Windows Vista

Sm0ke

hello all,

I am buying a new comp decided to go with Dell just for the finance more than anything else and I was wondering, what are the major problems with Windows Vista? I know my office is currently refusing to upgrade to vista and I've heard alot of stuff wont work with it? is it hard to Downgrade it to a Windows XP version or will i be stuck with Vista once I get it?


woot they moved it for me

Capt'n Midnight

If you buy a Business copy of VISTA your license allows you to downgrade to XP PRO

If you buy a home version you can't downgrade and would have to buy an XP license


As for downgrade, you can't. You have to install a clean version of XP after you get all the drivers.

godtabh

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

If you buy a Business copy of VISTA your license allows you to downgrade to XP PRO

If you buy a home version you can't downgrade and would have to buy an XP license


As for downgrade, you can't. You have to install a clean version of XP after you get all the drivers.

If you upgrade from XP to vista you can downgrade back to XP.

Give Vista a try. I like it.

Runs better than XP for me.

Irish Wolf

kearnsr wrote:

If you upgrade from XP to vista you can downgrade back to XP.

Give Vista a try. I like it.

Runs better than XP for me.

Which version of it are you running kearnsr? Home/Business/Ultimate? Did you have any problems installing any older software?

Apologies for the semi-hijack OP.. hopefully these questions may be relevant for you as well..

mathias

Been running Vista home premium 32 bit since release , it had problems at the start , but its fine now. It will run anything Ive thrown at it lately.

Im certainly happy enough with it and wouldnt go back at this stage.

Most of the apps it had issues with have been patched and the only things Ive had problems with lately are some very old games. ( circa 2001 )

Do you have any particular programs in mind ? I may be able to tell you.

Irish Wolf

Thanks Mathias.. nothing in particular in mind - but a lot of the reviews I've read about the home edition were pretty down on it.. although, the ultimate edition got a fairly general thumbs up..

Guess I should check any "critical" software is patched for Vista first..

GrootWitBaas

Just a bit of information that might be good to all. I got Windows Vista X64 Home premium, and also got home basic for the second pc, but had lots of problems on home basic until u upgraded it to home premium.

Now on my own pc I’m running x64 and in the beginning i were a slight bit annoyed with it, as my £300 printer did not work (and won't according to HP & Microsoft), had to get a "new" webcam and so on, but at this state I’m frustrated if I need to do something on windows xp, as I grew very fond of Vista.

some of it is only cosmetic, but I must say I have better performance out of my pc at this stage as with xp (yes I still run a dual boot xp just in case)

I'll recommend vista to most, but i also hear most people warning every one about it. Just make sure all the hardware is vista compatible, or build for vista and you should be fine.

O and i do advice to stay well away from the home basic, as there is no media player (yea sure you can bypass that bit, but it's a hassle) and some other options. I recommend for most home use at least Home premium, and chances are you'll never look back ..... :rolleyes:



[MOD EDIT] Removed black txt as it can't be read on Cloud theme...which I use

zoe

GrootWitBaas wrote:

O and i do advice to stay well away from the home basic, as there is no media player (yea sure you can bypass that bit, but it's a hassle) and some other options.

With the Dell Vostro desktops that are on offer at the moment they come with either;

Windows Vista™ Business
Windows Vista™ Ultimate
Genuine Windows XP Professional

I don't think the Vista Business has a media player. Is there any free software available which is similar to the media player?

Does the Windows XP Professional have a media player?

Creamy Goodness

buisness comes with media player afaik just doesn't come with media center.

xp pro definitely has a media player, no media center though.

the_syco

If you get Vista, ensure you have 1GB of RAM, minimum. 512MB for vista is like 256MB with XP. It'll run, but that's about it.

zoe

Cremo wrote:

buisness comes with media player afaik just doesn't come with media center.

xp pro definitely has a media player, no media center though.

Ah right, is that what it is. Thanks for that.

What does the media centre do?

the_syco wrote:

If you get Vista, ensure you have 1GB of RAM, minimum. 512MB for vista is like 256MB with XP. It'll run, but that's about it.

I realise some think Vista is slower than XP, though if I was getting a minimum of 1GB of RAM (perhaps 2GB RAM) and I wanted to keep the PC for at least four years, would you have any preference on either Windows Vista Business or Windows XP Professional?

Jonathan

zoe wrote:

With the Dell Vostro desktops that are on offer at the moment they come with either;

Windows Vista™ Business
Windows Vista™ Ultimate
Genuine Windows XP Professional

I don't think the Vista Business has a media player. Is there any free software available which is similar to the media player?

Does the Windows XP Professional have a media player?

It sounds like you want Home Premium but it is not an option on the website.

It is possible to get Vista Home Premium on a Vostro 200. Mine arrived last night, and I'm very pleased with the price I paid for what I got. Just ring up the sales line repeatedly until you find a salesperson that is not incompetent and will not say that the PC is not powerful enough for Home Premium

zoe

jmccrohan wrote:

It sounds like you want Home Premium but it is not an option on the website.

It is possible to get Vista Home Premium on a Vostro 200. Mine arrived last night, and I'm very pleased with the price I paid for what I got. Just ring up the sales line repeatedly until you find a salesperson that is not incompetent and will not say that the PC is not powerful enough for Home Premium

Thanks for that

Did it cost any more to have Vista Home Premium on a Vostro 200 compared to Windows Vista Business or Windows XP Professional (which both cost the same price on Vostro)?

Also, what Gb of RAM did you get for Vista?

Jonathan

zoe wrote:

Thanks for that

Did it cost any more to have Vista Home Premium on a Vostro 200 compared to Windows Vista Business or Windows XP Professional (which both cost the same price on Vostro)?

Also, what Gb of RAM did you get for Vista?

It costs less than Vista Business. Its seems dell only let you put it on if they have an option to have home basic on the pc. It costs €30+vat on top of home basic. It works out about €40+vat cheaper than Vista Business iirc.

I got 2gb of ram. The Vostro has 4memory slots so I would get what ever comes with the pc (lowest price) and upgrade yourself for much cheaper. That way you get what ever dell give you + what ever you add yourself for the same price or even cheaper as you would be paying dell to give you just what you bought yourself.

Man i messed that last line up.... I hope you know what im trying to say.

CptSternn

Sm0ke wrote:

hello all,

I am buying a new comp decided to go with Dell just for the finance more than anything else and I was wondering, what are the major problems with Windows Vista? I know my office is currently refusing to upgrade to vista and I've heard alot of stuff wont work with it? is it hard to Downgrade it to a Windows XP version or will i be stuck with Vista once I get it?

Vista is a step above XP. The big issue which you must also take into consideration is the fact that in 2008, Microsoft is retiring XP. That means no more security updates, fixes, or patches.

If you choose XP, then at some point in the future you will have to upgrade, else you will find your computer susceptible to all the new viruses, attacks, and a cadre of other hacking techniques in 2008.

Might as well go ahead now and do it, this way it doesn't cost you anything.

People fought change with each OS release. Windows 3.11, Windows 95, Windows ME, Windows 98, etc. This is nothing new.

That being said how many offices are running Windows 3.11 these days? Needless to say if you want to continue to use your computer with the latest software and websites, you have to keep upgrading the OS.

If you upgrade now, you can at least get the learning curve out of the way and be ahead of the game.

You don't want to be the guy in the office running Windows 95 on his 486 with 4 megs of RAM who complains because he can't open any Excel files that aren't compatible with Office2000.

Stephen

They won't be ending support for XP as early as 2008, they're only making XP licences no longer available in '08.

zoe

Thanks jmccrohan

jmccrohan wrote:

It costs less than Vista Business. Its seems dell only let you put it on if they have an option to have home basic on the pc. It costs €30+vat on top of home basic. It works out about €40+vat cheaper than Vista Business iirc.

With the Vostro 200 MT ( D08V02) there is no Home Basic option available so I suppose they probably wouldn't allow Vista Home Premium on it...?
http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=ie&l=en&cs=iedhs1&kc=&oc=d08v02

jmccrohan wrote:

I got 2gb of ram. The Vostro has 4memory slots so I would get what ever comes with the pc (lowest price) and upgrade yourself for much cheaper.

The cheapest RAM with this PC is 1024MB which is 2x512MB.

To bring it it up to 2048MB [ 2x1024 ] costs an extra € 72.60

What do you think about this extra price? Is it possible to purchase this extra RAM elsewhere at less than €72.60 ? I'd be concerned about purchasing the correct RAM which actually fits the PC.

chump

vista business on a dell pc here...

runs very sweetly and I really like vista

and get RocketDock for it too, nice

Jonathan

zoe wrote:

With the Vostro 200 MT ( D08V02) there is no Home Basic option available so I suppose they probably wouldn't allow Vista Home Premium on it...?
http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=ie&l=en&cs=iedhs1&kc=&oc=d08v02

Humm... thats odd.. it was an option when i was buying the pc. They must have changed it since I ordered mine. I remember the salesman saying that he couldnt give any discounts when i was haggling because dell were actually making a loss on my system... maybe thats why they changed it.

It all just depends how badly you need the home premium features over business features.

With business you loose the movie maker and Dvd authoring software (dont worry you can still burn dvds, Vista HP just has software to do it all for you. ease of use really) and the media centre software - useless in my opinion.


Best thing to do is to just keep ringing up and asking for it. And dont take no for an answer. Say that it was previously available so therefore it must be an option. oh yea and if they use the argument that you need a Viiv processor to use Home Premium just laugh and say so you dont. Vista Ultimate (a superset of both home premium and business) is an option so then Home Premium must run on it if something that contains everthing that HP has plus more also runs on it!!!

zoe wrote:

The cheapest RAM with this PC is 1024MB which is 2x512MB.

To bring it it up to 2048MB [ 2x1024 ] costs an extra € 72.60

What do you think about this extra price? Is it possible to purchase this extra RAM elsewhere at less than €72.60 ? I'd be concerned about purchasing the correct RAM which actually fits the PC.

If you were to get the 1gb from dell you could get this from kompett. this would give you 2gb for €46 or better still, get this for €89 and then have 3gb which is loads! (more or less the max that vista can address, i think its 3.2gb iirc)

But again it is hassle so its actually not a bad price from dell at all really considering you have to pay shipping from komplett aswell.

zoe

jmccrohan wrote:

It costs less than Vista Business. Its seems dell only let you put it on if they have an option to have home basic on the pc. It costs €30+vat on top of home basic. It works out about €40+vat cheaper than Vista Business iirc.

Do you mean Home Premium costs less than Vista Business?

I checked about the Vostro 200MT D08V02 and they informed me I could have Home Premium though I was informed Home Premium would be about €38 more expensive than Vista Business.

The salesman said Home Premium is a more expensive than Vista Business.

ethernet

zoe wrote:

Do you mean Home Premium costs less than Vista Business? ...

Is sure does. As the features increase, so do the prices: Home Basic --> Home Premium --> Business --> Enterprise --> Ultimate

The salesman said Home Premium is a more expensive than Vista Business.

I guess the cost of upgrades on a machine would vary.

zoe

Thanks ethernet

In both cases it was the same PC with same spec.

The one with Vista Business was one price, but when I enquired about having Vista Home Premium instead I was told as Home Premium is a better product than Vista Business the total price would increase by about €38..!