Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[ENFIELD_MV6]

i really do need to learn more about computers me thinks

[mathewst]

I agree TheBoy it could have been called Vista R2.
But my opinion is that Vista was rubbish.
It could have been good but it turned up to be a product which was simply rushed onto market and proved neither stable , or successful, and of course very resource hungry.
Windows 7 is not a completely new OS but it is based on Vista. They finally decided to use good things from vista and repair the bad ones.
You could say it is a similar story like win98 and win98 SE

[Chris_H]

I decided to stop paying voluntary income tax to MS years ago but the number of engineers I have sat next to who have cursed the day they installed Vista is legion.
I will do my best to avoid Win7 as well.

[TheBoy]

I agree TheBoy it could have been called Vista R2.
But my opinion is that Vista was rubbish.
It could have been good but it turned up to be a product which was simply rushed onto market and proved neither stable , or successful, and of course very resource hungry.
Windows 7 is not a completely new OS but it is based on Vista. They finally decided to use good things from vista and repair the bad ones.
You could say it is a similar story like win98 and win98 SE

Vista is/was far more stable than its predecessor, XP.  Vista was always going to have an uphill struggle, due to a fairly extensively modified architecture. Added to that, people don't like change, and PC 'experts' are the worse - if they can't use something because they cannot be bothered to learn it, it's "crap"


Windows 7 takes EVERYTHING from Vista. It simply tweaks a few things here and there.  Its single biggest improvement is to reduce the high resource requirements that Vista needed to run well.


Remember, Windows 7 is that close to Vista (Windows 6.0) that it is actually internally version Windows 6.1 (anyone running windows 7, just type winver).  Thats going to cause an awful lot of confusion down the line.

Incidentally, XP was v5.1, showing how close it was to W2K (5.0), just tweaked (and broken) to transision the Win9x to NT more easily).  Windows Server 2003 was Win 5.2.

Windows Server 2008 is v6.0 (its basically a serverised Vista), 2008 R2 is 6.1 - a serverised W7.

[TheBoy]

I decided to stop paying voluntary income tax to MS years ago but the number of engineers I have sat next to who have cursed the day they installed Vista is legion.
I will do my best to avoid Win7 as well.

For the standard desktop, there is no other option for 90% of people. KDE/Gnome/CDE/Java just aren't usable enough for joe public.  And the underlying OS is flawed, but thats a different story for another day.


I keep banging on, but people you said 'vista is crap' with no real justification are simply people who are unable to deal with new things.

[Chris_H]

I decided to stop paying voluntary income tax to MS years ago but the number of engineers I have sat next to who have cursed the day they installed Vista is legion.
I will do my best to avoid Win7 as well.

For the standard desktop, there is no other option for 90% of people. KDE/Gnome/CDE/Java just aren't usable enough for joe public.  And the underlying OS is flawed, but thats a different story for another day.


I keep banging on, but people you said 'vista is crap' with no real justification are simply people who are unable to deal with new things.

I am confident that you don't know them but they had justification.  It was hanging apps left right and centre - and some users were IT Admins.

I hope you don't choke on the MS fish-hook! 

[Dishevelled Den]

 Well this is all very apropos as I'm about to install W7 on my Scaleo E Media Center (desktop version) which is running Vista at the moment.

Having regard to my Neanderthal understanding of operating systems Microsoft products have allowed me to make use of computers in a way that otherwise I would have struggled with by trying to use any other system.

If I’m not back on again by this evening, then something has gone wrong :-/

[Mr Skrunts]

Reply #25 was a very helpfull evaluation. Totally agree not to set as Admin on an XP install, learnt that mistake the very 1st week I tried it, not through being smart, but by being naive and thought that was the way to go on the 1st istall, then set up as a user afterwards.

The last few years I have lost track of whats happening software/hard ware wise and when Vista came out I thought I would give it time to settle then build a brand new Vista based machine.  Seems I may have done myself a 2 fold favour by waiting.

Up till now I have never used or seen Vista or Windows 7 in action.  I take onboard what TB said about taking on new software and saying its naff.  I was not eadger to move from Dos/Win 3.11 (Loads Dos based games) to windows 95 at 1st, didnt like it at all.  Took a different approach to XP but suffered from driver problems, probably the reason I didnt jump straight to Vista.

So now that I am ready it seems Windows 7 is the way to go.  Do I go for the Ultimate Version?

Also what is UAC?

TIA.   

[TheBoy]

I decided to stop paying voluntary income tax to MS years ago but the number of engineers I have sat next to who have cursed the day they installed Vista is legion.
I will do my best to avoid Win7 as well.

For the standard desktop, there is no other option for 90% of people. KDE/Gnome/CDE/Java just aren't usable enough for joe public.  And the underlying OS is flawed, but thats a different story for another day.


I keep banging on, but people you said 'vista is crap' with no real justification are simply people who are unable to deal with new things.

I am confident that you don't know them but they had justification.  It was hanging apps left right and centre - and some users were IT Admins.

I hope you don't choke on the MS fish-hook! 

I rest my case.  As I said earlier - many pc 'experts' are the worse, as they are the laziest to relearn techniques.  Hanging apps? Which ones. Vista was relatively solid with most apps from same era - admittedly older ones didn't always display properly, or the newer security features in Vista caused them to fail due to not obeying the programming rules that MS have always stated (including some of MS's own older apps )



As to being Mr Gate's whipping boy, professionally I do 3rd line for Solaris, Linux and Windows for a very large IT company.  I know the strengths and weaknesses of all 3 quite well - its what I do .  Lets face it, the only alternative even remotely close to Windows desktop is Mac OSX, and generally, joe public Windows users struggle even with that transition.  KDE/Gnome for GNU is a step too far.  Obviously, nobody could recommend Sun's offerings for a desktop for mr J Public.

So I always choose what I think is the right product for the job.

Want a large database (not mainframe based), or busy, scalable, workflow managed webserver, I'd pick out the Solaris (or other similar 'proper' Unix route in most cases - unless the technology was tied to another platform, eg .NET).

Want a small webserver utilising unix type technology, but cost more important that reliability - thats Linux's niche (though Sun are really gunning for this as well)

Now for a desktop, 95% of the time, Windows is the best option.  Windows 7 is probably the best Windows desktop, followed closely by Vista (if you have the hardware to run it).  XP really drags up the rear - its old, was a compromise at launch due to having to scrape and bow to Win9x line, architecturaly insecure against users thinking they are more knowledgable than their abilities imply, and needs to go to the great OS graveyard.

[TheBoy]

Reply #25 was a very helpfull evaluation. Totally agree not to set as Admin on an XP install, learnt that mistake the very 1st week I tried it, not through being smart, but by being naive and thought that was the way to go on the 1st istall, then set up as a user afterwards.

The last few years I have lost track of whats happening software/hard ware wise and when Vista came out I thought I would give it time to settle then build a brand new Vista based machine.  Seems I may have done myself a 2 fold favour by waiting.

Up till now I have never used or seen Vista or Windows 7 in action.  I take onboard what TB said about taking on new software and saying its naff.  I was not eadger to move from Dos/Win 3.11 (Loads Dos based games) to windows 95 at 1st, didnt like it at all.  Took a different approach to XP but suffered from driver problems, probably the reason I didnt jump straight to Vista.

So now that I am ready it seems Windows 7 is the way to go.  Do I go for the Ultimate Version?

Also what is UAC?

TIA.   

It would appear than running as a restricted user is somehow a slur on the lenght of our manhood, hence, those with egos larger than their ability, have to run as an Administrator (and all the insecurity that produces).

UAC is microsofts attempt to ensure that even those running as an Administrator are, in fact, only running as a restricted user most of the time.  When a task that needs Admin rights is performed, a little pop-up asks if this is an intended action. Idea being to stop rogue processes making system changes.  This will stop many trojans, hopefully a fair few other nasties.  Its also a reminder to a user that they are doing something potentially dangerous to the system.

Its not a complete solution by any means.  But its a damn site better than the XP way (ie, if a rogue process gets started by a admin (intentionally or not), it has free reign over the system).



Unix and Linux suffer similar to XP - many people insist on running as root (Unix/Linux equiv of Administrator (only more powerful)) or users with UID of 0 (Unix/Linux equiv of a member of local group Administrators (only more powerful)), and is how most Unix/Linux gets compromised.  Like (pre Vista) Windows, Unix/Linux entire security model is based around users and services running within a restricted security context.  Break these rules, and, like (pre Vista) Windows, Unix/Linux has no real security. Unix/Linux has no common equiv of UAC, so that makes (Vista onwards) Windows architecurally more secure than the supposed best (security wise) midrange systems.  Obviously, Windows popularity means its a bigger target though.

[mathewst]

Well from what I saw (not much but) I would have to agree that Windows 7 is currently the best option.
But hearing the other admins opinions in my company most of them if they had to choose would chose Windows xp 64bit over vista any time.

[Chris_H]

Reply #25 was a very helpfull evaluation. Totally agree not to set as Admin on an XP install, learnt that mistake the very 1st week I tried it, not through being smart, but by being naive and thought that was the way to go on the 1st istall, then set up as a user afterwards.

The last few years I have lost track of whats happening software/hard ware wise and when Vista came out I thought I would give it time to settle then build a brand new Vista based machine.  Seems I may have done myself a 2 fold favour by waiting.

Up till now I have never used or seen Vista or Windows 7 in action.  I take onboard what TB said about taking on new software and saying its naff.  I was not eadger to move from Dos/Win 3.11 (Loads Dos based games) to windows 95 at 1st, didnt like it at all.  Took a different approach to XP but suffered from driver problems, probably the reason I didnt jump straight to Vista.

So now that I am ready it seems Windows 7 is the way to go.  Do I go for the Ultimate Version?

Also what is UAC?

TIA.   

It would appear than running as a restricted user is somehow a slur on the lenght of our manhood, hence, those with egos larger than their ability, have to run as an Administrator (and all the insecurity that produces).

UAC is microsofts attempt to ensure that even those running as an Administrator are, in fact, only running as a restricted user most of the time.  When a task that needs Admin rights is performed, a little pop-up asks if this is an intended action. Idea being to stop rogue processes making system changes.  This will stop many trojans, hopefully a fair few other nasties.  Its also a reminder to a user that they are doing something potentially dangerous to the system.

Its not a complete solution by any means.  But its a damn site better than the XP way (ie, if a rogue process gets started by a admin (intentionally or not), it has free reign over the system).



Unix and Linux suffer similar to XP - many people insist on running as root (Unix/Linux equiv of Administrator (only more powerful)) or users with UID of 0 (Unix/Linux equiv of a member of local group Administrators (only more powerful)), and is how most Unix/Linux gets compromised.  Like (pre Vista) Windows, Unix/Linux entire security model is based around users and services running within a restricted security context.  Break these rules, and, like (pre Vista) Windows, Unix/Linux has no real security. Unix/Linux has no common equiv of UAC, so that makes (Vista onwards) Windows architecurally more secure than the supposed best (security wise) midrange systems.  Obviously, Windows popularity means its a bigger target though.

Linux/Unix manuals have always been littered with warnings not to login as root generally.  The reason I have often had to give Admin rights to Windows users is that too many brick-walls got hit with them going about their legitimate business otherwise.

I would argue that MS are playing catch-up in this respect and may have now got close to where they need to be on user authentication and access rights.  What has held them back has been their priority of making everyone else incompatible with themselves.  It will continue to hold them back as a manufacturer of useful products as there is no sign of them changing their underlying philosophy.

In case people think I have the 'solution'; I am writing this on an XP machine.

I was amused the other day to read in a trade paper that a number of manufacturers of portable machines were looking to run Linux alongside Windoze so that features like MP3 and web browsing could be accessed by the user before it was time for them to shut the machine down again!

[Mr Skrunts]

Which version to go for then.

Home/Premium -Proffesional - Ultimate.

Automatically I would assume that going for the Ultimate version would be best, but am I right in thinking this.

[espen22]

If you go for the 64bit version, you still might run in to apps and older equipment that is not supported.
But its not a big deal.
I use WMvare to run a copy of XP under my main os, so i just use that for the problematic apps:)

VMvare is a program that lets you "install" many os inside your main os...

Better to goolge that if you are curious:)

[Auto Addict]

We've got 12 windows in our house.