Why Microsoft must abandon Vista to save itself
No, the title’s not mine. It comes from Don Reisinger, writing at CNET news.com.
I get asked by friends occasionally what PC to buy or whether to upgrade their existing PC to Vista. I haven’t bought a Windows PC for over 5 years now and although we do have a old PC in the cellar running Windows 2000 for Ruth’s PC-based quilting software (since that is where she quilts), we use our Macs for all our day to day work. I usually recommend that my friends switch to Apple Macs, but if they won’t consider it, or are on a limited budget, I suggest using Windows XP or the Linux Ubuntu distribution (which will feel much snappier than Windows XP on older PCs) – there have been so many reports of problems with Vista, not to mention Microsoft offering Windows XP downgrades via Dell, HP and other larger vendors because customers are so dissatisfied with Vista.
Don’s article is interesting because it’s the first mainstream press article I’ve seen written by someone who uses Macs, Ubuntu and Windows Vista PCs, who thus has experience not only of Windows, but the main alternatives, where the author concludes that even after a year, Vista is still not ready to be released.
Never before have I seen such an abysmal start to an operating system release. For almost a year, people have been adopting Vista and becoming incensed by how poorly it operates. Not only does it cost too much, it requires more to run than XP, there is still poor driver support, and that draconian licensing scheme [digital rights management as Microsoft has implemented it in Vista] is a by-product of Microsoft picking on the wrong people.Don puts up a good case for the problem not being the operating system alone that is causing Microsoft problems, but also their muddled marketing.
The article is worth a read.