nad_masters's Full Review: Microsoft Windows® Vistaâ„¢ Home Premium Edit...
Is the question "are we ready for Vista?" or is it "is Vista ready for us?"
Note:
I've been waiting for Epinions to put in Windows vista as a product, but again, their search failed me yet again. For some reason, even after months, it was not listed. Searching for "Microsoft Windows Vista" does not yield any results close to what you'd expect. Somehow, I got used to Google-styled searching. I decided to search for the whole string "Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium" and it finally showed up. I have lots to say just before it was released to the public after using the MSDN version a few months before it was officially released. I fear there are some who could have used the info then is now too late.
Also, keep in mind that there are lots to cover in windows Vista that I cannot possibly cover. That's where Google comes in, as well as Vista Tips articles on published magazines as Vista matures.
Intro
Looking at what's new, it seems like Vista would be a great new operating system that would change the world. The 3D Aero Glass interface, DirectX 10, even the basic interface was changed. The new start menu has much improved, as well as the built-in search. Looking back, it's still just Windows. In all, Microsoft is banking (pun intended) on the emotional response of consumers, not unlike the allure of the next new car model.
There are many different editions of Vista, and it may confuse a lot of users. For the majority of users, there are "only" four that are widely available: Home Basic, Home Premium, Business, and Ultimate. Also, each edition has 3 different versions - Retail Upgrade, Retail Full, and OEM. Retail Upgrade and Full are boxed versions of Vista that you can purchase at your local store. OEM, however, are full versions but only available for original equipment manufacturers (local computer shops or your friendly next-door computer geek).
The difference between Retail and OEM is that OEM does not come with any technical support from Microsoft, and the license cannot be transferred to another computer. In other words, an OEM Windows is tied to the original computer it was installed and licensed on. Retail allows you to uninstall Windows Vista from your old computer and move that license to the new computer. It makes DIYer lives easier. Also, the retail package includes both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions, but with OEM, you buy one or the other. Which one you choose depends on if you need to move Vista to another computer one day and if you can live without Microsoft's tech support. Tips later on...
The Different Sides of Vista Home Basic ($99 Upgrade, $199 Full, $99 OEM): For those who have budget notebooks or desktops that can't handle a lot (think cheap $500 or less computers) but still want to gloat about having Vista, this is the edition for you. It is the cheapest edition of Vista, and comes with the bare necessities. Core technologies such as DirectX 10, improved kernel, and the UAC is included. However, the 3D Aero Glass interface is not, as well as the lovely Media Center. Basically it's a re-skinned Windows XP Home Edition with Vista technology and without the Vista WOW factor. This is the only edition of Vista (besides the 3rd world version called Starter) that does not have the 3D Aero Glass interface. All other editions of Vista have the WOW factor built-in.
Home Premium ($159 Upgrade, $239 Full, $129 OEM): If you were thinking about the OEM or Retail Full version of Basic, then I should hit you. For $30 more, you can get the OEM Home Premium version! This edition includes the 3D Aero Glass interface as well as the Windows Media Center which (with a TV Tuner) allows you to record and watch TV. It also includes applications for a tablet PC. As you can see, for most users, the Media Center and Tablet PC support is not a very convincing reason to move from Basic to Premium. This is why I say Microsoft is banking on the user's emotional response to upgrade to Vista. The biggest reason why anyone would want Premium over Basic is the 3D Aero Glass interface. The 3D Aero Glass interface is the WOW factor. This is the version that will satisfy almost everyone.
Business ($199 Upgrade, $299 Full, $159 OEM): Think Home Premium, but without any of the fun stuff like Windows Media Center (though the Windows Media Player is still there). It still has the 3D Aero Glass interface and the Tablet PC applets, but it also adds the ability to connect to a domain network. It also has a few more security options such as file encryption and TPM support (think finger print authentication).
Ultimate ($259 Upgrade, $399 Full, $199 OEM): As the name says, this is the Ultimate version of Vista. Ultimate as in it has everything all the different editions of Vista have combined. This is like Home Premium crossed with Business. You can use Windows Media Center and connect to a domain network! You can have your cake and eat it too! Of course, this comes at a price. Also, there are Ultimate-specific extras such as Dreamscape (a wallpaper background that is actually a looping movie - imagine a fish tank with fishes swimming around as your wallpaper).
That's just a lot of info! Let’s go inside Windows Vista Home Premium to learn more!
System Requirements
The requirements are listed in Microsoft's website here:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/editions/systemrequirements.mspx
Because there are many different editions of Vista, requirements can either be relaxed or extreme. For Vista Home Premium, however, the recommended system requirements are:
* 1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
* 1 GB of system memory
* 40 GB hard drive with at least 15 GB of available space
* Support for DirectX 9 graphics with:
o WDDM Driver
o 128 MB of graphics memory (minimum)
o Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware
o 32 bits per pixel
* DVD-ROM drive
* Audio Output
* Internet access (fees may apply)
TV tuner card required for TV functionality (compatible remote control optional).
Windows Tablet and Touch Technology requires a Tablet PC or a touch screen.
Installation
It doesn't matter what version of Home Premium you install (32 or 64 bit), they both install exactly the same way. Once installed, the interface and overall feel is also the same. Microsoft did a good job at co-developing both versions.
I will cover installing from scratch (as this is much faster than an upgrade).
Installing Vista Home Premium is much simpler than installing any version of Windows XP. Make sure your computer can boot from a DVD, insert the disc, and reboot. Once it boots up, it will ask you which language you wish to install and some regional information (time, currency, and keyboard layout). After you select them (or for most US users, just click Next, as it is already English and US settings by default), you will be presented with a big "Install now" button. Just click on it and you're on your way!
It will ask you for your CD Key on the next step. You can enter it now or leave it blank. If you leave it blank, you will get to have a 30-day trial before you need to insert a CD-Key and activate. You will also be asked to select the edition of Vista you wish to try.
Next, you will be asked to accept the license terms. Have a snack handy while reading through it (who really does?), then check the "I accept" box and hit Next.
After that, you will be presented with the type of install you would like. However, if you are doing a fresh install this way (booting from the DVD), you the only choice you have is a Custom install. This lets you install a clean copy of Windows and letting you choose which hard drive and partition you would like to install on. Choose it!
When asked about which drive you wish to install to, you are also allowed to load drivers for disk controllers such as SATA and SCSI. Thankfully, unlike Windows XP's unfriendly F6-hell, you can now install drivers from CD, DVD, or even a USB Flash Drive. This is a much improvement from Windows XP. In either case, just pick the drive and install!
From here on out, it will not ask any more questions. This also means that every option possible are all installed, unlike previous versions of Windows that allow you to pick and choose what you'd like to leave out.
Initial Impression
When Vista first boots, it asks for you to put in a username, password (optional), and background wallpaper, as well as choose your avatar (small picture that represents your login profile). This makes the user feel like Vista is allowing them to configure a personalized Windows from the get-go.
The Welcome Center will pop up to greet you as well, not unlike Windows XP. However, the Welcome Center is much more useful than XP's greeting. Right away, the first thing you will notice is the computer's configuration (CPU, memory, video card, and the Computer's name - or host name). Below that, you have several icons that allow you to customize windows Vista from this welcome committee. You can add new users, connect to the internet, transfer files and settings from another computer, view detailed info about your computer, learn about Windows Anytime Upgrade, etc. This is more than what XP did in their Welcome box. You can un-tick the "Run at startup" box to keep it from welcoming you every time you boot up Vista.
The next thing you'll notice is the new taskbar, start button (which is now called the Windows Orb), and of course, the Windows Sidebar with a huge clock and RSS reader.
Features from the Get-Go
The Windows Sidebar comes with Gadgets already built-in that are pretty useful. While the clock is pretty (and can be useful when you want to make sure you are out of the office by 5:00), it may not be that useful since there is already a digital clock on the right hand corner of the taskbar. However, I found the included weather gadget to be very useful. There are also a calculator, calendar, contacts, CPU Meter, Slide Show, Picture Puzzle, and Notes. you can also add 3rd party gadgets. I have a Battlefield 2142 stats gadget that tells me my current score. Nero includes a gadget with their newest Nero version that allows you to copy CDs without requiring starting the Nero program.
The Aero Glass desktop interface looks very nice. The taskbar is translucent enough to let you see the part of the wallpaper it would normally obscure. The windows title bar allows you to see thru it (though not enough to read text underneath the see-thru part).
Alt-Tabbing now lets you see a preview of the windows you are Alt-Tabbing to instead of just the icon of the program. Of course, who can forget the 3D flip version of Alt-Tab, which is Windows-Tab. The windows are live, which means that if you are playing a video and Alt/Windows-Tab, you will see the smaller version of that video playing in the preview.
Also, if you mouse-over any minimized programs, a small preview of the program is displayed.
Then there is the start-menu. The new start menu with the on-the-fly search box is the best part of Vista usability-wise. No more needing to use the Run command (though it is there if you wish to use it - you must unhide it though). Also, it is designed not to be cluttered and stay compact. Unlike previous Windows with Start menus, folders don't open up to the right or left side (wherever there is space). Instead, they expand below where the original folder is at, which keeps everything neat and tidy.
These are pretty minor stuff considering, but it does add to the "WOW" factor Microsoft is advertising. Of course, in my opinion, they are minor stuff. I am paying to upgrade for THAT?
The Drivers Situation
Currently, drivers are still not mature yet for Vista. NVidia and ATI graphics drivers still need to be optimized, as they are still slower than their XP counterparts. Creative Labs X-Fi drivers for Vista do not take advantage of all the card's features (does not support surround sound as of writing, as well as optical output for 64-bit version of Vista). Though in Creative's case, the X-Fi drivers for XP wasn't mature either.
For the 32-bit version of Vista, most of the drivers made for Windows 2000/XP or Server 2003 will work. For the 64-bit version, the Windows XP Pro 64-bit or the Server 2003 64-bit drivers may work. Some of them actually work better than the Vista-specific version, while others break Vista. To be safe, I suggest using the Vista-specific drivers if they exist. If not, make a back up before you attempt to try the XP or Server 2003 equivalent. Also, given the choice between 2003 and XP/2000 drivers, always use the 2003 version, since Vista is based off Server 2003's kernel.
Explorer
The new Explorer requires some getting used to. The drives show you a status bar of how much of your hard drive is being used. If you have a CD or DVD that isn't full yet, and can still be written to (an open session), they will also have a status bar as well.
How you view files and folders has vastly changed. Instead of well-defined views, you get a choice of those in XP as well as the ability to scale the size of the icons. Photos and videos have a preview of what's inside as their icon instead of a generic icon. This makes the scaling icons much more useful for someone trying to find a particular video or photo.
Also, instead of showing the real path of a folder in Explorer, they show path of the folders without the drive letter. when you click on the folder, you can drill into what is inside that particular folder tree. I am not particularly fond of this, but if you click at the end of this simplified path, the full path comes up and you can edit it like how you were able to in XP.
In almost every Explorer window (even found in the Photos Preview), there is a Burn button that allows you to use the built-in CD/DVD burning utility to burn files into a disc. The menu bar is gone, but if you hit "Alt", the menu comes back temporarily for you to use. If you close any of the menu items, though, the menu bar disappears again. This may cause some confusion for users who are used to the menus but do not know the keyboard shortcuts. Most users do not know that the Alt key allows you to get to the drop-list menus (this works in all versions of Windows as far back as 1.0).
Windows Media Center
Windows Media Center in Vista has a new makeover. It looks much more complex than Windows Media Center 2005, but makes better use of alpha blending effects. It is very hardware intensive, as I have seen several Gateway computers in different Best Buy stores that were on display with Media Center running on a satellite feed. The interface was very jerky like a slide-show. It was practically unusable. The video card was a GeForce 7300GT, so that worries me a bit. However, it could be just those Gateway models, as I have seen other slower computers that ran the interface much faster (still hiccups a bit, but at least it's not a slide show).
I actually disliked the new Media Center interface as the simplicity of the up/down menus have exploded. It now has options that go side to side as well. This makes finding things much more complicated than MCE 2005. Needless to say, I was lost a bit, even though I am a hardcore MCE2005 user.
After upgrading my HTPC with the Intel Pentium Dual-Core E2180 CPU and a revamped motherboard that can accommodate the E2180 CPU, I had the hard decision to whether or not I should upgrade to Vista or continue a very stable and happy experience with Windows Media Center 2005. Curiosity got the best of me, so I decided I could try out Vista Media Center.
I was shocked to see that Vista have drivers included for my Haupauge WinTV tuner with FM radio. It also detected my 2 VBOX DTA-150 digital tuners! I have a total of 3 tuners (1 analog, 2 digital), and Vista didn't seem to have a problem with it - at least initially...(more on that later).
Setting up Vista Media Center is no different from setting up Windows Media Center 2005. You go through the steps of setting up the tuners (source), your zip code (for the Guide), display type, the number of speakers, etc. Once done, you are set to go.
I transfered my schduled recordings from my old MCE2005 installation with mceBackup 2.0, a program written by another MCE enthusiest. Kudos to him, as it worked perfectly! I was happy I did not have to re-do all of my scheduled programming in Vista MCE.
Functionality-wise, Vista MCE does everything that MCE2005 can do. I also like the fact that you can now hit the "power" button on the remote and have Vista stand by while recording a show. Um... okay, let me explain that. Instead of complaining that it can't stand-by when a show is being recorded (like MCE2005), it actually shuts the video off (so your TV will show a blue screen or whatever it normally shows when there is no video signal) and continues to record. After it is done recording, it will go into full S3 standby! That's good news since before this feature, I had to leave it on overnight to record shows when I want to go to bed during a recording. Now, I just hit the "power" button on the remote, turn off the TV and just head straight for bed.
Speaking of the remote, the "leftover" MCE remote works perfectly with Vista MCE! No real reason to go out and buy a Vista-specific MCE remote unless you want the updated look. Seems like everything could be controlled by the MCE2005 remote without missing any feature. Anyone with a Vista MCE remote, please let me know what's the difference besides the asthetics!
This was all functioning great until a few days later when all of a sudden, one of my VBOX DTA-150 tuners somehow got "lost". Vista just detected it as a unknown device! I realized this when Vista MCE complained that a recording was in conflict with another recording. I have multiple tuners specifically to allieviate issues like these! I manually searched for the drivers and installed them. Vista complained that the drivers may be wrong for the device, but I risked it and installed them anyways. I was back up and running like normal. Update (Feb 25, 2008) - this issue never cropped up since.
Other than that hiccup, Vista MCE ran like a champ.
The interface was just as confusing as I thought it was. It felt like the PS3 interface. I guess they are trying to make better use of wide-screen real estate now that they are becoming more common than 4:3 screens.
When looking at thumbnail lists for pictures, TV, movies, and music, you'll have to get used to the way Vista MCE lays them out. They are much more clusted together and it makes it harder to see how they are arranged (by date or by name). With MCE2005, the icons were spread out, and while less of it was visible on screen, it was easier to scroll around and see what you are looking for. With Vista MCE, they are clustered! Sure, you can see more in one screen, but that "convience" does away with MCE2005's approach of making it easier to view. You can set it to "large" or "small" list, but even the "large" list is too small for my taste.
Like MCE2005, it takes a while for thumbnails to be cached and shown on the icons. However, Vista MCE seem to do better than MCE2005 with caching the thumbnails in the background. Though not completely transparent (the interface can get clunky during caching), it's much better than locking up and not allowing the user to move the cursor at all like MCE2005. What's worse with MCE2005 was that it caches all of the user's button presses so once it's done caching the thumbnails, whatever you pushed gets executed! This can cause unpredictable results. Thankfully Vista MCE does not have this annoying issue. A great reason to upgrade to Vista MCE if most of your media is stored on a network drive.
The radio still does not have a recording function. It still allows for you to rewind or pause live radio, however (just like with live TV). It also allows for you to set up presets. The interface for the radio looks updated from MCE2005, but functions exactly the same. Tuning of stations is instantaneous with no perceivable lag.
AOL Radio is now available, and I must say it is a very welcomed inclusion! I never knew that AOL have their own internet radio service like Yahoo did with Launch. I was hoping that Yahoo Launch would create a MCE plug-in, but after listening to AOL Radio, the free account's audio quality rival's Yahoo Launch's self-imposed "medium quality" audio setting for free accounts. AOL Radio's audio quality sounds as good as or better than the high-quality setting of Launch's paid account. AOL Radio also feature XM stations (for free - so it seems), and also on-demand music videos. Out of all the online programs, AOL Radio is my favorite (weird to say since I usually hate anything AOL).
I haven't played around with Vista MCE's online programs too much, but MovieLink seems to be up there. They allow for rental of movies for $4 or you can purchase them for $20! I don't think the price of owning a downloaded movie is very attractive. I'm sure they are standard def anways and probably not as good as a real DVD. I'm making assumptions, yes, but at the price they are asking, I don't even want to try out their service.
I looked at the Discovery Channel's online IPTV. They offer clips of their most watched shows. They are entertaining, but with only a few clips, they get watched quickly and leave you wanting for more.
Vista MCE didn't improve much on MCE2005, but a few touches here and there makes it a good upgrade only if you were ready to do an overhaul of your HTPC in the first place. Alpha-blending the menu with what's playing is very nice, and being able to put the machine to standby while recording a TV show is absolutely a nececity that was overlooked in MCE2005 to make it feel much more like a set-top box rather than a PC. Only complaint is that when moving around the menus while a video is playing, sometimes the picture-in-picture in the lower left hand corner dissapear. In other times when it's there, its much smaller than MCE2005, so you can't really see what's going on. If Microsoft can make the video a little bigger and have it on the bottom left more consistantly (like it was in MCE2005), it'd be much better.
Application Compatibility
If you are a gamer like me, you will be concerned with what games will work for Vista. When Vista came out, I was into World of Warcraft. Vista has absolutely no issues with that game. Performance felt identical to that of XP. After getting bored of WoW, I got into Battlefield 2142. In that game, however, it would crash during loading of another map. The performance is much slower as well ran under Vista, and I was required to turn down the graphics to be able to play smoothly. You must run the game with administrator privileges otherwise game servers will kick you out due to Punkbuster thinking you have modified the game.
There are also concerns with Vista not supporting Direct Sound anymore. This is true, and any games that rely on Direct Sound for hardware acceleration and surround sound, you can now only play in software mode with only stereo. It is strange that Microsoft decided to forgo their own made-up API and went with OpenAL. Battlefield 2142 uses OpenAL and all of Creative Lab Sound Blaster X-Fi features. However, the drivers of the X-Fi are not very mature (not even the XP drivers). So this reminds me of the chicken and the egg.
Also, though Vista supports OpenAL, it does not support OpenGL directly. when playing OpenGL games, they are remapped to DirectX APIs, which slows the game down drastically. Games such as Doom 3 and Prey rely on OpenGL.
Some applications may run, but then act strange. You may need to run them in administrative mode as well. Others will invoke Vista's UAC to ask you before running the program to promote it to run with administrative rights.
Firefox, a very popular web browser, have some issues when it needs to be updated. To update Firefox, it will download the update and ask you to restart Firefox to update. Once you do so, it will say that Firefox needs to shut down to update (even though it is not running). This is due to a file being placed in the user's profile instead of the Program File folder like it did in XP. When a program is ran without admin rights, Vista remaps all request to write to the Program File folder to the user's profile instead. So if you update Firefox, it will not work correctly.
Anti-virus programs as well as disk defrag utilities that were made for XP will not work under Vista. Most of these programs have been updated to newer versions that do. Diskeeper 10 was updated to work with Vista, so you may have to patch an older copy of 10. Symantec Antivirus 10 was also updated to work with Vista, so you will need to get an update from them as well. AVG's free antivirus program currently works with Vista in version 7.5.
So far all of Microsoft Office (tested with 2000 to 2007) runs under Vista without any issues. On a side note, because Office 2007 now have a new file format, there is a "compatibility add-on" you can download that allows Office 2000, XP, and 2003 to open and save to the new Office 2007 XML file format.
Certain programs, such as WinRAR (a file archive application) will be annoying to use, since every time you run it, UAC will ask for permission. what is worse is some features that are added to windows will not work. For example, if you right-click and choose to extract the file, nothing will happen. I figure this is perhaps due to it requiring elevated privileges.
You can always turn off UAC, however. This allows more programs and games to run without problems. WinRAR ran flawlessly with UAC turned off.
Until applications and games are designed from the ground up to be Vista and UAC-aware, we will continue to have issues here and there.
Power Savings
I am currently running on my laptop and have found the power saving features to be more robust and reliable than XP. Standby seems to wake up my laptop every time I need it to. With Windows XP, I worry that it will never wake up. The Standby/Sleep mode is so good that I rarely do a complete shut-down any more. In fact, Microsoft wants us to put the computer to sleep instead of fully shutting it down now. Instead of a big shut-down button like XP, it is a sleep button. Shutting down the computer now requires extra steps. However, you can change this behavior so that the button is a shut-down button again.
The Sleep mode seems to work well for my laptop, but for my desktop, it just seems to sleep in S1 mode (components go off, but CPU and PSU fans stay on). What is worse is that when I try to wake it up, it won't wake up at all! My desktop acts like how Windows XP would act if I told it to sleep. So it seems to be a hit-or-miss still for desktops. And yes, I set it to S3 in the BIOS.
Hibernation was introduced in XP, and is relatively reliable. I still sometimes have the occasional times where it doesn't work, though few and far between. This hasn't changed in Vista. However, what has changed is that it takes longer for Vista to go into hibernation. Hibernation takes whatever is in your memory, writes it to the hard drive, and then turns off your computer. When you turn it on the next time, Windows see that it was set to hibernate the last time it was on and loads what it saved previously from memory back into the memory. Not exactly fast, but faster than a cold boot still, and (if it didn't go horribly wrong) whatever you had opened before you hibernated comes back like you never shut-down. Since the PC is completely off, it doesn't consume any power. It offers a good compromise between a full shut down and sleep mode (and more reliable than sleep, too).
The power balance applet actually works without a driver with my AMD Turion 64. Setting it to power saving mode, no matter how hard I work the CPU, it would stay at the slowest clock speed (800 Mhz for me). Using the balanced mode, when idle or using low CPU, it stays at 800 MHz and only goes up when I need more CPU power (all the way to the full 2GHz). Maximum performance pegs the CPU at the full 2 GHz even when I am not running anything. All this without a driver, unlike XP. The new Core 2 Duos have this feature built into the CPU itself, so no driver is needed at all for either XP or Vista, though I wonder if the Vista applet to allow customization of this will work on the Cores.
I/O Performance - UPDATE July 7, 2007
As stated with video games, performance can either be virtually unchanged from XP or it can be much slower (using same hardware and settings). It could be attributed to drivers, sure, but what about disk and network I/O?
Vista feels very snappy when starting up and shutting down (not so much going into hibernation though). It's also can be snappy in light GUI use. However, if you try to copy a file, you may notice that it seems to take forever. It is no mind trick.
I have noticed when copying files from almost any disk source to the hard drive (or another destination) takes extraordinarily long. A built-in SD Card reader on my laptop usually gets one of my card to read at around 6 MB/sec in WinXP. However, the same card and reader gets anywhere between 300 to 700 kb/sec in Vista! You did not misread - that's kb!
When deleting or copying files, it takes a while for Vista to "prepare" before it actually does the deed. While it is true that XP can have this behavior, Vista is consistent.
Network browsing is even worse. Browsing network resources seems to drag on, while the window locks up. Copying files takes forever to get ready then copy. Even then, it is no where near the bandwidth of the network interface's capacity. I've checked the Task Manager "Network" section and notice the chart - it goes up to around 10-30% of the capacity for a few seconds, then goes to 0% for a few seconds. Why this roller coaster? XP have a smooth consistent line from around 50% to around 90% of utilization of the bandwidth!
I've also notice that playback of videos suffers as well. Even when playing back from the hard drive (a local resource), skipping and pausing is the norm. Forget about playing Hi-Def content. The same hardware with XP can play the same files without any hesitation.
With performance figures like these, you can't say that Vista is just "inefficient" with I/O activity. It's down right broken!
Ready for the Masses?
For most users who just use the computer for web browsing, typing up letters, and chatting, Vista will work just fine for you. It is not ready for the enthusiasts and gamers, nor is it ready for enterprise use, however. Those in large corporations have custom applications written, and they usually are very sensitive to the operating system's environment. Vista may break allot of what the programmers originally coded the application for, and unlike a boxed program, they are not easily updated and patched (and usually they don't have regular updates as big-name programs).
For those who play games, your current library of games may not work well under Vista, especially those that require Punkbuster for online gaming. World of Warcraft does not rely on Punkbuster so you will be okay. However, Battlefield fans would have to watch out. Also without support for OpenGL, certain games that use them will perform poorly. Video drivers for ATI and NVidia video cards have not matured yet for Vista, adding a slight performance hit as well.
If you are thinking about buying a new computer with Vista, ask yourself if you can hold out for about a year. Perhaps the programs you use on a daily basis may have been updated by then for Vista use. Drivers will be more mature then as well. So why suffer the compatibility issues now?
If you can't wait a year, I would say go ahead and purchase your computer with Vista, since it makes no sense to go backwards. Vista is looking forwards, and you should not make your new computer obsolete sooner by not getting Vista. Sure you can "upgrade" a year later when things look better, but you will be spending a lot of money. My suggestion is to tough it out for a year with Vista.
What about those who have windows XP now, but have hardware that is suitable for Vista? Stick with XP! Wait a year! Who knows? By then, you may be looking into a new computer, which will have Vista pre-installed anyways.
Despite what the press and Microsoft say, Vista really have no place in most people's homes or offices yet.
TIPS
Sometimes when you boot from the DVD and try to install Vista, it will ask for drivers for the DVD-ROM drive. This actually means that the DVD-ROM drive you are using to install Vista is not compatible with the installer. There is no fix for this besides using a different drive to install. This may mean replacing your drive with another. :( Time to go shopping!
When you are at the part where it asks you were you would like to install Vista, you may get an error such as that it cannot find a suitable volume with the right criteria to install to. This usually means one of a few things: the BIOS is not set to boot to that hard drive, the hard drive isn't formatted yet (which most of the time, you won't need to format to install, but it's a known bug), or lastly, the drive is not a "Drive 0" (you have another drive on your computer that is recognized as the very first drive). The fix is pretty easy then. For the BIOS, make sure it is set to boot to the hard drive you want to install to. For the format, just format the hard drive before you install to it. Lastly for the Drive 0 - if the drive you wish to install to is not recognize as Drive 0, you will have to unplug any other hard drives (or disable them in your BIOS) so that the drive you wish to install it is the only drive the computer will recognize. This will end up as "Drive 0" when installing Vista.
You can purchase the Upgrade version and still do a clean install without a previous version of Windows installed! Just install it without a CD Key, but select the same edition of Vista as the CD Key you own. EX: Install Home Premium if you have the Home Premium CD Key. Once you installed it, you get 30-days to try out Vista. But instead of trying it out, go ahead and activate it. It will ask for the CD Key. You can enter your upgrade CD Key here, and it will accept and activate your copy of Vista!
Also, for those who fret over which OEM version (64 or 32 bit) to get, remember that it is the key that determines what edition you have. A 32-bit CD Key will work with a 64-bit install, and vice versa The CD Key only determines if it is Basic, Premium, Business, or Ultimate. My suggestion? Buy the 64-bit version and ask a friend who recently bought a name-brand computer for their Vista CD (which most likely is 32-bit). Install and use the 32-bit version for now until the rest of the world is ready to accept 64-bit completely.
Make an image of your hard drive after you install and activate Vista. The reason why is because if you ever need to re-install Vista, you will also need to re-activate. This means you will have to call Microsoft's hotline. However, since it's been activated before, you cannot activate it again unless you talk to someone live to help you. Do you really want to waste your time this way? Trust me - image your hard drive after activating but BEFORE any drivers or applications are installed. Call this your "Restore CD".
Last Words
There is no way I can cover every aspect of Microsoft Windows Vista in a single Epinions, nor do I plan to. If you have any questions or would like me to cover something I did not get to here, please ask in the comments area. Thank you for reading my Epinions.
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