Vista sucks!

[az_max]

If I remember correctly, by purchasing a copy of Vista, Microsoft will allow you to use that purchase as a new license for an existing copy of their operating system. In other words, if you loose your XP license info, they make you purchase a copy of Vista to "authenticate" your XP copy. I know that was the case back in the Windows XP and 2000 days. 2000 was actually a pretty solid operating system from what I remember.

Yes, M$ will allow you to downgrade licenses. Businesses do it all the time. We've been buying Vista licenses for a while now, but have no intentions of going to vista any time this year.

No, most vista machines do not support xp operating system to be installed.

Huh? I'm sure 90% of the devices sold right now have XP drivers. Wipe that drive clean and install XP from cd. I have brand new Dell desktops and laptops running XP just fine. Even the IBM servers that don't have XP listed on the ServeGuide CD are capable of running XP. I installed it on a x3550 about 6 months ago.

 

[97Rover]

Before I got smart and bought a Mac, I had a VAIO and wiped it clean tried to instal xp, but the drives were different. I could not get the right drive and it voids the warranty if you "downgrade" to a previous operating system. Now I have a new never installed xp pro sp2 if anyone wants it.

 

[RBBailey]

This is really strange, of course you hear a lot of bad this and bad that about things when they come out, and MS always gets bad reviews from people even before the program comes out. But honestly, I have not had any trouble at all with Vista. I'm sitting here racking my brain to think of something, and I can't. I'm running it on a cheapo VAIO that I got for $500 new, dumped 2 gigs of RAM in it for $50, and I've been very happy. One of the things I've found is that when a program freezes, the Alt-Ctrl-Del works every time, which is a big improvement on XP. And I've never had more than one program freeze at a time.

Also, I've found that Vista and XP share almost all the same drivers. A lot of the drivers I had to go get were 2000 or XP drivers, not made for Vista, but they work just fine.

If you don't like it for whatever reason, that's fine, I don't like Mac because of a few reasons in the same way I don't like Toyota v. Land Rover.

And I believe you when you say you are having problems, but I have no idea how to help since I've never run into, then had to fix, any issues at all. I've been running Vista for 6 months now.

 

[kennith]

When XP came out, it was bloated, and still is to a degree, though we have managed to discover ways of trimming the fat over time. After a few years of patches and updates, XP has evolved into a stable, predictable operating system. I built this computer for Windows 98, and it has seen every operating system since then. I've built quite a few machines, and run everything from Windows 3.0 up, so far as graphical operating systems go. I never liked them until 98. I was a DOS person until I just couldn't stand it any longer.

This machine has never locked up. Never frozen, nor presented the BSOD on XP. The only issues I have are with programs that are just prone to issues by themselves, and even then,they just shut down, and everything else still works fine. I'm running extremely old technology in this thing, with a gale of fans to keep it all cool, everything is pumped to it's maximum ability, and it's still faster than anything on the shelf.

I recently bought a Vista machine to see what it was all about. It was a good deal on the hardware off a shelf, and the Vistal license was handy. Mind you, this was a name brand, off the shelf system.

It flat out crashed 5 times in the space of 2 hours, and wouldn't even complete a recovery installation without giving up completely and throwing up a screen I haven't seen since XP came along, the BSOD. I tried everything, and finally determined it wasn't worth a format and a warrenty claim, so I ditched it.

Even so, let's examine the hardware. It was an Athlon 64, top of the line processor, not just a cheapie 64, either. It had 2 gigs of ram, a great video card, and all the trimmings. If I were to build an Athlon 64 machine, I'd use the same specs.

It was an absolute pig. This machine, running an Athlon XP processor, smoked the pants off of it. Not even in the same class, not even a fair fight. It HAD to be Vista.

Vista is a hog. A very shaky hog with three legs and a tail halfway in the sausage machine. It should never have been.

Cheers,

Kennith

 

[robertf]

Things that I couldn't get to work with vista:

anything made by autodesk
solidworks
MS visual studio, even with the vista updates
e-prom programming and emulating equipment
pci video cards for 2nd monitor
brand new dell all in one printer

 

[Alyssa]

I use my Vista laptop and IE7 for all the LR websites, even though they specifically say it can't be done... I haven't had a problem.
I actually like Vista better than XP. I think the photo folders are better, and I really like how the internet is integrated. It's a lot more stable than XP ever was. I have only had one program freeze... just ONE TIME... ctrl alt del restarted the program, and it was back to normal. I didn't even have to reboot. Things freeze constantly on my two XP desktops. I have two complaints about Vista. #1: Updates don't seem to download automatically, even though it's set up that way. I still have to install them manually. #2: No Clipboard viewer!! What kind of crap decision was that?
PT, it's likely an adobe / flash / java issue, rather than a vista issue. Those are the most obscenely buggy programs. Java & adobe constantly crash my LR apps. I generally have to reboot, go to the website, and download the most recent version or fix.
Also, you can still buy new out of the box XP PCs. Most companies aren't ready to switch over to Vista, so they are still widely available.

 

[rovercanus]

Paul, it's not Vista that sucks, it your HP.
I run dual operating systems on my Toshiba laptop and have no problems with Vista or XP. I run multiple programs for work, mainly machine programing, autocad and the like.
We had a Compaq at work, I tried to tell them what a piece of shit it was but they had to find out for themselves.

 

[ptschram]

Thanx for the comments. I'm still trying to decide if I want to keep this machine. My XP machine had become stupidly unstable and would crash just as I got going on anything important-mainly when trying to generate quickbooks reports that my accountant was clamoring for. Firefox would shut down several times each day, usually just as I ahd finished a particularly eloquent response to one of your technical problems!
I avoided it and avoided it and finally had to get something as I haven't been able to balance my checkbook, nor pay my sales tax as I can't run the reports.

I bit the bullet and did something I rarely do, I even bought the new edition of quickbooks! I use an applicaiton long past the point anyone else does, I was running Quickbooks 2004! At this point, it looks like I might go back to it, if I can find an XP machine to make it run, I'm down to about 48 hours before I have to pay my sales tax!

The CD I want to run that I absolutely have to be able to use are the CD-ROMs put out by Land Rover that have the service manuals, parts catalogs, electrical troubleshooting manuals, owners manuals and sales publications all on one CD. Sadly, they are copy=protected by an applicaiton put out by Hexalock. I have tried to run the fix that Hexalock says will work around Vista, but either I'm not doing it right, or it doesn't work with the Land Rover disks.

While I have 48 hours to pay my sales tax without incurring a penalty. If it's not paid on time, the Indiana Dept of Revenue will send me a huge bill for what they estimated my sales tax should be. The last time I was late, they sent me a bill indicating my taxable sales that month were $3K more than my gross last year!
Clearly, it's in my best interest to get my sales tax paid on time!

When I bought this machine, I was very careful to ask how long a return period I had. I have 13 days to go! I'm hoping I can get the one disk I really need to work in that time period.

PT

 

[I HATE PONIES]

Hey P.T. I have Vista on my laptop in the shop. It will run the Rave CD with all of the enclosed manuals. It does give me the "update Adobe" message evry time. You may be able to open it with an older version of Adobe.

I have had trouble with just about everything else. Even the Norton security that came with it wouldn't work without going to their website and downloading the fix. I have given up on Kodak Easy Share. First it wouldn't run and now I can't remove it! Everytime I try to download the fix it screws up something else.:banghead:

 

[Leslie]

My office uses a lot of in-house written software, that was originally done under Win2000 but had been tweaked to run under XP... it will NOT run under Vista.... the entire state has made the decision to not go to Vista.

And, our office has recently decided to allow telecommuting, so, I'll be able to work from home two-days a week now. So, I've been looking for a new machine for home. Has to be able to run ArcGIS, AutoCAD, and our in-house software, which means, no Vista (nor an Apple either; I'm not anti-Apple anymore, but, it just can't run the software natively, and it doesn't make sense to pay twice as much for an Apple to turn around and run XP on it).

What I've learned: You can't downgrade just any version of Vista: you have to have Vista Business or Vista Ultimate, and you can bring it down to XP-Pro... you can't downgrade to XP-home nor Win2000 or anything else, and you can't start from Vista Home and then downgrade.

Dell will sell you a PC w/ XP outright until June 19th. After that date, you have to get Vista Business and have them set it up downgraded to XP-Pro. HP's small business side will send you one w/ XP, but not their home-side. Gateway won't do XP now. Toshiba only has a bottom-end one with XP on it. Alienware has one w/ XP, but you'll pay twice as much for one from them.

I've not decided which way to go. The IT folks here hate the HP's that have been coming in anymore and like the Gateways better, but Gateway can't be had w/ XP, and, XP is a requirement. Toshiba, I just can't get one configured the way I want in my price range. Dell, I swore I'd not do again, but, if it's between HP and them, I dunno yet....

I feel your pain, PT.... I'm listenin', seein' what the solution is....

 

[garrett]

The future looks bleek. First the LR3.......now this. Thanks guys. My morning is ruined.

 

[ptschram]

This is the last time I am going to say this, I am NOT talking about the RAVE disks. I am talking about the CD-ROMs that are vehicle specific and have everything but the labor operation times on them, these are the CDs you can get from the dealers as well as the parts houses.

The next person who tells me they can run the RAVE disks is gonne get a visit from me armed with the mythical broken Series halfshaft!

VMWare player is installing, if it works, I'll keep this machine, otherwise, it and the quickbooks go back for a refund.

 

[Ol'Drippy]

We only run XP-Pro within my company that I'm aware of. We have a variety of laptops here in this office alone. The HP laptops SUCK. Those things crash so much.. I've got a Toshiba Tecra which I've had to replace the screen on, but I'm rough on my equipment.. other than that I wouldn't hesitate to buy another. I got another Toshiba for the house which does run Vista but it is simply for surfing/photo management.. we don't really run any programs on it.

I just bought a Sony Vaio for the office with XP-Pro.. so far so good on that one as well

PT.. dump the HP if you can, you'll be much happier with something else

 

[ptschram]

I'm gonna shut this thing down, reboot and see what it does with the VMware player. If it works, I'll keep it. So far, it's been more stable than my old XP machine.

If it doesn't work, I'll bite the bullet and get what I really wanted, a new Toughbook with integral GPS. It will cost me half a years wages (er, skimming) but it will be more of a known entity, both from hardware and software.

Cheers,
PT

ps-Drippy, if it works, I'll have an answer for you on your power issues.

 

[SGaynor]

Like Leslie said, you can get a machine with XP loaded; you just have to go the the business side of Dell/HP. Take back what you've got, and get a new machine with XP.

I hate MS.

 

[bruce441]

Have you checked, dell sells laptops with XP, I have gotten 'refurb's from them with xp, and they've been fine. If its work critical, you may do better with a warranty, or a lenovo..some of the older metal cased ones are XP OS'd and not alot of coin like this:
http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/latit_xfr_d630?c=us&l=en&s=bsd&cs=04
if youre rolling it into business lease etc that may be nice for the shop, or a toughbook..

I just got a new Dell ATG specified with XP Pro SP2 and all my old programs are running fine. Since I use it to service industrial equipment I had to import some license. It's out there but it's a factory order.

 

[D90DC]

Paul run MS virtual PC and then install 98 or XP in the shell it will run fine in that enviroment

 

[DIIdude]

What processor are you running? I remember reading that some AMD processors were not running well with Vista, continual reboots and such. But with Intel I've heard of no issues, except that you really need to be careful if you try to upgrade the OS to Vista, then you can run into some problems, but on new machines it should run fine.

Myself, I'm typing this on a machine I built almost four years ago and have had the same install of XP Pro on it since. It just does what I need it to without any hiccups whatsoever, so... if it ain't broke I ain't fixin it.

 

[ptschram]

I have now wasted almost the entire morning downloading what was supposed to make it work.

I need a computer, not a challenge.

I'm off to sell what's left of my soul and buy another mothfukle Dell with XP on it. As much as I'd love to have a new Toughbook, the $ just aren't available to do so.

 

[ptschram]

I'm losing interest in even trying to make this thing work. I'm trying to get VMWare server to install so I can run the XP OS, but now I need to download MS IIS to make the VMWare work.

Dell will sell me a machine that looks like it would run circles around the old Dell for about $950. It's looking better every second!