Windows Vista… the next big thing or the next big flop?

We as computer users have known for about the past 9 months that Microsoft is going to come out with a new operating system, making your computer now obsolete. Everyone has seen ads everywhere - newspapers, buses, subway cars, and seeing that people are selling parts of their bodies for advertising space nowadays, maybe the greeter at Wal-Mart’s forehead! You get the idea - Microsoft has been making a gigantic deal lately about how great and amazing and revolutionary this operating system is going to be to the computer industry, but is it really? By the screenshots provided below, you can see that the two don’t look much visually different. Now, as the saying goes, “looks can be deceiving”, in a way, that is true. There is more to it than just looking alike to XP. First of all, the start menu has changed. Instead of having to go click on “my documents” to see your files (by opening up a new window too), all you do in Vista is click on it, and it opens up right in the start menu where you can access them, move them, copy, paste, rename, etc., so basically, in a sense, it is sort of replacing windows explorer! The next major feature, which has been used frequently in the ads is the Windows Flip 3D, which is switching though applications (like you do with the Alt + Tab combination in earlier versions of Windows), except you get to see what is in and what’s going on in the windows in a 3D stacked view (shown below). Also, in the case that you don’t want to open up Windows Flip 3D, you can hold your mouse over a minimized window, and it will show you a small snapshot of what is going on in that window (individually, rather than showing all your applications like in windows flip 3D). Finally, adapted from Mac OS X 10.4’s “Dashboard” feature with “widgets” (more info here) are Microsoft’s lookalike version called Gadgets. This is SUCH a rip off of Apple’s idea, it’s not even funny… they could quite possibly sue…



For the veteran computer users out there (that have been with it since… say… windows 95 or 98), a question that I am surprised that has not come to the mind of many people is: why is it that EVERYBODY is complaining about the switch from XP to Vista, yet there were seldom any complaints about going from 95 to 98 or 98 to 2000. My opinion is because this is a generation where most people are tech savvy, and most people use a computer just about every day. This was not the case previously with the 95, 98 and 2000 generations. It used to be a luxury to have a computer, and only advanced businesspeople and sometimes schools would use them, where they were merely data entry, word processing, sometimes data transfer and research devices, whereas now, they are used for chatting, email, slideshow presentations, music downloading, poker, stocks, news, gaming, etc., and having the top technology is necessary to be able to do this. When all you needed to do was word process and enter data, as long as you could type a few things in, nothing else really mattered - just as long as you could get the job done, which is why, out of the few people at the time that used them, it didn’t really matter to be on top of the trends or not.



All in all - Windows XP is still robust and gets the job done for most people, so unless you have been struggling with XP (which I doubt!), and that Microsoft will still support it for another 5 years to come, it is not worth it to switch to Vista yet.





Oh yeah... and here are the screenshots i promised:


Windows Flip 3D:

Windows Vista Screenshot:


Windows XP Screenshot:

Hardware to supercede software?

There are two basic elements to computing. They are hardware, and software. Software can be known as the great variable. The cost of hardware can almost always be definite, but after the bundled software with the machine (if any), that’s when software becomes such a variable that some people worry about doubling, tripling, and in some cases even quadrupling or more, the cost of their system. There can be antivirus software, such as Norton Antivirus, there can be an office suite, such as Microsoft Office, there can be image editing software, such as Adobe Photoshop, and many, many more. Less than a decade ago, people had worries about multiplying the cost of their system, but nowadays, since being able to write and understand software code has become so much more commonly known, two things have happened that are now slowly killing the industry. The first one is piracy. In the old days, there weren’t security systems that required product keys and registration in paid software, but that is no longer the case, as people are now getting this software cheaper, or even free, because the common knowledge of code can be used to bypass, or hack these security systems, whether it’s by means of removing the registration script in the coding, or cloning the product keys. This is somewhat preventable, in ways such as encrypting the data on the software disk, making it harder to duplicate product keys, or even going as far as to plant a script in the software that tracks every unregistered version of the product down, and making harsher legal punishments for those caught with illegally copied software. Every security measure possible could be taken, but nothing is able to stop my next reason, and that is Freeware. Almost every piece of software I’ve paid for in the past has been paralleled by some kind of freeware, such as Openoffice.org by Sun Microsystems, which has fully replaced, and to some extent, superseded and outperformed Microsoft Office. Don’t be surprised if you see people stop paying for Microsoft Office, and just go and download Openoffice.org from the internet. Two hundred megabyte download, takes less than 2 minutes, and then BOOM! You’ve saved yourself over $200.00. Norton Antivirus? There’s AVG Antivirus, and of course, download.com’s third most downloaded piece of software, AdAware SE Personal, which does a better job of removing Adware and Spyware than Norton antivirus (which is why it has so many downloads). I could go on and on with this list of freeware, making you feel foolish for paying for your software, but I think you get the picture already. Some of you may be thinking that operating systems such as Windows XP or Windows Vista you cannot parallel. That is a false statement. An open-source operating system known as Linux is slowly taking over the operating system sector of software. It’s only a matter of time before every computer in the world has Linux, is protected by AVG Antivirus and AdAware SE Personal, is word processed by Openoffice.org, is image-edited by GIMP, and is completely fueled by freeware, making the next big software evolution coming from some guy sitting in his basement writing code 18 hours a day, distributing it for free, instead of in labs at megacorp companies such Microsoft, where they make almost the exact same software, yet expect hundreds of dollars per copy for it. Where does this leave them? Done, finished, dead, ka-put! You might think that this puts the computer business out of business altogether, but it doesn’t! Remember what the other element of computing is? That’s hardware. There's no such thing as "open source" hardware, or "pirated" hardware, because you can only do that with code. When it comes to physical components, such as in hardware, you have to buy a circuit board, capacitors, LEDs, ports, solder, resistors, everything that goes into it, as well as labour. Those things have to be bought. You can't download that new 400 ohm resistor from download.com, or torrent 6 or 7 capacitors. Unless you steal these from a manufacturing plant, the hardware industry looks pretty safe now doesn't it? Would like some comments on this please, because right now it looks like I'm one of the only people who thinks this way about this!

Macs or PCs?

“Hello, I’m a mac”… “and I’m a PC”…

Sound familiar to you? That is the beginning of nearly two dozen commercials in Macintosh’s attempt to thwart and dethrone Microsoft based PCs from being the number one in the world. What is it that makes Macs “better” than PCs? Is it their protection from viruses, spyware, adware and hackers? Is it their compatibility with other devices without drivers? Is it the fact that you can run Windows on them as well, so they’re the only computer you’ll ever need? Or even on their laptops - their power cord that just pops out in case someone trips over it? For those of you who haven’t seen the commercials, I bet you’re thinking “wow! No viruses? Run windows at the same time? No damage by tripping over a power cord? No having to search for device drivers when you get a new peripheral? I gotta get me one of these!”.
If that’s what you’re thinking, snap out of it. I will personally go over every one of the points I gave, and show why there’s no good reason to have to switch over to a Mac.

No viruses/spyware/adware/hackers:
This may be true. People always complain about windows getting viruses, so they need to get a Mac so this doesn’t happen. This is true for the time being, but over time, it will become a false statement. Why do you think it is that Windows has viruses? It has been the same platform since the mid 80’s, and the scripts in the software have been relatively the same, so people have had time to better learn and understand it, therefore making it easier to write code that alters the original code negatively, and slows down, or corrupts the computer altogether, which, is what a virus is. The reason Macs have little or no viruses is that since they have not been popular for very long, so virus developers, who only make viruses that will affect the most people possible, have not yet developed viruses for Macs yet, because it won’t affect enough people. However, seeing that this is a main selling point for Macs, and that they’re succeeding with it, these developers will come up with a virus sooner or later, because they will learn the scripts in Macs, just as they did in PCs, and learn the damaging alterations, and before you know it, that will be common knowledge to hackers, and the mac will be just as vulnerable as the PC.

Compatibility with other devices without needing to install drivers:
How convenient is that? You get a new digital camera (or webcam, TV Tuner, video card, external DVD burner, etc), plug it in, and use it without having to put in a disk, accept the license agreement you never read, wait for it to install, keeping you in suspense to be using it, and then eventually, you get to use it. This also relieves you of any possible stress of having to look around and find the drivers. Sure its convenient, but most people’s outlooks on adding new hardware are a bit exaggerated - many products these days don’t require drivers because of plug and play technology, and even if it wasn’t, how often do you add new devices? In a non-Mac case, you only have to install the driver once, so who’s to say that it’s a burden every time? Do it once. Get it over with. You’re done, you can do what you want with it now.

Run Windows secondary to Mac OS X:
This has got to be the stupidest invention ever. I mean, sure, people want to be able to run Windows too so that they have ultimate compatibility, and make the transition to OS X easier, but having this basically negates the whole first point about hackers, viruses, spyware, and adware, seeing that the for-now-immune Mac OS X is opening its gates with the more attack-prone Windows acting as an additional Avenue into the system, in a much more vulnerable way, and in turn, makes it even more vulnerable than a PC.

These points just cover how the commercials are misleading. These are the realities of switching to a Mac…

Right clicking, start menu, tray loading disk drives, floppy drives, taskbar on the bottom of the screen, desktop icons aligned to the left side of the screen, are just some of the things you give up by switching to Mac. However, what I have found in most people to be a problem for switching to Macs is in the software they were frequently using for PCs. Things like Adobe Creative suite, Microsoft Office and Macromedia Flash studio are all available for Mac, but you must purchase again for use on the Mac platform, which can double or nearly triple the cost of your machine.

Bottom line: Macs are great machines… for now… as soon as the virus factor starts kicking in, they will be dead, and PCs will be the majority of computers in the world, just as they should be.

The commercials can be watched here