Also, those with their Core2Duo, Core2Quad who complain about this simply need to take computer courses. If you do not know how to maintain a computer, then don't expect to get much out of it.
I maintain my PC, no heavy brainwork required. I Have Vista Uitimate, yet boot up in
Less than 60 Seconds, full functionallity. My *impressive* specs:
- Socket 478 mobo (Circa. Feb 2004)
- 3.0GHz Pentium 4 CPU
- 2GB DDR RAM (400 MHz)
- GeForce 6600, 256 MB DDR2 (AGP 8X)
* It wouldn't hurt if ppl made sure they had a decent PSU and proper air flow aswell.
Many of Vistas problems (those which everyone whines about, yet I have had none of) will probably be worked out in the service pack update.
@ Don Wilson
It looks ugly because the classic theme is basically the same UI you used in Windows 95 genius.
Bash, bash, bash - But you continue to use Windows..
actually, the classic UI in vista is unfinished, isn't polished at all, contains icons and elements from early betas of Vista and IE 7, and looks significantly worse than Windows 95 ever did. who's the "genius" now?
@ falconer
Well, I guess it makes you the genius then. I've had vista months before it was released and I've played around with things, so I would consider I've seen enough.
The classic theme, my genius friend, is the same Windows 95/98 standard BS that you would also see in XP's classic theme. Maybe this does have the odd Vista twist, but is is the same game, different box.
everything*
Remove: DRM, Windows Media, Internet Explorer, Windows Security Center, Windows Genuine Advantage.
Add: Ubuntu.
Yeah, basically.
With compiz fusion, of course. That really was wiiiiiide open for that.
I dual boot Ubuntu and XP. I know what I like. Vista would not be it.
...even if they open sourced it, it couldn't save it's sorry butt. I can just see Linus taking one look at it, laughing a little, taking the drivers, throwing the rest of the code at the wine project, and sanitizing his hard drive ;)
I know I would.
The biggest problem with Vista is the one that Microsoft can least fix - driver support.
Even after all this time, there's still a lot of (even brand new) hardware I own that doesn't support Windows Vista.
Maybe Microsoft could bribe (or offer "incentives") to manufacturers to release Vista drivers for all of their hardware less than 3 years old. And make sure the drivers actually work properly.
Other than that, I think the "Ultimate" edition should actually be the only version on sale. Price it at the same as Home Premium and then at install time give the option of installing a "basic", "regular" or "expert" version of the OS.
It would save a lot of shelf space and confuse consumers less.
How about the price, $350 for Business and $400 for Ultimate! It's especially ridiculous considering that Vista is revamped and over glorified Windows NT.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_NT
Ye, why bother changing it, XP works and Vista dosn't, simple. Use XP you get more done faster. Vista needs to come with a special Vista PC that can handle its clunky eye-candy code. Personaly I don't want eye-candy when I'm trying to work, just want to get it done ASAP.
64 Bit Digital Audio Drivers and drivers for my USB Toaster/Teapot
WOW another biased article! Vista needs a lot of work, and so does the journalistic integrity of Engadget.
I thought engadget was more of a blog rather than an unbiased objective technology journalism outlet.
I think by change they meant improve not downgrade.
"I thought engadget was more of a blog rather than an unbiased objective technology journalism outlet."
Every time someone questions Engadget, someone else trots out that excuse.
I could be wrong, but I at least _think_ I remember a time when I could come to Engadget and read about cool gadgets and reviews thereof. Sometime in the last year or so Engadget seems to have become infected with blog-poison: "sarcasm makes us cool and so does bashing everything".
So while Engadget may just be a blog, for a while there it felt like it was something more.
Engadget's more of an apple shill--dont go accusing them of lacking integrity.
Since when were blogs supposed to have journalistic integrity?
And I think sarcasm and bashing things do make them cool. I think that it's very important for the bloggers at Engadget to be critical of technology unless it's flawless, so the people who read the blog know what products to buy and what products not to buy. I feel that it's also important to do it in a funny, sarcastic way to make it a bit easier to read. If you want unbiased reports on technology, go look at a consumer reports chart. This is a blog, not a news report.
Well unfortunately bias is a fact of life in an industry (and real life for that matter) where there's at least two of every offering and nobody seems to be able to get by liking or using both. If you think you're getting bias here then subscribe to the Slashdot news feed and watch the Microsoft, Linux and Apple fanboys battle it out to the death.
Biased ain't so bad, it is the damn flame bait that's showing up everywhere that's the problem.
"I thought engadget was more of a blog rather than an unbiased objective technology journalism outlet."
"Every time someone questions Engadget, someone else trots out that excuse."
Every time someone questions Engadget, God kills a kitten.
Like Alexandre said: everything :)
Actually, better yet, I would make it more like Apple :D
Just like I would make http://www.Google.com results to be shown like http://www.PeekStr.com results ;)
interesting, this PeekStr has a great idea! thanks for the link.
You're welcome. It still has some shortcomings which actually come from Google Ajax itself. Basically, the results are not identical to those obtained from "regular" Google search but it's the idea of viewing pages there and then that matters I think.
Unless Google Ajax API improves a bit I think http://www.PeekStr.com will probably switch to Yahoo Search API to get more results per query and thus be more usable. Anyway, its new and it can be called a concept at this point, we'll see :)
Thanks dude. i have never visited that site. I also like that preview view. I was using a fire fox plug-in sometime ago to get a small preview in google search results.
thanks again
I think I'm incredibly cynical that I just imagined you going to the lengths to register 3 Engadget accounts to pull that off. I'll put it down to the general unhappiness that Monday morning is approaching.
@PeteC
If you knew me, trust me, you would know better. I have one and only one account where ever I go. [porn sites don't count ;)]
Snap.com seem to do a better job of that than PeekStr, it's faster and more polished.
Evan
@Evan
Last I checked they were using screenshots and not live pages to view.
And some pages they had cached but still nothing live.
Remember, PeekStr is just a concept, it's NOT a release or anything. Its just one guy and his idea created in a few hours.
Replace it with OS X?
no, i have a better idea. change only the NAME to OS X so it will sell to apple fanboys....
How about no? I love OS X, but I need windows to make fun off! >=D
Really though, change the UI it is really really tacky, I know I can change it back to the old XP or what not but then why would I buy Vista? There isn't that much on vista you can't find on XP and XP is a really great OS!
Well, XP *is* a really great OS, right. But was it that way from the start? NO! It's taken a couple years of updates and development to make it run the way it runs now. I remember when XP first came out... it crashed every day, my internet didn't work right, installers failed all the time, etc... I almost switched back to ME (gasp!). But now, I have had NO trouble with XP in the past six months. Vista will be the exact same way. Give it a year. It will become the primary Windows OS in use, companies will stop supporting XP, XP will be phased out by the schools, libraries, etc. But it will take time.
@"replace it with os x" comments: *yawn*
More "fanboy" comments... Lame.
I'm using Vista, and I'm actually fine with it. I do have a problem with my DVD drive, and that's it. Others, I have all 64-bit drivers for everything, and I don't see what the big deal is.
I would prefer these things, however.
1) Give us more Ultimate Extras! What did I pay for?
2) Not requiring me to upgrade my RAM, graphics card, and processor to have a speedy system like I did with XP.
3) Make the transparency effects even more transparent.
4) Force Adobe to release flash for IE 64-bit.
5) Let me move my Favorites folder to a different drive and still let me create favorites.
6) Make the UAC less annoying, especially when renaming files and move files.
7) Improve compatibility with games released before Vista.
I am fine with Vista. What really cracked me up was when Engadget said XP was reliable. I have had 3 XP machines and all of them became slow and unusuable but not because of spec, XP itself.
I agree that Adobe should push out the 64bit flash already, but my Vista rig is great, I built it making sure all components played well with Vista and they do. It is speedy and reliable. Plus I got to buy the OEM at 1/3 of the normal cost, at the expense of installing on multiple machines, which I don't need to do.
Engadget get off your high-horse and go lick Jobs arse, that's what your good at.
How hard are you pushing the software? I run some fairly high end apps and from my perspective Vista is a total POS.
all my hardware lists as compatible too, and while I have not had the OS that long, already I have had at least 3 total input lockup - power button doesn't work - pull the power crashes, one of which necessitated a full clean reinstall with major data loss. Regular OS crashes happen weekly, sometimes multiple times a day. It seems anything that pushes the OS hard, particularly in the graphics arena, will crash the thing.
Great comment. I'm running Vista Ultimate x64 with no problems at all. All drivers work great and system is just as stable as my XP build. All of the games I run work without issue and I have yet to find a program that has issues with my build. Overall I'm fine with Vista. It may not be the greatest thing ever, but I don't have any problem with it.
I do agree with several of your points:
1) Give us more Ultimate Extras! What did I pay for?
4) Force Adobe to release flash for IE 64-bit.
6) Make the UAC less annoying, especially when renaming files and move files.
@bombastinator: You say you're running high-end apps on Vista and that, IYO it's a POS. So, what high-end apps? I'm running high-end apps too, and I have no problems with it at all (64-bit Vista Ultimate). I'm also running 4 GB of RAM and the top of the line video card. Horsepower helps, but simply because the OS works better with better equipment, doesn't make it a POS.
Make it follow standards that aren't contrived by MS.
Remove all DRM.
Include Firefox/Opera options on install.
Include any kind of options on install ... (I don't want all that crap in my build. Why should I have to take it out after it's been installed?)
Tighter code, more open, don't gimp OpenGL by layering it on DX.
Smaller memory footprint.
Open and documented standard APIs.
Did I mention standards?
I agree wholeheartedly except for the opera/firefox bit.. others peoples products .. wtf?
The last thing windows needs is to become more like OSX. More scalable in terms of performance and a bit more open and it will be fine.
Personally, I hope they *don't include Firefox as an option to install. If they do, it could mean that my favourite browser will beocme the most targetted browser, hence making it more secure.
...And I think I'm still the *only* one that actually likes Vista who is not a fanboi (there are MS fanbois?! o.O)
For me, I would like the following changes: -
No big price tag please
More stability with core components (Win Mob Dev Cntr, I'm looking at you)
Less resource hungry
More customasation without third party apps
Better search function (It's better, but not fantastic)
Better updating... My AV updates important stuff without asking, why can't you, Vista?
Thanks, I know MS will never listen, but a stab in the dark is better than none :p
It's a well known fact security through obscurity isn't really security.
You might wan't to read up about Vista and OpenGL. Considering that half your list is devoted to criticizing the way MS handles open standards, it would really help your credability if you weren't completely wrong on the one actual example you used.
File transfers!
After a month of taking 3 minutes to transfer 5k files (that's five KILOBYTES) back and forth I just ditched Vista and switched permanently to linux. Couldn't be happier.
They just fixed that this Tuesday, bud. Run Windows Update.
Link to the update? I know the 2 updates that were leaked supposedly had a fix for file transfer speeds but I just reinstalled vista and got all the updates and I'm still only seeing 5.5MB/s when transferring over the network from an XP machine on a 100m network. I routinely get 10MB/s on the same network from xp to xp machines.
The updates aren't available on Windows Update yet but you can manually download them from MS.
kb938194
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=ae2f819d-c33d-48db-a7e3-62eef7c1f7c2&displaylang=en
kb938979
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=3FB80BB9-D832-425B-B42C-D3EB2071BBEC&displaylang=en
Fixed it THIS TUESDAY? That's just unacceptable.
If they released that fix this Tuesday, then the operating system wasn't ready for release until this Tuesday (which isn't to say that it is, now that the fix is out).
"and so does the journalistic integrity of Engadget."
How many times does it need to be said? This is a BLOG. By nature, every single post is an opinion post - this is not a news site. If you haven't figured that out by now, then you need to read a dictionary and look up the definition of the word "blog".
About Vista, MS needs to throw out the baby with the bathwater on this one. This OS is a complete and utter failure. I ran the beta and I've tried the final OS and I am *never* upgrading fully to Vista after my experience. It's just conceptually flawed from the start, and the code base itself is a buggy mess. I'm sticking with XP, and I'm "downgrading" any new machine that I buy to XP.
I don't know how MS could fix Vista, honestly. I'm not sure it can be fixed without a ground-up redesign. That probably means waiting until the next OS from MS... if there is one. And I'm not convinced there will be - even MS has talked about getting away from these huge OS projects. After the failure of Vista, they may want to hasten whatever change in plans they've been contemplating.
Like I said earlier, it may be just a BLOG, for at least a good year or two it seemed like it had become something MORE than JUST a BLOG. Some of us need these reminders that in the end, Engadget really is JUST a blog after all.
Pity, really.
@ Mark
Is it Vista making your Caps lock key turn on and off like that?
I completely agree with you! I can't stand Vista! Btw, if you buy a computer, make sure to check the manufacturer's website for XP drivers. Some of them aren't doing drivers for xp now even though there is demand for it... :\
The computer industry is becoming very frustrating.
@chezzo
Funny you would mention that, one of the only problems i have had with vista is that it kept switching me to a French keyboard layout in the middle of typing something, and I would have to restart to get it to go back to the English layout.
Just wondering: "I am *never* upgrading fully to Vista after my experience." So you plan to partially upgrade? Anyway, I am enjoying my vista, and agree that they need to release more stuff for Vista Ultimate. However, my computer runs fine with Vista. I like the new search feature, it's much better, and while there are still some problems with usability, it's a huge increase over XP. People need to quit automatically complaining just because everyone else is. Try it- you may actually.... should I say it?.... !like!.... vista.
Vista greatly reminds me of another MS failure....Windows ME
Unless SP1 for Vista can somehow completely overhaul Vista, and they lower the price, it looks like Vista is just going to go the way of ME...just pushed under the carpet and forgotten. Yet another bastard child of MS that we try not to talk about.
As for what to change...
WinFS...PLEASE!! :D
Have the PowerShell built in.
Quit it with the pop-ups already!! Just be smarter about it.
Kill the sidebar...I want every bit of screen real-estate I can get.
Just plain improve stability.
There's a lot more I'm sure but I haven't used it much yet.
ADD PRE-PORN LOADED WITH VISTA SO WE ALL CAN ENJOY IT RIGHT OFF FROM THE BAT. yayyyY!
The pro-Mac bias is REALLY starting to get old. I'm not a MS fanboy, but I'll admit I did purchase Vista at launch. Why? Because I had to build a new PC and completing a build with the most current OS made sense. As for your observations, the only one I can agree with is the lame privelages granted to me by being part of the "Ultimate" community. I have a large MP3 library and it has crashed the WMP ZERO times. Administrative popups were not an issue after the second or third day. Even if they still reared their head, just disable them. Anyone who reads this site should be savvy enough to know how. I had more BSODs with XP than I have had with Vista. I also had more driver issues with XP. Hell, my mom's HP all-in-one printer didn't even need a bloated 22MB HP driver because Vista picked up. Up to and including the fax and scanner.
The majority of posts in the last six months belong on TUAW not here. For a fair and balanced perspective on the iphone, everyone should go check out Maddox's latest post.
I may have missed something here but the article hasn't mentioned Apple or suggested switching to Macs. All I noted was that Vista isn't very good in its current form and that XP is more mature, which isn't terribly surprising. Honestly, I don't recall having read an opinion that differed very much from this so I don't see why the article is being acused of bias towards Apple. Might as well accuse it of Linux/FreeBSD/(*insert other OS here*) bias.
I know "replace it with OSX" isn't constructive but Vista needs to be made by a company that approaches it's market more like Apple. Hungry. MSFT has lost the hunger. It's dying like many big corporations who peak and look for the next lighting strike.
Vista needs to be replaced with an inventive totally new approach to desktop computing that can bridge the gap from XP. Not easy but that's what Vista was billed as, it ain't.
Apple angered a lot of it's user base when they transitioned from OS9 to OSX and from PowerPC to Intel. But they embraced the change and worked with developers to make these big leaps successfully. MSFT is so afraid of losing that imprisoned user base to Linux or OSX that they aren't willing to make great leaps of change. It's time for a leap of faith on the part of MSFT and not just ripping off one feature at a time to create a compilation of crap with a pretty package.
"Vista needs to be replaced with an inventive totally new approach to desktop computing that can bridge the gap from XP. Not easy but that's what Vista was billed as, it ain't"
Hopefully this is what Surface will do,, but i'm not counting on it
I don't think ANYONE will spend $10000 on a Table that has a broken OS.
Surface isn't going to change shit.
Microsoft will kill it soon into it's manufacturing because it'll sell horribly.
It already IS just like OS X, can't play any games, crash-prone resource absorbing and totally unnecessary over-done GUI, proprietary closed source technology, what's the difference: User base, that's just about it.
I couldn't agree with you more dan. Well said
I have a 4 year old laptop and I don't have any problems with Vista. I can't fully utilize all the features that make it better than XP but the ones I can aren't crippled. Most of the problems that people keep bringing up have been fixed and a lot of it is stuff they don't even understand.
I'm currently running Vista, and i have to say, I really don't see too much wrong with it. Nowhere near the amount people claim anyway. When i first upgraded i did have my doubts, and it took a few hours to get everything up and running properly, but once i managed that, it's been fine. Compatibility problems with certain products can be annoying, but it's a new OS, you've just got to give it time, and soon enough everything i need will be Vista compatible.
Make it lighter weight and reduce the hardware requirements, I would like to do more with my computer than run the OS I am sure other will agree. Give us a setting to keep it from asking if I am sure I want to do something (change a setting, open a file, etc..). Price Ultimate around $200 and home at $100. Or better yet, just offer ultimate for $200 and XP home for $80 because I see no difference between Vista and XP home except price.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116213
Shave about $110 of the retail price for the full version, and make ONLY 2 versions like they did (originally) with XP.
Fewer memory hungry apps. No more DLLs. No more drivers (Why can't they make it so one driver fits all versions of windows back to win2k?). Same old stuff.
I like Vista's simple image manipulation. The fact that I can right click on a photo and rotate it, without even opening the file is cool but, so far, that seems to be the "coolest" thing about it. I don't remember if you could do that in XP or not.
I really do like Vista and I'm wondering what you guys have screwed up that makes you want to go back to XP. I can say that I absolutely would not go back to XP.
Yes, you could rotate a photo with XP in the Explorer environment. I do wish they would bring back PowerToys, well, I only really wish for one, that you could compress and resize a photo with a right-click. I would've thought it would've been built into Vista.
I agree with everyone on the Ultimate bs. What exactly did I pay for? Dreamscene is kinda cool, but I've got a dual 24" screen setup, and even with my 8800GTX it's only more of a novalty that I quickly replaced with my high res static wallpaper.
Make it Open, and get rid of the DRM and "Secure Video Channel" crap.
...and no, I would not make it like OS X. OS X is like a private little sandbox where only a few can play. It's a nice sandbox, don't get me wrong (I may eventually pony up the dough for a Mac book Pro. But it's a private sandbox all the same. Seriously, do Mac fans have no desire to mod their computers into something completely their own? The other day, I saw a picture of an Optimus Prime PC that stood like 6 feet tall. Silly, yes. But I appreciate the desire to create something new and different. I seriously get a kick out of Apple's line "Think different". Yeah, as long as "thinking different" gets you into the Apple store buying stuff. "You can have any color you want, as long as it's Silver" - Steve Jobs take on a common Henry Ford quote.
Honestly, no. Too much hassle since I used to build PCs and got fed up with it. If you want to mod a Mac then it is possible but I suspect that most people are generally happy with the designs and just want to get on with things. I should note that I'm a laptop user so my choices are limited even in the PC world (aside from custom paint jobs or the like) so a good base design is all that I need in this respect.
I agree with Mac being too proprietary. I'm taking the dive into Vista soon. But as far as OSX v. Windows. Windows may crash from time to time for really odd reasons but at least I don't get that GODDAMNED "cannot write to disk" error like I do in OSX. Leopard will be nice, but unless Apple has fixed some flaws that were in Tiger I'll take my chances with the BSOD. Hey at least I know exactly what went wrong when Windows craps out.
My computer can't even run Vista, but runs XP great. When I get a new one the first thing I'll do is install XP because the new features in Vista just aren't woth the performance hit to me. They would have to make it run faster before I consider buying it, and that isn't very likely to happen.
If they made it play better with BF2 and STALKER I would be happy, seeing as those are the only problems I have had with it. As far as I can tell the big issue is other hardware and software makers cant get drivers made for Vista fast enough or just don't want to. Maybe they should send some thugs to those companies to get them off their asses.
They REALLY just need to listen to the apple folks though, and just close down shop for now...I guess. The world is only big enough for one OS. Why not an Apple product, for a change. Then MS can come back years from now as the inferior fringe underdog, in a world where everyone hates Apple'$ OS-$, and take the throne back.
Hi! The problem with STALKER is low virtual memory, if you're having trouble with it crashing out during saves. Kick your virtual memory up (I just set mine to four gigs) to solve the problem - STALKER doesn't actually need more, it just needs to see that it *could* have more. It's a horribly written game, I'm afraid.
I have Vista, I love Vista. Thats all I need to say.
I agree. I run a dual boot system (XP and Vista) and after 3 months of Vista, I cringe to even think of booting XP.
I really wish this thread wasn't polluted with closed minded individuals that don't use Vista. That's like me criticizing .. BeOS.. or some other OS I haven't used. (My old iMac was a piece of junk, BTW. I had absolute zero functionality to match my iToaster)
So for the sake of Vista being able to be brought up in a room without the iSheep rolling their eyes, I submit these two suggestions:
1) Give more kernel updates. Vista on my machine is very fast! But there are some quirks that rear their ugly head and cause annoyances. These small quirks are causing Vista to have a bad name. Go ahead and get the kernel more streamlined.
2) Just for those people out there who don't know how to handle the popups, have a "slider" to allow you to adjust your level of paranoia in some configuration window.
I wouldnt charge $400+, that's for damn sure.
In the same situation, I suspect you would - or your shareholders would bail.
Actually, in the same situation, I wouldnt. In my estimation, it is better to sell 4 copies at $100 or 2 at $200 than one at $400. $400 price tags promote piracy, and provide the motivation for breaking your DRM. Additionally, $400 is too steep a price to gamble for most consumers who are unsure their systems will even run Vista. As Microsoft, I'd rather sell 4 Vista's than 1, as I would be able to maintain my market share at that pricepoint.
The only problem i have with vista is its lack of the ability to monitor a line in, you cant plug in a mp3 player for example to a line in and have the sound playback on your computers speakers (7.1 surround in my case) other than that its actually been very good to me, i do miss the photo album view in explorer tho...
Are you sure you can't? I didn't try it as I don't have a devide to hand, but on my system if I go to Sound control panel > double click my device on playback tab > levels tab in popup, then I do see a slider for line-in currently muted.
Turn into DOS v.5
I like the sidebar, but if you don't just turn it off. Or is it too hard to exit and deselect "Load sidebar when windows starts". If it was Apple who included the sidebar you'd say, "This sidebar is rad, why can't MS invent something this useful".
If Apple invented the sidebar, it would actually work.
I like the sidebar, but if you don't just turn it off. Or is it too hard to exit and deselect "Load sidebar when windows starts". If it was Apple who included the sidebar you'd say, "This sidebar is rad, why can't MS invent something this useful".
Less is more. Vista feels too bulky. Every component should be optional. The newer operating system should not be over 10GB installed and is slower than the predecessor.
if microsoft releases a vista service pack to do the following, i'd be happy...
- less bloat (vista runs like a dog compared to xp)... need a "super lite and speedy" mode.
- one click to disable all the vista security warnings. an os should not endlessly annoy its users with warnings, pop-ups, dialogs... xp feels secure enough.
- more drivers.