Untangling the pre-Vista web

It’s chaotic out there if you’re shopping for a new PC. Whether you’re a bargain hunter or someone in need of a new computer right away, you could experience some confusion as you try to figure out which operating system you’ll ultimately be running.

That’s because Microsoft is a few short weeks away from releasing Vista, the latest version of Windows. If you’re buying a PC now, before Vista’s release, you need to carefully plan your purchase if you intend to upgrade later. There’s a coupon program called Express Upgrade that will entitle you to some version of Vista when it’s available. The upgrade will most likely be free, but there are some instances where you’ll have to pay for it, either a nominal shipping fee of about $10 or even $100 for the actual upgrade.

We visited several retail chains and Web sites to try to sort things out. Here’s what we learned.

Computers are supposed to be labeled "Vista Capable" or "Vista Premium Ready," depending on which version of Vista they’re configured for. But not all PCs are correctly labeled. A salesperson at a major retail chain told us that at least 20 percent of the systems for sale are missing the label that lets you know they are Vista Capable or Vista Premium Ready.

Even if the label is there, you need to be aware of which version of Vista you’re going to get under the upgrade program. Whether you’ll receive Vista Basic, Premium, or Business with your coupon will depend on the computer you buy and its hardware and operating system, as well as the way the individual manufacturer set up the upgrade program and maybe even the retailer.

Our advice: If you don’t want Vista, you should be able to save $100 or even $200 on a new XP system as retailers try to sell off old inventory. Savings could increase as Vista’s January 30 release gets closer. You can get many updated features even without getting Vista. For example, get the Media Center Edition of XP for entertainment features, and download Internet Explorer 7 for safer browsing. Of course, always make sure you’ve installed good third-party security software with a two-way firewall.

If you must buy immediately, plan for an upgrade to Vista Home Premium. (For most people, Vista Basic doesn’t offer enough to justify the upgrade.) Look for a system with the Vista Premium Ready label that’s equipped with XP Media Center Edition (or XP Pro, if you want Vista Business). Get at least 1GB of RAM and a third-party graphics card with 256MB of memory. Integrated graphics might be a bit more risky, but many options work fine, including Intel 950 or ATI 1150. Then check with both the retailer and the manufacturer before you buy to make sure you’ll be able to upgrade that system to Vista Premium. Microsoft has a Web site that takes you to various manufacturers’ Express Upgrade program details.

Don’t forget to fill out and submit or mail your Express Upgrade coupon. And be prepared to wait as long as a month or two after Vista’s release for your upgrade to arrive.

Finally, if you don’t need a computer right away, hold off for a few months. By then, most drivers should be updated and some of the bugs common with new operating systems should be settled.

— Donna Tapellini

Comments

[Kelly L.]

Macintosh is the silence between the notes; allowing users to enjoy the music. Alternatively, Windows is it's own obnoxious music that gets in the way of productivity. In other words Windows is far from a means to an end. This has never been about fanboy-ism, and all about intelligent design.

[The Boss]

Well Dave-o I'm both a "professional", and a "geek who plays games", and I think Macs are overpriced and overhyped. Sure, Microsuck ripped off MacOS, but what's (cr)Apple going to do about it? That battle was lost a decade ago. Windows based PC's run everything I want them to, and a lot of that includes software that won't run on a Mac. Sure, you can run Windows on a Mac, but if I'm never going to boot into MacOS, why pay the extra money for functionality I'll never use? That's like buying a PC to run MacOS. There's a reason I'm not wearing a dunce cap.

My point is that no amount of crying, whining, and gnashing of teeth is going to change the fact that the Windows PC is the de-facto standard, with well over 90% of the market, and the chances of Apple ever taking even an additional 5% of the market are grim indeed. They'll hang on for another decade or so before Dell buys them out. I won't be crying.

Do I like Microsoft? H-E-Double-Ell no, I hate 'em with a passion. Do I like Windows? Not really, but since THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE uses Windows and I earn my living designing software, I guess I'm stuck with it. On the other hand, those who say MacOS is any better or "superior" are seriously deluding themselves. It's just an OS after all, and both get the job done, but the PC has about a billion more software titles available than the Mac's do. Soooo if you wanna spend some extra cash on a Mac machine that is incompatible with 95% of the computers in the world, and has a seriously anemic software selection available, go for it!

Please don't bother posting a spreadsheet comparing Mac to PC. We've seen it all before. Just accept reality, come to grips with it, and continue happily using your Mac. More power to you for bucking the convention, but please stop trying to convert us all to the computer world's equivalent of Scientology. LMAO

Bye Bye

[Dave]

I'm a professional photographer and computer desktop designer. I've been in the business for 17 years. I've owned and used Windows PCs (which I believe are still DOS machines running Windows software which was a vailed attempt to copy the Mac system) and Mac PCs. I still use both platforms. I'll probably have to stay current with the Windows crowd because of the 2-3 times a year I get a customer who's given me some file he/she created with Publisher or Corel on a PC and they think it's some kind of work of art. But I won't worry about Vista for years.

If you truely are a professional and not just some geek who plays games there is only one computer you would even consider buying and that's the Mac. It's fun listening to all the chatter about the Vista release. It's like watching a sitcom on TV. After I've had a good laugh I get back on my Mac and do serious work.

If you have to worry about paying $100 or $200 more for a computer then you aren't serious about quality. Keep fooling yourself and keep pirating software and keep reformatting your hard drive. I'll stick with what the professionals use, a Mac. And, oh by the way, I've never had a virus on any Mac computer I've ever owned and I've had viruses on every Windows piece of *#@^ I've ever used. Vista won't change that.

[Roy Gathercoal]

CAUTION: THIS IS AN EXCEPTIONALLY LONG RESPONSE. The issues are not at all simple and all of the brief answers so far seem to miss the heart and the significance of the upcoming change.

So with regard to Vista and away from "my operating system can beat up your operating system" tirades (remember, the point of the article?):

Buying computers isn't "all" about computing just as much as buying cars isn't "all" about transportation. So the best advice is "know thyself."

If you lose sleep if you are not the first on your block then get Vista now. Of course it will be buggy. But then, so is Windows and MacOS and Linux and . . . they will be different sorts of bugs. But as the first with the newest every time, you are familiar with the drill.

If you are a serious gamer and have the money to really "do gaming" you should upgrade right away. Chances are your system will already pass the minimum thresholds. If nothing else, Vista/Aero/Longhorn brings serious graphics onto your screen. But then, anyone in this category isn't reading Consumer Reports to find out which brand new state of the art video card to buy!

For most of us, those who seem to want a bit more speed and capability each year but put off upgrades as long as possible because of the cost, Vista will not be our friend but there isn't much we can do about it in the long run.

Here's why:

(1) Vista isn't just a new operating system, it is a new way of doing computer stuff from the ground up. This new computing model puts the focus on your computer screen. Hence the huge increase in graphics/memory/storage demands.

So while it is technically true that the programs running on your machine now will continue to run ten years from now it is not guaranteed that software vendors will be there with you, taking their most expensive option: supporting both the XP and Vista platforms.

The song goes something like:
"we recognize the Windows XP as a legacy platform and so we will put our efforts into developing the very best software for the new generation. We will never abandon our loyal users. . ."

Which, translated, means (We aren't about to throw our development money down the XP hole while our competitors grab all the new market! We just aren't interested in filling the $1.79 discount. And we know you'll switch right alone with us--who else is going to develop the software you will need?)"

Which brings us to:

(2) Vista isn't the biggest change--dollars wise or impact wise--to the computer user. Software will end up costing far more than hardware upgrades, especially as it will require frequent updates at first as the flush of the first bugs surface.

If you were around in earlier days, you will remember the move from DOS text-based machines to Windows. The (then) new Windows software could do so much more than the (still functional) DOS software. Just moving a file on floppy disk from a DOS machine to run on another Windows computer could be infuriating.
If you missed those glory days the first time around, you'll see it now.

Funny how everyone seems to be talking about Vista--as if our file maintenance/computer management stuff was the reason we use computers!

No, most of us buy computers for use where we work, for games, tax preparation, games, accounting bookkeeping, games, address management, photo retouching and storage, email, more games, etc.

This is why the change that's going to affect many more of us even than Vista will be the new-from-the-ground-up Microsoft Office suite: Word, Excel, Outlook, Powerpoint, and (sometimes) Access. If you get a few free moments sometime just drop in on some of the corporate Information Technology Management sites.

Many of the corporate training people (the ones who train the army of people who try to get their computers to do what everyone else says "is easy") say the hardware and software costs won't even be half of the real cost to their companies.

*Everyone in their entire company* who now uses Office will have to be retrained: Clerks, secretaries, sales, human relations, repair, order takers, executives, buyers, stock management, everyone. The totally new set of office productivity programs will change--starting with an entirely new concept of how to do things on a computer and a radically new user interface. Dilbert, never seeming to be short of corporate silliness to expose, gets a breath of new life!

Hmmm. . .feel up to relearning how to do everything you currently do on your computer? Me neither. But if there is one lesson people learned from the last major overhaul of the operating system (from Windows 3 to Windows XP), it's that if you really do rely on your computer a piecemeal approach doesn't work. If you move, you really have to move.

Otherwise you will end up spending half your otherwise productive time trying to find a machine with the "other" system on it in order to open some file with macros, or edits, or any sort of presentation. Which brings us to:

(3) If you ever do anything with your computer that involves producing something that looks nice, you won't have the luxury of waiting to upgrade. The first time you see a Vista/Aero Powerpoint presentation done by someone who knows how to really use Vista you will understand. It's just not at all the same.

Vista is all about visual: High resolution crisp photo images, graphic layers, depth of field, special effects, perspective, even organization of information will be so different from everything done with the "old" XP systems that it will be months--not years--until someone throwing up a pre-Vista Powerpoint presentation will be yawned out of the room.

So as the frequent audiences of these acres of presentations, brace yourself: Just as the first few years after the Mac introduced fonts to our computer screens brought some painful universal contest to see who could put the most fonts on a single page, I must believe that some of the entirely novel elements of Vista systems will inflict its share of visual pain. This is, perhaps a small price to pay for the improvements that are possible.

Oh, and about sound. The brief window --measured in months --in which our music was separated from our computers by the Ipod/XP connectivity train wreck will be no more.
Hardware minimums listed to be "Vista Compatible" are minimums, not optimums.

Who buys a system with the bare minimum in disk storage? You think its an accident that we are seeing 500 gigabyte and even terrabyte hard drives show up on the shelves? By the time you store three seasons worth of the Original Star Trek, Masterpiece theater and Big Brother along with your entire digital music collection, a thousand of the funniest videos you've seen on YouTube and digital images of the entire Dead Sea Scrolls you will be amazed at how quickly the space goes away.

Oh, and the games. As they become more visual, with greater realism than ever before, doing it in real time 3D with layers and full soundtracks, they will take more speed, more space, and more (expensive) video hardware.
Even if you never play computer games ("I swear, only solitaire and only once!") you will still need far more than the minimum hardware configurations, so that:

(4) Whatever computer utilities you love now will probably go away in a couple of years. File management, backup systems, file transfer--all of these will be quickly replaced with products we don't even know we need, now. Many of the things we do with add-on programs will be incorporated into the new operating system, and the difference in how things are done will mean that many others will become obsolete. But hey, look on the bright side. . .

(5) Some of the people who are the hardest to shop for will have an all-new "I've really got to have this, really--you don't understand, I mean really truly have GOT to have this" list for birthdays, graduation, and probably even baby showers (the further we go from straight text, the more options there are for kiddie-ware).

My prediction: Christmas 2007 will be about Vista. New gadgets, new sound cards, new RAM, new games, new releases of old movies, and even new DVD-RW devices (BlueRay or DVD HD, or both?)

By about next year all the new upscale houses will need wireless bandwidth traffic cops--full color real-time video surveillance, fully integrated HD-TV/true theatre sound, accelerated access of nearly everything online and probably stuff-we-haven't-heard-about personalized lighting and climate control.

But behind everything Vista is a powerful driver that will be relentlessly pushing the move. Microsoft sees a huge and rapidly growing new market (some say 30% every year and on track to double the current number of personal computer users!), paradoxically in one of the corners of the world with the most pervasive and institutionalized software piracy.

Ultimately, Microsoft doesn't want us to be able to get by with XP. Redmond really does want us to change, and the sooner the better. The "software activation" and "Windows Genuine Advantage" programs have not been the "answer to piracy". Their bet is that with copy protection built into every module, every component, everything from the bottom up and inside out, the ratio of legitimate Vista computers to the total number of computers running will be much higher than XP could ever hope to reach.

We will switch, because it is in too many people's best interest for us to switch. It really is a question of "how soon?". Microsoft has already cut off all support for pre-XP systems. No set "good until" date for XP has been announced.

If you have getting along nicely with Windows 98 or Windows ME/2000 so far you are now officially on your own. Even if/when they find security flaws in these products Microsoft won't release fixes. Ironically, perhaps, no one else can legally patch these flaws either. The Windows code is probably protected better against patent infringement than against computer identity thieves! It is hard to imagine that Microsoft will wait even this long (six years for Windows 2000) to drop support for XP.

So most of us ultimately won't have a choice. If we want to be participants in the 21st century we will have to take this next step away from the computer-as-printed-page metaphor for computing.

If you can, it probably does make sense to delay the inevitable until the kinks and bugs are worked out. The advice about waiting for the Service pack releases (if they continue as they have for Windows XP, regular small patches will be made public, to be subsumed in a major "Service Pack" addition to the system.

When you do have to make the move to Vista, (if your office switches or a key piece of hardware needs to be replaced) you probably should think about changing much of your computing environment at about the same time--sort of a jumping into the lake instead of inching your way into the cold water.

One thing the short history of computing has shown is that trying to simultaneously maintain two separate systems is a real bear.

Just keep telling yourself how brave the new Vista World will be. And there are always the games!

One last thought. A few corporations have announced they will be switching to a Linux system instead of making the move to Vista. A casual sampling seems to indicate that the majority will take the plunge with Microsoft.

I'm not entirely sure that switching away from Microsoft will be anything other than a brief delay in the plunge. They probably won't return to Vista, but I doubt that the worldwide network of computer professionals who make Linux work as a viable option will fail to bring the new focus on graphics to their products.

After all, the various versions of Linux--as well as the free OpenOffice suite, for many a continuing viable option to the Microsoft Office Suite of programs--are so popular precisely because they are functionally equivalent to the commercial options. Most businesses can switch from Windows XP and an alternative suite of office software applications (such as OpenOffice or the Sun Computer-backed StarOffice) with less disruption than switching from XP/Office to Vista.

If Linux users are not able to take advantage of all the useful and good elements of the new set of software programs the various versions will find themselves at a significant competitive disadvantage. No one will want to be restricted to a Powerpoint-compatible program if the competition is effectively harnessing the real power of three-dimensional presentations.

Moving to Linux might make the transition easier--there is certainly no need by the Linux and Open Source programming communities to build copy protection into their code. Why would someone go through all the effort to steal what they can download for free?

So it is possible that you could gain some extra breathing room by moving to another operating system (and miss some of the most difficult bug-fixes), but I believe that graphics-intensive computing in some form, is here to stay.

Linux and OpenOffice characteristically require fewer computer resources to run than does XP/Office. One reason is the ease of customizing your own setup if you don't have to worry about charging for each little feature. If it is all free you can start with a much smaller package than the "includes absolutely everything in several configurations in one package" more traditional approach.

At some point, and I believe sooner rather than later, the new way of looking at computing will require similar hardware capabilities as does Vista. You just can't do 3-D graphics with a 2-D graphics card.

So perhaps it might be best for some users to just jump in and get it over with. At the least, many others will be "feeling the pain" with you! It is likely that many meetings will begin with some version of "my computer ate my homework." If, or when, it happens to you, it is indeed comforting to know that most everyone sitting at the table has experienced some similar frustration.

[The Boss]

I remember when all the Betamax people were proselytizing on why we should all dump our VHS machines because Beta was so superior. Give me a break, there's a reason why Mac commands a paltry single-digit portion of PC market share. Sure, it's pretty, but where is the software? OS2 anyone? LMAO!!

But I digress...

I liked the article, but I agree with the people who say wait 6 months or a year to upgrade to Vista. I also agree with the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" crowd...if XP works fine for what you're doing, don't bother spending your hard earned dollars on some eye candy that will only slow down your system.

[Steve M]

Why not Linux? The installations are more complete and easier to install.

[Cownerd]

Everybody wants a Mac! Nobody wants to PAY for a Mac!!

[Walter Grant]

Good article. Can't say I like Mr. Jiu's comment. I have both computers, prefer the Mac to just get work done. Continually frustrated by inexplicable Windows delays, inability to do anything while something is using the disk. long boot-up times,and problems ejecting USB disks or other removable hardware when I want to undock the PC. I have the latest greatest hardware. Have Lenovo T-60 laptop at work, MacPro at home. Same Intel Core Duo, same size & speed RAM,and similar disk. Mac is much much faster doing any task and easier to use. Other than getting used to menu bar at the top of the screen, If you are going to buy another PC for the upgrade, consider a low-end Mac. You can still run your Windows software with Parallels (within the MacOS) or Apple's Boot Camp (running Windows exclusively, only necessary for games using Direct X).

But back to the article. Suggest potential upgraders focus on the Premium upgrades and their cost. And the fact that your PC will be still under attack by virii, trojans, etc. despite the tighter security model offered by Vista. And that for games, you will still be required to run as Administrator which effectively bypasses the increased security in Windows Vista.

Finally, suggest you hold off on Vista until the 1st service pack or set of hotfix patches for Vista comes out. Don't get caught up in the hype of new versions. If your computer works well enough for your now, it will work well enough for some time with the existing hardware & operating system. Microsoft will still be maintaining XP for at least 2-4 years.

[Brett Jiu]

Good article. Nobody wants a Mac -- although if you have a Mac already you can (and should) run Windows XP, which is 10,000 times better than Mac OS X. All my Mac-using friends switched to WinXP and have been very happy. They enjoy more choices among hardware and software -- and who's not "pro-choice" when it comes to technology?

[Steve T]

Re: Richard Huggins-Amen to that. It was a little longer learning process than I expected, but Mac OSX has definitely paid dividends over the last 6 months.

[Richard Huggins]

The article about the buying decision regarding PCs and Vista makes a common but regrettable omission: the possibility of switching platforms and operating systems entirely, to the Macintosh. I do acknowledge that many people don't have a choice, but for those who might the option should have been mentioned.

Apple's current computers can run Windows and will be able to run Vista. For those who might enjoy the features unique to the Mac but need to be able to run Windows and Vista programs, it's a reasonable choice.