I throw down the gauntlet to the "real" geeks.

[Xander]

Originally Posted by Athenian200

If it's any consolation, I'm not as into Linux now that I know how most of it works and have done most of the things I wanted to know I could do in it... and now mostly use Windows again, simply for the applications available. I just happen to use it still.

Reducing down to a nice tache are we

Originally Posted by sassafrassquatch

Vista seems to be perfectly fine under the hood I just hate what MS has done to the interface. I don't like having it rendered by the GPU, Windows Classic in Vista looks like ass, the menu bar belongs above the tool bar and the tool bar is now static and unchangeable. The Control Panel is completely disorganized and requires more clicks to do things than in XP. Aero looks like foggy plastic rather than glass and Segoe UI is illegible to my eyes, Tahoma or MS Sans Serif is ideal. The new icons are very pretty though.

Should you ever get stuck with it, consult the wizard that runs tweakguides. His guide should be able to lead you through some registry fixes if it's too bad as is.

I guess that's the Linux route coming in. Mind you least with Windows it's usually in the vein of making it look nice or work better rather than foundation stuff like network cards....

Originally Posted by sassafrassquatch

I kind of like the way KDE, Gnome, X11 and the other window managers look, my beef is more with the silly Open Source ideology and it's irrational hatred of commercial software. The best open source application available is Firefox and its code base is derived from Netscape which was commercially developed. I pirate Windows, MS Office and Photoshop so I could give a shit if my programs are "free as in speech."

Nooooooooo don't think like that!! I like the whole KDE environment and it's that son of a two headed muppet that keeps tempting me back to try again and again to get it to work!!! Don't do it!!! The dark side it is!!!

[Either that or grab a C book with it ]

[sassafrassquatch]

Originally Posted by Xander

Should you ever get stuck with it, consult the wizard that runs tweakguides. His guide should be able to lead you through some registry fixes if it's too bad as is.

I actually bought Vista a few months ago. I liked it at first but after a while it started grating on me. I tried messing with everything but I still hated it. Most of the things I have a problem with, like the organization of the control panel, are unchangeable. I also had a problem with my video card, it's a Radeon 9700 Pro which won't run if I use drivers newer than Catalyst 4.11. The Vista drivers are obviously newer so I bought a Radeon X1650 Pro AGP but when I try to play a game my computer crashes hard and reboots. I don't know if it's a defective card or what, though if it were defective I would expect it to not work at all.

XP 4 Life *throws gang signs*

[Xander]

Originally Posted by sassafrassquatch

I actually bought Vista a few months ago. I liked it at first but after a while it started grating on me. I tried messing with everything but I still hated it. Most of the things I have a problem with, like the organization of the control panel, are unchangeable.

XP 4 Life *throws gang signs*

64 or 32? I bet you're on 32bit... so old school. You'd best get some guys called something "dog" in that gang






64bit 4 eva!!!


That reminds me... 64 bit has been around for ages..... where the hell is 128bit or 256bit???

[spirilis]

Originally Posted by Xander

64bit 4 eva!!!


That reminds me... 64 bit has been around for ages..... where the hell is 128bit or 256bit???

It's in your butt!

Nah I'm pretty sure we'll be OK with 64-bit for a long, long time.

I'm personally thankful that AMD cooked up a reasonably cool 64-bit implementation (which Intel, of course, copied as EM64t since they weren't about to be shut out of the game...) and managed to toss in a marginal performance increase alongside it (in the form of larger and more plentiful registers).

Intel & HP's original idea, IA64 (Intel Itanium), SUCKED hard donkey bytes. Emphasis on the "SUCKED", "HARD", "DONKEY" and "BYTES." We still have three Dell PowerEdge 3250 Itanium boxes down at my workplace's datacenter and I feel like going all Office Space on them every time I see them. Thank god they're sitting on the floor unpowered.

[millerm277]

First, insight into me: I do some programming (I know VB6/VB.NET, Java, and C/C++.), and I've used all of the operating systems mentioned except OSX.

Linux (well, Ubuntu, SUSE and the like), takes a bit of getting used to how things work (For example: Packages/installing things, and the file system), however, most tasks aren't any more difficult than in Windows or the like. The issue comes when you get into some of the issues that require Terminal (like some free apps and such), then things get confusing, although if you follow directions it's not hard, just "scary".

Vista: Like XP, but shinier....and with a couple annoying problems, like the slowest file transfers I've seen, and some driver issues. Also, moving everything in the control panel around for no reason is annoying, as is having to go manually enable the real Admin account.

64-Bit: XP-64 is horrible, Vista-64, in the short time I used it, seemed fine. Support for it is still lacking though, and until it starts actually coming installed on machines, that won't change.

[Xander]

Originally Posted by spirilis

It's in your butt!

Nah I'm pretty sure we'll be OK with 64-bit for a long, long time.

I'm personally thankful that AMD cooked up a reasonably cool 64-bit implementation (which Intel, of course, copied as EM64t since they weren't about to be shut out of the game...) and managed to toss in a marginal performance increase alongside it (in the form of larger and more plentiful registers).

That's the annoying thing in my book... 64bit... supposed to be a large improvement. The only large improvement I've noticed is I can have more than 4Gb of memory plugged in and showing.... however since nothing uses that much on home computing (bar a few programs) what's the point?

Originally Posted by spirilis

Intel & HP's original idea, IA64 (Intel Itanium), SUCKED hard donkey bytes. Emphasis on the "SUCKED", "HARD", "DONKEY" and "BYTES."

That's okay.... just don't crunch them. Takes your teef out!!

Originally Posted by spirilis

We still have three Dell PowerEdge 3250 Itanium boxes down at my workplace's datacenter and I feel like going all Office Space on them every time I see them. Thank god they're sitting on the floor unpowered.

Ah the server side is something I've yet to sharpen my teeth on much. Maybe soon though... small crashes to big BOOMS!!!

They did call me Sirus for a while at work..

Originally Posted by millerm277

First, insight into me: I do some programming (I know VB6/VB.NET, Java, and C/C++.), and I've used all of the operating systems mentioned except OSX.

Linux (well, Ubuntu, SUSE and the like), takes a bit of getting used to how things work (For example: Packages/installing things, and the file system), however, most tasks aren't any more difficult than in Windows or the like. The issue comes when you get into some of the issues that require Terminal (like some free apps and such), then things get confusing, although if you follow directions it's not hard, just "scary".

True... tried to install flash player like a million times.... used the terminal...followed the instructions... nadda.

That's the crux of my issue with Linux... too many things are processed without adequate feedback.

Originally Posted by millerm277

Vista: Like XP, but shinier....and with a couple annoying problems, like the slowest file transfers I've seen, and some driver issues. Also, moving everything in the control panel around for no reason is annoying, as is having to go manually enable the real Admin account.

That's the most useful trick I ever picked up for Vista... they totally frown on how it undermines their security scheme but I am always of the opinion that security on my PC should be at my own damn option.

Personally I consider Vista to be enthusiasts software. You have to have the patience and some considerable knowledge to make it comfy as an OS... either that or not knowing the difference...

Originally Posted by millerm277

64-Bit: XP-64 is horrible, Vista-64, in the short time I used it, seemed fine. Support for it is still lacking though, and until it starts actually coming installed on machines, that won't change.

*Presses button marked "Nuclear attack" repeatedly....*

*...nothing happens*

*Camera switch to sticker saying "Powered by Vista"*


Well I accept that you have the right to your opinion about XP64.. you are entitled to have a different opinion to the facts and I shall restrain myself from becoming all high and mighty and correcting you...


You're just wrong.






(Oh and as a note, the laptop I bought in the states comes preinstalled with Vista x64 Home Premium... perhaps the future is coming???



about frickin time!!!!)

[spirilis]

Originally Posted by Xander

That's the annoying thing in my book... 64bit... supposed to be a large improvement. The only large improvement I've noticed is I can have more than 4Gb of memory plugged in and showing.... however since nothing uses that much on home computing (bar a few programs) what's the point?

64-bit is a little ahead of its time on the desktop right now but with a lot of folks buying desktops with 4GB RAM nowadays, that "time" is coming very soon. Once apps start using more than 4GB RAM, and folks buy 8+GB footprints, 64-bit will show its worth.

On the server-side, 64-bit is a freakin' godsend. I can't tell you how many apps we have at work which mysteriously stopped working, only to find out after some quick troubleshooting that the apps ran afoul of the 3GB per-process address space limit. Answer? Upgrade to 64-bit systems/OS.

I'm happy Linux got on the x86_64 64-bit bandwagon very early on, because it's given them more time to iron out some of the compatibility problems with having 32-bit and 64-bit apps coexist. Still not perfect, but recent versions of Linux make it mostly seamless.

[Xander]

Originally Posted by spirilis

64-bit is a little ahead of its time on the desktop right now but with a lot of folks buying desktops with 4GB RAM nowadays, that "time" is coming very soon. Once apps start using more than 4GB RAM, and folks buy 8+GB footprints, 64-bit will show its worth.

On the server-side, 64-bit is a freakin' godsend. I can't tell you how many apps we have at work which mysteriously stopped working, only to find out after some quick troubleshooting that the apps ran afoul of the 3GB per-process address space limit. Answer? Upgrade to 64-bit systems/OS.

I'm happy Linux got on the x86_64 64-bit bandwagon very early on, because it's given them more time to iron out some of the compatibility problems with having 32-bit and 64-bit apps coexist. Still not perfect, but recent versions of Linux make it mostly seamless.

Well oddly enough I find XP64 better not only because it is slightly quicker (my 3DMark rises slightly under XP64) but also because half of the programs which usually find their way onto my system and slow the computer down, don't work on XP64

That was the idea with Linux actually. To have a computer pretty much naked of rubbish just for reliable email and internet with none of the slow downs.

Oh and as a side point I see that on the Windows 7 blog there's a few people asking for options in Windows 7 so it doesn't have to be bloatware... that I'd love to see happen.

[spirilis]

Originally Posted by Xander

Well oddly enough I find XP64 better not only because it is slightly quicker (my 3DMark rises slightly under XP64) but also because half of the programs which usually find their way onto my system and slow the computer down, don't work on XP64

That was the idea with Linux actually. To have a computer pretty much naked of rubbish just for reliable email and internet with none of the slow downs.

Oh and as a side point I see that on the Windows 7 blog there's a few people asking for options in Windows 7 so it doesn't have to be bloatware... that I'd love to see happen.

haha, nice

Speaking of Linux and "lack of Windows", I enjoyed this article that's made its way through the geek sites yesterday-- PC World - Vendors Rally While Windows Sleeps

The Latitude On feature uses a low-power Intel ARM processor, flash storage and Linux (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10) separate from the laptop's main CPU, hard drive and Windows operating system

Very interesting, this is also a tribute to the miniaturization going on with a lot of the "embedded" market nowadays--they were able to stuff an ARM proc and flash drive, along with the integration electronics, into a laptop alongside the host x86 CPU and hardware.

[Xander]

^^ Oddly Spirillis the more people move away from Microsoft and the more Microsoft start to listen, the more I like them...

I think I'll be one of the old bastion in the end. Still using windows when everyone else has gone over to linux.