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John C wrote: The debate is over, let it go people and ask yourself if you are a true professional Windows developer or a ranting child who would be better off shambling over to Linux and taking your mindless hatred to SlashDot instead.
I answered the poll as an end-user trying to Get Things Done, not as a developer (the poll does say "friends and family.")
As an end user, it is crap. Windows 7 looks like the right direction though.
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Visual Studio 2008 on my Vista machine runs ridiculously slowly and the screen layout gets messed up all the time (I have to minimise it and maximise it to get it back to normal)
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According to the FAQ of the Usenet group alt.sysadmin.recovery (ages ago, I don't know if it's still the same), all operating systems suck and they do so proportionally to the amount of actual work you have to do using them. In my mind, this more or less covers it, even though the ASR FAQ goes on to do a (meaningless, in my opinion) assignment of "objective" baseline suckosity values to various specific OSes.
Another factor is specific to version/flavour differences - such as switching from BSD Unix to AT&T Unix (which I did in the mid-80s if I remember correctly) or from XP to Vista. There, you're forced to find new ways to do familiar things all the time, which compounds the suckosity. Again, it's meaningless to compare the versions objectively - you will invariably prefer the one you're used to, until you've gotten enough used to the other one to tip the scales.
Personally, I'm adopting Vista and WS2008 at about the same rate as I did XP and WS2003 (maybe a little bit faster due to the fact that it's not as much ahead of the hardware specs as XP once was - XP was truly a performance pig even on new machines back when it was new), but I find myself annoyed at least hourly by having to look in other directions than I'm used to. Once I'm retrained on some task, though, the new way is usually better - at least slightly so. The new management interface in IIS7 made me furious a month ago but now I prefer it over IIS6. The little detail that everything that isn't default is shown in bold in the settings sheets is such a timesaver!
Peter the small turnip
(1) It Has To Work. --RFC 1925[^]
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I tried them all Mac, Windows, Linux and it's true: they all suck, but some suck more than others. I consider Windows XP to be "the path of least resistance". In other words, it's easier to do what you need to do using XP than any other OS.
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ed welch wrote: In other words, it's easier to do what you need to do using XP than any other OS.
I've been a System Manager on several OpenVMS systems and I would not ever change places with a Windows Administrator; just the thought of having to manage user accounts without a command-line interface makes me cringe. 
There are tasks for which a GUI is a good choice, but there are also many tasks for which a command-line is vastly superior.
And I never had carpal tunnel syndrome until I had to use a mouse all day.
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PIEBALDconsult wrote: There are tasks for which a GUI is a good choice, but there are also many tasks for which a command-line is vastly superior.
Which is why every serious Windows administrator does all user account management stuff from the command line. Active Directory is quite rich (perhaps too rich, there is too much to choose from) in command line tools. And scripting API:s for that matter. I have customers who have web apps do all the account management, driven by hire&fire people using wizards (it is always attractive to move the actual work out of the IT department).
Just don't overlook the "Windows Support Tools" on the server CD, though - they don't install by default...
Peter the small turnip
(1) It Has To Work. --RFC 1925[^]
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OpenVMS doesn't. 
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I bought my daughters PC just after XP came out. The Hard drive is full, and it only has USB 1.1. So I bought her a new Vista machine. It was hard to get it to do what I wanted, like connect to the internet.
Finially I had a "Boot up" race. The old cluttered XP system booted faster than the new, clean Vista system. I took back the "Vista Compliant" system and she's getting a Mac for Christmas.
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Wow. Not my experience.
I have XP running on a souped-up 3.2GHZ Pentium IV machine that I've had for about 3 years. Recently, I purchased a lower-end Acer laptop with 2G memory. Admittedly, it has a dual-core cpu at 1.8GHz.... Anyway, the Vista machine boots MUCH faster than the XP machine. I'm usually surfing the web on the Visa machine before the XP machine even gets to the login screen.... FWIW. They're both slow, though.... Let's just go back to DOS. Took less than 15 seconds to boot 
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Owen37 wrote: FWIW. They're both slow, though.... Let's just go back to DOS. Took less than 15 seconds to boot
I use Linux at home and it makes me frustrated at how slow Windows boots up. But it does take up to 30 seconds.
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Ever tried running windows 3.1 on a modern pc? It boots in less than 1 second from the dos prompt.
John
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Just for grins I loaded DOS 6.1 on a AMD Sempron 2800 last year. You had the answer before the enter key was all the way down! Vista on my AMD 64-bit single 3800 w/2GB memory boots faster than XP on my AMD 5400 64-bit dual w/ 4GB memory. Of course, XP can only use 3.5 GB memory and doesn't care about the second core or 64-bit architecture. The XP machine is scheduled for a Vista load soon.
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John M. Drescher wrote: running windows 3.1 on a modern pc
Sounds like fun! Does it still crash every 30 minutes and lock up DOS like the good old days?
"A Journey of a Thousand Rest Stops Begins with a Single Movement"
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John M. Drescher wrote: Ever tried running windows 3.1 on a modern pc? It boots in less than 1 second from the dos prompt.
How does bloat justify more bloat?
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Jeremy Falcon wrote: How does bloat justify more bloat?
More features and pretty GUI elements drive sales. Also hardware companies certainly do not want Microsoft creating efficient code.
John
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Option 2: I usually discuss the pros and cons of each OS in a balanced manner
Option 3: I usually agree that Vista is crap You can take a balanced view and come to the conclusion (and agree) that Vista is crap.
On the other hand, if option 3 had read I usually argue that Vista is crap, like #1, it would have been better.
Did Chris make a subtle distinction while wording the poll, or did he just make a typo? 
Cheers,
Vıkram.
"You idiot British surprise me that your generators which grew up after Mid 50s had no brain at all." - Adnan Siddiqi.
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All four are compatible; the poll should allow multiple selections.
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I dual-boot Vista & XP until SP1 came out. A month or two after that took XP off my machine. Now I am running Vista Ultimate 64bit and haven't found a program that could not run it. All my crashes (seldom) are related to one program which also crashes XP and OSX. I find XP painful to use at work. Reminds me of Windows 98.
I use this computer for gaming and coding so its a pretty hefty PC. Just bought the nVidia GTX260.
David
Vista user for 2 years+ now.
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Hi,
I run several instances of Visual Studio at a time on Vista boxes, works GREAT. Funny how XP systems needs to be rebooted every so often.
Note been running Vista for I guess over a 1 and 1/2, don't want to go back to XP!!!
All the machines here run Vista!
Keith
Keith
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You know, between my home and office, I work with four different machines.
My office desktop runs XP SP3 (P4 3.0 GHz) - works fine, does everything I need, fairly stable.
At home, I have a PC I built myself (AMD 64 x2) that runs Vista Ultimate SP1 - works fine, does everything I need, more stable than the work PC. And, it's been running Vista since the beta release without a single problem.
My work laptop has Vista SP1, and it sucks. Why? Because it's an outdated piece of crap with a 1.6 GHz P4 processor and a hard drive powered by squirrels in a wheel.
My wife's laptop is a <$500.00 job (AMD 64 x2) from Walmart running Vista - and it runs circles around my work machine (compile time in VStudio about half that of my work box).
Sorry to all you Vista haters out there, but both XP and Vista are good OS's in my book. It's hardware that makes or breaks the experience.
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I run XP with the latest SP on my work laptop (w/ 2 GB of RAM and an Intel Core 2 Duo processor). I only hibernate it when I go to and from work. I reboot it only about once every month or so. It runs great! I RARELY have anything crash on it. I usually have it loaded up with ColdFusion, IIS, SQL Server 2005 Developer, Eclipse and IE 6 all running at the same time as well. It is solid as a rock.
I have also tried out Vista (Business at work and Ultimate at home). I found that the performance of Vista is HIGHLY dependent on the hardware it is running on. I have no problems or complaints with the new interface but don't see any added value in it. XP works just fine for me and will acceptably with less hardware and so far there is no software that I need that runs on Vista and NOT on XP so I find no reason to upgrade.
--Stewart
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rdskill wrote: Just bought the nVidia GTX260.
dual 280's here.
_________________________
Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau.
Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
John Andrew Holmes "It is well to remember that the entire universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others."
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This is a poll that leaves me option-checkless.
I usually argue about lipstick on a pig, not operating systems.
I usually discuss pros and cons when I'm flat on my face, or up against the wall.
I ask Joe the Plumber whether something is crap.
I abandon all arguments at the strictly-anonymous orphan drop-off revolving window at the organ-transplant bingo games run by the Sisters of St. Surplus.
Vista may be the cat's meow for some people, yawn, it may be the disappearing grin of the Cheshire cat for others, yawn ...
It is hard to use for an old dog like me who has developed certain habits in the way he scratches his fleas.
woof, Bill
"The greater the social and cultural distances between people, the more magical the light that can spring from their contact." Milan Kundera in Testaments Trahis
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I am trialing Vista at home with an XP SP3 disc close to hand, so far it has lost my internet connection for 4 days and stopped streaming media to my PS3...but its sooo pretty.
I'd say for non techies at home it is OK, wouldn't recommend it for development or business use - thats why I VPN into my work PC for any dev work
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Maybe you forgot to pay your ISP. 
By the way, how do you vpn without your internet connection?
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