Poll: The Horrors of Windows Vista and the Wonders of Windows 7

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Swarley

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Apr 5, 2010
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I had Vista for years and it never gave me any problems, but now I have 7 and it is indeed much better.

I do love the changing desktop background.
 

ChocoFace

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Nov 19, 2008
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Skorpyo said:
Wouldn't know. I've (wisely) stuck with Good ol' XP.

Go ahead and call me old. I won't hear you over my WORKING computer.
As i also use XP, i feel compelled to give you a high five across the internet.
 

Laughing Man

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Oct 10, 2008
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It's slow, freezes up frequently, tons of programs refuse to work for it, programs crash frequently, the interface just isn't as good as XP, or *Chuckle* 98 for that matter.
So you're computer is rubbish then? Cold statement but having run a rock solid XP system and a rock solid 7 system there is little if any of the elements mentioned above that can actually be called accurate, mostly on the grounds that they are subjective and have zero empirical evidence to back them up.

What I can tell you is

It's slow
No it isn't benchmarks on my XP vs 7 system show hardly any difference, software and programs open at the same rate with maps in BFBC2 taking a tad longer to load in 7 than XP but that is down purely to Dx9 maps loading much faster than Dx10 maps.

freezes up frequently
No it doesn't, not if you have half an Idea what you are doing, disable drive indexing, better yet get a better hard drive one that uses magnetic platters instead of stone wheels.

tons of programs refuse to work for it
Two words 'compatibility mode' I haven't found a single program that doesn't work with 7 and any that don't work with it, reality check it's time to get the new version of that program.

programs crash frequently
Do they, you suffer from stutter, slow load times and random crashes, sounds like dodgy memory or a crappy hard drive. More importantly is what happens between XP vs 7 when a program does crash in a big way. On occasion XP would go tits up for me and what happens is you're left with an unresponsive computer that requires a reboot. On the rare occasion that 7 has gone tits up the system has always been recoverable, I have never had to hard reset my 7 system and I haven't had a single BSOD with it since I installed it last October.
 

Private Custard

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Dec 30, 2007
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Over the years, I've owned every Windows OS. I can't fully understand the love that people have for XP. In my experience, it's fairly stable, but over time seems to tie itself in knots. Every XP machine I've ever used, as well as machines owned by other members of my family, has gradually turned into a sluggish bag-o-shite.......I have no idea why!

My last PC (not a bad one for its time), came installed with Vista. I instantly had issues with stability, compatabilty and general user-friendliness. Eventually I got bored and bought the upgrade pack for 7 Home Premium (32bit). What a difference. My CPU wasn't being spanked constantly, my RAM was sufficient to run Lightroom well and the 8600GT was as simple as hardware changes get.

My current machine (as of last week), a Phenom II 2.8g 6-core with four gig of RAM and a GTX460, is absolutely loving the 64bit version.

The one issue that I've encountered is with the 1920x1080 resolution, it just wouldn't work when selected fom the list and kept switching back to 1152x864! I eventually sorted the problem by writing my own graphics driver using powerstrip.
 

Vrach

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Comparing Vista to 7 is like comparing shit to gold. Even XP is far better than Vista, assuming you're doing more than just going "ooh shiney" when using a computer.

And yeah, 7's pretty good, but it still has its bugs, some of which are really a disgrace not to be hotfixed... bring on the SP1 I guess.
 

Trivun

Stabat mater dolorosa
Dec 13, 2008
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I have crappy performance anyway because I use a laptop. But even on university computers, where Vista is running, the performance is still awesome with Vista. I have Vista on my laptop, and I love it. Meanwhile, my family has Windows 7 on their desktop back home and it keeps running really slowly or having various problems (though to be fair, my family has always had computer problems, to the point that when me and my family moved house over 10 years ago my dad threw the old computer down the stairs and claimed he dropped it in the move just to get a better computer from the insurance, purely because our old one was so crappy - he managed it too, and that new one lasted five long years :D).

The point is, I have experience of both Vista and Windows 7, and I much prefer Vista. Windows 7 is good, but I simply have a greater love for Vista. Just one man's opinion, but a valid and sensible, informed one, nonetheless.
 

Redlin5_v1legacy

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Aug 5, 2009
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MercurySteam said:
And....

[HEADING=1]HOLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE SHIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!![/HEADING]
That was pretty much my reaction. Vista was making my computer running at a snails pace and often I would get an error in the middle of a game. My life on the PC, both work and play, has been improved tenfold by my upgrade to windows 7.

I can't possibly even imagine going back to Vista willingly.
 

ALuckyChance

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Souplex said:
ALuckyChance said:
Skorpyo said:
Wouldn't know. I've (wisely) stuck with Good ol' XP.

Go ahead and call me old. I won't hear you over my WORKING computer.
Yeah, because Windows 7 is known to crash repeatedly, oh wait no it isn't.

Thing is, many video games aren't supporting XP, and neither does DirectX 10 and 11. Unless you don't play video games, which is fine.

I used to have Windows XP for quite a few years, and Windows 7 is basically that, but shinier and much faster when booting up and loading things.

Souplex said:
My exposure to Vista was very limited. It worked when I used it, but it wasn't as good as XP since nothing is.
I am unfortunately stuck with 7 at the moment. It is a wretched abomination. it's like if you took XP, gutted it of everything that worked, and made it into a slightly less crappy mac.
How exactly doesn't it work? I have Windows 7 on my computer AND my incredibly old laptop, and I've had no problems so far.
It's slow, freezes up frequently, tons of programs refuse to work for it, programs crash frequently, the interface just isn't as good as XP, or *Chuckle* 98 for that matter.
Oh, so just because you had a bad experience with it, that magically means that the operating system has no redeeming values whatsoever, despite the thousands (and then some) people who have had no problems at all?

Also, in the words of Laughing Man,

Laughing Man said:
So you're computer is rubbish then?
[small](note to self: remind him that "you're" is spelled wrong)[/small]

Any computer that has the problems you stated is more than likely the computer's fault, not the operating system's.
 

MercurySteam

Tastes Like Chicken!
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Swarley said:
I had Vista for years and it never gave me any problems, but now I have 7 and it is indeed much better.

I do love the changing desktop background.
I know, right? I have my background going through images of the members of Noble Team every minute and I love it. They really thought of everything, huh?
 

TheRealCJ

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Mar 28, 2009
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MercurySteam said:
Ok, so basically I had Windows Vista Business on my computer for three years, and although I was skeptical about it at the time, I dealt with it. In that time I had hundreds of 'Not Responding' and multiple errors that no one else seemed to get, but I dealt with it. Then, a few weeks ago when my Hard Disk broke down and I purchased a new one I also acquired a Windows 7 Ultimate upgrade disk and installed it. And....

[HEADING=1]HOLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE SHIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!![/HEADING]

The improvement in performance was mind blowing. My processor copied files twice as fast, games and programs installed so much faster and I didn't get stuck or get 'Not Responding'. Ever!

One of the biggest changes I noticed was thus: my computer isn't a beast, but it can play the newest games pretty decently. Back when I had Vista Batman: Arkham Asylum and Starcraft II lagged so bad I ended up getting bluescreen multiple times. Now Starcraft II plays as smooth as a 360 can run a Halo 3. My only conclusion is that Vista had so much crap in it that everything slowed down and suffocated my hardware. I also noticed that I have half the number of processes running in the task manager. Plus with User Account Control fixed to do it's job without ruining my life the OS runs so smoothly, while keeping you safe without restricting you.

When my friends ask me what I think of Windows 7 I say: "It's like they took all the bugs in Vista, (probably 8 phonebooks worth) sat down in a room, and didn't leave until they solved every single problem." It's quite accurate to say this as 7 has all the great features Vista did (like Aero) only they run smoother. Of course it doesn't have everything Vista did, Movie Maker 6 isn't there anymore but I did find an installer on the web so you can use WMM 6.0 for Windows 7.

[HEADING=2]Moral:[/HEADING]
If you are running Vista, upgrade to Windows 7 or suffer a significant reduction in performance!

Now Escapists, I ask your of your thoughts on Windows Vista and Windows 7.
Er... yeah, thanks for that.

Except I recently installed 7, and for some reason my battery life has been reduced by almost a third. I used to get nearly 8 hours out of a charge, now I'm lucky to get 5.
 

Thaius

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Windows 7 is tons better, yeah. Mostly because it copied everything good about it from Mac OSX, but it was inevitable. Any good Windows OS did that; when they try to do things on their own, we get Vista. But whatever, I'm happy for Windows users. Now they get to enjoy all the things Mac users have had for the last decade.
 

Sebenko

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Dec 23, 2008
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I'm Commander Shepard and Windows 7 is my favourite Operating System.

Seriously, it's fantastic. It just... works.

Thaius said:
Windows 7 is tons better, yeah. Mostly because it copied everything good about it from Mac OSX, but it was inevitable. Any good Windows OS did that; when they try to do things on their own, we get Vista. But whatever, I'm happy for Windows users. Now they get to enjoy all the things Mac users have had for the last decade.
Like locked down hardware and paying three times too much for a computer? lolololololol
 

thenumberthirteen

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Dec 19, 2007
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I really like 7. Luckily I moved from an XP machine to 7, but I have used Vista once or twice. The UI is more friendly (not as much a problem for me, but would be good for casual users) it looks nicer and has a lot of little features that make it better to use. I haven't experienced any issues with it and it seems to be compatible with all my programs.
 

DSK-

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I hate vista on my laptop, but I use XP on my main computer and probably will do for a few more years yet.
 

Laughing Man

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(note to self: remind him that "you're" is spelled wrong)
It's spelt correctly it's just grammatically incorrect, come on dude if you're gonna be one of THOSE guys at least get it right.

I used to be one of those guys, a person who knew jack shit about computers but felt that hatred of Microsoft and especially its latest OS was justified even if I couldn't give legitimate reasons for it. I then learned about computers, started building and modding them and as you have said, found that most of the 'issues' laid at the door of the latest Windows OS are more likely fundamental flaws with the computer hardware itself or worst yet a computer that isn't powerful enough to run the latest OS at all.
 

MercurySteam

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TheRealCJ said:
Er... yeah, thanks for that.

Except I recently installed 7, and for some reason my battery life has been reduced by almost a third. I used to get nearly 8 hours out of a charge, now I'm lucky to get 5.
I never said anything about laptops, so sorry if 7 is causing you problems. Try fiddling with your power settings.
 

Downfall89

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Aug 26, 2009
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Although I went from XP to 7, 7 is still superior. Far superior. Compared to Vista, however, Vista shouldn't even be legal to sell.
 

HuntrRose

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crazypsyko666 said:
Skorpyo said:
Wouldn't know. I've (wisely) stuck with Good ol' XP.

Go ahead and call me old. I won't hear you over my WORKING computer.
+1.

Everything good about Windows 7 is tenfold better in XP, or just as good, but less shiny.

Come to think of it, you can make XP shiny, too. :p
For the not knowledgeable standard user this makes perfect sense. For the ones that knows a few things it makes as much sense as a shotgun to the forehead.

Security, system stability and the "stop lusers from ruining their system" plus a huge amount of subsystems are upgraded, and work better in Win7 than in XP. Of course, it does have it's problems, mostly because Microsoft don't think users should be allowed to controll their own computers, but that is precent in XP as well.

Then again. If you want a system that is REALLY fast, stable and secure while being able to run on your old Pentium2 machine from last century, try out Linux.