Is Windows Vista the best Windows Microsoft ever made?

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

I wonder if downloading an updated Vista ISO, like the one that has SP2 preinstalled, will fix any issues with running the installer for you.

I have 2 official Vista DVDs (English 64bit Ultimate and Dutch 32bit Home Premium) as well as ISO files for all versions in 32 and 64 bit in both Dutch and English.  None of them install on this PC. 

It used to run Vista back when I was using my Gigabyte P67 motherboard, but ever since I went for this MSI Z77 one it just crashes during the installation.

According to MSI the motherboard is compatible with XP and everything from Win7 upwards. 

 

I have one more ace up my sleeve, and that is to install it on another PC and copy all the files over to the main SSD using a Linux live stick.  Going to try that soon, I feel like formatting the PC and making some changes anyway.  Either it bluescreens or it runs.

[JefferyD90]

Thanks. What I mean by saying that Windows Vista is the last OS Microsoft designed with power users in mind is that Windows development, ongoing until Vista, adding increasing control and adventurous possibilities into their releases, but that after Vista there was a snap-back, where Microsoft started removing everything superfluous, started reducing micro configuration options, and the design of Windows has seemed to me to be increasing austerity-driven, from Windows 7 until Windows 10.

 

Vista is the last OS before that direction change, and is the peak in Windows preference accommodation.

 

 

Thanks, I'm going to check that out.

 

I wonder if downloading an updated Vista ISO, like the one that has SP2 preinstalled, will fix any issues with running the installer for you.

Well, the original idea of Windows is the ability for developers (Steve Ballmer chant) to easily make programs for "power users" to do whatever they have to do.  With the advent of Windows 8, they have really started to bring that back with App development.  Microsoft realized that TONS of software is being developed and that NONE of it is being developed for Windows!  Reason is because Apple and Google have made this standard App model.  Microsoft allowed Windows to pass off all the work to the developers.  I would argue that power users want more programs and apps, and Windows 8 allows that better.  With that said, the idea of Microsoft "removing" features, I don't subscribe to this.  Most of it is just "moved" and I feel like people don't want to go looking for it OR just because it has changed in some way people are just assuming that the feature is removed and replaced.

 

I'd like to take your previous idea of the Quick Launch again.  It was a useful feature of Windows XP and Vista (along with earlier versions of Windows).  But it took up LIMITED taskbar space.  What Microsoft realized is "Hey, we could just make everything a 'quick launch'!  Put everything people want on the taskbar in a smaller icon only, quick launch like, format so you can fit more programs on the taskbar and be able to tell what they are, and your quick launch can be used better."  Quick launch, I'd say, wasn't removed at all, but instead superseded and took the whole taskbar over.

[JefferyD90]

Your talking about Windows 8-the worst OS ever made by MS after 95 and 3.1, not Windows 8.1 (AKA Windows 9), which isn't that bad from the times I've used it-though Windows 7 still makes more sense on a desktop.

 

I told you to take a step back for a reason.

 

 

Off topic:

What kind of drugs you are taking? According EVERYONE (including and mainly MS) W8 is absolute shit, garbage, junk, etc... When you made "best whatever" it's normal to have record sales (or at least close to record)- "strange" why, but W8 was less used than old XP... 

 

On topic:

 

Vista maybe is "best Windows"... In some other world, in another parallel Universe... In this world and Universe Vista is better than 8/8.1, but both are worse than 7. Even XP is better in some aspects than Vista and 8... Sadly W10 is no better than Vista... 

 

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/51719-windows-8-flack/

 

I'd like to direct you to a (all-be it old) post of mine.  It goes over several different points that show that if you don't like Windows 8 you have no reason to.

[mstef]

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/51719-windows-8-flack/

 

I'd like to direct you to a (all-be it old) post of mine. 

Sorry, but I don't see even half a reason to like Win 8... Literally DON'T SEE- your post is UNreadable in dark forum theme... 

 

Beside that- MS officially called Win 8 a failure... Forget that I have more than 50 reasons to NOT LIKE (or even hate) Win 8- who the fuck am I to argue with a multi billion organization? 

[iHardware Shelden]

I ran Vista Ultimate up until I was unable to play certain games do to Direct X and I loved it, it might be bloated to death but to me that is what a $200 os should be like, also who didn't think Dreamscene was f**** awesome! 

[JefferyD90]

Sorry, but I don't see even half a reason to like Win 8... Literally DON'T SEE- your post is UNreadable in dark forum theme... 

 

Beside that- MS officially called Win 8 a failure... Forget that I have more than 50 reasons to NOT LIKE (or even hate) Win 8- who the fuck am I to argue with a multi billion organization? 

Everyone is complaining about the lack of the Start Menu.  First off, I suggest that there is no lack of a start menu, most people are just too narrow minded to see it.  The Windows 8 Start Screen, is a start menu.  It has icons and links and everything the Windows 7 Start Menu had.  The tiles in the Windows 8 Start Screen are just like icons, you click them you open the corresponding app.  You right click and it opens a submenu with other options.  You click, drag, and drop them to move them.  So what really makes it different?  The Windows 8 Start Screen opens by default (this isn’t that big and is explained in just a minute).  The Windows 8 Start screen eliminates multiple clicks.  The Windows 8 Start Screen looks much cleaner, and more beautiful (this isn’t even debatable).

Most people are going to say that you lose your "All Programs" folders and such.  Well I say that is a null and void point.  The Windows 8 start screen has the ability to move your tiles around to wherever you want them.  You can customize groups of tiles however you want.  For example I have a group dedicated to games, where in Windows 7 each one of them would have had their own folder which is highly inconvenient when you just want to look at them and see what you want to play.  Notice my screen shot I have attached.  I have my office tiles separated, I have my games in a group, I have my media stuff (movies, pictures, music, and such) in a group.  All of this stuff would have had their own separate folder and would have been dug at least 2-4 clicks deep.

I am going to use 2 examples of launching programs that Windows 8 is better at doing.  If I wanted to launch Microsoft Word, with Windows 8 I click once it flips to desktop mode seamlessly and I’m working.  Windows 7 I will have to click 1 time to open the start menu and at best click 1 more time (if I have it pinned to my start menu) then it opens.  If I didn’t do that step then I would have to click 2 more times (once for all programs and another time for the Microsoft Office folder).

Next is World of Warcraft, which is one of the most popular games on the market today.  With Windows 8, once again it is one click away.  Windows 7 is the same story as before.  At best 2 click if I have it pinned, 4 clicks if it is not.  So inherently Windows 8 is BETTER (I want to make sure that word is understood "better".  People will say that’s your opinion and not everyone else’s, I got a clue for you fewer clicks is ALWAYS BETTER, no discussion.  You might like a worse way, yes but one way is better.  There is nothing wrong with having a preference for something that is inferior, but it doesn’t mean it makes it any less inferior) at opening applications and programs.

 

Another point people seem to not be in tune with is the charm menus.  This is because of 2 reasons I feel, one is people aren’t use to the mouse gestures and two people don’t understand them.  The charms are EXTREAMLY useful.  The search feature is SUPER powerful.  You type what you want to search, then click the application you want to search into.  For example if I want to check my latest Amazon order, I type "Amazon" and then click on "Mail" and I will see all my emails that are in relation to Amazon, intelligently sorted from newest to oldest.  Something that Windows 7 search cannot do at all might I add.  And if I don’t see it, I can just click on “Internet Explorer” and poof I get a web search for Amazon to see why I don’t have my email.  Windows 7 would require switching between several apps to get this done, with the search feature being in different locations, and usually using different options, to get the job done.  So the Search Charm is so much more unified in Windows 8 that it simplifies things.  Another screen shot has been attached.

Also the Share charm allows you to share whatever you’re looking at instantly with friends on social networks or via private messages like emails and other chat clients.  Something that has previously required developers to specially add that code into their websites or programs to do and usually it’s always in a different way.  Once again getting rid of all of the different ways to share something (sharing a YouTube video is different that a flicker photo simply because the share button is located at a different place on the screen) increases your capabilities and decreases your learning curve.

The Devices charm allows you to do TONS of great things, like print or send the audio or video source to a specific device, without having to go through (once again) different submenus.  You just go to your charms click on devices and your printer is there, your stereo is there, your TV and second screen options are there.

And for all of you advanced people, the settings option is there to change EVERYTHING, and once again, always in the same place and in the same way.  So finding the options menu for Internet Explorer is no different than that of the Pictures App, or the Mail App, or Netflix App…  I think you get where I am going.  Thus MAKING IT EASIER, and in the long term (as soon as developers get off their lazy asses) more powerful than ever before, because it will have more direct access to hardware and settings inside Windows.

 

But let’s address the first thing about the Charms, the gesture to get them to come up.  Some desktop users aren’t happy with having to “Mouse to..” a corner.  Well, let’s take a step back and look at this from a development point of view and I am even going to take it 1 step further.  Let’s start with the Start Menu of Windows 7 again.  The default location (and according to Microsoft the location of about 97% of their users, remember how you allowed them to send statistics to them to better improve your experience?  Yea that is how they figure this stuff out.  Did you opt out?  Then you decided to give up “your right to vote” on features of new version of Windows) is in the lower left and corner.  And let’s be honest, you just throw your mouse down in the corner on Windows 7 then find the button, no one carefully and meticulously navigates their way to the lower left hand corner and even if you did its only like a half an inch more of a dragging of the mouse.  So, the point I’m getting to is, weren’t you just making a gesture to begin with in Windows 7?  So how weird is gestures anyways?  Want to close a program?  Don’t we have a natural tendency to just mouse up to the top and click the red “X”?  I hope I have made my point there.  And I think they realized that, and decided “Hey, we got 4 corners to work with, let’s use them!”  So gestures aren’t really that big of a issue.  But I can potentially give it to that 3% of the crowd that weren’t represented by the other 97%.

While we are here about the statistics stuff, I want to bring up the Start Menu vs Start Screen again.  Remember how I said I would discuss pinning of programs to Windows 7 Start Menu’s at a later point?  Well this is it.  Microsoft also reported 2 things with their statistics.  First about 60% of the people that use Windows 7, DID NOT use the pinning feature.  So they never, not once, pinned a program to their start menu.  Second of the remaining 40% they realized the average number of pinned programs is 7, with a quick list of 10.  That is 17 programs in your start menu.  I have tested this, and on a 1920x1080 screen, that takes up all but about 2 inches of the screen (top to bottom).  If you start to display submenus you QUICKLY take up over half your screen real estate with your Start Menu.  Well, part of the whole screen being a Start Screen in Windows 8, is simply because the Windows 7 Start Menu (when used to its fullest) took up half the screen anyways!  So it is only logical for them to do a FULL Start Screen.

 

And the last thing I am going to directly address, that I believe people have a problem with, is the Apps.  Everyone makes fun of Steve Ballmer and his “Developers, developers, developers…” trip out, but he couldn’t be truer.  Windows is here today, because of 3^rd party programs.  And if people writing the apps don’t make use of the features of Windows 8, it becomes pointless quickly.  Let’s go back to some of my charms comparisons, like searching.  This is, by far, the most time cutting feature of Windows 8.  You can search “Miami, FL” and click on Bing and get suggestions from places to eat, and things to do.  Then click on Maps and get directions to there.  Then click on Mail and check if your booking went through for your next trip.  All these things are included in Windows.  But let’s talk about 3^rd party apps.  Like the American Airlines app.  What if you didn’t have a scheduled plan?  Is the app designed for you to search for a destination?  Is the app going to be smart enough to figure out how to use that feature?  It obviously would be GREAT for American Airlines if they did, because it would give you instant and easy results.  And if you was a frequent traveler, this would cut down A BUNCH on the time you spend looking for flights.  Or maybe you wanted to find a movie really quick on Netflix, does their app allow for it?  What about LinusTechTips?  Does it have an app so you can search the forum really quick?  If developers don’t take use of the features, it is just a useless waist of space.  And can Microsoft be to blame for that?  Especially when Visual Studios has a direct option when developing Windows 8 Apps to implement the charms into it (usually with a check box)?

 

There is the jist of it... since you cant read it.

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

There is the jist of it... since you cant read it.

 

Still can't read it.

 

[JefferyD90]

 

Still can't read it.

 

nightthememasterrace.jpg

Well, you're just going to have to highlight I guess.  That or walk around the world and be ignorant (which is blissful)

[Delicieuxz]

Well, you're just going to have to highlight I guess.  That or walk around the world and be ignorant (which is blissful)

I would say ignorance is not bliss. The poem where the line "ignorance is bliss" is actually commenting on the woes of growing old, saying with the line "where ignorance is bliss, tiss folly to be wise!", that if ignorance is the cost of staying eternally young, then it's foolish to wish to be wise (and therefore old, decrepit, etc). So the poem itself acknowledges that wisdom is better than ignorance, but that a youthful body is more valuable still.

[Dabombinable]

Thanks. What I mean by saying that Windows Vista is the last OS Microsoft designed with power users in mind is that Windows development, ongoing until Vista, adding increasing control and adventurous possibilities into their releases, but that after Vista there was a snap-back, where Microsoft started removing everything superfluous, started reducing micro configuration options, and the design of Windows has seemed to me to be increasing austerity-driven, from Windows 7 until Windows 10.

 

Vista is the last OS before that direction change, and is the peak in Windows preference accommodation.

 

 

Thanks, I'm going to check that out.

 

I wonder if downloading an updated Vista ISO, like the one that has SP2 preinstalled, will fix any issues with running the installer for you.

Ok, I'd forgotten about Dreamscene and Vista really sounds interesting if it isn't as locked down as 7 (The only time I used Vista, I could create a wireless adhoc network-Windows m7 has the option but it never works-even XP is better at even basic networking).

[Thony]

*cough* windows 7 if it had widgets support ! *cough"