WinClient5270

I guess it isn't really much of an issue since alternatives such as Foxit Reader still support Vista. But it would be interesting if somebody could get it going anyway.

I hope it's okay to post about (yet another) compatibility issue with Vista! Some of you may know already, but the latest version of Adobe Reader (Acrobat DC) only supports Windows 7 and later. However, I extracted the installer and got an MSI out of it. I edited the MSI with Orca and removed the NT 6.1 restriction, and it installed without errors. However, getting it to run is a different story. Judging by the error message attached, it appears that there's a missing call in USER32.dll called GetTouchInputInfo. I don't know if it can be stubbed or not, and I lack the necessary skills to do it myself. Would anyone here be interested in stubbing this call (or even finding out if it can be done)? Any help is greatly appreciated.

Firefox seems to be the best browser for Vista users. Recently, Google aligned their Vista and XP chrome versions since they apparently didn't have enough people using Vista to report bugs to continue maintaining the vista version, and as a result all chromium based browsers (i.e. modern Opera) use the unfitting XP UI on Vista as well. Google also mentioned dropping XP support at the end of this year, which means they'll probably take Vista down with it.

Hello everyone. Well here I am again with yet another Vista compatibility issue. I recently purchased a new laptop (HP Pavilion p15pt, to be exact). As you probably know the OS it came with was Windows 8.1. I quickly wiped that off and installed Windows Vista, only to find that there are no drivers available for Intel HD Graphics or Intel USB 3.0. I was pretty disappointed, so I had to install Windows 7 which does have drivers available. I don't really mind Windows 7 but I would much rather run Windows Vista. Does anyone know of a way to get these drivers working for Vista? Before anyone mentions this, I am aware that MSFN user AnX posted about this some time ago but never really elaborated as much as I would've liked, not to mention he was using Windows XP drivers which does not allow Windows Aero to work. His hardware was also older than mine so those drivers probably wouldn't work anyway. I also tried modifying the .INF files, but I just got an error that said Device Cannot Start (code 39) If it helps, the processor is a 4th generation Intel Core i3 4030U CPU. Here is my Windows 7 desktop and System Properties. Guess what, it IS in fact Windows 7... http://prntscr.com/7xqzrw

Has to be, as I've not seen it. Typing this from Vista Ultimate x64. I don't quite understand this bug, lots of people report it but I have never got it before.

He's referring to me, haha. I think the issue is caused by the Windows 7 display driver he's using. I am using the latest nvidia drivers on my system, which officially support Vista, and I do not get the error. Thoughts?

Well it appears that we've made a slight breakthrough... I finally managed to extract the installer using Command Prompt. And as a result, I got an MSI file along with a few other installation files. I took the MSI file and modified it with Orca MSI Editor, and I was able to easily remove the OS restriction in the file. However, there's another problem.. When I opened the MSI, I got an error about Windows Installer. My assumption is, Windows Vista only recieved Windows Installer 4.5, and this requires 5.0 to work properly, which unfortunately isn't available for Vista. I'm about out of ideas.. Thoughts anyone? Screenshots: http://prntscr.com/76v661 http://prntscr.com/76v63j

Allright, this should be enough for any expert to tell me what's wrong. Any help is greatly appreciated. I would say your video card is most likely dying. I'm no expert but I don't think it is supposed to look like that, haha. I may be wrong. For best Vista support, I recommend switching to Nvidia. They will be supporting Vista until April 2017 and you can most likely just modify the infs after that, too. I currently use Vista with a GTX 760, and it works extremely well. I've also found that nvidia drivers tend to be more stable than AMD ones, at least for me. Just my two cents.

Thanks for the help, I followed your instructions. However the problem still persists. I believe this is happening because I simply copied the VMware program files installation directory from my 7 partition to Vista, and I think running the installer is necessary for VMware to work properly, as certain services are required for virtual machines to launch and operate properly, and only running the installer can provide those services. VMware Player 7 does run at least though, however launching VMs doesn't work. I think the key culprit here is the version check found in the VMware installer exe file. Does anyone here know how to bypass the common OS checks found in software? I'm willing to bet it most likely checks the mere NT version number (in this case, NT 6.0) and it refuses to run if NT number= <6.1. Would anyone here have any idea on how to overcome this? Any information or help would be greatly appreciated, and thanks everyone for your input so far, it is very much appreciated. -2008WindowsVista

Sorry to bother, but could you elaborate a bit on how this could be done? I have no experience with this kind of stuff, lol. Thanks to everyone that has helped so far though, it is much appreciated.

I've gotten extremely close to getting it to run. You see, I am dualbooting Windows Vista and Windows 8.1, and here's what I did: I installed VMware Workstation on Windows 8.1, and rebooted into Vista. Then, I ran VMware from the VMware folder in the Windows 8.1 Program Files folder, and VMware Player version 7, which is also unsupported on Vista, ran without absolutely any issues. Workstation, on the other hand, was stuck on the "enter your product key or enter an email address to begin a 30 day trial" message. First I entered a valid product key, but it complained that I didn't have permission to enter a product key. And I tried using an email address to start a 30 day trial, it gave me the same message, despite the fact that I never entered a product key. It's a start though, and at least VMware Player 7 now works for those that need/want it on Vista. Any ideas?

The installer will not run. I did extract it with universal extractor, but I got these two strange files, as seen in this screenshot here: http://prntscr.com/5ooqd6 Any ideas as to what I should do now?

As some of you may know, VMware's latest version of their VMware Workstation product, VMware Workstation 11, is not supported on Windows Vista, and running the installer will nag you to upgrade to Windows 7 in order to use the product. Bearing in mind that Vista bears close resemblance to Windows 7 under the hood, is compatible with the latest version of Microsoft .NET Framework (Version 4.5.2), and even received a platform update that ported a bunch of Windows 7 features and APIs to Windows Vista, I've come to believe that VMware Workstation 11 would have no issues running under a fully updated copy of Microsoft Windows Vista, and choosing not to support it is just a marketing decision on VMware's part. I've seen people on here work wonders with getting modern software that requires Windows XP or later, to function on Windows 2000, since it, too bears a close resemblance with its successor under the hood, much like the relationship between Vista and 7. So, I would like to ask, would there be any way possible, to get VMware Workstation 11 to install and function on Windows Vista? I know that getting unsupported software to work on Windows 2000 was as simple as modifying Windows XP dlls to work with Windows 2000, and I was wondering if the same could possibly be done with Windows 7 DLLs, for Windows Vista? If anyone knows anything about how this could possibly be done, please let me know. Thanks in advance, ~2008WindowsVista.

Thanks a lot for the help.

If the drivers require Windows 7 or later, you can sometimes modify the .inf files that the drivers use, and change the build string in the inf file that restricts it to Windows 7 (6.1.7600 or 6.1.7601) to 6.0.6002.18005 and install them using device manager. they'll appear unsigned, but you should be able to just click "install anyway" and they'll install with no issues. I've used this method several times and it usually works, and this method has also been done here with the latest ATI drivers: http://forums.amd.com/game/messageview.cfm?catid=454&threadid=169548 jaclaz It works just fine after installing SP2 and the platform update. There is nothing wrong with it. I use it on several machines and it has never froze up, crashed, or anything of the sort. I use it for virtualization, rendering, photoshop, web browsing, music production, and more. Vista SP2 is a great OS, and it's much better than the overrated XP it replaced.

Hey everyone. I am wanting to dualboot Windows Vista Ultimate x64 with Windows XP x64 (or possibly Windows Server 2003), with Windows Vista already installed first. I was wondering if there was anyway to do this without corrupting Windows VIsta's bootloader, as I've heard that installing XP alongside Vista (with Vista installed first) will result in Vista's bootloader being corrupted. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

The only (confirmed) method would be to drag your "Videos" folder to your start orb and pin it under your Internet and Email Program links. There's no way to replace 'Printers' that I know of as that is an actual Control Panel applet and you can't put anything in there because Vista uses this to show the installed printers. The only items that I know of that you could change are Documents, Pictures, or Music. The rest are control panel applets and cannot be changed. EDIT: Looks like there is a way, but you'll have to sacrifice your Games link: http://www.winhelponline.com/blog/add-your-videos-folder-to-vista-start-menu-by-replacing-games/ Or if you don't use the Favorites folder, you can rename that to 'Videos' and use it as well. I'm pretty sure IE is the only browser that uses this to store favorites by default, so if you don't use IE it shouldn't be of any use. Or, you could Right click on the 'Favorites' link, click Properties, Click the "location" tab, and click "Move" and select your videos folder as the new location

actually, i don't know what level of performance you're aiming to get, but Vista runs like the wind on my pc, blows 7 away in terms of speed, boots up in 5 seconds and shuts down in 3. vista's "cluttered" UI can be customized, i saw where you didn't like how they crammed the file "tree" under the favorites links, but you can turn those off, see here: http://gyazo.com/7431f3f6ff28fce13260837c47cdc25d and i prefer vista's level of backwards compatibility (in terms of UI) over 7 or 8 any day of the week. 7 got rid of the classic start menu, so no choice for users that prefer it than to install classic shell (shouldn't have to install 3rd party software for something like that IMO) win8 got rid of the classic theme and start menu and has the cluttered and uncustomizable ribbon UI in explorer, as well as that intrusive and ugly start screen, so vista easily beats it. also 7 forces auto arrange in explorer for no reason, have to tweak a registry setting to turn it off, but vista doesn't do this.

No idea. Your Start Menu is broken lol. It's a setting available since Windows 98. No no, I did the same thing. And it changed nothing. and i used a real, legit copy of Windows XP Pro SP3. Screenshot here: http://gyazo.com/4375c5c305b48c9c8080d0ea652adf93 Notice how it is clearly checked and is enabled in start menu options.

Very well said. I agree completely.

From Vista itself! People hated it. Were they all wrong ? By the time they got used to it, 7 came out (which as you all say is just the same as Vista, just better), Seven had an other advantage; it came out on hardware that was twice as powerfull, and that's why people did not hate it. Saying that Vista is a viable choice for many today is like saying XP SP2 is a viable choice. I don't hate Vista, I don't hate SP2, it simply wouldn't come to my mind to use them unless it was already installed on a machine, but that would not be "a choice". Cheers. "Saying that Vista is a viable choice is like saying XP SP2 is a viable choice" Not at all. Windows XP SP2 (x86) has been unsupported since July 2010. The 64 bit version has poor 64 bit support (lots of 64 bit apps don't work on it, examples are Waterfox, Palemoon, and iTunes). And has been unsupported since April 2014, not to mention that it's poorly optimized for modern hardware and is stuck on DirectX 9.0c which means any modern game that requires DX10 or later (and most do nowadays) won't work on it. It has also been known to have tons of driver issues. Vista SP2 on the other hand is supported until 2017 and most 64 bit apps support it (only one i can think of that recently dropped support is photoshop CC). And it works well with modern hardware and bears close resemblance to Windows 7 in the way it handles core scheduling and RAM usage, and nowadays driver support (if you have AMD or Nvidia graphics or amd chipset, intel recently dropped support for vista) is fine. Vista SP2 with a platform update has DirectX 11 and most games will work on it. Like I said, I never said we should all switch to Windows Vista. But if you have an old machine lying around that has decent specs and still runs XP, Vista is a "viable" upgrade option as long as it's still supported. However you are completely correct about 7 being installed on better hardware than vista was installed on. Which contributes to it being so highly praised over Vista.

That's your opinion, and I respect it.However I use server 2008 and it seems to run much faster than Vista.. I wonder why? It even runs faster than Windows 7 for me, but the UI is the same as vista so you probably wouldn't like it.

You misunderstood what I said.I said if Windows 7 "in its form TODAY" had been released instead of Vista, it would've suffered the same fate, because it's a complete departure from Windows XP, just like Vista, as compatibility issues would've existed because of the new kernel. You know, I love how people think 7 "fixed" everything, when all they did was tweak the interface and remove some unecessary features from vista (i.e. Dream scene and sidebar) so they could claim that it uses less RAM. 7 still has the same kernel and driver model as Vista. How is it not a viable choice? Vista supports modern hardware, and I use it on my custom built PC. And it runs great. Well, can't please everyone I guess. Vista had to set the standards before 7 could successfully uphold them. Vista may be irrelevant for you, but it's still going strong for me. And yes, there's a whole community that still uses vista. Emotional? Who here is emotional?

I agree that Vista sucked when it came out, as I said in the article it wasn't quite ready yet. Also I agree that the Service Packs came too late, and honestly I believe if MS had waited until OEMs had written proper drivers for it and made sure that it wasn't going to be installed on a 1 Ghz celeron with 512 MB of RAM it would've been "good enough" to start with. However there still would've been compatibility issues, as Vista differed greatly from Windows XP under the hood. Also, about USB 3.0, yes, there are drivers available for XP, but they only make XP recognize USB 3.0 ports for that specific motherboard. Once you try using a device with the USB 3.0 ports, Windows XP will fall back to USB 2.0 compatibility mode, which will cause a bottleneck in speed as far as data transferring goes, or at least that's what I've been told. I may be wrong. Yep. Vista SP2 is indeed a fine OS, and I think if people that still hate vista gave it a chance they'd like it. I have a friend that said his cousin used to hate Vista, but he let him try it out with SP2 and he said he liked it. He thought 7 was still a little better but thought that Vista SP2 was almost just as good. And what I meant by Vista being misunderstood was people still thought that it sucked even though SP2 fixed almost every problem wrong with it, as they didn't give it another chance after trying out the RTM version.

Thanks. Glad you liked it.