Windows Vista vs XP?

What’s the story…

So I am about to buy a new PC. I am trying to decide whether to stick with XP, or try out Vista. I am leaning towards XP, since I know everything I need runs well with it… however I am wondering if Vista will eventually be the norm a year or two from now…

What do you guys think? Does anyone use n-Track with Vista? And do you think we will all be forced to eventually switch to it? Or not neccessarily…?

FWIW, I’d stick with XP.
Why give yourself more learning curve if you don’t need it?
There are guys using v3.x, doing work with it, and it’s suiting fine.
But I’ve become a convert of the “If it works, don’t fix it” school of thinking.

I can’t believe Microsoft is going to lead everyone by their nose!
Even though they already are… but if I do a new box, it’s going to stay XP at this point.
I should think keeping your OS current’d matter more for other PC activities, like surfing, sharing, etc.
Have a PC just for audio, and keep it XP.
If you’ve got this far, you’ve had enough learning curve!

Good luck trying to get a new box with XP. For most large volume stores with name brand (HP, Acer, etc.) you won’t have a choice. Everything is preloaded with Vista included and all the gobbly-gook that the manufacture adds for the ordinary home user.

The only other alternative is to build one yourself. Unfortunately the final cost will be more. Or you simply can fdisk, format and reload XP after you have bought the new box.

Paul

Here’s my big issue…

No matter what PC I buy… I have decided to reformat it once I get it, and install XP. However, I am buying a Dell and they offer either Vista or XP (Media Center Edition). So if I buy the Vista version… I can wipe it clean and install my older XP disc, and keep then have Vista if I ever need it… OR I can buy the XP Dell and get Media Center. So my choice really is… Vista (to use later maybe) or Media Center (to use now)…

You might want to do a quick forum search on XP Media Center; there have been problems reported from folks trying it. If there are Vista drivers for your sound card, you should be okay with the new OS, but I would check first, were I in the market for a new system…

Good luck!
'til next time;
tony w

Don’t believe I would go with the XP Media center, maybe the Vista route would be better, I am running Vista Home Premium here with nTrack 5 and no problems. Just waiting for the public release drivers for my sound card. Using the beta test drivers and they’re doing ok.

I’m using ver 5 with XP Media Centre (HP brand computer) and the Terratec EWS88MT soundcard with no problem whatsoever. That is a hard decision to make though…

I think I’m on record with my Vista woes (if not here then at another forum) but Vista will be the standard very shortly - no getting around that. If Vista drivers are available for all your gear then you’d likely be better off just biting the bullet and going with Vista now rather than changing over to Vista later when some program you want isn’t available for XP.

Hi Gents:

I wonder if somewhere down the road windows/Microsoft might take issue with registering a hard drive that had VISTA installed on it then the purchaser formats the drive to install another Operating System (XP or whatever) on that drive…
Then…
only to re-install VISTA again…



Could Microsoft treat something like that as an invalid installation?
AND…
Maybe, not register the re-installation of that Operating System ????


I’m presenting a pessimistic idea to this topic…







Bill…

Quote: (woxnerw @ Sep. 08 2007, 5:46 PM)

Hi Gents:

I wonder if somewhere down the road windows/Microsoft might take issue with registering a hard drive that had VISTA installed on it then the purchaser formats the drive to install another Operating System (XP or whatever) on that drive..
Then..
only to re-install VISTA again..



Could Microsoft treat something like that as an invalid installation?
AND..
Maybe, not register the re-installation of that Operating System ????


I'm presenting a pessimistic idea to this topic..







Bill..

Nope, not if the operating systems are legit. If you wipe the hard drive then there's nothing on there to conflict. There are some scenarios of upgrading withouth formating that aren't supported though...but I don't remember what they are.

As for not registering, you don't every have to register, by you do have to activate the OS to use it past a month (registering being sending in your name ands address and all that crap -- I don't and never have). I've reinstalled and activated many times (you do have to have copies of the OS for each machine), and only once have I had to call support to be able to activate, and that was for MS Office.

The root of the problem is still drivers. If you by a Dell with Vista preinstalled and you format and put WinXp on there, your going to have to round up WinXp drivers for the machine. Someone like Dell may or may not have WinXp drivers for the particular hardware that came installed on that machine (chipset drivers and anything special an OEM might do differently). These aren't drivers for soundcards that we might put in there, but drivers that are for THAT machine. When you build your own these would be on the motherboard disk.

The bottom line is drivers in virtually all cases.
Quote: (phoo @ Sep. 08 2007, 8:02 PM)

[quote=woxnerw,Sep. 08 2007, 5:46 PM]Hi Gents:

The root of the problem is still drivers. If you by a Dell with Vista preinstalled and you format and put WinXp on there, your going to have to round up WinXp drivers for the machine. Someone like Dell may or may not have WinXp drivers for the particular hardware that came installed on that machine (chipset drivers and anything special an OEM might do differently). These aren't drivers for soundcards that we might put in there, but drivers that are for THAT machine. When you build your own these would be on the motherboard disk.

The bottom line is drivers in virtually all cases.

So what you are saying is... if I build a Dell with Vista, but then wipe it clean and install XP.. I might run into problems with my motherboard being set-up just for Vista?

Hi phoo and Guys:
It was a few years ago now, the ones who were here then must remember that awful time when I was installing XP on this machine… I called India to authorize the operating system… Everything was fine, till somewhere along the “Build” I decided that I would begin/restart the build… I re-called India all with no problems… The re-build/re-starts continued several times till the call center guy told me he couldn’t authorize my copy of XP anymore… I had reached the limit of times that authorization permissions would take effect…

He suggested I call Microsoft Canada to explain the issue I had with my machine… and why he couldn’t re-authorize the build with the install codes I was using… I told the girl my story, there was a big long pause, then she gave me a set of codes that were entirely different from the “Code String” that I was used to seeing…

I’ve never had to call the Microsoft People sense, to get this Build authorized… On the other hand… I don’t want to have to rebuild this operating system again…

I see it as a vicious circle… You buy this computer and it works perfectly for two weeks/two months… Then you get some Malawi/Virus/Trojan that screws up your machine… If you can’t fix it yourself you get some shop to fix it, only to get it screwed up again… and so-on-and-so-on…

Bill…

Quote:

I might run into problems with my motherboard being set-up just for Vista?

You might run into problems finding drivers for hardware Dell (I'm just using Dell as an example) put in the machine or on the motherboard that Dell doesn't have anything but Vista drivers for. Since the machine was built by Dell for Vista they are under no obligation to supply WinXp drivers for it, unless they also sell the same machine with WinXp installed.

For example, Dell has put SoundBlaster Audigy 2 cards in some machines they sell, but those are OEM cards. While they are Creative cards they may be different from the cards Creative sells directly and may require special drivers that can be got only from Dell. I know this for a fact because I got on in my machine at work. It's so different than a full retail Audigy 2 that is has NO audio inputs and NO MIDI input or output external hardware support. It has full support for audio playback and onboard MIDI playback, but there is no hardware on the card to expose the audio inputs or any external MIDI devices. That stuff simply isn't wired on the card. Also, they aren't visible in software when using Dell's Audigy drivers. If I "upgrade" to the drivers from Creative's website I see them in software, but since they aren't wired on card there's no way to use them. This shows that they stuff is still on the chips. Dell shipped their own flavor of the drivers and craplets to hide these devices. This is only an example of OEM drivers being different. It's not any kind of swipe at Dell. It's just the way the companies do things.

Build your own and you won't have those kinds of issues. But, keep your eyes WIDE open for driver availability.

Bill, you've had a lot of problem with your machine(s) that most folks never run into fortunately. Generally there's no need to activate a machine until it's up and running. There's a full month of full use before Windows forces activation. Unfortunately, there are some things that can't be done until the machine is activated. The rule of thumb is to not activate until the machine is working like you want it. I reinstall machines from the ground up every few days in my day job and I never (or rarely) activate.
The only thing I've run into occasionally is getting some Windows Update fixes that won't install unless the machine has been activated.

Hi Again Gents:

Thanks for your reply phoo…


Back then and
while I was getting the XP operating system up-and-running and being eager and all, I never knew that authorizing the XP Build would become that big an issue…
If I knew then that Microsoft only allowed
say 4-6 authorizations per Install from the DISK I would have stayed away from authorizing the builds… to the very last moment. However, I don’t know if that would have helped me in my XP installations…
I’m not sure if I’ve gained anymore insight into this Operating System Matter…



I don’t know for sure…
and…
I don’t want to test fate…
but I may not get another Kick-at-the Can if I had to re-install this set-up and request another authorization…
Who Knows????



Recently, and it happened at about and during the time that the n-Track Board got spammed…
I got hit big-time with a Trojan/Virus…
I considered an operating system re-build…
It left this LAN and the machines almost useless…



In my opinion, of course, I don’t think you ever fully recover from that kind of HIT…
I think one can only say that your Virus Free for whatever number of days till another attack gets you…
Well…




At the moment and to get back to 100%, I’m struggling with 2-3 things with this setup…




The most serious of them was and I believe that this is fixed now…


Most guys that I know are able to check their VISA and Banking accounts with the computer(s) they connect to the Internet, with…
Well, I have that ability,
and I also buy mostly applications and software using my VISA Card on this machine… I don’t have any second thoughts about doing that, and whatever works…
O.K.




I don’t know how related this is…
but However, I was getting this mail in my “Inbox” …
It happened on a daily basis and went on for several days…
This mail from my Banking account asking me to update my IDs and Passwords and ALL, to ensure that I had continued access to my accounts while being “On-Line”…



Anyway, I knew this not to be “SO”, and I considered this to be a security threat…
I printed as much as I could see from the mail preferences and wrote all the data to a floppy and took it over the the local branch and showed it to the local security Guru at the Branch I do business with…
He was quite interested in all this data and said he would look after it…



I don’t get that kind of mail in my “Inbox” …
anymore… Who knows what he did with the data…
I don’t ask…


[EDIT]

More on this matter-and-issue…


I seem to be finding more and more secure mail that I know I should be getting in my “Inbox” in my Server’s Junk mail folder…
I am finding that to be kind of weird…
In fact…
before I got HIT It seemed to be the other way around…
I got plenty of junk mail in my “Inbox”… Is that something that I’m gonna have to get used to?



I’d like to know just where to look-and-find on this C Drive just where the data might be …
When you allow the request when you enter Passwords to open…
Lets say…
your password for opening the n-Track Forum…
to save typing it in the “log-on” fields all the time you
O.K. to allow-and-save your ID-and-Password for ease of logging on to the Board…

At the moment…
all of that stuff and entries seem to be corrupt and incorrect-and-all…
I’d like to be able to go in there and “EDIT/REMOVE” or “Re-Enter” my I.D.s and Passwords to make them correct…
Is that something that can be easily fixed
????

by somebody like me?
Should I even worry about it
????



The last issue I’d like to get behind me is…




With so many operating systems and boot drives I have on this LAN, it’s becoming a real headache to keep this LAN identifying the machines on this LAN…
It seems that every time I boot-up the setup to look at another machine’s drives through the LAN I find that I’m unable to “FIND” the machines on the LAN…
The I.P. Addresses don’t appear to re-new every time the LAN and machines come On-Line… Could this be Firewall related?



Is there something I need to pay attention to and configure to get this issue resolved??



It just never seems to stop…




Bill…

Bill you said -

“every time I boot-up the setup to look at another machine’s drives through the LAN I find that I’m unable to “FIND” the machines on the LAN…” -

look in MY COMPUTER on each PC and see if your drives still have SHARING activated -

COOKIES -in the last week this PC collected 152 cookies - these where 1st party cookies as i have 3rd party cookies blocked - if 3rd party cookies are accepted on your PC then there will be one (or more) cookie added for every advertisement that is on a web page - this averages out at 7, 3rd party cookies for every 1st party cookie - which means that unless you clean out your cookies your PC is a hive of little ETs all waiting to call home - well not everyone but a lot of them are tracking cookies that report your keystrokes back to a remote location -

you can clean them out by using the delete cookies option in TOOLS in internet explorer - but some cookies are smart, they do not go into IEs cookie folder -

i have said many times before that if you want a clean PC then you have to be prepared to put some time and money into it -

from all my years of working with PCs “SPYbot search and destroy” is the best (and its FREE) way of removing spyware but it does not do a complete job - to completely clean up your PC then you really have to invest in Evidence Eliminator - link below -

it is totally pointless keeping broken cookies on your PC - clean them out and start anew - the only thing you have to do after they are cleared out os to LOGON again to forums -

if you have passwords REMEMBERED for banking and credit card sites then its a wonder you have any money left - these are the prime target for SPYWARE they will have your passwords and banking details across to NIGERIA is a flash - COOKIES DEFEAT FIREWALLS and ANTI VIRUS SOFTWARE -

link to EE -

http://www.evidence-eliminator.com/


ALSO as you are not on broadband you do not need your firewall running when not online - so kill the firewall before trying to get across your network - if it works with the firewall OFF then look in the firewall prefs to overcome the problem -

Dr J

Hi Doc J:


I’ll have to check to preferences to see what cookies are being accepted here…
With that Panda removed, I’m quite vulnerable… I have to re-install it, I know…
The issue I’m discovering about it is, the browser resources it uses…
It’s tough on my dial-up and modem…
If I could streamline the browser launch I’d be more satisfied with it…
maybe…
Everything else with the setup here appears to be O.K.
I know without Panda looking at the Internet/browser the IE launch-and-browsing is quite fast and a real improvement compared to what it was before the Panda install…
I discovered there were two links in a file somewhere on the “C” Drive that needed to be removed…
I found them by running Spybot S&D and RegFix…
After those links were removed the Browser Took Off…
If I could some how configure Panda not to look so hard at Browser addresses I’d be Off-and-Running…




I’d say the boys over in Nigeria already have my banking numbers and know all about my accounts…
They gotta Big Check-Mark by my numbers…
It says…
Hey…
let that guy over there in “Bluenose Land” alone…
He’s doing the best he can… It can’t get any worse for him…
CAN…
IT…
????




Bill…