Vista Issues and Wishlist

sprkymrk

Okay, I've not had much time behind the wheel with Vista, but I am wondering how everyone else is liking/disliking it - and I'm hoping for specifics.

1. What problems or issues are you having with Vista so far, beyond the user interface differences which only takes a week or two to adapt to.

2. After having used Vista for a while, do you have a wish list for inclusion in a service pack or future release?

For me the biggest thing is the inability to run the admin tools from my workstation, like you can with XP. However I heard that was/is being fixed.

Ahriakin

I used it for about 4 months and then switched back to XP.

The admin tools were a big killer for me, they've been 'working on it' since inception and still no sign of a fix. How hard is it to repair DHCP MMC?

Wireless was a pain in the ass until I worked out you were better off telling it not to automatically connect to your hidden-ssid network so you could actually choose it from the list. It's terrible at detecting them so they rarely show and if left on auto in a fit of astounding stupidity there is no way to manually select your profile...you can see it, you can edit it but you don't have a connect option.

Cisco VPN client compatibility is still at the Beta level (though I haven't tried the All-Connect client yet).

No drivers for my primary printers at work. Granted they were old(ish) but it was a wee bit cheaper to just reinstall XP than replace them.

A little thing but I used dual monitor mode with my laptop. When docked the LCD monitor is my primary and the Laptop screen 2ndary. Every time I'd lock/unlock the workstation or it just came out of power saving it would switch the screens. It would actually start up okay, then after a few seconds switch over. Switching them back 20 times a day gets a bit old.

Other 3rd party software problems were a factor too.
[rant]I think I'm actually more disappointed it was so much small seemingly easy to fix stuff that they didn't bother doing anything about, that coupled with the way they shoved it down people's throats (they didn't force the OEMs to stop shipping 98 or 2000 like that when XP appeared) shows just how little regard their Vista strategy has for the actual end user [/rant]

At the end of the day it felt like work using it, with very little advantage over XP minus some eyecandy.

Kasor

Most of my client got issue with the Office 2007. It is not user friendly.

Memory still a killer for many of the machine.

So far we only have one LAN with Vista because everything still on XP. U got my point.

hugolucky

I work at a liberal arts college that recently implemented campus-wide secure wireless, Vista has issues when authenticating with WPA2 - AES
encryption and PEAP, where XP will save the logon credentials, Vista wont, the students have to reenter credentials every time they want to connect to the secure network, even if they are connecting to the same access point, MS recommended the following hot fix....

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/932063

...it doesnt fix the issue, MS is now saying that vista SP1 will fix the issue

at home I bought a new PC with Vista, for me there were more disadvantages with Vista than advantages, adobe photoshop, along with several other apps, simply do not function correctly after installing to vista, and no patches are available, plus my printer has no vista drivers, im not holding my breath on HP to update them

ive spent a good chuck of change on my tools, and im not gonna put out any more money for new versions, or new devices, when the ones i have work just fine for me, and so im dual-booting xp and vista, i spend 95% of my time in xp pro, vista just doesnt have any advantages for me

my wife thinks vista is pretty through, she loves the daisy clock in the side bar, im thinking big deal

garv221

sprkymrk wrote:

Okay, I've not had much time behind the wheel with Vista, but I am wondering how everyone else is liking/disliking it - and I'm hoping for specifics.

1. What problems or issues are you having with Vista so far, beyond the user interface differences which only takes a week or two to adapt to.

2. After having used Vista for a while, do you have a wish list for inclusion in a service pack or future release?

For me the biggest thing is the inability to run the admin tools from my workstation, like you can with XP. However I heard that was/is being fixed.

hmmmm.

"Vista... cancel or allow"?
http://youtube.com/watch?v=X4FF_aT_mE8

PC manufacturers are making it extremely tough for end users who bought a computer bundled with Vista to go back to XP. I just bought my fiance' a HP laptop pre-bundled with Vista. HP's site didn't carry the XP drivers, I had to hunt down single drivers through out forums and random sites. I used nlite to create my XP disk with the correct drivers. To be honest there are just too many things I cannot stand about Vista to even list. For me it feels like Windows ME, just pull it from the shelves . I actually own a powerbook G4 that I'm quickly growing more fond of.

hetty

Is it true that if you get a Vista license that enables you to install XP?

A MCT told me that and I think hes wrong.

I heard you can install an older version of office if you have the latest office license bit can you install and older version of Windows if you have a new license? Maybe its volume licensing?

How does the installation code work then?

garv221

hetty wrote:

Is it true that if you get a Vista license that enables you to install XP?

A MCT told me that and I think hes wrong.

I heard you can install an older version of office if you have the latest office license bit can you install and older version of Windows if you have a new license? Maybe its volume licensing?

How does the installation code work then?

That is true for open licenses. I have done it with Vista/XP, Office and Project 2003/07. You get two licenses.

blargoe

I'm pretty sure I saw on one of the developer blogs in the past month or so that the 2003 admin tools would never be released in a vista compatible version.

hetty

garv221 wrote:

That is true for open licenses. I have done it with Vista/XP, Office and Project 2003/07. You get two licenses.

Oh right, so its only for companies not everyone, would be nice if it was for everyone.

snadam

garv221 wrote:

PC manufacturers are making it extremely tough for end users who bought a computer bundled with Vista to go back to XP. I just bought my fiance' a HP laptop pre-bundled with Vista. HP's site didn't carry the XP drivers, I had to hunt down single drivers through out forums and random sites. I used nlite to create my XP disk with the correct drivers. To be honest there are just too many things I cannot stand about Vista to even list.

you and I both. I had to roll back two PC's from vista to XP, and it was the biggest pain. I went through the driver gauntlet as you did. Even then, I had some funky issues with drivers, but finally were resolved.

vista looks cool; but looks can be deceiving...

dstock7337

sprkymrk wrote:

Okay, I've not had much time behind the wheel with Vista, but I am wondering how everyone else is liking/disliking it - and I'm hoping for specifics.

1. What problems or issues are you having with Vista so far, beyond the user interface differences which only takes a week or two to adapt to.

2. After having used Vista for a while, do you have a wish list for inclusion in a service pack or future release?

For me the biggest thing is the inability to run the admin tools from my workstation, like you can with XP. However I heard that was/is being fixed.

I've actually been just fine running vista. Only thing that I really find annoying is the following scenario:

I have an RSS feed on my gadgets sidebar for MSNBC. Sometimes (with no consistant variable) when I click twice on a headline to open it, IE will open and crash out. I'll do this 2-4 times and then it'll finally open.

Memory hog is the second, but I experienced this when I upgraded from 98 to XP, so the typical growing pains is what I expect right now.

An another annoyance is certain XP software and games that have 3rd party encryption copy-protection software (Starforce specifically) do not work at all in Vista. This is due to it conflicting with Microsoft's digital rights management code conflicting with it. What a surprise, Microsoft wins in this virtual bout that starts when I put in that ol' trusty CD and finishes when the disc is done loading. Also, Microsoft won't fix it nor will Starforce. Ubisoft is one vendor that used this protection software and they won't bother fixing it either.

Also, Microsoft is doing now what Apple did a long time ago, force vendors of apps and hardware devices to comply with Microsoft standards, to ensure that the product will be stable with the operating system. Don't get me wrong, I find it very heavy handed and I don't like having to use an extra gig of memory now. But it's here to stay, whether we like it or not. XP will fade off into the wind but not anytime soon.
This is one reason why I use Vista but I haven't upgraded my wife's computer nor any of my family's PCs - They all use XP and I haven't advised any of them to upgrade.
But my mother-in-law has Vista... Actaully it's been working fine for my in-law but thats because everything she bought was brand new and designed for Vista.

sprkymrk

dstock7337 wrote:

But it's here to stay, whether we like it or not. XP will fade off into the wind but not anytime soon.

Probably, but not necessarily. Remember that horrible thing called Windows ME? A year after it came out it was pretty much disowned by MS and everyone that had switched to it went back to W98SE until XP came out.

dstock7337

sprkymrk wrote:

dstock7337 wrote:

But it's here to stay, whether we like it or not. XP will fade off into the wind but not anytime soon.

Probably, but not necessarily. Remember that horrible thing called Windows ME? A year after it came out it was pretty much disowned by MS and everyone that had switched to it went back to W98SE until XP came out.

True, but I don't see that pattern here with Vista. Part being aggressive marketing by Microsoft and part being that Vista is a stable OS. If you break down all of the nice GUI, you'll find that Vista is really Windows Server 2003. ME, 98, 95, XP, 2000 Pro, 3.11, etc were truely seperate Client Operating systems. They were designed with different Kernels than the Server OS's.
Microsoft realized that this gut the OS and patch it back together approach wasn't working and decided to take their most stable OS and repackage it: Vista is born (which was also part of the long delay of releasing a beta). Microsoft had a decision to make, build upon XP (which has been gutted out and rebuilt a bunch of times) and re-use its kernel or go with proven stability. Server 2003 has been Microsoft's most stable platform, so they built upon it's kernel and made Vista.
True, Vista could disappear but after Server 2008 and Vista, Microsoft plans on going to an only
64 bit approach with Server and Client OS's.

All of this was discussed in greater detail this last summer with Microsoft's Technet/MSDN Live In-person events.

I anticipate that this may be simply a bridge point for Client and Server OS but things will be changing between now and 2010 (Microsoft's next planned release of Server after 200. Time will tell.

In any case, I'd like to become more familar with Linux technology.

garv221

snadam wrote:

you and I both. I had to roll back two PC's from vista to XP, and it was the biggest pain. I went through the driver gauntlet as you did. Even then, I had some funky issues with drivers, but finally were resolved.

vista looks cool; but looks can be deceiving...

Gauntlet is right, it was absolutely brutal. I actually called HP first figuring they had the drivers on an FTP site but the tech actually told me it was impossible to install XP, lol.

Looks are deceiving, Vista takes a good couple of minutes to boot up and then controls your pc for you. I love how MS has a monopoly and is going to shove vista down everyones throat.

ally_uk

For me Vista was a pile of crap and a resource hog I encountered numerous issues with lack of driver support and some very strange happenings did occur when I used this O/S

I switched back to XP and I use Linux mainly Ubuntu and Debian Flavours I will probally use Vista again when the service packs are released as to me it seems pretty incomplete.

garv221

hetty wrote:

garv221 wrote:

That is true for open licenses. I have done it with Vista/XP, Office and Project 2003/07. You get two licenses.

Oh right, so its only for companies not everyone, would be nice if it was for everyone.

It is for everyone. You can buy an open license right now from CDW.

garv221

dstock7337 wrote:

Also, Microsoft is doing now what Apple did a long time ago, force vendors of apps and hardware devices to comply with Microsoft standards, to ensure that the product will be stable with the operating system. Don't get me wrong, I find it very heavy handed and I don't like having to use an extra gig of memory now. But it's here to stay, whether we like it or not. XP will fade off into the wind but not anytime soon.

That is what we call "ensuring you have no other choices for an OS but Windows"

I'm a young guy and always look forward to having the "new" updated stuff but this OS just doesn't work for me. MS needs an OS that has no extra fat on it and controlling security settings. I want to manipulate an OS and add the add-ons later not have to remove all their add ons. I agree we need Linux technology. I'm curious to see if Google will ever go public.

sthomas

I had an issue with user profiles in Vista. If I logged in as a user, then deleted the user profile folder under C:\Users, then logged back in as the user instead of recreating the profile like it did in XP it would create a TEMP folder and none of the settings would be saved when that user logged out. It took me awhile to figure out how to fix it but I finally stumbled upon this:

http://forums.microsoft.com/TechNet/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=1104418&SiteID=17

I was able to fix the problem by deleting a few registry entries under hkey_Local_machine\software\microsoft\windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList

Hopefully MS fixes this though because when you delete someones profile when they login again it should be recreated automatically.

Schluep

I have only had my new laptop for about two weeks but I have the 64 bit Vista loaded on it. For personal home use I really have no problems with it that couldn't be worked out. Many people using similar new hardware actually are running into more driver issues going back to XP than staying with Vista. All of my printers/flash drives/mice/monitors and other external hardware worked upon connecting them or with a simple driver download. All of the software I use runs properly with a standard installation or by running on compatibility mode. If the software was designed for a 32 bit architecture (which is the case for most of my software) I use a x86 installation for it.

I needed to update my router's firmware which was a simple process by obtaining it on their website. After that I had no problem connected to my WPA-2 encrypted home network. I have no problems networking with my other 3 XP machines or the printers attached to them. I plan on bringing a Ubuntu machine into the mix soon so we'll see what I can come up with there in a few weeks.

In terms of resource usage I can get much more processing power out of this laptop with the newer hardware than any of the other PC's I have. Most of the additional resources used by Vista can be disabled through a number of different optimization methods. A number of people on hardware/software forums all over the place and blogs have posted techniques that worked well for them on Vista in additional the standard ones we are all used to. Much like setting up a network, if something isn't needed it should be blocked (or in this case disabled).

Most of the current Vista issues will likely be more prevalent in a corporate environment. For personal use it is far more stable than XP was at first. The increase in resource usage compared to what we saw when XP first was released isn't nearly as bad either compared to the new hardware that is out compared to the hardware available when XP was first released. I waited much longer after XP was released to make the switch than I did after Vista was released.

Security looks much more promising on Vista as well. It doesn't have nearly as much vulnerability out of the box as XP did before the Service Packs were released. Even Administrator Accounts are prompted repeatedly for any action taken unless specifically disabled (not just installation, but even things such as changing settings in control panel which is a bit overboard). There is built in encryption functionality eliminating the need for third party software to effectively perform these functions and it is made very easy to use for a generic home user with no concept of what encryption actually is.

There is a lot more to it than just the look. I think in time and after a few service packs it will be more highly regarded than XP ever was. Once everyone can perform all of the tasks they need to perform and security is further enhanced and initial bugs are corrected I think we will start seeing opinions begin to change. Additionally, there is no doubt that moving to a 64 bit architecture is a wise move at this point, regardless of the M$ Conspiracy Theories and how Vista is designed to take over the known world.

I would wait before doing any type of upgrade to existing hardware or introducing Vista into most corporate networks. If you are purchasing new hardware especially for personal use it isn't as bad as it seems, and not at all comparable to ME.

Trailerisf

I like Vista. Its pretty.

Pretty bloody annoying.

ally_uk

Well with each release of Ubuntu is bringing improvements and increased usability it's only a matter of time Linux and the Open Source movement will really begin to steal some of Microsofts thunder.

I have replaced the majority of programs I use on my windows box with Open Source Variants and I feel they just run so much fluid and do not come with excessive bugs and bulk. Plus the bonus is it's free.

I agree with the comment which suggests Vista oneday will be regarded higher than XP once Microsoft have sorted out the security risks and bugs with the release of service packs.

But personally I am all for the Open Source Movement and belive this will play a major role in the future.

But I feel it's always best to deploy a network consisting of both Microsoft and Open Source Products that way you get the best of both worlds and the experience needed to support both.

networker050184

The only problem with open source is that if it generates that much business it will be turned into a money making machine and will therefore be used for profit. Before you know it Linux is then no better than microsoft. I think the only thing that keeps Linux open is the fact that Microsoft has such a strangle hold on the industry. Just my opinion though.

Anyway, back to the topic. I use Vista at home and haven't really had any issues with it. I agree that its a little too early to be used in the production enviroment, but it has TONS of potential. Think of when XP came out everyone complained about how bad it was. Change is hard sometimes even if it is for the better. Security on Vista can be a bit over the edge for an administrator, but will help protect users from the most dangerous thing out there..... themselves!!!!

Schluep

ally_uk wrote:

Well with each release of Ubuntu is bringing improvements and increased usability it's only a matter of time Linux and the Open Source movement will really begin to steal some of Microsofts thunder.

I have replaced the majority of programs I use on my windows box with Open Source Variants and I feel they just run so much fluid and do not come with excessive bugs and bulk. Plus the bonus is it's free.

I agree with the comment which suggests Vista oneday will be regarded higher than XP once Microsoft have sorted out the security risks and bugs with the release of service packs.

But personally I am all for the Open Source Movement and belive this will play a major role in the future.

But I feel it's always best to deploy a network consisting of both Microsoft and Open Source Products that way you get the best of both worlds and the experience needed to support both.

For us tech guys here you will find a lot more willingness to use and benefit from open source. I would be willing to bet a majority of people on these forums have worked with in a corporate environment or used one of the various Linux distros for personal use. Most of us like to experiment with a lot of different hardware and software to find what works best for us. Nearly everyone here relies on understanding how various aspects of technology work and making them work better for our living. Outside of supporting ourselves and our families most of us became interested in hardware or software long before the desire to work with it arose, and would be interested even if it wasn't income related.

That is not the case for the average user however. I have a lot of family members and friends that call with what they consider a serious computer issue because their optical mouse isn't working (the batteries died). Another common one is that the computer has a mind of its own and is intentionally putting bullet points on every line in a Word document. Gotta love when a password someone has used for 5 years on their home PC suddenly vanishes from their mind entirely and they are relying on you to fix it. When something breaks the average user does not care to figure out what went wrong, learn how to prevent it in the future, and search for their own solution. When working with open source it is usually your responsibility to search out a solution. When you purchase a product you typically have a Warranty or Service Agreement and can call up and scream at someone working in a Call Center and demand that they fix the problem you are having that you most likely created for yourself. Most people just expect a nice GUI and the computer to do all of the work for them. This is the reason that the open source movement will never become mainstream enough unless there is a fee involved. Open source can be easily shared and modified so unless you are purchasing just binary it is unlikely that a company will ever be able to successfully charge for a product. Most users would rather pay a few hundred or thousand extra dollars to make something work and never think about it again.

I know people that pay a few hundred dollars just for someone to come to their house and plug in all the cables on their newly purchased computer and make sure they can connect to the internet. Could anyone follow a set of instructions or even just match up the ends of the cables to plug them in correctly without knowing what they are? Of course they could, but that doesn't give them the desire to try.

dstock7337

Schluep wrote:

I have a lot of family members and friends that call with what they consider a serious computer issue because their optical mouse isn't working (the batteries died). Another common one is that the computer has a mind of its own and is intentionally putting bullet points on every line in a Word document... When something breaks the average user does not care to figure out what went wrong, learn how to prevent it in the future, and search for their own solution. When working with open source it is usually your responsibility to search out a solution. When you purchase a product you typically have a Warranty or Service Agreement and can call up and scream at someone working in a Call Center and demand that they fix the problem you are having that you most likely created for yourself. Most people just expect a nice GUI and the computer to do all of the work for them. This is the reason that the open source movement will never become mainstream enough unless there is a fee involved... Most users would rather pay a few hundred or thousand extra dollars to make something work and never think about it again.

Couldn't have said it better myself. I'm going to be studying Linux and potentially using more of it, as my company will be implementing a more robust VMware enviroment and as we continue to expand - I can see more vendor servers that have Linux and IT will have to support. Vendors often go for cheap and IT gets stuck with whatever the business units want.

XP is a really broken product. Think about it, it takes much longer to install of it's updates, hot fixes, security patches, etc., then it takes to install the actual OS. I'm not even talking about SP1, take Win XP Pro SP2 and you'll see it takes more time to update and patch it up then installing the OS.
It's like an old pair of jeans that are thrashed, have holes everywhere, a ton of stains, broken buttons and pockets. Some people like buying jeans like that and call them designer jeans or whatever. Lets face it though, for it to have no holes, shreds, stains, etc: you'll have to patch, seam, sew, and dye it. It won't be great but it'll be close to a brand new pair of jeans with no flaws.

Jeans are jeans, OS's may be a bit different but you get my point.