Anyone here had problems with Windows Vista?

[Memnoch]

I'm considering buying a new computer (laptop or desktop) and am not sure about Vista - I'm hearing some horror stories on review sites like CNET etc. Apparently some manufacturers are going back to putting Windows XP on their new machines until Microsoft sort it all out.

Anyone here use Vista and can comment?

[Bungleau]

I've been running Vista on my work laptop for over six months now. That machine isn't a gaming machine, so I can't make any comments about game playability

However, from a functionality standpoint, it's been good for me. I don't use the Aero interface (can you spell resource hog? I thought so...), and the only major issue I've had has been my printer. It's a multifunction HP, and HP doesn't have drivers (yet!) that fully support duplex printing. It's fine for straight printing, but not duplex. I did find someone at Microsoft who was handing out a fix for the duplex problem, and since implementing it, my problems (mostly) went away. There was one lingering problem with ACT!, but upgrading to the current version (as opposed to the ancient one I was running) took care of that problem.

I'd also upgraded to Office 2007, although the prior version of Office was working fine. Office 2007 has the ability to output to PDF, which eliminated a piece of software on my laptop

The only other annoying thing is how it thinks it will help me out. They've gone the other extreme direction in terms of security, and now I've got to remove many layers in order to be able to do certain things (like seeing certain directories, editing certain files, and so on). Granted, the *average* person should probably be kept away from those, but I'm not quite so average... except when I am

What are you looking to use it for?
All in all, it's been good.

[Dragonshadow]

I'm still on XP, but my boyfriend is running Vista. He seems to have had a few problems, but nothing too major.

[Jaradu]

Vista works great for me... I'm mostly either gaming or editing audio. On the rare occasion that I get an issue with a particular program, I can just run it in compatibility mode with Windows XP and that solves 99% of problems. For the other 1%, the developers release a patch to fix it.

[Trogdor]

At home? Vista for sure, it's an awesome OS. This is how I explain it to people:

Vista is like a new pair of shoes, it can be uncomfortable at first because its slightly different, but once you get settled in, you will never want to go back!

Considering support for XP will end eventually, there is no doubt you will end up with the OS eventually (assuming you decide to stay with Windows, but no doubt some "know it all" will enter this thread telling you to get away from Windows) so it couldn't hurt to jump in early and learn the ins and out's now.

The majority of the horror stories are from people with old hardware and incompatible drivers/applications. Which is the reasons why companies like Dell went back to supplying XP (The company I work for was one of many that made major complaints about being forced to go with Vista) so we ended up buying Vista machines and using Symantec Ghost or SMS to image XP back onto the machines.

All in all, a nice OS, with all the usual growing pains, the best thing you can do is judge it for yourself and don't listen to the Microsoft/Linux/Unix fanboys

[Chewbacca]

I got a new desktop a few months back with Vista home premium. The one problem I've had is very slow shut-down times. I found a few solutions on the interwebs, but havent tried any. Otherwise I find it quite a solid successor to XP so far.

[Variol (Farseer) Elmwood]

I'm surprised; I thought I was going to see more bashing. I still have XP and it's really all I need. I have heard several people have switched back though.

[Ilander]

Ubuntu 7.10 is fine for you if you're not a gamer...tried it recently, and I'm really impressed with it's usability, and compatibility...at least, if you're not running a ATI graphics card between the Radeon 9200 and the HD 2000 series.

Not that that is what the thread is about, but it's, I'm ready to say, finally a legitimate option.

Vista is fine, and while I don't intend to ever upgrade Hosscat's OS, my next system (who knows when that will happen!) will probably be a dual boot Vista and Ubuntu...one for open-source support, and "common" tasks, and the other for compatibility and gaming.

Unless they work out gaming in Linux in the next year.

[Spirits Reborn]

I used vista for awhile, its totally bogged my pc down. I bought a new one too- came preinstalled with vista. And Its slow, it will make a 2 gig ram computer feel like 512 . It was so slow. And some games arn't compatible with vista, like for some reason KOTOR wouldn't install for me on vista.

Driver problems are still there, (but most of them have drivers up for vista) so its managable. Its got a sweet gui, but that's mostly it. ITs basically XP with like alot of unnecessary gui upgrades.

I like to describe it as a brand new toy. You get really exicted by the awesome look, and you use it for a couple of weeks. But then you get used to the look, and notice that its a crappier toy than the one you "upgraded" from. So you go back to the older, more efficient toy.

[Ilander]

Oh, and there are major issues for NWN multiplayer (though that might be fixable via the windows xp-vista network patch).