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Feb 26, 2009 09:00 PM | 49
It's official, Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system gets the prize for being the most overhyped, underperforming information and communication technology (ICT) project. Windows Vista garnered 5,222 of 6,043 votes (86 percent) entered via the Web to snag top honors in the first-ever Fiasco Awards announced in Barcelona, Spain, today, beating out other contenders, including Google's Lively virtual world, the One Laptop per Child computer (developed by the Nicholas Negroponte-chaired One Laptop Per Child Association, Inc.) and Second Life. Second prize went to SAGA, the oft-malfunctioning administration and academic management system developed by Spain's Catalan Education Department for public school teachers in Catalonia.
Vista was announced in July 2005 and hit the market in January 2007 after a mega PR blitz by Microsoft, which promised it would be a slick, secure successor to the company's popular Windows XP operating system. Vista came with an eye-catching graphical user interface, and Microsoft positioned the operating system's Windows Media Center software as a tool that would make the PC the new hub of home entertainment systems. What Microsoft made less clear was that many customers couldn't run Vista without upgrading their PCs.
What's more, the Fiasco Awards Web site points out, the new operating system was complicated to navigate and had compatibility problems with many programs and hardware drivers, leading many people to just stick with Windows XP. Vista was such a dismal failure that many PC makers even recommended that consumers steer clear of it.
The company's recent introduction of Windows 7—Vista's successor after only two years—indicates that even Microsoft views Vista with disappointment, according to the awards organizers. The lesson, they said: more testing should be done to check reliability and performance before rolling out major product-marketing campaigns.
The purpose of the Fiasco awards is to "promote critical spirit and a positive attitude towards failure, which is a necessary stage in the road to success," say the award's organizers, who are identified on the Web site only as a "group of people linked to the ICT (information and communication technology) sector." The site notes that Thomas Edison made more than 1,000 attempts before inventing the light bulb, "so he learned how not to do it in more than 1,000 different ways."
Other finalists: Second Life (the virtual world's Web software must be downloaded on one's PC, which excludes people who don't own their own computers), One Laptop per Child (a plan hatched by the developed world to bring computers to the developing world at $100 a pop, only they it ended up costing nearly twice that), and Google Lively (a virtual world that relied more on the company's brand than on any interesting features to compete with Second Life; it was put out of its misery at the end of 2008, after just five months of operation).
Image ©iStockphoto.com/ Adam Balatoni
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49 Comments
Add CommentHEAR, HEAR - WHAT A OVERPRICED NOTHING PROGRAM, EVEN XP IS BETTER - OR EVEN THE ORIGINAL WINDOWS SYSTEM. iT DID NOT HAVE ALL THE EXTRAS - BUT IT WORKED
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think it's alright... except that it takes up 2much memory
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have four gigs of memory and 64bit vista runs OK but changing back to 32bit XP gives me more free memory and great performance... Still i cant because of the dx10 crap. =/
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvery time Microsoft comes out with a new version of Windows, all I hear is how it is inferior to the previous version. Reviewers complained about the copy protection and the heavy resourse useage of XP (http://reviews.cnet.com/windows/microsoft-windows-xp-home/4505-3672_7-6534881.html) but no one remembers the past. I have been a geek since the 1980s and have used Windows since before it was an operating system. Every new version is better than the previous version. Windows 7 will be better than Vista and the peanut gallery will complain about it too and tell everyone it is better to stick with Vista. Mark my words.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think bashing Vista is the most overrated useless activity any IT interested person can be doing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes Vista is not great, but it isn't crap either. It works and it works very well for gaming, networking is much easier on it, it installs faster than XP and on top of that it kind of looks good.
That said, it is not perfect, but not crappy either. The big problem with Vista is that it needs a powerful PC, computer sellers have to install the most recent OS though and most of the times the computers actually aren't powerful enough for it. RAM only gets you part of the way, you would need a very good CPU and graphics card to boot.
The question then remains if you find it good or bad for an OS to need such high specifications. I think that if I pay 400 euros for an OS, I would want it to be powerful, not slimmed down so that people can run it on hardware from 2003.
Every version is better than the last??? You must be speaking strictly about the gimmick features that are added rather than core OS functionality. I have two laptops, one running Vista and an older one running XP. The newer laptop is a generation ahead of the older one, with eight times the ram, and easily quadruple the processing power, not to mention bus speed, graphics, etc. Yet the performance I get from them is roughly the same for typical day-to-day use. The extra power chewed up by Vista is, to my mind, what makes it a flop.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHey Marko, reminds me of the old adage, "Whatsoever Intel creatith, Microsoft taketh away".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMicrosoft & family has not dissappointed me. They well known for putting out beta product for the consumer. They charge you hefty price, for some thing that has not been well tested. Dam the consumer..."We are Microsolft and we can do what we want ." Well folks , how long do we have to put up this. As seen in the auto industry...The big are falling fast...So will the creaters Vista.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWow, someone commenting with their caps locked and calling Vista a program. I was attracted to this discussion right away. I only recently started using Vista. I was/am in many ways still partial to Ubuntu Linux. Vista however has some very good features. It is a hog on resources, but for a user that is not technically adept and has the cash for a nice system it does as advertised. I honestly expected much worse than I got when I started using it. I was pleasantly surprised. After doing some Beta testing with Windows 7, I would not be in a hurry to upgrade. I don't see a lot of difference at this point. For real speed and basic functionality I still boot into Ubuntu Linux.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have also been a "geek" since the late 1970's....Vista is not a well designed operating system. Compare Vista to OS 10, Linux, or XP on criteria that you want to select and Vista comes in second (or third, forth, etc). It is slow, hogs reaources, is not very user friendly, locked in to one way of doing things (operating systems are supposed to be flexible), and presents way to many prompts. When compared to either OS x or Linux, Windows Vista still has major security problems.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswhatever happened to releasing updates with new or significantly improved features? That wasn't Vista - it presented no compelling reasons to make the change. I did make the change though - to Mac OSX and when stuck with a windows program xp running in VMWare works just fine. Bye bye ....
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think all the people that constantly bash a product, especially a MS product should try and build a better system. Everytime a "new thing" pops up for a phone, you have to have the latest phone, yet knobody complains and says - why doesn't this work with my 1999 nextel?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou have choices, go out and buy an over-priced MAC, or better yet get a $300 machine with linux and see if you don't spend months learning commands and still not be able to install your favorite software.
Bottom line, either keep your mouth shut, or buy something else. The world is filled with choices and you get to make your own!!
Well this is no surprise at all! How could a company as big as Microsoft release such a pitiful, piss poor product? This is the worst OS in history (yes, worse than the NT debacle). I hate Vista, because I won one... Bill!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell how interesting... my Vista desktop told me that I had commented on this thread, but apparently not? How ironic considering that it tells me everything I do, whether I need it or want it or not. Vista is the worst OS in history. I know this because I own one. Hey Bill, I want an exchange of an OS that knows how to play nicely with others (peripherals).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMore chrome, bigger tail-fins, same old geriatric V8 & chassi underneath...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDoWhileSomething " or buy something else" - I did, Linux, best move I ever made. I grant you, you do need more technical know-how to use Linux, but the benefits are overwhelming.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisImplementing Vista has proven to our company to be the single most expensive method of achieving results nearly as good as we grew accustomed to on XP. We have a dozen linux machines which are fine, but when we got a couple Apples, even for being relatively expensive up front, we found they were the cheapest to own, and have since replaced over 80 of our workstations with Apples. The only holdouts are about a dozen workstations in the engineering department, where much to our disappointment, Autodesk's obnoxious, overbloated licensing programs will not allow their software to remain licensed on a virtual machine. Unfortunate, as the benchmark tests show the program performed better running on the Powermacs than on anything else... while it held its license.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe've been able to cut 90% of our IT budget. That's huge.
For people primarily interested in word processing and the internet, most computers are drastically overpowered. You don't need a 747 to take a letter to the post office. Mac has a reliable OS and their basic notebook has more capability that most users will ever need. The problem is the constant "improvements" that make older systems and computers obsolete. It is annoying not to be able to open attachments in the new program or even to install the new program in your old but perfectly adequate computer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBashing Microsoft and Vista has taken on the same kind of silly kind of tenor that bashing Bush has. People just say awful things because it props up their little egos to do so.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm sure someone will respond to this with some outlandish "nothing is worse than (insert which you hate more here) type comment and that will only serve to prove my point.
Truth be told their is a very good reason Microsoft dominates the market. I have never been so disappointed by Micrsoft that I committed to something else. Having said that doesn't make me unique. becolby's point above validates that.
"The lesson, they said: more testing should be done to check reliability and performance before rolling out major product-marketing campaigns." ... "Windows 7—Vista's successor after only two years"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOh yes, lesson learned indeed. Two whole years! The main problem with windows is that with every iteration the system gets more and more bloated, built upon the old and dysfunctional ruins of its predecessors. They need to work from the ground up, which may take them quite a bit of time, but it would be well worth it. Every new version of windows takes up more hard drive space and occupies more space in the ram. The ever-more bloated operating systems are not built with any kind of efficiency in mind. Instead, they rely on the ever-increasing capacity of new computers to compensate for their bad programming.
Not going to go down the OS 10, Linux path as those are VERY different worlds.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHowever, I do want to state that I hated XP (all versions) and absolutely love Vista. I use is for Development, Operations and personal and find it in every respect better than XP.
I use Vista 64, purely because I want lots of RAM - currently 8MB, but I lust after more. I have a vital application which just won't run on 64Bit (XP or Vista), but which I run on a virtual PC (XP). The only thing that really does annoy me is that Vista decides how I should see things in Windows Explorer - I am sufficiently conceited to believe that I know what I want. Otherwise, its fine. Sort of.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think Vista has unfinished business. Several things I don't like about Visa is on the Home & Home professional you cannot add a comuter to a domain. you have to either pony up the money for Vista business addtion or ultimate. I understood why they did this because people purchased XP laptop or destops with XP home installed and added it to the coroprate doamin causeing security issues. But Microsoft purposely cripled its operating system so you had to purchase the correct version. 2nd file sharing is disabled by default which is good but only VISTA machine can shares resources or files unless you turn on files sahring but NETBIOS is not recognized . So much for small network or SAMBA type installations. 3rd windows small business server does not work with VISTA unless you upgrade to windows small server 2008.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVista does not have the abities to deal with multiple processor like scheduling process for grahpic or loading to be used with multiple CPUs. I feel this is part of the unfinished business.
However I do use Vista and I generaly like it but Microsoft did not take into mind small home users who might have old legacy systems or small home networks. Unless you pony up more money you don't get those features that were part of XP right out of the box.
again!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVista isn't that bad? ARE YOU CRAZY?!! Microsof Access - their own program - can't run under Vista without telling you you don't have permission to open your own files! Microsoft Excel runs VERY STRANGELY. Vista is ALWAYS bugging you to make decisions about your computer's security - something the computer should do. Vista isn't compatible, isn't sompatible, isn't compatible! IT"S SHIT!!!!!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIve been using Microsoft OS's since DOS 5.0 and I have never seen the backlash and hate from users as I have with Vista. Say what you wish, XP was fine after SP1, but even after Vista SP1 it is still a bloated Mess. Windows 7 is really just Vista SP3 without the Vista name (built on the same architecture/interface).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThomas Edison did not invent the light bulb. Two Canadians invented the light bulb and sold the design to Edison. Likewise some of Edisons best DC motors were Tesla'a designs. Yes, Vista is not well designed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@hotblack
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCan you give some statistics on how you cut your IT budget by 90% going with MAC's? I'm not knocking MAC's at all, but either your calculator is broken, or it doesn't say much for your IT dept.
Vista (64 in my case) isn't perfect. I miss compatibility with many XP (and all DOS) applications, as well as the lack of device drivers. However, it is much more stable than XP, has a nicer user interface, and (unlike XP) it addresses 8 gig of RAM. I've never had a Vista crash, and I can't say that about XP. So, I guess I wouldn't be as severe as others have been about Vista.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVista machines don't even work on normal router based TCPIP networks without infecting the Xp ones with patches to lay over your network so that vista can understand them. Why the extra code to plug in a machine to your router? My wife had Vista on her new HP laptop. We removed it, and without the Wireless Card/Nic and Sound working(because you can't get hte drivers for XP) it's still worth not having Vista on the machine.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt part of the network disvover protocol they put into VISTA. It also has limitations by seting itself to work on one router you have st up on oyur network but if you change the router your vista machine won't work until you either reinstall vista or remove the network adapter. This is a big headache as far as I am concerned they sould have made the network discovery part of it optional and it is but you have to turn it off or on manualy but NETBIOS is by default disabled unless you select file sharing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVISTA 64 bit version whie it can adress more meory and use the uniqe 64 bit aspects of the new CPU makes all the older 32 bit software unusable as far as device drivers goes and some applications like CISCO VPN just won't work with it. I feel like the 64 bit version was relased to soon for the end users to be ready for apps for it but there are . With 64 bit edition you have to be more computer literate to understand not all applications will work correctly on it until you upgarde to 64 bit drivers.
I basicaly don't know Microsoft . They are in the game to make a buck. I work in IT. I am therefor a camp follower. What ever the most IT departments go with I leran because there is a buch to be had in ti. As far as Mac goes it is more like a religion not a computer . If it were a all Mac world I would learn there sysytem . Linux is more for the insurtail streght type of computer or a like a finicky british sports car . Constent tinkering just to make the thing go forward but what a sports car if you can just understand all its brintly insantity. I perfer the order of Microsoft like the lord of the rings "One OS to rule them all". Just a joke enjoy !
Here's a simple question: How can Microsoft create a brand-new OS in about a year?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFolks who think Windows 7 is "new" are in for a surprise. I suspect that Microsoft has done nothing but revise Vista to address obvious complaints but, otherwise, Widows 7 is Vista under a new name.
Here's a simple question: How can Microsoft create a brand-new OS in less than a year?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe answer is THEY CAN'T: Recreating a major OS from the ground up in a year is impossible. Windows 7 is just Vista with changes that address obvious consumer complaints.
What annoys me more than Vista (if that is possible) is Scientific American quoting this website without any real critical thought or analysis. No real investigation about the developers or sponsors of the site or its credibility. Just blind acceptance of its legitimacy. You know, just because it's published on the web, doesn't mean it's credible! Forget scientific or critical analysis of references or sources, give the readers what they want - a chance to blow off steam about (the pile of excrement) that is Vista.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHave a look at the website, notice that the 2nd prize winner is some Spanish software project no-one has ever heard of (at least outside Spain)? Moreover, only 6043 unspecified people (they claim) voted. In any case, you could hardly describe it as the 'tech world'. Yet you use the phrase in your attention grabbing headline.
Have you thought that perhaps the site is a publicity stunt to draw attention to an unpopular government software policy decision or the like? Or maybe the anonymous "team of people from the ICT sector" are disgruntled competitors who did not get awarded the contract to implement the software for the Spanish education department? While I'm not suggesting that this is the case here, a little scrutiny would go a long way.
Quite frankly, I would expect a tabloid newspaper to make a story based on a website like this, not a supposedly serious scientific magazine. I really don't want to believe that "Scientific American" is an oxymoron.
Not in specifics, no. Sorry. I'm not the IT director. But here's a generalization... Any time we'd need to add a new machine, it was a $5000 workstation or plotter or whatever, but along with it, would come an invisible price tag of $15,000 in paying a staff to research it, order it, set it up, configure it, and stabilize everything over the next three months. The difference between a cheap $4500 PC and an expensive $5000 Apple was a drop in the bucket, and money we would have spent anyway on the myriad upgrades (& the time installing & troubleshooting) our existing PC's. The biggest expense with switching to Apple was once again the time. We did it machine by machine, gradually, with a period of overlap for people to get accustomed to the new before having to ditch the old to minimize the downtime in forcing everyone to learn a new OS. But being able to go from a team of 21 IT engineers to a team of 6, allowed us to pull that $ out of overhead and put it into more profitable avenues. We are in an IT heavy business though. For Billy Joe Bob whose time is worth nothing, saving the $500 and not having to learn a whole new OS is probably a bigger deal.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat's roughly it, or what I can tell you off the top of my head.
"The site notes that Thomas Edison made more than 1,000 attempts before inventing the light bulb, 'so he learned how not to do it in more than 1,000 different ways.'"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe light bulb was invented by two Canadians, Henry Woodward and Mathew Evans, who patented the invention in 1874 after having successfully tested it in Toronto. Edison bought the patent. Some inventors never do get it right...
Yeah Vista was/is overrated, but so is most tech things. They all promise to do something and mostly let you down. But I have run vista both 32 and 64 bit and as long as your hardware is good, it works just fine. There are some driver issues, more related to the hardware vendors fault than MS.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThose that complain go to the mac. You get increased driver funtionality at the cost of increased hardware cost, and much less software support.
And I sold our macbook after 8 months. Didn't like it. Had less crashes maybe, but it still crashed. Didn't like the monopoly apple represented.
At least MS is open sourced.
Or you could always go with linux. But then I guess there would be driver issues there and soft ware.
So I guess I'll stick with MS.
Thanks very much. Just drop the price in half or more please.
Everyone should switch to linux (more stable and free)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVista is a fantastic operating system, virtually the same thing as XP with a few visual perks. The majority if bias against it seems to rest on three things, a buggy release (which people rehash to sound tech proficient to stroke their ego), an annoying UAC (which any dumbass can simply turn off in the control panel), and the fact that people expect the latest software to run on their outdated machines. Of course, it doesn't help that computer manufacturer's (dell, hp, etc) sold underpowered machines for the first year or so after the release (ie w/ one gig ram) and claimed it could run vista, so people who don't realize their computer is crap blame vista. Pathetic.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBy the way, I really enjoyed the cellphone analogy :D. You don't expect your old flipphone to run the iphone apps, do you? Then why would you expect your old '01 desktop to run vista without some serious upgrades?
And for the person who cut 90% of their budget switching to macs... whaaaaaa??? Mac is the most overpriced and underperforming OS out there, and the fact that it is not sold as a standalone OS reaffirms that statement. It's no wonder your IT department refused to get one of your shiny new macs, because anyone who knows squat about computers either runs linux or a microsoft OS! Surprise!
Vista is a fantastic operating system, virtually the same thing as XP with a few visual perks. The majority if bias against it seems to rest on three things, a buggy release (which people rehash to sound tech proficient to stroke their ego), an annoying UAC (which any dumbass can simply turn off in the control panel), and the fact that people expect the latest software to run on their outdated machines. Of course, it doesn't help that computer manufacturer's (dell, hp, etc) sold underpowered machines for the first year or so after the release (ie w/ one gig ram) and claimed it could run vista, so people who don't realize their computer is crap blame vista. Pathetic.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBy the way, I really enjoyed the cellphone analogy :D. You don't expect your old flipphone to run the iphone apps, do you? Then why would you expect your old '01 desktop to run vista without some serious upgrades?
And for the person who cut 90% of their budget switching to macs... whaaaaaa??? Mac is the most overpriced and underperforming OS out there, and the fact that it is not sold as a standalone OS reaffirms that statement. It's no wonder your IT department refused to get one of your shiny new macs, because anyone who knows squat about computers either runs linux or a microsoft OS! Surprise!
One of the timgs people don't rewlaize about VISTA was it was devolped over 7 years as a project called longhorn. Microsoft does not devolpe operating systems in a year and dump them on the market. What they do is make a operating sysytem that runs on a specfic hardware platform like dell or hp . I agree with one posting the first release of VISTA was on underpoered machines. But the same thing happed with XP.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI feel some people like to gripe about microsoft prodcuts because they fell cool about it. I am just suprized they can devolp product that work as WELL as they do and at the PRICE they charge with out giving control over to some programer. In the past computers depended on programers who understood all they mysteries of the computer you therefore were at the mercy of the programmer. Micsoft broke that dominace remember DOS and devices driver IRQs etc. Windows forced a standardization of they way software should interact with out a need experect to understand its complexties. This is both good and bad.This has wiped out the need for craft in Inforamtion Technology. It also has made ubious the need for ocmputers but has driver compietier out of business. As a sole monoploy were are at the mercy of what they deem as necessary and all the feature they add or subtract.
Mac is the most overpriced and underperforming OS out there, and the fact that it is not sold as a standalone OS reaffirms that statement. It's no wonder your IT department refused to get one of your shiny new macs, because anyone who knows squat about computers either runs linux or a microsoft OS! Surprise!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBzzt. Try again smarty. Define "overpriced". For us it was cheaper, and well worth the miniscule up front price difference. It isn't sold as a standalone OS because it is written specifically for their own hardware configurations. It actually benchmarks out faster than our PCs did, and we've all but eliminated downtime. Our IT department were the first ones to get macs. Our (product) engineering department didn't get them because they use some specialized software that only runs on windows, and while it actually ran faster on a Mac running windows via Virtual Machine, the license wouldn't stick due to a system clock discrepancy in VMware.
So, wrong on all accounts.
I was pretty anti-mac before we switched, and shared a lot of these common misconceptions.
You are clearly a loud and proud Vista fan though, one of as far as I can tell, a very tiny minority. So I don't expect you're looking at anything with a rational, open mind.
It seems to me that the big problem with Vista is that it is not practical for intallation as an upgrade. I tried to install it on a four month old computer that fit all of the specs that were said to be required, and it was a total disaster. I had to wipe it clean and go back to XP, just to get the computer to work at all. I spent many hours with MS techs trying to get it to work, and they had no idea how to fix it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat the MS techs told me, while bantering on the phone, was that it was not a good idea to try to install Vista except at the factory, on brand new equipment, because MS never worked well for the first two years of a new program.
Every time microsoft comes out with a new operating system I buy a new computer to run it so I have not had any problems with any of the operating systems. I'm currently on my Vista computer and I have not had any problems whatsoever with it. And thanks to Fred Somers whose comment mentioned how the first Windows system was good. I still have Win31 running on an old computer and I still think it was a great operating system.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvery time Microsoft comes out with a new operating system I buy a new computer to run it so I haven't had any problem whatsoever with any of the operating systems. I agree with the commenter who mentioned that even the original operating system ran well. I still have Win31 running on an old computer and I still love it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHoly smoke, the Vista bashing is getting OLD! Sure, Microsoft goofed on the UAC and hardware requirements, but Vista is still the most secure and stable version of Windows currently available. Definitely the best choice for businesses.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI always love fighting over the internet... so utterly pointless but so delightfully satisfying :D
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo Mr. hotblack who arrogantly claims Mac superiority and price reduction over PC, you seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of how a computer actually performs. It's not the OS which determines your general system performance, but the hardware itself (processor, RAM, etc). I'm somewhat bamboozled how you can spend 5,000 to 15,000 dollars on a computer, considering that I build my own top of the line system for under a thousand dollars, easy. Right now I'm sporting an intel Q6600 quad core processor with four gigs of ram clocked at 1066 mHz. Combined with an EVGA 8800 GT video card, five terabytes of hard drive capacity, and a spiffy looking case, I'm astounded at anyone who can manage to spend anything more than 1,500, and still receive a crap system. But then I realize that you're working for a bungling, oversized, and embarrassingly inefficient corporate entity, and then your dilemma becomes quite clear. It's not the computers which are costing you so much, but the plethora of unnecessary bureaucracy and dabbling fools who insist on becoming involved in the decision to purchase new machines instead of simply letting your IT department upgrade the ones you already have... oh wait, I forgot, you CAN'T upgrade a mac. You have to buy a whole NEW Mac... People like you are a prime example why a business degree is generally considered to be such a worthless and easy major. :)
I will admit that I have a slight MS bias, but don't get me wrong, nearly every popular version of linux gives substantial performance gains in CPU utilization and gross performance in comparison to every other OS available. However, compatibility is somewhat of an issue with most popular programs, so, it's out of the running for most people, myself included.
Hi think vistais totally useless. It would not let Arcmap from ERSI, work. ERSI had to make changes to "their" system. I know, I had to build a computer to run Arcmap. It came with vista which had to removed and WIN XP installed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo Win 7 just Win XP fluffed up and we have to pay all over agian???
Tony
Yup, Windows 7 is the vista kernel with a few visual tweaks and a much less annoying user account control. Essentially, it's the same thing as Vista, but it has a new name and a brand new release, so people won't associate any bad connotations towards it like they did Vista.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this