back to article Dutch Consumer Association declares war on Vista

The Dutch Consumers Association has called for a boycott of Windows Vista, after the software giant refused to offer free copies of Windows XP to users who are having problems with Vista. A spokesman for the Consumentenbond says that the product has many teething problems, and "is just not ready". The association claims it …

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  1. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Stop

    Details please

    How many forums?

    Which forums?

    How many for?

    How many against?

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Horns

    oh really ?

    >>But offering XP to users is not a solution, according to Microsoft, which notes that many new peripherals are developed explicitly for Vista.<<

    Apart from devices for playing back "premium content", exactly what devices are these then ?

    Good on the dutch.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    Once again, if the product didn't completely suck

    I'm sorry but it's hard for me to have any sympathy for Microsoft after pulling a stunt like this... Anybody remember the problems when converting from 9x platform to NT, or NT to 2K (yes there were quite a few NT devices that wouldn't work on 2k boxes... What about the relative few, when converting from 2K to XP? Granted, those were mainly software incompatibilities, but they were still problems, none the less.

    Vista, while a great idea on paper (like communism and socialism), is one of the worst planned and executed bombs that has ever come out of the MS empire. And forcing consumers and some corporations, at gun point, to switch from their standards, like this, is nothing shy of blatant stupidity...

    Only an arrogant idiot (yes, oxymoron in this case) would honestly believe that they could get away with a stunt like this...

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    VISTA compatibility and stability

    Windows VISTA and all products that are expected to work with the new OS will take time to mature.

    I've been using the new OS for more than a month now on a custom-built PC and I am still trying to solve interoperability and stability issues.

    Windows VISTA comes with advantages compared to XP. If you are buying a VISTA PC, make sure it comes preinstalled from a trusted manufacturer and accompanied by compatible peripherals.

  5. Ole Juul

    The product should cater to the customers

    I think people have a right to a glitch free and fully functioning OS when they pay big money to a company that has decades of experience. It's obvious that MS is trying to control it's customers by making Vista the way it is. Perhaps the Dutch are starting to see the light.

    On another subject: I noticed that there is an unusual number of people with Microsoft promo sounding talk posting on other forums regarding this. I wonder if MS is so desperate they are getting people to post for them. That would be pretty pathetic.

  6. amanfromMars Silver badge
    Alien

    Code Violation ...... and a Binary Rape of the Sabine Women Dark Matter Op?

    "I've been using the new OS for more than a month now on a custom-built PC and I am still trying to solve interoperability and stability issues."

    A New World Order System for MSControl is not interested in interoperability and stability with compatibility, Anonymous Coward, as surely the very fact that Vista does not work well on a custom-built PC must tell you. It is working perfectly well as intended though..... to bring down Microsoft?

    "Windows VISTA comes with advantages compared to XP" ........ Advantages for whom as a complaint oft heard is that there is less individual customisable Control of Vista than XP which would mean that such Control is being ceded to MSBig Brother.

    And that is never ever going to be a roaring success, is it, as it would render it as a Sub-Prime Operating System milking Systems rather than being a Valuable and Valid Tool with which to run Systems within AI Beta System of Virtualised Controls in and above the Clouds?

    Been there, done that, got the AI T-shirt?

    Hark, ...what is that I see before me .... the distant sound of black helicopters?

    Don't forget the Virtual Reality though, IT is only AI Business and QuITe normal Wall Street, Dog eat Dog Practice. In fact, it must surely be XPected.

  7. Gabor Laszlo
    Alien

    @amanfromMars

    The first three paragraphs of that post actually made sense... Then he went off to dadaland again.

  8. karl reading
    Pirate

    vista isnt ready

    i must admit that there a definate fair few problems with vista. Im running Vista on my acer - its home premium and came as a free upgrade. i like its look and feel, and for use as a media center its very good, certainly looks good when my friends come round. Ive got vista ultimate on my dell laptop, and i tend to use that for more enthusisast tasks. one of the things that really makes vista a no go for me is that its useless at manageing files and folders on another machine, if i copy, paste, or delete from my vista rigs to my file server, everything seems to take an age, all it seems to do is say its calculating the time remaining. scandelouse.

    i hate to say it, but the best m$ operating system that i have used is server 2k3x64 - solid as a rock, no real idiosyncrases, just relyable and gets the job done!

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    Old Computer.

    Maybe if the 5000 complaints hadn't been using Computers that could barely run XP then there wouldn't be a problem.

    How many of these complaints are from the same person?

    You wouldn't expect the Quake wars to run on the Original specs for quake 1 would you??? So why expect old creaky machines to do just that???

    I've got an ancient PC with 32mb of ram and it runs 98SE fine, but I can't even find a version of linux that will run on hardware that limited.

  10. Jacob Reid
    Paris Hilton

    @Anonymous coward

    Never buy a stock built PC, it will come loaded with 'FREE software worth £500!!' - which includes rubbish like Norton Virus, Yahoo Spyware, Google Search Tracking, Dell PC Stability Reducer and other such rubbish.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Horns

    @Ole Juul

    " I wonder if MS is so desperate they are getting people to post for them. That would be pretty pathetic"

    Well they've got previous for it - there have been several stories about Microsoft "buying" bloggers etc.

    Nothing about Microsoft surprises me - they will do anything to ensure we all remain locked to their bloatware. OK maybe not anything.. I really do hope they would draw the line at murder, but everything up to that point (bribery & corruption, coercion, threats, etc.) seems to be perfectly acceptable to them.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The problem is...

    That most users do not have the time and inclination to become guinea pigs for yet another new operating system, i.e. vista. They cannot stop for weeks to sort things out as they fix

    WHAT MICROSOFT SHOULD HAVE SORTED B4 RELEASING

    VISTA .

    I am sticking to XP.

  13. Colin Wilson
    Coat

    IP addresses

    Maybe it's time we started to see the IP address of people posting comments.

    While it isn't the direction Microsoft want people to take ("upgrading" to XP rather than "degrading" to Vista), perhaps the consumer really should be given that option by default.

    Just because a car manufacturer brings out a new Coupe doesn't mean everyone will want or need it - sometimes you need a people carrier to get where you want to be. Putting a different badge on the boot of the Coupe doesn't mean it gives you the functionality you need.

    One fly in the ointment is the way Microsoft blatantly ignored peoples' update settings and forced through a set of updates recently that hadn't been asked for or agreed to - and i'm sure many people have had "issues" with updates that either broke the machine or dragged down performance to Vista levels.

    ...Some of you may know what I mean i.e. installing .NET 3.x - if this was forcibly rolled out to customers without asking, you'd have to move to linux !

    The more recent idea of "backporting" Vista^H^HKafka-esque functionality to XP is also a little worrying.

    Thankfully Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon is out in four days, and will install to a file under NTFS using Wubi offering dual boot capability - you can have the best of both worlds without risking your primary OS :-)

  14. Colin Wilson
    Coat

    FAO: Anonymous Coward / Old Computer

    Funny you should mention that you can't find a linux distrib that runs on your Win98 box - people had been working on linux since 1991 using even slower equipment than yours - they didn't take a 10 year break to wait until new equipment made it worthwhile.

    Perhaps you need to find yourself an old distrib, Redhat 5.x perhaps. If you're desperate, i'm sure i've got it around here somewhere - you can find my email address over at http://www.coreutilities.co.uk

    ...Wait... you mean you want a new distrib with all the features ? - if you're so sure it should work, go and buy Vista for it. If you're so sure a new linux distrib should work on it, i'm sure Vista will too !

  15. Stan

    Hmmm...

    How about a stripped out linux kernel running on top of vista to sniff out devices, load its modules and plug the output back into vista as a fully functioned but generic device of the same type?

    Then it would be easier to install this one penguin based and gpl'd 'universal driver' than go hunting for the poxy things. Half the MS systems out there would have to run it....and then...and then the world would be ours.....all your base are belong to us....mwahahahaha.....

    See what happens when a man from mars starts to make sense ??

  16. Tony Barnett

    Two drinks minimum

    "OK maybe not anything.. I really do hope they would draw the line at murder, but everything up to that point (bribery & corruption, coercion, threats, etc.) seems to be perfectly acceptable to them."

    It's called marketing.

  17. Timothy Slade
    Boffin

    @anonymous coward, re: old pc

    puppy linux. Tried and tested on a config with that little ram, by me and others.

  18. Mike

    far jacob

    never buy a stock built pc?

    buy one with vista, it works

    build your own and can't get vista working? That's YOUR fault...

    Not Microsofts - they are not your mum - if you are incapable of finding the correct drivers etc - go and buy a package off the shelf...

    Honestly - what are you all moaning about?

    Vista doesn't work on my homemade piece of crap?

    IT IS BECAUSE YOU CAN'T GET IT TO WORK

    Vista works on my 'off the shelf' entertainment PC

    It works on all my laptops

    it EVEN works on my home built games pc - did i have more trouble with it? of course i did...is that Microsofts' fault? NO it is not...!

    Stop moaning about Vista and get on with it...

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    The biggest turd ever generated ...

    they should be in next years Guiness book of records !

    Vista is pure 'byproduct of the bovine growing industry. most notably of the male bovine kind.'

    Microsoft will 'retire' XP from oem channels in Q2 next year. i stocked up on a bunch of licences already ...

    i have played with Vistai for 2 months.

    - its slow ( even with all the eyecandy switched off

    - every 2 freaking seconds it needs attention so it can run a piece of software ( allow-deny question)

    - older software continually has these nagging screens.

    - its confused with drive mappings.

    and lastly :

    - file copying is slow . i blame the RIAA for that. They're probably snooping every time you copy or move a file with vista. Seeing how they are in league with M$... come on, it's the only logical explanation right ? Doen't vista mean 'view' like in : We now are having a nice 'Vista' on what resides on all these people's computers.

    Tin-foil hat , asbestos underwear , lead coat, hazmat suit, door... taxi !

  20. The Other Steve
    Gates Horns

    I'm with Mike

    The only way you can have Vista 'forced' on you is if you buy a new system. If you do buy a new system, it will work.

    All the pre installed Vista boxes I've seen seem to work just fine, including my GFs new Vista laptop which so far has not exhibited any problems whatever in regular use.

    If you went out and bought Vista to install on something else, and it didn't work, tough shit, what did you expect ? Obviously the box you are trying to run it on is not compatible with the Vista spec, or your hardware is unsupported.

    You should have checked before you CHOSE to spend your money.

    Those who are saying that MS is forcing people to upgrade at gunpoint are falling into the zealotry trap.

    I have as many reasons to hate MS as the next person, especially under Ballmer, and some of their recent treatment of developers has been astonishingly shoddy (you want to talk about actual forced upgrades, talk to some developers), and they didn't pay me for this post, but my experience with all of MS software (from DOS 3 onwards) has been much less troublesome than this constant whining would suggest, and certainly on the whole less troublesome than the many linux distros I've used over the same time period. [1]

    I've said it before, and I'll say it many more times, most of the people who have really messed up windows systems are incompetent and are trying to offload the blame for this onto MS. There's no need for this, there are plenty of real issues to complain about.

    And for the linux jihad, who are about to wade in and paint me as an MS shill, I can see two linux boxes from where I'm sitting, and I have three VM based nix installs on the box I'm typing this on. Ironically enough, these are all installed in MS Virtual PC. Go figure.

    [1] Granted, I haven't yet tried any of the wazzy new super easy distros like ubuntu, because all I have to spare is legacy hardware that isn't adequately spec'd. It would be pretty stupid to expect a good experience from the new and bloaty forms of nix desktop on a shitty old box, now wouldn't it ?

  21. amanfromMars Silver badge
    Boffin

    @ Hmmm...

    Stan, you're the man ...for is that a NeuReal Virtualised OS proposal from stock components customised?

    "See what happens when a man from mars starts to make sense ??" .... Hmmm?

    Have you ever considered that it always makes sense but the subject is simply complex to start with?

    What do you know of Virtual Reality Applications in Terms of Relativity to the Beta Management of Perception via the CyberIntelAIgent ARGonaut Portal aka NeuReal World Order Programming? More than you Imagine, one would always hope.

    Definitely more if you can Imagine IT, that's for sure.

  22. Mark Allen
    Flame

    Vista Problems

    Why do people blame Microsoft for printer drivers not working? I hate to defend M$, but this is not only their fault. It is the fault of the printer manufacturers.

    The printer companies don't want you using that old printer... they want you to get fed up and go out to buy a new one.

    What I _do_ swear at are the number of Microsoft products that have problems on their own OS!! Or trying to get it to sit happy in small networks with XP or Win 9x PCs. Usually involves setting up a split network and extra printers...

    As to Linux and pre-win98 hardware.... my router is Linux running on a 486 with 16MB RAM.... mmmm... 72-pin EDO goodness... and an AMD 586 (100Mhz beast!!)

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Horns

    @Mike

    Thanks Mr Ballmer. Wondered how long it would take for you to bring your unique pursuasive intellect to these premises

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    What's the difference between a rabbit that's been pulled out of a hat and Windows Vista?

    One is the product of a cunning stunt.

  25. John Colby

    @Mike

    Congratulations - so you're the person who's made it work!

    My university's not upgrading, and I don't want to be one of the ones who finds out the hard way that my machine's incompatible. It may be OK on new machines, but new machines just to run an operating system are not an option in many cases.

    Applications which run normally and are central to anyone's operation should run normally on an upgraded system - after all there's all the code is in the new OS. Drivers, I agree, could be a different matter, but the bloat surrounding any new Microsoft product is enough to put many people off.

    Including me - I'm saving up for an iMac.

  26. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    I have a fun new game...

    Pick the sentance parser of your choice (http://visl.sdu.dk/visl/en/parsing/automatic/trees.php), paste in any given sentance from amanFromMars, and marvel as his sentance structure defies all attemps to be mapped into any kind of grammatically recogosizable sentance tree.

  27. Frank Rysanek

    It's not just drivers for old hardware, far from that

    Quite a lot of legacy business software fails to run correctly on Vista, even fairly simple apps and some handy utils. This is not a matter of hardware drivers - this is a matter of backwards compatibility with user-space software. I know about people who recently got a new name-brand Notebook PC with Vista preinstalled, and after losing a day or two trying to make their beloved apps work, they downgraded to XP (having a corporate multi-license) and were up and running in a few hours, including all the software and all the third-party hardware drivers in their most recent versions. And XP *sing* on the Vista-ready hardware :-)

    Yes, there's the drawback with message-signaled interrupts, but that's quite negligible on a business desktop/laptop... If the MSI capability was back-ported to XP via SP3, that might be interesting :-)

    Obviously this is going to improve over time, as third-party software suppliers provide Vista-compatible updates.

  28. Peter Ramins

    Fock Vista.

    All the people saying "it's likely just old computers with a problem" - you're sort of missing a pretty large point.

    It's not up to Microsoft to tell people when to upgrade their computers, and it's certainly not up to Microsoft to FORCE people to upgrade their computers. Honestly, so long as the hardware lasts, a modern office could easily survive and thrive day-to-day ops on early 90s hardware AND software, Blackberries not withstanding.

    It's a huge racket. Let's release a new office suite every 2 years that really doesn't offer ANYTHING new over the previous release, certainly not enough to justify a full point release, but let's get it bundle with new computers so people into "old office trying to open new office document" problems as often as possible, and maybe they'll run out and drop $400 on the new copy.

    It's the same thing with the OS. Win2k is still a fine operating system. In fact, if you strip XP of 90% of the stuff that pisses people off, you're left with... 2k. Except hey, I have an idea, even though the operating systems are virtually identical from a hardware standpoint, let's make it so drivers will refuse to work on 2k installs even though there is no real reason they couldn't. Maybe this way people will go out and buy XP upgrades.

    Same with Vista, except Vista's growing pains are far worse than XP's ever were. My particular favorite thing about Vista is how it requires ~700mb of ram footprint to... show you a desktop, if you have the bells and whistles turned on. Wow, that's efficiency. Good jorb, Microsoft. Get any handjobs from the hardware lobby lately?

  29. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Alternatively, avoid the problem, and join the penguins ...

    Linux on the desktop isn't perfect, but if you're reasonably technically savvy, then its a massive step up from Windows of any hue, and its all free. Ubuntu seems to do all that I need, and more. But then I'm not into playing games... I have a console for that :)

  30. David Wilkinson

    If you want to attack Microsoft, there are much better grounds than this.

    If some OEM wants to standardize on Vista I can't think of a legal or moral argument against it.

    Microsoft still sells OEM versions of Windows XP. If your favorite vendor decides not to offer XP, you can shop elsewhere.

  31. paul clarke
    Gates Horns

    Who really thinks vista is of any use?

    I'm sorry, but you are sadly mistaken.

    I have tested both the 32bit and 64bit versions of business and they both suck.

    Driver support is absolutely pathetic. I had two laptops, both 64 bit running 64bit Business edition, they were identical. One would allow use of a SanDisk Cruzer, the other said it could not install drivers for it. I have not had any success with Vista as far as peripherals are concerned unless you insist on using the crippled drivers shipped with the OS.

    I have had a PC running fine for days, and then suddenly there is a problem with the sound card drivers (the ones shipped with the OS!!) and so no sound. As the manufacturer of the MoBo does not yet officially support Vista with drivers (The board is vista certified and should use the drivers supplied with the OS) then there is no chance of getting the sound re-enabled without doing a re-install. Then there is the added case of vanishing DVD-RW drives, DVB-T cards that simply vanish and will not re-install. A huge problem with more than 3GB ram on Nforce 3 Chipsets (64bit XP is fine, but 64 Bit Vista crashes more often than David Coulthard) even when every memory test runs fine.

    Vista is simply not suitable. It is extremely resource hungry. They still have not fixed the slow file copying from network drives (or indeed internal hdd's!!)

    Microsoft need to come clean, extend XP life by two years with SP3 and fix Vista. Otherwise this could become the worst OS since Windows ME.

  32. Jon
    Stop

    @Bill Gates

    Microsoft pays bloggers??

    Hey Bill.. Bill.. Yeah Bill, it's me old buddy, old mate, I'll blog for you... My Vista machine is doing exactly the job that it was employed to do.. I've no complaints at all..

    How's that? Worth a few bucks that you wouldn't notice slipping from those $billion coffers? Please? Pretty please?

    I promise not to tell anyone that the job I'm employing my Vista box to do which it's so good at is to act as a door stop to my office and I won't tell anyone that I've taken steps in my clients contracts to prevent them from upgrading supported PC's to Vista without renegotiating their support contracts because supporting this monolith it so much more labour intensive. Promise.

    It's a great, wonderful, holy OS which I can never find fault with, ever, and you can quote me on that for a few $k

    xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

  33. Luther Blissett

    Milking the cow at both ends

    Want XP on your new Vista machine? Sure thing - just pay the M$ tax twice:

    http://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/xp-downgrade/page.asp

    "Windows Vista has arrived but many people still prefer to use Windows XP on their laptop.

    The majority of new systems come with Windows Vista built in and will continue to do so. This is why we now give you the option to downgrade to Windows XP Professional on selected laptops for only £40!"

  34. Kwac

    Ready?

    Vista certainly negates the 'linux isn't ready for the desktop' from the MS apologists.

  35. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    For Microsoft see British Leyland, Compaq, Texaco

    The reason Microsoft produces products like Vista is because they have a monopoly, and the reason they have a monopoly is because US business law protects monopolies. Do you think the US government would rather we were all using a more efficient, cheaper non Micrsosoft OS developed in Germany or China? Nope!

    A couple of years ago I went to a Microsoft training event and the guy there said that Microsoft's basic programming principle is that RAM is cheap and it is easy for consumers to upgrade their machines. In other words, Microsoft doesn't design their software to meet the requirements of the user, they expect the user to design their computer use around the requirements of the OS.

    However, just as we saw in the UK in the 70s, state protected monopolies breed complacency, inefficiency and, ultimately, products that fail to meet the needs of the consumer. For the first time, the average consumer now accepts that Microsoft is doing a bad job (only Microsoft fanboys actually believe Vista is a great OS) and it is only a matter of time before one of the other mega-corps get in on the act. All it will take is for a global recesion or other business disaster (eg the EU forcing the sale of PCs without OS) and a company like Google or Tesco producing a cheap, simple, clean looking, fast running OS without all the junk that comes with Vista and Microsoft will go belly-up. I wonder who will end up owning the Microsoft brand name?

  36. Marli
    Unhappy

    @ Brent Gardner

    hmmm the page crashed my vista laptop ;(

  37. J
    Stop

    Interesting...

    "If you went out and bought Vista to install on something else, and it didn't work, tough shit, what did you expect ? Obviously the box you are trying to run it on is not compatible with the Vista spec, or your hardware is unsupported."

    Two or three people have advanced that "defense" here already. Fine and fair, let's say. I just want to see how many of them will say the same reasoning next time someone complains that the copy of some Linux distro they downloaded (for free) does not recognize the multimedia buttons in their laptop, or that they need to go to the command line to make their XYZ card work... For some reason, I don't see that happening. And by now everyone knows you can buy computers with Linux on them. Oh well, I guess people feel more inclined to defend a crappy product they've paid a small fortune for than they do for a crappy product they've got for free...

    By the way, the latest Ubuntu runs faster on a >2 year old laptop than XP (not mine, a friend's), so nobody should be afraid of the newer distros.

  38. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Linux isn't perfect

    I built this beast this summer it's specs are far more than Vista requires in all respects but you know what it's not running Vista I am using Slackware everything works I am not an expert everything is very very fast and you know what it worked the first time just like it was made for this mostly intel system. I am happy as a clam. I too have a console for games. You see even old iron pants Slackware has gotten so good a rank amateur can use it imagine how good those easy distro's must be. I think I will post anon as I do not wish to be hunted like an animal by irate Windows users. You know I thought XP was pretty decent for MS WTF happened to them.

  39. Emmett Clifford
    Thumb Up

    Several Gotchas

    I've been supporting Vista as a tech support engineer since May getting 8-10 calls a day for Vista issues. Here are some Gotchas that will help you avoid the more serious issues. By the way, I've been supporting MS Products, and I do not work for them, since 1953 and Vista is the cleanest release I have seen for MS

    Gotchas

    1. Do not under any circumstances update from XP or any other operating system to Vista. Do it and you are damned forever. A clean install is the only way to go.

    2. Do not under any circumstances have Macafee running on Vista unless you want BSODs, system hangs, no internet, MS mail not responding, complete OD wipeouts and other serious consequences.

    3. Do not under any circumstances try to run any version of Vista with under 2gb memory. You'll get slower and slower until you grind to a halt.

    4. Forget Inet Exp ver. 7. Download Firefox.

  40. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    'Not' forced to upgrade?

    I do use XP for business but that is not the issues I want answered.

    I run XP at home to more or less do two things, surf the web (and view stuff) and to play games.

    MS forced me to upgrade to XP because of Direct X, as my new games will not play on XP. Now I am willing to accept the leap from 9x to XP because for the most part 9x was a bodged pile of horse poo. Now I remember well the issues I had going to XP, and happly there was not to many, mostly because M$ put a lot of effort into backwards compatible drivers and a DL you could run to 'test your compatibility'.

    However, Vista brings me lots of things I do not want nor need. One of the things I do need as anybody who wants to play games knows is an up to date copy of DX. This will force me to upgrade. Now you could say its not MS forcing me but the hardware industry and the games industry, but I would say NO. Why?, because what is it that makes the new versions of DX not work in XP?, and more to the point should'nt XP have a support life expectancy? hu?

    I would also like to point out at this point that if MS's plan to get every game creator (for PC's) to use DX to prevent people like me for playing using linux or mac's, then well done. I would love nothing more than to kick MS and most of there apps into touch and have a choice of OS's to play my games on top of. Anybody remember Open-GL and Quake-GL. Ahh the good old days before MS killed it. (and don't be pedantic about my choice of words, nor my meaning).

    My complaint is MS kill off my choices awhile ago and now I am 'forced' to upgrade. As it happens I am quite happy with XP, more so than 9x or dos 3.3

    (I do not think other products are perfect but I would at least like to choose the non-perfect product I use.)

    -MonkeyNutts.

  41. Steve Welsh

    @The Other Steve

    Yeah, quite right. It runs fine. It runs just like my old P-II 350.

    Like a dog, in other words.

    Bloated, DRM-ridden crap!

  42. Steve Welsh

    @Emmett Clifford

    "I've been supporting MS Products, and I do not work for them, since 1953 and Vista is the cleanest release I have seen for MS"

    REALLY??? Was M$ going that long before Wm Gates III was born, then? I'm amazed!

    "cleanest release"? You have to be joking! How old are you? 10?

    The nearest M$ got to a decent operating system was Win2k. My local supermarket is still running it. The navy is still running it [ed, can you put the Windoze for warships link in here?]

  43. Nick Galloway

    Consumer rights

    If it doesn't work you send it back and either get a refund or a replacement that does the job. Straight forward and simple. If Vista doesn't meet the consumer needs then in the interests of client satisfaction I would have thought a reasonable offer would be a copy of XP. My father had a Dell machine that was pre-installed with Win '98 and a DVD ROM drive that was a bit dodgy when playing DVDs. After numerous hardware rebuilds by Dell they finally succumbed and coughed up for a copy of Win 2K, which solved the problem. It was advertised as being able to play DVDs and couldn't, so the option was a fix or the money back, thanks Mr. Dell. Sadly it needed some heavy duty conversations to get Dell to come to the party.

    I hope the Dutch bloke gets XP or his money back.

  44. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Horns

    The Internet...

    ...has made it far too easy for companies to release any old crap then get users to check for updates to fix the problems which should have been fixed before release.

  45. rasmus petersen
    Black Helicopters

    Title

    "Many problems seem to occur on older systems or with older peripherals"

    And should that not invalidate MS's claim about new devices ...

    anyway in 5 years when we have the first SP or two maybe they will get me to try Vista else I'm not in a hurry

  46. amanfromMars Silver badge
    Boffin

    Red Eye Thinking...

    "What's the difference between a rabbit that's been pulled out of a hat and Windows Vista?

    By Anonymous Coward

    Posted Sunday 14th October 2007 17:01 GMT

    Joke Alert

    One is the product of a cunning stunt."

    And in the Steganographic Stealth of that alert Joke lies the Key to the Magic Kingdom?

    A Vista Driver of Immaculate Grace, Anonymous Coward?

    Is it possible that Vista is not an evolutionary but a revolutionary OS Boldly Going and requiring ITs Drivers/third-party software suppliers to also make a Quantum Leap into Virtual Space territory? A question which only its Creators can answer definitively?

    It is then hereby asked.

    That surely must raise the possibility/present the reality to Microsoft [any Business Intelligence], that should it not be so/should it not have been so, so it now is because it has been articulated/visualised/Virtualised. And should Microsoft not see and/or accept such as would be the Reality, it would leave them vulnerable to Take Over and/or Management Buy Out .

    I trust that makes Word Perfect Sense ....[to VirtualMachines (42 Create VirtualMachines2)]

    Parse that, BG, for a whole NeuReal Great Game XXXXPerience. [Interesting Initials, by the way, BG, considering the Content of this thread, AIReSearch on a Global String. :-)]

  47. alistair millington
    Flame

    Thing for me is .

    This weekend I helped out my sister with her new laptop, it came with Vista and the supplier didn't supply driver disks so I had to keep it that way. I clicked on the vista gadgets, got the CPU display (looks like car speedo's) and 41% of the 2Gb of RAM was used just to look at the desktop.

    That for me is enough to worry that all those Pc's running 1GB as a good deal for Vista must be horrendous to use.

    @Mike,

    I bought my Vista from a reputable supplier on a machine they built for me. The only game I played was halo2 and both Vista and Halo2 (An MS built for vista game) crash, unplayable. Doing everything you say still doesn't have Nvidia with a good release of drivers, or games designers with a reliable and stable release. Kind of leaves your argument dead in the water.

    @The other Steve

    I have 10 years Experience in IT and I hate Vista for the problems and incompatibilites it evidently has. Don't include me in your definition. They are forcing an upgrade because of the minimum specs required, and my dual Nvidia 9750 GT GFX cards you would have expected to be supported as they are the largest GFX suppliers. But nope, not with Vista and not for the first six months after release.

  48. Ashley Stevens
    Stop

    Why Microsoft?

    I think the Dutch are going about this all wrong. Why are they trying to get Microsoft to supply XP? They should be encouraging users to simply not buy Microsoft products if they are not happy with the products Microsoft offer. That's the way the market works in all other areas except operating systems Those buying new machines can buy Apple, those who insist on using PCs or who are upgrading old PCs can run Linux. I don't know why the Dutch aren't pursuing these options. If they did that, maybe Microsoft might take a bit more notice too.

  49. Edward Rose

    Re: 1953

    The 4004 was released in 16-pin CERDIP packaging on November 15, 1971

    'Nuff said. (Okay, from wiki' but Intel will tell you the same). IC's aren't much older.

    I use gentoo, not the easiest to get around unless you know what you're doing. Easy to learn though.

    Debian, that bit more simple.

    Ubuntu, a doddle to install.

    Can't stand Suse or Redhat, both have very nearly put me off using it.

    Don't mind winXP

    Modern *nixs will run on old hardware, you just need to cut out the 'bloatware' like openoffice (no offence to the team, I use it quite happily). ie up-to-date kernel and light apps work fine. Try Debian.

    My mate had a vista ready PC according to the MS tool. Gave up trying to install it because MS lied. Is the tool any more accurate these days? Or are people still told the software should install fine.

    Either way, the consumer has a right to money back if the product does not work as it was sold to. So if the machines should be able to run the product, then money back if not perfect. Not quite the complaint, but that comes down to monopolies.

  50. Andy Whitaker
    Flame

    It's not all Vista's fault

    I baught a new laptop that came with Vista and i have had to revert back to XP. This was due to HP not supporting duplex printing on Vista (works fine on XP!) and Norton's Internet Security 2007 being stopping access to trusted web sites in a completely unpredictable fashion (it works under XP!).

    While Vista has some issues I'm surprised people arn't screaming for a public sacrifice from HP. The issue with the printers was known in March and they are not planning on fixing it. Allowing people to print on two sides and save paper is not a high priority for them.

    I tried (I really, really, did try) to talk to Symantec about the issues with Internet Security 2007. Beyond advising me to reinstall the product (which i did - lots of times) they had nothing to say. No error messages were written to the log files. Access was not denied to the web site - a university web mail over SSL - but the browser would not be able to find it. Turn off Internet Security and it all works.

    So before you knock Vista have a look at the performance of the third parties. They are as much to blame as Microsoft.

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