"Why should you upgrade to Vista?"

[srochford]

This week's Technet flash is a special with the above title. One of the sections concerns performance - "There is another perception that Windows Vista underperforms in every area of the system when compared to Windows XP. "

 

It's worth looking at it and watching the video. This is a classic of how you can prove anything you want with statistics. What it's supposed to show is that Vista copies big files much faster than XP. What it actually shows is that if you have Vista machines on your network, they will trash the performance of your XP machines!

[Michael]

To be honest, I really couldn't care if Vista outperforms XP in network file transfer. Vista needs much more powerful hardware to run efficiently and under performs XP in most other tests, which is a backwards step.

 

Microsoft are missing the point completely which is why although Vista sales are high, actual Vista machines in use is totally different.

 

Time costs money which is why Vista adoption at enterprise level isn't happening. There are still too many application and driver compatibility issues I read everyday, which in practice means more testing and testing again.

 

I mean for example, what benefit has it brought renaming Program Files and Documents and Settings directories? Will Vista make my workforce work faster because everything's animated? The answer to all these questions are either no or none. If Microsoft had concentrated on compatibility between XP and Vista then Vista would be used more often than it actually is.

[sparkeh]

Microsoft are missing the point completely which is why although Vista sales are high, actual Vista machines in use is totally different.

 

QFT!

 

Vista figures are vastly inflated and everyone knows it (well people in IT I guess).

 

E.g. Sixty new machines at school, sixty Vista licences sold, sixty copies of XP installed under downgrade rights. Which figure gets counted in the stats?

[srochford]

I mean for example, what benefit has it brought renaming Program Files and Documents and Settings directories?

 

I think that's about the only thing which is worth having :-)

 

I've had so many programs which have problems with folder names that have spaces in them but this isn't going to make me change to Vista!

 

MS could also have fixed that in XP - pretty sure you can choose where "D&S" goes with an unattended install so you could have something similar to say "program files" is actually called "programs" etc.

[Diello]

Umm... Vista totally b*ggers your file transfers!!! That's one of the biggest things against it for crying out loud!!

[Michael]

I agree there are always workarounds, but that's why I wrote time costs money. You're having to fix things which should of been left well alone.

 

And I actually remember reading that one of Microsoft's goals is to maintain compatibility with Vista. Too little, too late, but nevermind. Microsoft clearly didn't see it a problem it would break thousands of applications. A very poor decision.

 

I'm all for innovation, but there are times they just change names of directories just for the hell of it. There is no benefit!

[srochford]

Think you missed my point - I'm saying that the name change *is* a good thing (and perhaps one of the few!)

 

I've had many applications which fall over because you're trying to install them in c:\program files\xxx when they want c:\xxx or perhaps c:\apps\xxx

 

Writing scripts is also that bit more difficult - you end up with things like:

 

sFolder ="""c:\program files" & sName & """" 

 

so that there are double quotes round the folder name.

 

In this respect, Vista is a winner - but it's not a reason to change!

[Guest Guest]

^ the "program files" bit is such a pain. I try to use variables like %programfiles% as much as possible but like said sometimes software just throws a fanny fit.

 

Vista still doesnt work with some of my hardware and alot of the software i use. And according to the manufacturers theres no plans for a fix/driver/update in the near future as the performance losses are just too high for it to be a forward step.

[torledo]

i agree with steve, dropping the ridiculous documents and settings in favour of users was a long overdue move....much more intutitve and having spaces in the main folders was pretty lame anyway. Didn't realise that Program Files was renamed also, again Programs or Applications is a much better way of naming.

 

Whatever the merits of Vista, i think it's obvious M$ don't see it as their desktop OS going forward....no doubt we'll see the Windows 7 beta program kick off sometime next year, and by 2010 we may have an OS that can play nice with old and new hardware and do what IT departments want of it in terms of performance and deployment options.

 

A couple of members have given some insights into their experiences with Vista rollout following hardware refresh cycle that seems to buck the overall negative consensus toward Vista. Ofcourse too many schools and indeed organisations are not in the position to take the risk of a mixed Vista/XP environment or are unable to move to Vista wholesale because they can't afford to buy new computers througout the org.

 

I think it'll be harder to avoid getting to grips with Vista and the deployment options as a sysadmin....it would be very easy to concentrate on developing existing skills with Xp and forget about Vista, but how practical is it to not use it, becuase some companies will be using it and will continue to even after Windows 7 arrives.

[sparkeh]

Vista still doesnt work with some of my hardware and alot of the software i use.

 

Its not so hot on hardware that is supported. I tested it out on my desktop at home which easily matched recommended specs and all devices have Vista drivers. The experience was less than encouraging.

 

*10 minute boot time comprising of about 1 minute to load up and 9 mins of black screen before displaying login screen. This was related to gfx drivers continually falling over. Strangely the cylce always lasted about 10 mins.

 

*Frequent BSOD, rarely see this anymore with XP.

 

*Every boot something happened to the sound card. Initially it couldn't find it at all. Bizarrely this was solved by sticking in a second sound card. The new card was never detected but then the original one was?! However the drivers had to be reinstalled after every boot.

 

*Network card drivers would suddenly disappear during a session. Checking device manager would show the card as an unknown device. Needed reboot to solve.

 

*Shutting down would take anywhere from 5 mins to and remarkable 30 mins. Just had the blue thing spinning and telling me it was shutting down. Not installing updates or anything.

 

XP is back on it now and everything is rosy.

[farmerste]

the thing that has really pi**ed me off about vista, from a school/library type environment, is that microshaft still have absolutely no idea what, or how computers are used in school, and what is required, thats why you have to buy loads of additional software from other manufacturers, and spend ages 'hacking' their software in order for it to be suitable for use with children, or anyone with learning disabilities.

 

They have learnt nothing, but they are too arrogant to ask !

[Andrew_C]

and by 2010 we may have an OS that can play nice with old and new hardware and do what IT departments want of it in terms of performance and deployment options.

Sorry, but what have you been smoking? The last thing WinTel want is for you to be able to use old hardware. If you could do that you wouldn't upgrade, and the share prices would fall. End of!

[torledo]

Sorry, but what have you been smoking? The last thing WinTel want is for you to be able to use old hardware. If you could do that you wouldn't upgrade, and the share prices would fall. End of!

 

so all this we've been hearing about a modular OS is wide of the mark....

 

also, microsoft could quite easily not have bothered with Vista, and instead continue to ship new pc's with xp as the OS tax....it would have made no difference to them, may even have saved a few billion in R&D and marketing. For that matter i don't think sticking with xp on new machines would have hurt intel or the OEM pc builders a great dea either....after all very few companies bought new pc's purely so that they could run vista. If xp was the preinstall of choice it wouln't have changed their purchasing decisions.

 

Success in the enteprise has always been about retaining customers and offering value added i.e SA, professional services, selling a wide breafth of apps... M$ practically give the OS away for many large customers and education orgs.

 

there's other value in upgrading new hardware irrespective of what OS is being used, reduced power consumption and new fangled lights out mgmt of new intel pc's are important enough features to contempate a hardware upgrade before even thinking about Vista.

Edited June 6, 2008 by torledo

[andyrodger50]

renaming Program Files

 

I have a Vista test machine, and Program Files is still called Program Files. Not sure why it changed on your install of Vista!

[ifrit1066]

History so far

windows ME (More expence) best feature: recovery

Windows XP (xtra profit) best feature: works

Windows Vista (visually is sweet, technically awful) best feature: comes in a nice box

 

Recently i turned the tap feature of my mouse pad( laptop) and after installing an update it resets the options and changed how to access the option. At the moment im abit antiVista. School is getting new comps in the summer and guess what, its a time of fear.