Hmm. I'm new here but it isn't the first MAC vs PC argument I've heard. I feel I must give my

. First of all, let me start off by saying that in my opinion, there is no clearly better OS. Windows wins in some areas, OSX in others. So when someone tells me they find OSX is the better OS, I have no problem with that. To each his own. However, what I can't stand is Mac users who feel that their precious OSX is far superior to Windows in every way, and try to convince people of that by exaggerating and just plain lying. So:
The biggest lie thus far in the Vista vs OSX debate is the UAC, and the add Apple made mocking it. Now when I saw the add, I saw it as a somewhat funny exaggeration of Vista, that was in no way based on fact and was just another one of Apple's ridiculously exaggerated (but funny) adds. However it seems many Mac users have taken it to heart, as seen in the original article this thread is based on. The fact is UAC asks for your permission for any system wide changes, or for changes in folders that it sees as special (root, program files, windows etc). Which is good. Microsoft has scored almost perfectly with it's UAC, and how some of you mac fanatics can't see that, I don't know.
Let me deal with the various situations brought up in this thread:
QUOTE (Forceman @ Mar 20 2007, 10:25 AM)

Dont forget copying files to C:, program files and installing apps you usually get two prompts. I tried deleting something from program files that I put there and it wouldn't let me. After switching off UAC it was fine, but you do get prompted alot in the control panel and would have been simple to prompt once for the entire control panel.
When changing anything in the root folder or one of the other 'protected' folders, it firsts warns you that doing that will require admin privaliges, and then the second promt requires you to either enter admin password if you're not in an admin account, or to click allow if you are in an admin account. I aggree they could have just asked you once, but come on, is clicking okay a second time THAT big a deal?
And yes in some ways it would have been nice if the whole control panel should have admin privaliges required, and then not have to give permission for each thing inside it, but there are actually quite a few things in the control panel that do not require admin privaliges, so MS chose the more secure option.
QUOTE (Forceman @ Mar 20 2007, 10:25 AM)

The Apple advert is correct as you get prompted for most of the stuff in control panel, prompted for each app you install even though it's just one(two apps contained in one i.e iTunes/quicktime).
The Apple advert is WRONG. It claims that you get asked for permission to do even the simplest of things, like chatting with a friend. The only time you get asked for permission is when you do something that requires admin privaliges - system wide settings changes, installing programs, drivers etc. Just like in Linux or OSX.
QUOTE (Forceman @ Mar 20 2007, 02:47 PM)

Well, it's just a case of clicking Allow, if you go by what you said UAC is useless, a password prompt would have been more more useful.
Actually I thought so too until I saw your post and decided to experiment. Since it it just me that uses my laptop, it only has one account on it, (mine), and I just left it as an administrator account. But does that really make sense? No. So I created a separate admin account with a nice tough password, and made my account a standard user. So now, if I do something that needs admin privalages, I get this nice promt:

Which looks pretty similar to what happens in OSX. I just enter my admin password and I'm good to go.
So basically, anybody who sets up a normal user in an admin account is being silly. Of course UAC is then useless because all they have to do is click 'allow'. That situation is the human's fault, not vista's. Only use an admin account for installing drivers and stuff, although you don't really need all that.
QUOTE (elviejo @ Mar 20 2007, 06:33 PM)

Also, if you install a program with elevated privileges, every time you try to use that program, you get the prompt to allow that program to run. Don't try to deny that UAC sucks the way it is implemented, is you against the world,and, sorry, but must be you who is wrong, not the rest of the world.
This situation only occurs in some old programs that were not designed to work with UAC. UAC does not suck, if you use it correctly, then it works almost perfectly. Sure there are some things that could be improved, but jees, it's only been out a few months. And YOU do not qualify as the rest of the world. It is him and me and a few others who recognize what an improvement vista is, against a few mac users who look for everything possible in windows that they can exaggerate and then criticize.
QUOTE (elviejo @ Mar 20 2007, 06:33 PM)

Another thing is networking, try to share a printer and you are going to see what a pain in the ass it is, even between different flavors of windows, forget it with other OS's. Oh, by the way, yesterday I was backing up a DVD from my granddaughter ( with some scratches ) and every time the backing up program got to the scratches I got a blue screen, that don't even happen with XP, isn't suppossed that the program hangs, not the OS?
I too have gotten a few unexplained blue screens, however they have been few and far between, and some bugs are expected in a new OS. I am actually very pleased with the LACK of bugs in Vista, especially after experiencing the launch of XP

. And please don't tell me that OSX doesn't have bugs when it is launched, because OSX only has to work on a very limited amount of hardware options, where as Vista/windows has to work with just about every hardware component out there. There just isn't any comparison.
QUOTE (Tech607 @ Mar 20 2007, 06:43 PM)

I do not see where you can control the side bar in the Control Panel. You can set it to open on startup, move it, or view what gadgets are open but I do not see where to hide it and open it in the CP. If the choices are hidden and not located inside the Windows Sidebar Properties icon, then that would really be ignorant of Microsoft. Clicking the show desktop button will hide my other programs also, so that is no answer to the problem of being able to easily hide it and have it reappear when you want.
I know you can turn off UAC but that makes the computer as vulnerable as XP.
I don't know about the whole sidebar issue - I turned off the side bar within my first day with Vista. But you are right about the second part, turning of UAC doesn't make sense.
QUOTE (track09 @ Mar 20 2007, 07:01 PM)

Read about Vista like an intelligent person, and you'll understand it's not Xp with a new coat. But heaven forbid zealots realize this. I'm glad to see your article on .mac is so unbiased, and well written (sarcasm). If you used Vista primarilly, you'd realize UAC only occurs durring installations.
Thank you. Glad someone else out there has looked at vista through unbiased eyes.
QUOTE (Purple Puppy @ Mar 20 2007, 07:03 PM)

I think that microsoft should let there be a button on the mouse to enable flip3d, just like the squeeze button on the apple's mouse.
Very true. Although I'm sure someone will come up with a way to do this.
QUOTE (Panda200x @ Mar 20 2007, 07:10 PM)

I went to Mac and came back...
I think Microsoft has improved dramatically on Vista. The UAC can be annoying but once disabled it was 10x easier. Its true that DVD Maker and WMM is in no league compared with iLife which is why several companys develop new programs to cope. The start menu is better than XPs which doesn't overload the screen with folders. I think Microsoft understands intergration well (IE, shell?

). I've used Vista for 14 days and no flaws, crashes or even virii have affected me.
Agreed but please turn back on UAC, it makes it much more secure. All other modern OSes have some form of it (linux, osx etc), and sure it is somewhat inconvenient but it is a whole lot more secure.
QUOTE (robotskip @ Mar 20 2007, 07:31 PM)

No, that would also be bad security -- you might as well have a prompt as soon as the PC starts and than if the person clicks Allow than that whole session will have no more prompts.
And no, the correct is wrong, the ad implies you get a prompt for the most simple things, like saying hello which is BS and you know it.
Here is a list of things which give you prompts, that's hardly 'everything' done on Windows, in fact, most things aren't covered.
I installed Visual Studio like that and I don't get prompted every time.
How about, one of you prove you get prompts for EVERYTHING till than, it's not me vs the world, it's me vs a bunch of randoms on a forum who can't prove anything or extremely little.
Keep up the good fight

.
QUOTE (rollcage @ Mar 20 2007, 10:44 PM)

I have Visual Studio installed, it tells you that you should run it with admin privileges (requiring you to go through the UAC prompt every time you run it). I can't wait for the next release, it's starting to get quite annoying.
One major thing that I've noticed about UAC is if you try to open something from IE (word document I think will do this), you first get a prompt from IE asking you if you want to open the file, then you get a UAC prompt asking you if you want to allow IE to open the file. You shouldn't have to tell it twice.
The biggest problem with UAC is that it requires you to confirm a single action more than once. If you want to change the clock, you shouldn't have to confirm that you want to change the clock and then enter your credentials. Entering your credentials should be enough to verify.
I also love it when you get a security center notification telling you that you've turned off security center notifications.

Finally some good
constructive criticism. I agree there are times when you have to answer two prompts when one would have done. But does that mean UAC sucks, doesn't do its job etc? No. (I'm not talking about you by way, its other posts I'm refering to).
QUOTE (lostgame @ Mar 21 2007, 12:38 AM)

...and that's it, right there. The only sentence really worth reading in the article, it's kind of biased. Okay, REALLY biased. But you know... it's hard not to be, I understand...
Unfortunately the law is trying to stop Microsoft from integrating. Look at all the lawsuits they have gotten because of windows media player and internet explorer and all the anti-competition crap.
QUOTE (Forceman @ Mar 21 2007, 02:59 AM)

Twisting words again I see, I said most of the stuff in control panel. UAC may not be annoying to you but dont defend it like it's not annoying to everyone else. Are you saying we dont use Vista and UAC really dont bother you so much?, how about when you do turn it off it bothers you again with a notification every friggin time.
I recently install Vista because I got sick to death of XP even for the small time I use it for a few games, so dont patronize me and others claiming UAC works perfect because it dont.
UAC doesn't work perfectly. But does OSX's user control work perfectly either? No. Quite frankly I got pissed having to enter my admin password everytime I wanted to change a system wide setting in OSX. I like how with vista when I am doing system wide configuration, I just log into my admin account (enter password once), and then just click 'allow' for the individual things. When done with major config, go back to user account. Plain and simple.
QUOTE (elviejo @ Mar 21 2007, 07:29 AM)

If you want to know if is you against the world, google for UAC Vista and you are going to see, and, don't worry, I'm going to prove you as soon I get home from work; by the way, you know what is bad security?, when a feature who suppose to protect your computer only ask "allow or not allow" without a password, anyone who is sitting in front of that computer can "allow" and that's also a hole who can be exploited remotely; what is going to happen with UAC?, one of two things, must of the people with some knowledge are going to turn it off, the average people are going to click "allow" by ignorance, both ways the purpose of it are going to be defeated. I almost forgot, what about networking?
I dealt with this a bit further up. You are clearly ignorant as to how UAC works. Only a moron (or someone who doesn't know about admin and standard user account) would give his mother in law an administrator account. Infact just about everyone should use a standard account, and then just enter the admin password when a system change needs to be made. Exactly like OSX. So stop looking for (imagining) the bad in Vista, and see the good.
QUOTE (elviejo @ Mar 22 2007, 07:31 PM)

That's not the problem, is not the program who "want" to run as administrator, is ME, the owner of the machine, who told vista to run that program as administrator, if you look at the picture, ( yeah, is a picture because that stupid UAC don't let you do nothing else, not even take an snapshot of your system) the image at your right are the properties of that program, you can see, I admit with some difficult, that it must run in compatibility mode with windows xp sp2 and as administrator, and there is the problem, why in the hell vista need to ask me every time I run the program if I want to allow it?, because the stupid kid don't remember what I told him in the first place!.

I agree there should be a 'remember this' sort of setting one could choose. But this problem only occurs with old problems that weren't designed for an environment with UAC, so some problems are expected. All new software should run without a hitch. Remember this is a major environment change for windows. Most windows programs just expected to have admin rights from the get go. In XP some programs just wouldn't run in a limited account. So infact UAC is an improvement.
So that's about it for UAC. It is a great improvement to Windows XP, and definitely brings Windows on par with OSX and linux for that type of security. Sure there are some improvements that could be made, but for a first attempt it is excellent. It would be nice if Mac fanatics could simply see Vista from unbiased eyes and be glad of the competition, instead of bashing everything Microsoft does with exaggerations and lies.
Now please don't take this as a personal attack on anyone. I am not a Windows fanatic and I do not think Vista is the
best OS out there. I just cannot stand people attacking an OS without having a true knowledge of how it works, and by using lies and exaggerations. Those apple adds are mean to draw people by humour, not to realistically portray PCs.
Stephen.