16 Comments

1. sol vason:

The better question is “why?”

Windows 98 was an excellent system that did everything an opating system needs to do. Of course it needed to be rebooted ever 3 hours but that was no problem.

2000 was no improvement but it did require a day or 2 with the manuals to learn how to make it as useful as 98.

XP stays up for a week before needing a boot. But it requires 1 week to learn how to get it to do what 98 can do.

Vista. I’ve tried several times to use Vista. Finally I dual booted XP on my new Vista computer and that computer works just like it had 98.

Some day I’ll be forced to use a new version of Windows that will probably cost $2000 (inflation) and will take 2 weeks to get it to work as good as 98. It would be really nice if a new version of Windows was alreasdy set up to run like 98.

Nov 29, 2009 - 2:41 pm 2. Dean Thompson:

Let’s also not forget that 10.6 is targeted at Intel hardware only, so that hinders the number of sales.

Nov 29, 2009 - 5:15 pm 3. Steve Ducharme:

You’re all kidding yourselves. The future belongs to Google. Most of my computing footprint is already there anyway so let’s get on with the OS already. Bring it on. I can’t wait.

Nov 29, 2009 - 8:43 pm 4. Ron Coleman:

Man you Apple-flavored Kool-Aid imbibers (a word I do not use lightly in the presence of Vodkapundit) really won’t fargin (sorry, there’s no English word for this) Microsoft even the smallest hint of the occasional competent execution of something, will ya?

Nov 29, 2009 - 10:02 pm 5. Stephen Green:

Ron –

Didn’t mean to imply that at all. But as my dad used to say, if you didn’t understand what I was saying, that’s my fault, not yours — I’ll try again.

By all accounts, Win7 is an excellent (and secure!) OS. Most users say it fixes everything wrong with Vista and then some. Apparently, it’s a real pleasure to use.

So, congratulations to all of you Win7 early adopters, for finally attaining all those pleasures I’ve enjoyed since 2006. And I would have enjoyed those pleasures back in 2001, but I was a little slow on the switcheroo uptake.

Nov 29, 2009 - 10:16 pm 6. Casey:

Oh, my. First, sol, you need to narrow down what you mean by Win98; the original, SE, or Me? The most robust version was SE, and Me was the worst dog since MS-DOS 4.x. Also, ‘98 was the last 16/32bit hybrid, and still used MS-DOS as a boot loader.

Win2k, on the other hand, was far more robust and powerful than any flavor of 9x. It was the first commercial (i.e. mass market) Windows which used the NT kernel.

I have no idea why you think extra study was needed when migrating from one flavor to another, unless you’re talking about tweaks. I’ve used evert 9x/NT flavor (except Me) had never had any learning curve issues. Then again, the first thing I did with XP was change the Start menu to the “classic” form, as I prefer functionality over eye candy. The only issue I ever had with Win2k was that Mozilla liked to crash 2 or 3 times a week on that platform, alas.

Also don’t understand the “need to reboot” point, although I’ve seen folks make similar claims before. The only reason I do a new boot is that I turn off my home machine when I go to work; no point in wasting the electricity, no? I can say I found even the original Win95 quite reliable, as I ran an Opus BBS 24/7 for quite a while on that platform. I had a 486DX2-66 with 8 megabytes of RAM, and the BBS worked flawlessly. I could even play Quake while people were online, though they could tell I was doing so by occasional pauses in throughput. Never had to reboot the system “just because,” and I honestly can’t remember a time coming home from work (or getting up in the morning) to find a locked-up system. That might be due to the fact that the version of Opus I used was a WinNT console application that worked equally well under ‘95.

The upgrade path 95/98SE/2000/XP made sense, as each new version offered genuine improvement, although the big jump in memory requirements for XP irked me to no end. Vista was a joke, offering mostly eye-candy and UI changes. In fact -from what I’ve heard about 7.x- I consider Vista the world’s biggest beta test.

Steve D., I’m surprised you are so enamored of returning to the old mainframe/client model, because that’s what Google is offering. Sorry, I like to keep my data here, where I can back it up, thankyouverymuch, and I prefer to select my own applications, instead of Google-word, Google-tunes, or Google-mail. Do you really want to put that much trust in a company that works hand in glove with the Chinese government?…

I think Dean is on more solid ground. If one drills down to the source of the above claim, you’ll find it was based on a survey of systems online for the weekend of Nov 21 & Nov 22. For those two days, the systems surveyed online showed 5% and 5.14% for Windows 7 (avg of 5.07%) compared to Apple’s Nov 15-21 average of 5%.

That’s it. That’s the big kahuna; the big score!

Let me translate for MS: The newest version of our operating system (which as Stephen pointed out is the first decent offering from MS in eight years) for a couple of days enjoyed a slightly higher market share than Apple, a company which holds ~ 7.6% share of the PC market.

Yet another translation: total market share of the latest version of the 92% Goliath is greater than the total market share of the latest version of the 7.6% David. Quelle surprise.

What I found interesting is this little tidbit: Apple has 91% of market for $1,000+ PCs. In other words, 9 out of 10 buyers who plop down the $$$ for something more than a mass-market box are buying Apples. Hmmm….

Nov 29, 2009 - 10:36 pm 7. Doug:

The Mac versus Windows debate is like being given the options in “I’m Gonna Get You Sucka,” do you want to leave via the stairs or the window?

Being an open source guy, I have to commend Apple for stealing and adopting all the best practices and code in the open source community, then pretending they own them and then cutting off any significant development from the outside community to whom they owe their success. Try to get an app built for the iPhone sometime. Worst approval process ever.

Apple is lucky that Microsoft has the vision of Ray Charles and executes that impaired vision with the skills of Jake Delhomme in the playoffs.

I feel dirty using both of them.

Nov 29, 2009 - 11:04 pm 8. tm:

Mac fan-boys are like liberals only less numerous thank god.

Nov 30, 2009 - 12:57 am 9. Mr. Lion:

Which is, unsurprisingly, old, and sucky.

I can happily say that the only real exposure I have to doze these days is compatibility testing with internet #$!@%ing explorer, and even with doze-seven, it still feels like getting into a rusty 1970 Ford Pinto with duct tape holding the door on and an ever expanding pool of gas underneath, after having spent my entire existence driving a Ferrari 250 GTO.

Nov 30, 2009 - 6:26 am 10. Steve Ducharme:

Case you wrote: “Steve D., I’m surprised you are so enamored of returning to the old mainframe/client model, because that’s what Google is offering. Sorry, I like to keep my data here, where I can back it up, thankyouverymuch, and I prefer to select my own applications, instead of Google-word, Google-tunes, or Google-mail. Do you really want to put that much trust in a company that works hand in glove with the Chinese government?…”

google is a looong way from the old mainframe client model. Storage location of my data is still up to me. My hard drive hasn’t exactly disappeared and I’d be a moron to completly trust anyone with my data so I don’t see your point. Online storage is an option for sharing data not a requirement.

The Google environment is not yet a a one-stop-shop for all my needs but it’s getting damm close. As long as my connection speed is DSL or better I’m happy as a clam. Obscene amounts of storage are available and the ability to interlink it all from docs to photo’s to e-mail to Google earth etc etc.. seemlessly in one online environment is getting excellent and getting closer to perfect every month.

And oh yeah… ALL FOR FREE!

As far as the sell out to the Chi-coms I agree. But then again Microsoft has blood on their hand in this one also so where do I go exactly? Ubuntu is Ok I guess but hardly comprehensive solution.

Peace!

Nov 30, 2009 - 10:46 am 11. Neil:

Steve D.,

I’m sure this doesn’t describe your situation, but those of us who do work under NDA are effectively prohibited from using Google tools, at least in my (occasionally paranoid) opinion. If I use Sketchup to design some a part for a client, did I really retain control of the data at all times? Ditto for using Google word processing tools for creating product specifications. If I were to use Gmail for client communications, Google would be serving me ads based on the content–do I really have an expectation of confidentiality there?

Using Google tools is like undressing in front of a window. Most of the time, nobody’s watching….

Nov 30, 2009 - 2:33 pm 12. Doug:

Neil, NDA’s are worth less than toilet paper, but I do sympathize with the spirit of honoring them in good faith and understand your predicament. Why would you be using your personal email for doing confidential work anyway? I use gmail enterprise for my business, get all the benefits of actual collaborative tools that are completely secure.

Case, all the moralistic arguments of boycotting Google are sophomoric and make you sound like awfully close to an undergrad. Google is “hand in glove” with the Chinese gov’t? Yeah, that’s not hyperbole or anything. I’m not saying their China policy is one that I would agree with, but if you think Google is Evil, I hope that you don’t do your banking with a large multinational bank. Their business dealings with China are far more compromising than putting content filters and firewalls up.

Anyway, I hope it is worth all that extra effort and cost to back up your data. For me it isn’t. Different strokes for different folks, I guess.

Nov 30, 2009 - 3:07 pm 13. Casey:

Doug, you owe me a beer for that Sucka reference! I’m now wiping the last one off of my monitor.

Steve D: I was under the impression that Google apps retained the user’s data remotely, much like webmail applications track your mail online. If you can keep your data local, or at least back them up locally, good on Google.

I admit I hold a very definite preference (if not bigotry) for local applications.

Doug: I wasn’t using the point about collaborating with the Chinese as a major point, but a minor one. The question still stands (with respect to both data & personal integrity), should one trust Google? From what Steve D has told me, one is not as reliant on remote storage as I had thought.

And, yes, it is ALWAYS worth the extra effort and cost to back up your data! I’m very much a belt’n’suspenders kinda guy in that respect.

I don’t understand the spite shown Applesiders just because they like Apple products. Certainly OS X has mastered the hydra once known as *NIX to the point where they can offer a worry-free, hassle-free, no-learning-curve-required experience for the typical modern computer user. No, I don’t like all of the policies and/or approaches Apple espouses with respect to intellectual property, but at least they offer a full-up “plug’n'play” platform combining ease of use with better security than MicroSoft. From what I’ve read, it’s not too hard to augment a normal modern Apple system with all sorts of *NIX goodies, including various shells, editors, compilers, and so forth.

The Wintel platform, alas, used to have lovely goodies as Turbo Pascal, various useful BASIC interpreters/compilers, and shell enhancements like 4DOS or 4NT. These days, not so much.

Nov 30, 2009 - 10:42 pm 14. Doug:

Casey: if you’re ever in SF, the next two beers are on me.

I work pretty closely with the Goog, so maybe my fears are alleviated by those relationships. As Steve said, if they haven’t done a good job at communicating clearly, it’s their fault, not your’s.

The personal ideologies of their founders and CEO are a bit annoying, but I think they offer some pretty incredible technology. I think the future is collaboration (see 37Signals and Google Wave) and it is impossible for that to happen without storing data in the “Cloud” (ie the Internet). Also, they execute their business really well for a large Corp.

Apple has AMAZING products. Microsoft deserves what they get for Vista (worst major tech release EVER), but some of the stuff that they have developed is quite good–unfortunately, they have absolutely no business strategy or branding voice around it, so it sits out in the ether with no relevancy to anyone.

Dec 1, 2009 - 12:01 pm 15. Will:

I must agree with Casey. I used Windows 2000 every day from mid-2001 until this January, when I built a new PC for the Windows 7 beta test. I also used Windows 3.11, 95, Me (which was the worst OS I’ve ever worked with), and XP.

The two champs are Win2K and Win7. Like 2000, 7 can run for weeks at a time without reboots. On both OS’ the only BSoD’s I’ve dealt with were related to faulty hardware or drivers. Since upgrading to the final version of 7 in October, I have had no issues. It just works, and it works as well as anything I’ve ever tried.

I’m sure MacOS is very nice, too, but I’m far too cheap to buy one of their PC’s. For a cheapskate like me, a DIY computer is far and away the best blend of perfomance and value.

Dec 1, 2009 - 4:55 pm 16. Casey:

Will, you remind me of the specific reason I prefer XP over 2k, since the latter gets by with far less resources: ClearType. XP has it, and Win2k doesn’t. Huge difference on the screen.

Come to think of it, if you (as a DIY-er) don’t mind buying Intel mainboards, it’s possible to put together an Intel mainboard rig which will boot OS X. You have to get a specific board, maybe cpu, and so on, so it matches the stuff Apple puts in its system. Then you get a copy of Darwin Linux and a copy of OS X, do some mucking about, and voila! you’ll get the Apple logo. If you’re interested, google OSx86 or hackintosh. Wiki has interesting entries for both.

Dec 4, 2009 - 10:59 pm

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