Microsoft Windows Vista Review - Review

[Doomer D. Great]

Microsoft Windows Vista Review
By:Hassan "Doomer" Gulzar



Introduction

Vista (noun): “A distant view or prospect, especially one seen through an opening, as between rows of buildings or trees”

It took five years to be finally released; Windows Vista has the longest development time in the +20 years of “Windows” itself.

From the day it was officially announced, Vista has been promising a completely new user experience from home to business. In the end, there are many new features but also, there is almost same number of features that did not make it to the retail version. Features that simply disappeared... a few with reasons, rest without trace.

There is criticism in the air… The Mac users say they have been enjoying the “new experience” for some time, years ago. If you look at Vista, you may think it is just an upgrade to Windows XP but on a closer inspection, it anything but an upgrade! Even a typical user would admit over time that yes, there is something different about Vista than its predecessors… okay so he or she may not be able to pinpoint it out. Regardless of the all-bad-talk, just as Windows 98 users (typical + business) faced the big question of upgrading to Windows XP, they will face the same question again and probably like before, they will upgrade to Vista.

During the development-drama of Vista, Linux and Mac were fast releasing upgrades to their products. There was a time in Pakistan’s IT history… sometime after 9/11, when everyone was talking Linux. Major universities were getting the “core” and developing upon it, their custom Linux OS. There were so many claims about Linux being a free alternative to Windows 2000 servers at the time… Linux was the future.

Not even one of them custom OS has been released. Only a few universities switched but on experimental basis only. Most computer labs in Pakistan are Microsoft Certified.

So what was happening during the five-year development of Vista? Not much in the first two years… it was the “Yes… no, No!” time. I will be literally rewriting the wheel if I started explaining that duration. You might want to read the “Road to Gold: The long road to Vista” by Paul Thurrott. He has documented everything you could ever think of about the events that took place in the five years from 2001 to 2006 and continues.

Overriding the Past

Even with new OSs from Linux and Mac, none is any challenge to Vista. Vista’s real threat is an OS that already is installed on 19 out of 20 PCs worldwide… It is not made by any other company then Microsoft itself! It is their most successful OS so far, it is Windows XP!

The most common term in computer talk, Windows XP was and still is the most successful OS in the series. Before XP, people used to say that you should not ever convert to NTFS as it is for networks only. Microsoft brought their NT series with the numerical series into one box label it Windows XP and God bless them for that! Not only they provided a typical user with the business power, they paved a way for more powerful true-networking based platforms like Windows 2003. That is not the half of it: With XP, MS realized the vastness of the project and developed innovations that were never heard of like the Beta Program. Interested users actually played a direct or indirect role in the development of XP! Had it not been for the privacy matters, my name could have been in the “About Windows” because I sent every single error/crash through the error-reporting tool that was something very new back then. There is not a device out there, which will not run on XP… unless it is fried, or something. Windows 98 users found it very easy to switch because the front-ends were almost identical. During a typical use, the user would not even feel that they are working on NT core instead of Chicago. With XP, Microsoft marked the beginning of a new era of Windows, yet keeping the “code of conduct” same.

With Vista, that code also changes along with almost everything. Vista is potentially very extensible. Even though most of it Vista-only features are now available on XP and 2003 i.e. Internet Explorer 7, Windows Presentation Foundation (Avalon, XAML, and WinFX), and RSS platform, Vista still stands out as a unique package. Microsoft presents Vista as the base for the next decade for Home, Business, and Development.

The Colors of Vista

“Windows XP comes in two colors: Green and Blue”, a typical Pakistani response to question(s) like “What are the different editions of Windows XP”?

When it retailed, Windows XP was two: The green version is the Home Edition of Windows XP and the Blue is the Professional Edition. The Pro edition had capabilities that are more powerful then the Home edition, which was applicable to typical daily usage. With the passage of time, Microsoft expanded the XP series by adding more flavors: Windows XP Media Center, Windows XP Tablet PC Edition, Windows XP Professional x64 Edition, XP Embedded, and the more recent XP Starter Edition. Some of these new flavors further evolved on yearly basis.

When we consider Windows Vista, there are six flavors to choose from, broadly speaking:

•Windows Vista Starter
•Windows Home Basic
•Windows Vista Home Premium
•Windows Vista Business
•Windows Vista Enterprise
•Windows Vista Ultimate

There are the nasty “N” and “K” variants of some of these six base-editions. Also, if include the 32 Bit and 64 Bit versions too, we end up with around 17 editions in total. That is right, seventeen editions that will cover every possible segment of all-that-is-PC on planet earth!


US Dollar to Rupee rate @ $1 to Rs. 60.66 as of 2nd March 2007

Here is some text defining the different editions from My Digital Life

Windows Vista Starter: Available in 119 emerging markets, Windows Vista Starter provides individuals and families with the basic benefits of Windows Vista at an affordable price. Designed for first-time PC users, Windows Vista Starter is easy to learn and includes help features tailored to beginner users. It will not be retailed. It is shipped preloaded with new PCs only.

Windows Vista Home Basic: the operating system for homes with basic computing needs. It is easy to set up, it helps you use your PC more securely and reliably, and like all of the editions of Windows Vista, it is compatible with the widest range of software, devices, and services that you use and trust. If you simply want to use your PC for tasks such as surfing the Internet, corresponding with friends and family using e-mail, or performing basic document creation and editing tasks, then Windows Vista Home Basic will deliver a safer, more reliable, and more productive computing environment.

Windows Vista Home Premium: the operating system for homes with advanced computer needs. It will help you use your laptop or desktop PC more effectively as well as enable you to enjoy new, exciting digital entertainment experiences—all with the benefit of added security and reliability.

Windows Vista Business: Designed to meet the needs of business organizations of all sizes. For small businesses, Windows Vista Business will help keep PCs running smoothly and more securely so you will be less reliant on dedicated IT support. For larger organizations, Windows Vista Business provides dramatic new infrastructure improvements, enabling your IT staff to spend less time focused on the day-to-day maintenance of PCs and more time adding strategic value to your organization. Windows Vista Business also offers powerful new ways to organize, find, and share information while staying better connected whether you are in the office or on the road. This helps your business to run more efficiently than ever before.

Windows Vista Enterprise: Designed to help global organizations and enterprises with complex IT infrastructures lower IT costs, reduce risk, and stay connected. Building on the features in Windows Vista Business, Windows Vista Enterprise provides higher levels of data protection using hardware-based encryption technology. It also includes tools to improve application compatibility and enables organizations to standardize by using a single worldwide deployment image. Available only to Volume License customers who have PCs covered by Microsoft Software Assurance. These customers are also eligible to acquire an optional subscription license for the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack for Software Assurance. This software extends the value of Windows Vista Enterprise by reducing application deployment costs, enabling delivery of applications as services, and allowing for better management and control of enterprise desktop environments. Together these technologies deliver the most cost-effective and flexible Windows desktop management solution.

Windows Vista Ultimate: The most comprehensive edition of Windows Vista. It is the first operating system that combines all of the advanced infrastructure features of a business-focused operating system, all of the management and efficiency features of a mobility-focused operating system, and all of the digital entertainment features of a consumer-focused operating system. For the person who wants one operating system that is great for working from home, working on the road, and for entertainment, Windows Vista Ultimate is the operating system that lets you have it all.

In addition, from My Digital Life, a very complex flavor vs. feature matrix (that I posted on WCCFTech earlier):


* Feature is optional

Right, that takes care of what Microsoft offering. Now how Microsoft is offering it? Well, apart from the full DVDs of the different Editions, Microsoft is going to deliver Vista to you in three ways:

•Vista Upgrade Version
•Express Upgrade
•Windows Anytime Upgrade

For understanding what-old-OS-get-what-new-Vista-edition, we observe this chart:


Vista Upgrade: For this option, folks running Windows XP (particularly), Windows 2000, and Windows XP 64 Bit qualify. However, there is a catch if you are folks running Windows 2000 and/or Windows XP 64 Bit: You will get the upgrade price but you will not get an in place upgrade (immediate upgrade). They will use their Vista Upgrade to do a full re-install of Vista. As for Windows XP users, you get both upgrade price and in place upgrade or a full install.

Express Upgrade: The controversial one, this is more of a promotion act. If you buy a new PC preloaded with Windows XP from 26th of October 2006 onwards until 15th of March 2007, you get a chance to obtain Windows Vista for free (or inexpensive, as put by Microsoft). Windows XP preloaded includes Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005, Professional Edition, Tablet PC Edition 2005, or XP Professional x64 Edition. For people who purchase Windows XP Home Edition, they will get half-price upgrade to Windows Vista Home Basic or Home Premium to their choice.

Windows Anytime Upgrade: This option is for traversing within Windows Vista Editions towards high-end flavors. You are required to own Windows Vista Home Basic, Home Premium, or Business to play this card. The upgrade possibilities are as follow:

•Home Basic Ã* Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate
•Home Premium Ã* Windows Vista Ultimate
•Business Ã* Windows Vista Ultimate

This sometime leads to strange methods to obtain Vista Ultimate at a much cheaper price. For example, if you go for a XP Media Center 2005 PC for now, you eventually can use the Express Upgrade to get Vista Home Premium. Once there, just use the Windows Anytime Upgrade to go Vista Ultimate.

Installing/Upgrading Windows Vista

Installing Windows Vista is probably the easiest part. Software installation could not be simpler and direct then Windows Vista’s Installation. Okay, maybe Office 2007 setup might be, but that is far-out of this scope.
The Windows Vista Setup routine is more streamlined, simple and far more elegant than ever. There is simply no more DOS-based portion of the setup anymore. After a DVD boot, Windows Pre-installation Environment (WinPE) takes over and it is a smooth drive hence fourth.

The Setup goes a lot faster... I mean Windows XP is a CD based installation and Windows Vista is DVD based. Windows Vista install in half the time Windows XP does. Microsoft achieved this by implementing an Image-based approach. Unlike its predecessors, the complete DVD image of Vista is dumped on the hard drive, expanded, and then system is rebooted. In older days, Windows was installed by reading a file from the setup CD, expanded in RAM, and then placed on the hard drive one file at a time. This was a real drag.

The Setup does not ask much... As pointed out before, the setup offers very few choices if run under the default interactive mode. This behavior, however, could be changed by installing it under administrative environment, again not covered here.

The Setup slipstreams effortlessly... It was rather a dilemma to apply service packs to the Windows XP set so that it will install with updates. The whole concept is changed in case of Windows Vista, as there is a simple “Updates” folder on the root of the setup DVD. Just put the hot fix setups and service packs here and slipstreaming is done! At a certain time while installing, Vista will run these setups and the newly installed Windows Vista will be up to date.

The key to the Editions is the Key itself… Probably most interesting is the fact that regardless of the edition you buy, all the DVDs of Windows Vista are exactly same! That is, they all contain the same data. If you buy a Home Basic Edition, your DVD will have Ultimate Edition on it! The Product Key you enter will determine the to-be installed Edition. This greatly reduces the complexities on Microsoft side else, they would have to provide different DVDs as RTMs and so on. Do mind that 64-Bit Editions are on separate DVDs.

Depending on your scenario, the Windows Vista Setup would present different options. The main possibilities are:

•Clean Install: When installed to a new or a formatted hard drive, there will not be any special choices here. Just boot from the DVD and install.

•Upgrade: Not the recommended way to go but still an available option, upgrading an old Windows OS or upgrading a lower Windows Vista edition to a newer will activate certain new screen in the setup procedure. And here is another chart showing the upgrade walkthroughs:


•Dual-Boot: The most recommended method, have another empty hard drive or a new partition on a current hard drive and dedicate it to Windows Vista. Windows Vista will install a Boot Manager so that you can chose between which OS you want to boot. For worried folks, this is the safest method to be sure. Your current OS will have all you files/drivers/stuff, and when you feel like checking-out, just boot into Windows Vista.

•Preloaded: If you feel that your current system will not be enough for the demanding Windows Vista, you might want to consider an upgrade or a completely new system. Wait on that then… let Windows Vista settle and once branded suppliers are giving Windows Vista loaded on Windows Vista Compatible hardware, buy then. You will get Windows Vista and a machine that would be designed to handle that kind of load.

The WOW Experience

The real excitement starts when you eventually get a copy of Microsoft Windows Vista on your PC. The number of innovations is huge. Microsoft’s “WOW” campaign, as strange as it might sound at first, is actually very interesting as one thing or another will eventually make you say “WOW” for sure.

I will be covering as many WOWs as can in as much detail as possible.

The “My” is gone:
Finally, the strange My Computer, My Documents, My Videos etc. is all gone and for good! No more “My”… I do not know what this would mean for others but this was “My” first WOW moment!

The Desktop:
The Windows Desktop has indeed come a long way. This is the main workspace, which is responsible for providing a launch pad for several applications. At first glance, it seems no different but as soon as you start dragging icons around, you will realize that it is unique now. It has a new context menu and supports HD videos as background (Windows DreamScene is explained later). Also, see Control Panel Ã* Personalize for further info on the new Desktop.

The Sidebar:
The Windows Sidebar is one of the much-anticipated features on Vista. It startups along with the system by default and is a clean glossy seamless blend on the desktop. It contains space for different Gadgets. Many gadgets are shipped with Vista. It might be a highlight for sometime but afterward, you might want to stop it from opening on startup, as it is known to be a memory hog. The Microsoft’s Gadget website has a large collection of official and user created gadgets.

The Sidebar’s property screen is very direct and could not be any simpler. The link to get gadgets from Microsoft is present in the lower-right corner.

The Start Menu:
The Windows Start Menu got real dynamic changes and most focus on the way the information is presented. Old/Classic Start Menu used to obscure the screen if there were a huge number of items in it. As long as you browse the user area of the new Start Menu, it will not obscure anything, as it will not expand outside anymore. Just click or highlight the “All Programs” menu item and start navigating. It fully supports dragging and dropping and unlike its predecessor, it will always drop in the proper place and allow you to keep something dragged while you try to find the location.

Along with Pin Area and the “recently used applications” area, we have the fixed portion. Items in this portion are configured through the Start Menu setup dialog (Properties Screen).

In addition, there are the main system commands dealing with Logs-Offs and Reboots. Sleep and Hibernate are quite same now. Pressing the red button will immediately put your system to sleep or hibernation (configured in Power Options). Waking back up is sometimes even faster! Coming back from hibernation takes only a few more seconds. This was a missed feature… finally, no more dialogs to decide what the user wants to do. Just your simple press-to-execute-thing.

From the look and feel side, the Start menu blends perfectly in the taskbar and does not feel to be a separate application like the older Start Menus.

It tries to reflect your highlighted item by showing the highlighted item’s thumbnail in the users picture frame… Cute stuff! Overall, Start menu is now officially the place to start Windows Vista everyday life!

The Taskbar:
The Taskbar has been degraded rather than upgraded… you can longer drag toolbars and throw them on the desktop. The complete Taskbar sticks to the bottom-only now. One can no longer drag it to the top or the sides. Therefore, that would be a bummer for those who actually moved the Taskbar elsewhere or love to see small floating windows on their Desktops. As for what we do get, well a sturdy looking Taskbar with a very nice auto fitting for all sorts of toolbars. Remember in Windows XP with Windows Media Player 11? If WMP is minimized, it will turn into a toolbar in the Taskbar but with a height just a bit higher than that of the toolbars causing an ugly misalignment… not anymore!

The Live Thumb:
Now, the Taskbar has a new nifty secret weapon: Live Thumbnails! That is, live thumbs of all the opened windows in the taskbar instead of the usual tooltip showing the minimized windows title. They are called Live because they are actually updating themselves from the UI point of view just as is their actual-minimized counterparts.

What it means is that not only the installation progress bar of some application or game will be seen animating real-time while minimized in the thumbnail, a minimized (windowed) movie-player playing a movie will show a thumbnail with the actual movies being played! When Microsoft said that you‘d see what going on without having to actually click, they were being very serious!

The Standard UI, Aero:
Windows Vista bring within a standard UI concept that all dialog boxes, pop-ups, folders, browsers, application, & applets (Control Panel Applications) should be a simple containers with a title bar, address bar (if possible) and two navigation button (Back & forward).

Almost 60% of Windows Vista follows this trend but there are many UI elements that are still old school. This creates confusion sometimes as users are welcomed by a completely new shiny interface but the sub-forms are still “the old and the grey”. I do believe that with time, Microsoft will patch-out all those old remnants and Windows Vista will truly have a Standard UI.

The Icons:
Icons in Windows Vista are big… I mean they are huge and hence their sharp lines yet a jelly like look that almost make you want to reach out and grab them. Windows Vista’s new Standard UI is also Windows Vista’s Resolution Independent UI. Aero has the ability to deal with the high-resolution displays of the future. It has support for a resolution-independent UI. Our current monitors generally have a resolution of 96-DPI (dots/pixels per inch). So, the Windows XP icons sized at 48x48 are displayed on screen in a half-inch square.

Future LCD screens, however, will support resolutions up to 240/320 DPI. Therefore applying the math here, we get ugly stretched icons. To be displayed at the same size without quality loss, icons must include much larger images. That is the reason why Vista introduces a new standard for Windows icon size: 256x256 pixels. Yes, a jump from 48 to 256!

During the Early Windows Vista Betas, Towelie and I noticed how the icons look simply gorgeous on “Extra-Larger icons” setting. We concluded that Windows Vista finally features the Linux icon formats: Vector Graphics. Simply put, regardless of how much you stretch them, they will retain their sharpness and smoothness even at 1280 by 1024 pixels! This turned out to be a wrong supposing. The current Vista icons are still… well icons. In addition, this time, the standard Windows Vista icon includes these 12 formats:

•256x256 - RGB/A
•48x48 - RGB/A
•32x32 - RGB/A
•16x16 - RGB/A
•256x256 - 256 colors
•48x48 - 256 colors
•32x32 - 256 colors
•16x16 - 256 colors
•256x256 - 16 colors
•48x48 - 16 colors
•32x32 - 16 colors
•16x16 - 16 colors

To get some descent sizes from Windows Vista’ .ico files, only the 256x256 images will be PNG-Compressed and such .ico files will not shoe their 256x256 formats to Windows XP.

The Explorer:
The one application that really connects the user with the PC, the Explorer is running always and if it is terminated, the complete windows simply disappear! It is the case in Windows Vista… Except that, the Explorer got extreme overhauling.

The new animations of windows minimizing or maximizing are there to tell exactly where the window went. The new blend-in and blend-out effects for almost all windows are cool. The see-through “Aero” interface is the most talked about thing here. However, there are some negatives here:

•The same-colored title bar makes it difficult to point out any specific window if there are a lot of them opened. Even see-through does not help then…

•There are certain applications that are hard-coded into Windows Vista as incompatible and there are some, which the user will be running in compatibility mode. When such applications are executed, the Aero UI does something I never thought it would: It switches to a non-aero UI almost instantaneously… killing Aero UI of all their windows forcing the UI rendering on 100% CPU again… Not acceptable.

•The borders of application and folder are very thick. Although at the time of writing, there is a fix for this, I am surprised that there was no built-in option to decrease it.

•When any folder/windows or application is maximized, the alpha blending turns itself to opaque… why? Why Microsoft, why?

In the old days, Internet Explorer 4 came out; it brought a new interface to the boring Explorer of Windows 98. It just added a white strip with a blue header and an orange line under the opened folder. Served no purpose at the time but the “Folder Tasks” idea was born.

The new Task-based folder view is necessary for all and we rarely get to see a folder in its classic view anymore. Windows Vista takes the concept to a completely new dimension. In Windows Vista’s folders, you will see a Favorite Links section and a Folders Section below it, both on the left side of screen. Navigation could not be easier than this.

There are three panes namely, the Detail Pane, Navigation Pane, & the Preview Pane. The Preview pane is usually disabled. Along with these panes, there is the status bar and the menu bar. All these Panes and Bars combine to render one folder view.

The Breadcrumb:
One of the more exciting things and probably overlooked by a casual PC user, the new breadcrumb control that replaces the old text-based Address bar used in folder browsing. Why is it called breadcrumb? Well, frankly, I cannot think of a better code name myself. The concept is that regardless of how deep you navigate, you can always return to any folder in the wake and jump straight to its child folders too. If you right click this control, you will get an option to copy it (special) or as text (old school).

Clicking in it will convert it to the old text address bar. It also supports built-in progress bar that starts ticking as the files/folder within the opened folder are studied by windows.

This new control is a complete innovation and one of my personal favorites!

The Arranging & Sorting:
Not much new in the arranging department however, there is one more option other than usual Sort-By and Group-By: the Stack-By option. For someone well informed about WinFS, He and/or She will probably tag this as WinFS remains. Stacking allows you to get virtual folders where there exist no folders but only files. You will enjoy good and properly organized files without having any folder at all!

The columns available for all these “–By” options are almost infinite! Windows Vista love to store many Meta-Data for different files. You could Sort, Group, Stack by virtually anything you can think of… except maybe the pet’s name.

Within any folder, try to stack-by name and you will see blue folder appearing in a new window.

Similarly, you can try Stacking-by type.

Opening any of these folders would behave just as you would expect from the normal none-blue folders.

The most notable thing here is that when you are stacking, you are actually searching. Remember from now on, that the blue or virtual folders are indicating that you are actually searching for files and these folders represent filters.

The File Dialogs:
I almost forgot to mention this one! The file open/save dialogs in Windows Vista are quite different from the previous ones. My personal favorite is the Save dialog. It appears in a very small size and for a minute, confuses the user.

You have to click the Browse Folders expander to get the old-like look. Tags are an essential part of the Windows Vista file management and I have started to use them on all file I save.

The Flip3D:
The most-talked about WOW in Windows Vista, the Flip3D allows you to stack active windows on each other in a loopy manner and using the arrow keys or the Window Key + Tab (initializes Flip3D) to navigate. One thing though, you do not want to forget about the good-old Alt + Tab: If a form has a dialog-box active and you use Flip3D to search for the Dialog-Box, you will not find it! However, Alt + Tab will find it. Flip3D will show the Parent Folder of Window or the Main form of the application only. There is also a Flip2D. It is active if Aero UI is not active.

The Control Panel:
Like almost every other thing, the Control Panel also got new trick up its sleeves. It can be accessed from the Start Menu or from the new menu button in Computer.

Just like in Windows XP, the CP opens up in a new organized manner with more groups to choose.

However, nothing beats the classic interface. There are many new controls in Windows Vista.

I will try to go through most below:

Backup and Restore Center: The old System Restore is now a full-fledge Back & restore application with capabilities to create a 1:1 images of current windows setting in case of total hardware failure.

BitLocker Drive Encryption: This idea might seem bizarre and impractical, but for high-tech software companies or top research departments, this could be a dream come true. If you can partition (or repartition) according to the BitLocker’s requirements, you get to encrypt you partition. Therefore, even when a hard drive is attached to another computer, none of the files will be readable. For a typical user, this feature should not be touched!

Network and Sharing Center: One station where all traffic meets, the network center is also one of the innovations.

If you are on a network, you can get a full map and a good path to the Internet. You get summary for every Network device on the machine.

Within the Network Center is an access to the Connections manager, where one can manage each connection and set advanced properties.

Parental Controls: This is a completely new thing introduced in Windows Vista.

The global game ratings system can be selected from the left side:

Similarly, some global minor Family Safety option can be adjusted:

By choosing a user account to be parented, one can moderate using simple links, can set different parameters and even request a usage report.

People Near Me: This is called Windows Meeting Space. Using mainly wireless network/internet access, Meeting Space creates a virtual office or a study room where all people around you with compatible devices are shown and all of them can share interests and ideas. It resembles a messenger where basic chat is the basic feature. From drawings to presentations and videos, Windows Meeting Space is bound to accomplish what NetMeeting never could: a very free from bounds “live” relation.

Performance Information and Tools: The most visited place as it has that (Windows Experience Index) Rating everyone is talking about, this control panel applet allow user to view summary and then fine-tune performance related sub-systems in Windows Vista. A user gets to manage Startup Applications, Visual Effects, Indexing Options, Power settings, Disk cleanup, and advanced tools, which shows deep collection of everything related to performance from different services and Administrative logs.

Personalization: This is the complete replacement of the desktop’s old context menu.

One can choose the desktop icons to show or hide:

Color of UI:

Backgrounds:

Screen Savers, Mouse Pointers, old Desktop settings, Sounds, & Themes:

System: The main control panel applet, the System allows user to view/change Windows Activation and Registration Status, the OEM information, system-level tweaks and all stuff that is Power User. This is where the Device Manager also resides. Computer Name and Network ID can be changed from here as well.

Program and Features: The replacement to Add/Remove Software, this applet allows the user to service different installed software on the PC. User can Uninstall, Modify (Change), or simply Remove different software.

Along that, users can also see a list of installed service packs or updates to different Microsoft products and service any particular one.

You can also view your digitally purchased items here. In addition, you can turn ON or OFF, the components of Windows Vista itself.

Windows CardSpace: One of the more radical ideas, CardSpace is a single solution to the hundreds of user names & passwords we create on daily basis while surfing (suffering, in this case). Instead of creating a account of every site, there will be certain sites that’ll provide people with CardSpace cards. Anytime while surfing, you are asked to enter a user name and password or register, you will also be presented with an option to select from CardSpace. Choosing the latest, your compete workspace, i.e. The Desktop, all opened windows will go dead and Windows CardSpace will take over. There will be a list of Cards and you can choose the one suitable. Login problems solved. This is being implemented with quite a pace at time of writing.

Windows SideShow: Yet another innovation, this is probably a bit more on the cooler side. SideShow allows you to utilize small gadget that can display data or numbers or text or simply small LCD screens that does all. If you have a laptop, then you can just close its lid and let it run in a battery saving mode because you could still read your email on a SideShow compatible device attached to the USB port of the laptop. Similarly, you can watch Media Player’s visualizations on a SideShow device… if you ever wanted to. Office Outlook’s Calendar works in a similar manner too. These devices will gain popularity and so their functions will go beyond as well.

Windows Update: this is where you get to keep your OS and supporting software up to date.

Windows Defender definitions & OneCare updates arrive here along with Office updates too. This is the place to get the famous Windows Ultimate Extras too. A user can view a complete history of installed updates here.

Administrative Tools:
Even though Windows Vista is not related to the new Longhorn Server, the administrative tools nevertheless are quite advanced. The serve different purposes but the most noticeable feature is they all look exactly same. The key is the new Management Console v3.0.

Released quite late for Windows XP, the Management Console cannot be more powerful and task oriented then in Windows Vista. The Management Console is a single application capable to host different Snap-Ins. All the Administrative tool share snap-ins that go in the management Console and hence the exact standard Power-UI. Here are a few important ones:

Computer Management: This snap-in is the main admin tool. It essentially provides organized links to other snap but does not have anything of its own.

Event Viewer: Allows viewing the monitoring and troubleshooting messages from windows and other programs.

Windows Vista and its internal applications are mostly populating the Event Viewer because unlike Windows 2000/XP, Windows Vista has many logs… almost a log for every application that comes with it and logs of services.

Internet Information services (IIS) Manager: IIS7 in Windows Vista is quite radical as it is now modular-managed and at the same time, the support for FrontPage extensions is gone.

There is an option to add the older IIS6 manger through Windows Vista features.

Print Management: This new Print Manager clearly states that it wants to and can handle multiple printers with many queues per each printer.

Reliability and Performance Monitor: From the introduction to R&PM’s help, you can use Reliability and Performance Monitor to examine how programs you run affect your computer's performance, both in real time and by collecting log data for later analysis.

Reliability and Performance Monitor uses performance counters, event trace data, and configuration information, which can be combined into Data Collector Sets. Performance counters are measurements of system state or activity. They can be included in the operating system or can be part of individual applications. Windows Reliability and Performance Monitor requests the current value of performance counters at specified time intervals. Event trace data is collected from trace providers, which are components of the operating system or of individual applications that report actions or events. Output from multiple trace providers can be combined into a trace session, such as the Windows Kernel Trace used by Resource View to show real time CPU, memory, disk, and network activity.

Services: Even with the new MC3, this one oddly looks the same and performs the same. You will see almost double number of services in Windows Vista. They are not recommending a GB RAM for nothing!

Task Scheduler: I use the scheduler for many things including full late night auto-download management by scheduling weeks ahead. This new snap-in type got me dizzy but soon afterwards, it turns out to be far more organized and very powerful then any thing.

The User’s Folders:
In Windows Vista, the “Documents and Settings” folder in no more… instead, it has been replaced by a “Users” folder on root of the system drive.

Similarly, there is no “My Documents” anymore either. There is a folder named to your login that will be your main base. This folder contains many users’ special-folders. Many are self-explanatory but I will go through them anyway:

Contacts: This is where all the contacts are stored and in a very well defined manner. There are all the usual options to perform contacts related functions here like import/export, sending, editing etc. You can define yourself here too.

Desktop: This is your desktop folder. Place anything here; it will appear on the main desktop.

Documents: The “My Documents Folder”, this is every applications favorite place and there is not much happening here (as it should).

Downloads: The default download folder. No explanation needed.

Favorites: The favorites are placed here. Many of Windows Vista bundled applications and Office regularly visit this place.

Links: Any shortcuts to folders placed here will show up in the save/open dialogs as direct access, formally known as Favorite Places.

Music, Pictures, Videos: The multimedia folders.

Saved Games: A new folder with a self-explanatory name, all save files, user data, configuration files should go here.

However, at this moment, only Windows Vista games support this folder. Other will follow but for now, live with the saves clutter in the Document folder.

Searches: Any search you commit can be saved and this is where the query is saved. As I mentioned before, that stacking is also searching and hence, it (virtual folders) too can be saved.

The Games Explorer:

Games finally get their own independent nation in Windows Vista. A built-in Games Explorer understands whether the software being installed is software or game ware and adds an icon of the game in itself.

It supports many games and will try to keep itself updated if an internet is detected when it is opened. Certain games like Oblivion and Neverwinter Nights 2 were immediately detected with proper context menu and information. Seemed like that developers provided that info during installation.

Other get updated icons and information while GE is open and internet is available. You can paste/drop a game shortcut from the desktop or start menu and it will appear in the GE and hence, will eventually get updated officially. A user can customize the context menu to include extra things like map editors or updater or like me, trainers.

There are a few basic setting in the options screen:

Also, there is a direct link to the Parental Controls here:

Windows Media Player 11:

WOW, 11 already? WMP came a long way from the original Media Player in 9x. The new thing I found in WMP11 was the way the media was organized. I did not look deeper… I never want anything else than proper organization and presentation.

Anything advanced tends to confuse me in WMP case... I just want to listen to my music.

Album View:

Artist View (notice that I'm also searching "Fort Minor"):

Results for "Fort":

Ratings View:

Toolbar'ed:

Ever since Windows 98, I have been using many media players but it looks like I am back where I started from: Windows Media Player. WMP11 has it all… I doubt I will ever install anything else.

The Internet Explorer 7:
IE7 could not come at a better time as IE6 was taking a beating from competitors. IE7 cannot be called an innovation, as it offers nothing new that the competition does not already have.

I do know that I have started to use IE7 more than any other browser and that I feel when it comes to gazillion tabs, IE7 out-performs, and as the memory MB-hit is relatively lower. IE7 look like it is a part of the Windows Vista Explore… this was something that was never felt from all the old Internet Explorers. With RSS support, IE7 is the complete browsing add-on for an already feature rich host OS. The new security features are a plenty and even there is some doubts about the new phishing filter that it might slow page rendering, I will never turn any of them off. The look and feel credit goes to the presentation of the tabs.

To check emails, to visit secure sites, and to remain certain the no website will show any trace design misalignment, IE7 is my choice.

Windows Calendar:
I never used these to-do like software but Windows Calendar is just too simple and extremely powerful. It is so direct and an expert in getting the job done. I am regularly maintaining my daily chores and upcoming meeting on Calendar now.

Windows Photo Gallery:
The Photo Gallery is a unique way to browse the pictures on your PC. It is smart and capable to group the pictures in different ways. Tags are like ultimate weapons here. This is Microsoft one stop for Image/Video preview, management, & wizard editing.

Opening any Image results in Photo Gallery’s Preview mode. By launching Photo Gallery, you land in the Management view where you just surf and navigate using the different filters. If you press the Fix button in the Preview or the Manage mode with an image selected, you get a different interface: Edit mode. Here you get Auto Adjust, Adjust Exposure, Adjust Colors, Crop Picture, & Fix Red Eye. Pressing the big blue button will launch the new slideshow in Windows Vista. You have a variety of themes to apply and this is the coolest feature of the whole Windows Vista’s media portion.

Windows Movie Maker:
The Windows Movie Maker is essentially same. It is now Windows Movie Maker v6 but there is no major difference in it from the predecessors. WMM6 supports HD video now as it can import and export (publish) it. WMM6 also allows importing of Media Center’s recorded TV shows and so, you can import a 2GB or 3GB 30 minutes TV show and publish it as HD .wmv and get nice quality on a minor ~750MB

Windows DVD Maker:
This wizard-like application is probably the simplest bundled software in Windows Vista.

It creates a descent and standard DVD in three steps or four steps. This DVD will work on any DVD player or PC. You start by adding images/videos to a burn list. All images will go in one slideshow.

You cannot have more than one slideshow per DVD. Any song(s) added will be automatically attached as background music to the slide show. Next, choose a menu style.

Next: Burn it!

Windows ReadyBoost:
I would feel like a broken record if said “another innovation” again… but that is not going to stop me mentioning this innovation: ReadyBoost allows you to use those cheap USB drives as memory add-ons.

They must satisfy the requirement though… they must be USB 2.0 or better and they must have a certain minimum mega bytes free. From my experience, any stick smaller than 512 MB is not worth it.

The performance gain is not equal to some FPS gain. It not meant to be. Information, which is meant to be cached to the hard drive, is redirected to ReadyBooster devices. This information is kept in a single file with pre-allocated space. It is encrypted so it is not going to work on other systems, Windows Vista or not. You might see some gains if you are already on a gigabyte RAM or more.

Windows ReadyDrive:
(Innovation) In the near future, some companies are going to launch a new breed of hard drives called hybrid drives. These drives are going to be different from our current generation, as they will have huge built-in non-volatile memory like 1GB or more (no, not the current 8MB buffers, they are volatile). So, if something is stored in these memories, they are retained. The system boot-ups will be a lot faster as critical info will be stored on the memory portion. This will benefit laptops more as doing so save battery a lot. One more thing, no previous OS will support these drives unless the manufacture decides to provide drivers. Windows Vista is already ReadyDrive!

Windows Ultimate Extras:
It may seem that the “Ultimate Extras" is the only thing that will force people just go for Windows Vista Ultimate. That is quite true too!

Nevertheless, it also very false. At time of writing, there were four Ultimate Extras launched: Hold 'Em Poker, Windows DreamScene, Windows BitLocker Drive Preparation Tool, Secure Online Key Backup, & GroupShot. I am only going to focus on the important here:

Windows DreamScene: Definitely not important, this one allows using any MPEG or WMV as you animated desktop wallpaper. This does not cause any useless CPU usage or performance hit. It does sometime hypnotize me…

Windows BitLocker Drive Preparation Tool: Remember I said a normal user should not touch BitLocker? Well, because it will re-partition your hard drive killing data. Microsoft did not place any option to select BitLocker partition setup during Windows Vista Setup. This was strange, as only after installing Vista, you would get a change to re-partition according to BitLocker’s requirement and end up re installing Windows Vista again. Strange, na? As the tool’s name says it all, Windows BitLocker Drive Preparation Tool will re-partition your hard drive preserving everything and allowing BitLocker to be activated.

Secure Online Key Backup: When you digitally lock your hard drive with BitLocker, you are asked to create a digital certificate and a password. Secure Online Key Backup is a way to recover the password and the certificates as if lost; there is no hope for the recovery of the encrypted data. Now, normal users can use this very advanced and extremely powerful feature!

GroupShot: (demonstrating the application) "Now my problem with photos is not necessarily technology, it's not that I can edit them, and organize them, or share them, I can't take a picture to save my life," he said. "I'm always cutting people's heads off, or I'm catching people, like in this case, with their eyes closed. So here, I have two pictures. In this one, her eyes are closed, in this one, his eyes are closed. What I want to do is put both of these pictures together into one good picture. So, GroupShot is going to let me do that. I simply select here, take the good part of this picture, I go back here and take the good part of this picture. Now GroupShot didn't fix these pictures, it created the picture I wish I would have taken. Pretty cool." -- Microsoft's Justin Hutchinson described GroupShot during the Gates keynote.

Conclusions:
I tried to as honest as I possibly could and yet it may seem that my love for Microsoft may have a biasing effect on this review but let me tell you that Windows Vista has done nothing but increased that love beyond scale!

Its not that Windows Vista have no bugs, there are bugs but not like upon the launch of Windows XP. All the incompatibilities for legacy applications/hardware in Windows Vista can be easily explained and the net result is a minor offensive on Microsoft side but major problem due to the publishers/manufacturers. This is very vibrant in the sound department. Due to the sudden removal of DirectSound from the DirectX, older soundcards simply refuse to work properly yet I have tried three old devices and they all were able to produce sound properly. Only in video games do they fail as they cause massive shuttering. I do not believe this is any issue. Game developers should add support for OpenAL and hardware manufacturers should create a solid simple driver for their hardware instead of labeling it obsolete. That is just stupid!

Everyone is complaining about Windows Vista and its 64-Bit versions. I believe that has it not been for Windows Vista, I would have never been able to experience the 64-Bit! Windows Vista is going to bring the power of 64-Bit to our homes. There is not another OS out there that brings the complete list of its 32-Bit counterpart’s software to 64-Bit… just like that! The issue is with the drivers. Well blame the hardware manufacturers this time too! I mean, think about it… playing high-end games on 64-Bit computer… only because of Windows Vista 64-Bit.

I have pointed out as many bugs/ugliness as I could per review-object and clearly, the obvious bugs are related to Aero, and others very few are deep inside the new core. So, the main issues are asthetics and look'n feel related... they will be fixed. Windows Vista’s Service Pack will probably hit users before Windows XP’s first Service Pack. I will be among the many happily downloading it instead of the few complaining.

As for the US government banning Windows Vista and Office 2007, well that is something soon to change as the support cycle for current (old) Microsoft OS will come to a proud end. Moreover, on the topic, why does Microsoft even bother publishing Windows in the Europe? The silly N and K variants with out media player and stuff… just let them live one day without Microsoft. Such waste of money on those childish lawsuits…

The whole Pakistan is in deep shock to hear that Visual Basic 6 simply will not work on Windows Vista… though application compiled from it will run nicely. I say in good riddance. I just do not understand when Pakistani developer will learn to “move on”. When will companies have mercy on their employees buy buying a little descent PCs… and by descent, I mean anything above a PII… Pakistan, so far has accomplished nothing remarkable in the .NET era. When it has been completely implemented, the .Net is just starting to appear in development houses and on experimental basis. The clients simply refuse to buy a “descent system”… lame.

With all that said, I will state that Windows 95 moved the world from 16-Bit to 32-Bit. That was an accomplishment and the same can be said about Windows Vista: Not only it allows real 64-Bit computing, it simply changes that way user interact with their PC. The way information presented to the users and shared among users, Windows Vista is developed keeping the thing that actually matter in focus. It does not try to implement it own constraints.

Windows Vista is definitely the best thing to date and the features it was able to keep after a very rough and frustrating development period, Windows Vista is here to stay will most likely be on every 18th PC out of 20 before Windows Vienna.

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