Upgrade to Vista? - Comments Page 1

Vista? No. One of Gateways’ last customers before they left Oz’s shores and while I have upgraded the amount of RDRAM ( 640Mb: expensive rare stuff ) and one of the CDROM drives to that of a DVD burner, the ( slow ) 20Gb HDD and 32Mb Nvidia graphics card do not allow for a Vista upgrade of the most basic.

I think that ultimately with the right advice ( perhaps through this site ), I will upgrade my HDD (EDI) and Graphics card and soldier on for a few more years yet with my old faithful Gateway and Windows XP Home edition Upgrade. (No I won’t mention ME.)

EDITOR'S NOTE: I agree, XP systems will be around for quite a few years.

No way Jose, I'm sticking with XP since Microsoft will never bring European prices down to the levels, before tax, that the USA enjoys. What possible justification is there for me, living in Spain, to pay nearly double the price paid in the richest country in the world?

In checking for XP it looks like I must do a clean install WOW!!! I need help --How and where do I "Back Up" all my 33 programs--Favorites for 5 different e-mail addresses---All my Documents---and then figure out how to transfer them all back to a new Operating Program---I see hours and hours of work and the super chance for errors as I am no computer expert---How can it be worth it????

EDITOR'S NOTE: No need to format and install Vista from scratch. It will install right over XP as an upgrade.

I'll just keep my HP laptop running XP until Leopard is released and I have enough money to get a MacBook. Mac OS X beats Microsoft Vista anyday in my opinion. I love how you can boot a Mac laptop into Target mode and use it like an external hard drive. The easiest "networking" solution I've come accross for being able to help a friend back up his/her Mac or for me to migrate to a new one.

I bought a new computer with Windows Vista Home Premium pre-installed. I am NOT impressed; a pretty GUI does not cut it with me. Already had to disable the fancy "User Access Control" feature. Windows Mail, formerly Outlook Express, loads VERY slowly and cannot get my Hotmail email. My scanner won't work and Audacity won't either. Like Chris Pirillo, maybe I'll upgrade back to XP.

We almost have a quorum here :) No to Vista.I'll keep XP going as long as I can. Since I have "Pro",I may have some advantages over "Home". BTW,Volume Shadow Copy is on XP Pro as well. There are many apps that can simulate Vista on XP. I have hundreds of apps that work on XP,but will- or may- not work with Vista. With all the extra costs involved,the choice is clear.Next is switching to Linux.

As a very satisfied XP Pro user I would not use Vista if it were free. I think the only way Microsoft will be successful with it is on new computers that come with it already installed.

One piece of advice: If you are planning to upgrade to vista (permanently or to check it out) make sure you have your Windows XP (assuming it came preinstalled) restore CDs. By having them you can (although you destroy all data on the hard drive) downgrade back to XP. This is of course mainly directed at people who have gotten a "free" upgrade to Vista from the computer manufacturer (e.g. HP).

I use XP at work and on the laptop at home but carried on with Win98SE on my old workhorse PC. For my birthday I got a shiny new PC! So I've made the leap from 98 to Vista. I've taken to Vista in a way that I just never did with XP. Now I'm wishing that they would upgrade to Vista at work (not likely: too expensive and no benefits for higher education).

BTW I'd echo what Alfie says: if you think it is expensive in the US think about us in Europe paying *twice* the price that you do. I won't be buying it for the laptop and we'll wait until prices drop before we upgrade Kev's PC.

Any DirectX9 video card supports Vista. You can do quite well with a $100 card if you need an upgrade. The 8800-type card is only necessary if you want to run DirectX 10 games in Vista, of which there are none as of yet. The price on DX10 cards will come down over time of course.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Low-end cards will "work" with Vista, but they may not support Windows Aero, or the Aero UI may run poorly. DirectX9 graphics performance may suffer as well. Of course try what you have first, and only spend $$$ if your video card isn't cutting the mustard.

I recently upgraded my OS from XP and I'm glad I did. The computer is much more stable, and it runs quite a bit faster too. While with XP I had trouble with my printer and video card, the new system operates them perfectly: even the built-in scanner in the HP all-in-one that never worked in XP now works. Upgrading to Ubuntu was the smartest move that I ever made.

During our testing on the Vista Beta's and RC1, we noted that motherboard chipset made more of a difference in the operation of Vista features than the video card installed. A Dell Optiplex 620 (which comes with the 945 chipset) will run full-blown Vista, all features including the Aero interface working, off the onboard video.

The university is not permitting Vista on any networked computers until completion of our testing or the availability of the first service pack (which, strangely enough, should occur about the same time!). Since Microsoft support of Windows XP is thru 2011, there is no hurry to get on the Vista bandwagon.

In my testing, I noted while the surface looks new, if you tunnel down deep enough into the sub-menus, XP is still there. Vista is a new coat of paint on an old house. Maybe there is a new screen door too, but it is still the same house.

I believe Charles is right about the graphic requirements for running Vista, even with the Aero UI on. According to Microsoft, the Aero UI will work fine even on PCs that are not built for gaming, as long as they have a decent DirectX 9 capable card with 128 MB of video RAM and supports Pixar Shader 2.0. These specs are met by the majority of video cards built in the last 1-2 years, excluding some onboard graphic chips.

I've used Vista RC1 and RC2 versions on a system I own with a $130 Nvidia 7600GS card w/256 MB memory. I had all of the Aero features turned on without any perceivable slowdown. My suggestion for anyone concerned about their graphics card is to run the Vista Upgrade Advisor to see if your card supports Vista and Aero UI.

I'm glad I switched to Ubuntu as well. Microsoft sells spyware now since WGA in XP now its got an antivirus in Vista that will delete your files if microsoft doesn't want you to have them. Why would I want any OS sending information to Microsoft about what I've said online or other activities I have done online?

EDITOR'S NOTE: I'm glad you like Ubuntu Linux, but your claims about Windows are wildly off base. WGA is NOT spyware (See http://askbobrankin.com/is_genuine_advantage_spyware.html for more info) and your claim that Vista has anti-virus software that will delete your files is plain crazy. Do you have ANY credible evidence that MS is spying on your online activities or wantonly deleting your files?

Most of the tech rags I've read suggest waiting until you upgrade to a new box to avoid the headaches Vista may otherwise offer. While the upgrade functionality in Vista is evidently much superior to prior OS's, the numerous hardware requirements may mean a reduced functionality.

I know a few people who are dual booting to use Vista as some of their hardware and apps don't run there, so they have to drop back to XP for some tasks. As Chris put it, they don't have the time for that. Also note- if you have XP Pro, you can't upgrade to Vista Home editions.

One thing not mentioned is the issues around DRM. Digital Rights Management (that is , of the studios rights) is built in to Vista. I understand that if your entire hardware chain does not support the latest DRM, the media will not play. An HD-DVD movie for example may not play if you use a DVI video connection to your monitor because the superior quality of DVI does not have DRM built in. HDMI does. So video card, monitor, sound card, and certain mother board features all have to support this. If you think putting an HD-DVD player in your computer will let you play those DVD's, expect a surprise. And note that most computers now on the market do NOT meet this standard. So if you are into media on your computer, you may have 2 major upgrades in your near future - one for Vista, and another to let media play in Vista. Like waiting for the Blue-ray HD-DVD war to settle, its another reason to let hardware catch up to Vista before you invest. Same issue is taking place with wide screen TV's - capable may not be the same as ABLE with the new DRM.

WORTH READING: A Cost Analysis of Windows Vista Content Protection -- http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html

Windows Vista includes an extensive reworking of core OS elements in order to provide content protection for so-called “premium content”, typically HD data from Blu-Ray and HD-DVD sources. Providing this protection incurs considerable costs in terms of system performance, system stability, technical support overhead, and hardware and software cost. These issues affect not only users of Vista but the entire PC industry, since the effects of the protection measures extend to cover all hardware and software that will ever come into contact with Vista. This document analyses the cost involved in Vista's content protection, and the collateral damage that this incurs throughout the computer industry.

I just installed Vista last weekend, and let me tell ya, I love it! I dont use any of the new features, it just really looks cool!! And it gave me a reason to upgrade my PC. A $70 diamond Radeon 9550 from walmart was more than enough to handle the new OS with zero conflicts. I shelled out a few bucks for another gig of RAM, but that was needed anyways! All-in-all even a four year old dell can handle vista flawlessly with the right upgrades!!! My only issue is that I cant sign in to my Hotmail account, this happened once before when I installed IE 7 with XP... Any advise on how to make my mail work on hotmail.com???

I put myself in a bit of a pickle. I purchased Vista Ultimate Upgrade for my WinXP Pro system. However, I have a hive error that requires a System Recovery of the original XP install disk (which I cant locate) and I thought the Vista upgrade would be able to assist (figured I kill two birds with one stone). Now I have a Vista upgrade and still cant boot my machine. Ugh.

EDITOR'S NOTE: No problem - you can do a FULL install with your "upgrade" edition. See http://askbobrankin.com/upgrade_to_vista.html

Well I think I might upgrade to VISTA, but probably not for at least another few months or so. My screen reader manufacturer already seems to have great VISTA support in the works, but I'm very happy with XP. BTW, I read on an email list that VISTA might stand for Visual Information Spoken To All.

EDITOR'S NOTE: I agree... stick with XP as long as it works for you. And Vista is not an acronym, just a play on the "view through the Window(s)" theme.

I am getting ready to purchase a new computer and pass my current one down to my 5 year old son. I like to take pictures with my digital camera and save them on the computer, somtimes I edit them and sometimes I do not. I create Newsletters, currently with Print Shop 21 - hoping to Upgrade. I do all kinds of things with Microsoft Office 2003. I am doing genealogy with Family Tree Maker. We like to play games ranging from Hoyle Book/Puzzle/Card Games to NeverWinter Nights I and II.

My question: will the new computer (XPS 410 - Intel Core2 Duo Processor E6300 (2MB L2 Cache,1.86GHz,1066 FSB) ) do all of this -- It comes with Vista - Is that a good idea on a new computer or not? Will the Core2 Duo and the Vista run with older software?

EDITOR'S NOTE: Sounds like it should run everything fine. But I know several smart techies who have decided to return to XP after trying Vista. I would still recommend XP.