Vista SP2 beta could land within next four weeks

Here we go again......

.....just as I've "fixed" problems with my last Vista update, the prospect of more strife rears it's ugly head.

Its not totally Vista's fault

I am no Vista fan, and I have been doing more downgrades than upgrades on Vista, its not a great product, but it works..upto a point.

One reason I noticed that why users hated Vista so much is becuase manufactures or shops are NOT selling the right kit to run it on, good example this morning, a laptop came in, user said Vista sucks, it crashed after an online update, but overall, its slow as a dog, fixing the software werent too diffiuclt, our guy did it within 30 mins, but closer inspection revealed this laptop with a very fast dual-core pentium only had 512MB (with64MB taken already by video), 2 mins to add 1GB of memory and its speedy as it should, still no comparision to XP but its more than workable.

This is not the first one we got that were sold by PC World, if they simply add another £20 on top of the laptop price for teh extra memory, they would have had a lot more happy customers, not to mention Vista would be more acceptable, so in many ways, Microsoft are not totally to blame for the crap uptake of Vista, so many factors added to make it one of the most unpopular OS ever.

The REAL SP1

Here it is - the real SP1 for Vista. Maybe a few weeks after its release people* will start to take Vista seriously.

*with any kind of clue

SP2? Nah.

I installed vista on a new gaming rig just last week. Went on smooth, quick and aside from a well known driver issue (the companies, not MSs) it's been great.

Then again both my work laptop and my gaming rig surpass the recommended specs.

Box shifters and penny pinchers

Always the same - and it starts with Windows minspec

The xp home minspec is

233mhz

64mb

and the real belly buster

1.5gb available hard disk

Imaging buying that with Norton preinstalled

It's called built in redundancy

Vista, no problems here

As a beta tester of both Vista and SP1, I've had virtually no problems all the way through. Maybe I'm just lucky (doubt it), but I have yet to see any of these problems that are apparently so prevalent.

Still waiting on my SP2 invite though. :(

@ Its not totally Vista's fault

Like hell it isn't!

I run it on the same AMD64 4Gb RAM machine that I run Ubuntu 8.04 and 64Studio and they both fly compared to Vista which, even with Aero disabled, still does an extremely amazing impression of a tortoise!

Also, it keeps wanting to change my Nvidia Raid drivers from my latest ones to ones that are over 2 years old!?! Like, yeah! I'm really going to let it do that!

mumble.. mumble.. %$&"$*(($"£ pile of shite....

I swear the whole world is retarded

There is bugger all wrong with Vista, sure perhaps if it was shipped with a lot less of the security features and Aero functions turned off we would all be a lot happier but I just don't understand where this crap about having to downgrade or problems with updates come from.

I have been running a laptop with Vista on it for over 18 months no problems at all and all service packed and hotfixed to the hilt.

I have built and supported a network of over 50 PC's all running Vista and have never encountered a problem.

The only problems I have encountered is dimwit sys admins who can't RTFM.

I thought they were going to call in Windows 7

Does anyone use Vista for serious work?

Ok not a fan of all the Mac ads, but this new one is funny

I don't like most of the Get a Mac ads, but with all the new Windows marketing with Seinfeld and all, I found this one hilarious:

http://tinyurl.com/6ee3lr (the link is safe, goes to Apple's site)

It does require QuickTime though, sorry about that.

@SP2?!? What about SP1?

That will be addressed in Windows 7.

On a more serious note I have been using Vista for almost a year now without problems that werent because of my own fault. (IE: fucking with stuff I shouldnt have fucked with just to see what I could do)

I do blame the manufactures for shipping Vista on alot of subpar machines.

@The Avangelist - Well said!

Damn straight! Running it under boot camp on a Mac ( oh the humanity! ). Nothing wrong with Vista, happily does everything I want in a Windows O/S. I also run OSX and Linux on my Mac so no I am not in bed with any one particular brand. Before you start the only reason for using a Mac hardware is the energy saving and the peace and quiet you get when you are not running normal PC kit with the deafening sound of 95db of fans running constantly!

AC, I loved that ad (microsoft money, ad campaign versus software)

It's totally on target, and even funnier when you see Steve Balmer saying, "Well, sure, you smart ENTERPRISE customers can just wait until Windows-7." Kinda shoots the ad campaign in the foot for anyone who knows much of anything about computers. The company really knows that the product is utter sh*t, and it's developed multiple personality disorder from the stress of declaring it "wonderful" at the same time they fast-track a replacement. It's truly ME-II.

The thing which amazes me most about Vista is: When you're running as an administrator and pop up the file manager ("windows explorer"), it utterly refuses to let you follow symlinks to "sensitive" data. Doesn't give the pop-up about "Windoze needs you to confirm...", just REFUSES.

The only ways around it are (1) restart in "safe mode"; or (my favorite way) just shove the darn hard drive into my Linux box and DO MY WORK FROM HERE.

You are all deluded

I personally have never had any problems with anything. This obviously means that everything is OK. Anybody saying otherwise is clearly deluded.

Also, anything I don't have a use for or don't like should never be made as that would be stupid. It is impossible that anyone else would have a use for it or like it.

(Sadly the people this satire is aimed at will simply not get it....)

Vista problems?

I bought Vista (I know, who would actually pay for this DRM laden, bloated piece of crap) and I had no problems with it, installed fine, updated fine, SP1, fine. The HATED DRM which everyone always goes on about has never had any effect on my PC (which isn't a Cray by any means, still a 32 bit single core processor for Gods sake)

OK, it isn't everyone's cup of tea, especially here on El Reg (where "real" operating systems come on punch cards) because most of the readers don’t like Microsoft and that’s fine. To say that every user of Vista is suffering, or that it is impossible to set up a small (50 user) network without any major issues is generalising to say the least.

The worst thing for me was the changes they made, seemingly because they could, to the familiar menu systems. OK it took me as long to learn the new ones as it took me to learn the (superficial operating) differences between Windows and Ubuntu so no big deal really. I just don’t understand why they made the changes, especially to office! A bit like a car manufacturer moving the pedals around “just because”

Far too late M$!

Bought Vostro 1400 laptop with 3GB of RAM and dedicated NVidia graphics. I thought, as an IT professional, I have to learn about mainstream OS. Yes it works but so do vacuum cleaners, but when you switch them off they do so as opposed to the mainstream OS - it starts installing patches and the process can't be interrupted.

This is just tip of the iceberg. SP1 broke my wifi catcher button functionality. Tried to setup net profiles? Ever renamed user and then found out that it didn't rename user directories, and you can't do it either without worrying you will break 50+ pieces of software you needed to install in order to have environment you are used to? Cooling fan blowing crazy most of the time? Etc, etc.

>>> It does what _it_ wants, not what _I_ want. <<<

Once I realised the the fact that I have no longer control over MY system, I knew I learned enough about the mainstream OS and installed guess Ubuntu 8.04 - all worked out of the box.

However, hats of to M$ campaign, that can be defined as "it just works", very clever. If linux community wasn't so diversified and fragmented, maybe we'd have a real alternative ready for an average industry office user and we'd also have software tools of equivalent or better than .Net.

M$ Haters. Penguin Obsessed.... Welcome home.

Wow. It certainly seems to me that this site is absolutely CHOK full of Microsoft haters, Penguin freaks, and one-track hard-nosers.

Linux is a DAMNED good OS. It is fast, it is stable, and it runs on damned near anything. Yes I can run Linux (albeit an older version) on any box I have ever handled, including Sparc's, PowerPC's, and my Cell phone.. Probably my Dryer too, it has a computer controller inside it... But for my mother, my father, my daughter, neighhour, etc. Linux is just not for them. Slight Windows compatibility issues, lack of simple click click for some things, and inability to "just go to download.com to get a shareware tool" make it a poor choice for someone like that. For the large corporation with thousands of systems to handle, the I/T overhead may be too much. Compatibility with legacy applications and backends mean Windows is the only option, save for a million dollar retrofit..

Windows Vista is a damned good OS. It's fast, it's clean, it's stable, it's compatible, and it just plain works. Yes, you read that right. It works. I run it on my HP notebook (which was designed for Vista) and it works fine. Ohhh.. I hear all the haters out there "Yah, of course, it was designed for Vista. Of course it's going to work!". Surely you must recall the WinModem days. Yes, Linux users could not say "It works" unless they design the system themselves with the right hardware.. Thereby making it "Designed for Linux". Of course it's going to work. My car takes specific oils, and if I drop generic 10w30 in there, it's going to cause problems. I use VW Certified oil in my VW.. who'd have thunk...

The big beef is running the right OS on the wrong hardware. Vista just plain does not work on some hardware. End of story. Try installing OSX out of the box, on your PC. Thank you for calling.

I'm getting really really fed up hearing everyone here bitch and complain cause they have had bad experiences with Windows this, and Windows that. Everyone is up no "XP is the best" bandwagon.. yet.. I'm old enough to remember the days when XP was the latest hideous beast form Redmond, and "No way I am going to use that candied up piece of crap. I am sticking with the only OS worth using if I have to use MS.. Win2k".

We get it.. You hate M$.. You love Penguins. Move along now. :)

Mine's the one with a different OS in each pocket.