Why You Might Want to Wait to Upgrade to Windows Vista
April 16, 2007 Posted by Beth in : Microsoft, Opinion , trackback,
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I’m not a clueless computer user; actually, I’m a technology trainer, mostly with Microsoft Office software. But I’m also not a tech geek. My husband would laugh till he cried if I tried to claim I was. So you can guess that I haven’t yet explored all the ins and outs of Windows Vista, which is installed on my work-provided Dell Latitude D620 notebook computer. But lately I have been using it just enough to be finding reasons I dislike it.
This article isn’t written from a OS geek or tech support person’s point of view – I’m sure there are lots of great reasons they have for liking or disliking Vista. These are reasons from a reasonably savvy but typical end-user’s viewpoint.
1. I CAN’T USE MY PRINTER OR MY WEBCAM
Most of my peripherals don’t have drivers yet that work with Windows Vista. Right now, to use my home printer for a file that sits on my Vista machine, I have to email it to myself and open it from another computer in my house. So as you can imagine, it’s more than a bit frustrating.
2. OMG IT’S SOOOO SLOW OPENING FOLDERS & INSTALLING UPDATES
Some people have no problems running Windows Vista on their machines with a quickness, but whenever I have to access a folder, it’s time to take out a book and read a few pages while I wait for my machine to respond. My coworkers said this sometimes happens if you upgrade instead of doing a clean install, so I asked tech support to do a clean install. It didn’t make a bit of difference. This computer is less than 1 year old and claims to be Vista capable. I guess that just means you can install Vista, but is certainly no recommendation that you should.
Along with this, Windows updates seem to take forever to install. The other day, it took well over 10 minutes for 1 update to install. I was trying to shut down and take my Vista computer to work with me that day. I ended up having to leave before it finished so I wouldn’t be late to work!
3. AERO GLASS TURNS OFF IN A HEARTBEAT
As Microsoft probably intended, my first reaction to Vista was “Oooooh, pretty.” One of the new features that Vista is touting is Aero, its slick new design style (and as everyone and their mother has noted, it’s basically just Microsoft catching up with what Apple’s been doing for years).  Problem is, if you run software that doesn’t support Aero Glass, it turns off. For all programs, not just the one that’s not compatible. Suddenly your nice new interface ain’t so nice anymore.
BUT NOT TO BE A DOWNER…
If you’re buying a brand new machine anyway, don’t be scared of Vista. The new interface is slick-looking. I love the Search feature from the Start button – so much easier to find my applications! And the Alt+Tab functionality is much nicer than in Windows XP. The security features definitely seem better, even from my limited security viewpoint, and there’s a new Sync feature (that I haven’t played with yet, but looks similar to the Windows XP Power Toy Sync Toy). Vista has a lot to offer… just maybe not for “Vista Capable” machines as much as “Vista Premium Ready” brand new beauties.
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Addendum: I spoke with my coworker who has the exact same computer running Windows Vista, and she has no problems with slow load times for accessing folders. So what gives? This makes me question Windows Vista even more, that 2 identical machines that have no extra junk on them are running the OS totally differently.
I can’t tell you exactly which “episode” it was, but Steve Gibson was having general symptoms such as you are describing, including EXTREME slowness in silly things like moving objects on the desktop, and solved the problems by updating his video driver, even though Vista wasn’t complaining about it.
I realize that your post is more of a review of Vista than a practical complaint, but I hope that this helps. I’m a Win2000 man myself, and my worry is that I not only won’t be able to easily find a copy of Win2000 for my next machine - a license, really - but that I won’t be able to find any hardware to run Win2000. I don’t know if these fancy quads and whatever will run Win2000 at all. I imagine that it’s a completely different HAL.
Thanks.
David.
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