Vista Haters?

OK,  I have to admit my least favorite thing to do ever is upgrade to a new OS.  Especially given the guidance of never do an upgrade instead for you to do a clean install.  Getting my machine just the way I want it which often takes months.  Most people aquire software over time (lots of time) and getting things configured just the way you want including finding the right antivirus solution I have been thru all the major players from Mcafee, Symantec, CA, ZoneAlarm and yes even OneCare (which I happen to like because it seems to stay out of the way), I just hate the ideas of having to start from scratch with my system to do an upgrade because you are never sure what bad software will be left behind. 

I have been running Vista at work on my laptops since beta 2 and the experience varied, however I also own an iMac which I primarily have run Windows XP Service Pack 2 with Office 2007 and a ton of development and other productivity tools from Adobe Creative Suite to Visual Studio.  I just did not want to take the plunge of wiping my iMac to install Vista, XP was working like a charm.  I did start to miss some of the features I got from Vista at work.  So I said to myself let's try the upgrade (yes the Upgrade, not a clean wipe).  I booted in OS X, downloaded bootcamp 1.2 updated my firmware really easy and painless.  Booted back in XP stuck in my Vista Ultimate CD and selected upgrade.  A few hours (a little over 2hrs), the machine came up, I ran thru tested a ton of stuff from Adobe Flash 8, Swish Max, Visual Studio (required a service pack) and Office 2007 a few programs asked me to re-register like Flash and SwishMax (very painless).  It has been 4 days now and under heavy usage, and coding stress and everything just works.

I just went to print a document and noticed my HP Wireless printer was missing.  I was thinking I would have to go out to HP download the drivers and configure it because it is connected to my wireless network like I did in XP, but nope.  I selected "Find Wireless Printer" and less than 30 seconds later my document was printing.

Why is this worth a blog posting?  One, I did an upgrade and kept pretty much all my old applications and configuration!  I know I should expect this stuff to work, but to be honest I was fully expecting to be forced to wipe my HDD clean followed by the nightmare of device driver hunter, and troubleshooting for next two weeks.  Then start the long process of reinstalling applications, tools and utlities. 

It just works! Very nice!

Now why am I running an iMac?  24' monitor no tower to run wires from, dual core, 64 bit kick butt piece of hardware!   And Yes, Vista kicks butt on my iMac, and yes, I use OS X, but I must say I prefer Vista any day.  Now my iPod is a different story iTunes rocks, I just wish they could get more of my favorite TV shows like Family Guy, House and Boston Legal.

** Oh yea I had to update iTunes (no biggie life still goes on).  I want to see the next version of Apple's OS, but it seems like the are busy getting the iPhone out (not interested), Windows Mobile 5/6 is a killer OS.

Comments

• Anonymous
  April 20, 2007
  I pretty much agree with all the sentences except the piece which says that iTunes rocks...