[Quagmire]

MS has released the official name of longhorn. Windows Vista. This is going to compete with a Leopard? MS is full of idiots. They should of kept the name Longhorn.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/default.mspx

[AtHomeBoy_2000]

I guess they finally got tired of "Long tooth" and "Long wait" jokes.

[thegelding]

is Vista better??

"when is the release date?"
"way off into the vista"


g

[Batman]

Of course, now there is "Hasta la vista baby!"

And vista, meaning "a distant view" could explain the long wait.

Edit: http://www.vistawindows.com/ - Microsoft better watch out, I feel a lawsuit comming on

Edit 2: In latin, vista means chicken

Finaly Edit - I swear: VISTA = Vastly Inferior System To Apple

[Franz Josef]

OK crap name, admittedly. But consider this [pregnant pause] - Longhorn, oops, I mean Vista may be the first OS from M$ which is more or less OK (albeit with bad UI and very unintuitive) and semi-secure (compared to the predecessors).

If Panther and Tiger were so much better than XP (I contend they were and much better than say xvsxp.com gave them credit for) what is Leopard going to have to be sooooo much better than Vista?

[HHogan]

I was using Longhorn the other day and actually made the decision that post-XP, I'll never buy a PC again that runs Windows.

I'm finished with Microsoft

[AtHomeBoy_2000]

Originally Posted by HHogan I was using Longhorn the other day and actually made the decision that post-XP, I'll never buy a PC again that runs Windows. I'm finished with Microsoft

Care to share your Longhorn (oops! Vista) experience? What impressed or disapointed you?

[brutox]

Every microsoft OS has a codename before it get's released.

Did you guys forget Windows XP's codename 'Whistler' ?

[Brad]

I don't think many people have forgotten that. Most big titles are the same way. Apple is just an oddball in that its codenames became so widely-known and used throughout the community that it decided to jump on the bandwagon with 10.2 and market based on the internal names. I guess we were expecting Microsoft to do the same since it had been calling it Longhorn in public and even had a longhorn steer logo in a few places.

The late classic Mac OS codenames were all related to music (Copland, Tempo, Gershwin, Allegro, Sonata, Fortissimo). The Mac OS X codenames are, obviously, big cats. The Windows codenames are related to ski resorts (Whistler, Longhorn, Blackcomb). Adobe uses some more exotic and interesting names like Space Monkey, Big Electric Cat, and Venus in Furs.

[ohara]

Longhorn will restore the pure Windows user experience that the release of Windows 98 had obscured and overlaid.

[flail]

Originally Posted by ohara Longhorn will restore the pure Windows user experience that the release of Windows 98 had obscured and overlaid.

Wow, I think that's pretty hopeful and quite uncertain.

I think Microsoft's overwhelming grasp of it's market obscures any motivation for much needed improvement. Why should they be better? They have no reason too. Since I can't foresee any logical reason for a change, it must be assumed that MS will continue to produce low-quality, unintuitive products that fail to provide security, reliability and ease of use.

Just my .02

[HHogan]

I've always tried all the major OS releases by Microsoft prior to release.

I loved the 2000 beta, and the final version might be my favourite Windows of all time.

XP has been decent, I wasn't overly impressed by it, but it's served me well. It's flakey and can use some improvements, but it isn't that bad.

Longhorn is just horrid. The UI is horrible, it's integration with other apps is brutal, the overall look, and feel just turned me off. They've removed most of the interesting additions that were expected. It's a 2nd tier operating system in my eyes.

I'd honestly liken it to MacOS X Public Beta.... yes 10.0. It just seems that dated, lacking innovation, and overall is a pain in the ass to use. I'm not a huge Apple fan-boy, I enjoy what it brings to the table, but I don't go ape over every little thing they add. But Longhorn is so lackluster, that it makes Tiger seem like a whole decade ahead of it. You just shake your head in wonderment of who is actually running things these days.

[HHogan]

Originally Posted by ohara Longhorn will restore the pure Windows user experience that the release of Windows 98 had obscured and overlaid.

I completely disagree. Longhorn is like Microsoft trying to add eye-candy, but doing it in a fashion of pamphlets, or books. The graphics are way to big, they remove the workspace, and make it seem like you're working on a 14 inch screen with 640x480 resolution again.

You have to remove all options for the "eye-candy" in order to get working with a decent platform.

It's totally not worth it

[Franz Josef]

Originally Posted by HHogan I completely disagree.

It is ohara - disagreeing is the only reasonable course.

[HHogan]

Any of you guys remember that old IE-favourite browser/toolbar that Microsoft used to have in the early days of IE?

Just imagine that spread all over the Operating System

[BuonRotto]

I'm sure ohara is just rolling as usual.

Originally Posted by HHogan I was using Longhorn the other day and actually made the decision that post-XP, I'll never buy a PC again that runs Windows. I'm finished with Microsoft

To be fair, it is in beta right now. There were some Tiger betas that would have had you thinking the same thing, and they were released within weeks of final.

I still don't know what exactly is left of Vista at this point.

[HHogan]

I know it's beta, and it isn't my first experience with them. I've tried almost every OS ever released in one beta form or another.

I know what to expect, and what can still change, it doesn't change the fact that I was disgusted with the system as a whole.

[CoolToddHunter]

Originally Posted by flail Wow, I think that's pretty hopeful and quite uncertain. I think Microsoft's overwhelming grasp of it's market obscures any motivation for much needed improvement. Why should they be better? They have no reason too. Since I can't foresee any logical reason for a change, it must be assumed that MS will continue to produce low-quality, unintuitive products that fail to provide security, reliability and ease of use. Just my .02

For motivation, Microsoft has the profit motive. Windows is their bread and butter, and no one is buying anymore because it's "good enough." If they truly made a superior product, people would flock to it, as they did with Win95. So I think a better question is, why aren't they better.

But don't ask me to answer that...

[Brad]

Odd. I always thought Microsoft's "bread and butter" was the Office suite...

Sure, Windows has helped to lock in the desktop monopoly, but I don't believe MS earns as much from the huge discounted OEM contracts as it earns from Office sales. Does anyone have some figures on this?

[The Return of the 'nut]

Originally Posted by Brad Odd. I always thought Microsoft's "bread and butter" was the Office suite... Sure, Windows has helped to lock in the desktop monopoly, but I don't believe MS earns as much from the huge discounted OEM contracts as it earns from Office sales. Does anyone have some figures on this?

i don't know. 95% of computers sold having a windows license that MS gets money from is a pretty considerable chunk of change.

As it is, I think most of Office sales are also from huge discounted OEM contracts

[DMBand0026]

How much you guys bet Microsoft will announce soon that they had to delay the release of "Longhorn" again because they'll say changing the name to "Vista" was an added feature. And as we know, each time they add or take away (more often take away) a feature, it pushes the release date back 3 months.

[shatteringglass]

Windows Vista? Huh. I don't know. I kind of like it. It's somewhat refreshing, for Microsoft. I think they understood that they needed to get as far away from the XP (and those million security holes) nightmare as possible.

More importantly, though, I wonder what the final finished product will look like, especially after they hacked off every one of the innovative features they promised.

[Moogs]

I think "Vapah" would've been a much more appropriate name....

[MCQ]

Originally Posted by Brad Odd. I always thought Microsoft's "bread and butter" was the Office suite... Sure, Windows has helped to lock in the desktop monopoly, but I don't believe MS earns as much from the huge discounted OEM contracts as it earns from Office sales. Does anyone have some figures on this?

Looking at Microsoft's 8K... you're almost right. Not quite though. Based on MS's recently announced quarter:

Microsoft Client (Windows): $3.034 billion
Microsoft Information Worker (Office, OneNote, Visio, etc.): $2.909 billion.

Window client sales also has slightly more revenue over the last year than Information Worker sales... 12.234 billion vs. 11.013 billion.

[Banana]

Actually that makes sense...

Almost 90% of time, I see wintel computer coming with win xp and office suite preinstalled...

Mind you, I'm talki gbig brand like Hell... Er, Dell except for their low end machines which usually don't to make it seems cheaper.

[sunrain]

A little something I whipped up.

Enjoy.

[scratt]

But to meet the autumn 2006 deadline, Vista will be launched with some key components missing. Once they have been released - probably in the form of so-called service packs - the operating system will have a much-improved filing system, a new way to render graphics and much higher internet connectivity.

That's my favorite quote..
It's a bit like VPC for the Mac!

There will be no great graphics support, a crappy file system, and the internet access will be crippled. Their own admissions for the v1 release!

So what will you actually be buying? XP with new skins?

[rasmits]

Of course they have motivation to build a better product. They're not ignoring the fact that Apple is growing twice as fast as the rest of the PC market, and that security (which happens to be OS X's strong point) is a number one issue.

Vista is still based on Windows NT right? I just don't see what could have taken so long.

[AtHomeBoy_2000]

Originally Posted by scratt So what will you actually be buying? XP with new skins?

ummm..... yea. Sounds about right!

[julesstoop]

http://www.vista.com/

These guys have there main office next door to Microsoft's.
They are not amused...