Why Microsoft must abandon Vista to save itself

[SUBMAN1]

Pretty much sums up Vista. I have 3 systems running Vista right now, and I do not plan to add any more.

-S

September 26, 2007 9:05 AM PDT
Why Microsoft must abandon Vista to save itself

Posted by Don Reisinger (http://www.news.com/8300-10784_3-7.html?authorId=9727958&tag=author)

http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/i/bto/20070926/WindowsVistaUltimate_web_270x297.jpg
The Microsoft albatross
(Credit: Microsoft)


While Vista was originally touted by Microsoft as the operating system savior we've all been waiting for, it has turned out to be one of the biggest blunders in technology. With a host of issues that are inexcusable and features that are taken from the Mac OS X and Linux playbook, Microsoft has once again lost sight of what we really want.


As we're more than aware, Vista Ultimate comes at a premium. For an additional $160 over the Premium SKU price, Ultimate gives you a complete backup and restore option, BitLocker Drive encryption, the ever so popular Windows Fax & Scan, and the "Ultimate Extras." But what started with a promise of "Extras" by summer, quickly turned into an apology from Microsoft and the eventual release of DreamScene and Windows Hold 'Em (among others) today. And while each of the "Extras" runs just fine, Microsoft's "Extras" blunder is just another reason why the company must abandon Vista before it's too late.


The first indication that Microsoft should abandon Vista is its poor sales figures. According to a recent report titled "Windows Vista Still Underperforming in U.S. Retail" from NPD, Vista sales are significantly behind XP sales (http://www.news.com/Running-the-numbers-on-Vista/2100-1016_3-6207375.html) during its early days. Even worse for Redmond, some are reverting to XP (http://www.news.com/The-XP-alternative-for-Vista-PCs/2100-1016_3-6209481.html), citing issues with compatibility and overall design. And if that wasn't enough, Macs continue to surge and with the impending release of Leopard, Microsoft may be in for a rough holiday season.


With each passing day, it's becoming blatantly clear that Microsoft released Vista too early and the company's continual mistakes and promises that can't be kept are further annoying the Windows faithful.


Much talk has been given to Service Pack 1 (http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9783639-7.html) and how this update should address many of the issues users have with Vista, but I simply don't agree. Will SP1 eliminate the ridiculous Microsoft licensing schemes? Will SP1 drop the price on the higher-end versions? Will SP1 eliminate the need for users to buy a new computer just to use the faulty OS?


SP1 will do nothing but fix the holes and issues we currently know about and create even more. As we all know from the days of Windows ME and even XP, Microsoft is not the best company at finding and addressing security issues, and chances are, Vista will be no different.


One significant problem that I have with Vista is its inclusion of new DRM, specifically the company's decision to install Protected Video Path. To prevent a person from copying (or in most cases, backing up) a movie, the operating system provides process isolation and if an unverified component is in use, the operating system shuts down DRM content. For the first time on any operating system, we're not even allowed to backup our favorite movies? Come on.


I also find it interesting that Microsoft decided to take the user access control concept from Mac OS X and make it much worse. Can someone please explain to me why I need to be asked if I wanted to do something entirely innocuous like open a third-party app from a well-known software company?


Never before have I seen such an abysmal start to an operating system release. For almost a year, people have been adopting Vista and becoming incensed by how poorly it operates. Not only does it cost too much, it requires more to run than XP, there is still poor driver support, and that draconian licensing scheme is a by-product of Microsoft picking on the wrong people.


The road ahead looks dangerous for Vista and Microsoft must realize that. With Mac OS X hot on its tail, Vista is simply not capable of competing at an OS level with some of the best software around. If Microsoft continues down this path, it will be Vista that will bring the software giant to its knees--not Bill Gates' departure.


Of course, categorically dumping an operating system is quite difficult and with millions already using the OS, chances are Microsoft won't find a good enough reason to do it. And while I can understand that argument, there's no reason the company can't continue to support Vista and go back to the drawing board for its next OS. Even better, go back to XP--it's not nearly as bad as Vista.


As a daily user of Mac OS X, Ubuntu and Vista, I'm keenly aware of what works and what doesn't. Mac and Linux work.


The time is up. Microsoft must abandon Vista and move on. It's the company's only chance at redemption.http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9785337-7.html?

[Linton]

Three?i would have thought that you may have learned your lesson after one!

[SUBMAN1]

Three?i would have thought that you may have learned your lesson after one!
I did, but I needed to test software. And I would downgrade this one I am on right now, but I used an upgrade version of Vista, which effectively disabled my XP key during the upgrade.

My main system that I game on and do the majority of my work still runs MCE 2005. I have 10 copies of Vista as well, so it is not like I couldn't upgrade it - it is simply a case of that I do not want to - it's a downgrade in my opinion. Vista is one fat bloated pig! No other way to describe it.

I am still trying to figure out one advantage of using Vista - After running it for 6 months now, I have yet to come up with 1 single advantage over XP other than DX10 - which could now be backported to XP after they threw NVidia that bone on the memory archetecture. That removed any limitation now from being able to run it on XP with that one change.

-S

[The WosMan]

This article is spot on. Vista is pure crap. They should just call it quits and refund everyone that bought it and figure out how to make a decent OS. They should also get DX10 to work on XP so I can play DX10 games and not have to buy Vista.

[DeepIron]

I am still trying to figure out one advantage of using Vista...
I can hear "The Who" singing, "Won't Get Fooled Again"... Maybe the advantage is a better customer or market awareness... :up:


Vista is pure crap. So, true to form, M$ offers even MORE crap and wants the end user to pay for it... Vista Ultimate!... Good Grief... :down:

[bookworm_020]

Three?i would have thought that you may have learned your lesson after one!

Glutton for punishment!:damn::damn::damn::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: :rotfl:

[The WosMan]

Yes, and the real mistake is they are ticking off all the MS fanboys. Their lack of a good product is alienating people who traditionally have supported their products. Further, I am sure that many corporations are probably looking at Vista and saying, I am not putting that on my computers. I know the company I work for, our IT folks have always had whisperings of using Linux based systems and we have over 30,000 employees.

[U49]

God saves the stupid customer
we save our money

[SUBMAN1]

If I had 30K employees, I'd look hard and long at Linux w/ OpenOffice. Works fine for most situations. Get all identicle HW, and do mass HD duplication.

-s

[DeepIron]

The last company I worked for as an IT Admininstrator had been looking at either a LINUX or a M$-based ERP solution to replace their aging HP system... I entered the project about halfway through the decision cycle and advocated the LINUX based solution...

They went instead with the M$-based solution... and put a 8 mo timeline on the implementation. Due to the President of the company, wanting to "take a different direction in the IT department", I left the company 18 months ago and they STILL haven't realized a workable system...

Too many gotchas in the M$ software...

[goldorak]

This article is spot on. Vista is pure crap. They should just call it quits and refund everyone that bought it and figure out how to make a decent OS. They should also get DX10 to work on XP so I can play DX10 games and not have to buy Vista.


Hear hear, I would be happy for DX 10 to be included in windows xp 64. ;)
Windows Vista ? You're better off skipping this one, just like ME. :shifty:
I've always said it, you buy one MS OS and skip the next and buy the successor and so on.

[U49]

If I had 30K employees, I'd look hard and long at Linux w/ OpenOffice. Works fine for most situations. Get all identicle HW, and do mass HD duplication.
-s

In many cases anything beyond 1k means get rid of desktops finally and for all times and switch to terminals.
... which doesn't say anything what you run on the machines that the terminals are connecting to...
And exactly THIS is the point where politics start and you can achieve some astonishing "flexibility" in the price model of your former suppliers :D
That will be all that the sourcing department of your company wants to achieve.

Let's wait and see what will happen when "TCO" is understood on the customer side of the market too.

[SUBMAN1]

If I had 30K employees, I'd look hard and long at Linux w/ OpenOffice. Works fine for most situations. Get all identicle HW, and do mass HD duplication.
-s
In many cases anything beyond 1k means get rid of desktops finally and for all times and switch to terminals.
... which doesn't say anything what you run on the machines that the terminals are connecting to...
And exactly THIS is the point where politics start and you can achieve some astonishing "flexibility" in the price model of your former suppliers :D
That will be all that the sourcing department of your company wants to achieve.

Let's wait and see what will happen when "TCO" is understood on the customer side of the market too.

Terminals i find are way too limiting. People and sales reps for terminal companies have been pushing that idea for ages - since 100 Base-T came out actually, but not many companies bite for the reason i give abaove. Terminals are fine for a specific task, but not for as many things as the average office worker relies on. How would a sales rep deal with a peice of software that was unable to be run over a terminal for example? You can't. Terminals are an idea however if the only app you plan on running is email and an accounting/inventory function but that is about where their usefulness ends.

-S

[SUBMAN1]

This article is spot on. Vista is pure crap. They should just call it quits and refund everyone that bought it and figure out how to make a decent OS. They should also get DX10 to work on XP so I can play DX10 games and not have to buy Vista.

Hear hear, I would be happy for DX 10 to be included in windows xp 64. ;)
Windows Vista ? You're better off skipping this one, just like ME. :shifty:
I've always said it, you buy one MS OS and skip the next and buy the successor and so on.
XP 64 in its current itteration is not a good OS either. No 64 bit apps, coupled with limited drivers made it a nightmare to deal with from my perspective. When someone starts complaining because they can't print to a specific printer simply because a 64 bit driver doesn't exist, it leads to massive problems in an office environment.

No one wants to make drivers for X64 either simply because you have to pay M$ to certify them before you can release them to the public. M$ did this as a way to force DRM down your throat and to force control over what drivers are on their system, but this I think has backfired on them. I know of no MS employees even that want to run X64 let alone a home user. Maybe some home users, granted, but I know of no one using it for the reasons described above. And besides, what app are you going to run on it? Office? Can't! There is no 64 bit version. Games? Far Cry is the only 64 bit game I saw, and you can't tell the difference. So that leaves Internet Explorer 64 bit, but even it is of limited usefulness since Adobe never bothered to release Flash and Shockwave in a 64 bit versions. So you can read internet text in fast 64 bit - and thats about it. Neat.

-S

[U49]

Terminals i find are way too limiting. [...] How would a sales rep deal with a peice of software that was unable to be run over a terminal for example? You can't. Terminals are an idea however if the only app you plan on running is email and an accounting/inventory function but that is about where their usefulness ends.
-S

Are we talking about the same "terminals"? I 've never seen any office worker application that could not be run on terminals ...
I've even seen one CAD department working only on terminal front ends with high power stuff in the back end ...

Sales rep's? you are talking about the guy's in the company who sell the stuff of the company?? They are the first ones to NEVER see a desktop computer again :D. They will recieve nice quiet almost-unbreakable non-deconfigurable designed terminals (some look like a nice womens purse) with access to their sales software, the companies catalogues, email and nothing more. They are usualy the easiest ones.

[goldorak]

XP 64 in its current itteration is not a good OS either. No 64 bit apps, coupled with limited drivers made it a nightmare to deal with from my perspective. When someone starts complaining because they can't print to a specific printer simply because a 64 bit driver doesn't exist, it leads to massive problems in an office environment.


I don't agree. Windows xp 64 is an excellent operating system IF you have compliant hardware. And thats a big IF for the home enthusiast. In my case all my hardware is 64 bit complient (either with Vista or XP 64). My sound card from 2001 is 100% compliant thats surprising isn't it ? :p
So really a home user should buy only if they have supported hardware.
Now for business its really a little different because hardware at that level has support for 64 bit. So its not really so big and issue for them on the hardware side.



No one wants to make drivers for X64 either simply because you have to pay M$ to certify them before you can release them to the public. M$ did this as a way to force DRM down your throat and to force control over what drivers are on their system, but this I think has backfired on them. I know of no MS employees even that want to run X64 let alone a home user. Maybe some home users, granted, but I know of no one using it for the reasons described above.


Now, I hate MS as much as the next guy :lol: but I agree with some decisions they made with their 64 bit operating systems. And DRM is not the principal issue right here.
You should now that Windows XP SP 2 has support for DRM for playback of high definition media (blu-ray and hd-dvd) as does Vista. So its not really a surprise.
The decision to lock down the kernel is a good one, the decision to stop supporting legacy 16 bit code is a good one. One that should have been implemented many years ago but market forces dictated otherwise.



And besides, what app are you going to run on it? Office? Can't! There is no 64 bit version. Games? Far Cry is the only 64 bit game I saw, and you can't tell the difference. So that leaves Internet Explorer 64 bit, but even it is of limited usefulness since Adobe never bothered to release Flash and Shockwave in a 64 bit versions. So you can read internet text in fast 64 bit - and thats about it. Neat.
-S

Now now, going to a 64 bit os is a good thing even for 32 bit applications. We are seeing the first limits of a 32 bit architecture in games (as they are the leading edge).
Some games such a Supreme Commander practically exhaust completely their address space (which is only 2GB) crashing in windows. And you can't even use the /3GB switch because it makes the operating system much more instable.
So even these applications gain something by going in 64 bit, the capacity to overcome the 2GB limit in the address space.
And you'll see more and more games hitting this limit.
The only downside to 64 is the impossibility of running 16 bit code, or 32 bit code that contains 16 bit code. And I'm not going to shed a tear over this.
64 is the way of the future.

[SUBMAN1]

Are we talking about the same "terminals"? I 've never seen any office worker application that could not be run on terminals ...
I've even seen one CAD department working only on terminal front ends with high power stuff in the back end ...

Sales rep's? you are talking about the guy's in the company who sell the stuff of the company?? They are the first ones to NEVER see a desktop computer again :D. They will recieve nice quiet almost-unbreakable non-deconfigurable designed terminals (some look like a nice womens purse) with access to their sales software, the companies catalogues, email and nothing more. They are usualy the easiest ones.

Still, this is fine if you are working in a uniform environment where many of your workers all use the same apps. I look at it from a position with blinders on in that I have every person on specific tasks and they used specialized software per task and this software can change weekly. The idea of maintaining an app server in that environment doesn't sound too intriguing. It is a case of user controlled app management being transfered to a central IT controlled app management environment. In some ways, the increased IT costs for dealing with a centrally managed system may actually increase in a circumstance like mine. Also, the need for constant conenction, VPN, and offline cabability kills any terminal type app stone cold. ANother thought, with 30K workers, I seriously doubt that it would be an easy environment to maintain either, not to mention possible bandwidth problems! 10 gbit or 100 gbit pipes is a solution, but Gbit ethernet, and especially 100 Base-T could easily turn itself into one massive bottleneck.

I guess I am saying I've never seen a convincing terminal based system that is what I would call 'ideal'. I've also never seen a terminal solution in any tech firm or any office that I've seen yet that I have visited. Its just too limiting to specific tasks and shuns flexability. It would be perfectly fine for a robot workforce if thats what you got - like a manufacturing environment maybe.

Just thinking here.

-S

[SUBMAN1]

I don't agree. Windows xp 64 is an excellent operating system IF you have compliant hardware. And thats a big IF for the home enthusiast. In my case all my hardware is 64 bit complient (either with Vista or XP 64). My sound card from 2001 is 100% compliant thats surprising isn't it ? :p
So really a home user should buy only if they have supported hardware.
Now for business its really a little different because hardware at that level has support for 64 bit. So its not really so big and issue for them on the hardware side.

Now, I hate MS as much as the next guy :lol: but I agree with some decisions they made with their 64 bit operating systems. And DRM is not the principal issue right here.
You should now that Windows XP SP 2 has support for DRM for playback of high definition media (blu-ray and hd-dvd) as does Vista. So its not really a surprise.
The decision to lock down the kernel is a good one, the decision to stop supporting legacy 16 bit code is a good one. One that should have been implemented many years ago but market forces dictated otherwise.

Now now, going to a 64 bit os is a good thing even for 32 bit applications. We are seeing the first limits of a 32 bit architecture in games (as they are the leading edge).
Some games such a Supreme Commander practically exhaust completely their address space (which is only 2GB) crashing in windows. And you can't even use the /3GB switch because it makes the operating system much more instable.
So even these applications gain something by going in 64 bit, the capacity to overcome the 2GB limit in the address space.
And you'll see more and more games hitting this limit.
The only downside to 64 is the impossibility of running 16 bit code, or 32 bit code that contains 16 bit code. And I'm not going to shed a tear over this.
64 is the way of the future.
I use the /3gb switch without any instabilities. Not sure where you get that idea. I have one machine that runs 4 GB all day every day and I never turn it off. I've never had even a lockup or anything on it. Works fine. Run games on it fine. What else you need? I have friends running 4 GB with the /3gb switch as well. Never saw issue on their systems either. Guess you must have built yourself a bum 4 GB 32 bit machine at one point.

Supreme Commander - THis will be a switch if it actually uses that much RAM. I'll buy it just to test it if thats the case. Let me research this and see if it is true that it wants that much memory. WHat I am guessing based on your statements that it is unstable with the /3gb switch instabilities, is that it is not actually using that RAM like you say, but has a major memory leak bug. That is what the evidence is pointing to.

on the 64 bit - RAM capability is the only reason to have 64 bit, since you aren't getting any benefit from extra speed gains from 64 bit, thats for sure.

-S

PS. Confirmed - its a memory leak since it should run on 512 MB:

http://img267.imageshack.us/img267/8022/scfa5.jpg

PPS. Here is some talk about how to deal with the memory leaks in Supreme Commander: There's some memory leak bugs that are known about. If performance starts to tank during a skirmish, save the game, exit SupCom, wait a couple of minutes, then restart it and load your save back up. Performance should stay fine for another couple of hours or more at that point. Save regularly. If performance stays good for over 4 hours expect a crash to desktop and save often

[goldorak]

I use the /3gb switch without any instabilities. Not sure where you get that idea. I have one machine that runs 4 GB all day every day and I never turn it off. I've never had even a lockup or anything on it. Works fine. Run games on it fine. What else you need? I have friends running 4 GB with the /3gb switch as well. Never saw issue on their systems either. Guess you must have built yourself a bum 4 GB 32 bit machine at one point.


I should have been more specific. 3GB switch and Windows Vista 32 can break havoc on applications and on the operating system itself. Although the causes for each problem is different.
In the new operating system the graphic cards memory is directly mapped into the applications address space, whereas in windows xp it was not. So for instance on windows xp if you used the 3GB switch you had 1GB for the os, and 3 GB potentially for the application. Whether you had and 256 MB card or a 512MB graphics card, the potential address space of the application was 3GB. In Vista its different, if you use the 3GB switch, 1GB goes to the os, but in this case you must account also for the video memory. So if you're using a top of the line card with 512MB or 700+MB guess what ? 3GB-700/512MB doesn't leave a lot for the application does it ?
Thats why you get more instability and crashes with this situation on windows vista 32. Now you'll ask why did MS change the way memory was mapped ? Because of DRM concerns.
And in the end, its just bad practice to enable the 3GB on a 32 bit os which just wasn't designed in normal cases to do this. Some badly written drivers suppose to have 2GB address space, when thats not the case, take cover. Problems come on xp and vista 32.
But if you have no problem, thats good. ;)


Supreme Commander - THis will be a switch if it actually uses that much RAM. I'll buy it just to test it if thats the case. Let me research this and see if it is true that it wants that much memory. WHat I am guessing based on your statements that it is unstable with the /3gb switch instabilities, is that it is not actually using that RAM like you say, but has a major memory leak bug. That is what the evidence is pointing to.

on the 64 bit - RAM capability is the only reason to have 64 bit, since you aren't getting any benefit from extra speed gains from 64 bit, thats for sure.

-S

I had two links to anantechs articles in which they discuss in a very open and clear way this issue.

A Messy Transition: Practical Problems With 32bit Addressing In Windows Part I (http://www.anandtech.com/gadgets/showdoc.aspx?i=3034&p=1)
A Messy Transition (Part 2): Windows XP, Vista, and the 2GB Barrier (http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=3044)

[antikristuseke]

I use the /3gb switch without any instabilities. Not sure where you get that idea. I have one machine that runs 4 GB all day every day and I never turn it off. I've never had even a lockup or anything on it. Works fine. Run games on it fine. What else you need? I have friends running 4 GB with the /3gb switch as well. Never saw issue on their systems either. Guess you must have built yourself a bum 4 GB 32 bit machine at one point.


There is no point in having a 32bit os on a maching with 4gb or more of ram.

A common misconception is that 64-bit architectures are no better than 32-bit architectures unless the computer has more than 4 GiB of memory. This is not entirely true:
Some operating systems reserve portions of process address space for OS use, effectively reducing the total address space available for mapping memory for user programs. For instance, Windows XP DLLs and userland OS components are mapped into each process's address space, leaving only 2 to 3.8 GB (depending on the settings) address space available, even if the computer has 4 GiB of RAM. This restriction is not present in 64-bit Windows.
Memory mapping of files is becoming less useful with 32-bit architectures, especially with the introduction of relatively cheap recordable DVD technology. A 4 GiB file is no longer uncommon, and such large files cannot be memory mapped easily to 32-bit architectures; only a region of the file can be mapped into the address space, and to access such a file by memory mapping, those regions will have to be mapped into and out of the address space as needed. This is an issue, as memory mapping remains one of the most efficient disk-to-memory methods, when properly implemented by the OS.

[SUBMAN1]

There is no point in having a 32bit os on a maching with 4gb or more of ram.


Sure there is. This article misses the point. 4 GB is not by choice (dual channel dictates it), but it is an added bonus. You can address 3 GB with a 32 bit OS, but what this fails to mention is that the kernel goes into the 4 GB address space, leaving the entire 3 GB available to programs. Wikipedia is woefully inadequate sometimes and that tidbit doesn't tell anything about the whole story. THis is why the switch is called the /3gb switch because that is what is being reserved as addressable space for software.

-S

[goldorak]

Sure there is. This article misses the point. 4 GB is not by choice (dual channel dictates it), but it is an added bonus. You can address 3 GB with a 32 bit OS, but what this fails to mention is that the kernel goes into the 4 GB address space, leaving the entire 3 GB available to programs. Wikipedia is woefully inadequate sometimes and that tidbit doesn't tell anything about the whole story. THis is why the switch is called the /3gb switch because that is what is being reserved as addressable space for software.

-S

Actually no, on a 32 bit os the total address space is 4 GB (=2^32).
It doesn't depend on the amount of physical memory you have installed in the computer.
With 4GB worth of addresses this is what happens, 2 GB are used by the os and 2GB by the application.
This can be changed by the 3GB switch by making the os use only 1 GB and the application 3GB.
But this can bring problems, either at the application level via programs that don't use the 3GB because they haven't been compiled to be aware of this limit, or at the driver level via drivers that are so poorley written that they make assumptions they shouldn't be making in the first place.

The solution : use a 64 bit os and thank god MS locked down the kernel and imposes signed drivers. Maybe poorly written drivers will be a thing of the past at last.

[SUBMAN1]

Actually no, on a 32 bit os the total address space is 4 GB (=2^32).
It doesn't depend on the amount of physical memory you have installed in the computer.
With 4GB worth of addresses this is what happens, 2 GB are used by the os and 2GB by the application.
This can be changed by the 3GB switch by making the os use only 1 GB and the application 3GB.
But this can bring problems, either at the application level via programs that don't use the 3GB because they haven't been compiled to be aware of this limit, or at the driver level via drivers that are so poorley written that they make assumptions they shouldn't be making in the first place.

The solution : use a 64 bit os and thank god MS locked down the kernel and imposes signed drivers. Maybe poorly written drivers will be a thing of the past at last.

Thats is not the whole story either - but yes, it would be split 2 & 2, and would then change to 1 & 3, but you must also take in account of Virtual memory. Your scenario of an app having problems with this switch is true - but that would be only prior to apps made before Visual Studio 6.0 arrived on the scene (A really really long time ago - prior or about the Windows 2000 days). Present day apps are made in much later revs of Vis Studio and will not have this problem as you describe.

ANother advatge to 4 GB of physical memory - You can also probably get rid of your swap file! Though some software will choke if it can't see a swap for some reason, most apps will still function fine.

Never seen a problem with that switch and it is in constant use on a modern day system. Not sure why you had problems unless you were trying to run apps from the Win 98 days when WIndows 2000 was new.

-S

[Onkel Neal]

Due to all the bad vibes people have been putting out pver Vista, MS has geared up their PR muscle. (http://www.blimptv.net/mostpopularV1.html) :doh: