Reader Comments

Very good article It would be good to see a article with the hardware requirements to run the OS and with other apllications running as well .

I'm running Build 5270 on an Intel Centrino 1.6GHz with 1GB ram and it runs perfectly with all the advanced graphics and Aero Glass turned on, I expect by RTM that you should be able to get it to run on a 1.0GHz machine with 512mb ram and a VDDM/LDDM compatible graphics card (specs are what I'd guess for full Aero Glass effects).

Fire Microsoft's marketing department. FIRE them! This is so hilarious. Microsoft is such a corporation. They don't even realize they speak in meaningless corporation market-speak now. "Would you like Windows Vista Home Basic or Windows Vista Home Premium? Or perhaps you would prefer Windows Vista Ultimate? It's 'optimized for the individual!' Or if you're wanting something quick and cheap, what about Windows Starter 2007? Or do you need Windows Vista Business for your home business?" "Um...what? I thought I just needed Windows." "With any version of Windows Vista, you'll get to run Windows Mail, Windows Address Book, Windows Picture Gallery, Windows Live Messenger, Windows Media Player, Windows Internet Explorer, Windows Defender, and Windows DVD Maker! Access them all from the Windows button, previously the Start button, integrated with Windows Live and Windows Office Live! Also comes prebundled with Windows Office on request." "Does everything need to start with Windows?" "Windows Vista! Clear! Connect! Organize your digital life!" "Please stop reading from the Microsoft.com Windows Vista page and speak like a human, please...I just want something to surf the 'net with..." "Well, here's a 3.2Ghz 1GB RAM powerhouse with a DirectX9.0c video card with Vista pre-installed...you're gonna need it just to boot up and display windows on the screen." "WHAT?! That's it, I'm getting an iMac."

bonch, LOL, your imaginary conversation is hilarious and isn't far from the truth! I agree that they should fire Microsoft's marketing department... just look at what they also did to all the Visual Studio 2005 editions, what a bunch of idiots!

bonch, you should be writing commercials for Apple. Brilliant. And it's only funny because it's true... As for "reading from the Microsoft.com Vista page", I love Paul's clearly objective line: "Windows Vista Ultimate. The best operating system ever offered for a personal PC, optimized for the individual." Yikes. Talk about reading from the script. And here's a question: Why do have to go all the way up to "Ultimate" to get a version "optimized for the individual"? Shouldn't the "Home" versions be "optimized for the individual"? This is gonna be fun.

"Clear," indeed. This is a transparent case of MS marketing trumping development decisions and feedback from customers and the press. Let's call it what it is: a total disaster. It's a disaster for the OS, by crippling features in dumb ways. (EU legal compliance notwithstanding, but why punish your US market for that?) It's a disaster for support of all types, by again creating different OSes with different capabilities and workflows. It's a disaster for the platform, because it will slow adoption and confuse users. And it's, ironically, a disaster for marketing, because there's no way you can sell this many flavors of an OS. Of course, it hasn't actually happened yet. Maybe there's time to get them to about-face on what looks like it good be a really great upgrade. Paul, thanks for breaking this now -- because what every journalist, every user needs to do from here on out, EVERY time we mention Vista, is to start and end with this complaint.

The tragic part is that once upon a time, Vista was supposed to be a really great and revolutionary rewrite of Windows. Marketing and management killed that.

M$ reminds me of the American car companies building their bloated overly chromed cars while ignoring what their customers wanted and the Japanese cars slowly taking over. One of these days M$ will get a wake up call and people just wont pay big bucks for DRM hobbled bloatware.

This sounds like the right environment for Linux to jump in and gain some market share.

This is more proof that Microsoft is losing it's grip. They have been completely out of touch with their users and developers. IE 6 & 7 is a web designer's nightmare, this Vista DRM is a nuisance, Active X should be outlawed. Some people may not like Macs, but you have to admit that Apple really nails usability. Microsoft should stop copying 2-3 year old features and figure out how to implement OPEN SOURCE architecture!

All you wanna-be hot shot developers need to relax. WINDOWS is for the general public and Microsoft knows EXACTLY how to market. Windows will eventually take over the entire house, from PC to everything electronic. Think Microsoft Toaster or Microsoft Microwave all controlled by Vista v2.0 Think about it from the point of view of the general public? before blasting me. You know I will buy and so will countless millions... perhaps tens of millions...

You know I will warez and so will countless millions... perhaps tens of millions... ---------------------------------------------- There, edited for truth ;)

"...Optimized for the individual." What does that even mean? And on the heals of this article, what are the prices for these editions? Do the premiums come at premium costs? And the ultimate versions at an ultimate cost? ... Wow, I don't like the sound of that.

Most decisions that people make today involve choosing between a different range of products from a multitude of different suppliers. They are used to these choices - what DVD player to buy, what car to get, which mobile phone. They're used to these sort of choices, and will be neither confused nor put off by the range of Windows versions available.

What is a personal pc? I always thought a pc was a personal computer. The best os ever avalable for a pc already exists, it's OS X. Second best is Linux in it's various distributions.

MS should just simplify all this stuff. They should just have a home editiona & a business edition (& starter edition if they really can't help it) I can see that Douwe is really flaming & jabbering mis-infomation :-)

ki829 probebly never used anything else, otherwise he/she would know what I mean. I don't flame, I had my problems linked to windows and mac and linux, so I know what I'm talking about.

You are just jealous because you didn't get to post it first.

Okay for starters MAC is not what is technically considered a PC. Next VS 2005 is a dream come true for me I can afford to learn programming and have a decent compiler in several languages. What they mean by optimized for the individual is probably that it can be configured your way. I am throwing down MAC OSX or Linux in fact I use a Linux distro in a play computer. I'll admit that Microsoft may be going overboard with the SKU and all that. However this may be a dream come true like VS 2005. Windows is a little bloated however bloated does not mean slow programmers sometimes have to choose whether to optimize for speed or for size. Also if you like OS X so much why do you waste your time reading Windows articles, with the exception of curiosity(forgive my spelling). I am upset that they made two home and several buisness editions. For now let's assume that Microsoft knows what they are doing and for heaven's sake cut down on the system requirements.

"Teencoder" spews: "Okay for starters MAC is not what is technically considered a PC." Uh.... The American Heritage Dictionary disagrees with you: Definition: personal computer n. Abbr. PC A computer built around a microprocessor for use by an individual, as in an office or at home or school. There you go.

I'm not sure there's going to be as much confusion as you think. I figure most PC's are going to come pre-bundled with Home Basic. Media Centers and Tablets will use Home Premium. Business IT staffs which are paid to make these kinds of decisions will choose between Business and Enterprise depending on what they're doing and people building computers from scratch for specific purposes like programming will have Ultimate as an option. Starter is only for developing countries and won't really be in the mix. As for the N versions, thank you EU. It's really not all that complicated. Most people won't even see the choices and those people who have the choices, have them because they're the kinds of customers who care.

"Windows Vista Ultimate. The best operating system ever offered for a personal PC, optimized for the individual." Yawnnn... The best OS right now for personal computers is OS X. When is Microsoft going to actually deliver this "Ultimate" operating system? All we get are delays, hype, and more hype - excuse me, I guess that I should say delays, "marketing", and more "marketing".

yawn. That's what we'll be doing while we wait for our current clunkers to run this stuff. And wait for the slew of articles from explaining how bad WinXP is. They should have told us this before they tried selling us WinXP, but of course that wouldn't be good for business (yet). Perhaps its called Windows Vista because we'll end up looking outside more while the PC takes ages to respond. I'll never understand why Apple doesn't support OS X on non-Apple machines. Is it because OS X is also bloatware?

Apple invented the PC (Personal Computer) with the Apple II, kicking off this whole revolution in the first place. Macs are PCs; people differentiate Windows-based PCs simply because the original IBM computer actually called itself "PC." "Based on the comments I've gotten from Microsoft, perhaps the Small Business version of Vista is indeed making a comeback." Yeah, because more editions of Vista are just what is needed...

I am afraid that you Linux and Mac "Fanboys" (and you know who you are) should give it a rest. None of this information is final and thus is speculation. Part of your negativity and constantly whining about the big bad Microsoft has partly contributed to the massive amounts of legal costs that Microsoft has to put out to people like the EU who will simply waste the money anyway. Way to go in encouraging an efficient economy! And when you think about responding about how it is better for the EU to have the money than Bill, don't bother until you have your own 20 odd billion dollar charity fund. As to bring it down to the level of saying that you will pirate the software, grow up as being a bunch of thieving "fanboys" does not improve your image any. I know and agree with everybody that the versions look overly complicated. They are and hopefully Microsoft will do something about it but if you are going to come to a site that is about professionals discussing Windows, please try and keep your "fanboy" sentiments to yourself. Just my 2c worth.

"I am afraid that you Linux and Mac "Fanboys" (and you know who you are) should give it a rest. None of this information is final and thus is speculation." When some starts throwing out the word "fanboy" to dismiss other arguments, you know their opinion is going to be meaningless. "Part of your negativity and constantly whining about the big bad Microsoft has partly contributed to the massive amounts of legal costs that Microsoft has to put out to people like the EU who will simply waste the money anyway." Good! Microsoft has been illegally preventing others from competing since the early 90s, from preventing OEMs from shipping Novell Netware to killing OS/2 to crippling Windows on DOS alternatives, all to protect the Microsoft bottom-line at the expense of superior alternatives. "Way to go in encouraging an efficient economy!" An illegal monopoly is not an efficient economy. "I know and agree with everybody that the versions look overly complicated. They are and hopefully Microsoft will do something about it but if you are going to come to a site that is about professionals discussing Windows, please try and keep your "fanboy" sentiments to yourself. Just my 2c worth." What fanboy sentiments? People are just pointing out that this is classic Microsoft marketing at work. AT LEAST SEVEN VERSIONS? Good god.

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