Vista" is gonna have many people following the upgrade train again... 9998

In comp.os.linux.advocacy, DFS wrote on Sun, 31 Jul 2005 00:05:44 -0400

Ooooooooh......advertising copy........

Oh for censored's sake.

Fast Boot and Resume

In many cases, Windows Vista start-up time is noticeably faster than Windows XP. When users start up their machines, Windows Vista performs many processing tasks in the background, returning control to the user much sooner than previous versions of Windows. Even this short wait happens less frequently than before, because users don't have to reboot Windows Vista as often.

Look you brain-dead marketdroid so-and-so's, *WINDOWS NT* had this capability. Your OWN OS ran things in the background during login! It was *extremely* obvious -- and, if one didn't wait, resulted in the cheery "we used cached information for your login" because of a sequencing problem of some sort.

(Linux for its part brings up the GUI very late in the boot cycle.)

Instead of shutting down the computer to save power, users can use the new Sleep state, the default state for turning off computers running Windows Vista. Sleep combines the resume speed of Standby mode with the data protection and low power-consumption characteristics of Hibernate. When entering the Sleep state, Windows Vista records the contents of memory to the hard disk, just as it would with Hibernate. However, it also maintains the memory for a period of time, just as Windows XP maintains the memory in Standby mode. Windows Vista enters and recovers from Sleep state in seconds, and while the system sleeps, power consumption is extremely low.

Hmm...sounds like somebody needs hardware support here? Does this sound like "Wake-on-LAN"? Is the Sleep State secure against outside packets?

Improved Responsiveness

To address performance issues, Windows Vista uses memory more efficiently, provides new scheduling mechanisms for time-critical work, and provides state-of-the-art self-tuning and diagnostics. These improvements provide a much more consistent and responsive user experience, with fewer blocking disk I-Os and fewer degradations from background activities. In many cases, Windows Vista is more responsive than Windows XP on the same computer hardware.

Ah ha, it's already started I see. "Buy our new stuff; our old stuff was crap!"

Built-in Performance Diagnostics can detect and self-correct performance problems. Windows Vista provides instrumentation and services that support both user-driven and tool-driven diagnoses of common performance problems. Performance problems addressed by Built-in Diagnostics include media glitching, slow application startup, slow boot, and network-related delays.

Riiiiiiight. How does one fix a "network-related delay"? Also, fixing a bad block is impossible, though one can work around it.

Performance counters are more reliable and secure, as well as more widely implemented. A new performance monitor provides a richer user experience that allows IT professionals to easily monitor, trend and diagnose performance-related issues. Windows Event Logging Service provides ongoing information about system operations by raising and logging events.

Oh great, more hidden capabilities in XP.

Built-in Diagnostics

Windows Vista can self-diagnose a number of common problems, including failing hard disks, memory problems, and networking issues. Windows Disk Diagnostics detect impending disk failures and guide users through data backup, disk replacement, and data restoration. Windows Memory Diagnostics work with Microsoft Online Crash Analysis to detect crashes possibly caused by failing memory, prompting the user to schedule a memory test the next time the computer is restarted, and providing guided support. In Active Directory domains, administrators can configure Built-in Diagnostics using Group Policy settings.

Hmm...how much does one want to bet that this will be accompanied by a requester that obliterates half the screen while the user is trying to type in his master's thesis and is concentrating on that -- then the user finds out he can't exit the requester until he goes through the backup-reformat-restore procedure? Oh, and after all that -- does it actually work afterwards to bypbutt the bad block?

Even in closely managed enterprise environments, it's common for mobile users to go weeks or months without a backup. Data loss caused by unexpected disk failure can be disastrous, and a user might spend weeks recreating work. Because Windows Vista can proactively detect impending failure, IT departments can perform a full backup, replace the hard disk, and restore every byte of the user's data before the failure occurs. This proactive repair can potentially take place overnight or over a weekend, virtually eliminating end-user impact.

Oh, and how consistent is *this* paragraph? The proactive repair presumably requires the unit to be *plugged in* -- a difficulty for a mobile device in, say, Southwest Africa. Or maybe it makes too much noise to leave plugged in. Also, this "proactive repair" appears to require user intervention -- otherwise known as Big Mommy Software. "You have to back up now, Junior."

I won't go through the rest of it; I've already exceeded my quota. :-P

-- It's still legal to go .sigless.