A New Motto For Microsoft Vista!
Courtesy of an unidentified commenter on a survey done over at PC World comes a catchy new slogan for the newest Microsoft operating system. Vista: It runs like a dead hamster!
When I posted a little survey concerning the news that Microsoft plans to discontinue most sales of Windows XP on June 30th, I expected lots of people to take it, and for the sentiment to be overwhelmingly pro-XP. They did, and it was. (More than 3500 people completed the survey, and 83 percent of them are unhappy with Microsoft's move.)
I was startled by how many people took the time to not only participate in the survey but share their thoughts at length–and by how diverse their opinions were. Some folks were raving fans of XP; others just grudgingly tolerated it. Some reported nightmares with Windows Vista; others said they were happy Vista campers. More than a few said that the prospect of an XP-less world was prompting them to consider dumping Microsoft operating systems altogether in favor of Linux or Mac OS X.
Over the next few pages, you'll find a sampling of the 1000+ comments the survey prompted. If they inspire you to share your own thoughts, we're still listening–just leave a comment on this article.
XP Plaudits"Windows XP has mature to where is the best OS in the market. It's better then Leopard or Tiger from Apple. It's more convinient than Linux and it has gone to a point that I feel it is very secure. Of course nothing is 100% secure, but Windows XP comes very close. The performance is much better than Vista and right now there are more compartible programs to XP than Vista. What would had me jump into Vista, a new file system and a faster seach engine, it's not being deliver. So why switch? Vista is a XP with a fancy look, nothing more. XP has become as secure as Vista, without the slowdown."
There are many, many more opinions over there. A lot of people are going to be very angry come June. I suppose this means that there will never be a service pack 3 for XP, either. Too bad. For all my unhappiness with the XP system, it actually is fairly stable now after all the many patches. And I am used to it and can get around in it pretty well. So, I'll reinstall all my XP systems before the end of June and update them just before they pull the plug. That should get them a few more years of service. When the computers eventually die or become so hopelessly outdated as to be unusable, I'll change to something else.
So far, Ubuntu Linux has been working very well for me for office-type applications. I think Microsoft should be worried. Vista is not doing well for them and they are going to lose business over it.
Geek Stuff | Gaius Thursday, 20 March , 2008
By wheels, Thursday, 20 March , 2008 @ 10:40 pm
I have little problem with XP as an OS - I used it at home for a number of years, and at work from not long after I started using it at home.Where it fell down for me was in adding hardware to my system - things just didn’t work right, upgraded drivers had to be acquired from vendors because of system crashes, and some things had to be uninstalled because they just never worked.I ended up moving to Macs as my XP systems at home died. I’m still using XP at work, and I recently put an XP partition on one of my Macs so I could continue to use the tax software I’ve been using for a few years.I suspect that Microsoft will be using other methods to force Vista acceptance. I’m supposed to be getting an upgraded system at work, because mine’s several years old. We got in a new Gateway that had Vista pre-installed, and an XP Pro install CD to allow me to "upgrade" it to XP.Unfortunately, there are no XP drivers available for the video, the networking interface, the DVD burner (it shows up as a CD read-only drive), and who knows how many other things. I had to put Vista back on it, and another system is being ordered in for me, because some of the tools I *have* to use don’t run on Vista.If the drivers for the hardware aren’t available for XP, people who want or need XP will be stuck with older hardware. That still leaves them with reasonably capable systems at the moment, but another year or two down the road they may be hurting.
By wheels, Thursday, 20 March , 2008 @ 10:41 pm
Hmmm. Wonder what happened to all my paragraph breaks?
By Steev, Friday, 21 March , 2008 @ 1:38 am
“Windows XP has mature to where is the best OS in the market. It’s better then Leopard or Tiger from Apple.”
On what basis? The number of Apps that run under XP? Other than that there’s really no comparison in terms of elegance, security, ease of use or speed.
Sorry, I may sound like a fan, but this is a ridiculous statement. Why would the writer even mention Tiger?
By sam, Friday, 21 March , 2008 @ 12:12 pm
Wheels: The paragraph break doesn’t work here on the Boulevard. I wouldn’t go so far to say XP is the best operating system on the market, although probably the best Windows. I have used all of them from Windows 3.1 through XP, and it is easily the best. I haven’t used Vista or Mac or Linux though.