Why Do People Hate Vista?

[carmen510]

My father bought it, and he says its great. I'm also thinking of buying it. However, I want to know why people hate Vista. I have the hardware to run it, but I want to know why not to buy it.

 

[taper]

Here's a basic list. Vista just isn't mature enough yet. After a service pack or two it'll probably be good, but right now I don't see any need for it, other than a few niche users. Copying files is just plain bad, to the point of inexcusable. If you copy a lot of files at once, and maybe a lot between reboots, Vista will sometimes silently discard some of the files, so if you don't manually check the destination folder size against the source size, you risk not getting everything. DRM is another big problem, but that's a whole thread all by itself.

 

[Zelig]

People don't like change.

It's exactly the same as the transition from Windows 9x to Windows XP, loads of people online were complaining about how their favourite hardware and software didn't work with XP.

Anyone who has used both XP and Vista directly after launch can attest to the fact that Vista was in a far better position at launch than XP was.

 

[Quintillus]

1. It costs $100 minimum to buy it. It really is quite similar to XP, so why spend $100 on it? It's just not worth the five Jacksons.

Beyond that, it still has a number of problems. Most significantly with Civilization III. Civ III stopped working on Vista for me after 2 days, and only lasted 4 weeks after I did a clean install. Now I've reinstalled Vista twice. Neither Firaxis nor CFC was able to figure out why it wasn't working.

CivIII isn't the only program that doesn't run perfectly, just the only one I've had stop working at all. The other night I was playing Halo when I got a Vista "This program has stopped working" error.. And when I first got Vista, before I did a clean install, nearly every program I installed got that error the first time I ran it for a decent amount of time (though few did multiple times). Reliability just isn't as good as XP.

Never had any file copy problems at least. Though it does annoy me that when you have pictures in a folder, the Explorer always defaults to having "Rating" and "Date Taken" be amongst the headers - quite inconvenient if they aren't taken with a digital camera. I always have to switch those two off and "Date Modified" on.

I would've been OK with the switch to Vista had Civilization III worked fine all the time. But as it didn't, I can't recommend Vista to any CivFanatic.

 

[Murky]

My father bought it, and he says its great. I'm also thinking of buying it. However, I want to know why people hate Vista. I have the hardware to run it, but I want to know why not to buy it.

It has a feature that constantly prompts you to allow or deny programs to run, which is really annoying unless you turn it off. Microsoft doesn't recommend turning it off because that supposedly makes the system more vulnerable to infection by malicious software.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

It annoys the loving s--- out of me. those are the best words I can use when talking about vista. The allow programs to run is one. The copying of files is another thing. Lastly is the unreliability of it when using programs. All of these are stated above yes, and they all annoy me to no end ( I have to use a vista system at work). I dont need my OS to be my nanny, I just want it to work...

 

[Zelig]

1. It costs $100 minimum to buy it. It really is quite similar to XP, so why spend $100 on it? It's just not worth the five Jacksons.

So don't install Vista on your old computers. However, the fact remain that it's a better OS than XP, and almost always worth buying instead of XP for a new computer.

CivIII isn't the only program that doesn't run perfectly, just the only one I've had stop working at all. The other night I was playing Halo when I got a Vista "This program has stopped working" error.. And when I first got Vista, before I did a clean install, nearly every program I installed got that error the first time I ran it for a decent amount of time (though few did multiple times). Reliability just isn't as good as XP.

That has nothing to do with reliability, that's a compatibility issue. All new MS operating systems have similar compatibility issues, and Vista is doing much better than XP was after 10 months. Soon enough, Vista will be have more compatibility with new hardware and software than XP does.

Though it does annoy me that when you have pictures in a folder, the Explorer always defaults to having "Rating" and "Date Taken" be amongst the headers - quite inconvenient if they aren't taken with a digital camera. I always have to switch those two off and "Date Modified" on.

This annoyed me too, I googled a fix, and it took me about 3 minutes in total to permanently kill off anything other than the columns I want for every folder.

It has a feature that constantly prompts you to allow or deny programs to run, which is really annoying unless you turn it off. Microsoft doesn't recommend turning it off because that supposedly makes the system more vulnerable to infection by malicious software.

So disable UAC, it takes 20 seconds. XP has features where the default selection is a poorer choice than in Vista, and I don't hold those features against XP.

 

[Speedo]

People like to complain.
People like to complain about new things.
People like to complain about new things that aren't 100% perfect.
People love to complain about anything new from MS.

If you were paying attention to computer related stuff at the time of XP's release, you'll realize that most of this is just a repeat.

 

[Mise]

I personally think the biggest problem is that XP was just such a good product. So many people use or have used XP, far more than Win9x, so it will take much longer for Vista to be adopted by the mainstream.

 

[taper]

Is there really a need to change? When XP replaced 9x or ME, it didn't need a service pack or patches to be better right away. The service packs and patches that have been release have made XP a pretty decent OS. It will do virtually anything the average person needs it to, and will still be that way for at least a few more years. Or you could spend more money(even on new computers) for an OS that doesn't work as well now, has a small chance of being "better" by the end of next year, and might be better by the time Windows 7 comes out. And then the cycle starts again. If XP does everything I want it to, what possible benefits does Vista have that justifies the cost and trouble, even in the long term?

 

[Ball Lightning]

I have vista on my laptop and it works fine and many of my older games and programs work well on it, and nothing bad has happened yet (2 months). So i don't know why people don't like it.

 

[Ghost Ranger]

It's probably related to how even minor changes in a piece of software's GUI can cause people to freak out, which makes sense because most people want something that 'just works', because they are used to how the software is laid out.

 

[Zelig]

Is there really a need to change?

No, there isn't, and almost nobody is claiming there is. However, there is no reason to stay with XP either.

When XP replaced 9x or ME, it didn't need a service pack or patches to be better right away.

Yes it did, more so than Vista. The migration from 9x to XP wasn't even the same code base. The change from XP to Vista is more similar to the upgrade from Windows 2000 to XP. Not a huge difference, but XP is clearly superior to 2000.

Or you could spend more money(even on new computers) for an OS that doesn't work as well now, has a small chance of being "better" by the end of next year, and might be better by the time Windows 7 comes out.

Except Vista is better now. I use both XP and Vista regularly on a wide range of hardware, Vista is faster in both performance, and usability because of enhanced features.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

Id say this is a pretty bad reason to use Vista. Considering that I change hardware every 3 months or so, means id have to reactivate every 3 months or so. While it wouldnt be overly difficult, why. Why have me do it, as it is just another annoyance.

 

[Zelig]

Id say this is a pretty bad reason to use Vista. Considering that I change hardware every 3 months or so, means id have to reactivate every 3 months or so. While it wouldnt be overly difficult, why. Why have me do it, as it is just another annoyance.

That's a problem with XP too, I've easily called MS a few dozen times to get XP to activate on systems where it wouldn't work over the online system.

In some circumstances, Vista will require reactivation with fewer hardware changes than XP, in others, it will be more leniant.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

But a Driver update. That has NEVER forced me to reactivate. Yes I know XP is also bad with hardware updates, but it takes driver updates fine. Ive gone between Omega and Catalyst close to a dozen times now on this install, and XP has never even so much as made a peep about it. From the looks of this article though, it seems as though Vista almost s---s its pants every time you do a driver update. So if its a new platform, such as a new video card, you're gonna be forced to call M$ every time nVidia or ATi release a new driver?


I will try this myself on my work machine sometime this week, just to see what will happen there.

 

[Padma]

People like to complain.
People like to complain about new things.
People like to complain about new things that aren't 100% perfect.
People love to complain about anything new from MS.

If you were paying attention to computer related stuff at the time of XP's release, you'll realize that most of this is just a repeat.

Very, very true.

Of course, I also dropped MS when XP came out, for pretty much the same reasons.

 

[3141592]

Yes it did, more so than Vista. The migration from 9x to XP wasn't even the same code base. The change from XP to Vista is more similar to the upgrade from Windows 2000 to XP. Not a huge difference, but XP is clearly superior to 2000.

Umm, actually windows XP and Vista are completely different version (version 6.2 vs. version 7). Vista's code was built from the ground up, thats why it took so long to realse.

Simply, if you are getting a new computer get Vista, if you are using very new Vista-optimized software get Vista, if you want DX 10 get Vista, otherwise stick with XP utile one of the first three things happens.

 

[Zelig]

Umm, actually windows XP and Vista are completely different version (version 6.2 vs. version 7). Vista's code was built from the ground up, thats why it took so long to realse.

They're both built off of the NT kernel, modern operating systems generally don't get built from scratch. Vista development took a long time because the original version based off of the XP code stalled and MS basically restarted in 2004 using the Windows Server 2003 codebase.

FWIW, Windows 2000 = NT 5.0, Windows XP = 5.1, Windows Server 2003 and Windows XP x64 = 5.2, and Windows Vista = 6.4.

Simply, if you are getting a new computer get Vista, if you are using very new Vista-optimized software get Vista, if you want DX 10 get Vista, otherwise stick with XP utile one of the first three things happens.

I agree completely.

 

[Chieftess]

It's not very compatible with old games. Also, it doesn't seem to do anything new, other than show flashy graphics.