Microsoft admits Vista failure

[poopypoo]

Well, I'm not a huge Vista fan, but MS does what it needs to. I think they gauge the consumer's desires accurately -- your average home user wants something as close to turnkey as possible -- one package for all their desktop application needs. And they don't want to learn anything. Just, by and large, this is what I see. I agree with Frank and others that an OS has no place being this -- that MS's greatest flaw for me is thinking that they should do a bit of everything -- but thats where being the top public company takes them. As is, Linux is perfect for people with brains. The digital driver signing and DRM of Vista are annoying. The reliance on a quality 3d adapter is not an improvement. The ever-escalating cost of replacing working stuff with less-working stuff is not exciting. However, none of this is MS's problem, if you want to look at it that way. If I had one thing to improve about Vista, it'd be that more people would code games for money on Linux... ;_;

 

[BRiT]

Well, i paid about $140-150 for mine, so i doubt you'd pay that much more for yours, considering Norway is normally semi-expensive when it comes to software.

Do not doubt. That is the cheapest price for OEM Vista Ultimate in the US; $180 - $190 before shipping/taxes . The cheapest price for OEM Vista Ultimate is $185 on Pricewatch, $178 on Froogle, $180 on PriceGrabber, and $190 at NewEgg.

 

[Gelanin]

Do not doubt. That is the cheapest price for OEM Vista Ultimate in the US; $180 - $190 before shipping/taxes . The cheapest price for OEM Vista Ultimate is $185 on Pricewatch, $178 on Froogle, $180 on PriceGrabber, and $190 at NewEgg.

Ah, Ultimate it makes sense yes.... But why would you really need Ultimate ? Its not like it has alot of things you really need compared to say Home Premium (if you're a "normal" home user/gamer). The only thing i considered getting ultimate for was the remote control, but i can get a 3'rd party software for that, and its not often i've used it on my old w2k3 box either, like less than 10 times in total.

 

[Graham]

The best way to make Vista better is to turn it into a real OS. Most of the things it does/tries to do aren't the responsibility of an OS. Vista is an OS, with lots of crappy tools and bloatware integrated. Get rid of those.

Well. Thats your point of view. You can install vista without this 'bloatware', or simply uninstall them when it finishes. Nothing stopping you. But for the majority of users out there? It would be a marketting blunder of pretty epic proportions. If Apple were to do what you propose, it would utterly kill macOS - as it is heavily sold on iLife, iTunes, iEtc.

And make it easier for the power users and programmers to actually access the underlying and very well hidden OS functionality (preferrably through a programmable text interface)

such as PowerShell?

, while presenting the average users with a simple and streamlined interface that makes it easy for them to start and stop applications, and a bit visibility tuning thrown in for good measure.

Err. It is easy to start an application, and to stop it too you click it's icon, or it's 'x'. I'm sure you mean something else, but I just want to put into perspective what the average user needs.
Visibility tuning? do you mean things like the reliability and performance monitors that are new to vista?

Like how Linux has developed in the past years.

Most of the things users are expected to do and know when using Windows are there to tune the crappy build-in tools and mini-apps. And part of that is, because free/OpenSource software is as much discouraged as possible: they're in it to make them and their supporters the most money possible, not to make things easy on the users.

Well. It's buiness I guess.
However if I look in my start menu, I see the majority of programs I have are free. Sure there is office, etc, but for each of those there are three operas, game studio express', google earths, etc.
I'm not even going to bother with the support/ease of use/setup issues you raise. Linux is certainly improving in this respect, but just look at digi's latest post and it's hardly kittens and rose gardens.

_xxx_, read what you wrote again. I think you are letting emotional attachment to an idea get in the way of reason. I respect why linux 'zealots' are so passionate about their 'cause' - but what I absolutely can't stand is the insistence that it is the one true way. It's like a religious cult, but with an OS. I'm not saying you are one of them, but it's getting awful close. Everything you expressed as fact (with words like sane, crap, bloated, kill etc) are all your opinion. There are ~1 billion people out there with access to computers. So perhaps chances are there are people out there who want something different? Well. Thats why there are products out there that fill that need!

Personally I really like vista. I still use XP as primary OS, but in time I'll switch my machines.

 

[Kaotik]

I can't do anything but laugh at the people who are talking about "bloatware" when it comes to applications, they've improved a lot on many ends (IE7 compared to older IE's, WMP11 compared to older WMPs etc), and seriously, even if you go and replace all those programs with your personal favourites, the average joe won't. He wants to go and buy a computer that Works(TM) and plays his media (WMP) and can browse the internet (IE) etc etc. Has all the basic tools for everyday usage.

Let's take a hypotethical point - let's remove all "extra applications" from Windows. How exactly were you planning to get to internet to get all those new applications? How many Firefoxes or Operas do you see on store shelves?
Oh, but you have it on CD/DVD already? Well, most people don't.

 

[_xxx_]

Even the crappiest internet provider will deliver a CD with some of these apps, at least Firefox and some sort of media player.

And however you twist and turn it, it's a totally moot argument. Following that logic, we should have used solely IE since the Win95 days. Or how would we get into the internet otherwise?

Nothing against having those apps there, but they don't need to be active or "preferred" out of the box. If I don't want to use them, I don't want to be forced to go searching for registry hacks and other tricks to get rid of that (IMO) malware/bloatware. If I shell out money for something, I want to be able to control it - it's that simple. If MS denies me that, I'll vote with the wallet but still have the right to free speech - and will thus call them a bunch of greedy idiots.

 

[Kaotik]

Even the crappiest internet provider will deliver a CD with some of these apps, at least Firefox and some sort of media player.

And however you twist and turn it, it's a totally moot argument. Following that logic, we should have used solely IE since the Win95 days. Or how would we get into the internet otherwise?

Of course not, but most have no doubt used IE to get that Opera or FF if they want to use those, no?

Nothing against having those apps there, but they don't need to be active or "preferred" out of the box. If I don't want to use them, I don't want to be forced to go searching for registry hacks and other tricks to get rid of that (IMO) malware/bloatware. If I shell out money for something, I want to be able to control it - it's that simple. If MS denies me that, I'll vote with the wallet but still have the right to free speech - and will thus call them a bunch of greedy idiots.

Which of the "bloatware programs" eat your memory when you're not using them, exactly?

 

[_xxx_]

duh, double post

 

[_xxx_]

Of course not, but most have no doubt used IE to get that Opera or FF if they want to use those, no?

Which of the "bloatware programs" eat your memory when you're not using them, exactly?

Many unneeded services like remote registry, netbios, .NET stuff (grrrr!!!), help and support service (LOL), shadow copy, telephone service, telnet, net meeting, Messenger, system log, applog, indexing for example. And that's only XP, Vista will surely have more stuff.

It's not about the memory, but just about them being there in the first place. None of these are needed at home or at all to begin with.

Let alone the stupidity called security center with the crippled FW and nag-service ("Do you really, REALLY want to start this programm? You sure? I thought you wanted to type in 'I'm a (l)user'") and on and on.

 

[Kaotik]

Yes, it would be better of course if you could choose on installation if you want them or not, but still it's better they're available than that they're not, having .NET installed by default for example makes life easier since more and more programs are using it.

Of course this doesn't apply to all users, like you.

The Firewall, even though it won't give you all the fancy features of 3rd party firewalls like keeping closer eye on what moves and where, does a good job at what it is doing, and it is 2-way firewall now

The UAC I agree with you, they went too far with it, you should be able to control it more on what it puts it's finger on, or have "query ever 30mins" or something as long as you're logged with "admin" account.

 

[_xxx_]

It would be as simple as allowing the "power user" or "Yes, I know what I'm doing" option on install. But then MS will come with "yeahz, but how do we keep the less knowledgable group away from that?". So I don't have high hopes.


Oh, and of course the activation which I utterly hate. That to me is the biggest insult ever in the computing world.

But then I'm moving away from windows anyway, so I'll stop bitching now

 

[Gelanin]

It would be as simple as allowing the "power user" or "Yes, I know what I'm doing" option on install. But then MS will come with "yeahz, but how do we keep the less knowledgable group away from that?". So I don't have high hopes.


Oh, and of course the activation which I utterly hate. That to me is the biggest insult ever in the computing world.

But then I'm moving away from windows anyway, so I'll stop bitching now

Well, in my honest opinion you're bitching about alot of stuff that isnt a real issue.... Take activation, took me 0.0001 second, and i had to do absolutely nothing except type in the product key while installing.

All the services you mention above, can be turned off easily, and its not like they take alot of space either. The UAC can also be turned off easily enough, so it seems to me that most of what you complain about can be easily enough turned off, and become a non-issue.

 

[_xxx_]

It's not about activation requiring effort, but about it being there in the first place. To me it's an invasion of my privacy, period.

 

[chavvdarrr]

Uh oh, I haven't read the whole thread, not even close, but I'm shocked on how negative attitude some people have against Vista.

For the memory usage, someone actually did a quite good test on it

LOL
Sorry.
Make a simple test
Install XP and Vista, then start running virtual machines.
Guess which OS will run more and better ?

 

[chavvdarrr]

The UAC I agree with you, they went too far with it

it can be easily switched off through local policy. First thing to do after installing fresh Vista

 

[Kaotik]

it can be easily switched off through local policy. First thing to do after installing fresh Vista

Yes, I know, but still the way they implemented it is plain wrong

 

[Kaotik]

LOL
Sorry.
Make a simple test
Install XP and Vista, then start running virtual machines.
Guess which OS will run more and better ?

Last time I tried VMWare Vista warned that the program has known compatibility problems with it, and VirtualPC 2007 was still a beta, has it gone retail with Vista support already?

 

[N00b]

As for better memory management, nice. But it's not like anyone still uses 256 MB of RAM or such, so meh. I also don't care if my apps need 0.3 seconds longer to load either.

Well, I was actually talking about situations where you have 2 open VMWare images, several instances of Visual Studio, Outlook and IE. On a 2 GB system this workload pretty much brings XP to a halt, is slower but still responsive. Since my colleagues and me do max out physical memory (2 and 3 GB machines) almost every day during work, this is a really import and productive feature to us.
Regarding SuperFetch: We are not talking 0.3 seconds here. The improvements on startup times for often-used applications can be several seconds. So it's definitely a gain.

 

[suryad]

I would just like to point out that the increased memory usage is because of the super prefetch feature where it keeps the app loaded in memory for faster performance. I thgouth that WAS the main point for having RAM...ie to be consumed...so that hdd usage is minimized.


And for those worried about bloatware check out an app called vlite.

 

[_xxx_]

noob, I'm talking about home users, not work. I don't care what I use at work since it's well, work.