A Windows to Help You Forget

“In just two weeks, on Oct. 22, Microsoft’s long operating-system nightmare will be over. The company will release Windows 7, a faster and much better operating system than the little-loved Windows Vista, which did a lot to harm both the company’s reputation, and the productivity and blood pressure of its users.” Read the full review on All Things Digital

Gizmodo previews Windows 7

Could Windows 7 accomplish everything that’s expected of it? Probably not, but it makes a damn good attempt. We’ve tested the gold master, the final version going out on October 22. Upgrade without trepidation, people. With excitement, even.

Windows 7 is not quite a “Vista service pack.” It does share a lot of the core tech, and was clearly designed to fix nearly every bad thing anyone said about Vista. Which ironically puts the demon that it was trying to exorcise at its heart. What that means is that Windows 7 is what Vista should have been in the public eye—a solid OS with plenty of modern eye candy that mostly succeeds in taking Windows usability into the 21st century—but it doesn’t daringly innovate or push boundaries or smash down walls or whatever verb meets solid object metaphor you want to use, because it had a specific set of obligations to meet, courtesy of its forebear.

That said, if you’re coming from Windows XP, Windows 7 will totally feel like a revelation from the glossy future. If you’re coming from Vista, you’ll definitely go “Hey, this is much better!” Read the full article on Gizmodo.Com

Cross Q&A: Is Windows 7 Good for Gamers?

Jason Cross knows his tech. A former editor at ExtremeTech.com who also contributed to Computer Games Magazine, Cross has been covering the gaming and tech scenes for 13 years.

Cross is certainly a good geek to explain Windows 7, the Microsoft OS that comes out Oct. 22. Like all new OSes, Windows 7 confuses me. My PC is 3 years old, and while I’ve upgraded it to help it run current games at nice resolutions, I’m still not sure if my machine is up to running Microsoft’s new OS. I doubt that I’m the only one with questions.

So I asked Cross about some of my questions about Windows 7… Read the full article at BitMob.Com

Why Windows 7 Will Be Worth The Upgrade: No Comparison to Vista

Windows 7 will be out on October 22. According to what I’ve been reading, it’s slated to be a pretty good operating system. A much better version than Vista and better than XP.

Jon Prange, Sr. Enterprise Architect for Interphase Systems, a leading management and technology consulting organization writes that there were several challenges that were presented with Windows Vista that limited the operating system’s adoption rate and fostered some poor feedback that quickly proliferated. Read the full article on SmallBizTechnology.Com

VistaSucks.WordPress.Com to review… Windows 7 RC

You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone more skeptical of Windows than I. So tune in shortly as I review Windows 7 RC.

Now. for the record… I’m going into this with an open mind. I despise Windows Vista, loathe XP, and have become an Apple Fanboy since Vista’s release. In all honesty though I’d like to see Microsoft do something right. I would love for Windows 7 to succeed where XP and Vista failed. I’d love for Microsoft to give me faith in Windows PCs again. I’ve heard good things floating around the net lately about Win 7. Enough good things that I’m curious to have myself a look for myself.

Here’s what will follow shortly. I will be installing the 64-bit version of Windows 7 on the same machine that I had previously attempted to install & use the 64-bit version of Windows Vista Ultimate on when it was first released. What fairer test could there be? Aside from a minor video card upgrade there have been zero changes to the system since November 2006. The PC has been sitting in storage since I got my first Mac in 2007.

The machine is a single core Athlon FX-57 based PC with 2GB of RAM, SLI Nvidia 7900′s, and a 74GB 10,000RPM Raptor

If Windows 7 is really the OS that Vista should’ve been, it should run exceptionally well on this system which was fairly high end in 2006.

We shall see.  Stay tuned.

Apple Sweeps Consumer Reports’ Laptop Recommendations

NYTimes reports that in the most recent issue of Consumer Reports, Apple’s laptops rated highest across the 13″, 14″-16″ and 17″ laptop categories.

Consumer Reports rates laptop computers on performance, ergonomics, versatility, display, speakers, battery life and weight and provides an aggregate score. Scores for Apple’s MacBook, 15″ MacBook Pro, and 17″ MacBook Pro exceeded all others in each of their categories, earning high recommendations from the publication.

The cost of the machines reviewed, however, varied widely with computers ranging from $600 to $2800 being compared in the same categories. These results come shortly after Microsoft’s most recent laptop hunters ad which features a film-maker looking for a laptop computer for video editing. Microsoft’s is pushing the price argument strongly in their recent ad campaign, while Apple has argued that “a PC is no bargain when it doesn’t do what you want.” Read the full story on the NYTimes.Com (found via MacRumors.Com)

Which is Better For Your Business? A Mac or a PC?

“To start, I need to tell you that up until 2006 I was an avid PC user. Starting with my first computer when I was five, an IBM PS2 Model 30 (without a hard drive), I’ve been loyal. I started with DOS, then Windows 3, 3.1, 95, and then XP. Then came Vista. Before Vista, I spent a lot of time rebooting but it was more or less bearable. After Vista, which is by far the worst operating system ever made, I had to find another solution.

In the summer of 2006, I upgraded about 80% of my company’s computers to Macs…” Read the full article at PCWorld.Com

A Windows Guru spends two weeks with a Mac

“…I’ve been on the front lines of the Mac-PC war for as long as I can remember. My first work computer was an IBM PC with an 8088 CPU. I liked it so much I forked out the money to buy my own machine: an IBM PC XT clone running an 8086 chip, and bulging with 640KB of RAM and a whopping 20MB hard disk.

Since then, I’ve written dozens of books and hundreds or thousands of articles, columns and blogs about PCs and Windows. Along the way, I’ve earned the unending enmity of plenty of Mac folks.” Read the full article on ComputerWorld.Com

Texas state Senate bans Vista from use in government agencies

According to Sen. Juan Hinojosa, vice chairman of the Finance Committee who proposed the ban, he did so because “of the many reports of problems with Vista.” He goes on to say that:

“We are not in any way, shape or form trying to pick on Microsoft, but the problems with this particular [operating] system are known nationwide. And the XP operating system is working very well.” Read the full article on ComputerWorld.Com found via TUAW.Com

Even in Test Form, Windows 7 Leaves Vista in the Dust

Some good news for a change on the Windows front. More and more people have got their hands on the pre-release version of Vista’s succesor and the initial reactions are pretty positive. Walt Mossberg chimes in with his opinion:  “…I won’t be doing a full, detailed review of Windows 7 until it is released in final form, but here’s a preview of some of the main features of this new operating system and some of my initial impressions.

In general, I have found Windows 7 a pleasure to use. There are a few drawbacks, but my preliminary verdict on Windows 7 is positive.

Even in beta form, with some features incomplete or imperfect, Windows 7 is, in my view, much better than Vista, whose sluggishness, annoying nag screens, and incompatibilities have caused many users to shun it.” Read the full review on All Things Digital

Under the Hood, Windows 7 Is Vista’s Twin

“…Bottom line: So far, Windows 7 looks, behaves, and performs almost exactly like Windows Vista. And it breaks all sorts of things that used to work just fine under Vista. In other words, Microsoft’s follow-up to its most unpopular OS release since Windows Me threatens to deliver zero measurable performance benefits while introducing new and potentially crippling compatibility issues.” Read the full article at PCWorld.Com

First Look: Windows 7

At PDC today, Microsoft gave the first public demonstration of Windows 7. Until now, the company has been uncharacteristically secretive about its new OS; over the past few months, Microsoft has let on that the taskbar will undergo a number of changes, and that many bundled applications would be unbundled and shipped with Windows Live instead. There have also been occasional screenshots of some of the new applets like Calculator and Paint. Now that the covers are finally off, the scale of the new OS becomes clear. The user interface has undergone the most radical overhaul and update since the introduction of Windows 95 thirteen years ago. Read the full article and see the screenshots at ArsTechnica.Com

Windows Vista No Longer Matters

Make no mistake: Microsoft has moved beyond Windows Vista, which will become all too apparent during this week’s Professional Developer Conference. Windows 7 is the future, and in many ways it’s the present, too.

Contrary to ridiculous assertions recently made by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Windows Vista is a flop. If businesses aren’t buying Vista, after waiting six (now seven) years, it’s no success. Yet, during the last day of the Gartner 2008 expo 10 days ago, Steve asserted that Vista “has been extremely successful.”

A few days earlier, Steve boasted: “Vista is our best-selling product ever. So, if that takes too much getting over-we’re not going to have products that are much more successful than Vista has been. We sold over 180 million copies in the first 18 months, quite successful.” Really?

But who’s buying this “best-selling” product ever? “We have 180 million users, mostly on the consumer market,” Steve said in an Oct. 2 speech. Oh? According to Gartner analysts Neil MacDonald and David Smith, only about 10 percent of enterprises have adopted Windows Vista. That’s not a high number, particularly in context of the approximately six years between Windows XP and Vista. Read the full article on Microsoft Watch

“Hey, Dad…Can I have Linux back?”

“My oldest son, creator of flame wars, finally discovered that you can only surf to the nether regions of the Internet so many times before even Vista business succumbs to malware. His computer an unusable mass of pop-ups, spewing traffic over our network actually asked me tonight to reinstall Linux for him.

He still wants a Vista virtual machine since Spore is a pretty fine game and his Zune probably won’t play nice with Linux. However, for everyday use, he’s done with Vista. Not only does it lack the “amusing desktop effects” (which his mother hates, by the way, on her new Linux desktop), but even running Clamwin and Windows Defender, he still managed to infect it with a variety of junk, rendering it useless when he had a term paper to write.” Read the full article on Christopher Dawson’s Blog

Has Microsoft lost it?

The ‘Wow’ marketing campaign for Vista has been replaced with the more desperate ‘if you try it, you might not hate it’ Mojave campaign, and mini-PCs – one of the few PC sectors that hasn’t stagnated – are sticking with Windows XP. Even Office, Microsoft’s cash cow, is under attack from free and open source rivals.

So has Ballmer inherited a poisoned chalice? Has Microsoft lost it? And if it has, can it find it again? Read the full story on TechRadar.Com

The top five reasons why Windows Vista failed

The public reputation of Windows Vista is in shambles, as Microsoft itself tacitly acknowledged in its Mojave ad campaign.

IT departments are largely ignoring Vista. In June (18 months after Vista’s launch), Forrester Research reported that just 8.8% of enterprise PCs worldwide were running Vista. Meanwhile, Microsoft appears to have put Windows 7 on an accelerated schedule that could see it released in 2010. That will provide IT departments with all the justification they need to simply skip Vista and wait to eventually standardize on Windows 7 as the next OS for business.

So how did Vista get left holding the bag? Let’s look at the five most important reasons why Vista failed. Read the full story on Between The Lines

A third of new PCs being downgraded to XP, says metrics researcher

More than one in every three new PCs is downgraded from Windows Vista to the older Windows XP, either at the factory or by the buyer, a performance and metrics researcher said today.

According to Devil Mountain Software Inc., which operates a community-based testing network, nearly 35% of the 3,000-plus PCs it examined had been downgraded from Vista to XP.

“Either these machines were downgraded by [sellers like] Dell or HP, or they were downgraded by the user after they got the machine,” said Craig Barth, chief technology officer at Devil Mountain. “In any case, these machines are no longer running Vista.” Read the full story on ComputerWorld.Com

Are Macs More Expensive? Let’s Do the Math Once and For All

“It’s of those eternal questions of the computing world that never seems to get answered definitively: Does the “Mac Tax” really exist? Some folks are positive that Macs are overpriced compared to Windows computers; others deny it steadfastly. Almost nobody, however, bothers to do the math in any serious detail.

So that’s what I’m going to do. And since Apple manufactures multiple models, I’m going to do it one computer at a time, starting with the MacBook, the company’s consumer notebook.” Read the full article at Technologizer.Com

An Open Letter to Windows Vista

“We haven’t talked, but I’ve been watching you from afar and feeling your pain as you’ve dealt with more than your fair share of challenges. Eighteen months after your debut, you simply don’t have an aura of success about you. Worse, your aging predecessor, Windows XP, has unexpectedly gained armies of devotees who refuse to give it up. It’s a pretty sad state of affairs-your original marketing tagline may have been “The Wow Starts Now,” but many people remain steadfastly unwowed.

The idea behind Microsoft’s Mojave Experiment was to suggest that those who spurn you do so out of ignorance. It’s true that some Vista doubters base their distaste on what they’ve heard about you rather than hands-on experience. But I don’t know of anyone outside of Redmond who’d maintain that long-term exposure to you turns the average computer user into a raving fan. Sure, you’re better than you were when you first showed up, thanks to Service Pack 1 and improved compatibility with applications and peripherals. But I’ve talked to lots of people who have used you for many months, and while some of them are pleased with you there are plenty whose feelings range from ennui to anger.” Read the full article at technologizer.com

Quality Control at Microsoft. An expose.

Dean Takahashi, one of the most respected tech journos around, spent years putting together this mind-blowing expose that reveals the truly epic scale of the problems that lead to millions of dead Xbox 360s. It really is one of the most stunning flustercucks in gaming history. According to his account, Microsoft willfully ignored deep, systemic problems in the console’s production that reached from chipmakers-initially, only 16 out of every 100 of its IBM-made processors worked-to production lines, where just before launch, an unbelievable 68 percent of consoles made were clunkers. Read the full article at VentureBeat.Com found via Gizmodo

Former Mac hater reflects on his switch to Mac. (Pt. II)

“…What I find interesting after 6 months is the impact buying that little MacBook had not only on the way I handle my personal computing but to a large degree the influence it has had on the way I do my development work. You see after I bought the MacBook I found myself doing more and more with it. I had a Windows XP development / gaming rig parked directly in front of me but I was constantly sliding my hands over to the MacBook.

My entire development platform-at the time Visual Studio-was completely set up and I had my after-market libraries installed and was using it to build my next online service business. Even with all of my development experience being Windows based I constantly found myself pushing away from my XP system and over to the MacBook.” Read the full story on David Alison’s Blog

Researcher finds Internet Explorer 8 to be a memory hog

“…By test end, IE8 Beta 2 had grabbed 380MB of memory on the 2GB-equipped system running Windows Vista, while IE7 accounted for 250GB and Firefox 3.0.1, the most-recent version of the open source browser, had taken 159MB. When the same tests were run under Windows XP, each browser consumed slightly less memory than in Vista; IE8 Beta 2, however, continued to lead the competition by wide margins.

“When Windows XP starts, the entire OS takes 130 to 150MB,” said Barth. “Suddenly you’re looking at a memory footprint for IE that’s bigger than Microsoft’s earlier operating system. IE8 is fatter than XP.” Read the full story on Infoworld.Com

Enterprise Mac adoptions highest since late 80’s

Don’t look now but Apple Mac hardware and the accompanying OS X 10.x operating system software are gaining significant momentum among corporate users.

A new, independent Yankee Group web-based survey of 750 global IT administrators and C-level executives found that nearly four out of five businesses–approximately 80%–have Macs and the OS X operating system installed in their networks. And although the Apple Mac hardware and OS X operating systems still represent a small niche, adoption and acceptance of Mac hardware and operating system software are growing at a steady and sustained pace not seen since the late 1980s. Read the full story on YankeeGroup.com found via MacUser.Com

Vista: Whose ‘reality’ do you believe?

Forrester Research issued new study results today claiming that 18 months after release, “Vista is still struggling to gain a foothold in large companies.” Forrester called Vista the “new Coke.”

Forrester said that Vista use remains in the single digits (“just under nine percent according to Forrester’s month-by-month desk-top analysis of 50,000 of our enterprise clients across 2,300 companies. That’s up from six percent in January of this year, but far short of the 87 percent penetration for Windows XP.”)

Meanwhile, Bill Veghte, Senior Vice President for Online Services and Windows Business Group, told FAM attendees today that Vista’s uptake among business users is solid. He said Vista enterprise sales were up 20 percent and renewal rates for Software Assurance among business users were greater than 80 percent. (Not surprisingly, there were no stats in Veghte’s presentation about what percentage of business users are downgrading to XP. Read the full story on All About Microsoft

Linux is easier to install than XP

When you buy a new PC today, unless you hunt down a Linux system or you buy a Mac, you’re pretty much stuck with Vista. Sad, but true.

So, when I had to get a new PC in a hurry, after one of my PCs went to the big bit-ranch in the sky with a fried motherboard, the one I bought, a Dell Inspiron 530S from my local Best Buy came pre-infected with Vista Home Premium. Read the full article on Practical-Tech.Com

One customer’s nightmare getting a refund on Vista.

My laptop was stolen, so I went down to Best Buy and picked up an HP dv6815nr since it was on sale for $599.99+tax. After powering it up, I was confronted by the Microsoft Windows Vista EULA and the HP EULA.

If you take the time to read the Microsoft EULA it is disturbing to say the least. But I won’t get into that here – many others have bashed this EULA to bits. Notice that there is no option to not accept their terms – you agree, or else… Or else what? I stared at the screen, and decided it was time to take the leap to Linux.

I found an 800 number on the HP website and made Phone Call #1 Read the full story on Equiliberate.Org

From Win32 to Cocoa: a Windows user’s conversion to Mac OS X—Part III

 

“…All things considered, Apple is offering an attractive platform. The APIs are robust, the tools are good (and getting better), the design philosophy is coherent, and the platform as a whole has a direction. The company will continue to improve and refine the experience for users and developers alike.

But it’s not without some regret that I move away from Windows. There are good things that come out of Microsoft. I like Visual Studio a lot, I think Office 2007 is fantastic, and there are parts of the .NET platform that could be very good. I think Microsoft could—and should—do better.” Read the full article on ArsTechnica.Com

Vista: Victim of Enterprise Malaise

Windows Vista probably deserves a break, but it won’t be getting one from Major—what Microsoft would call—milestones aren’t driving enterprises to radically change their Vista adoption plans. Even I’m surprised. I expected the release of Windows Vista Service Pack 1 or the end of Windows XP OEM sales to mean something for Vista adoption. Nope.

If Vista were a person, it might have an insecurity complex from all the rejection—and for good reason. Not since Windows Me has a Microsoft operating system seen such cool market reception. Based on a recent eWEEK survey of more than 400 IT decision makers, enterprises aren’t lessening their resistance, even when there is good reason. Read the full article on Microsoft-Watch.Com

Vista: DOA in the Enterprise

The year-to-year, or wave-to-wave, surveys are yet another dismal pronouncement on the state of Vista adoption among businesses. The numbers are grim, and there’s not much spin I could put on them, even if I were so inclined. I’m not. The data should always tell the story-and there’s a whopper here.

The really bad news for Microsoft: the number of business PCs running Windows XP increased from 2007 to 2008-three times the increase in the percentage of PCs running Vista.

Perhaps worse: The majority of businesses waiting for Vista-meaning those running older Windows versions-migrated to XP instead. Microsoft had counted on Windows 2000 and older versions to go to Vista. The newest Windows saw some conversion, but XP got much more.

Windows Vista Adoption

Worse still: By the end of 2008, the majority of businesses will have just 9 percent of their PCs running Vista. The number only rises to 28 percent in 2010.

Welcome to the world of continued Windows XP dominance. Read the full article on Microsoft-Watch.Com

Windows should start over from Scratch.

Microsoft Windows has put on a lot of weight over the years. Beginning as a thin veneer for older software code, it has become an obese monolith built on an ancient frame. Adding features, plugging security holes, fixing bugs, fixing the fixes that never worked properly, all while maintaining compatibility with older software and hardware — is there anything Windows doesn’t try to do?

Painfully visible are the inherent design deficiencies of a foundation that was never intended to support such weight. Windows seems to move an inch for every time that Mac OS X or Linux laps it.

The best solution to the multiple woes of Windows is starting over. Completely. Now. Read the full article on NYTimes.Com

Classic Clips: Bill Gates Chews Out Microsoft Over XP

From Gizmodo.Com:

“With Bill Gates saying good-bye to Microsoft this week, we’re realizing more by the day how much we’ll miss the guy. And when reading through the many interviews floating around this week, we came across this jewel from 2003. A leaked memo from Microsoft, it’s several pages of Gates just laying into his design and programming staff for—among other issues—his personal experience when trying to install Windows Moviemaker. And it’s a very fulfilling read if you’ve ever been frustrated by a Microsoft product.”

Head on over to Gizmodo to see this jewel for yourself. It includes such wonderful quotes as: “The lack of attention to usability represented by these experiences blows my mind. I thought we had reached a low with Windows Network places or the messages I get when I try to use 802.11. (don’t you just love that root certificate message?)” Gizmodo.Com

Intel to skip Windows Vista

Intel, the giant chip maker and longtime partner of Microsoft, has decided against upgrading the computers of its own 80,000 employees to Microsoft’s Vista operating system, a person with direct knowledge of the company’s plans said.

The person, who has been briefed on the situation but requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of Intel’s relationship with Microsoft, said the company made its decision after a lengthy analysis by its internal technology staff of the costs and potential benefits of moving to Windows Vista, which has drawn fire from many customers as a buggy, bloated program that requires costly hardware upgrades to run smoothly.

“This isn’t a matter of dissing Microsoft, but Intel information technology staff just found no compelling case for adopting Vista,” the person said. Read the full story on The New York Times.

PC sales are way down. Macs way up.

“…Consider this: Apple’s retail market share is 14 percent, and two-thirds for PCs costing $1,000 or more.

Should I repeat those numbers? The share data is for first-quarter brick-and-mortar stores, as tabulated by 

the NPD Group. Apple’s market share is but one measure of success. Sales growth is way up, while Windows desktop PC sales are way down.

“In notebooks they’re growing two times the market,” said Stephen Baker, NPD’s vice president of industry 

analysis. “Windows notebooks are pretty much flat right now.”

For the first quarter, Windows notebooks had “zero percent” growth year over year, Stephen said. By comparison, Apple notebooks had “50 to 60 percent growth.”

On the desktop, “They’re up 45 percent,” he continued. “The [overall] market is down 20 percent. Windows desktops would be down 25 percent.” The figures are also for first quarter.

I spoke with Stephen earlier this afternoon. He remarked: “iMacs are growing and the Windows desktop ain’t. No matter how you look at it, Apple is outperforming Windows.”  Read the full article on Apple Watch

PC gamers shun Vista, sticking with XP

Games like Crysis benefit clearly from the DX 10 upgrade, but that benefit hasn’t been enough to push gamers into upgrading to Vista. Historically, those are the very first computer users, living on the bleeding edge, to upgrade to new hardware and operating systems. The statistics from Valve, whose Steam system lets gamers download titles from the web and which collects system information in return, shows that Vista still has less than a 15 percent market share among these users.

That’s roughly in line with the total consumer market, but it’s a real surprise considering the advantages Vista’s DirectX 10 offers gamers. There’s no way to run DirectX 10 on XP, so the only way to get the very best PC gaming experience is to run Vista. They should theoretically be lining up to buy Vista in droves. Read the full article on Yahoo Tech

 

From Win32 to Cocoa: a Windows user’s conversion to Mac OS X—Part II

“…I want to write nice applications. I want to be able to concentrate on my own code rather than fighting the API the whole time. I want my applications to fit in with the OS and work in a way that’s consistent with first-party applications and even other third-party programs. I want this because I think it leads to better software; it means I can spend my time creating innovative and useful software that people enjoy using. I really want to do this, but you know what? On Windows it’s just too damn hard.

Microsoft has had good opportunities to do something about this, but they have been systematically squandered through a combination of ineptitude, mismanagement, and slavish adherence to backwards compatibility. The disillusionment I feel is incredible. I enjoy writing programs, but I don’t enjoy writing for Windows. And while once it made sense to stick with Windows, it just doesn’t any more. There’s now an attractive alternative: Mac OS X”  Read the full article on ArsTechnica

 

Popular Mechanics – Mac vs. PC: The Ultimate Lab Test

“…Simply put, Vista proved to be a more sluggish operating system than Leopard. Our PCs installed some software faster, but in general they were slower in our time trials. Plus, both PCs showed weaker performance on third-party benchmarks than the Macs. Our biggest surprise, however, was that PCs were not the relative bargains we expected them to be. The Asus M51sr costs the same as a MacBook, while the Gateway One actually costs $300 more than an iMac. That means for the price of the Gateway you could buy an iMac, boost its hard drive to match the Gateway’s, purchase a copy of Vista to boot-and still save $100. Read the full review on Popular Mechanics

Why ‘No Macs’ is no longer a defensible IT strategy

Once confined to marketing departments and media companies, the Mac is spilling over into a wider array of business environments, thanks to the confluence of a number of computing trends, not the least among them a rising tide of end-user affinity for the Apple experience.

 

Luckily for IT, many of those same trends are making it easier for tech departments to say yes to the Mac by facilitating IT’s ability to provide enterprise-grade Mac management and support.

“We’re seeing more requests outside of creative services to switch to Macs from PCs,” notes David Plavin, operations manager for Mac systems engineering at the U.S. IT division of Publicis Groupe, a global advertising conglomerate. There are so many requests that Plavin now supports 2,500 Macs across the U.S. — nearly a quarter of all Publicis’ U.S. PCs.

And Plavin is less of an anomaly than you might think. Buoyed by increased interest in the consumer arena, Macs are cropping up in more and more organizations, in large part because end-users are pushing for them. Read the full article on InfoWorld.Com

 

From Win32 to Cocoa: A Windows developer’s conversion to Mac OS X

“A couple of Gartner analysts have recently claimed that Windows is “collapsing”; that it’s too big, too sprawling, and too old to allow rapid development and significant new features. Although organizations like Gartner depend on trolling to drum up business, I think this time they could be onto something. “Collapsing” is over-dramatic-gradual decline is a more likely outcome-but the essence of what they’re saying-and why they’re saying it-rings true.

Windows is dying, Windows applications suck, and Microsoft is too blinkered to fix any of it-that’s the argument. The truth is that Windows is hampered by 25-year old design decisions. These decisions mean that it’s clunky to use and absolutely horrible to write applications for. The applications that people do write are almost universally terrible. They’re ugly, they’re inconsistent, they’re disorganized; there’s no finesse, no care lavished on them. Microsoft-surely the company with the greatest interest in making Windows and Windows applications exude quality-is, in fact, one of the worst perpetrators.” Read the full article on ArsTechnica.Com

 

Top Analysts: Windows collapsing under its own weight; Radical change needed

Microsoft’s Windows juggernaut is collapsing as it tries to support 20 years of applications and becomes more complicated by the minute. Meanwhile, Windows has outgrown hardware and customers are pondering skipping Vista to wait for Windows 7. If Windows is going to remain relevant it will need radical changes.

That sobering outlook comes courtesy of Gartner analysts Michael Silver and Neil MacDonald. Half of a full room of IT managers and executives raised their hands when asked whether Microsoft needed to radically change its approach to Windows. Read the full story on ZDNet.Com

Former Mac hater reflects on his switch to Mac

“…While I am not a card carrying Mac fanboy (it does have issues like any piece of technology), I wanted to try and summarize why I like the Mac so much now that I’ve been using it heavily for the last two months.

I have been a Windows user and software developer since 1992, and a DOS user and developer since 1984. I used to hate Macs and as recently as 9 months ago my avatar on one of my forums was John Hodgman (the PC guy from the Mac ads).

Now I really enjoy using my Mac and am drifting away from Windows as a platform. Here’s why:

Read the full story on David Alison’s Blog found via SwitchingToMac.Com

Microsoft Succeeds in Making Vista Even Worse

Windows Vista is already perhaps the most frustrating product Microsoft has yet heaved onto the computing public. But now its Service Pack 1 update, which is supposed to FIX holes and squeaks in the Vista code, seems to be making things worse — so much worse that venerable publications like Computerworld are running stories about how to get SP1 off your machine. InfoWorld has a piece about how Vista users are blasting Microsoft on Microsoft’s own Vista blog. Read the full story on SeekingAlpha.Com

Study finds businesses more satisfied with Mac OS than Vista

Corporate users of Apple Inc.’s Leopard operating system are more than five times more likely to say that they are “very satisfied” with the OS than business users of Microsoft Corp.’s Windows Vista, a research firm said Wednesday.

In a February survey of 2,200 U.S. corporate computer users, 53% of those using Mac OS X 10.5 reported that they were very satisfied with their operating system. Of those using Windows XP or Windows Vista, however, 40% of the former and only 8% of the latter said they were very satisfied.”Apple continues to set the standard for corporate customer satisfaction,” said Paul Carton, director of research at ChangeWave Research. That, and the fact that corporate buying plans for Macs remain at historically high levels, indicate that users like what Apple’s doing, continued Carton. Read the full article on ComputerWorld.Com

Vista SP1: Threat or Menace?

“Popular wisdom says you should wait for SP1 before switching to any new version of Windows. Ironically, the question on the minds of current Vista customers iswhether it’s the right time to switch to SP1.

Vista SP1 reportedly wraps some 551 bug fixes along with performance, reliability, and compatibility enhancements. But given how customers who have upgraded from XP have struggled with driver and application incompatibilities, it’s no surprise that many are gun-shy of the latest update.” Read the full article on WashingtonPost.Com

Microsoft top brass ‘burned’ by Vista problems

“Private Microsoft emails unearthed during a US court case have revealed that even the software giant’s own executives struggled to get Windows Vista running smoothly.”

“…One executive, Mike Nash, complained he was “burned” so badly by compatibility issues he was left with “a $2100 email machine”.

Steven Sinofsky, the Microsoft executive in charge of Windows, struggled to even get his home printer working with Vista.”

“Jon Shirley, who experienced compatibility problems with his Epson printer and scanner and his Nikon film scanner.

He could not even get some of Microsoft’s own MSN software products to work on Vista and refused to upgrade his other computer to the operating system.

“I cannot understand with a product this long in creation why there is such a shortage of drivers,” Shirley wrote to Ballmer.

Other emails from various Microsoft executives show that even they struggled to work out what “Vista Capable” and “Vista Ready” meant when buying a new PC.

“Is it true that Vista Ready doesn’t necessarily mean Aero capable? I got a Dell Latitude that is Vista Ready but doesn’t have enough graphics [hardware],” Sinofsky wrote.”

Read the full article on SydneyMorningHerald.Com.Au

See also this article on the NYTimes.Com

My nightmare trying to upgrade to Vista SP1

“Pity me. I’m trying to update to Vista SP1 and it turns out I’m one of the people on the Vista SP1 banned driver list. I’ve wasted hours of my life that I won’t get back, and still no SP1. I’ll show you what I’ve gone through, including screenshots, so that you don’t have to go through this mess yourself.” Read the full article on ComputerWorld.Com

Apple snags 14 percent of US-based PC retail sales in February

Apple’s computer sales in the US have grown considerably from last year – at 60-percent unit growth and 67-percent revenue growth – granting it 14-percent of all computers sold for February. According to AppleInsider, Apple’s laptop systems saw the largest growth, representing a 64-percent increase in units sold, and 67-percent increased revenue, suggesting strong acceptance of the company’s new ultra-portable, the MacBook Air. Read the full story on AppleInsider.Com

Desktop OS, Hold the Vista

EWeek has released their Enterprise IT survey findings on OS migration. The general consensus? IT Pros still hate Vista.

“…72 percent of respondents said they expected the desktop OS they were using now to be the one they would be using in 2009. Some respondents were looking beyond Vista, with 6 percent saying the desktop OS they expected to be using in 2009 would be Windows “7,” the post-Vista version of Windows.” Read the full report on EWeek.Com

Court docs reveal Microsoft’s TRUE motivation for relaxing Vista’s License Agreement

“…Microsoft finally relented in January and allowed Vista Home Basic and Vista Home Premium to be virtualized, company officials attributed the change of heart to a newfound “maturity in the industry,” in terms of being able to trust “what’s under the virtual machine.”But the real reason for Microsoft’s capitulation became clear on March 7 via a new joint-status report in the Microsoft-Department of Justice case. It turns out BIOS maker Phoenix Technologies (a long-time Microsoft partner) filed a complaint with antitrust regulators about Microsoft’s virtualization restrictions.” Read the full story on All About Microsoft

PC Magazine: “[Apple's Mac OS is] by far the best operating system ever written.”

“…After three months with Apple’s Mac OS X Leopard Version 10.5, I have three main things to say about it. First: Despite minor problems, it’s by far the best operating system ever written for the vast majority of consumers, with dozens of new features that have real practical value”

“ If you’re in the market for a new machine, it’s time to look seriously at a Mac, especially now that all Macs can run Windows along with OS X through the built-in Boot Camp feature that lets you install Windows and Leopard in separate partitions. Even better, third-party software from Parallels or VMware make it possible to run a Windows program in a window on the OS X desktop. It’s even possible to set up OS X so that Word documents automatically open in the Windows version of Microsoft Word.”

“I’ve found Vista to be a major disappointment that tends to look worse the more I use it. I still use Windows XP for getting serious work done in long, complicated documents. But OS X is easier to manage and maintain and I vastly prefer OS X to Windows for Web-browsing, mail, and especially for any task that involves graphics, music, or video. Leopard performs all such tasks even better than previous versions did—and Leopard is the only OS on the planet that works effortlessly and intuitively in today’s world of networked computers and peripherals. Leopard is far from perfect, but it’s better than any alternative, and it’s getting harder and harder to find good reasons to use anything else.” Read the full review on PCMag.Com

Mac customers 81% “Very Satisfied” compared to Vista Basic’s 15%.

The chart above says it all but you can still read the full story at BaltimoreSun.Com. Found via SwitchingToMac.Com