Mircrosoft has gone the way of so many 14 year old programmers… They’ve made their OS look really pretty, but at the same time they’ve removed all of any functionality that was in XP.
Let me describe my situation: I just built a desktop a machine, and I had a Windows XP and Ubuntu Linux dual-boot setup, and working fine. I decided, hey, what the hell, let’s upgrade to Vista. Big mistake.
The experience started out pretty painlessly. I put in the Vista DVD into my DVD drive, and used the onscreen install guide. It upgraded from Windows XP, keeping all my data in about 2 hours. Great, I thought.
I rebooted system, and I was greeted with the message: “Please select a location for the network ‘Network 1′”. I clicked home. I mean, what the hell? It’s a desktop with no wireless card, every single time I plug in an ethernet cable I’m going to want the computer to go and get an IP from a DHCP. Every time. I mean, seriously.
I set the time, and let Vista start a performance check, which lasted a substantial amount of time with absolutely no indicator of progress. As soon as I actually get into my new desktop, I’m hit with a wave of lag equivalent to starting a Starcraft game with somebody connected to a dial up router over wireless. I’ve got a 2.8 Ghz processor, its not that slow!
After Vista taking its sweet time to open the task manager (about a minute), I get to click my first of a million “allows” when I want to view all the processes on my own machine. No admin password request, no username prompt… just “allow.” That’s what I call security.
I discover that Microsoft has deemed it nessacary that a “TrustedInstaller.exe” take monopolize my processor like they monopolize the computer market. Microsoft needs to figure out how to name their processes, “TrustedInstaller.exe” does not sound like a trusted installer, it sounds like a virus.
Anyhow, I decided to reboot. Microsoft decided that GRUB was inferior to its own bootloader, which decided Vista was the only OS on my machine worth booting. I found out it was pretty easy to fix a grub, just boot onto a Ubuntu live CD and run these commands:
sudo grub
find /boot/grub/stage1
root *the results of the above command, ex: (hd0,0)
setup (hd0) # always hd0
quit
At this point, I though my troubles were over and my computer would be ready to go with Microsoft’s brand new and “Wow”ie Vista. I was so wrong.
After booting again into Vista, I discovered that Microsoft does not make you validate Vista if you upgraded from XP. Just don’t enter a serial and uncheck the “activate online” check box, and the upgrade from XP to Vista is free… cash wise, at least.
My epic Vista story continues with me wondering why I can’t open “My Computer” without sitting around for an hour and a half watching the Windows equivalent of the spinning-ball-of-death. I uninstall some useless programs, and start the disk defragmenter, which has become even worse. No more pretty hard drive pictures, you don’t even get an ETA or a progress bar. It is the WORST GUI I’ve ever seen.
Despite that, it decided to reset my MBR. Again. Great…. I reinstalled GRUB again, and all was well.
I’ve got my Vista install fully setup, after 2 days of “dealing with it.” It still sucks, and it runs about 10% slower then XP. My friends tell me to “get a dual core, you won’t notice.” But the joy of it is, you still lose that 10%, regardless of how fast your processor is.
I used to be able to play UT2004 at normal settings without any problem at all. Now I play it on low settings and still get lag in 1v1 instant actions. Starcraft used to work, now my colors suck until I enter a game. I used to be able to run a virus scan and surf the web at the same time, now it is just too much for my processor.
I’ve decided that Vista is not worth what I payed for it — nothing. It’s Windows XP with a face lift and more “accept or deny” messages. The firewall is the same. Everything is the same, they just made it slower and shinier. Good job Microsoft, keep up the good work.
I’m doing some experimenting with gaming under Linux, starting with UT2004, and then moving on to some others… I never thought a game advertising that it “runs on Linux” would ever be a buying point for me, but it is now. I want to avoid Vista at all costs.
People read this post, and say, “Hey, Apple’s no better!” That’s just wrong. Tiger runs faster then Panther, Panther faster then 10.2, etc. Apple adds things to its OS’es AND makes it shinny, without adding extra bullcrap nobody needs (alt + tab and 3D flip? I mean, WTF?)
