You may have heard that Microsoft is "like, totally serious, guys" about patching up
Vista's good name, and, well, so far they're off to a rocky start. After pushing up a few lackluster web ads, they've decided to trick users en masse to prove a point. They've termed the Punk'ing the "Mojave Experiment," which placed 120 regular computer users of all different OS persuasions in front of a Vista box, except they were told they were getting to look at the next Microsoft OS, codenamed "Mojave." Results of the test will be unveiled tomorrow in what are sure to be glowing customer reports. Scientific validity of this test aside, we're not exactly sure testimonials from a blind taste test are going to turn the tide of Vista ill-will, but now we're starting to sound like
Demi Moore our parents.
[Via
Techdirt]
posted Jul 28th 2008 5:09PM
10 minutes to rate an OS?
inadequate me thinks.
First impressions are important.
The keyword is "demo". Of course their not going to be able to show them in-depth features such as a networking or audio stack and new multi-task management in 10 minutes.
It just serves as a "demo".
If it takes 10 minutes to boot, that's adequate enough to rate it. If it take 30 seconds to boot and over 9 minutes to ask permission to open one program, that's also adequate.
Vista takes 10 minutes to fresh install and be at the desktop vs the 45minutes to an hour on XP
How often do you fresh install, John? You must do it often if you're worried so much about the time it takes.
I recently went from 32bit to 64bit and happened to notice how long it took to install. Took another 20 minutes to do a complete restore of all my automatic backups.
BigD(some numbers): It takes 30 seconds to turn off UAC.
I love Vista TOO :) I can't stand the morons that have never used it or try to run it on a $400 budget comp that really would only run win98 well tell me that it's a "TOTAL FAILURE". How dumb.
Why would 10 minutes be inadequate? Apple fan boys are able to rate everything ever produced by Apple as absolutely perfect and without flaws before they are ever released and just a glimmer in The Jobs (PBUH) glorious mind. They are also able to determine that everything else is utter crap before it is released and without even trying it.
So why is it a stretch to say "Hey, this is not bad" in only 10 minutes?
"First impressions are important."
Agreed. Which is why the world looks at Vista how it does, with a scornful sideways glance... "Who farted?"
... and no actors with scripts.
No kidding! This is the stupidest BS I've ever seen. The problems with Vista are not READILY APPARENT! Now, go buy a retail copy and try to install it on a 2 year old PC and get it working with all your old hardware and software!
On a new decent-spec PC, Vista runs just fine. Is it worth the ~$200 to upgrade from XP Pro? Not to me! There are just not enough features to justify it. All the primary "new" features of Vista are already available (and better most of the time) from third party software. Software and hardware compatibility have no doubt gotten better since it's launch, but it still can be a nightmare upgrading an old PC.
Also, For me at least, XP just feels a lot faster and lighter.
So the other day, I dug out an old Win98 laptop I hadn't touched in four years. It's been through it's fair share of wear and tear -- keyboard falling apart, spyware, etc.
Amazingly though, it just felt fast. Responsive. More so than XP, Vista, or even OS X or Ubuntu. Old version of MS Word booted up quickly, the menus popped open quickly, and web browser launched in record time.
Of course, it crashed really fast as well, but I was more than a little surprised that an old OS could feel that zippy. Makes you wonder how fast these next-gen OSes could be if you just turned off everything you didn't need.
Also a Windows Vista Ultimate x64 user since it was released. Rock solid stable. I'm starting to be annoyed by the Vista bashers because:
1. They never used it before for more than 1 day
2. They listen to all the "other" people that bashes Vista.
3. They complain and blame Vista if there is ANY slight problem that has nothing to do with Microsoft at all.
And UAC is NOT annoying, it is annoying because you keep doing something that changes the system directly or indirectly, which in why in first place you are not supposed to doing that. (I mean who the hell clicks on device manager, copies files into the system directories, rename files in system directories & start menu, etc ALL the time?)
Sometimes I think I'm the only one who likes Vista... oh well.
I'm with ya pal, vista works fine if you buy an adequate computer with vista pre-installed
Exactly, I don't get what's wrong with it, it works fine for me. Is it because it's not apple?
I'm with ya pals. Vista works fine if you buy a decent PC AND a licensed copy of Windows, either pre-installed or purchased by you.
Pirated Vistas are piece of crap, same as most of other pirated software. Always get licensed software, friends.
I won't let you get low-ranked on your own. I'll admit it. I like Vista, too.
But there are certainly a hell of a lot of caveats. There are some annoying new things you have to get used to (UAC is only the beginning of the security headaches). It needs some tweaking to get performance up a bit--and don't even think about it on older hardware with less than 1GB RAM...and you really want 2. Driver/App compatibility was pretty bad, but it's MUCH MUCH better now. I rarely run into a problem with it anymore.
But there's a lot to like: The file copying dialog is probably my favorite (it's the simple things in life..), Network and Sharing Center, tweaks to the folder explorer navigation, the Personal folder w/ subfolders layout (Download folder finally omfg). And yes, the damn eye candy always helps (but if you need performance turn it the hell off). I've been using it on my work laptop for a little over a year now, and I prefer it over XP...using XP now seems a little antiquated, missing features, etc.
I wouldn't recommend anyone currently using XP to go out and buy the upgrade, but if you're buying a new PC and willing to give it time, you may just end up liking it.
I love my Vista. The only problems I've run into with Vista are drivers... very little of which can be faulted to Microsoft.
I'm loving Vista.
I would agree, though, that you're more likely to get better results on a machine with it pre-loaded. It works well enough on my desktop, but nVidia's drivers for SLI on 64 bit Vista with my cards (7800 GTs) are, well, sucktastic.
Vista runs beautifully on my laptop, though, and I feel like I'm stepping back in time when I sit down in front of my desktop.
I actually like the idea of Vista, but have had problems with incompatibility & driver issues. You can blame the 3rd party vendors, but at some point MS needs to work things out.
In fact, I'm currently setting up my second Lexmark printer because the first was so buggy with Vista (frequent "loss of communication" messages) while my XP laptop worked just fine all the time.
I love vista too, and this is coming from a hardcore apple fanboy. I dual boot vista ultimate on my MBP and wouldnt use anything else. I hate xp, cant stand linux, but vista is a beautiful operating system....
and i dont care what anyone says about UAC, the first time i used a vista comp, I actually felt safe about browsing the internet and typing in passwords...
dittos... 64bit is a dream. And I can install it on whatever hardware I own, I don't have to buy it from Microsoft (or Apple).
Never had a problem with Vista. I love it. Been using it since Jan. 31 2007 (release day).
I like it too, especially as the third party drivers work now.
I'm looking at you nVidia.
My only post on this topic:
"The only problems I've run into with Vista are drivers... very little of which can be faulted to Microsoft"
Remember that when you claim to never want to use Linux for lack of software or hardware support.
That is all.
It would be great to show engadget a few of pages of how everyone is actually loving Vista...I know I do!!! And it works GREAT!
Maybe then, their Vista coverage (and Microsoft stories in general) will have a more positive spin from their fruit loving writers. BTW, most people that read your site are smart enough to pick up on your slight remarks of insult.
SO POST:
How much u love VISTA!
FTW!
I'm with you guys.
I love Vista and I'm not ashamed of it in the least. Honestly a very sweet OS that looks good and performs well on my laptop.
Yay! We're not alone! Let our voices be heard, loud and strong. The silence has forever been broken, we can use Vista freely now...
I love as well.
You must remember something.
People tend not to go "OMG IT"S FREAKING AMAZING!!!!" when stuff works perfectly... ok I lie... some Mac...fanatics/enthusiast does that, but you know what I mean.
People tends to speak up loud when stuff doesn't work. But wit their is the Internet. A person name usually varies form forum to forum, and the unhappy people (I am being general here, this is true for almost every product), will share their bad experience on many sites. So you and me, as reader sees that more people actually hate a product then what they actually are.
I'm with you guys as well. Vista Ultimate runs flawlessly on my 2Ghz machine with 1.5GB of RAM. I've used it on 1.8Ghz and 768 MB of RAM before as well, and I don't see why people complain about it being a resource hog. Worked fine for me.
But then again, I do simple web browsing and some gaming as well. It just makes me mad when people ASSUME Vista would have the PC crawling with a 1.5 Ghz processor and 512MB of RAM without even using it themselves.
Vista runs just as good as XP did when I had it on this machine, and it opens up applications a bit faster too.
Look how cute this is! All of you guys writing about how much you like Vista, how "it just works," and how you don't care about if no one else likes it.
...and high-ranking each other as well!
Cute.
Some driver incompatibility IS actually Microsoft's fault.
Well, I have an HP printer for which no Vista driver was released. But the driver for some other HP printers that was included with Vista works fine with it. However, Vista did not detect this, I had to install it manually, and I only found out through trying various drivers and getting information from a Linux printing site.
Count me in too.
Vista is the best OS i've used to date, bar none, going all the way back to the Pre-Windows days at that.
I agree hardware drivers cause much of Vista's headaches. I saw a few weeks ago that Creative Labs finally updated their Audigy 2 driver for the first time in 15 months. This came 3 months after Vista SP1 hit Windows Update, which refused to install SP1 if it detected the old Audigy 2 driver.
When Microsoft explicitly codes a hard block against installing a long-awaited service pack upon detecting the presence of your year-old driver, you know your driver support is lame.
Me likey Vista too. It has been very very good to me.
@ill trooper
Your outnumbered.
I use XP, but I've wanted Vista since just before SP1, seeing as NVidia have been working hard to get drivers working well.
"vista fanboys spotted!"
I find that vistqa should never be installed on a computer without a decent graphics card but on my laptop a inspiron 1520 ive been using XP Pro. my computer needed a fresh install so i upgraded to vista and i can say my computer has never been faster. Ilove vista now i was reluctant after all the bad reviews but my only niggle with vista is the way i have to install msi files
I love Vista and I don't know how I lived without it's Media Center.
Vista is fantastic. Never had it crash even after extensive tweaking. Never gotten a virus. UAC only pops up occasionally and takes only 3 seconds to click through. Only a few programs don't work by default but are fixed by running them in compatability mode. All the new features are wonderful and time-saving. Not to mention the OS looks wonderful. This is coming from someone who uses OSX on a daily basis at work, and dabbles in Linux frequently. OSX feels like it's too cushioned and restricted preventing me from digging deep into the OS (though my terminal was disabled by the sysadmin). The programs I need for my livliehood don't run in Linux or WINE and have no quality substitutes (yet). For know, my only choice is Vista.
I just got an hp touchsmart 2 computer, and it was the first vista computer my mom and i had in the house. She has had a vista computer at her office since vista came out. Gotta say that the touchsmart is extremely useful. It's sitting in our kitchen as a replacement for our tv. We can look up recepies, watch tv, and access our other pc's in the house and at my mom's office. It has the same processor specs as my desktop computer, which is running xp, and i've noticed that it pulls up firefox (as well as other applications) faster than my desktop. It also doesn't come with bloatware. Like none. There were about 5 icons on the desktop screen and none of them were to sign up for things.
Vista is good on a computer that was made to run it. Don't kid yourself into thinking it's going to run on a 2 year old computer. That's not the way Microsoft works.
Can't deny it, I love Vista as well. I'm a power user, as I do audio/video, and while I wasn't happy with my hardware vendors for their slow driver rollout, Vista has NOT crashed on me ever and my second machine (my testbed) is a pirated version, only cause I put everything that's junk on there (OSX, Linux, pirated stuff I might buy.), its still a trooper! I cant imagine how anyone could possibly have a true basis for hating Vista other than UAC, which I'm still not happy about, I'd rather have the option of turning it off at install, and no annoying nags telling me I need it on.
Better hope those 120 don't hear this news before tomorrow... or wait, wasn't Vista out for like over a year?
another top secret launch party in the Mojave desert.
I went to ZERO HOUR, the xbox360 launch event, I'll spoil everything:
Palmdale, CA
Hangar 703
Nothing new. I have been getting "punk'd" by Microsoft since the late 1980s.
Why dont you guys bitch about Pizza Hut's Tuscani pasta commercial that fooled new yorkers in the same way?
Carl's Jr. did the same thing.
Food is a little different than an OS. And I don't think anyone is bitching that Microsoft tricked these people.
Except they should have called it the new Apple or Google OS.. or gosh even LINUX. to really punk those fuckers!
Because this isn't an Italian food blog?
you're soaking in it!
I was reading this one article that I found on digg that showed people comparing vista and 'mojave', with a conclusion of mojave being better. I gues people are just haters.
Did ya know Charlie Chaplin was world's third at imitating... Charlie Chaplin?
They don't want Vista, then give them Vista 2 :)
How did they find 120 people that didn't know what Vista looked like? How many of those XP users got their license from a Vista downgrade?
they probably went through the list of "vista sucks" parrots on Engadget. Most of them have never seen it.
Yeah vista is great and MS should stop dissing it by releasing all those patches already.
It's a novel marketing idea, we should give them that.
that's what $100 million gets ya, apparently.
it's pretty smart, i suppose, but also sort of smells desperate to me.
hahaha yes the Win32 libraries are messy, but quite powerful. Case in point, creative uses for System Hooks.
They can try and win those disappointed with vista back all they like but i think in this case its gonna have little to no effect.
Vista was a complete waste of what... 6/7 years for microsoft, they managed to take XP and make it sexier, and add the most annoying security feature in the worlsd UAC. Great reason to upgrade... not.
Im sure ill get comments saying oh but vista is so much different under the hood, but the results are hardly groundbreaking when using it lol
Pah, what do i care lol Linux and OS X suit my needs at the moment :) Windows doesn't have anything to offer but pain lol
It's prettier than XP and has bajillions more software for it than linux and OSX, what's not to like?
And UAC is easily turned off in the first 30 seconds of computer use. Seriously. It's like complaining you don't like the default background, just change it.
@Darth Abe
Windows is old technology, its clunky, bloated and down right slow.
I wouldn't class my self as a mac fan when i say this, but OS X gets the formula right. You plug in a printer and right away you start printing lol Windows you plug in the printer, get the driver disk, install it test print, find out those drivers are XP only, start googling vista compatible drivers etc... Another example, i tried to get my bluetooth keyboard running on xp and it took literally 3 times as long to get it done, the passkey system just doesn't work lol
Id gotten so used to having little issues using OS X and Linux when i had to go back to windows breifly (ironically to fix a nic card issue with my Mum' laptop) it felt horrible. So many useless steps to get things done lol Right click on something it has to pause and think about it, have to dive through hoops to get to the network connections window to see the hardware status lol
Meh lol
OSX 10.5.4
LOL
Pah, low rank me lol
Has anyone else seen the inevitable flaw in the ranking system?
If your opinion is NOT that of the majority you become instantly low ranked xD
If you arse lick/follow mass opinion then happy days, highest ranked for you sir!
yeah ur totally right lol, windows is just a heap lol, why do all the sheep go to the OS with the most functionality lol, when will they learn lol...lolololololol and one more lol
Hate to break it to you Aaronage.. Vista's driver library is vastly larger than OSX's. In fact.. i cant remember the last time ive ever needed to pull out the driver disk when installing a printer, camera, smartphone, etc.
Why dont you try installing an 8800GTX or newer on a mac.. oops.. cant do that! No driver support!
At Aaronage I don't know what printer you have, but my HP printer and MBP, it wasn't plug in play. I had to get the MBP to manual detect it. Then again on my Vista portion of my computer I also had to choose the drivers for the printer also.
@Aaronage, you're being low ranked because you're wrong. Every printer I've plugged into Vista is ready to print within seconds. That includes old and new printers. I've not had to reach for a CD or print a test page yet. Vita has excellent peripheral compatibility out of the box.
Remember, it's not Microsoft's fault that you (and your poor mother) don't know how to use a computer.
Thanks to everyone pointing out the blatantly obvious xD
"yeah ur totally right lol, windows is just a heap lol, why do all the sheep go to the OS with the most functionality lol, when will they learn lol...lolololololol and one more lol"
Yeah people buy windows because its the only thing they think is on offer, they think a computer runs windows nuff said. They don't know of the alternatives, and until the consumer learns more about them microsoft got it good. If you think extra fuctionality includes troubleshooting then enjoy it xD
-
"Hate to break it to you Aaronage.. Vista's driver library is vastly larger than OSX's. In fact.. i cant remember the last time ive ever needed to pull out the driver disk when installing a printer, camera, smartphone, etc.
Why dont you try installing an 8800GTX or newer on a mac.. oops.. cant do that! No driver support!"
Har har graphics cards, its true a Mac can't play games! Upgrades are practically none existant! This is something i really don't like about the Mac platform, the range is very limited and it is a very very annoying lol
But hey, if i was running apple OS X would be licensed out to all x86 PC's :)
@jackem
I can tell the difference between good and bad software, hence i don't use windows :) My mother however doesn't, she uses what comes pre-loaded of the shelf.
@Aaronage
I find it funny that you complain about UAC in Vista, yet you say you're happy with Linux. Every Linux distro I've used requires you enter in your password when doing any administrative tasks - even more annoying than simply clicking a button, and its much more difficult to turn off. I'm a Linux user, but bashing Vista on a decent security feature that is less intrusive doesn't make any sense.
@aaronage
Until you've written low-level programs for Windows using the Win32 libraries or learned about how the HAL works, which I'm guessing you don't know what that even is, then don't go dissing Windows. Windows, as all operating systems are, is a remarkable piece of software. Most errors are cause by third party apps (slow system, errors, BSOD, etc). Windows itself is stable, its some of the world's dumb-ass programmers (cough cough AOL software cough cough) that kills the performance.
Sorry AOL, but its well known your software sucks. Try having a nice, SIMPLE piece of software (KISS method works wonderfully).
"Until you've written low-level programs for Windows using the Win32 libraries ... Windows, as all operating systems are, is a remarkable piece of software."
Wow, I don't know what to say about this... The Win32 libraries are the most ugly, burdensome, glitch and error filled libraries on this planet. Perhaps you were coding on a different set of libraries that didn't have the SystemParametersInfo methods and other crufty interfaces?
@MMGoalster
What can i say lol
I dabbled with Pascal when doing my a-level's. Hard, still have no idea what to do lol. Im not saying i know how everything works, that would be silly :)
I speak from others on this topic, my windows loyal IT teachers, school technicians, programmer friends all loath windows for programming.
Hell i even had a 2 hour lesson in which my teacher had a rant on windows programming xD
But i agree AOL FTL
just two weeks ago, i installed my hp officejet d135 (an old printer) and my deskjet 5740 on my Vista machine. Just plugged the usb and vista quickly detected it both. I was like, this is easier than the last time i installed both printers on my xp machine. (i had to download the drivers from hp)
@Matt,
So you have only used a Debian based distribution? Most Linux distributions I have used have a separate root account for administrative actions. Debian(and possibly other main distros but I am not familiar with them) and other distributions based on it also have a root account but you typically access it via the sudo command from your user account. However, you may also access root directly via the log in. ___________________________________________________________
As far as Vista goes; it seems as capable as any other MS OS that came before it. I must say I do like the "super fetch" memory management that MS decided to implement. Load as much as possible into cache, unused system memory is wasted of memory.
Christ Aaronage, did someone replace your punctuation with a huge bag of 'lol' you just had to use in as few posts as possible?
Your posts, they make no sense.
@JB
I've used Ubuntu, which yes is Debian based, but I primarily use Fedora. Of course you can log in as root if you want to perform a bunch of administrative tasks, but no one does that and its not even recommended. On both distros, if you want to perform an administrative task you have to enter in your password or use "sudo" from the command line (outside of logging in as root of course, which I don't think you can even do on Ubuntu). Neither of those operations are any easier than simply clicking "Allow," so I don't see how anyone can complain about coming from a Linux background (at least if they use any of the popular distros).
This is going to be interesting.
Dude no fucking way, that's exactly the same machine i had and no lie that's the same machine that made me hate vista, a HP pavilion DV2000 with 2GB of Ram and a intel core2duo chip, no lie this machine use to take about 3 minutes to boot up completely and about 1 minute to shutdown, anyone out there with this machine will agree with me, that this is one of the worse system's they could have tested the vista OS on it. Am starting to have doubt already on these test
dude. totally.
For starters, the results are already known, see http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-9998336-56.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
the Tuesday 29 thing is probably videos or interviews of the people or something
secondly, the point of this experiment is that common conceptions of vista are as often misconceptions as they are hearsay or just general ill-will towards microsoft, with this post demonstrating quite a lot of that. The fact is that vista is fine if your computer doesn't suck and does a ton of stuff better than xp while looking prettier.
/rant
so my computer sucks just because it's 5 years old?
does that mean yours does to... 5 years from now?
Hm.
Indeed, my computer will suck 5 years from now. Fortunately for me, I live in the present so I'm safe for the moment.
Yes I will admit my computer which is good right now will most definitely suck in 5 years. My second computer is 5 years old. Back then it was awesome, now it sucks. It is now worth about $100.
I put off really using Vista for a long time cause of all the bad comments, but then I tried it and really liked it, but then after a couple days I was sick of it and went back to XP. So I'm sure it'll look awesome for a 10 min demo, but idk how many of these people would want to keep using Vista.
Or perhaps a demo of any OS is more impressive than actually using it day-to-day?
I've seen demos of carpet cleaners that would pull red wine right out of white carpet.
That doesn't mean it's an informed decision to knock over the wine glass just for sport.
A ten minute demo, eh. Sounds like it was really put through its paces.
what, does everyone sit in the Apple store for 6 hours trying out OSX?
Most people buy machines based on very little - mostly looks, or shiny screens, or if they get a rebate or a free monitor. Or they pick them for certain applications, gaming ability, or product loyalty.
coffee, I've no idea, do they?
Anyway, whatever. You and the 'low-rankifiers of the apocalypse'' are most welcome to your opinion that ten minutes is enough to completely put an operating system through its paces. I'll make a concerted effort to respect it.
An opinion of Vista after using it for 10m is more valid than an opinion of Vista having never used it at all.
Good thing I didn't offer an opinion of Vista then, isn't it.
Sounds like typical PR marketing bullshit. What better way to "prove" that Vista's tepid reception was just because of the way it was marketed originally, than with some "official" "scientific" "blind test survey" of "typical" people, with hidden cameras and all. Kinda like that Carl's Jr. "restaurant hamburger" commercial, only less convincing.
maybe your "post" is "low-ranked" because it has too many "quotes" and is "dumb".
//and carl's jr burgers kick "ass"
Well.. Actors are people too. And it must have taken at least 10 minutes to learn their lines.
i'm sure to be fair, they'll show the bad along with the good reviews, right? right???
yeah, i can see why you guys low ranked this. how could i be so naive as to not blindly believe in the truth-telling of a corporate marketing department!