Vista problems

Question

Can anyone possibly explain to me why I wasted $250 of my hard earned money to upgrade my perfectly functioning and stable Windows Professional XP operating system to this '' Vista Ultimate that I am using now?  Maybe I assumed that as good as XP was, that Microsoft would have expanded upon that and come up with something even better, but Instead I am getting the feeling that we are re-living the ME experience all over again.  If anyone reading this is still debating making a change to Vista....Take my advice and save your money.  So far this is nothing but a big joke. I have a very updated Dimension system with Pentium 4 processor and plenty of memory, ect..... and yet I have had more errors and messages saying that programs have to be shut-down and restarted than I have ever had on any previous operating system!  I can't hardly use my Internet Explorer 7 without getting a message about it about it shutting down and restarting...and then giving you a message that it is trying to find a solution to the problem....Funny thing is, it has yet to find any solutions to any of the 250 problems I have had with it in the first 20 days that I have owned this joke of an operating system.  Maybe Microsoft should do us all a favor and start coming up with a few solutions to take care of these problems.....How many years was this software in the developmental stages?  You would have thought that they could have worked a few of these bugs out before releasing this garbage to us the consumers...AKA ERS!  It aint just me having problems....You can google all the error messages and problems and find out that everyone else is having the same problems.....But we are all  at the mercy of Microsoft to work these problems out.  I guess I should have listened to what my friends told me.....but I didnt, and now Iam paying the price in a big way!  I better hurry up and post this though, before my computer just restarts again for no reason....and I lose everything I am doing.....DID I MENTION,  I'AM NOT A SATISFIED CUSTOMER? VISTA=JUNK

radiodr · Answer

I grant you that my system is going on 2 years old now, but according to the Microsoft Vista specs and the advisor my system should still be well within the the recommended specifications.  The only thing that is so frustrating is that XP worked almost flawlessly on my computer for the better part of 2 years....and not until I decided to install Vista did I ever have a problem.  Maybe I'am wrong, but I dont think my computer is that out-dated yet....At least not for what I do with it (mainly for the internet and for running business software-Quickbooks, ect)  I'am not  really a gamer (although I did run Farcry and Flight Simulator 2004 on this same computer when I had XP installed.....without any problems I might add) I agree with you though, there are things that I do like about the new Vista....but unfortunately right now...at least in my case, they are far outweighed by the problems that I am having with the stuff. I should have waited 6 months before making the upgrade...I would have been better off. My system specs are: Pentium 4    3.0GHZ, Memory=1.5GB, Harddrive=250GB  Video=ATI Radeon 128MB, Sound=Audigy 4 Maybe not that spectacular, but I hope its not a dinosaur yet!

Snooters · Answer

sorry to hear about your problems. i'm getting the free express upgrade, but i already decided to hold onto the disks for about a year, lol. i think it will be a good os, but not for a while.

robertc123 · Answer

The funny thing about his is how time fly's a Pentium 4 is not a good candidate for Vista. I'm sure you have a lot of older hardware in that system. I would never dream of putting Vista on my Pentium 4 it will diwe a slow death. In a year or so I will get a quad core with Vista installed. I only installed Vista on my Laptop because it has all the latest hardware and now that I got the bugs out I really like all the new Vista features.

pcgeek11 · Answer

Did you do an upgrade or did you clean install Vista.   If you upgraded that could be a big source of problems. I ran RC1 and RC 2 on a P4 2.66 Mhz, 768 MB Ram, Mobility M7500 Ati with only 32 MB Ram and it ran fine for months ( No Aero ).   pcgeek11

startiger · Answer

I am having problems and poor performance with a new machine that had Vista pre installed. It's an XPS 410 with a 2.1GHZ dual core processor, 2GB of ram and a 256MB video card. This machine is slower than the 5 year old computer it was meant to replace. It freezes and locks up for no reason. I can't play music on this machine because the audio playback freezes and drops out. Something is always writing to the hard drive so how long before that will fail? My printer and scanner don't work, no drivers. Trying to install winXP drivers for anything is a bad idea. Yea, I tried that and up the system so bad I had to use system restore to get rid of all the files that broke. Why isn't Vista backward compatible with legacy hardware and software? Windows XP could run anything back to the win95 era. ...Did I mention this thing runs as slow as a dog with 4 broken legs? Is Microsoft going to fix these problems? Can I get an operating system 'downgrade' to WinXP pro? ...Or do I return this thing to Dell and give up on Vista?  BTW search the internet and you will see that others are having problems with Vista, this thing is starting to look like the evil twin brother of Win ME.

Bobmitmen · Answer

Sounds like an upgrade. There are many apps that require updates to run properly on Vista. Perhaps you should go through your apps one at a time and see what is required for Vista. I did a clean install...and one at a time...tried my apps. Biggest problems were with Sonic MyDVD...needs v9...and a few others. Most apps were good! I have a desktop running Vista...P4-3.2 GHZ with Hyperthreading and 1GB of SDRAM...no issues at all...except lousy ATI Video drivers...but anyone who has ATI knows those problems.

You might want to check this out:

http://www.iexbeta.com/wiki/index.php/Windows_Vista_Software_Compatibility_List

Bob

Message Edited by Bobmitmen on 02-25-2007 10:14 AM

radiodr · Answer

Actually, my install was a clean install....on a new 250GB harddrive, as I read that doing a simple upgrade caused a lot more headaches for some people...so I opted to go the other route. I agree with the person who said he is having performance issues.....It just seems that everything seems to be slower....and takes more time to load up than it ever did when I was running it on XP Pro.....I mean I thought that this new Vista software was geared for performance and was supposed to run smoother....It doesnt seem that way yet to me.  Another example...My ATI video card is working, but I still cannot the newest 7.2 catalyst software to load on my machine.....It gets about half way through the installation process then I get the infamous error message (that I am getting all too used to seeing) that says that this application is restarting...and that Microsoft is looking for a solution..ect, ect..   and all you can do is close the application and try again. I have taken the time for each piece of hardware in my system to go out to the manufacturers website and look for the newest....Vista compatable drivers to use....which is fine...IF they are even available yet. Another example of a problem I am having.....If I go to a website....(I will use youtube.com as an example) and say I try watching a simple video....the application will open up and the video will start playing, then after about 15 seconds it will freeze up and give me the message: INTERNET EXPLORER HAS STOPPED WORKING-followed by A problem caused the program to stop working correctly, Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available.  Then it shuts down, and restarts internet explorer.  It is rather frustrating...I know others are having the same problem....because you can google it...and see for yourself, but I have yet to see anyone who has offered a fix for this....

p51d007 · Answer

Sounds like an upgrade. Maybe it is just me, but I prefer to install ANY OS upgrade as a clean install. More than anything else, to get the piled up junk off the computer. Old drivers, backups, restore points, win.ini/sys.ini/registry entries. I like to start off clean. That being said, as a 'test', I wanted to see what happened with an upgrade. I keep two HD's for my laptop. One current, and a monthly image on the other HD. I took the backup drive, imaged it to what is currently on my laptop (E1505). Popped in Ultimate and upgraded. Took over an hour, but it caught 100% of everything, all software, hardware works perfectly. At least with me, it went smoothly. Played with it for a couple weeks, still worked fine. Yanked it and put my XP image back on. This is a work computer, so I can't be screwing around with not having a backup drive...just in case. I think Vista will be ok, but I won't install it for 24/7 use until mid summer, or when SP1 comes out, which I think a lot of IT professionals are using as a time table. Or when XP is sunset and they can't get XP anymore. XP has been one of the most stable OS's I've ever used. The only time I reboot my home computer is for a software required update. It runs months on end without a problem.

Bobmitmen · Answer

Depends on what the legacy hardware is.  I was told my Epson Perfection 1660 Photo scanner would NOT work in Vista.  So when I installed the Twain drivers for XP...I did so in XP compatibility mode...and guess what...I have a scanner.  Not all is lost.  Give it a try in XP compatibility mode and see what flies...   Bob

zeeky222 · Answer

Startiger..... I read your post and I could have written it myself!!!!   I just purchased an XPS 410 with what sounds to be the same set-up as you have... it STINKS!  I am getting shut down more than I EVER did on my (yes! the SAME!) FIVE year old comp- running XP.   I get shut down in Paint Shop pro A LOT! And last night I wrote an important e-mail in outlook... hit 'send' and the whole thing FROZE! It said something to the effect: 'Spell check has been halted' and asked if I wanted to send anyway- but with no option of 'yes' or 'no'... it had to be shut down to start over! Lost ALL my info and had to research it all over again :(  I have lost MORE on this stupid thing in the 2 weeks I've had it than I lost in years on my old one :(   My printer (Canon PIXMA ip6600D) seems to work on it- though it says there IS an incompatibility- it IS working (knock on wood!) but my Epson Perfection 2450 scanner is NOT :(  I can find no update for that so had to set it up on the old puter across the room from the new one (= PAIN with my job!)   Does anyone else have isues with having more than ONE window up in IE?  I was researching something last night and wanted 2 open (compairing specs) but it would just pull up #2 & continue to say 'connecting' and just stay white. It would NOT load. Then I tried to copy the info from what I had up- to paste it into word.... but I was unable to COPY! In fact- most of the time, my right click will not work! NO highlighting a LOT of the time.  As well as- if I try to use anything at the top... exit, page etc., it just will NOT work :(   I am VERY close to feeling HATRED for this thing :(  I am paying over 2k for a machine that I am fighting and getting LESS work done on, than I could get done on my old one. I am FRUSTRATED and ANGRY :(   Oh... and when I ordered through DELL, they neglected to add the 'Premium Pack - Advanced Photo+Music: Deluxe Pack + Paint Shop Pro XI'   that I asked for.... which means I now have to purchase it all seperately :(   I emailed them about this, and they never bothered to even reply :(   Does anyone else have problems like I'm having with the mouse clicks etc.? It's as though the mouse just freezes but I don't think that's it, as it will often still work on the one page I can pull up.   I bought this new comp for a job I am working that I ONLY have X amount of hours per week to work-- and I have had VERY LITTLE time of actual WORK- because I am fighting the thing more than getting it to work :(

querry1 · Answer

Ok..I just bought a new e1505 with t5500 core2duo and loaded up ultimate vista with no issues at all. I think you are right about being like millennium edition. Vista is leading us to Vienna just as Millennium led us to XP. Vista supports x86 or 32 bit and 64 bit. Vienna will be only 64 bit. No more x86 32 bit. So if your computer does not support 64 bit you probably need a new one. XP will load onto your old computer but Microsoft has already downgraded support for the original Windows XP. So XP is ending and Vista supports up to 15gb of memory. I can not even imagine why. Looks like a new era. We might be looking at 128 bit or even 256 bit in the very near future. Go buy yourself a Core 2 Duo. Vista and my core 2 is just outrageously fast and performs way better than XP ever did.

Bobmitmen · Answer

Radiodr   Let me save you some time.  The ATI 7.2 Cats are horrible.  Want to talk slowdown.  In 3D gaming...a lot of people are losing massive fps using the 7.2's.  Cause a lot of screen flashing, etc.  Say with either 6.12 or 7.1 (7.1's have issues as well...but nowhere near as bad as 7.2).    Also...a few things I have done to keep things clean.  Use Java runtime 6SE...then make sure to go to Adobe and get flash player and shockwave.   I still get IE shutdowns from time to time...but nowhere near as bad as in the beginning.  Now that Vista is settling in...actually not that bad   Bob

radiodr · Answer

Bob,   Thanks I will definetly take your advice.   Radiodr

pcgeek11 · Answer

Wow,   All I can say is I'm glad I didn't get an XPS 410. I bought the Inspiron 1501 and it purrs like a kitten with Vista.   pcgeek11

Cougar5.0 · Answer

' I am having problems and poor performance with a new machine that had Vista pre installed. It's an XPS 410 with a 2.1GHZ dual core processor, 2GB of ram and a 256MB video card. This machine is slower than the 5 year old computer it was meant to replace. It freezes and locks up for no reason. I can't play music on this machine because the audio playback freezes and drops out. Something is always writing to the hard drive so how long before that will fail? My printer and scanner don't work, no drivers. Trying to install winXP drivers for anything is a bad idea. Yea, I tried that and up the system so bad I had to use system restore to get rid of all the files that broke. Why isn't Vista backward compatible with legacy hardware and software? Windows XP could run anything back to the win95 era. ...Did I mention this thing runs as slow as a dog with 4 broken legs? Is Microsoft going to fix these problems? Can I get an operating system 'downgrade' to WinXP pro? ...Or do I return this thing to Dell and give up on Vista?  BTW search the internet and you will see that others are having problems with Vista, this thing is starting to look like the evil twin brother of Win ME.'   Man, I could have written that myself, except I have an M1210.   Besides Outlook XP & other programs not working (why would MS want their own software to work when they can force you to upgrade by keeping it incompatible), I CANNOT believe that WMP 11 breaks up the sound with 30 seconds left when it decides to load the next song off HD (seeing as it takes 10 seconds for Vista & WMP to load the first song I can see why!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   Vista is a dinosaur that is extinct even before it hatched.   I am wondering if my Dell is part of the problem though as most people with the breaking up sound are using a Dell - hmmm....   Dell, do you have any answers to this problem in Windows Media Player and Vista???

Windows General

Vista problems

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