Is the vista beta stable enough for basic use?

[Insomniator]

I dont really do anything but surf the web and talk on aim on my computer since i stopped playin source and war3; it would be cool to give vista a try but it isnt worth it if nothing works very well.

any thoughts?

thanks

 

[stash]

That's highly dependent on your hardware, but it should be fine. I've been using Vista on my laptop (primary machine) for about a month now.

 

[Megatomic]

I think my hardware is too cutting edge for Vista. Trying to install the latest NV drivers for my 7900GT caused it to lock up with the LCD off and the power LED flashing. Plus, I had a hard time getting the damned OS to reboot for some reason. It just stayed at the desktop. I had to press the reset button to get it to reboot.

I'm going to wait a while for some better hardware support to try Vista again. Maybe Netgear will get off their asses and release drivers for my SC101 while I'm waiting.

 

[Link19]

Originally posted by: Megatomic
I think my hardware is too cutting edge for Vista. Trying to install the latest NV drivers for my 7900GT caused it to lock up with the LCD off and the power LED flashing. Plus, I had a hard time getting the damned OS to reboot for some reason. It just stayed at the desktop. I had to press the reset button to get it to reboot.

I'm going to wait a while for some better hardware support to try Vista again. Maybe Netgear will get off their asses and release drivers for my SC101 while I'm waiting.

Vista is meant for the most cutting edge hardware that can be thrown at it!! The more cutting edge, the better for Vista.

 

[Megatomic]

That's what they say. Let's just say I was much less than impressed with my first day of Vista. The constant requests to let apps run and the piss poor driver support (not Microsoft's fault entirely) ruined the experience for me.

Linux installed much easier on this very machine. Now that's just ass backwards any way you look at it.

 

[stash]

The constant requests to let apps run

What apps?

 

[Megatomic]

Any apps I try to run. And several (processes) that windows started when I went to install drivers. I can't go and do it again as I've ditched Vista for the day.

 

[stash]

Any apps I try to run.

Most apps should not prompt you. Again, it would be helpful if you listed the apps so I could possibly find out if they are known issues or something you should file a bug for.

 

[Megatomic]

stash, I appreciate the interest to help, but with no ability for me to use my NAS (netgear's fault, not Microsoft's) I'm just not feeling very interested in installing Vista again.

Maybe I'll reinstall in a few days when the interest piques me again.

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: stash

Any apps I try to run.

Most apps should not prompt you. Again, it would be helpful if you listed the apps so I could possibly find out if they are known issues or something you should file a bug for.

Since you brought it up, I'll ask... Adobe Bridge and InDesign CS2 won't work properly unless started with "run as administrator." I filed a report under Application Compatibility with the Microsoft Beta Client thing - is that the best way to notify MS of issues like that one?

 

[Megatomic]

I think that is part of Microsoft's attempt at "helping" us. I'd read all about it in the past few months, I just didn't know it was going to be such a nuisance.

 

[spherrod]

so far I've found Vista very stable on my Dell laptop - not doing anything more than E-mail/Internet and Office though

 

[jameswhite1979]

I had a early beta release and have not downloaded the latest one but I was not able to get any AV working on it I would assume this is sorted now as many of you are using it just good to know.

 

[Solema]

I also have the same problem where Vista will not reboot. I have a 6800GT.

 

[stash]

I filed a report under Application Compatibility with the Microsoft Beta Client thing - is that the best way to notify MS of issues like that one?

Yes, although most of these problems will need to be resolved by the app developers.

 

[stash]

The UAC team just posted a video that among other things, shows how beta2's UAC experience has improved since the older builds, and how it will continue to improve. For instance, deleting shortcuts from the desktop won't prompt anymore post-beta2

http://blogs.msdn.com/uac/archive/2006/06/09/624013.aspx

 

[obeseotron]

I installed it a couple days ago on a reasonable, but not cutting edge machine (single core a64, 1GB RAM, 6800GT AGP). In terms of stability I would say that it is more than stable enough for basic tasks, and I haven't experienced any crashes doing anything.

While stability is very good, performance is a mixed bag, at least with only 1GB of RAM. On a fresh install, first boot, not even with all the drivers installed Vista was taking up 700MB of RAM, compared to a little less than 200MB for XP SP2. Graphics performance seemed fine with nvidia's new beta, but the system is so strapped for RAM than hitching makes games really unplayable. I would never install Vista on a 512MB machine. Vista's GUI seemed to actually be more responsive than XP's, at least when it wasn't swapping, it looks good, though that 3D switching feature looks horrible and needs antialiasing which I can't figure out how to install.

Other random things that kept Vista from being usable day-to-day for me include the inability to set up 5.1 speakers. You can select it, but when you click test speakers, only the front two work. Windows ICS refuses to enable itself

Finally, Vista doesn't play nicely with RAIDs. I have a RAID0 array on two of my SATA ports and two single hard drives in the other two. I couldn't even get to the stage of installation that lets you load drivers for drive controllers until I disabled the SATA ports the RAID is connected to in the BIOS. The DVD would boot, say there was an error detecting disks and just hang. After I disabled the RAID, I then installed it to one of the single drives and after reenabled the RAID and installed drivers and I can now access the RAID, but this is not the way it is supposed to work