I sell quite a few Dell laptops to people in. When you go to PC w0rld or any other local computer shop and buy a new system you’ll find it comes pre-loaded with the new Windows Vista OS (operating system).
However this really kills the performance on a brand new laptop or desktop machine. My advice to all my customers is to “Upgrade to XP“. I offer this service as part of my sale when a new system is purchased.
There are many reasons that Vista is good but there are also many reasons why XP is still king. Vista is an embarrassment for Microsoft and it’s not the first time the software giant has offered a poor OS. Back in 1999 I believe Microsoft released Windows ME which was also a poor excuse for a new operating system. Built around Windows 98 core it had few improvements, just a some what glossy image. Sound familiar?
My own choice was Windows 98 and Windows 2000 at the time. However Windows 2000 was brand new and few software vendors supported desktop user applications. I had to learn the hard way!
Now there is a similar situation with Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. I’ve opted to try Windows Server 2008 as my new “power user” workstation OS. However I’m already learning from my mistakes.
I installed it on my system last night with somewhat ease. The new 8gigs of RAM in my system are now being seen and the quad core CPU I picked up from the U.S. on the cheap is doing the trick. However I have no Internet access. It turns out that very few wireless (wifi) cards are supported in the new Server 2008. This is mainly due to it being built around the Vista x64 core and all drivers have to be signed from Microsoft. This means that any hardware makers have to approach MS for driver signing prior to the hardware being compatible with Server 2008.
Anyways it looks like I’ll be under my house at some point hard wiring a connection to my modem ! As I’ve said before, it’s not a waste of time if you use the experience wisely.
Why the hell would you recommend people downgrade to XP on a vista compatible machine, and a machine already WITH vista on it ??
SP1 for vista is already out, and i think you;ll find theres not much software that “WONT” run on vista nowadays, buying a vista enabled machine, then buying an additional XP license is stupid.
Also i am sure selling if XP home is now defunct, as microsoft only support and sell it to business users and thats only until fourth quarter this year, when it’s most likely going to be pushed back till the “new” windows OS is out.
Trying to use a Server product, ie Server 2008 as a home machine, then complaining about it not supporting Wireless Cards, is nothing short of idiotic !! Its a SERVER product, therefore it’s designed for a SERVER, Servers don’t EVER tend to be wireless in any kind of live or business workplace.
For power users server 2008 actually makes a great desktop, most of the useless cruft is switched off by default, it runs quick and has many of the good things without a lot of the crap. XP still makes sense for people who typically buy shit low end laptops, vista performance on these is awful. By the time they need to upgrade, the next version of windows will be out.
funkydave,
Vista is only good if you have a good machine. Most laptop hard drives are 5400 RPM and vista really likes to thrash the HD with the super fetch feature.
Put XP on most laptops and you’ll notice a big boost in preformance. I currently have Vista installed on my main rig but thats a quad core, 8GB system with RAID 1 which can handle it.
Vista really does suck for the average user that just wants to surf the web.