“Microsoft executives love telling stories against each other. Here’s one that platforms vice-president Jim Allchin told at a recent Windows Vista reviewers conference about chief executive Steve Ballmer,” David Frith reports for Australian IT. “It seems Steve was at a friend’s wedding reception when the bride’s father complained that his PC had slowed to a crawl and would Steve mind taking a look.”
“Allchin says Ballmer, the world’s 13th wealthiest man with a fortune of about $18 billion, spent almost two days trying to rid the PC of worms, viruses, spyware, malware and severe fragmentation without success,” Frith reports. “He lumped the thing back to Microsoft’s headquarters and turned it over to a team of top engineers, who spent several days on the machine, finding it infected with more than 100 pieces of malware, some of which were nearly impossible to eradicate.”
Frith reports, “Among the problems was a program that automatically disabled any antivirus software. ‘This really opened our eyes to what goes on in the real world,’ Allchin told the audience. If the man at the top and a team of Microsoft’s best engineers faced defeat, what chance do ordinary punters have of keeping their Windows PCs virus-free?”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Nothing about the Windows morass and/or Ballmer surprises us anymore.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Chris” for the heads up.]
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Microsoft: recovery from Windows malware becoming impossible; better to to wipe and rebuild – April 04, 2006
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Go MonkeyBoy!!
You ain’t touching my Powerbook…
They should have Allchin play the PC guy on the Get a Mac ads.
flame on !!
That’s about the 2,233,445 negative post about MS. Surely MDN has now run out of stories, right? RIGHT??
A team of engineers spent several days on this one computer. No wonder Longhorn/Vista was so delayed.
Even Ballmer knows about 15 minutes is all you give to a infected Windows PC, then after that it’s just more effective to erase and reinstall the operating system.
Ballmer just wanted to take the machine back for the engineers to study, like a diseased rat or something.
Just bought a MacBook and set it up this weekend. It works AWESOME with one small exception…
When I tried to print to a shared printer from Microsoft Word, Word crashed (not the computer, just the Word app).
Apparently it was because the networked computer the printer was connected to was asleep but it goes to show that the Microsoft software was the only software that had issues while setting up this new notebook.
For some reason, Ballmer and the word “moreass” just seem to go together…
Why Would Allchin tell an audience how crappy their OS is in the first place. I wouldn’t stand in front of an audience an tell them how my OS was turned to junk and a team of engineers were skunked by how polluted that Laptop was. The actual solution was low-level format and re-install.. and oh perhaps backup some useful data if it could be cleaned enough to actually be re-installed on a clean laptop..
Most telling bit “This really opened our eyes to what goes on in the real world.” Yes. Your software sucks ass. Stop with the Ads that say your software is more secure, better. Stop with the PeopleReady ads. Fix your product.
If this is true, here is why I like it. This promotes change and better products. I think that competition is healthy, it keeps quality high. Plus, I don’t really want apple to become this big giant – that is annoying. I like the little guy – it’s like my little secret.
Ballmer is himself a malware.
That says it all. These jokers suck and so does there malware.
Oh brother… who in their right mind tries to run anti-virus software from an infected machine? Once compromised it CANNOT be trusted. You have to boot off something else and scan it from the outside.
I’m surprised that Alchin is allowed to say these things. I guess it goes to show you that MS thinks they have no competition. They know the default decision is Windows and that very few people think about their OS for more than 3 seconds. Apple has had tons of ammo to use against Windows for years and has never capitalized on that, so Alchin knows that giving them even more, publicly admitting to serious system flaws, isn’t going to change anything.
And the sad thing is, they might be right. The OS market may never change.
Truth hurts.
$30+ billion in cash in the bank, ton of programmers, all of this time and their stuff is still swiss cheese.
Amazing!
Wow. Just Wow.
Windows XP has been on the market for how long, and their top engineers are JUST NOW having their eyes opened to how dangerous malware can be?
Take off the blinders, turn off the Xbox 360, and come out into the sun.
Wow. Ow.
Come on people, lets get some hate going here.
Priceless…
Can’t believe that Uncle Fester didn’t put the lightbulb in his mouth first!
What a maroon.
Runs the company and can’t clean the shit from the OS.
Classic, just classic.
SB
No koolaid here – It’s a Mac site, that means negative post about M$ are part of the bargain. There are other sites that take a gentler approach on M$, maybe one of those would suit you better.
is it just me or does ballmer look a lot like Hannibal lechter in that photo?
“That’s about the 2,233,445 negative post about MS. Surely MDN has now run out of stories, right? RIGHT??”
That’s okay–Microsoft keeps making new ones.
wow that was JUICY. What can you possibly say to top what Jim Allchin just described. I feel sorry for all the people using that software. There is a choice.
Owned.
Did you hear the one about the salesman who thought he could run a software company?
He failed.
I can’t believe Allchin and MS only realized NOW what happens in the ‘real world’ to their products. What will MS discover tomorrow?
Please, continue to employ these people at MS for as long as possible.
From the article it sounds like this story has been released to the public as an ad for MS’s Live Onecare it seem to imply the following: Look you need our new security service, heck we can’t even keep our own machines clean without it, now please fork over the cash. Or that’s how the Windows World will interpet it. My interpetation of this sad story is: DUDE!! I’m so glad I didn’t get a Dell.
(1) I’d be very embarressed for this story to get out if this was a story about me and my product.
(2) I find it very ironic that the next story down on the site is “Why I’m more productive on a Mac.”
Caca toy albino jam.
That shoudl be his penance for all of his misdeeds. He should be forced to join the Geek squad and remove malware from peoples computers
I’ve got a Windows machine at home that has XP loaded on it. XP is great! There is absolutely nothing wrong with Windows XP as an operating system. It is the cat’s meow.
That is, until I turn it on….
I’ve got a Windows machine at home that has XP loaded on it. XP is great! There is absolutely nothing wrong with Windows XP as an operating system. It is the cat’s meow.
That is, until I turn it on….
“‘This really opened our eyes to what goes on in the real world,’ Allchin told the audience.”
What rock have they collectively been living under?
It’s no wonder they haven’t solved the problems their own product produces.
How many chairs were hurled during the two days that Monkeyboy tried to work on the infected PC? That’s what the inquiring minds want to know.
But that’s OK. The computer only cost $100.00. That justifies everything. No high price sissy computers in that house. I mean, what real man would pay all that money for a computer that actually works?! Come on – Life Is Tough! Computer troubles well … that just proves you can TAKE IT!
We have a great fix for your computer in our pipeline.
“We have a great fix for your computer in our pipeline.”
A really rich fix with the rich features you have been looking for. Rich and innovative.
Six and a half years, I’ve had ten Macintosh machines owned by me at one time or another (currently only 3) and NEVER had I had a virus, worm, trojan, etc.
That alone says it all on how secure my Mac’s are.
If I only had an email for Steve Baulmer so i could share with him this news, hehe..
Chris Powers
pic lol
XP is great, until you network it.
OS X is a modern OS that was built with networking/internet in mind. Windows is based on ancient code that was not.
Just proves time and time again… Ballmer give back the shareholders their money, close microsoft down and go to an Apple Store and buy a Mac.
the ignorant bastards (that would be windows users) deserve every virus they get. It’s like smokers being killed by cancer, they had it coming!
I cannot believe this.
Not the fact that it took all that time and energy to clean that shitbox PC (that’s a given), but the fact that the execs start telling those kind of stories to their employees. What kind of leadership role are they setting? Where is the incentive for these people to want to work? That makes me sick. If Allchin walked up to me and my team of devs and told us that story, I’d slap him in the face and quit on the spot.
I’m not saying that you can’t one-up each other, but in the state M$ is in, and the obvious unhappiness of everyone in and around there, this is not a time to pull that crap. And to make it public! Redic.
Absolutely redic.
I want to see Apple beat the living shit out of Microsoft. Right now, I’m not sure it [M$] will make it past Round 2.
Hey me,
I am having the same problem with Safari crashing on a MacBook. I was able to print to either a networked (on a G4) HP3845 or Canon iP3000. Suddenly I get safari crashing whenever I try to print. The G4 is not asleep. No M$ apps on the MacBook.
is it …… could it really be…….
………………….UNCLE FESTER?!!
hey emil, some people started smoking before anyone was told it was bad for their health. my dad was one of them. so f*ck you and your poorly conceived analogy.
why isn’t someone suing Microsoft for all the negative impact Windows had (and obviously still has) on humanity, security, industry…or werever else it’s been used (?) Is it because it’s so difficult to measure or what?
Time to dig up all of the installation CDs and serial numbers, back up your data, reinstall Windows and reinstall your apps. WHEEEEE!
CLASSIC!!!
I noticed some people asking why Allchin would dare say the things he did. The simple answer is that Allchin is retiring upon release of Vista. He wanted Vista to be a ground-up rebuild of the OS but Bill Gates (yup, Bill still calls the shots at Microsoft) wouldn’t approve it. My guess is that Allchin got fed up enough to bail out after this project was released to market.
Unless he cares to do it himself, the bride’s father needs to take his computer to a computer store and have them completely wipe the disk and reinstall the system. Most stores charge about $80 for that service – $100 more if you want your data backed up. A choice example of TCO with “real” computers.
Can’t solve the problems?
He should have been fired!!!
I would never invite Ballmer to my wedding. Unless he of course was the wedding singer.
Not.
“Emil – the ignorant bastards (that would be windows users) deserve every virus they get. It’s like smokers being killed by cancer, they had it coming!”
Most of us have habits that are killing us, Booz (alcoholism), Soda Pop (onset diabetes weight gain, calcium loss), Gum (build-up of plaque in the walls of the arteries), Sunflower seeds (weight gain, too much salt), yes, even smoking. None of these things are particularly healthy, but I don’t think judging someone for an addiction they have is wise, you one the risk of having one down the road or being judged for one you have now. Addictions are real and difficult to kick.
This really opened our eyes to what goes on in the real world
MS didn’t KNOW before?!?!
An admission like that should earn the entire Windows division a ticket to the unemployment office. OMFG.
Contrast this to how we’re told NeXT’s development worked. You coded it, then used it yourself, then went back and fixed what didn’t work. If you can’t make it work, chances are nobody else can (witness MS’s own engineers).
Does MS even USE Windows in-house?? Or are they such a morass that all of Windows’ many problems just get reported into a black hole?
I sadly own a computer with Windows and it the largest period it did not hung itself was like 3-5 days. Usually it died every 2 days or even 2 per day and there is absolutely no chance to avoid this because I do very much usual and right things.
If I would have more money I would but Apple — just to save my time and nerves which erode while I fighting with this sh*t.
Gosh, I can not tell you how much I hate that thing I own, how much I tired of this — SYSTEM processes die, stack conflicts, cache errors, critical falures. And I have the latest WinXP SP2+updates set.
And yes, my hardware itself works perfectly. My problem is only software thing.
@Static Mesh-
The reason why Balmer & Co didn’t do a format and re-install most likily they didn’t want to seem like losers to Balmer friend.
Think about it, having to do a format and re-install is a full admission that their MS OS sucks.
Wow, the only way I could fix your computer is to cry uncle.
Oh, to all the MS fanboys – this is was said during the Windows Vista reviewers conference.
Let’s see you try to spin this?
So much for your great (not) OS – your own MS engineers couldn’t fix it. How’s the everyday user going to be productive?
Oh, and they want to they their users, we can’t fix, clean the virus, malware, spkyware form computers but we can safeguard your PC if you buy our yearly service.
Do you know what really scary – MS fanboys are going to buy into this. A sucker born everyday.
“That’s about the 2,233,445 negative post about MS. Surely MDN has now run out of stories, right? RIGHT??”
Actually, there are as many stories as there are Wndows users!
“That’s about the 2,233,445 negative post about MS. Surely MDN has now run out of stories, right? RIGHT??”
MDN will NEVER run out of stories because I’m convinced there are enough stupid, people that will keep using Winduhz no matter what pain is inflicted. And I”m also convinced Bill will never fire Uncle Fester.
And they make my humor of the day reading, so keep ’em coming–there will be more tales to tell as the rope tightens around M$.
To : No Habits?
Most things you list are habits that we have every capability to change although many don’t for their own reasons.
Lethargy is one. Inertia is another. Fear of change another.
And choosing not to change those habits is as much a conscious choice as is choosing TO change those habits.
It’s hard. Damned hard. I quit smoking 15 years ago and to this day I still sometimes wish I had a smoke. But I don’t becuase I choose not to.
And I don’t punish myself with Windows becuase I choose not to unless of course someone pays me a LOT of money to do so. And then I might.
And at the end, when I can give up Windows and go back to my Mac, it’s like giving up smoking all over again and breathing in the fresh air and realizing there really is something better out there.
So a billionaire top executive (at least salary-wise) spends two full days on a piece-of-shit computer, then turns it over to a group of top engineers for another day or two. Am I the only one who sees the economical madness in this? No wonder they get behind in OS development if one bug-ridden computer can sequester their top people for several days.
apple will one day be the new ms
but without the retarded bosses
Makes sense to me – you could buy a Macintosh and have 100 machines supported by one person, or you can buy Windows and 1 machine supported by several people.
Now the Windows people are “top engineers”, so its obvious that the Windows guy is getting a better deal because of the quality of the after-sales service.
Now it truly makes sense why Corporate IT prefers Windows to Macs – if it wasn’t so tragic, I’d piss myself laughing.
What intrigues me is that Microsoft are charging their users $50.00 per annum for OneCare virus protection. Maybe some users will pay, not realizing that it is possible to design a secure OS. Maybe Microsoft knows it can’t make a good OS anymore so it is getting into the anti-virus market itself.
“why isn’t someone suing Microsoft for all the negative impact Windows had (and obviously still has) on humanity, security, industry…or werever else it’s been used (?) Is it because it’s so difficult to measure or what?”
You ought to see some of the stuff in the End User LIcense Agreement, they practically take no responsibility.
This story is perfect. M$ exists on ignorance.
I wonder if there is any way to find out who this guy is. Man could you imagine this guy’s story as a switcher ad?
MDN Magic Word – Start as in ‘Click here to shut down’
Give me a break. Like smoking (HELLO, IDIOT!) isn’t OBVIOUSLY bad for your health? Like you needed stupid warning messages to tell you OBVIOUS truths? You tell me that you didn’t think that inhaling tobacco for years and years would be BENEFICIAL for you, did you? Stop demanding that people protect you from yourself and get off the martyr train, please!
‘This really opened our eyes to what goes on in the real world,’
Oh my. MS really is staffed with a bunch of blind no-life retards. Do these people not know how to conduct business? Do they think they can determine market needs simply by fiat? Do all of their business plans get formulated in a closed box?
How embarrassing.
When Paul Otellini advised people to get a Mac, it was the prelude to the Apple+Intel deal.
What’s the deal here?
Either Allchin’s defecting to Apple or MS has something to sell. Like OneCare’s protection racket!
Otherwise, Allchin is the secret blogger of mini-microsoft!
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PS. Windows IS just like cigarettes. People didn’t know what they were getting into when MS got on the Internet. “They use Windows at work. That must be what I need at home.”
emil’s analogy works. His attitude doesn’t.
Coolest. Story. Ever.
I’m sure the chairs are flying in Redmond over this one…
Somehow I don’t think Steve came in with the computer screaming “I love this company”
Anyone else think the picture in MDN’s article looks like Lord Voldemort?
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as already mentioned by a few people above, the first thing that came into my mind was Uncle Fester from the Adams Family.
mainly because he is a Clone from Uncle Fester in both brain capacity and appearance.
In case someone forgot how he looks like; ladies and gentlemen, Uncle Ballmer (Uncle Fester):
http://www.addamsfamily.com/addams04/fester.html
and MDN, please use the first picture in my link above for your next Ballmer article, people won’t know the difference ^_^
I found this absolutely hillarious. Just imagine Steve Ballmer sitting in front of a Windows computer screaming and swearing. Stories like this make me feel happy about staying on Mac. There are no viruses and malware here.