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[56K WARN] Windows Vista (code name: Longhorn)

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 4:10 am
by m3mn0n
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/

Any MSDN subscribers (or anyone else) have a chance to download and test Beta 1?

How did it go?

A friend of mine got it and told me he was very impressed. I'm going to see if I can borrow his disc and install it on a new partition so I can have a go myself. :D

Judging from the site, Microsoft really raised the bar with this new system. And it seems like a software developer's dream from their MSDN page. heh

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 4:22 am
by onion2k
Anyone who runs a Microsoft Beta product is, in my opinion, utterly mental.

If you're desperate, run it on a PC that has nothing important on it.

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 7:54 am
by m3mn0n
Thanks for that lovely feedback. :roll:

It'd be nice if this didn't turn into another anti-MS/anyone who uses Windows is a moron thread.

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 7:59 am
by feyd
Although I've done a lot of beta work for them in the past, I've come to a general rule that if I'm not a developer on the project, I won't touch the beta until it hits release candidates.. things are just too unstable until that point most often. Since this is an OS beta, I'd agree that putting it onto a machine that you can dedicate to testing is a good idea.

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 9:49 am
by theda
You could even partition part of your harddrive off for it and just have a dual OS system, and switch between the two.

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 10:16 am
by shiznatix
that wouldnt save your computer if it decided to go crazy

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 10:37 am
by s.dot
Sami wrote:Thanks for that lovely feedback. :roll:

It'd be nice if this didn't turn into another anti-MS/anyone who uses Windows is a moron thread.
Sorry about this post then :) but, I'm turning more and more into a windows hater every day. I'm still trying to get FreeBSD installed... I'd really like to get that to work :(

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 12:44 pm
by anjanesh
They've definitely changed the look from XP. the dialog boxes are now a bit transparent.
Vitual Folders.

Image

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 4:01 pm
by m3mn0n
shiznatix wrote:that wouldnt save your computer if it decided to go crazy
I'm sure it's safe enough to install on a partition if they are offering it to hundreds of thousands of software developers.

No 3rd party drivers or software installations will take place so I don't see the huge risk that's apparent to some.

A 30-day trial of a fresh install won't hurt anyone. :lol:

anjanesh: Yeah it's looking much nicer than XP. Hey, is that a screenshot of your trial or did you grab that from the web?

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 4:13 pm
by Roja
onion2k wrote:Anyone who runs a Microsoft Beta product is, in my opinion, utterly mental.
I've run quite a few, and while I can't disagree with being mental (HEH!), I will say there are non-insane reasons to do so.

First and foremost, as a developer (we all are, right?), its important to know whats coming in the future, so our code can work for users.

For example, I code a webgame. I'd love to switch to xhtml, but I can't because IE doesn't handle it correctly. In Beta1 of Vista, its still broken. However, in Beta2, it might be fixed! That would be extremely useful knowledge for me, as I could then begin moving towards xhtml.

But beyond that, I'm also a user. I'd like to know if - some ten years later - they finally fixed the idiotic and annoying startbar adjust issue. Whats that? Move your start bar to stretch across the top of the screen, instead of the bottom.

Now open a few new windows that aren't maximized. Eventually, you'll find an application (for example, possibly media player) that will open with the top of the window bar BENEATH the start bar. Oddly, Microsoft added support to ensure that didnt happen before the release of win95, yet various applications and upgrades have not removed the behavior - all the way to Windows XP!

Its not insane for me to want to see if they fixed that, and if not, let them know on their beta forums. In fact, thats exactly why they do betas.

Of course, I'm the first to stand in line and argue that running windows is (by itself) insanity. But then again, I never claimed to be sane! :twisted:

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 4:31 pm
by m3mn0n
heh

I hate that little annoyance also. I like to make my start bar double the normal size and on the top instead of the bottom, but so many programs (both Microsoft & 3rd party ones) still open below the newly positioned bar which is why I am stuck with the bar at the bottom currently.

See I like having all the controls in the top part of the screen and then the content, work area and such at the bottom but having controls on both the top and the bottom and all that in the middle isn't bad either.

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 6:40 pm
by theda
Personally I don't think that Vista is that much better than XP. If anything, it'll be an even worse memory hog. Until Microsoft can learn to find a way to have things run FAST without having to have a 3ghz, 1gb ram PC, it'll be more intelligent to just stay with XP or whatever you currently have.

->Security? Hell, the only people that need to worry about security are the ones who are either stupid or run a business server. And those business servers don't need fancy desktops. The stupid people would only need Vista because they'd end up screwing something up and need all the help they can get <_<. For everyone else, Vista isn't much of a better choice than XP.

And from a report I read a while back, even when Vista comes out, the majority of current Microsoft customers won't be upgrading. The majority of businesses will probably stay with their current stuff. (Who the hell wants to have to redo their entire network, just to update a product?)

Sure it looks nice, but so does a Rainforest. You don't see people tereforming their backyards do ya?

I want actual proof that this is better. All the new stuff I see is just new transparencies and styles. Whoopeedieedooo. Security? From what I heard, they pretty much screwed over their other products WinFS and the such.

I want a system that looks nice AND actually runs. Not a system that looks nice and requires you to shell out and additional couple grand to actually make it useful. Transparencies take quite a bit of processing power I do believe...

I bet you all that within the next two years, there'll be ways to modify your current XP installation to look exactly like what you see in that screenshot.

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 7:15 pm
by Burrito
on a different note but with regards to the same topic:

what are some features that all of you would like to see implemented with longhorn?

one thing I'd love to see is the ability to move applications on the taskbar. For example I always have my email application running on the far left side of my taskbar, but there are days when I don't open it first and so to keep me sane, I have to close everything I opened before it to move it over...would be nice to just be able to drag apps wherever you want them.

one thing I am really looking forward to is the ability to run sql queries to find files. it'll be interesting to see how sql acts as a file system and how well MS implements that brilliant idea...

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2005 11:53 pm
by josh
The ability to completely uninstall IE from the computer.

Also plugin ability (kind of like litestep, but without litestep) would rock.

Multiple desktops

Posted: Mon Aug 01, 2005 12:06 am
by anjanesh
Sami wrote: Hey, is that a screenshot of your trial or did you grab that from the web?
From the web - Seattle News