On Thu, 18 Jan 2007 13:56:42 +0100, Richard Rasker wrote:
> Op Thu, 18 Jan 2007 12:01:05 +0000, schreef Roy Schestowitz:
>
>> Walt reviews Vista: Eh.
>>
>> ,----[ Quote ]
>>| We're willing to bet those among you that don't make gagging sounds
>>| whenever you're in eyeshot of a PC have probably already played with
>>| Vista a bit. Maybe you don't have the last beta installed on your
>>| machine, but you've sat down to a Vista box and at least logged a
>>| few minutes with oohs and ahhs at Aero and Flip 3D. So by this
>>| point you probably well understand that Vista, while being a major
>>| step forward for Microsoft, will for most users represent something
>>| more of a long overdue feature pack, finally bringing Windows up to
>>| date with OS X.
>> `----
>>
>> http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/18/walt-reviews-vista-eh/
Walt Mosberg has become a raving Apple Zealot of late. He can't really be
taken as unbiased.
> When I stated several months ago that Vista required some 10 - 20 times
> the system resources of a current PC, Windows apologists laughed at me.
Because you deserved to be laughed at.
> One of those specimens even said that Vista would run on anything with a
> 1GHz CPU and 256MB of RAM. Uh-huh.
I still stand by that. I've done it. I've used it in that configuration.
> "The vast majority of existing Windows PCs won't be able to use all of
> Vista's features without major hardware upgrades. They will be able to
> run only a stripped-down version, and even then may run very slowly."
Note the phrase "may run". He doesn't know. He hasn't tried it. I've run
Vista on a rouphly 1GHz computer with 256MB of RAM. He hasn't, you
haven't.
> So Erik, there's your "On older hardware, it will run just fine in a
> reduced functionality mode": Yeah it will run almost as good as XP runs
> under normal conditions - that is, with all kinds of malware and registry
> bloat slowing the system to a crawl.
Actually, it ran quite fast.
> "Microsoft says that Home Basic can run on a PC with half a gigabyte of
> memory and that Premium and Ultimate will work on a PC with one
> gigabyte of memory. I strongly advise doubling those numbers. To get
> all the features of Vista, you should have two gigabytes of memory,
> far more than most people own."
"to get all the features". If you're going to run it on a machine
incapable of handling all the features, you have to expect to forfeit some.
Like trying to run KDE on a 128MB machine, it's dog slow and painful.
> Two gigabytes is at least four times the amount of memory most people have
> today.
4 times is not 10-20 times. Hyperbole much?
Yes, Vista runs great in 2GB. And yes, you may have to sacrifice some
functionality (like Flip 3D) to run on a lesser machine. But you'll be
sacrificing KDE to run Fluxbox or Windowmaker if you're going to run Linux
in an inadequate configuration. Such arguments are pure hypocricy.
> "Even more important is your graphics card, a component most people know
> little about. Home Basic can run on almost any graphics system. But
> Premium and Ultimate will need a powerful, modern graphics system to
> run well."
Modern as in "any average or better video card from the last 3-5 years".
My 3 year old laptop runs Aero just fine, and it only has 64MB of video
memory and a GeForce GO 5200. It also only has 512MB of memory, though
it's a 3.2Ghz P4 Mobile (not Pentium M). Everything runs smoothly on it.
It was pretty high end in its day, but is roughly equivelent to any low-end
PC of today.
> Powerful as in: at least four times the amount of normal graphics memory
> and a hefty GPU. Double the hardware resources once again.
Most low-end computers have 128MB to 512MB of shared graphics memory,
adjustable. All it needs is 12MB for most (64MB for some) video cards.
Anything sold in the last 2-3 years will have a good enough graphics card,
though it may require an updated driver.
> "On a three-year-old H-P desktop, a Vista upgrade installed itself fine.
> But even though this computer had a full gigabyte of memory and what
> was once a high-end graphics card, Vista Ultimate reverted to the Basic
> user interface. And even then, it ran so slowly and unsteadily as to
> make the PC essentially unusable."
This sounds like the classic case of no drivers available, plus most likely
an older bios. If it was a high end video card 3 years ago, it supports
Aero today. I know of no case where that is not true. As for being slow
or unsteady, that clearly points to a driver issue, which is typically the
case when you try to install Vista on older hardware before RTM, since
vendors haven't yet updated their older drivers for Vista.
Tell you what, in 6 months after Vista has been released, let's see how
people are liking it.
> The third machine was a new, small Dell XPS M1210 laptop. In general,
> Vista ran smoothly and well on this Dell, but some operations were
> annoyingly slow, including creating a new message in the built-in
> Windows Mail program. This surprised me, because the Dell had two
> gigabytes of memory and a fast processor."
The M1210 uses slow 2.5" hard drives, and they don't have things like
native command queing. The first 1-2 days of Vista are a lot slower
because you're condending with the indexing service and the automatic
defrag features, not to mention the prefetch functions haven't yet
established a pattern. Like XP, Vista gets faster with a few days because
it's had time to self-optimize, and initial maintenance tasks have
completed.
Using a system for a few hours after installing it is not going to give you
an adequate idea of what using it for a month will be like.
> I think my calculations were quite correct after all: *at least* quadruple
> RAM, double graphics card, and double CPU speed. In my book, that makes
> 4x2x2=16 times the amount of system resources. *At least*, because even
> a bit of stinting on memory or graphics power will apparently "make the PC
> essentially unusable."
Where did you learn to do math? You have to add resources in parallel, not
multiply them. The average amount of resources is 2x, with a 4x Peak.
Even if you want to an asshole, the worst you could justify is summing
them. Multiplying the resources counts them multiple times.
So no, your calculations were not anywhere near correct.
> But wait, there's more! -- or perhaps I should say "less"?:
>
> "If you bought a PC in the past few months, and it had a "Vista Capable"
> sticker on it, it should be able to run at least Home Basic."
>
> Huh? What kind of a con job is this? So people get "Vista Capable"
> machines foisted upon them, to find out that it only runs Home Basic -
> sort of like XP in a crapped-down mode. People should be warned for this.
It should *AT LEAST* be able to run home basic, most likely it will run
premium just fine.
> And then there's the modes home user, who just uses a PC for a bit of
> e-mail and doing a bit of work after hours. Surely, they don't need all
> that eyecandy, and those whistles and bells of the Premium or Ultimate
> versions?
>
> "But some regular users may need Vista Ultimate if their companies have
> particular network configurations that make it impossible to connect to
> the company network from home with Home Basic or Home Premium."
That's complete bullshit, and a total misunderstanding on the part of
Mossberg. Any VPN client is going to run just fine on home basic, so long
as it's compatible (which right now there's only a few that are, that will
change after RTM).
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