Computer buffs............ (experience, eternity, Article, Zen)

[michel]

http://techrepublic.com.com/5100-108...ml?tag=nl.e019

I finally got my hands on a copy of Windows Vista Beta 2 and wouldn't you know it, the motherboard in my test system bit the dust. My goal in testing Vista was to use the same system throughout the entire beta program in order to see how my hardware would fare with each successive release of Windows Vista. So I ordered a new, comparable motherboard that carried the same onboard ATI RadeonXpress 200 graphics system with 128 MB of shared memory and accepted my AMD Athlon 64 3400+ CPU. However, I did decide to add another 512MB chip to bump my RAM up to 1GB.
While I waited for the package to arrive, I read the Beta 2 Technical Reviewer's Guide from cover to cover. While it is, as expected, sprinkled with marketing material, it is also packed with pertinent information, lots of screen shots, and because it's a full color, glossy paper publication, was fun to read.
Once my motherboard and RAM arrived, I reassembled my system, inserted the Beta 2 DVD and began the installation procedure. It, too, was a fun and painless experience. I will chronicle my Beta 2 installation experiences for this edition of the Windows Vista Report.
Getting started

As you probably know by now, Windows Vista's installation media is DVD, presumably due to the fact that the number and size of the installation files exceeded the 600MB to 800MB range of the standard CD. In any case, I booted the system from the DVD and Setup took over and displayed a relatively fast moving progress bar accompanied by a short message stating that Windows is loading files.
After a few minutes, the Windows Vista blue/green aura background appeared and everything went quiet--no DVD activity, not hard disk activity, nothing. Not sure if the installation had locked up or what was going on, I decided to sit back and see what would happen. After what seemed like an eternity, but was actually no more than 3 or 4 minutes, a dialog box appeared and prompted me to choose language settings. As such, during what appeared a frozen screen, Setup was actually busily preparing for the next step. (Hopefully, Microsoft will add some sort of progress indicator at this stage in a future release.)...............see the link for the rest of the article.

[Scarlett Wampus]

If anyone reading this wanted to play around installing Beta 2 too they should go here.

Vista definately looks good. The security features do sound quite impressive and its GUI is less cluttered and more intuitive than XP.

[ChrisP]

Haven't even looked at Vista yet

Yeah, I'm not big on Beta testing for Microsoft, esp. when they're charging US for the "pleasure". Show me the colour of your monaaaaay Bill sweetie.

[ChrisP]

Originally Posted by Scarlett Wampus

If anyone reading this wanted to play around installing Beta 2 too they should go here.

Vista definately looks good. The security features do sound quite impressive and its GUI is less cluttered and more intuitive than XP.

Certainly the GUI is nicer looking, but as Revasser pointed out to my ignorant arse a little while ago, that's because it's not only alotting itself regular system resources like RAM, Page file space and Processing power... they've now seen fit to lock off part of your GPU power just for it's pretty interface!

[Scuba Pete]

So, you're saying it's becoming more like Linux???

[ChrisP]

*cough*

No. The opposite. Linux might take some, but it doesn't allocate anything. (at least not in the versions I've used... That RedHat stuff can be a bit suspicious though... why does it have such a sneaky looking fedora?)

[Scarlett Wampus]

More like Linux?

[ChrisP]

I dont' think he understands the subtleties of open source.

*Please Mr N.Doc sir... not the concrete shoes....*