The Vista Death Watch

[lord_muad_dib]

>> I'm pleased to see Microsoft took a page out of *nix's book and added a useful (and powerful) security feature

 

 

lol thank god i never seen such a feature on any *nix

 

what *nix "book" have you read?

[mhbas0001]

>> I'm pleased to see Microsoft took a page out of *nix's book and added a useful (and powerful) security feature

 

 

lol thank god i never seen such a feature on any *nix

 

what *nix "book" have you read?

 

 

The feature is question is running user accounts with limited privlidges as the default behaviour, instead of giving users full administrative access, and asking for their permission to execute programs that require unrestricted access to the system. It exists in Mac OS X and Linux, and If you don't believe such a feature exists in *nix based systems, then you don't know much about *nix at all.

[lord_muad_dib]

>> If you don't believe such a feature exists in *nix based systems, then you don't know much about *nix at all.

 

that makes me smile

 

anyways... in every *nix.. when something needs admin grants... you need to enter a password, and only ONCE for a limited time, and it's only for what it's needed

 

in vista there's a popup for every single action you do

it's more like a "security advisor".. than a true access granting system

 

so.. as i said.. thank god *nix is different!

[mhbas0001]

Sorry, my mistake.

 

Your post doesn't demonstrate a lack of knowledge about Unix, it demonstrates a complete lack of knowledge about Windows Vista and User Account Control.

 

UAC does not prompt you for every action, it only prompts you when you choose to run an executable that require administrative privlidges, and warns you when modifying system-critical components such as the registry. Nothing more, nothing less.

 

For you to claim otherwise demonstrates a complete lack of understanding about the way Vista works, a readiness of your behalf to indulge sweeping generalisations, and a tenuous grasp on reality.

 

That makes me smile.

[A Nonny Moose]

In actual fact, with user account control there's absolutely no need to run antivirus software, so long as you take the time to read the prompts before you click ok. Nothing can run on a Vista based machine unless it has your explicit permission, and by default, all user accounts run in restricted mode, just like a Unix-based system.

 

I'm pleased to see Microsoft took a page out of *nix's book and added a useful (and powerful) security feature.

 

I like this too, but someone will come up with a way around it. It's only a matter of time.

[Azurael]

UAC is badly implemented to the point of being annoying though. UAC asked me to 'Cancel or Allow' practically every app I run (now it's off.) It's not a functional security feature if users automatically click 'Allow' because they a) don't have to type a password, which would make them think about what they're doing, and have to click it so often that it becomes second nature to them.

[FUKKU]

I didn't read the article, but I learned almost 15 years ago, when Dvorak wrote the back page of MacUser magazine, that he is a bumbling idiot. I don't care if he is bashing Apple or Microsoft - he almost never knows what he's talking about (he may occasionally be right by sheer random luck though).

agreed, dvorak sucks and he even admitted at one time that most of what he writes is to get attention (and for an online journalist that leads to page views and ad clicks and more money) and has little basis in fact.

 

vista won't die because regardless of your opinion on its quality, it's now preinstalled on new computers and people will have to upgrade eventually. microsoft knows this. i don't know anyone who has done an xp->vista upgrade but i know a lot of people who have bought new computers with vista on it this year.

[mhbas0001]

UAC is badly implemented to the point of being annoying though. UAC asked me to 'Cancel or Allow' practically every app I run (now it's off.) It's not a functional security feature if users automatically click 'Allow' because they a) don't have to type a password, which would make them think about what they're doing, and have to click it so often that it becomes second nature to them.

 

 

I agree completely. UAC is poorly implemented, and the prompts occur so often, that even the most experience user can become inclined to click through them without so much as a second glance. The only consolation is, once your computer is set up, UAC will prompt you far less often. In my opinion, it only really becomes usefull when a prompt pops up that you're not expecting (e.g. when you're browsing the internet), then it's important to make sure you read them properly before clicking ok.

 

In this instance, the weakest link in computer security is the user - those who click allow without thinking will become infected. Those who read the prompts can happily run without antivirus software.

[Lothyrawir]

What Dvorak says is totally true. I have actually never yet personally seen a Windows XP user upgrade to Vista. I do know people that bought PCs preinstalled with Vista though.

 

I was one of those unfortunate enough to buy a comp preloaded with the pile of excriment

Well I upgraded from XP to Vista. And my opinion is Vista is faster than XP on Core 2 Duo (due to SMP), has unix like security, and unlike XP has never crashed on me.

 

That being true, there are some things that won't run on Vista, so I do maintain an XP install.

 

Your kidding right? It's sad almost everytime I load IE the thing stops responding for at least 45 seconds. My wife has forbidden me from messing around with the OS in anyway so I can't downgrade, or it's the couch for a month  *sigh*

[mhbas0001]

On what specifications are you trying to run Vista?

[waradmin]

I was one of those unfortunate enough to buy a comp preloaded with the pile of excriment

Your kidding right? It's sad almost everytime I load IE the thing stops responding for at least 45 seconds. My wife has forbidden me from messing around with the OS in anyway so I can't downgrade, or it's the couch for a month  *sigh*

Buy another computer, and opt out of having the worthless OS installed.

[sponkemonke]

Vista was a poorly made operating system. There are still bug that lurk. Some go back as far as Windows 95 in the Explorer. Then there painful features like UAC and DRM. Theres too many problems too list and Microsoft knows that. To hide the problems, they add a nice UI to cover it up.

[Alessandro17]

My wife has forbidden me from messing around with the OS in anyway so I can't downgrade, or it's the couch for a month *sigh*

 

I feel sorry for men who become slaves of their wives, I really do.

[Proteo]

I feel sorry for men who become slaves of their wives, I really do.

I really feel sorry for men who never met a woman that worth being slave of.

[(MoC)]

Umm, nice job Vista!

 

XD

[CLiDE FTW!!1]

[Alessandro17]

I really feel sorry for men who never met a woman that worth being slave of.

 

Love and slavery don't go together well.

[sandmanfvrga]

Vista could be the next ME. Will it die? Time will tell. Rumors of XP SP3 being SO FAST that many may stay with XP longer with the SP. Also Vista SP1 has been reported to NOT speed up the OS. I think Vista will either die, or just be mediocre.

 

On the wife thing, I agree that men shouldn't be slaves. I love my wife, but she tried to pull that cough thing on me and I told her if she wanted somebody on the cough, to go out to the cough. Her mom and her had that attitude and no offense to women, you are not over men. To me, my wife and I are 50/50. I am not boss of her and she is no boss of me. If you want to live life like that, go ahead, but I will not and I love my wife and she loves me but that old "get in the dog house" {censored} will not fly. I don't see why women want equality (I do think women should be equal in all things in life) but in situations like this, want to be over/better than a man. Don't make sense. Probably opened a can of worms, but oh well. I am more into the Vista discussion anyway.

[robotskip]

About people trying to use that 'fair' 'benchmark' as some valid point:

 

XP SP3 speed lead over Vista SP1 narrows under similar workloads

http://www.betanews.com/article/XP_SP3_out...sion/1196208954

A heavily promoted performance test by an evaluation software firm appeared to situate Windows Vista SP1 performance against Windows XP SP3. But the initial workloads were actually different due to the Office software used, testers admitted to BetaNews today.

 

But some readers noticed that both systems weren't being tested using the same workload. And since the team's testing software focuses on such factors as ActiveX Data Objects (ADO), whose deployments are very different for Office 2003 than for Office 2007, the differences do matter.

 

So by their request*, the team installed Office 2003 on the Vista system, keeping in mind that Vista may still replace much of the infrastructure from the OS upon which the suite relies.

* Why the hell didn't they do a fair comparison from the beginning? I guess "OMG TRIPLE PEROFRMANE DUD" is so much cooler. Way to go, trolls.

 

Vista SP1 benefit will be stability and reliability, not performance

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=978

Will Vista SP1 and how this won’t bring any relief to those who find Vista a bit slow or sluggish? Not really, but then again service packs aren’t about performance increases; they’re about reliability and stability.

 

I’ve seen a lot of service packs in my time. Windows 95 and ME 98 (Win 98 actually got what’s called a “Customer Service Pack”) both got one service pack, NT 4.0 saw six, Windows 2000 had four and XP has so far seen two. But what I don’t remember regarding any of these service packs is installing it onto a system and then seeing any significant boost in performance. Service packs don’t really work that way. Sure, you’ll feel specific improvements as a result of some of the tweaks and fixes contained in the service pack, and you might feel the benefit of having your operating system refreshed by loading the service pack onto it, but a service pack should not be looked upon as a performance upgrade. If your system can’t run an OS, what it needs is upgrading or replacing, not the application of a service pack.

 

And ..

 

http://www.anandtech.com/systems/showdoc.a...i=2917&p=11 (This is from Feb too, so they're are much, much, much better drivers out, patches for Vista, etc)

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000688.html

 

Let's also remember we've had devs like the ones for Crysis that don't surprised if you get better performance for DX9 games in Vista thanks to DXL9, memory management improvements, driver model improvements, etc -- basically, all we're waiting for to see these actuate is decent drivers.. but hey, it's not like companies had several years to work on them.. oh wait, they did?

 

If you compare benchmarks over the time since launch you'll see the 'performance hit' is decreasing thanks to drivers from hardware companies but let's all yell at Microsoft and no, I'm not completely shifting the blame off Microsoft but the majority of performance hits relating to gaming are thanks to poor drivers from Nvidia and ATI (Or AMD now).

[Superhai]

The problem with UAC is not it in itself. It is a good idea that MS should have implemented years ago. The problem lies in how MS has diciplined the apps and games developers. As they have made software that requires Admin access to run, and that is everyday apps that in no way should require it. Many of those have now got their wakeup call which is maybe too late.

 

I haven't used a antivirus software for god knows how long, but I am critical to what I run so my system is stable and has been always. That is also relating to Vista, but on the other hand I have used only the X64 version of both XP (since 2005) and Vista. Vista is faster than XP if you remove some of those extra features that Vista have even when aero is running but you must have the newest video drivers, and I don't run IE or WMP.

 

I think that MS has got its large user base in the corporate world as a big foxtrap. They have to make a OS that is able to run those akward apps the corporate world don't want to use large amounts to change. But I have a feeling that MS realizes that now they have made the hit to the wall with the current kernel and everything they do are simply ensuring it is running in a safest possible environment with alot of patches around it. I hear that they will change the kernel in Vista SP1, but there is still very limited possibilities you have if you are not going to break compatibility.

 

If MS want to survive they should use their massive resources and start on scratch, a new kernel and a entire new OS. With a basic system no {censored} like IE or WMP deeply integrated and if they want fancy stuff like dwm.exe then put it in the base. People really wants 0ms response, not 1ms. People buy faster computers because it is faster, it is not an excuse to write slower os and apps. They want more memory to use it on the data not on the os or apps. Also apple must also not forget this!

[apowerr]

If MS want to survive they should use their massive resources and start on scratch, a new kernel and a entire new OS.

I agree. When you consider the money and talented engineers that Microsoft has, It's obvious that if they wanted to they could make the best OS in history

[Forceman]

About people trying to use that 'fair' 'benchmark' as some valid point:

 

XP SP3 speed lead over Vista SP1 narrows under similar workloads

http://www.betanews.com/article/XP_SP3_out...sion/1196208954

* Why the hell didn't they do a fair comparison from the beginning? I guess "OMG TRIPLE PEROFRMANE DUD" is so much cooler. Way to go, trolls.

 

Vista SP1 benefit will be stability and reliability, not performance

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=978

 

And ..

 

http://www.anandtech.com/systems/showdoc.a...i=2917&p=11 (This is from Feb too, so they're are much, much, much better drivers out, patches for Vista, etc)

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000688.html

 

Let's also remember we've had devs like the ones for Crysis that don't surprised if you get better performance for DX9 games in Vista thanks to DXL9, memory management improvements, driver model improvements, etc -- basically, all we're waiting for to see these actuate is decent drivers.. but hey, it's not like companies had several years to work on them.. oh wait, they did?

 

If you compare benchmarks over the time since launch you'll see the 'performance hit' is decreasing thanks to drivers from hardware companies but let's all yell at Microsoft and no, I'm not completely shifting the blame off Microsoft but the majority of performance hits relating to gaming are thanks to poor drivers from Nvidia and ATI (Or AMD now).

 

What dont show up in benchmarks it how much memory the game uses up, with Vista 64 it takes up about 900Mb of ram and exiting out of games with no little to no ram left and the memory caching slows down Vista alot. I found XP MUCH better and faster without any paging to the HDD at all and the fact is Vista does take up more memory regardless of it using it better or caching it. Also while caching memory the disk IO is busy so apps take longer to load first time. Vista may have better memory management but that goes out the window when it uses more memory initially, after all you can't cache what you dont have.

 

So tell me Mr know it all, how can Vista be faster if alot of the disk IO is spent caching memory, you wouldn't need to claim it back if it didn't use it all in the first place.

 

OK so lets talk about decent drivers, since when have Windows had decent drivers because Microsoft blame 90% of problems on them, it help if they didn't change their driver model every version so it takes dev a year to figure it out. I should imagine it will take them till Windows 7 to get right and then yet another version of drivers to write for.

[robotskip]

You didn't even read the link I posted and you can't make some broad, sweeping comment that Vista definitively uses x amount of RAM.

 

Here it is, again: http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000688.html

 

I never said I knew it all, they don't change the driver model every version, this is the first big change in what, years? And please, practice your English, I really don't know exactly what convoluted point you're trying to push. Oh, and lol at trying to sound oh-so-smart, you remind me of those kids who go into Word and use the thesaurus and than expect others to be impressed, hah.

[Forceman]

You didn't even read the link I posted and you can't make some broad, sweeping comment that Vista definitively uses x amount of RAM.

 

Here it is, again: http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000688.html

 

I never said I knew it all, they don't change the driver model every version, this is the first big change in what, years? And please, practice your English, I really don't know exactly what convoluted point you're trying to push. Oh, and lol at trying to sound oh-so-smart, you remind me of those kids who go into Word and use the thesaurus and than expect others to be impressed, hah.

 

Your not so smart yourself, any brainless person can post quotes and wiki facts, funny enough wikipedia has been found to be factually wrong many times. it's funny because Vista takes X amount of ram when people dont know what that X is and the fanboy like you will say it's a low number rather than high. If you read what I said proper you'll realize I know a bit about how Vista caches and uses memory, it uses so many tricks to keep the system responsive no wonder people dont know what the real usage is.

 

What you seem to do is post fact from other people without learning them yourself, if you knew about Vista usage of memory you wouldn't need to post blogs and wiki so called facts because Microsoft write though facts which i'm inclined to doubt. Microsoft look after their business customers so Vista is optimized for app office usage in the way it uses memory, that dont mean {censored} on the OS as a whole. memory usage and trickery is about as clear as Vista versions(Even Microsoft own people got confused in court) so dont come to me with your so called facts about how well Vista uses memory because it's tricks we've know about.

[robotskip]

Well smart or not (I make no claim), at leas I can spell you're correctly! So, Vista is using memory to keep the system responsive, according to you anyway, how is this a bad thing? I guess you're a masochist and like seeing all that empty physical RAM! Also, how is an operating system which is optimized to make apps run well a bad thing? Isn't the whole purpose of an operating system to, well, run the apps that a user wants? Oh, and prove your statements with third party comments.

 

I never said it was a low number, please stop making things up. It makes me cry inside. Oh, and so what if I link to someone else? Does that make it any less relevant simply because I didn't spout it out in garbled English? Nope, and you've still failed to address what the CodingHorror (An excellent, excellent site) detailed -- hop to it, sunny and prove these 'tricks' from a third party are false. See, making magical, broad claims that everyone is false without really any backing makes you look a tad bit silly and hey, any brainless person can do that (Oh no he didn't!), to those with a clue anyway, so feel assured, you've impressed the masses here and they will revel in the awesomeness that are your oh-so-definitive posts.

 

To tell you the truth, I don't really know what you're trying to say in the last paragraph, at the beginning you seem kind of calm and your English isn't too bad but than you seem to get all worked up like a little kid when someone steals his candy and seem to lose focus.

 

FOCUS. And remeber, bad words are, well, bad and at least man up and don't use some lame 'censored' thing.