Antilles Posted September 1, 2007 Share Posted September 1, 2007 After a defrag program I used about a month ago completely wiped my hard-drive (I know..crazy huh?) I saw an opportunity to give Vista Ultimate a try and to be honest I was more pleasantly surprised than I imagined considering my machine is getting on a bit, still running P4 1.8Ghz with 512 Ram and a GeForce 6600GT 128MB card it gives me a 2.4 Performance score...or whatever they call it, experience points or something. It even ran reasonably well with Aero Glass and Flip 3D running but as always I do prefer to use Vista Smoker when Im about to use Photoshop or run a modern 3D game like Oblivion to get what I can out of it. Theres only a small handful of apps and games that I use that Ive had some difficulty running but have managed to overcome any probs by simply Googling for help. However, theres always a flipside and I was gutted to find that my Creative Soundblaster Live 5.1 hardware wasnt even recognised in Device Manager so therefore had to resort to a 3rd party driver to get my amp to pump out the sound correctly, the initial drivers on the CD i still had since 2001 worked ok and it was recognised after installing but the sound was wrong, all echoey and such and Ive no idea why Creative or even MS for that matter refuse to release what Im sure would be a simple fix for the ageing sound system, after all it cost me a pretty penny just 6 years ago, why should I scrap it for a new sound system just cause they think I should. If I frk out several hundred quid for a surround sound system for the PC Id expect some support even a few years down the line, or are they saying its not worth keeping after so long, its ridiculous. If I do need another sound system, Creative will have to sing for my money. Any recommendations from you guys for a nice PC sound card/speaker setup would be welcomed. (non Creative preferably..screw em) Anyway back to Vista, all is running well once Ive had my little fiddle around with tweaks and Black Vipers Service Configs and Im more than happy, if anyone is having doubts about the OS I can assure you its not as bad as a lot of blogs/forums are saying. I still like XP but Ive really gotten used to Vista already and Im sure that SP1 final will be finished soon, Im not risking the beta! For now it actually gets an 8/10 for its coolness the other 2 points I deducted for the problems I encountered, if all was well with those itd sure get a 9.9, maybe 10 out of 10! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TetsuoShima Posted September 1, 2007 Share Posted September 1, 2007 It's not just Creative's fault really, MS totally changed the way sound works in vista, there no longer is integrated support for hardware accelerated audio and such, so they have to use very roundabout ways of getting theri products to work, it took them about 6 months just to release a decent driver for the Soundblaster Audigy. Since the Live is EOL for a couple of years allready, I wouldn't expect them to ever release an updated driver for that one (btw, if you want the full audigy vista driver functionality, you even have to pay to get them, they are distributed for free for old cards). At this point, for Vista there still is some benefit to buying a Creative Soundblaster soundcard (slightly better sound quality, some acceleration via OpenAL), however, if you buy a good quality motherboard these day, the soundquality is allready very high compared to the old days, so you'd have to be a real audiophile (or have too much money in excess) to buy a seperate sound card. Buying a high end sound card for you current setup, I'd strongly recommend against: 1. pci slot is going down and in a while will be no more (so also no more support) 2. your computer does not have a pcie slot (and the supply is pcie soundcards is very limited) So if you pay 50-100 (or more?) pounds for a new soundcard now, I can tell you that in 4 years it will be pretty much useless... (if you're complaining about lack of driver support after 6 years, then I'm sure you'd hate lack of hardware support (and hence software also) after 4 years even more) If you do want to buy an add-in soundcard at this point, buy a low end el-cheapo one that just fits your lowest needs and when you upgrade your computer, buy one with a good motherboard that has a good onboard audio chip, I can assure you that those good audio chips on motherboards nowadays (if they are implemented correctly), give better sound then your Soundblaster Live did/does! If you are not satisfoed at that point, you can allways upgrade to a pcie soundcard at that point, buying a high end pci soundcard now, is not a good idea, if you don't have too much money to spare. You cannot currently upgrade your motherboard to a new and recent version and keep your ram, processor and graphics card, so if you do that, you'd need to buy a whole new computer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tinned_Tuna Posted September 8, 2007 Share Posted September 8, 2007 Nope I tried the beta and disliked it as much, if not more than most other Windows versions. I put Ubuntu back on the machine that had it on when the beta license ran out. (Also, as a note, the machine was a gaming machine built in 2003 or 2004, but the exact specs fail me). For me, Windows of any sort just doesn't push my buttons. I find the way it's built to be illogical and it frustrates me that there's no decent command line interface without messing around loads, I like (on my Linux machines) to just be able to hit Ctrl-Alt-F1 and be able to get a new tty login, and then to use screen to have all sorts going on... it's just awesome. Then, you can install (or more likely, just turn it on) SSH so that you can easily & securely get back to your machine remotely. Personally, Linux & Mac is just more efficient, but I have tried Vista and it wasn't for me. (I know my boss put it on his machine and is hating the thing, lol, and he's a big MS fan) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rara Avis Posted September 11, 2007 Share Posted September 11, 2007 Ditto on the beta. Damn memory hog as well! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chiggy Posted September 12, 2007 Share Posted September 12, 2007 Sadly there will be no escape for me when it comes to Vista. Nearly all of the off the shelf machines are being shipped with it. The same can be said about the machines that are bought in by businesses, all shipped with Vista. So as a wannabe tehnician there is no escape, its a case of learn it or die :-\ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ulysses Posted September 12, 2007 Share Posted September 12, 2007 I have vista on my system but I have partitioned my hard drive and have XP on one halve and Vista on the other halve. But I tend to mainly use XP. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chiggy Posted September 13, 2007 Share Posted September 13, 2007 Did you install Vista first or XP? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Megalith Posted September 13, 2007 Share Posted September 13, 2007 worse thing about vista imo is the explorer interface (prefer up too breadcrumbs tbh) has a dual boot system too ubuntu/XP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ulysses Posted September 13, 2007 Share Posted September 13, 2007 Did you install Vista first or XP? erm xp first then Vista Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phabianh20 Posted September 13, 2007 Share Posted September 13, 2007 I'm using it on my media box. I think it has potential, but I am far from putting it on all my windows machines. You have to make sure you have the latest drivers for everything. Its definitely a memory hog with its new theme. Some days it seems more like a public beta test than a real release. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Antilles Posted September 30, 2007 Author Share Posted September 30, 2007 Well, Ive had my fun with it for the time being. Ive gone back to XP SP2. After the sound hardware problem and a few of my apps/games that just wont run, especially my new latest version of Driving Test Success DVD being reported as 'counterfeit' which Id only just purchased from Morrisons (Safeway) an hour earlier, it worked on my sis-in-laws XP machine fine. Just as happy to be running XP and If I wanted I could just use an XP-Vista Makeover if I wanted its theme. The next machine I buy will no doubt be Vista so Ill wait til then. I still like the OS, but its just got too many wee niggles right now! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chiggy Posted September 30, 2007 Share Posted September 30, 2007 If Microsoft admit that they will be re-releasing Vista.........then I see no point in buying it. I will wait. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ulysses Posted September 30, 2007 Share Posted September 30, 2007 My main issue as a gamer on a pc is DX10, I dont really like Mr gates and Microsoft FORCING me to pay £100 + so I can play any games which are DX10 only and not releasing DX10 for XP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kyran Posted October 1, 2007 Share Posted October 1, 2007 If Microsoft admit that they will be re-releasing Vista.........then I see no point in buying it. I will wait. I would have thought you would have the free one they give to computer students via the student portal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ulysses Posted October 1, 2007 Share Posted October 1, 2007 Why do students get it for free?? if the rest of us have to pay for it why should they be exempt! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chiggy Posted October 1, 2007 Share Posted October 1, 2007 I was never told about Vista through Student Portal. Shame I`m not a student anymore..........the Network + course I wanted to do this year was cancelled due to lack of interest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amnot Borg Posted October 1, 2007 Share Posted October 1, 2007 CISCO covers basically the same thing as Network+. Maybe there is some interest in that? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chiggy Posted October 2, 2007 Share Posted October 2, 2007 CiISCO costs 250 pounds per term. Its free to those who are in the ICT business.......but if your unemployed you pay the full price. :grr: I must say with great deals like this at my local college their not exactly encouraging learning in the area of ICT. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bbbb Posted November 17, 2007 Share Posted November 17, 2007 Vista is currently going through what XP went through when it came out. In time Vista will get better and hopefully worth buying. I have yet to buy into Vista because I know how bad XP is when it comes to older titles. I'm wondering, can you run Win98 on a new computer? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TFMF Posted November 17, 2007 Share Posted November 17, 2007 I seem to remember XP being a bit more of a hit than Vista, though. :thinking: Maybe I'm wrong though... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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