Vista

[Nova]

Heya folks.

I recently bought this Acer laptop, 2ghz, 512mb, rather nice for the low £400 price tag.
It came with Windows Media Centre edition, which I'm not sure if anyone knows, but it seems to be Windows XP with a special program on it which makes your pc/laptop work like a jukebox, it's very nice.

However, I just found out that Acer are running a program which means that they will upgrade any laptop or pc they sell to vista, once it comes out.
However, although because I have MCE, I am entitled to Vista home Premium (The one with the Aero interface), because of needing 1gig of ram to use it, and only having 512, I can only have Vista home basic (The one without Aero)
.
I wondered if there was anyone out there (looking at warmfluffy) who knows enough about the new Vistas to tell me whether it is worth switching from MCE to Vista Basic.

Cheers.

 

[nickspoon]

I would, personally, not upgrade to Vista. XP will continue to serve me well whenever I need to boot Windows. If you're dead set on Vista, I would upgrade the RAM and get Premium. The Basic isn't worth it really, and you'd probably end up upgrading to Premium eventually. I am not an expert on the topic, however - far from it.

Also, 1GB of RAM is a pretty hefty requirement for just the 3D desktop. I take it MS didn't steal enough from Beryl (which is using up 30MB at present) But I digress, rapidly.

 

[Mudi]

I thought that Aero was just a composite manager, is it full 3D? If it is just composite, then there really is no excuse for needing 1GB of memory :blink:

Even if it is full 3D, there really is no excuse for needing 1GB of memory...

 

[WarmFluffyUK]

Heya folks.

I recently bought this Acer laptop, 2ghz, 512mb, rather nice for the low £400 price tag.
It came with Windows Media Centre edition, which I'm not sure if anyone knows, but it seems to be Windows XP with a special program on it which makes your pc/laptop work like a jukebox, it's very nice.

However, I just found out that Acer are running a program which means that they will upgrade any laptop or pc they sell to vista, once it comes out.
However, although because I have MCE, I am entitled to Vista home Premium (The one with the Aero interface), because of needing 1gig of ram to use it, and only having 512, I can only have Vista home basic (The one without Aero)
.
I wondered if there was anyone out there (looking at warmfluffy) who knows enough about the new Vistas to tell me whether it is worth switching from MCE to Vista Basic.

Cheers.

Well Media Centre is basically XP home edition that has a fancy media player/recorder built in. Like XP home edition, Media centre is missing many of the extra features such as Remote desktop, Security options & the ability to join domains. However all of these can be done with a bit of hacking.

Windows Vista comes in 5 flavours, Home Basic, Home Premium, Business, Enterprise & Ultimate. The only two that have Media Centre built in are Home Premium and Ultimate. So when you eventually decide to go for Vista, make sure you have Home Premium if you want to keep your bells and whistles . Ultimate is going to be VERY expensive.

As for when to go for Vista, I would be inclined to leave it a while yet. Let the hardware manufacturers bring their drive base up to spec, or you might find yourself unable to to use some of your existing hardware.

I myself will be upgrading to Vista as it will be part of my job. Everyone will eventually upgrade too, as I bet games and other software will be targeted at Vista. Give it 2 years and 90% of us will be using it, except for the die hard people who shout "I will not upgrade when windows for workgroups 3.11 does everything I want!" :lol:. And please note I'm being sarcastic there and not literal.

 

[darkman]

I don't know what percentage I am in. I haven't used Windows for five or more years now. Been using SuSE Linux. I have been using Windows at work. It is the only time that I expose myself to it. Sooner or later I am sure they will upgrade to Vista. If I had to go to a proprietary OS I would probably pick a MAC. That is just me. If a person is really into games and movies, it is best to go with one of the proprietary OSs. Windows seems to be the main game playing OS. Linux has a long way to go when it comes to the games. Codeweavers just released their newest version of Crossover that is supposed to support World of Warcraft and Steam based games such as Half Life 2 plus some others. Don't know how well that would be though. I only do emulation in Linux, like SNES Genesis, and Mame. Also played a little PS1.

 

[nickspoon]

But for anyone who might want to get anything done, Linux is great.

Wine is getting pretty good anyway, and certain Linux games are excellent (like Nexuiz). The problem with Linux is mainly hardware drivers and games - Mandriva 2007 is just as easy as Windows if not easier. The problem is, we end up with a catch 22 - to get hardware drivers and games, we need users, so the companies will bother; and to get users, we need hardware drivers and games. A pain.

Look! I'm digressing again.

 

[Nova]

So, basically, you suggest I upgrade to a gig, and get the Home Pro?

 

[sam fisher]

I'd stay with XP for a while, you don't need to upgrade, you'll just lose performance.

 

[Klepto]

Linux has a long way to go when it comes to the games.

I see it more like: Games have a long way to go when it comes to Linux. I've quite a few commercial games for Linux (NWN, X2 and others) and they run just fine. It's not the platform that's at fault, it's just the games aren't usually written for it.

As for Vista, I'm a Linux zealot so probably best if I say nothing

 

[Nova]

How much? I don't really see that it will be a large difference if I upgrade. My CPU is double the recommended by Microsoft, and with a gig ddr2 card that brings me up to 1.5gig. Will it really be that bad?

 

[sam fisher]

How much? I don't really see that it will be a large difference if I upgrade. My CPU is double the recommended by Microsoft, and with a gig ddr2 card that brings me up to 1.5gig. Will it really be that bad?

I have a 7600GT massively over clocked, a CPU twice as fast as vista's recommended, and it was still not better than XP.

 

[Blah]

I'm not buying. I don't want to give MS any more money. I think their bubble's gonna burst soon.

 

[Ravnos]

So, basically, you suggest I upgrade to a gig, and get the Home Pro?

I'd suggest you upgrade to a gig (cause you can always use more RAM) and then install Linux instead.

Seriously though, how are they doing the Vista upgrade? Are they going to send you a disc so you can install it yourself, or do you have to send the computer in? Because if it's the former, there's no harm in getting the disc and then waiting a while to install it to see if it would be worthwhile.

 

[WarmFluffyUK]

I'm not buying. I don't want to give MS any more money. I think their bubble's gonna burst soon.

Sorry to annoy you but you're wrong, New computers are being supplied with vista already. And what dictates the market, it's Joe public, not the people in the know.

If you really think any Linux variant is going to take off, it needs to be be supplied with new systems, and not as download/upgrade options.

The public only really know what they are given, 99% of them think that windows is part of the computer. I asked one person what word processor she was using the other day and she told me she was using "Word XP", get the idea?

It's the same reason VHS won over Betamax, but Betamax was BETTER..... Er, didn't win over tho did it... Better marketing to the public gave us the inferior format, and we all accepted it happily!

 

[Blah]

Yeah, theres no chance of any distro taking off while MS is in the picture. I just think there about to screw up, big time. Then they will lose their followers.

Heh, I'm using XP MCE right now, it what came on my laptop.

 

[krosfyah]

If you do any gaming then definitely don't upgrade. I remember when I tried it quite a few games didn't even run, and those that did had crappy performance due to drivers being in early stages.

I learned my lesson when I upgraded to x64 and half my stuff wouldn't run anymore. I'm sticking with good old regular XP for as long as possible.

 

[nickspoon]

The VHS won over Betamax because of all the porn on VHS.

You tend to find that most Joe Publics would rather not buy a whole new PC or upgrade their existing one and go through the hassle of installing Vista, then actually verifying it with Microsoft seventeen times. Their piracy protection, infrequent and often useless updates and massive security holes will be the death of them. Businesses will go first, as they have the IT pros who know what they're doing, and for businesses, Windows upgrades are very expensive. The general public will eventually follow suit.

 

[Blah]

That's exactly what I was trying to say. Thanks.

 

[darkman]

I'm not buying. I don't want to give MS any more money. I think their bubble's gonna burst soon.

The public only really know what they are given, 99% of them think that windows is part of the computer. I asked one person what word processor she was using the other day and she told me she was using "Word XP", get the idea?

I totally agree with you. Most people that go out and buy a computer, or use it on their job, don't even know what an Operating System is. They are just totally unaware that there can be a choice. They basically approach and use a computer just as one would set down and use a TV. They see everything as integrated. They look at brand names when buying.

 

[Nova]

I'm not buying. I don't want to give MS any more money. I think their bubble's gonna burst soon.

The public only really know what they are given, 99% of them think that windows is part of the computer. I asked one person what word processor she was using the other day and she told me she was using "Word XP", get the idea?

I totally agree with you. Most people that go out and buy a computer, or use it on their job, don't even know what an Operating System is. They are just totally unaware that there can be a choice. They basically approach and use a computer just as one would set down and use a TV. They see everything as integrated. They look at brand names when buying.

Personally, I don't think that this is true. I mean, even my dad knows that if he wants compatibility with the things he needs for what he does, he will use a windows PC, and if he needs to do something design based, for sketch plans, etc, he'll use my old imac, because it's easier for him, and he'll say "I can't do this on windows, can I use the mac?". You'd be surprised how many people know of the availability of different os's