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Vista CTP build 5270 = Major frustration

R

Robor

Elite Member
We have an MSDN subscription here at work and I've got a spare unused hard drive for my laptop so I decided to give Vista another try. Here's the details of my Vista experience:

1) Booted with Vista DVD and it bombed early with an errored saying something about not being able to determine my hard disks. It never even made it to the partitioning part.

2) Since this was previously a Fedora Core 4 hard drive I booted it with an Ubuntu CD and deleted all of the partitions. I then created a single FAT partition that's 50% of the drive (about 10GB) then exited during the install process.

3) Booted with Vista DVD again and this time it recognized my HD and the partition I created and free space were viewable. Just to be safe I blew away the partiton and recreated it (10GB for Vista) but did not format.

4) Install process continues - VERY SLOWLY - until I get another error about not being able to write to my HD.

5) Restart from scratch and this time I blow away the previous partition and just let Windows have the entire drive. Install process continues - again very slowly - until I get another error (can't remember specifics on it) only this time much further along. Attempt to continue setup and repair fails.

6) Boot system with Ultimate Boot CD and examine partition info. It shows only the single NTFS partition I created earlier. Delete it and try again.

7) Boot system with Vista DVD again. This time I create a single partiton from the whole drive and format it. Process is continuing now. Will followup...

UPDATE: Got it up and running now. I changed the taskbar to classic view and launched IE7. It bailed with... "Please close Internet Explorer A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will notify you if a solution is available". I clicked 'Close Program' and IE closed - I didn't get notified. I know it's a beta but the previous version I tried was more stable than this.

Notes: This system is an IBM T42 (pretty common) laptop. It's stable in WinXP Pro and Ubuntu. It had no problem installing Vista/Longhorn Beta 1. This hard drive had no problem with Fedora Core 4 on it as well.
 
I'm not an expert in Vista install issues, but I would definitely recommend posting your experience over at the beta newsgroups. They should be able to go through your Panther logs and figure out what is going on.
 
I had similar issues with a IBM T23, however, I've installed Vista on mutliple systems without a problem. It is still a beta after all.
 
Originally posted by: STaSh
I'm not an expert in Vista install issues, but I would definitely recommend posting your experience over at the beta newsgroups. They should be able to go through your Panther logs and figure out what is going on.
Click to expand...

:thumbsup:
 
Maybe the 3rd time is the charm? 🙂 It just went past the first auto-reboot and it's on to "Completing Installation" now. It's still only about 25% up the status meter though.

The weird thing is the 'Beta 1' version installed without a hiccup. It wasn't very stable and about 50% of the software I tried to install failed but the OS install was painless. Slow but painless that is. 😉
 
I think the 5270 build on MSDN was a staged build, so it's a little strange that it's taking so long.
 
I think the 5270 build on MSDN was a staged build
Click to expand...
It's not a staged build, it's a regular install. I'm not surprised it took so long to do the install.

So far as I know MSFT, TAP and MVPs are the only ones who currently have access to staged builds.
 
What I'm installing is the latest Vista CTP (Community Technology Preview) that's on the MSDN subscribers site. I'm pretty sure it said it was 5270.

Update: So far so good. Abotu 50% through the progress bar I got a screen refresh and it's at "Completing Installation... Do not restart your computer during this time". I've got a spinning hourglass and constant HD activity. It's been here for about 10 minutes now.
 
I hope performance in general is better during the install; even with the staged install 5270 took me about 45 minutes to install on my laptop and probably 35 on my desktop. I want to see those sub 20 minute installs they've been talking about!
 
Yeah I can't help you there 🙂 I do automated installs from Redmond over the VPN, so my installs usually take all night. Sometimes being in the field sucks.

I signed myself up for the MS Connect beta just to be able to download the CTPs at at decent speed. But I like to get the daily builds too.
 
Originally posted by: spyordie007
I hope performance in general is better during the install; even with the staged install 5270 took me about 45 minutes to install on my laptop and probably 35 on my desktop. I want to see those sub 20 minute installs they've been talking about!
Click to expand...

Something is definitely wrong here then. My install was about 90 minutes and a simple shutdown restart took about 2 minutes. It was another 60-90 seconds before the desktop was ready for use. That's much slower than XP in all cases.

BTW, it's 6+ GB without a single piece of software loaded! :Q
 
No 90 mins is pretty par for the course with a non-staged build. And yes 5270 was pretty slow, you should notice an improvement when the Fep CTP is released. Remember, 5270 was still pre-feature complete, so perf was not always the highest priority.

And yes, it takes up a assload of HDD space. I'm guessing (hoping!) this will come down, but I don't have any info for you on that.
 
But remember, it is still in beta. It's not really meant to be usable for anything. The only thing at this point Vista should be used for is OEMs and hardware/ software developers to make sure their software will run in Vista once it comes out.

One thing that really gets me is when people start complaining that their copy of Vista sucks (not that I am saying you are doing this). Guess what people... it's a Beta, and half the people who complain shouldn't even have a copy of Vista in the first place, b/c they got it from somewhere else ... obviously they do not have an MSDN sub. That's just my .02
 
Originally posted by: Robor
Originally posted by: spyordie007
I hope performance in general is better during the install; even with the staged install 5270 took me about 45 minutes to install on my laptop and probably 35 on my desktop. I want to see those sub 20 minute installs they've been talking about!
Click to expand...

Something is definitely wrong here then. My install was about 90 minutes and a simple shutdown restart took about 2 minutes. It was another 60-90 seconds before the desktop was ready for use. That's much slower than XP in all cases.

BTW, it's 6+ GB without a single piece of software loaded! :Q
Click to expand...
Again the install times I stated above were for staged installs on newer hardware; it's not surprising that your non-staged install took 90 minutes.

And take note of Brentx's post; the reason it is on MSDN is not for you to have a new OS to run, it's so you can develop software that takes advantage of the new OS features.

Erik
 
One thing that really gets me is when people start complaining that their copy of Vista sucks (not that I am saying you are doing this). Guess what people... it's a Beta, and half the people who complain shouldn't even have a copy of Vista in the first place, b/c they got it from somewhere else ... obviously they do not have an MSDN sub. That's just my .02
Click to expand...
Bashing MS is what all the kewl kids are doing these days, ya loser 😉

And I'm not at all saying you were bashing anyone Robor 🙂
 
Oh, I definitely know it's a beta and all but I swear the previous 'Beta 1' I had installed ran better. This 5270 took several retries to install, took longer, and is definitely slower once I finally got to the desktop. I'm guessing there's more features in it because I don't remember all the 'eye candy' as it's being coined. Some good - some bad from what little I did with it. Couldn't figure out how to tell Explorer to *always* view details in all windows. I'm sure I'm just missing it. One major disappointment is IE7 totally refuses to launch. I guess I could troubleshoot it but I'll just wait until the next build is posted on the MSDN site.

Nah, I'm not a Microsoft basher. Far from it really. Sure, there's some things that Microsoft does that I don't like (Bungie purchase - XBox 360 launch - WinME 😛 ) and I've always hated troubleshooting MS Office bugs for users but all in all Microsoft makes pretty good stuff. And I don't care what anyone says - WinXP is a great OS (in the right hands).
 
Do you get glass on that laptop? Looks like you have enough video ram.

There was a pretty big difference in the UI from B1 to 5270. Was the last build you had really beta1? Or was it one of the earlier CTPs? If it was B1, a LOT has changed.
 
It did have the cool looking effects so I guess I did have 'Glass'. I don't remember that from before - same system too. I haven't tried anything between Beta1 and 5270. Was this Glass added between Beta1 and this 5270 release?

I'm back on Ubuntu right now. If there's going to be another CTP this month I'll wait for it before having another look at Vista.
 
Glass was in beta 1, but it has changed. Things like the 3d tab (shift-tab, i think) and the live preview when you hover over minimized windows require glass and weren't in Beta 1. You can also 'tint' your glass in 5270, by changing the color and opacity.

The February CTP should be out Any Day Now.
 
Sorry to hijack, but since we have a Vista developer (I assume) actively following the thread, and since the forums don't need yet another Vista thread, I'll ask here... While it is said that the new color management stuff in Vista will maintain compatibility with old profiles (as I understand), will it also be compatible with "legacy" color management hardware (such as the Gretag Macbeth Eye One stuff) assuming of course that the manufacturers write drivers?
 
Hah! If you're you're refering to me, I'm definitely not a Vista developer or a developer of any kind 🙂

I'm just a self-hoster.

But to answer your question, I would assume yes, but take that with a truck sized grain of salt.
 
Originally posted by: STaSh
Hah! If you're you're refering to me, I'm definitely not a Vista developer or a developer of any kind 🙂

I'm just a self-hoster.

But to answer your question, I would assume yes, but take that with a truck sized grain of salt.
Click to expand...
Well, you work for MS, and seem to know "a bit" about Vista, so what would I assume? 😉

Thanks anyway; it seems that I'll just have to wait for the public beta, and then test my CMS hardware myself.
 
Yeah I'm subscribed to a very busy DL internally where people like me who are testing Vista post issues, so I'm pretty familiar with it. But no development for me, and I haven't seen any information about color management hardware so far.
 
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