is vista worth using now?

[blackangst1]

Holy triple post!

 

[TanisHalfElven]

Originally posted by: Griffinhart

Originally posted by: fleabag
People on this forum seem to be very biased towards windows vista, not sure why, whether it's the fact that "newer is better" mentality or what but it bothers me to no end. They sure love to tout how vista is so great and how they'd "never look back" yet forget to mention all the things you'll lose, the annoying shit that pops up all the time and their Orwellian environment they've propagated, progressively evolving with recent windows releases.

It's not that newer is better. It's that better is better. Vista is a better OS than XP in general. As for this "orwellian environment" you mention, I assume you mean UAC pop ups. Frankly, they don't bother me in the slightest. Maybe because I'm pretty Orwellian about what I allow to run on my system. I regularily check to see what apps are trying to autolaunch at startup, I never do normal installs because of additions to google or yahoo toolbars being installed. UAC just sort of fits in with my philosophy of wanting to be in control of what can and can't run on my PC so it's actually not a negative for me and on top of that it DOES help protect against malware in the process.

As all the things I've lost by going to Vista, care to point any out to me? I haven't found any myself. But it's a pretty consistant argument against Vista. Yet, I haven't come across any yet. Now, I'm sure there are some drivers out there that may not ready for Vista or that the hardware manufacturers have made a decision to to support under Vista but we had the same problems going from Windows 9x to Win2k/XP. I have yet to see anything nearly as difficult as that transition.

Oh and please don't say my statements are unfounded because the last thing I'd want or would wantonly do is discourage the usage of windows and subsequently become a proponent of Apple's OS.

Ok, how about unsubstantiated? You are telling us that we lose stuff, you make references to things without explination. Until you give real world examples of all this your claims are, in fact, unfounded. The truth is, most negative comments about Vista have been really nothing more than incorrect, misunderstood, or out right lies.

This isn't to say that I would recommend everyone I know to immediately upgrade to Vista. Far from it. On the other hand, I see very few reasons to have someone chose XP over Vista and many reasons to chose Vista over XP.

i can't figure out people problem with UAC. honestly i find it wonderfull to know that not everyone of my programs is running with admin/root privilage. i think most people belive its like the mac vs pc video on youtube. its NOT

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: tanishalfelven
i can't figure out people problem with UAC. honestly i find it wonderfull to know that not everyone of my programs is running with admin/root privilage. i think most people belive its like the mac vs pc video on youtube. its NOT

Funny, I thought that the video captured the essence of UAC almost perfectly. "You are coming to a sad realization, allow or deny"

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: Soviet
4. Various UI annoyances, multiple icon selection is made difficult by having a massive box around every frickin icon, try and drag a selection box from the TOP of the screen ABOVE an already existing icon, oh wait you cant do that, it just moves the icon instead of making a lasso because of that box thing around every icon. Whats the deal with the drop down navigation menu at the top of every folder, it used to show you the directory you were in in XP, now it shows some random recently visited places, its pretty useless like that.

Finally, someone agrees with me that that is a piece of useless UI.

 

[zpe]

Ya, the Vista UI feels too bloated . I'm not talking about UAC by the way. I haven't been bothered too much by UAC, not as much as I thought. It's still annoying, but bearable. Even without UAC, simple tasks take too many unnecessary clicks.

 

[Griffinhart]

Originally posted by: zpe
Ya, the Vista UI feels too bloated . I'm not talking about UAC by the way. I haven't been bothered too much by UAC, not as much as I thought. It's still annoying, but bearable. Even without UAC, simple tasks take too many unnecessary clicks.

That hasn't been my experience. While some tasks, mostly system settings, may take a click or two more everyday simple tasks are quicker. Specifically not having to navigate the program menu on the start button is a pretty big time saver. The search feature is a huge time saver.

Want to run Event Viewer? hit the Windows key and type even<enter> and it's there.
Word? Windows wor<enter>

Any app, control panel or function you would ever need to access are just a couple of keystrokes away. It's far more efficient than it was under XP.

 

[Mem]

I was using XP this morning for updates and some general use while I was downloading the updates etc..I can't say Vista feels any slower or UAC giving me any time consuming problems.

I actually like UAC (its a security feature and there for a reason,never know when a sneaky trojan might try to slip pass) and as most people have stated very easy to disable, so a lot of people are blowing it way out of proportion(like always with Vista and any new OS that arrives).

I wonder what annoying topic they are going to pick with Vienna down the road,any guesses?

 

[ShawnD1]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry

Originally posted by: tanishalfelven
i can't figure out people problem with UAC. honestly i find it wonderfull to know that not everyone of my programs is running with admin/root privilage. i think most people belive its like the mac vs pc video on youtube. its NOT

Funny, I thought that the video captured the essence of UAC almost perfectly. "You are coming to a sad realization, allow or deny"

That's the feeling I got too.

It's not just about the clicking. It actually prevents things from starting properly. It stops Riva Tuner from working on boot. It also stops VNC from working on boot. Both of them are malicious software that could potentially harm your computer allow or deny. Turned off UAC, and everything is peachy once again.

 

[zpe]

Originally posted by: Griffinhart

Originally posted by: zpe
Ya, the Vista UI feels too bloated . I'm not talking about UAC by the way. I haven't been bothered too much by UAC, not as much as I thought. It's still annoying, but bearable. Even without UAC, simple tasks take too many unnecessary clicks.

That hasn't been my experience. While some tasks, mostly system settings, may take a click or two more everyday simple tasks are quicker. Specifically not having to navigate the program menu on the start button is a pretty big time saver. The search feature is a huge time saver.

Want to run Event Viewer? hit the Windows key and type even<enter> and it's there.
Word? Windows wor<enter>

Any app, control panel or function you would ever need to access are just a couple of keystrokes away. It's far more efficient than it was under XP.

I guess I could try using search. Vista is so slow opening explorer windows. In comparison, OS X's Finder is so speedy that it's like running Windows 95 on a P4 .

The Start Menu is.... worthless. Even on an X2 3600+ with 1 GB it's slow.

 

[imported_spike99]

Yesterday I did 2 things, unistall Nvidia firewall and unistalled video driver... and then only installed latest beta video driver.... since then... I have been playing various COH games... and no problems.... There were times where I was like.... Oh Oh, I think this may be the time for game to crash... but the gods heard my prayer It did not crash at all... Hell, I can even start Crysis from 64BIT folder now... Man this is great... !!!
And very special thanks to Mem !!!!

OK, here we go again!!!! Same problems as before.... when playing AOE III, I'm getting BSOD, and playing COH... it is crashing all the time....

I really thought I had fixed all my problems after uninstalling NVIDIA ForceWare Network Access Manager . I really did not have any problems until today.... and I have not installed anything new on the computer....

The only thing I can think of... is to take my video card into a computer shop and have them test if there's a problem with the video card.... If not then It's a problem with VISTA.

There is one thing weird that occurs when I turn my PC on... I have Everest Ultimate (monitors CPU temp) and it when it starts it attempts to load drivers and it basically gets stuck and unresponsive... I assume that it gets stuck loading video drivers... Also, other software were also getting stuck including IE & Firefox. I had to re-install several times video driver before this got resolved.... But I'm still getting alot of crashes playing games !!!!

If anyone as any suggestions, pls let me know....

I'm definitely getting fed up with all these video driver problems...

Thanks in advance for your suggestions.

 

[rchiu]

Originally posted by: Mem

I'd hardly call it a "minimal" cpu usage hit, it's a pretty big hit when you're going from a highend Xfi soundcard to integrated sound. Not to mention you're not getting any of the features your soundcard has when you use vista.

I hate to burst your bubble but X-FI accounts for less then 1% sales World Wide on the PC when you take into account onboard sound and other sound cards,so frankly the minimal CPU usage X-FI has does not even make a dent or impact in the big picture,also you can thank Creative Labs for having a closed market for full EAX support ,if they had opened up their EAX support earlier(way before Vista was even alpha and not just EAX2) things might have been different.

It's funny since processors,video cards keep getting faster with multi-core etc but people still go on about CPU usage with software sound like we was back in the early 90s,wake up people we are almost in 2008,things have moved on.

X-Fi is not just about CPU usage, it's also about 3d sound positioning and sound quality. Is there software sound that does something similar? And is there any software sound based hardware that provides sound quality comparable to SB and other hardware based sound card?

 

[soonerproud]

Originally posted by: ShawnD1

That's the feeling I got too.

It's not just about the clicking. It actually prevents things from starting properly. It stops Riva Tuner from working on boot. It also stops VNC from working on boot. Both of them are malicious software that could potentially harm your computer allow or deny. Turned off UAC, and everything is peachy once again.

If Riva Tuner was properly coded to begin with there would be no issue with UAC. Microsoft has for years asked developers to program properly, yet many still do things the easy way instead of the right way.

I look at it this way. If the developers of Riva Tuner are too lazy to code it properly for Vista, then I don't want to use their junky software.l

 

[Mem]

Originally posted by: rchiu

Originally posted by: Mem

I'd hardly call it a "minimal" cpu usage hit, it's a pretty big hit when you're going from a highend Xfi soundcard to integrated sound. Not to mention you're not getting any of the features your soundcard has when you use vista.

I hate to burst your bubble but X-FI accounts for less then 1% sales World Wide on the PC when you take into account onboard sound and other sound cards,so frankly the minimal CPU usage X-FI has does not even make a dent or impact in the big picture,also you can thank Creative Labs for having a closed market for full EAX support ,if they had opened up their EAX support earlier(way before Vista was even alpha and not just EAX2) things might have been different.

It's funny since processors,video cards keep getting faster with multi-core etc but people still go on about CPU usage with software sound like we was back in the early 90s,wake up people we are almost in 2008,things have moved on.

X-Fi is not just about CPU usage, it's also about 3d sound positioning and sound quality. Is there software sound that does something similar? And is there any software sound based hardware that provides sound quality comparable to SB and other hardware based sound card?

Onboard sound has improved over the years,you heard of HD?..Go and check the latest boards from brands like Asus etc....they all have HD 7.1 sound etc...(some even have plug-in slots like stand alone sound cards).
Fact is with the X-FI you are cattering for a very,very small market compared to onboard sound,also onboard HD 7.1 sound is good enough for most users,not to meantion cheaper and in most cases better driver/software support then Creative Labs.

 

[rchiu]

Originally posted by: Mem

Originally posted by: rchiu

Originally posted by: Mem

I'd hardly call it a "minimal" cpu usage hit, it's a pretty big hit when you're going from a highend Xfi soundcard to integrated sound. Not to mention you're not getting any of the features your soundcard has when you use vista.

I hate to burst your bubble but X-FI accounts for less then 1% sales World Wide on the PC when you take into account onboard sound and other sound cards,so frankly the minimal CPU usage X-FI has does not even make a dent or impact in the big picture,also you can thank Creative Labs for having a closed market for full EAX support ,if they had opened up their EAX support earlier(way before Vista was even alpha and not just EAX2) things might have been different.

It's funny since processors,video cards keep getting faster with multi-core etc but people still go on about CPU usage with software sound like we was back in the early 90s,wake up people we are almost in 2008,things have moved on.

X-Fi is not just about CPU usage, it's also about 3d sound positioning and sound quality. Is there software sound that does something similar? And is there any software sound based hardware that provides sound quality comparable to SB and other hardware based sound card?

Onboard sound has improved over the years,you heard of HD?..Go and check the latest boards from brands like Asus etc....they all have HD 7.1 sound etc...(some even have plug-in slots like stand alone sound cards).
Fact is with the X-FI you are cattering for a very,very small market compared to onboard sound,also onboard HD 7.1 sound is good enough for most users,not to meantion cheaper and in most cases better driver/software support then Creative Labs.

Heh, I have a couple of secondary system using HD sound, and I gotta tell you, if you think HD is the same as Creative Sound card, you are missing out big time. I don't use those pc for gaming so I dunno how well their implementation of 3d positioning is. But when playing mp3, the sound quality is night and day. Creative have been the standard in pc sound. Yes they have been losing market share, but I doubt their market share is "very, very small". And just because mainstream PC user can't tell what's a good sounding solution, it doesn't mean the rest of us have to suffer with them.

 

[Mem]

Originally posted by: rchiu

Originally posted by: Mem

Originally posted by: rchiu

Originally posted by: Mem

I'd hardly call it a "minimal" cpu usage hit, it's a pretty big hit when you're going from a highend Xfi soundcard to integrated sound. Not to mention you're not getting any of the features your soundcard has when you use vista.

I hate to burst your bubble but X-FI accounts for less then 1% sales World Wide on the PC when you take into account onboard sound and other sound cards,so frankly the minimal CPU usage X-FI has does not even make a dent or impact in the big picture,also you can thank Creative Labs for having a closed market for full EAX support ,if they had opened up their EAX support earlier(way before Vista was even alpha and not just EAX2) things might have been different.

It's funny since processors,video cards keep getting faster with multi-core etc but people still go on about CPU usage with software sound like we was back in the early 90s,wake up people we are almost in 2008,things have moved on.

X-Fi is not just about CPU usage, it's also about 3d sound positioning and sound quality. Is there software sound that does something similar? And is there any software sound based hardware that provides sound quality comparable to SB and other hardware based sound card?

Onboard sound has improved over the years,you heard of HD?..Go and check the latest boards from brands like Asus etc....they all have HD 7.1 sound etc...(some even have plug-in slots like stand alone sound cards).
Fact is with the X-FI you are cattering for a very,very small market compared to onboard sound,also onboard HD 7.1 sound is good enough for most users,not to meantion cheaper and in most cases better driver/software support then Creative Labs.

Heh, I have a couple of secondary system using HD sound, and I gotta tell you, if you think HD is the same as Creative Sound card, you are missing out big time. I don't use those pc for gaming so I dunno how well their implementation of 3d positioning is. But when playing mp3, the sound quality is night and day. Creative have been the standard in pc sound. Yes they have been losing market share, but I doubt their market share is "very, very small". And just because mainstream PC user can't tell what's a good sounding solution, it doesn't mean the rest of us have to suffer with them.

I have been using CL cards since SB16 days(using Audigy 4 and onboard sound at the moment FYI),fact is onboard sound has improved over the years,its not question of what the mainstream user can hear or not, onboard sound is good enough for most people,sure you can spend loads of money on nice speaker system and sound card but is the price to sound quality performance gain worth the money for most PC users?...most will say no.

Lets be honest here,if you want the absolute best you won't be using PC system for your music etc...( regardless of what sound card is installed),you' ll be using expensive audiophile HI-FI seperates(not linked to your PC) for your music enjoyment etc.....I know I do.
I use PC for gaming and general use and audiophile HI-FI seperates for my music/movie enjoyment ,but hey thats me.


We all have different standards,point I was making is onboard sound has improved since the late 90s, also sound card market is shrinking ,CL have killed most of the competition and even they are having problems,I won't meantion all the X-FI driver problems that a lot of users have had(sure latest drivers have fixed a lot of issues but how long has it took CL,Vista has been out since Jan).

Back on the topic of is Vista worth using now?....sure is,so many benefits easy outweigh the negatives which are minor in my experience.

 

[rchiu]

Originally posted by: Mem


I have been using CL cards since SB16 days(using Audigy 4 and onboard sound at the moment FYI),fact is onboard sound has improved over the years,its not question of what the mainstream user can hear or not, onboard sound is good enough for most people,sure you can spend loads of money on nice speaker system and sound card but is the price to sound quality performance gain worth the money for most PC users?...most will say no.

Lets be honest here,if you want the absolute best you won't be using PC system for your music etc...( regardless of what sound card is installed),you' ll be using expensive audiophile HI-FI seperates(not linked to your PC) for your music enjoyment etc.....I know I do.
I use PC for gaming and general use and audiophile HI-FI seperates for my music/movie enjoyment ,but hey thats me.


We all have different standards,point I was making is onboard sound has improved since the late 90s, also sound card market is shrinking ,CL have killed most of the competition and even they are having problems,I won't meantion all the X-FI driver problems that a lot of users have had(sure latest drivers have fixed a lot of issues but how long has it took CL,Vista has been out since Jan).

Back on the topic of is Vista worth using now?....sure is,so many benefits easy outweigh the negatives which are minor in my experience.

Well, I have Vista on my laptop but I don't see much benefit over my other xp machines. But the audio aspect of Vista really turned me off because it doesn't support the two main sound card I use currently, x-fi and m-audio revolution. Yes, those vendor deserve part of the blame for not coming out with the drivers. But a big portion of it is because MS single handedly decided to rewrite the audio hardware layer.

I do use HD audio and tried to like it, but let's face it, mobo maker is not gonna invest $50+ on sound with mobo costing around $150. That's why there will be market for discrete sound cards, and it's important for MS to work with that industry and make sure the industry supports the new OS.

People use PC for many reasons, but multi-media is one of the major one and sound is a major piece of multi-media. I do have stand alone high end audio system that probably cost me over ten grand over the years. But for quick listening of MP3 and gaming with advance sound features, a good audio card is essential to me. Vista is a new operating system, and for me to spend the money to upgrade, it should be a step forward and not some limitation to one major feature I enjoy.

 

[jonmcc33]

Originally posted by: Mem
That's because a lot of XP users spread FUD about Vista,I remember 2K users doing the same thing when XP arrived and ironically I was doing the same thing ie... defending XP against 2K users,same thing is happening again with Vista ,you can bet it'll happen again when Vienna is released down the road and the cycle will continue etc....UAC(your so called pop-ups) only took me 2 weeks to get use too and if it annoys you ,it can be disabled so is it really a problem?

You say about things you lose,what about the more things you gain,remember it works both ways.

Actually...Windows XP wasn't worth using until SP2 came out for it. That's when I made the permanent switch from Windows 2000 Pro SP4.

UAC is a complete waste. It's the same thing that you can functionally do by using Windows XP as a regular user instead of administrator and using the "Run As" option.

 

[jonmcc33]

Originally posted by: soonerproud

Originally posted by: fleabag

Originally posted by: hclarkjr
i would like to know why so many are having sound problems with vista? i have an audigy 2 Zs and have absolutely no problems at all with in vista ultimate 64 bit. i have been running it now for over a month and am sticking with it. other than 1 piece of software that i could not get to run i have had no troubles getting drivers and installing games and such.

Well I bet you're not even aware that audigy 2zs is of no use in vista because it's treated the same as an integrated sound card sadly.

Ever heard of Alchemy ? And there is a free version that supports all Creative cards. Free Alchemy

Direct3D is translated into Open AL and restores the functionality of these cards on Vista.
That means you can still get the full functionality of the cards in Vista.

Wow...but the rest of the $200 package of my Audigy2 ZS Platinum is still completely useless. Creative also charges Audigy owners for use of ALchemy.

Edit- Your "free" version is illegal software BTW. I wasn't sure if you could link to that here.

 

[stash]

It's the same thing that you can functionally do by using Windows XP as a regular user instead of administrator and using the "Run As" option.

No it isn't, not even close. It's painful to run as a standard user in XP. I did it for over a year, and it was a pain in the ass. You have to put in all sorts of hacks to make things work, and even then things won't work. Stupid things like time changes, power settings and other stuff. UAC is a thousand times better than runas with XP.

 

[jonmcc33]

Originally posted by: stash

It's the same thing that you can functionally do by using Windows XP as a regular user instead of administrator and using the "Run As" option.

No it isn't, not even close. It's painful to run as a standard user in XP. I did it for over a year, and it was a pain in the ass. You have to put in all sorts of hacks to make things work, and even then things won't work. Stupid things like time changes, power settings and other stuff. UAC is a thousand times better than runas with XP.

Hacks? Just "run as" on an EXE to run the application to install it? How hard is that? No hacking required out of anything.

 

[BehindEnemyLines]

Originally posted by: jonmcc33

Originally posted by: stash

It's the same thing that you can functionally do by using Windows XP as a regular user instead of administrator and using the "Run As" option.

No it isn't, not even close. It's painful to run as a standard user in XP. I did it for over a year, and it was a pain in the ass. You have to put in all sorts of hacks to make things work, and even then things won't work. Stupid things like time changes, power settings and other stuff. UAC is a thousand times better than runas with XP.

Hacks? Just "run as" on an EXE to run the application to install it? How hard is that? No hacking required out of anything.

I think it's a given that "run as" works fine for the applications that require it or installing applications. There are some things that won't work in a limited account. You can't view (not change) your calendar from the clock, you can't change power profile, you can't repair a network connection say your wireless, etc...

I had to add myself as a "Network Configuration Operators" and create custom admin login using supercrypt (lsrunase) since "run as" doesn't save password per application.

 

[stash]

Originally posted by: jonmcc33

Originally posted by: stash

It's the same thing that you can functionally do by using Windows XP as a regular user instead of administrator and using the "Run As" option.

No it isn't, not even close. It's painful to run as a standard user in XP. I did it for over a year, and it was a pain in the ass. You have to put in all sorts of hacks to make things work, and even then things won't work. Stupid things like time changes, power settings and other stuff. UAC is a thousand times better than runas with XP.

Hacks?

Yeah, hacks. Like this. And this.

 

[mechBgon]

Originally posted by: jonmcc33
UAC is a complete waste. It's the same thing that you can functionally do by using Windows XP as a regular user instead of administrator and using the "Run As" option.

In the first place, neither UAC on Vista, nor using a non-Admin account on XP, are "a complete waste," unless you consider using potent, proactive security safeguards "a complete waste." Personally, I consider them "extremely worthwhile."

Secondly, since you claim "it's the same thing," go ahead and show us how WinXP virtualizes Registry and directory structures when using a non-Admin account, as Vista does with UAC enabled.

 

[jonmcc33]

Originally posted by: stash

Originally posted by: jonmcc33

Originally posted by: stash

It's the same thing that you can functionally do by using Windows XP as a regular user instead of administrator and using the "Run As" option.

No it isn't, not even close. It's painful to run as a standard user in XP. I did it for over a year, and it was a pain in the ass. You have to put in all sorts of hacks to make things work, and even then things won't work. Stupid things like time changes, power settings and other stuff. UAC is a thousand times better than runas with XP.

Hacks?

Yeah, hacks. Like this. And this.

1. Editing the registry is not a "hack". Tweak UI does the same thing. Is it a hacker tool?
2. You think UAC was created for changing power options and the date? Are you kidding me? I think I'm going to cry from laughing so hard.

 

[jonmcc33]

Originally posted by: mechBgon
In the first place, neither UAC on Vista, nor using a non-Admin account on XP, are "a complete waste," unless you consider using potent, proactive security safeguards "a complete waste." Personally, I consider them "extremely worthwhile."

Thanks for agreeing with me on one part...

Originally posted by: mechBgon
Secondly, since you claim "it's the same thing," go ahead and show us how WinXP virtualizes Registry and directory structures when using a non-Admin account, as Vista does with UAC enabled.

We don't need to do that. We just need to prevent the average home user from filling up their computer with all the stupid spyware and malware along with the 20 toolbars.