Was Windows Vista THAT Bad?

[Lefia]

Just now, 3VRMS said:

Out of curiosity and completely out of the discussion, anyone know what keyboard that is?

Yes, it is the Roccat Vulcan 100/120

[brandishwar]

Ah Vista. My experience with it was on a laptop I was issued by my previous employer before Windows 7 came out. I'd previously tried Vista thanks to an MSDN subscription I had for a short time, giving me access to betas and an early release copy of the final build. And I never had issues with it. I stuck with XP on my home systems merely because I didn't see a need to upgrade away.

 

Plus the different "editions" of it was confusing at times.

 

When "Weven" became available, the company's IT department offered everyone an in-place upgrade. Just download it, install it, and you're golden. In theory, at least. I refused to take the upgrade, in large part due to my experience with in-place upgrades in the past. I always do a clean installation with Windows. With the free Windows 10 upgrade, initially that was an in-place upgrade merely to get the system registered with Microsoft's servers, then I wiped the system and installed it clean. And when my current employer offered an in-place upgrade for Windows 10 for my Windows 7 laptop, I again refused it.

 

My teammates at my previous employer, though, knew I wasn't taking the 7 upgrade. A few had asked, and I said I wasn't doing it. So in a bid to convince me to do so, several of them (thankfully not including my manager) made it a point to ask me periodically if I'd upgraded to 7. Then when I predictably answered No, they'd explain all the ways Vista had crashed or blue-screened on them, basically doing whatever they could to get me to upgrade to 7. I'd just shrug my shoulders. As I'd never had a problem with Vista, but I previously had issues with in-place Windows upgrades, I had more incentive to NOT take the upgrade to avoid any significant downtime. If I'd run into any issues with the upgrade, I'd lose a day of productivity trying to get it figured out, or needing to have IT re-image my HDD back to Vista or install Windows 7 clean.

 

Windows Vista was Windows 6.0, showing the major changes from Windows 2000 (5.0) and XP (5.1). But given that Windows 10 is merely Windows 6.3, there obviously haven't been any major enough changes under the covers that warranted Microsoft to bump the version number.

[Egg-Roll]

I'm not reading threw this topic... Instead I'm just going to ignore everyone and type

 

I hated Vista, had a love/hate with 7, and wish Windows 10 would burn in hell for eternity.

 

Back when V was brought out I was actually building my P4 computer (I am fairly sure of it) and was looking into both XP and V. I chose XP due to all the hate V had. 2 years pass I installed Ubuntu, and let me tell you the eye candy on Ubuntu was similar to V and in a lighter package. So did MS mess up on the new OS's? Oh yea... My next computer will be primary Ubuntu/Linux based and Windows will be VM'd for games (which many weirdly play better threw, also windows seems to work better as well).

 

If I could go back to the days where a Windows OS would only take 15gb as a max I would in a heartbeat, sadly those days are dead with XP.

[poochyena]

Vista was my favorite OS until windows 10 came out. I hated windows 7. They took away the ability to re-arrange icons in folders and the taskbar was extremely weird.

[Master Delta Chief]

Never really worked with Vista before since I basically went from XP immediately to Windows 7 once I got a new computer. However, the times I did work with Vista, it was a pretty good looking operating system and still is to this day in my opinion. I think the OS is pretty underrated due to the fact that it had many problems in the beginning. It was also perhaps a bit too power hungry with the new visuals I guess. Vista was just released too premature, basically at the wrong time. If they'd planned things a little better with the drivers and what not, then Vista might have been a success.

[Paddi01]

I skipped Vista completely and went to W7 directly.

[ZacoAttaco]

3 hours ago, RorzNZ said:

BTW this was a very nicely produced video. No overdone memes or shoddy editing. Very well done. Title was much better than clickbait titles we've become used to. 

Yeah agreed, it was both entertaining and educational. A that's an excellent combination.

[orbitalbuzzsaw]

6 hours ago, firelighter487 said:

"janky looking u.i"

 

Vista was beautiful. Aero in general was. don't @ me.

@firelighter487

[ZacoAttaco]

17 minutes ago, OrbitalBuzzsaw said:

@firelighter487

The disrespect from @OrbitalBuzzsaw here is insane. I luv it

[happymax1212]

I always loved Windows Vista and have also tried various versions of the Windows Vista Betas (or codename "Longhorn"). It's really good looking and its aero effects and animations are smoother than Windows 7, if you compare both OS pixel by pixel, frame by frame. Windows Vista actually renders the aero effect before the windows itself is rendered, whereas in Windows 7 both are rendered at the same time, resulting slightly faster loading time but worse aero effect. In Windows 8 Beta aero effects finally got better and are as good as the one in vista, but only to be completely deleted from Windows 8 RC (GOOD JOB MICROSOFT). Another good feature is that maximized windows in vista will get a darkened border instead of the normal transparent one, the idea was to help people getting focused on that window, sadly this feature is gone with Windows 7 as well. Not to mention Windows DreamScene and many other features only to be seen in vista. There are actually more interesting ideas and features in Longhorn (Pre-Reset) that didn't make it to the final release, for example virtual desktops (introduced in Longhorn Milestone 3 Build 3683), it's likely the APIs are reused when this feature is re-introduced in Windows 10.

Windows Vista introduced desktop compositing (DWM) (first introduced in build 3683, but was quite different), WinPE-based installation(first seen in build 4001), bitlocker, WHQL driver signing, UAC, Parent Controls(first introduced in build 4008), bar indicating disk usage in "Computer"(first introduced in build 3683)... so many features that we take for granted today, but were too advanced for the mainstream PCs in 2007.

 

[Rarity]

not that bad actually , its still running on an old acer laptop of mine ... 

[X_X]

Never really had a problem with Vista, wish the same could be said for W10.

[xdhsystems]

13 hours ago, CPotter said:

Get an unrestricted 30-day free trial of FreshBooks at https://www.freshbooks.com/techtips

 

Check out the available positions at Memory Express at https://lmg.gg/8KVKd 

Where is the that ibm monitor cover from. That's awesome.

[Canada EH]

Careers at Memory Express - Yeah retail aint where its at, good to start off in your resume building but better to move up the ladder as soon as possible. I haven't been in there store in years. The guys over at Bestbuy knew fuck all, saying that its one thing and its not at all.

 

Vista really does suck, plus its not even supported.

[AdmiralKird]

So many times with XP - I can't be the only one who experienced this - explorer.exe crashed on a daily basis. No more file browsing, no more desktop icons visible, taskbar went away, etc, etc... It didn't matter which system or how many times I reinstalled. You had to go through the lame process of launching Task Manager and starting exporer.exe as a new task. Super tedious and annoying for an OS.

I don't know how much people remember, but blue screens and freezes used to be super, super common during general use. It was even more so in the 95/98 days. I don't mean to rip on XP, it cut them down probably to half about every other week, but Vista pretty much got rid of them. It took about six months before I got my first freeze.

If you had the hardware, Vista was great when it came out. If you didn't, it would suck. Windows 7 could have had zero changes from Vista, been released several years later and people would have loved it because they would have thrown out the Pentium III they were installing it on in 2006.

[Darknast]

21 minutes ago, AdmiralKyrd said:

If you had the hardware, Vista was great when it came out. If you didn't, it would suck. Windows 7 could have had zero changes from Vista, been released several years later and people would have loved it because they would have thrown out the Pentium III they were installing it on in 2006.

 

Basically this.

 

Windows Vista was not a bad SO at all, people just hated it because ir required more CPU and RAM than XP and at the time there was a lot of old Pentium III machines runing XP(or even Windows 98). Somehow these people managed to convince the general public to not even try vista, i know a lot of people who in between 2007 to 2009 bought a new computer and without even give the SO a chance, they directly formated and installed XP, so at the end, basically nobody had an opinion of their own, it was all a case of "someone said this SO sucks, so i will belive him without even trying to have a opinion of my own"

 

Microsoft was smart and instead of Vista SP3 they changed the name and the start menu and released the beloved Windows 7 wich was after the "multicore" boom so lots of people had already replaced the computer. They also altered the RAM requirements so you no longer could install 7 on machines with 512Mb of ram or less.

 

Its funny because with XP something similar happened, nobody wanted to switch to XP and people went nuts when Doom 3 was announced with no Windows 98 support (for example), but nobody remebers that...

[Egg-Roll]

3 hours ago, AdmiralKyrd said:

So many times with XP - I can't be the only one who experienced this - explorer.exe crashed on a daily basis. No more file browsing, no more desktop icons visible, taskbar went away, etc, etc... It didn't matter which system or how many times I reinstalled. You had to go through the lame process of launching Task Manager and starting exporer.exe as a new task. Super tedious and annoying for an OS.

I don't know how much people remember, but blue screens and freezes used to be super, super common during general use. It was even more so in the 95/98 days. I don't mean to rip on XP, it cut them down probably to half about every other week, but Vista pretty much got rid of them. It took about six months before I got my first freeze.

If you had the hardware, Vista was great when it came out. If you didn't, it would suck. Windows 7 could have had zero changes from Vista, been released several years later and people would have loved it because they would have thrown out the Pentium III they were installing it on in 2006.

XP like every OS less Apples is purely based on hardware. So while yes some saw explorer.exe exploring new ways to piss you off many didn't. I only really saw it when I started messing around with XP's core system to make it faster on boot up or when I OC'd my P4 to 4.8Ghz.

 

Chances are the reason why you saw daily issues was likely due to bad drivers, this could be from Dell ASUS etc or simply some random cheap Chinese part put into the system by you or the computer manufacture. It could also of been software you installed as well.

 

Also think of it if EVERYONE had daily crashes XP would not be one of if not the longest supported OS's out there at 12.5 years.

 

Also also a P3 in 2006? I don't think anyone would buy a computer with a P3 in 2006, unless it was used and for a really good price... P4s PD's and Duos made up most of the hardware back then, and it wasn't CPU that was the issue, it was Vista was literally years ahead of computer hardware.

 

The P3 systems my family had where from somewhere 99-01 

[jeetsagar]

6 hours ago, xdhsystems said:

Where is the that ibm monitor cover from. That's awesome.

 

[Void Master]

Stop insulting Vista

If its ahead of time than it is not that bad.

I still have an lg r410 laptop with a core 2 duo p8600 and a 9300M GS 

it was very good back then

It is a good OS 

But it had some problems

i remember running bf2 on that thing at first

I admit that it faced may problems

But the graphics were so amazing and XP looked very outdated compared to it.

so i wish that people stop talking about vista as if it was a killing machine that was put finely to sleep.

People should just chill about vista 

Come on 

Forget and let it go !

[SyncroScales]

Hello,

I also posted this at the original video. LinusTechTips should do a video properly about Windows Millennium Edition. And give credit where credit is due.

 

YouTube - Was Windows Vista THAT bad?
Linus Tech Tips
Published on Nov 17, 2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLgRryt2ZtE

 

It is great that Linus Tech Tips and everyone else involved gave Vista a balanced review. You needed good hardware for 32-bit and 64-bit (which had slight differences, such as which devices worked for ReadyBoost and after which update.). Once Service Pack 1 came out it was very different. Service Pack 2 was really good and with all the other updates and drivers, Vista was very stable.

 

Some have said Windows 7 is Vista SP 3. Windows 8.1 is Windows 8 SP 1. And Windows 10 is Windows 8 SP 2.

 

Windows Millennium Edition was not a bad system, with the right hardware and some updates. It is time that a proper and historical review is done. During the same years look at Windows NT (Windows Server) being a disaster. Look at Windows 2000 being a disaster for many years and having poor support or driver issues and a lack of games and programs, etc. There are many games and even programs that were offline or online that worked in Windows 95 or 98 that Windows Millennium Edition handled right away, then the patches were a big improvement. And if the companies and programmers tried to figure out Windows Millennium Edition patches and bugs, it helped the programmers prepare for Windows 2000 and XP. XP had a horrible launch and was bad until SP 2. What about the Windows Update SP 2 malware/virus that Microsoft offered a bounty for?

 

Does anyone remember how Microsoft put a manager in charge of Windows Millennium Edition that did not understand it? His skill set and the other managers skills were better for other systems, and they realized too late that Windows Millennium Edition could be improved. Microsoft was in big trouble during these years because of the problems with Windows NT (Windows Server) and Windows 2000. They were close to dropping Windows 2000 and abandoning it. This was mis-management from Microsoft and trying to make people buy a new version of Windows every year or two. I think these managers moved up into different positions at Microsoft later, who were they?

 

Why is there Windows 98 and Windows 98 Second edition? Windows 98 needed a huge overhaul and a service pack would have been great instead of Windows 98 SE. They took people off of Windows Millennium Edition and put them into Windows 98 or Windows 98 SE or Windows 2000 or Windows NT (Windows Server) and then onto Windows XP because it was being released. Windows Millennium Edition was abandoned.

 

Could Windows 98 have been given a Service Pack and there was no need for Windows 98 Second Edition? Yes if more people had the internet and could download the files without a dial-up connection. The updating process was too long before. Peoples hardware was also older with some of the machines in the 1990's and early 2000's. People go mad when you called or emailed Microsoft about buying a Service Pack or having the physical product mailed and there is no guarantee it would work. Sales reps at Microsoft also said you install at your own risk, do not upgrade unless you have to.

 

Windows 98 Second Edition had problems and did not always work with programs or games. It required more support and the right hardware too.

 

Windows Millennium Edition could have had a Service Pack or more and it would have been improved and seems to be a slightly less version of Windows 2000 (although Windows 2000 is NT not Windows 9.x). Stuff like this  seems to be in the code for future plans, such as the registry edit that allows access to 1 GB of RAM not only 768 MB, even if most programs in those years would not use it. The USB support and other things were automatic or included. Etc. E.G.: https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/304943/computer-may-reboot-continuously-with-more-than-1-5-gb-of-ram

 

What about the sales reps or managers in the stores? Most of who did not care or understand all the products? Selling Windows 2000 one or two years ahead of it's time and nothing worked on it. Many customers sold or threw away their old systems with Windows 9.x and regretted it for the lack of games, programs, ease of use and the need for two or more computers in a home. Those sales reps and managers knew Windows 2000 or XP was not good and ripped a lot of people off. Then they expected you to come back and buy another system.

 

Some Techs, who works in IT and who worked at Microsoft will say otherwise. But there was lot of political factors and situations that need to be acknowledged about Windows Millennium Edition. Any information is always great.

 

I was happy to find and listen to something such as this pod cast from tech people such as Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell - Dotnetrocks - 0290 - Sneath and Taylor.wma - 2007 and other things like that. They explain some of the behind the scenes stuff that is important to understand about the different Operating systems. "Carl and Richard talk to Windows veterans Tim Sneath and Ian Ellison-Taylor about the olden days of Windows, how it has evolved, and how it may look in the future from a developer perspective."

 

If anyone wants to get old copies of Windows or Microsoft programs for virtual machines or older hardware they can contact Microsoft's Sales department and they might have something that is inexpensive. But they will try to sell you newer versions of programs. A lot of people do not know about this.

[ShieldSean]

As a PC gamer, I thought Vista was great, but I had fairly new hardware, and all my drivers were solid since I ran mainstream hardware.

[Velcade]

You're trending!  Nice

 

[PianoPlayer88Key]

I liked when Linus said "That's really when the excrement hit the air circulation unit, so to speak."

 

As @LinusTech was talking about the relatively high hardware requirements, Vista being slower than its predecessor, etc ... it gave me an idea for maybe another video?

• A comparison of each version of Windows (1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 3.1, NT 3.1, 95, NT 4.0, 98, 2000, ME, XP, Vista, 7, 8 (maybe also 8.1), 10 (1507),
• using the ORIGINAL launch release, without subsequently-released patches / updates / service packs
• Running on the bare MINIMUM hardware (and no using virtualization; use actual hardware) required to get it to "walk".  (Which may be lower than the "official" requirements, for example I've run Windows 10 in one VM with 256 MB RAM, and another VM where my multithreaded Cinebench R15 score was "4"; also I've seen a youtube video running 10 as low as like 192MB RAM or something like that, or 7 on like a Pentium II or III, etc.)
• From the perspective of someone who has absolutely NO tech experience (just knows how to open instagram by clicking an icon, for example),
• doing whatever someone might normally have done on a computer of the era.

The goal:  Find out which was the LEAST bad on its INITIAL release, on the MINIMUM hardware that would run it.

 

And, for a 2nd video idea that I just thought of:

Start with whatever might have been a typical mainstream / midrange / average hardware configuration with an "older" version of Windows ... then see how many versions newer you could go without upgrading *any* hardware.    Which could be upgraded the farthest without replacing hardware?  (I'm going to guess that if you got a Vista capable PC, it should run 10, so that might be the "most versions upgradeable".)

 

 

[danwat1234]

I cringed when I saw John Connor on the Sarah Connor Chronicles use Windows Vista while jamming a Terminator brain chip into a PCI Express slot.. what a fanboy.

[williamcll]

Performance wise how would vista run games compared to 7, 8.1 and 10?