When are you switching to WinXP?
it seems that some people are not planning on switching right away. if you are one of them, what are your reasons?.
it seems that some people are not planning on switching right away. if you are one of them, what are your reasons?
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Imaging that rolling green hill and blue taskbar. That little brown dog jumping up and down. The bright colors saying "click me" "click me". The intuitive wizards making it sooooo easy for non-admins to mess up your servers. The bloated junk which MS will probably not allow you to leave our during install which means taking it out AFTER install which means hundreds of left behind files and registry entries.
Ah, Linux WILL rule the world. It's already embedded in everything around the world. Soon it's desktop will reach the appropriate level of user-friendliness. An OS to make both the user/power user happy.
Ah, Linux WILL rule the world. It's already embedded in everything around the world. Soon it's desktop will reach the appropriate level of user-friendliness. An OS to make both the user/power user happy.
Except nothing runs on it. Not to mention that with it (d)evolving into a more "Windows" like interface, it will wind up having most of its instabilities and bloated size as well. I do like the ability to completely customize it, but it isn't worth dealing with until REAL replacements for apps (not that StarOffice POS, or Nutscrape) that run in Windows come out. Does anybody have a good recommendation for an office suite in Linux? I am also waiting for major apps like Flash and Photoshop to make it to Linux, otherwise I will just have an OS and nothing to really use on it. I know that there are a good deal of freebie apps that are available, but I still want the ones that I am familiar with. Changing OS is bad enough, but having to find equivalent apps to replace the ones that I already use (and have licenses for) it just too much at this time.
While WinXP is "handy" with some of its utilities, I find it to be a disappointment because it is such a pig. However, it's definately a major step forward from Win9X.
While WinXP is "handy" with some of its utilities, I find it to be a disappointment because it is such a pig. However, it's definately a major step forward from Win9X.
DosFreak,
I never thought I'd think that way about Linux, but I'm beginning to...
However, I don't think it will make it onto corporate workstations, as the cost of re-training employees on Linux would far outmatch the cost of simply putting Windows everywhere... even though Linux is free.
And also, that whole thing about leftover files and registry entries... that's exactly why I lile my OSs lean and mean. With Windows XP, I just KNOW there are thousands of files and settings and registry entries out there which are completely useless to me, as I would disable all the junk associated with them. When I'm done with a bananna, I don't just throw the peel on the couch.. cuz it takes up space, is gross, and it doesn't belong there. Same concept here. Lotsa trash leftover when you are done disabling and tuning all the settings.
Also, if you notice, when you go into the system properties in Windows XP, to the place where you can change all these settings regarding smooth scrolling, fading, and the like... there are three settings to chose from: Fastest, Custom, and Normal(?). If you chose fastest, then all the garbage that is enabled in the box below becomes disabled. So it is evident right there, that Microsoft knows all the extra crapola included in XP slows down the system.
Hey maybe some day I'll be a die hard Windows XP fan. But as of now, I'm certainly not impressed. I never thought I'd see an operating system use a freakin cow pasture as the default background. Just a solid color, or perhaps a Windows logo or something... would be fine. Or even.. if XP used the Silver color scheme with the Crystal wallpaper as the default... that is quite nice. But BLUE taskbar and GREEN fields!?? Who designed that? Also, I hate that the start button is like 3 times the size of the old one.
I do, however, dig the new start menu. It's handy.
One other thing, I was not too displeased with Windows XP after I disabled everything. It wasn't all that bad when changed back to the old style. The only problems I encountered with that was I couldn't administer my domain using either the adminpak.msi from the Windows 2000 Server CD or the adminpak.msi from the Windows .NET Beta 2 CD. I had to do that by Terminal Servicing into one of my domain controllers and changing things from there. That's not all bad, however it's much nicer just to open up my "MASTER MMC" and do everything from there. That's why, when .NET comes out, I may go ahead and make the switch. I have some reading to to about it. There's not much technical info out on Windows XP yet. Most of it seems to be very watered town top level mush propaganda aimed at the home user.
If anybody has some good links which talk about Windows XP's domain/AD structure and how it relates or works with that of Windows 2000, please list em'.
If you guys can't tell.. I'm extremely bored at work today.
I never thought I'd think that way about Linux, but I'm beginning to...
However, I don't think it will make it onto corporate workstations, as the cost of re-training employees on Linux would far outmatch the cost of simply putting Windows everywhere... even though Linux is free.
And also, that whole thing about leftover files and registry entries... that's exactly why I lile my OSs lean and mean. With Windows XP, I just KNOW there are thousands of files and settings and registry entries out there which are completely useless to me, as I would disable all the junk associated with them. When I'm done with a bananna, I don't just throw the peel on the couch.. cuz it takes up space, is gross, and it doesn't belong there. Same concept here. Lotsa trash leftover when you are done disabling and tuning all the settings.
Also, if you notice, when you go into the system properties in Windows XP, to the place where you can change all these settings regarding smooth scrolling, fading, and the like... there are three settings to chose from: Fastest, Custom, and Normal(?). If you chose fastest, then all the garbage that is enabled in the box below becomes disabled. So it is evident right there, that Microsoft knows all the extra crapola included in XP slows down the system.
Hey maybe some day I'll be a die hard Windows XP fan. But as of now, I'm certainly not impressed. I never thought I'd see an operating system use a freakin cow pasture as the default background. Just a solid color, or perhaps a Windows logo or something... would be fine. Or even.. if XP used the Silver color scheme with the Crystal wallpaper as the default... that is quite nice. But BLUE taskbar and GREEN fields!?? Who designed that? Also, I hate that the start button is like 3 times the size of the old one.
I do, however, dig the new start menu. It's handy.
One other thing, I was not too displeased with Windows XP after I disabled everything. It wasn't all that bad when changed back to the old style. The only problems I encountered with that was I couldn't administer my domain using either the adminpak.msi from the Windows 2000 Server CD or the adminpak.msi from the Windows .NET Beta 2 CD. I had to do that by Terminal Servicing into one of my domain controllers and changing things from there. That's not all bad, however it's much nicer just to open up my "MASTER MMC" and do everything from there. That's why, when .NET comes out, I may go ahead and make the switch. I have some reading to to about it. There's not much technical info out on Windows XP yet. Most of it seems to be very watered town top level mush propaganda aimed at the home user.
If anybody has some good links which talk about Windows XP's domain/AD structure and how it relates or works with that of Windows 2000, please list em'.
If you guys can't tell.. I'm extremely bored at work today.
I'm running XP right now and loving every minute of it. My original reasons for upgrading were so I could run Final Fantasy VII without having to have a Win9x partition and therefore ridding my system completely of Win9x forever. While that hasn't exactly come to fruition completely (FFVII crashes at the subgames now instead of the battles, I'm thinking it has something to do with my nVidia video card...) I now have so many other reasons for keeping XP that I just can't get rid of it. 2k required lots of fiddling around to get certain games working to to sloppy coding on the developers behalf. Under XP most of them installed ran effortlessly although a couple still needed special arrangements. XP also appears to cure that stupid "assign every PCI device the same IRQ" problem that 2k had which means my SBLive! doesn't cause a bluescreen when starting a game that uses EAX. The new Luna shell is pretty cool too, it makes a nice change from that boring old explorer shell. Despite the disappointment of having FFVII screw up on me overall I'm still impressed by XP and it will be staying on my box for a while.
Originaly I just wanted to try it out so I did I dual boot with my 2000 pro. Well that was a bad desision. I ended up having to scrap 2000 becasue of some conflict stuff. SO I just switched to XP. I have been there since.
A big problem with Linux is the massive number of individual distributions out there. Add to this the fact that you can make your own if you feel lucky, and you have an OS "running around like a chicken with its head cut off". There are more distributions than versions of Windows.
Another potential nail in the Linux coffin is the current development of the Darwin kernel for Mac OS X. Apple has embraced Open Source and the Darwin kernel can be run on x86. It's in development right now, but you can download it and (try to) run it on your PC. Like Linux or BSD. Darwin is supposed to be pretty close to FreeBSD.
I'm no prophet, but I'd say Apple has a better shot getting a wide spread adoption than Linux.
Red Hat, Mandrake, Storm, SuSe, LOAF, Turbo, Corel, Caldera, and just Linux itself are available.
Seeing as Apple is pretty big into USB and Firewire, it's not going to take forever to add support for new hardware to Mac OS X. I used to think Linux was pretty cool and all that, but there's just too much going against it to really be a viable option. I do not see Linux becoming a real desktop alternative to Windows unless there are some major changes. It's not user friendly, and I don't think many people are thrilled with spending more time, sanity, and obscene phrases getting something to work under Linux. Windows causes headaches, no question, but Linux just adds to the frustration.
If Microsoft wants to believe Linux is a real threat, fine. Microsoft isn't paying attention to the real enemy to Gates uber-geek throne. With Apple joining Open Source, I believe we are looking at the beginning of a very viable alternative to Windows.
Another potential nail in the Linux coffin is the current development of the Darwin kernel for Mac OS X. Apple has embraced Open Source and the Darwin kernel can be run on x86. It's in development right now, but you can download it and (try to) run it on your PC. Like Linux or BSD. Darwin is supposed to be pretty close to FreeBSD.
I'm no prophet, but I'd say Apple has a better shot getting a wide spread adoption than Linux.
Red Hat, Mandrake, Storm, SuSe, LOAF, Turbo, Corel, Caldera, and just Linux itself are available.
Seeing as Apple is pretty big into USB and Firewire, it's not going to take forever to add support for new hardware to Mac OS X. I used to think Linux was pretty cool and all that, but there's just too much going against it to really be a viable option. I do not see Linux becoming a real desktop alternative to Windows unless there are some major changes. It's not user friendly, and I don't think many people are thrilled with spending more time, sanity, and obscene phrases getting something to work under Linux. Windows causes headaches, no question, but Linux just adds to the frustration.
If Microsoft wants to believe Linux is a real threat, fine. Microsoft isn't paying attention to the real enemy to Gates uber-geek throne. With Apple joining Open Source, I believe we are looking at the beginning of a very viable alternative to Windows.
Do you honestly feel Microsoft don't know where their threats are?
Do you think anybody could 'sneak up' on Microsoft and release something that will kill their products over-night?
It's more than highly unlikely.
Microsoft have never taken Linux as a threat.
Sure a lot of organisations use it in the corporate place, I have a Linux Web Server and a backup Linux Mail server should my Exchange Server go wrong.
But all these promises from the Linux community about how they would hold some 40% of the home desktop market have become nothing.
Linux as it currently stands is not a valid alternative, period.
BeOS is not a threat, considering PalmOS have just recently bought the company for next to nothing and the purchase was simply for current Internet technologies, they have no interest in taking BeOS any further.
Could Apple be the next attempt at taking a market share from Microsoft?
Well it's possible and I'm sure Microsoft will have evaluated exactly what is on offer now, evaluated in which direction it is going and will have already decided if it is a threat or not.
If it is a threat, then expect similar technologies in the next Windows release.
If it isn't, then expect Microsoft to not even mention them - Microsoft have learnt it's a lot more simple to simply ignore and never mention than it is to simply attack an 'alternative' product.
Most of the time the MS rivals will quite happily shoot themselves in the foot.
We already have this situation with Linux, more flvaours than you can shake a stick at and now finding that modules created to run under RedHat Linux wont run under SuSe for example - so much for the x-platform world of Linux, suddenly you have to be running exactly the same flavour of the OS - kind of defeats the purpose of it all really.
Hystorically Microsoft haven't made that many mistakes despite what the Linux and the 'We hate Microsoft' communities have to say.
One of their biggest being their very slow entry to the Internet and more so the browser market.
However when they did hit that market and once the product had matured (IE 4.0) suddenly MS had the best product on the market, since IE4 Netscape has been unable to compete.
Are there any rival products to the MS ones?
Well ask MS, they might be a little bias, but if they are attempting to incorporate similar technology from a 'rival' product into their own then you can assume it is a true rival product.
Do you think anybody could 'sneak up' on Microsoft and release something that will kill their products over-night?
It's more than highly unlikely.
Microsoft have never taken Linux as a threat.
Sure a lot of organisations use it in the corporate place, I have a Linux Web Server and a backup Linux Mail server should my Exchange Server go wrong.
But all these promises from the Linux community about how they would hold some 40% of the home desktop market have become nothing.
Linux as it currently stands is not a valid alternative, period.
BeOS is not a threat, considering PalmOS have just recently bought the company for next to nothing and the purchase was simply for current Internet technologies, they have no interest in taking BeOS any further.
Could Apple be the next attempt at taking a market share from Microsoft?
Well it's possible and I'm sure Microsoft will have evaluated exactly what is on offer now, evaluated in which direction it is going and will have already decided if it is a threat or not.
If it is a threat, then expect similar technologies in the next Windows release.
If it isn't, then expect Microsoft to not even mention them - Microsoft have learnt it's a lot more simple to simply ignore and never mention than it is to simply attack an 'alternative' product.
Most of the time the MS rivals will quite happily shoot themselves in the foot.
We already have this situation with Linux, more flvaours than you can shake a stick at and now finding that modules created to run under RedHat Linux wont run under SuSe for example - so much for the x-platform world of Linux, suddenly you have to be running exactly the same flavour of the OS - kind of defeats the purpose of it all really.
Hystorically Microsoft haven't made that many mistakes despite what the Linux and the 'We hate Microsoft' communities have to say.
One of their biggest being their very slow entry to the Internet and more so the browser market.
However when they did hit that market and once the product had matured (IE 4.0) suddenly MS had the best product on the market, since IE4 Netscape has been unable to compete.
Are there any rival products to the MS ones?
Well ask MS, they might be a little bias, but if they are attempting to incorporate similar technology from a 'rival' product into their own then you can assume it is a true rival product.
Re: Windows .NET (XP) Server
I'm currently running Windows 2000 Server (legally) which was upgraded from NT4.0. Since I don't feel like reinstalling everything, and have no plans to buy new hardware, it looks like I have to wait until the Server version ships.
Any guesses on when this might be? It looks like .NET will go through a couple more betas (Microsoft really wants to get this right or Sun will ream them), and then maybe a service pack before they are going to ship it with the OS. By my recongining, that means mid-2002, if not later.
I also somewhat fear core changes which would make Server less adequate as a workstation. For exmaple, are there any plans to drop DirectX support, etc in the Server version?
I'm currently running Windows 2000 Server (legally) which was upgraded from NT4.0. Since I don't feel like reinstalling everything, and have no plans to buy new hardware, it looks like I have to wait until the Server version ships.
Any guesses on when this might be? It looks like .NET will go through a couple more betas (Microsoft really wants to get this right or Sun will ream them), and then maybe a service pack before they are going to ship it with the OS. By my recongining, that means mid-2002, if not later.
I also somewhat fear core changes which would make Server less adequate as a workstation. For exmaple, are there any plans to drop DirectX support, etc in the Server version?
