Vista: Get it now or wait?

[Thanee]

How about Knoppix?

Bye
Thanee

 

[doktorziplok]

All my install experiences with Linux have been nightmarish, to put it mildly. In OS X you install a piece of software by dragging it into the applications folder, and that's it. In Linux you have to compile it, decipher cryptic warnings about dependency files, find the dependency files, try to compile them, find THEIR dependencies, install the thing, find out something else is broken.

There's a reason ENWorld's server runs MySQL 4.0 instead of 5.1 -- installing ANYTHING on Linux is outside the base package is a pain in the neck even for an experienced computer user. It's worse that getting something to work on Windows 3.1. It took me some 6 hours to update Apache on the box and it's not an experience I'm keen on going through on my home computer.

Yum has alleviated this somewhat - but it's still a headache compared to Windows or Apple. Linux is great for servers - but I've yet to see a good, friendly and easy to use desktop solution.

you might try ubuntu 6.06 (dapper drake). i've installed it on multiple machines with no issues. sure it lacks drag-n-drop installation, but it does have a software installer where you merely check a box and click "install."

the actual process of installing ubuntu is one of the most hassle free computing activities i've ever done. i think there are like 6 steps, mostly entering your user info (username/passwork/time zone). on a newer machine you can have it installed and updated in about an hour or so.

i personally like using the command line, but i can appreciate why someone wouldn't want to. i mean after 10 years of the "c:\" architecture, it can be a little unsettling to see something different.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

Modern? I think your rig is pretty much top of the line for modern PCs (well, your ram isn't super high, but the rest...). If Vista is noticeably slower on it (even if only slightly), that doesn't seem like a good thing.

The only real difference is some very slight drop in framerate in games, and like I said, its a brand new video board architecture and beta drivers. Give it a month and we'll see if they eliminate the difference.

Other than that, no noticeable performance difference. I think I'm noticing the drive chitter more since I finally broke down and got rid of the case I'd been using for 10 years. (Poor old Steely -- that thing woulda stopped a bullet, but it just wasn't up to snuff when it came to good airflow anymore). The new one is whisper quiet.

 

[Mycanid]

Yes ... I am the admin of the small business here, and we are quite happy with Win XP Pro. I really do not see a reason to upgrade to Vista at this point.

I like to wait at least a-year-and-change for a bunch of the bugs to be ironed out before even beginning to consider something like an OS upgrade.

We didn't move from Win2k to WinXP until they came out with SP1.

We didn't move from Win98se to Win2k until they came out with SP2.

I have also had poor experiences with linux distributions on pcs similar to what Morris has said. But I should also say that I have been more and more impressed with Mac OS X over the years. I have been especially interested when they moved to the Intel hardware platform (the possibility of dual boot being the main factor).

For us (a small publishing house) if we were forced to change OS for some reason I would be much more inclined at this point to go with Mac....

 

[drothgery]

Yes ... I am the admin of the small business here, and we are quite happy with Win XP Pro. I really do not see a reason to upgrade to Vista at this point.

Now, as a web developer who primarily works in ASP.NET, I'd prefer to be working in Vista now, and especially after the server counterpart comes out, mostly because both Vista and Longhorn Server have IIS 7, instead of the situation I've got now with IIS 5.1 and XP Pro on my desktop, and IIS 6/Win2K3 on our servers -- which means there are some things I can do on the servers that I can't do on my desktop, and so sometimes complicates testing and deployment.

 

[Mycanid]

Now, as a web developer who primarily works in ASP.NET, I'd prefer to be working in Vista now, and especially after the server counterpart comes out, mostly because both Vista and Longhorn Server have IIS 7, instead of the situation I've got now with IIS 5.1 and XP Pro on my desktop, and IIS 6/Win2K3 on our servers -- which means there are some things I can do on the servers that I can't do on my desktop, and so sometimes complicates testing and deployment.

That seems a worthwhile reason for your looking into upgrading!

But we do no such development here. Mostly page layout, photoshop work, a little video editing and "daily computing tasks".

 

[Michael Morris]

Now, as a web developer who primarily works in ASP.NET, I'd prefer to be working in Vista now, and especially after the server counterpart comes out, mostly because both Vista and Longhorn Server have IIS 7, instead of the situation I've got now with IIS 5.1 and XP Pro on my desktop, and IIS 6/Win2K3 on our servers -- which means there are some things I can do on the servers that I can't do on my desktop, and so sometimes complicates testing and deployment.

Not to sound mean, but if you use IIS you deserve what you get. Apache is *so* superior to IIS it isn't funny. Yeah, IIS has asp, but compared to PHP it's no contest (Yes, I'm aware PHP can be compiled to run under IIS)

 

[kirinke]

As with anything from Microsoft, consumer beware. Never, ever buy the first version of it. It always has bugs. While I'm no computer guru, I've found this to be very true.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

All my install experiences with Linux have been nightmarish, to put it mildly. In OS X you install a piece of software by dragging it into the applications folder, and that's it. In Linux you have to compile it, decipher cryptic warnings about dependency files, find the dependency files, try to compile them, find THEIR dependencies, install the thing, find out something else is broken.

There's a reason ENWorld's server runs MySQL 4.0 instead of 5.1 -- installing ANYTHING on Linux is outside the base package is a pain in the neck even for an experienced computer user. It's worse that getting something to work on Windows 3.1. It took me some 6 hours to update Apache on the box and it's not an experience I'm keen on going through on my home computer.

Yum has alleviated this somewhat - but it's still a headache compared to Windows or Apple. Linux is great for servers - but I've yet to see a good, friendly and easy to use desktop solution.

That is night and day different than my experiences with a debian based distro, such as Ubuntu. For example, I type in apt-get install firefox and it pulls the package from the repository, and installs it plus all its dependencies. apt-get/aptitude deals with all dependencies when installing packages, or you can use the synaptic package manager and do it in the GUI, though I prefer to work from the command line. Even downloaded debian packages that aren't in the repositories are quite easy to install without using the command line. I've never used Yum, but I don't like .rpm based distros based on bad experiences with Red Hat years back. Where I work we are moving all the machines to Linux, desktops and servers, with anything that won't run in Linux being run in VM's under Linux.

Anyway, Ubuntu is a very easy to install and use Desktop distro.

 

[Ranger REG]

As with anything from Microsoft, consumer beware. Never, ever buy the first version of it. It always has bugs. While I'm no computer guru, I've found this to be very true.

The same rule applies to D&D. Never buy the First Printing.