Comments on: Microsoft: Vista piracy rate is half that of XP

Software maker hopes to keep that momentum with Vista Service Pack 1 by closing some loopholes, though it will make things a little less miserable for those with non-genuine Vista.

[Uncoveror]

Even free not cheap enough.

No one wants Vista, not even if it is free. Accept it, Microsoft! You have made a lemon. Just scrap it.

[wil2liv]

even pirates prefer XP

That is probably the most accurate title for your story. Out of about 20 people I know that have used or tried Vista, only one of them actually likes it. I have 7 computers at my house, and after installing Vista Ultimate, I decided not to "pirate" my one licensed copy on any of my other systems. XP is SO much better.

[Skydiver069]

Tend to agree,,

My story, as many have probably already experienced for themselves:

Vista was pre-installed on my new Laptop. Since then I've repartitioned the drive and loaded XP and a Win 2003 eval edition, too..

Although I primarily use Vista so I can get my head around it (will have to support it sooner or later), I can't stand the fact that with 1Gb of memory the system sucks back roughly 85% of that during idle periods. XP and 2003 server are more then happy with 1Gb RAM.

So.. My guess is that very few even want Vista on their PC's. Aside from the fact that the O/S has been completely revamped - familiar button's being renamed, tasks being done in different ways, etc. - it's simply a bloody resource HOG that brings newer PC's to a crawl.

With that in mind, perhaps the pirates are truly doing the User community a favour by leaving Vista's code alone.

[Skroob]

You may actually have an old PC

Really, I mean this is just history repeating itself.
I am a corporate tech, and just like you I have to deal with upgrades too. Soo sad such is the life of technology.
Ms was trying to make an OS that fits the new and next gen harware of the era, JUST LIKE XP DID!!!
Does anyone remember when XP was released? This thread might as well have been copy and pasted from that time period. Everyone complained about how slow it ran on their machine, and how it wouldn?t run their crappy little 98 and 95 programs. Sometimes progress sucks, if you don?t like it buy an abacus.
If MS makes you feel so sore on the bottom switch to Linux, and don?t wine to me about programs not running on it as long as similar projects like "wine" are great alternatives.
It?s all about matching up the right software for the right hardware. Just because vista is out doesn?t mean you HAVE to upgrade. My desktop was at a point where all of the upgrades I gave it only gave me a marginal increase in performance for XP. Vista uses the resources I provide it reasonably well (not as well as Ubuntu I might add), yes their are glitches, and like XP, they will go away!
Just recently I had one of our users approach me about her personal PC, and whether she should upgrade from W2k to XP, after a look I told her she was better off where she is, that XP would slow her down. TECHNICALLY it would run on her machine, MS said so on the package, but I also know that reality is a much harder truth.

This thread is separated into three groups, optimists, pessimists, and the uninformed.

[ethana2]

Ubuntu FTW

Microsoft makes their thing harder, we make ours easier.

We have overtaken them, now we just watch the people migrate.

Don't bother with Vista. Download Ubuntu. If you don't like it, hey-- go back to windows for a year. As of now, Ubuntu is better than Windows Vista for all my purposes.

[Skroob]

Word up

I dual boot between Vista and Ubuntu, and have Ubuntu set as my default.
So far I?ve loved it and haven?t had problems getting some of my windows programs to run on it.

Many of the programs I use for school, like say Mathmatica, have Linux versions anyway. And my desktop runs faster on Ubuntu (With all of the eye candy running, Compiz whomps Aero) than it did on XP!

[Dango517]

There waiting for the release of SP1,

there not stupid. No seriously, it's pretty early to be claiming a victory for Microsoft on this issue, the OS hasn't been out a year yet. Very soon now the pirates will be in full production.

Activation is such and important part of the system and the first. What really makes this situation bad is that Microsoft benefits from activation. There the ones this is for and they can't protect there own interests and when the annoyances become too great for consumers they go somewhere else and this hurts Microsoft twice.

The big issue here is how is prerelease testing being done by Microsoft for an OS? There really falling down here. A major review of this process within Microsoft is badly needed, way too many problems are slipping by them. Do they use this software themselves before it is released? If so, is the corporate culture such that people are fearful to speak up about problems within? Does management listen to these internal prerelease complaints? Do managers and administrators hold on too tightly to bad ideas? Whats up with this? Once it's checked out within Microsoft how is it being reviewed by the general public? Are novices included in the testing. Are Linux and Mac users included? Activation is only a symptom of a much larger problem at Redmond, poor quality and an effective means of dealing with it and they aren't alone.

.

[inachu]

Vista is bloat code.

XP is best for gamers.

[volterwd]

Actually

people are trying to pirate vista but it locks up 80% of the time while installing.

[georgetman]

Vista Piracy

Why would that surprise anyone? I have a policeman friend who can verify that the theft rate for used diamond rings and used gold jewelry is much higher than that for used toilet tissue. Could t be that's because the used tissue is harder to conceal? Or some other reason...

[krantistor]

vista piracy

vista piracy rate is half that of XP since nobody really wants to upgrade :-)

[Renegade Knight]

Anti Piracy Mode

They stick another mode about validation. While diagosing my computer Gateway asked me to install a memory patch from microsoft. I got the patch but could only boot in safe mode. Safe mode would not validate the computer (said it wasn't ok when it was) and the patch would not installed. It took a dozen boots to get regular boot stable enough to validate (which it did fine in regular) and install the paths.

What a pain.

[developIT]

I can see that many here are calling Vista a pile of **** and other not so pleasant words. But Vista still has more users than OSX or Linux. If Vista is **** then what do you call OSX and LInux with less users. Is there any word then lower than **** that we can call both of these OS?

[imhodudes]

Wonder if Microsoft is also tracking the upsurge in competitive OS's - like Mac and Linux - since they made Windows harder to pirate? Betcha it more than offsets their increased sales. Let's face it - there is nothing technologically advanced about activation - Microsoft could have required it even before the Internet was around - but choose not too, probably for the very reason that giving away a copy of Windows was considered better than allowing a rival OS to take over a desktop.

[Matt876]

In order for something to be worth pirating there has to be a demand for it. Seems logical XP is pirated at a 2 to 1 ratio to vista since nobody wants vista. In the future vista is going to be looked at like windows me.

And if osx was so great bootcamp wouldn't exist...