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Published on November 7, 2007 By Dan Greene In Personal Computing
I've had an OEM copy of Vista Ultimate 64 bit version, with all the updates installed expect the foreign language ones, for about a month now. This article details the features which I do not like.

7. Instant search tool, great useless tool, the constant indexing of my hard drive has not actually made it any easier to find what I was looking for. Sure if know the exact name of a file or the general size yeah I can save time because I don't have to wait for a search to complete, but I generally have to do several searches to find what I am looking for. Still not very helpful

6. Inconsistent loading of the OS. I turned on my comp when I came home and just let it sit, didn't log in nothing, went to watch some tv for a bit, had dinner, came back to a blank screen, a solid on harddrive light and dvd rw drive light on solid, no signal to the monitor. I pressed the spacebar, wiggled the mouse, tried esc, then CRTL + ALT + DEL, nothing changed. I had to reboot because Vista feel off a cliff while I wasn't using it. Fucking lame.

5. UAC, nuff said, annoying as fuck, turning it off, in my system tray the red shield icon sits, unable to ever get that out of there, every once in a while when Vista feels like pushing my buttons, it pops up like the robot from lost in space "DANGER DANGER" whatever. When you turn off a feature in Windows it should go away, and bother you no longer. Not the UAC, I'm sure there is a hack, but I am seriously not motivated enough to figure it out cause I am just gonna scrap Vista if SP1 doesn't radically change my mind.

4. I hate with Vista, that sometimes programs like Yahoo messenger, lock up or crash, Doom3 has done it, and it brings the OS down as well, Like I can CRTL + ALT + DEL and get to the menu of options, which are all bad execpt the task manager, which is the only thing I wanna see pop up when it happens, but when messenger dies for whatever reason, it locks the whole OS up. On XP with this same rig, via my quad core, I could just select the process, and kill it, and restart Messenger, with Vista, I can't get the power of the 3 cpus not maxxed out, to the task manager. That's bullshit Microsoft!

3. Disk utilities, specifically the defragmenter, I'll run that, then I'll run the Aus logic disk defrag, and get another 5-10% better defrag from doing that, WTF?

2. Lack of extras and I mean serious lack. There is no Windows Virus scanning, so I use AVG, but with Windows having historical vulnerability to viruses you'd think that they would be interested in providing a free anti-virus for people running Vista, but my biggest lack of extra falls into the category of Word Processing. There is no MS WORD, no EXCEL, nothing, on the "Ultimate" copy of Vista. Basically you spend $200 on an OS, and then you can spend another $150-$600 on word processing software? Seriously, a computers primary job used to be word processing and it has never really gotten away from that. Imagine, a coffee maker that doesn't brew coffee anymore, but controls your television. Where the hell is Microsoft on the ball on this one?

1. Slowness, I hate that this OS runs slower, and bogs itself down, on a monster system. It is probably more secure and maybe more stable than XP, but I was doing fine with XP SP2, security wise, and stability wise, and experiencing much more responsive OS tasking, and switching between what I was doing. Vista is all bullshit when it says you can do more with more.

There are only two benefits that Vista has going for it, one is DX10 and DX10.1, and being able to handle more than 4 GB RAM. That's it. I have decided that everything else about Vista is either pure fluff or less than the value offered by XP.

[MOVED FROM BELOW DUE TO JU's PISS POOR EDITING SCHEME]

Well here are a few things I would have included in the Vista Ultimate package.

1. Better Speech Recognition The Vista Speech Recognition menu is slightly faster but it doesn't seem to recognize my speech any more effectively than XP. Which is sad. Gates said that he saw us using verbal speech to communicate with our computers much more than typing way back in the 70's/80's. For sure it would be faster and more efficient than typing. My first experience with speech recognition was in the days for a 500 mhz cpu. Then again with my single core 2.4 ghz processor. Now that I have a quad core, of which Vista mostly doesn't utilize, the experience has not significantly improved. This type of a program could/would vastly improve the versatility of an OS. It would also give Windows a feature other OS's don't have setting them apart.

2. Real Word Processing: MS WORD Where is the Word Processor for Vista? Oh yeah it's in another $500 upgrade package aside from the OS. What bullshit. They don't even include the back burner Microsoft Works anymore. They could have at least given the user MS WORD 97 or 2003 or something instead of nothing with ULTIMATE! What they did give you is the antiquated notepad which doesn't even "nextline" properly but reads text files great. Except for the free Textpad program which works even better and opens more different kinds of text files. Wordpad was also included but it's the same Wordpad as WIN95. Really is that what I'm paying for with Ultimate, a word processor that was midrange 13 years ago?

3. Faster and better performance than the previous OS Really instead of the whole sidebar crap they could have bumped the speed of the a window closing or opening from the half second you see, to something like a tenth of a second, increased the size of the red X bar so when you wanna close something, you close it on the first try every time, and instead of just renaming everything from XP to Vista, they should have errorer on the side of making fewer changes to names of things, because now everybody has to learn a whole new OS again. If I was going to have the sidebar, the first thing I'd have in there is a google map of where the computer is at, instead of a second clock, 4 inches above my digital clock on the system tray. Real big benefit Microsoft.

4. Driver Support for EVERYTHING I mean everything, Microsoft is the biggest company in the industry, they have an OS which is the basis for everything to run on and 3rd party devs to develop for, not the other way around. Vista, should have included all the drivers that XP had for programs and hardware, and automatically emulated 32bit mode when necessary. So that end users, i.e. me, don't have to go digging online to find drivers for stuff that works with XP just fine. On a 15 gigabyte install, there wasn't room for a folder with these updates/drivers?

5. Real Backward Compatibility With an Ultimate copy, or "Premium level copy" of anything, there should be support for programs that originally ran on older copies of Microsoft OS's. Start with DOS and work your way up. This should come standard, with Vista Ultimate and why not. Obviously end users aren't going to be able to remember every thing they run on XP or Win 2000 that ran on older stuff like 98SE, 95, and DOS. There are a very few but select programs that people keep and run be it because of older machines or just low IT budgets. Whatever, there is a need to run older stuff and that capability should be with Vista at the "Premium level copy" of the OS.

Comments (Page 3)
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on Nov 08, 2007
Anyway, why should you use a keyboard to find an app? Might as well go back to DOS...
on Nov 08, 2007
agree with Fuzzy, RC and vista Best combo!
on Nov 08, 2007
You should try skinning it, the skinning of the start menu has been significantly restricted now in Vista.


I know this has been a major problem and frustration for skinners, however I was talking about it from a usability standpoint.

Anyway, why should you use a keyboard to find an app? Might as well go back to DOS


I understand your view Fuzzy, but a keyboard is an integral part of any PC/Laptop. Perhaps I am lucky that I'm left handed but use the mouse with my right hand, so my 'natural' hand is always available to type a quick few letters in to instantly find the app I want. Of course I use Objectdock and all my commonly used progs are available without having to open the Start Menu at all.

I think that Microsoft should have had an option to use the old style fly-out Start Menu. It's all about choice and personal preference after all. For me it works better. I didn't hate the old way, but prefer the new way.

Luckily we have all found Stardock and can customise our personal systems according to our personal desire. Everyone's different.....
on Nov 08, 2007
Another thread that reminds me of the bloke who complained bitterly about having to eat too many shit sandwiches...yet, when ever his wife asked what he wanted for lunch, he could never be bothered to think of anything for himself: "Uh, just gimme the same shit as I had yesterday."
on Nov 08, 2007

Thanks ALMonty, i have made the restore discs, but nothing happens when inserted in the drive. Staples UK where the machine was bought cannot get it to work either. All good fun !!!!


He mean't the recovery partition on the harddrive,you would normally see it in the DOS boot screen in lower right corner "recovery options F10" or in the all programs list under wording like "pc help & tools" not that it'd help you it sounds like you have a hardware issue either ram or mobo
on Nov 08, 2007


LOL...

Anyway, Vista doesn't actually crash, it just hangs and does whatever it is doing going on about 3 min before I have to reboot if I want to get any work done, this is when Yahoo Messenger fucks up. With XP I could always get to the task manager and it was always given priority 1 on the system at least from my perspective as user.





I tend to see similar posts about wincustomize software or a blind that was installed saying crap like it's stuffed up my computer etc this topic you made is no different,you just need to take the time to figure out where the balls up YOU made is ,i don't say that lightly as i believe it to be fact simply coz i've been there with xp when i first bought this comp back in 03,in the frst two months i averaged a reformat every week either because i got infected or put in 3rd party software that did'nt play nice nowadays i know better which is why this machine runs smoothly & quickly

on Nov 08, 2007
(Gideon hugs his Ubuntu 7.10 machine)
on Nov 08, 2007
Gideon I worry about you and that machine sometimes.   

Liquidguru.. you do a fine job of expressing your points, nice commenting style.
on Nov 08, 2007
ObjectBar!!


He, He, maybe we can agree on the fact that RightClick is in fact a specialized and toned-down version of ObjectBar.

......but on the other hand.... RightClick all the way!!

(aufisch hugs her Vista64-"Gutsy Gibbon" machine)
on Nov 08, 2007
Does it take a year for the Control Panel fly out menu in the Start Panel to open for anyone else? All other menus open fast but Control Panel is sloooooooooooooooooooooow.

Anyone else?

on Vista Ultimate
on Nov 08, 2007
just a second or so here, craig. vista ultimate 64 here
on Nov 08, 2007
Does it take a year for the Control Panel fly out menu in the Start Panel to open for anyone else? All other menus open fast but Control Panel is sloooooooooooooooooooooow.

Anyone else?

on Vista Ultimate


Less than a second here, but I have a pretty good rig. Vista x64 as well.

on Nov 08, 2007
I got a whopper of a system but it's 32 bit. hmmmm, my first intolerable issue.   
on Nov 08, 2007
I think you need anger management rather than XP. Maybe you should try cooling down and pushing the option to turn off the UAC warning, and maybe checking your system to see if something is installed that it doesnt like, and try compatibilty mode?
on Nov 08, 2007
I think that Microsoft should have had an option to use the old style fly-out Start Menu. It's all about choice and personal preference after all. For me it works better. I didn't hate the old way, but prefer the new way.


Goodness! So that is what was meant by uneventful Start Menu... I've been using Vista since July 27, 2005 and enjoying the new way so much, that I've totally forgotten about the old fly-outs.

Luckily we have all found Stardock and can customise our personal systems according to our personal desire. Everyone's different.....


And that is what makes us all cool!




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