Why Windows Vista doesn't suck

[vinifera]

you don't have to even like aero, any other non transparent skin does its job

[NoelC]

That reminds me of the one other thing about Vista (at least on my work PC, anyway) that I find confusing: for some reason, once in a while the file/folder view settings in Windows Explorer change on their own. Sometimes they'll appear in category view, at other times columns (such as file date or size) disappear, and I have to go into the settings and put them back the way I want them. Have no idea why this would be happening.

 

Been a while since I used Vista daily, but I have to say I do remember that happening to me as well.

 

-Noel

[11ryanc]

That reminds me of the one other thing about Vista (at least on my work PC, anyway) that I find confusing: for some reason, once in a while the file/folder view settings in Windows Explorer change on their own. Sometimes they'll appear in category view, at other times columns (such as file date or size) disappear, and I have to go into the settings and put them back the way I want them. Have no idea why this would be happening.

 

My experience with Windows 7 is much less extensive, but it doesn't seem to do this to me.

 

The taskbar jumplists in Win7 are a definite plus, but OTOH I don't care for the wide and flat taskbar or the default icon view there (I prefer text labels). Fortunately it's simple to set those back to Vista style, but I still find it a (minor) annoyance.

 

--JorgeA

That is the one issue that plagued me in Vista. Business, Ultimate, and even Server 2008. It was not the folder type feature either. Sort heading columns altered itself, grouping settings would out of the blue sort itself, icons looked different, opposite folders shared settings etc. I could find Registry patches to disable auto folder type, however my problem was views and settings simply changing for no reason. Kind of drives me mad how I can find no documentation on this. Could even be triggered by a driver. Just not enough people using the OS these days to find out.

Edited June 8, 2015 by 11ryanc

[PRB]

That reminds me of the one other thing about Vista (at least on my work PC, anyway) that I find confusing: for some reason, once in a while the file/folder view settings in Windows Explorer change on their own. Sometimes they'll appear in category view, at other times columns (such as file date or size) disappear, and I have to go into the settings and put them back the way I want them. Have no idea why this would be happening.....

--JorgeA

 

Me too! I'm a daily Vista user and get this same behaviour ocassionally. I've always assumed there was some hidden logic as to why it happens but I've never given it enough thought to try spotting a pattern.

 

Other than this particular quirk, I love the look and feel of Vista. 

[NoelC]

I think it was just a bug - one that was eliminated in later releases.

 

-Noel

[Jody Thornton]

I think it was just a bug - one that was eliminated in later releases.

 

-Noel

Has to be, as I've not seen it.  Typing this from Vista Ultimate x64.

[WinClient5270]

 

I think it was just a bug - one that was eliminated in later releases.

 

-Noel

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.

[JorgeA]

This happened to me again last night, and may serve as an example of what we're talking about.

 

My Windows Explorer preference for the "Computer" view is Tiles (the last item in the Views menu). Last night, for reasons unknown, when I went into Explorer the items under Computer showed up as Medium Icons and I had to manually change them back to Tiles. I have no idea why this would happen, Vista seems to do it on its own.

 

Don't get me wrong, though. I love my Vista system and it's still my main work PC. I wouldn't dream of changing it to 7, let alone anything that came after it.

 

--JorgeA

[NoelC]

If you ever do dream of changing it to 7, I have been there, done that, and had it work out to be a more productive experience.  Actually, I think you have my book on the subject.

 

-Noel

[vinifera]

"7" has same bug

 

but at least I know its settings are not registry tied but to

%HOMEPATH%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\...s*** inside

or

%PROGRAMDATA%\Microsoft\...s*** inside

or

%HOMEPATH%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\...s*** inside

 

whenever i purge some contents from those paths via cmd script

all folder "icons" lose their last settings

Edited June 10, 2015 by vinifera

[xpclient]

The folder template settings used to get reset in Vista. It was a bug that *was* fixed in Windows 7.

[11ryanc]

Folder templates themselves do in fact change if in this scenario. So no reg patch is capable of working around the damage. Those workarounds are intended to ditch the templates and use the all items view everywhere. I fail to understand what is causing it to happen. I know many who use Vista just fine, then once in a while this crap. All my machines subjected use Radeon cards, but so do many others without a hitch.

I'm using 7 as of now. It is somewhat "fixed" in the light of these issues, yet broken in others as mentioned above. Still quite like it though. Have it configured to resemble Build 6801 theming/boot skin wise.

[JorgeA]

If you ever do dream of changing it to 7, I have been there, done that, and had it work out to be a more productive experience.  Actually, I think you have my book on the subject.

 

-Noel

 

I do indeed!     It's a fabulous guide and I highly recommend it to anyone wishing to get the most out of their Windows 7 system.

 

One of my Windows 7 machines has a Vista theme installed. If and when I make the switch over to 7 for everyday use, it'll be with either a Vista or a Longhorn theme, they're so much more visually appealing than 7. But of course 7 is in turn immensely more attractive than 8, let alone 10.

 

--JorgeA

[NoelC]

I hear you about the visual appeal.  Fortunately, we have Big Muscle and his wonderful Aero Glass restorer.  Unfortunately, there's nothing one can do about SOME applications (thinking about Office 2013 or Visual Studio) that choose to leave behind the desktop theme entirely.  I can't freaking believe Microsoft is choosing to make all of Windows 10, out of the box, look like Office 2013.  I guess they just couldn't find anything that looked worse to model their work after.

 

-Noel

[mrbigmouth502]

Vista wasn't necessarily a bad OS, it was just released way too early. They should have waited until at least 2008 to release it, as consumer PCs were finally getting to the point where they could run it somewhat acceptably. Vista got its bad reputation from being preinstalled on underpowered machines that really should have been running XP.