Vista, One Windows Too Many?
Mark is asking When Will You Upgrade to Vista? To answer your question Mark, not any time soon. Microsoft hasn’t exactly completely lost me as a customer but neither have they done anything at all that makes me want to upgrade. I will elaborate but first here is what Mark has to say
Is there enough in Vista to convince you to jump early on the bandwagon? Having used Vista, I think it’s just fine. The look and feel are slicker, the security features are better (albeit somewhat annoying) and multi-media features are impressive. Despite all that, Vista is an upgrade rather than a new release, and like any upgrade, you really need to ask yourself if it’s worth the hassle and aggravation to move from something that works to something that apparently works better or differently.Based on conversations with people within the tech community, I’ve come across one person who has upgraded to XP (and it hasn’t been the most pleasant of experiences). Meanwhile, I’ve heard of several people making the move to Mac. Is there a trend here? Probably not but the Mac’s stability and hassle-free OS may be starting to win over more people who wouldn’t have even considered moving to the Mac side. There also appears to be growing interest in Linux (a few folks at a party on the weekend were talking about Ubuntu)
First of all, Mark! Talking about Linux … at a party? Shame on you, heh.
My thoughts are closer to the people in the tech community Mark has been speaking to. I upgraded from Windows XP to a Mac laptop, a dual-boot XP and Ubuntu laptop (which still doesn’t work wirelessly under Ubuntu, curses!) and a Centos Linux based LAMP development server. Out of these machines it is the Mac I like best.
My Windows desktop dev machine is staying XP for now but since I get Microsoft software for free while I still have my MVP MSDN subscription (the award expired but my subscription has yet to) I might just give Vista a try at some point. I have real doubts it is powerful enough to run Vista, and I have even more doubts I will gain anything from it. In fact my guess is I will spend fruitless and expensive hours swearing at it and go back to XP.
There has been nothing at all I have read that makes me want to upgrade. Many people are saying the Vista experience is slower and more frustrating than XP. I don’t play games, XP works, it is all set up how I like it. I’m productive and do not have any serious security worries.
Microsoft, anybody, give me one good reason why I should upgrade …
Posted on February 14th, 2007 by Chris Garrett in Development
I have to buy a new computer and the one thing I don’t like about it (besides the cost) is the fact that none of the computer manufacturers let me choose Windows XP for the pre-installed OS. My only choice is Vista. Uggh!
Yeah it’s shocking how few popular PC companies allow you to buy a computer without an operating system pre-installed. Just give me the driver disks if I need them but let me install my OWN choice of OS!
I was content with Windows 98 since I did not play games and had enough computing power for what I wanted to do. But Microsoft stopped supporting Windows 98. So I went from Win98 to XP without installing WinMe or Win2000. That alone made waiting worth it. I hope to stick with XP until the next generation(s) of Windows. By then, I may need a new computer, anyway, but I can avoid one or more generations of new OS headaches.
Yeah, I seriously thought about the upgrade for a new system I’m building for my wife. But since I’ll have to service and maintain it, the answer was No.
I also blogged a bit more about my thoughts and pulled together a few more folks thinking here.
And yeah, I have a Ubuntu laptop that isn’t able to get the wireless up either…sigh.
The main dealbreaker for me is the lack of support for peripherals. My ScanSnap, my printer - if they won’t work with Vista (and they won’t), forget it. I need the Windows machine to run a bankruptcy petition preparing program I depend on but otherwise, it’s all Mac for me from now on.
Thanks guys, not many people on the side of vista so far … :O)
When filling out my order for the new PC, if I choose under 2GB ram I get a warning that Windows Vista runs optimally on 2GB ram or more. Guess every time Windows comes out with a new OS it helps the pc companies make more money too. What a deal.
Well, at least I didn’t talk about Vista at the party..:)