Why Windows Vista doesn't suck

[JorgeA]

IMO it depends on how much "stuff" you have loading into the system at bootup. I have a lean-and-mean Vista Business machine that boots up as fast as any Windows 8 box I've seen in action. (Not that I've seen that many of those... )

 

--JorgeA

 

[jaclaz]

IMO it depends on how much "stuff" you have loading into the system at bootup. I have a lean-and-mean Vista Business machine that boots up as fast as any Windows 8 box I've seen in action. (Not that I've seen that many of those...  )

You mean you haven't seen many Windows 8 machines or that you have seen many of them completely idle and only a few of them in action (i.e. actually producing something) ?

 

 

 

jaclaz

[JorgeA]

 

 

--JorgeA

[NoelC]

Well put.

 

Up until it burned out last year (bad capacitors), I kept my circa 2005 Dell Precision 470 dual Xeon workstation running Vista x64, even though I bought several better systems since.  It became a file server, having served well as a development workstation for quite a number of years.  It ran for months between reboots mandated by updates.

 

As machines go, it was a very fast one for its day, and by contrast a very slow one as compared to today's modern systems.  With a decent video card (which I didn't start out with) it actually ran Vista very well indeed.

 

And it never, ever, never crashed. 

 

Vista was the first Windows OS I used that didn't present a significant chance for loss of data, even though I worked it hard.  Folks like to tout XP, but in its day when XP was used hard - I mean crunching through gigabytes of serious data - it could and would fail hard.  XP tended to use up its resources, requiring a reboot every so often.  Vista was the first Windows OS I could put through the paces that would just run ad infinitum without needing a reboot.  Someone involved in Vista development had their head screwed on straight.

 

Vista brought us such a polished, elegant UI.  Who'd have thought they'd be making the window dressing worse now with each new version?

 

I've moved on - my main workstation runs a newer Windows version, but I'll always fondly remember Vista.  Of course I can and do boot it up in a Virtual Machine, which facilitates testing of products destined for folks using Vista.  It's poignant to run the same software side by side on various different versions - makes you realize how much Microsoft is trying to destroy the desktop.

 

 

-Noel

Edited March 8, 2015 by NoelC

[11ryanc]

Opinions are subjective. We all know very well people here choose to remain on XP, even as far as 2k in many cases. I think you guys are awesome keeping those products alive  Personally, I love Vista (SP2 or Server 2008 SP2). But I can understand why some detest it. It's not near as low latency on hard disk, it hates life below 4 GB of RAM, and customization is as good as gone. But what I fail to understand is, why do so many love XP, hate Vista, and then hop on the 7 wagon? I mean 7 did have a less rocky release. You can run 7 without any SP's and it's usable. But look at the whole shell of the OS. Heck, you can't even bypass Auto Arrange within Explorer without a patch to the registry. The Classic Control Panel is gone, substituted with a less user customization icon "Views". Libraries are a semi-cool idea, but their a nuisance on only 1 User Account. Even more so aggravating how the Start Menu forces all media links to them. The old school applications are gone from 7 and onward. Paint being my biggest regression. I like the idea of features expanding, perhaps a new UI. But it's really difficult for simple pixel art. Grab a line, click out, grab a line, click out. WTH is all that about? The desktop fails to refresh where needed on some occasion. Normally, when there is a lot of desktop items in view. I'll move stuff into other directories, and I have to manually refresh for it to catch up. Similar fashion working with Account settings. On Vista, I can change my account name, restart Explorer, and it will see such changes instantly. 7 needs to be entirely logged out for the OS to catch up with new adjustments. DWM is also less responsive. Perhaps different for others. In my case, animations are rougher than Vista's. I also notice higher CPU. Not the case in Server 2008 R2 though, even with DWM and Aero. Really polished as a whole too. Search is also an annoyance. Especially for me, I manage a lot of data across multiple drives. Advanced Search within Vista was downright amazing. To the point UI, easily fine tuned. 7 just about thrashed it, to the point where XP is on top.

I run Server 2008 SP2 (Vista converted) and it runs amazing. I just see no "improvement" in 7. Just weird changes, and messed up search.

[vinifera]

can't tell anymore when hes sarcastic or not

[Proud Windows user]

Yeah. I like Vista, but Vista haters are hating me on YouTube and are annoying. Vista SP2 is stable and good, works a little bit faster in my VM.

[vinifera]

it still has its own annoyances even with SP2 that they refuse to fix since it would mean code change

hence win7 SP1 is preferred over vista

 

then again you can have all from both worlds with build 6608

[JorgeA]

Yeah. I like Vista, but Vista haters are hating me on YouTube and are annoying. Vista SP2 is stable and good, works a little bit faster in my VM.

 

I'd be curious to know what anybody could hate about Vista at this point. Unless they're Metro/Win8 fans and can't stand Aero Glass and 3D elements, but then their objections would apply to Win7 too.

 

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

it still has its own annoyances even with SP2 that they refuse to fix since it would mean code change

hence win7 SP1 is preferred over vista

 

then again you can have all from both worlds with build 6608

 

What are some of these annoyances? The main (or only) annoyance for me when using Vista is that, for whatever reason, once in a while the mouse pointer jumps around by itself all over the screen.

 

--JorgeA

[NoelC]

 

What are some of these annoyances? The main (or only) annoyance for me when using Vista is that, for whatever reason, once in a while the mouse pointer jumps around by itself all over the screen.

 

 

Don't worry about that.  It's just the NSA.     

 

I agree, I don't see Win 7 and Vista as being fundamentally different.  Win 7 was mostly just refinement.  Vista.1.  Don't get me wrong, it was high time to refine things, though some could say it was the beginning of the modern trend where virtually nothing of real substance is being done to Windows.

 

One thing I particularly liked about older Windows versions was that Explorer windows were oriented more toward presenting higher information density and getting useful things done, rather than reducing cognitive load at the expense of productivity. 

 

Just look, for example, at how much extra chrome and whitespace are in the Win 7 and newer File Explorer windows, vs. say, XP or Vista.  With every version they've been spreading things out, and removing features (arrange your own icons, anyone?). 

 

If they keep it up, some future Explorer will show only one file at a time in a big sea of whitespace.  I think even way back in the late 2000s they knew they'd be trying to shove a new big-font system down people's throats, and started trying to lubricate the passage.

 

Not that the new versions can't be tweaked to put more information on the screen closer together - I've been doing that a long time.  But it can't be done with system-provided configuration options - you need 3rd party software.

 

-Noel

[vinifera]

to me vista sucks in 3 main aspects

 

1. file manager is clunky, something win7 corrected

2. taskbar is useless, again something that win7 improved alot

3. if you enable UAC and prefetch and indexing, you're trashing your PC

 

lets not forget SxS hell

[11ryanc]

to me vista sucks in 3 main aspects

 

1. file manager is clunky, something win7 corrected

2. taskbar is useless, again something that win7 improved alot

3. if you enable UAC and prefetch and indexing, you're trashing your PC

 

lets not forget SxS hell

1. File Manager - Clunky how? It had sort heading, a file tree that could partition side by side with favorite links, and completely unlocked to arrange item positions. On the flip, Windows 7 removes sort heading menu outside of details view, resulting in more clicks. The file tree is screwy, if you show all folders your pinned locations will easily get covered up. Libraries are pushed out on you in the Start Menu, and partially in Explorer. No option to byass. Typically harmless, but aggrevating somestimes with single accounts.

2. Lol..

3. Superfetch - I do agree somewhat. Vista's Superfetching was quite monstrous. It was designed that way though, idea is to take strain off the hard drive. I see little to no difference either way. With an SSD, or even a high performance HDD, it's useless none the less. As far as UAC goes, it can be tweaked in Vista via Group Policy. But imrpoved greatly in 7, so yeah.

I love them both, and I can easily customize them both on the outside, and some through Reg settings. But I fail to understand how some of these flaky sides to 7 are so vastly overlooked in the light of hating Vista.

Composing this from Windows 7 Home Premium x64

[JorgeA]

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

Edited June 8, 2015 by JorgeA

[smeezekitty]

 

Yeah. I like Vista, but Vista haters are hating me on YouTube and are annoying. Vista SP2 is stable and good, works a little bit faster in my VM.

 

I'd be curious to know what anybody could hate about Vista at this point. Unless they're Metro/Win8 fans and can't stand Aero Glass and 3D elements, but then their objections would apply to Win7 too.

 

--JorgeA

 

I know not everyone is a fan of Aero (I like it myself). But I don't understand how anyone likes the ugly flat look of W8. Honestly, it looks like something out of the 1980s