InsideTech

Well, Vista is more than a politician... MS is a law firm. They acquire software companies and pay people to adapt it to their OS, and MS brand the software. But does everybody know what happens when a person or company wants to demo the software? A tech spends countless hours researching what the best solution is, only to find out that by demoing the software, they are creating license issues with other MS components used in the organization. Then the MS "phone home" software kicks in and/or a disgruntled employee contacts MS. What happens next? The company has the option to pay a ridiculous fine or sign up for an exclusive MS contract stating that if an alternative exists, the company must use MS software, must agree to upgrade to the latest version of MS software throughout the organization, and give free MS advertizing on the company's website. Think this is right out of a conspiracy theory or scary tech movie? I had heard about this too, and I'm a linux guy... then i lost my last job due to the same situation - MS only company now. MS lawfirm is the greatest business in the world, maybe i could do the same with drugs... "Well, you can either pay with your life, or you can sign this contract to exclusively use my drugs for the next 10 years, and recommend my drugs to all your friends..." Way to go, MS.

"The problems with Windows Vista, Mr. Brooks accuses were due to hardware manufacturers negligently expecting Windows Vista not to be delivered on time, and then being left unprepared when it was."

Bull. Bring back my bleeding menus and get rid of those bleeding "ribbons". There's a reason the menu hasn't been "overhauled" in 20 years... that's because it *works*. Even if every other problem with Vista was fixed, I'd stick with Windows 2000/XP and Office 2003 just for that.

It's not "Vista versus Mac", it's "Vista versus XP", and even with Microsoft presenting us with a fair accompli by pulling XP from the shelves, the world is full of holdouts. I just got a new work laptop with Vista, and after 30 minutes I wiped it and "upgraded" back to XP. It's just not worth the hassle dealing with all the spam in Vista.

Mac and PC Wars......
I have been back and forth with this, I do Web design, flash, graphics, and I even write code and do networking and used to be an MCSE. I learned on a PC so I have a partiality; I also like the PC available higher-end video cards for the memory to create in. I tried Macs a long time ago and found the software counter intuitive, Quark express especially.

Well… A well setup PC can handle vista, and it’s as intuitive as XP, does something’s better and is admittedly prettier. I will say one thing I have never seen the blue screen of death not one single time with the vista system.
A long time ago I had renamed folders in XP from MY documents to just documents and pictures etc. They are much easier to find just press the first letter and you are there, Vista adopted this same strategy and it actually confused some people. This was the complaint I heard the most, I can’t find MY Documents. Change…. Sometimes frustrates. Your Documents are found in the Documents file.
I have a Desktop PC with XP and a notebook with Vista, one of my best clients switched to Mac a couple of weeks ago. He asked me to learn with him and set it up. Oh MY….
Turned the Mac on and wow it saw the wireless “N” network... so does any PC with wireless capabilities, My client was so excited by this, I was done founded by his reaction, I pulled my notebook and said look it sees it too…add the code and poof off to the internet. He wasn’t impressed, His $3000.00 dell PC had crashed one time too many (BTW it was the hard drive which dell has since fixed).
While I was sitting there and he was playing with his new toy, I connected him to the actual wired network server, from my notebook without it being part of the domain; I could see his files on the Mac…ohh crap security issues, can’t do that without permissions being set on a PC. (This has since been fixed but it took a while to figure out).
He bought “parallels” (to jump back and forth between Mac OS and XP) spent 2 hours trying to set that up, now I know why the Mac store WONT install it, It still doesn’t work.
The biggest problem I have is when you install or download anything I don’t get to choose where the file resides, it puts it where it wants then I have to hunt for it, what really frustrated me was a I downloaded a zip file, had to search to find it, found it, unzipped it, I wasn’t given a choice where it went so I lost it again, had to run search again, had to turn on something( it was a setting for exe files I think) so it could find it. Installed it and you guessed it couldn’t find it again….ugghhhh.
To make a long story short, they are computers and they are all frustrating at times, I spent 8 hours with the Mac and went home hating them as much as ever. I hated Vista when it first came out; I have to admit I LOVED XP when it came out. But its all about time, the more time you spend the easier they all get, the question is are you willing to compromise your work productivity to learn something new that may or may not benefit you in the long run. Going from PC to Mac is at best difficult, Vista is an easier pill to swallow, advertize that Microsoft.

For the record I am running Vista Ultimate on my 6 year-old machine. With a 1.7 GHz AMD Athlon 2000+ and 1GB RAM it may not ba as fast as a 64bit dual-core processor with 2+GB of RAM I LOVE IT!!!! Perhaps MS needs to talk to Vana White and buy a clue.

And by the way, If you are having problems with Vista and are not running SP1, you need to get it. I had a few issues in the past, but since SP1 my system has been 100% reliable.

I got a free copy of Vista from Microsoft's Power Together campaign with Office 07, and I was very reluctant to give it a shot, so it sat for about a year, but when I added a second HD to my computer, I figured I might as well have a recovery OS on it, and after using it 6 months or so now, I think WINDOWS VISTA IS AN EXCELLENT OS. I still use XP at work, but I hardly ever boot to it on my personal machine. The hardware requirements are not as crazy as what Apple and others would have you believe and it is a slick interface with better support for wireless etc, and a nice search function. The bad rap it gets is more manufactured than anything else by the media and Apple. Of course it is going to have more bugs than macs, but consider that Apple also only has to develop a OS for a small set of overpriced hardware which they control, and if anyone makes anything else that uses that OS they sue the pants off of them, meanwhile Windows develops for hardware made by thousands of companies. Apple=Proprietary, let's not forget that these guys took the most industry standard interface, USB, and turned it into a proprietary hunk of junk.
If you are badmouthing Vista and don't use it, or never have, then I do not consider you qualified to state an opinion on it. I have used Macs and I actually like the OS, but I cannot stand the hardware or the price tag, not to mention the support for gaming is close to 0.

I recently went to see Wall-E, the lovable little robot movie, and there was a noticeable chuckle from the audience when Wall-E rebooted. What was the sound? A MAC REBOOTING. You only get the joke if you own a Mac or are around Macs. Like I said this was not just a couple of people, but basically most of the audience, which should tell you what direction many consumers are going in.

For myself, migrating to Mac has not been without some adjustment. It is not perfect, and some things are downright annoying. But the overall comfort factor on Mac is so high, I never have to worry about my appliance computer, it simply works, it has great graphics, and it has great style.
The more time you spend on the Mac, Windows begins to really look dated, and Vista looks like Microsoft simply tried to emulated Apple's interface. I spend most of my day now on Mac and Linux. These two are the future, Windows is not. Microsoft needs to simply scrap PC-DOS, and sell apps. This is what they do best, but operating systems are not MS's strong point. Windows Vista, or whatever, is simply PC-DOS with a pretty face. Microsoft would do better to simply scrap the OS, and start over, maybe even use a free os to stage their apps on, they already have products for the Mac, they could do so much better without PC-DOS.