Top 15 Tech Let Downs of '07

Libra Monkee · Post by **Libra Monkee** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 2:29 pm

Among this list.

The iPhone
MS Vista
The Zune
OSX Leopard

I'll let you see what one made the top. No surprises though.

WRXWagon2112 · Post by **WRXWagon2112** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 2:45 pm

Amazon's Unbox? Really? Another review site ranked it as the best video on demand site available. I guess there's something to be said about opinions, right?

--Alan

Post by **Sabre** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 3:20 pm

Agreed, all are subjective... but this is probably the 3rd or 4th list I have seen that listed Vista as the worst invention for this year. I have to admit, I agree with them.

Libra Monkee · Post by **Libra Monkee** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 3:33 pm

Okay... maybe there are a few surprises.

Phibs · Post by **Phibs** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 4:21 pm

Ditto, tried vista twice, it lasted a total of 2 weeks on my system (which is quite beefy). Ran like a dog, ate my ramz, had awful drivers, crashed a bit, and in general was just annoying in daily usage.

Post by **complacent** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 4:34 pm

Am I the only one who's had a good experience with Vista?

Granted, I'm prolly one of the first to fire off a shot towards M$, but aside from driver/hardware growing pains... I kinda dig it. It works pretty well, but needs a

-ton of tweaking to do so if your system wasn't specifically built for Vista.

:shrug:

sirwilliam · Post by **sirwilliam** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 4:50 pm

complacent wrote:Am I the only one who's had a good experience with Vista?

Granted, I'm prolly one of the first to fire off a shot towards M$, but aside from driver/hardware growing pains... I kinda dig it. It works pretty well, but needs a -ton of tweaking to do so if your system wasn't specifically built for Vista.

:shrug:

I have only had bad experiences w/ my mothers PC running Vista. Maybe it is just an isolated case?:lol:

Just like the article said, it has much better security features vs. XP but the interface is lacking and the speed is much slower...and I like the fact that it will ask me, "You just clicked on your mouse, do you want to proceed w/ the click?"...okay, not really but close enough

Also, the whole hardware non-compatibility issue was a real PITA but has gotten better. Also, the upgrade prices are ridiculous. The only version worth getting for the full built-in features is the Ultimate edition and that is too much freakin' money.

I just call it Windows ME part deux!

Post by **Sabre** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 4:51 pm

The last time I tried it, I played with it for a week on a test system. I tweaked the living hell out of it and it was acceptable. I then had to use that test system for a different project. That being said, XP is much faster for me to setup and requires a lot less tweaking to get to the same performance levels.

sirwilliam · Post by **sirwilliam** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 5:06 pm

Sabre wrote:The last time I tried it, I played with it for a week on a test system. I tweaked the living hell out of it and it was acceptable. I then had to use that test system for a different project. That being said, XP is much faster for me to setup and requires a lot less tweaking to get to the same performance levels.

So you know how to tweak it to run just as fast? Curious as to what all you had to turn off and/or remove to accomplish this. Do tell...in a PM!

chicken n waffles · Post by **chicken n waffles** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 5:17 pm

Phibs wrote:Ditto, tried vista twice, it lasted a total of 2 weeks on my system (which is quite beefy). Ran like a dog, ate my ramz, had awful drivers, crashed a bit, and in general was just annoying in daily usage.

i've been running vista for a couple months now with zero, that's ZERO, problems. no crashes, either, and i'm pretty demanding on the os. the interface is almost identical to xp, so the learning curve was very flat. i'm not sure where the "awful drivers" comment is coming from, unless you're trying to plug up some obscure webcam that was last compatible with windows me.

if you have an old, crusty ass computer and you install vista, you (this is the general "you", not you specifically) should be kicked in the face repeatedly. however, it sounds to me like you're embellishing a bit. if you aren't, maybe you should stick to unix.

Phibs · Post by **Phibs** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 6:11 pm

chicken n waffles wrote:
Phibs wrote:Ditto, tried vista twice, it lasted a total of 2 weeks on my system (which is quite beefy). Ran like a dog, ate my ramz, had awful drivers, crashed a bit, and in general was just annoying in daily usage.
i've been running vista for a couple months now with zero, that's ZERO, problems. no crashes, either, and i'm pretty demanding on the os. the interface is almost identical to xp, so the learning curve was very flat. i'm not sure where the "awful drivers" comment is coming from, unless you're trying to plug up some obscure webcam that was last compatible with windows me.

if you have an old, crusty ass computer and you install vista, you (this is the general "you", not you specifically) should be kicked in the face repeatedly. however, it sounds to me like you're embellishing a bit. if you aren't, maybe you should stick to unix.

Lol I hear you. I actually run XP on it for playing games like Battelfield2 and Crysis. I have a long history with windows, don't worry

ASUS P5B Deluxe LGA 775 Intel P965 Express
EVGA 8800 GTX 768M
650W ANTEC PSU
Core 2 Duo 2.4Ghz
2G DDR2 800 Corsair memory
2x 150G 7200RPM Raptor HDs in Raid0
1x 500G Storage disk
Sony NEC Optiarc 18X DVD±R DVD Burner
Creative XFi
Logitech G15 gaming keyboard
Razor Deathadder USB mouse
24" Dell UltraSharp widescreen LCD
650W ANTEC PSU

If that is a crappy old system, let me know where I can buy another for crappy old prices!

Phibs · Post by **Phibs** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 6:12 pm

Sabre wrote:The last time I tried it, I played with it for a week on a test system. I tweaked the living hell out of it and it was acceptable. I then had to use that test system for a different project. That being said, XP is much faster for me to setup and requires a lot less tweaking to get to the same performance levels.

Agreed. XP does what I need and is quite fast, so there is no real reason to switch to Vista at this point.

chicken n waffles · Post by **chicken n waffles** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 6:59 pm

Phibs wrote:
chicken n waffles wrote:
Phibs wrote:Ditto, tried vista twice, it lasted a total of 2 weeks on my system (which is quite beefy). Ran like a dog, ate my ramz, had awful drivers, crashed a bit, and in general was just annoying in daily usage.
i've been running vista for a couple months now with zero, that's ZERO, problems. no crashes, either, and i'm pretty demanding on the os. the interface is almost identical to xp, so the learning curve was very flat. i'm not sure where the "awful drivers" comment is coming from, unless you're trying to plug up some obscure webcam that was last compatible with windows me.

if you have an old, crusty ass computer and you install vista, you (this is the general "you", not you specifically) should be kicked in the face repeatedly. however, it sounds to me like you're embellishing a bit. if you aren't, maybe you should stick to unix.

Lol I hear you. I actually run XP on it for playing games like Battelfield2 and Crysis. I have a long history with windows, don't worry

ASUS P5B Deluxe LGA 775 Intel P965 Express
EVGA 8800 GTX 768M
650W ANTEC PSU
Core 2 Duo 2.4Ghz
2G DDR2 800 Corsair memory
2x 150G 7200RPM Raptor HDs in Raid0
1x 500G Storage disk
Sony NEC Optiarc 18X DVD±R DVD Burner
Creative XFi
Logitech G15 gaming keyboard
Razor Deathadder USB mouse
24" Dell UltraSharp widescreen LCD
650W ANTEC PSU

If that is a crappy old system, let me know where I can buy another for crappy old prices!

i'm running a similar setup, and i've had no driver/performance/crashing issues whatsoever.

Libra Monkee · Post by **Libra Monkee** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 8:20 pm

Vista is still doing very poorly in Benchmark tests. For gaming, comparably equipped XP machines are getting higher 3DMarks and PCMarks than Vista.

Thus far everyone who I've heard from who likes Vista hasn't pushed to do anything beyond daily processing. But, when it comes to file sharing, print services, and other things that grandmom wouldn't do. Vista falls terribly short.
I still think Vista is headed the way of WinME.

Phibs · Post by **Phibs** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 8:22 pm

Libra Monkee wrote:Vista is still doing very poorly in Benchmark tests. For gaming, comparably equipped XP machines are getting higher 3DMarks and PCMarks than Vista.

Thus far everyone who I've heard from who likes Vista hasn't pushed to do anything beyond daily processing. But, when it comes to file sharing, print services, and other things that grandmom wouldn't do. Vista falls terribly short.
I still think Vista is headed the way of WinME.

Yeah I experienced horrible speeds via my gig-e lan in vista and tried many drivers. XP still performs better in all aspects of gaming / general use. DirectX10 was quite nice with Crysis but the OS itself wasn't worth keeping for DX10 alone. I hope they backport DX10 to XP.

chicken n waffles · Post by **chicken n waffles** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 8:24 pm

where have i heard these types of complaints before? hmmmm...

oh yeah! WHEN XP FIRST CAME OUT, AND 2000, AND 98, AND 95.*

bbl, going to play tf2 with all the settings maxed out and burn a dvd simultaneously, with shitloads of proc and physical memory available.

*windows me has been left out of this list because it was truly a piece of refried goat ass

Post by **Sabre** » Wed Dec 19, 2007 8:34 am

Honestly it was at the beginning of summer when I optimized my Vista install, so I don't remember everything. I disabled quite a few services, threw the swap on a different drive etc. etc. I *might* try it again sometime, but probably after SP2 since SP1 shows no speed improvements (unlike XP SP3 which has shown some improvements across the board).

And for the record, I was an early adopter for 95 (had the beta), 98 (beta as well), 2000 and XP.

If I want pretty, I switch to my FreeBSD desktop running Enlightenment 17

It loads in seconds and looks better!

sirwilliam · Post by **sirwilliam** » Wed Dec 19, 2007 10:09 am

Wanted to share a quote from a buddy:

I have a friend who is on the new OS team (the whole vista team was disbanded/fired). He assures me that the next OS will be a lot better. haha. I had dinner with him last night and we discussed the problems etc. We came to a very good conclusion which we both knew already. Windows is pretty stable. The only reason why OSX is "more stable" is because the apple controls both the hardware and the software. Microsoft has no control over the hardware people are putting in their machines. Driver problems are the #1 reason for instability of the OS. Oh, and the box that asks if you want to send the problem to microsoft DOES WORK! Apparently that's the data they use to bring problems to 3rd party companies to have them fix drivers etc for windows.