A new computer was needed at work and yesterday the big brown truck dropped off a shiny new Dell computer for me to configure. Now mind you, this is my first experience with Vista because I never got around to actually loading any of the beta releases that came out. Out of the box and up and running it is nice and pretty and round and all that crap, but there are some ups and downs for it.

First and foremost, I’ll complain, that’s what everyone always does anyway.

  • It needed an Internet connection to do anything
  • I can’t control the user account Administrator at all
  • It locks computer after about 30 minutes of being idle, requiring a password to be entered
  • Stupid pop ups asking if I really want to create a new folder on the desktop
  • Using 800mb of ram just to sit idle
  • Dumb way it handles logging into the box itself or a network domain

I’m sorry, but it is a memory pig. This one has the Business flavor installed, which comes with Office 2003, but it is not active. It’s just there and wants you to call and get a registration code for a fee. The logging in thing is stupid. At work we have a domain, we log into it. Traditionally on Windows you will hit Ctrl + Alt + Del and enter a username and password and from a drop down menu select the network or the local computer. For Vista, if you want to log into the local box you must type it as COMPUTERNAME\user and then your password. Dumb! It also seems to lock the computer after about 30 minutes of being idle, requiring reentry of a password.

There are some good things about vista, I’m not sure what they are yet, I’m still getting used to it, but if I find them I’ll do a follow up post. This may put a damper on my plans for a new notebook; I’m not overly thrilled with the power consumption or the idiosyncrasies that are vista as of yet.

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