My initial impression was that I liked the new look and feel. You simply get tired of looking at the same stuff over and over, even with changing backgrounds and themes, XP's GUI was getting a bit stale for me. So I like the new UI, and LOVE that it runs using the GPU and not the CPU. I feel it is more responsive in many ways than XP's UI b/c of this.

Then there is UAC. I don't know where to begin. This has to be the most annoying feature ever implemented. I give them credit for trying to make things secure, but UAC is so verbose that it pretty much defeats its own purpose because I'd guess probably 60% of all users are going to disable it within a day or two. I've noticed it is the source of a few of my software conflicts too.

Well I'm going to just summarize what I think real quick. I don't need to be told that MS made Vista its own product and not an XP service pack... but in all reality, almost every feature that MS touts for Vista could have been implemented within XP if they wanted to not make so much damn money. Bit locker could have easily been done, UAC is basically like a hybrid user control system/ZoneAlarm-like OS firewall. The sidebar looks exactly the same as Google's does in XP. The new "search" thing is available for XP and Google makes an alternative that is essentially the same. They moved some "special folders" around, big deal.

To really summarize how I feel: What the hell were MS programmers doing all these years? This certainly doesn't feel like the work of years and years of man hours. The fact that even the UI running off the GPU would be possible to implement under XP (windowblinds does this for instance) makes one wonder if there is any justification other than profit for Vista to be it's own Windows version. Seriously, what the hell have microsoft employees been working on for so long? It can't be Vista b/c if they are that inefficient then they make the government look good. There isn't even all that much "under the hood"/"behind the scenes" stuff to justify the upgrade.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to uninstall it. It has more features yes, but it just isn't as big of a step as one might think 7 or so years of work might produce. Honestly, I feel it's about the same level of upgrade SP2 for XP was as it is to SP2. The only reason I could ever recommend throwing down the money for this is when XP is completely abandoned sometime in 2008. Get it with a new computer, but I wouldn't buy this thing. In case you're wondering, my copy was payed for by my company so it wasn't my blood money.

So that's what I think. It's not very elegantly written and I apologize for maybe not going into more detail but I'm tired and still half asleep. I'd like to hear what others who have been using Vista think of it so far.

Thanks for the update.  I'm not a computer person and don't know what a UAC or GPU is.   I bought my computer in December and it included an upgrade to Vista.  So in plain english, Should I install it or not???  I am happpy with XP but am concerned that it will no longer be supported.

Quoted: Thanks for the update.  I'm not a computer person and don't know what a UAC or GPU is.   I bought my computer in December and it included an upgrade to Vista.  So in plain english, Should I install it or not???  I am happpy with XP but am concerned that it will no longer be supported.

UAC= User Account Control
GPU=Graphics Processor (your graphics card whether it is integrated on the motherboard or separate)

UAC is a pain in the ass but can be disabled. If I were you, and I'm basing this on not knowing your level o computer knowledge, I would wait awhile but eventually upgrade. Right now there are simply too many programs that have incompatibilities with Vista. Hell even Acrobat doesn't work 100% yet. Your computer should be fine with its drivers as I just installed Vista on a computer someone bought from Dell just before Vista released. Dell has their own special little Vista upgrade CD that helps out but I did a clean install (wiped the hard drive and started from scratch). One thing MS seems to have done a fairly decent job of is including a bunch of drivers. While they may not be as perfect as the ones from the actual manufacturer of your hardware, most if not all your stuff will be working just fine upon booting Vista the very first time. So basically, I would just give it a couple of months so that some software companies update their products and then install it. I don't think it's worth the hassle right now. When you do install you may want to devote an entire day to the process. It just takes a LONG time to backup all your stuff, install a new OS and reinstall all your software.

So how does is network with other (XP) machines?

One of the main things that was supposed to be a big deal was the new file system. Unfortunately, they did not ship it yet it for what ever reason. It may be added later via a service pack. The other main advantage is Direct-x 10. (which no one needs yet, as almost no games take advantage of it, but there will b some this year that will).

There are a ton of things they did a ground up rewriting of. For instance, the entire way graphics are not only displayed, but generated. Vista is the new foundation upon which they will build for many many years.

Most people have no reason to upgrade, but will be forced to when they buy a new pc that has that crap loaded. Gamers will certainly not want to upgrade as the performance is certainly NOT on par with XP. I will upgrade when Direct x 10 games (that I want) are available, and not before. If they wouldd have shipped it with the new file system, I would have upgraded already.

You can shut the UAC off with the command line. But I agree... it's a non-event for me right now. I will get it with a new box.

The active window stuff is cool, but I can't justify an upgrade just because of a pretty interface.

You forgot to mention it is a resource hog.

Quoted: You forgot to mention it is a resource hog.

No more so than XP when it was released...

Quoted: So how does is network with other (XP) machines?

yea, its fine in that respect. I'm on a network with a few XP boxes and the file, print, internet sharing is working just fine. Finding the network/sharing settings and some of their layout is a little different than XP but it all works together.

Quoted: One of the main things that was supposed to be a big deal was the new file system. Unfortunately, they did not ship it yet it for what ever reason. It may be added later via a service pack. The other main advantage is Direct-x 10. (which no one needs yet, as almost no games take advantage of it, but there will b some this year that will). There are a ton of things they did a ground up rewriting of. For instance, the entire way graphics are not only displayed, but generated. Vista is the new foundation upon which they will build for many many years. Most people have no reason to upgrade, but will be forced to when they buy a new pc that has that crap loaded. Gamers will certainly not want to upgrade as the performance is certainly NOT on par with XP. I will upgrade when Direct x 10 games (that I want) are available, and not before. If they wouldd have shipped it with the new file system, I would have upgraded already.

I'm sure you know this but just to clarify for others... MS will only be releasing DirectX 10 for Vista. Not because it couldn't be done for XP easily, just to make you bend over and grab your ankles a year or so before you were ready to take it that way from MS.

So far, I really like Vista.  I have it running on two "experiment" computers.

Although at this point, I don't see any real compelling reason to upgrade a perfectly working XP machine.

Quoted: What the hell were MS programmers doing all these years? This certainly doesn't feel like the work of years and years of man hours.

Please report to the nearest train station as you are to be shipped to a, um...... re-education center.  It's the Microsoft way afterall!

The big thing MS has been doing is.... Int64

I have Vista Home Basic on my new laptop..I feel like I'm on the hind tit and missing out so I'm wondering if I should go ahead and upgrade to Home Premium ($80) or find a way to get back to XP..I don't care enough to shell out $200 for Ultimate

Quoted: I have Vista Home Basic on my new laptop..I feel like I'm on the hind tit and missing out so I'm wondering if I should go ahead and upgrade to Home Premium ($80) or find a way to get back to XP..I don't care enough to shell out $200 for Ultimate

"hind tit"

Without looking at the differences I can say the Home Premium I installed for someone seemed very capable, fully featured, and probably the most appropriate version for most people. If I were you I'd either upgrade to that or go back to XP. I think you may be sucking on that "hind tit" after all.

Quoted: Quoted: You forgot to mention it is a resource hog. actually no it's not. it fully uses the installed hardware so nothing is left idle 100% of the time

Yes it is. I purchased a notebook for a co-worker last week which I specifically looked for the "Business" version of Vista. Since the home versions of XP lacked server connectivity, it was a logical assumption that the business edition of Vista would be required for our network. Guess what has absolutely NO support for Netware now? Furthermore, there's no support whatsoever for the IPX/SPX protocol (other than some hack on the interweb). I realize these are older networks, but some of us have legacy apps that require Netware servers and the IPX protocol. How hard would it have been to include this? It's just another example of MS leveraging their OS to stomp on the other guys.

Anyway, to end this rant, I had to spend hours formatting and installing XP pro, loading drivers, etc on the laptop I had hunted for, wasting time trying to find an incompatible OS. Once I had it on there, it ran considerably faster than Vista, when you discount the fact that Vista did not really shut down all the way (it kind of goes into sleep mode by default on the Lenovo I bought)

Quoted: Quoted: I have Vista Home Basic on my new laptop..I feel like I'm on the hind tit and missing out so I'm wondering if I should go ahead and upgrade to Home Premium ($80) or find a way to get back to XP..I don't care enough to shell out $200 for Ultimate "hind tit" Without looking at the differences I can say the Home Premium I installed for someone seemed very capable, fully featured, and probably the most appropriate version for most people. If I were you I'd either upgrade to that or go back to XP. I think you may be sucking on that "hind tit" after all.

Sorry, ever since I hit 40 a few years back I've started to sound more like my Dad..since my wife and kids just left for Grandma's house I'll put the upgrade on my "to do" list for the day..I stuck an extra Gig of RAM in the new laptop to help cover the bigger jobs

Quoted: To really summarize how I feel: What the hell were MS programmers doing all these years? This certainly doesn't feel like the work of years and years of man hours. The fact that even the UI running off the GPU would be possible to implement under XP (windowblinds does this for instance) makes one wonder if there is any justification other than profit for Vista to be it's own Windows version. Seriously, what the hell have microsoft employees been working on for so long? It can't be Vista b/c if they are that inefficient then they make the government look good. There isn't even all that much "under the hood"/"behind the scenes" stuff to justify the upgrade.

Haste makes waste. It takes less time to do things right than to do things over again. It's like at work if you do something half-assed to save time you end up having to spend a lot of time redo-ing it. This is a multi-billion dollar version of that.

I've been using Vista Ultimate on a new laptop for about 3 weeks now.  
The 1st thing I did was disable that ridiculous UAC.  What is odd is I had to enable it to upgrade to Adobe reader 8.0(that's an Adobe bug, not MS).  After I upgraded, I disabled that crap again.

I have absolutely no complaints with performance, and a resource hog it is not.  I'm running Office Enterprise 2007 on it, with no problems having 3 or 4 Office windows open while surfing the net, and playing mahjong.

It seems like a well set up OS.  All my old scanner, printer, and external harddrives installed without a problem.  If I was to complain about anything it would be the network configuration change took a bit to get used to.

Of course, after posting this, my new box will explode

i've been running ultimate for over a month now i guess.  

3k+
1.5gb pc3200 ram
2 160gb in a raid0
ati x850 pro


only software that didn't load  aim pro
only software that i get a error message steam  
i had to tweak bf2 to run as admin.  its runs fine now

i bought a readyboost drive from newegg a 2gb drive.   using the full  capacity and i could tell a difference.   the only thing that pisses me off is my board asus keeps trying to boot of the usb drive.    i have it disabled in the bios and it STILL attempts to boot of the usb drive.  SO i have to unplug the drive let it boot to the load vista screen then plug it in.   NOT a fault of vista obviously.    and no i haven't checked for bios updates

i have had no problems viewing webpages.  ALL my online banks updated their pages to function with IE7.    windows defender built in is a excellent idea.    

bitlocker won't work on my pc due to the raid0   OH well.  

it always seems like it loads for a while even once its up to the desktop.   but perfomance is NOT affected

we do have a computer forum

ive been running vista business for a couple weeks now and i have not had one problem and very much enjoy it. although, i would not have bought it. i got it free with a coupon i got when i bought windows XP back in december.

i even upgraded, not a new install, and not one problem. im very happy with my vista experience.

Vista didn't recognize my key for activation ..after making the phone call to a crowded place on the other side of the planet..I got activated and am in the process of upgrading to Premium Home..we'll see what happens

I helped my elderly neighbor set up a new desk top computer.  We tried downloading the Viesta program for the printer-no go. Returned the printer for one that was compatable- they lied. Ordered the disk for 2 day delivery-took 10 days. Juno would not work, used AOL (installed) to download the right version. This has been the hardest to setup and use system I have ever encountered. The poor woman was in tears about it the Office Depot and manufacture (Ivonov?) were less then helpful.
If I get a new lap top can I use the XP from my current computer?
I will not go through this nonsense.

Quoted: Quoted: You forgot to mention it is a resource hog. actually no it's not. it fully uses the installed hardware so nothing is left idle 100% of the time

I have been running it as beta tester for 9 months.  

I have my test machine set as a dual boot and start either XP pro or vista.  There is a very most certainly a difference in performance.