First time Vista impressions from a late adopter

[LCB001]

Originally Posted by sswilson

So far the most insidious complaint I have is the loss of my "up one level" button on my file folders, but that's probably just a matter of changing my preferences.

I guess I also qualify as a late adopter, I just upgraded from eight years of 98SE to Vista 64bit and other than having to relearn where to find stuff, have had no problems with it. I did turn the UAC off because it was just annoying. I use AVG 7.5 Free as antivirus again with no issues.

To replace "up one level" just hit " Backspace". It acts like a toggle switch if you hit it again .

[Mars]

Originally Posted by sswilson

Another question for folks running Vista 32bit... what freeware virus app are you running? I've had so many problems with AVG under XP pro (legit version believe it or not... :) ) that I'm looking for an alternative.

I've also had numerous problems with AVG, Avast is my freeware AV of choice.

Originally Posted by enaberif

I'm going to take it sswilson isn't much of a power user?

I'm a power user, running Vista as my Windows OS on my main rig for 19 months now. :p

Originally Posted by Mibs

Here's another trick. Hold alt and use the arrow keys.

Also works for internet browsing in all the useful browsers.

Originally Posted by DarKStar

For all you VISTA users, I highly recommend this freeware tool - Copy the contests of your install disc to a folder on your HDD and isntall VLITE, the latest version - You can use VLITE to customize your install, strip down the fat and uneeded bloat, integrate drivers, SPs, etc and build a new ISO. You would be very surprised, I managed to strip down to a CD-ROM sized install - Now my VISTA runs much faster and better and takes much less memory at boot - so I can use the full resources on games. Once installed you can use tools like VistaManager, VistaSmoker and TweakVI to further trim the fat - you can eventually make it just as fast if not better than XP. I get a 5.9 score btw, :D

As a long time user of nlite and vlite, I can say with confidence that they have little effect on performance in most situations.

Current uptime on my system is 63 hours, and combined CPU time for every Windows component is about 25 minutes, even ignoring that the vast majority of that is low priority, that's about 0.66% of my cpu power, or enough to bring me from 60 fps to 59.6 fps in a cpu bound game.

Some memory can be saved, but memory is dirt cheap to simply buy more of. In an extremely optimistic scenario, you might save 500mb by stripping everything from Vista. That's worth less than $10 of RAM, it's easier to just pony up the $75, and get increased performance without losing any features.

[magictorch]

Originally Posted by enaberif

Maybe I'm starting to soften up I don't know hahaha.

IF I get a decent job at the end of these grad studies I'm sending you a copy of VISTA 64bit. On one condition though- you have to at least write a few notes on your first and final impressions

[enaberif]

Originally Posted by magictorch

IF I get a decent job at the end of these grad studies I'm sending you a copy of VISTA 64bit. On one condition though- you have to at least write a few notes on your first and final impressions

I already have a copy.. installed and removed.

It annoys me to no end.

I simply do not like the way it looks, functions and works.

[magictorch]

Ah well, There is still time for it to improve before the next OS. Maybe that vista CD will find its way into your drive at some point again.

[CWestfall]

The first time I ever used Vista, it was at a friends place. He was rattling off all the specs and I thought it would have to run pretty well.

Then I found that applications loaded about as fast as a Pentium III running Linux.

[Boldeagle]

Originally Posted by CWestfall

The first time I ever used Vista, it was at a friends place. He was rattling off all the specs and I thought it would have to run pretty well.

Then I found that applications loaded about as fast as a Pentium III running Linux.

Thats pretty unfair on linux.

[DarKStar]

Originally Posted by enaberif

I already have a copy.. installed and removed.

It annoys me to no end.

I simply do not like the way it looks, functions and works.

Neither do I which is exactly why I use vlite + other tools to RID those useless (in my opinion) features and enable the Xp classic look adn feel of VISTA - I like to trim the fat off VISTA not because of memory, I have 4GB (mind only 3 can be used in VISTA32) but the point is freeing up as much memory of stuff I don't need. I use a trimmed down VISTA strictly for DX10 games and might transition slowly to it as it's gone a long way and runs things fast.

if you don't like how VISTA functions wait until you see Windows 7's pie chart interface LOL

[CWestfall]

Originally Posted by Boldeagle

Thats pretty unfair on linux.

No offence intended. Nothing runs that well on a Pentium III, though Linux does the best. (Thus why it's on there)

[sswilson]

So far I'm still much more impressed with Vista under these conditions than I thought I would be. I've currently got AVG, Openoffice Writer, Paint.net, IE, Media player, and the Boinc client all running at once (boinc is set to run even while computer is active) and physica memory usage is still only 970MB (54% of available) with no noticable lag at all in the system.

General impressions while installing is that large programs (like Nero or OpenOffice) seemed to install faster. I didn't do any kind of benchmarking on this, it's just an impression, however I do a full XP install at least every couple of months so my memory should be fairly fresh. :)

The 3D window interface isn't impressing me much, I kinda thought it would allow me to rotate the windows around rather than just putting them up in a row to allow me to select easier, although I can see where it would make switching between multiple pages fairly easy.

Overall, for general use, (and based on a very short testing experience) I see no reason why a person wouldn't go with Vista other than having a new interface to learn. I was expecting a sluggish memory hog, but so far am not experiencing any of that even on a stock E6400 with 2G mem and onboard vid.