“If Vista’s price, especially for Europeans, is its most eye-popping feature, its second most eye-popping feature is the Aqua Aero desktop interface. Windows now has translucent icons and translucent window borders. Taskbar tabs zoom, with graphical preview thumbnails showing the window’s contents, just as they do in Aqua,” Thomas C Greene reports for The Register.
Greene reports, “The directory and file organisation, and the overall look and feel, are strangely reminiscent of…oh…what’s the name of that OS I’m thinking of? But this is not to say that imitating Apple hasn’t made the Windows UI a lot better. It has. Search looks like a Spotlight clone, but it’s been improved from the bottom up, and it’s available in any window dealing with file management or system management, and from the start menu.”
“Microsoft’s next homage to Apple is the sidebar, a collection of little utilities and other single-use apps like clocks and timers and feeders bearing news headlines, stock reports, sports scores, etc. These are called Gadgets, to distinguish them from Apple’s Widgets. Thus, we can say that they’re not actually identical,” Greene reports. “You will also find a very iCal-looking Calendar, and a very iPhoto-looking Photo Gallery. Neither of which is bad. The look, feel and behaviour of both is quite similar to the Mac versions, which is all the better.”
“Dialog boxes are now cleaner, and wizards too. They look more Aqua-ish, and they function better, with far less mindless interrogation,” Greene reports. “Mercifully, Microsoft has dropped its condescending “My” obsession, and directories are now given grownup names like Computer, Documents, Pictures, and so on [just like Apple’s Mac]. And not a moment too soon.”
“Next, there’s the Flip-3D feature, which gives you a moving Rolodex view of your open windows. When the one you want comes into view, you stop flipping at that point and it opens for you. Unfortunately, there seems not to be a reverse feature on this little merry-go-round, so if you miss your stop, round you go again. I wonder when I might ever find it useful, as I rarely have enough windows open to make a challenge out of finding whatever I want in the taskbar. I rather think it’s there merely because it’s “cool”. And I’ll confess; I’ve played with it a few times. I’ve never used it, mind, but I have fiddled. And it is rather cool, actually. And pretty useless,” Greene reports.
MacDailyNews Note: Flip-3D is an inefficient piffle that was not given enough thought (or was too constrained by Apple patents.) In other words: typical Microsoft. Please see related article: Microsoft botches another copy job: Windows Vista Flip-3D vs. Apple Mac OS X Exposé – June 26, 2006
Greene continues, “Now for another little irritant: immortal craplets. There are two. One is the Vista Security Centre. I have disabled it. I have shut it off in Services. I have tried to shut it off in Msconfig. It won’t die. Every time I boot, the craplet pops up and demands to be enabled. But if it really is disabled, then why am I seeing the bloody thing? And there’s another immortal craplet: one that tells you that you’ve “disabled important startup programs”, like the Security Centre, for example. I’ve tried to kill this ridiculous thing too, with no joy.”
“So, one craplet pops up demanding to be enabled; you exit that, and a different one pops up telling you that you really ought not to have done that. Now, my definition of malware is pretty straightforward: malware is any code that causes my computer to behave in a way I don’t intend, or any code that prevents my computer from behaving in a way that I do intend. Thus the Vista Security Centre is, quite simply, malware,” Greene reports.
Greene reports, “So, there’s our first look at Vista. It does benefit from a lot of good ideas, many of them Apple’s, of course, but good nevertheless. It simply doesn’t work very well, unfortunately. There are serious problems with execution; it’s not polished; it’s not ready. It should not be on the market, and certainly not for the outrageous prices being charged. Don’t buy it, at least until after the first service pack is out. Don’t pay to be a beta tester.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: “Don’t buy it, at least until after the first service pack is out. Don’t pay to be a beta tester?” Here’s much better advice: use your head and Get a Mac – unless you enjoy helping to finance Microsoft’s eternal quest to make upside-down and backwards five-year-old poorly-simulated Macs that never work anywhere close to as well as Apple’s real thing.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers too numerous to mention and very persistent in their requests for posting particular article for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Best Buy ads: ‘Make Your Move to Mac’ – just weeks after Windows Vista consumer debut – February 19, 2007
Microsoft’s Ballmer warns on Vista, says revenue forecasts too aggressive; shares drop – February 15, 2007
Windows Vista’s DRM is bad news – February 14, 2007
Mac OS X Tiger vs. Windows Vista: Mac’s migration a breeze, Vista’s migration a headache – February 12, 2007
Forbes: ‘Windows Vista utterly unimaginative, internally discordant and woefully out of tune’ – February 09, 2007
Computerworld: Windows expert dumps Windows, switches to Apple’s Mac OS X – February 08, 2007
Windows sufferer spends six hours trying to ‘upgrade’ to Vista, says: ‘I should’ve bought a Mac’ – February 07, 2007
Windows Vista woes push BBC News editor to regret never having ‘defected’ to Apple Mac – February 06, 2007
Digit: Don’t buy Vista; Microsoft may be driving millions to stick with XP or move to Apple Mac – February 05, 2007
TIME Magazine: Microsoft’s Windows Vista ‘an embarassment to the good name of American innovation’ – February 02, 2007
Microsoft’s Windows Vista: Five years for a chrome-plated turd – January 30, 2007
Digit: ‘Microsoft’s Windows Vista may be the best reason yet to buy an Apple Mac’ – January 29, 2007
Pioneer Press: Windows Vista shows ‘Apple is an innovation engine; Microsoft, not so much’ – January 29, 2007
Windows Vista disappoints, so get a Mac – January 29, 2007
Analyst: Microsoft’s Windows Vista could be an opportunity for Apple – January 26, 2007
CNET Reviews Windows Vista: Is that all? Clunky and not very intuitive vs. Mac OS X; warmed-over XP – January 24, 2007
Mossberg: Microsoft’s Windows Vista offers lesser imitations of Apple’s Mac OS X features – January 18, 2007
Windows Vista disappointment drives longtime ‘Microsoft apologist’ to Apple’s Mac OS X – January 17, 2007
InformationWeek Review: Apple’s Mac OS X shines in comparison with Microsoft’s Windows Vista – January 06, 2007
NY Times’ Pogue reviews Microsoft’s Windows Vista: ‘Looks, Locks, Lacks’ – December 14, 2006
15-year Windows vet tries Apple Mac: ‘My God! This is amazing!’ – December 04, 2006
Dave Winer: ‘Microsoft isn’t an innovator, and never was – they are always playing catch-up’ – December 01, 2006
Harvard Medical School CIO picks Mac OS X over Linux and Windows – November 30, 2006
Top Windows developer dumps Microsoft’s ‘pile of crap’ for Apple’s Mac OS X – September 12, 2006
$399 for Windows Vista Ultimate?! (Hint: Get a Mac) – August 29, 2006
Apple’s Mac OS X Leopard is 64-bit done right, unlike Microsoft’s Windows Vista kludge – August 14, 2006
Microsoft Windows Vista: If you can’t innovate… try to impersonate Apple’s Mac OS X – August 10, 2006
Analyst: Apple’s new Mac OS X Leopard sets new bar, leaves Microsoft’s Vista in the dust – August 08, 2006
Microsoft botches another copy job: Windows Vista Flip3D vs. Apple Mac OS X Exposé – June 26, 2006
Windows Vista rips-off Mac OS X at great hardware cost (and Apple gains in the end) – June 13, 2006
Computerworld: Microsoft Windows Vista a distant second-best to Apple Mac OS X – June 02, 2006
Windows users have been Beta-testers since 1985
I LOVE macs as much as the next sane person, but Macdailynews needs to come up with some new material for there ‘takes’ on stories. We have read the same crap rewritten that many times, we know that the take is and what story it is.
Microsoft has got to big for its boots and has failed miserably with the shitest thing on the earth called vista.
Lets see some mac related news to make the mac experience better than the best it is.
Cheers
Is it true, is there really only one way Flip 3D runs?
Would make sense why you never see anyone ‘using’ Flip 3D in a demo, they just seem to show you that it ‘looks cool’, and flip through, then click away.
If this is true, I only have one word to say – WOW.
Actualy you can flip backwards on flip 3d. Think you hold shift down. “Search looks like a Spotlight clone, but it’s been improved from the bottom up, and it’s available in any window dealing with file management or system management, and from the start menu.” Huh? You can spotlight from any window on a mac even the save windows.
C’mon Dave, a big part of the Mac experience is Schadenfreude!
Why has it taken MDN so long to post this article? Is this ‘Be kind to Microsoft Week’ or something? We demand answers!
Honest Dave, I agree – MDN needn’t have said a word. The Register said it and the MDN comment was merely bitter grapes. Bitter – as in “beyond sour”. The two OSs have nearly reached parity, though Vista has yet to quite catch up to Tiger, and an argument can be made for either choice. Maybe not a good argument, but a reasonable one. Like “my company uses (low cost, quickly replaced) Windows PCs and gives me a laptop”.
MDN: Let … It … Rest!
DLMeyer – the Voice of G.L.Horton’s Stage Page
Hey, you didn’t quote the best line in the review:
“When my Vista reviews are finished, I’m going back to a dual-boot Linux/XP system.”
That’s pure gold there!
“Don’t pay to be a beta tester.”
Like we all did with 10.0? ;P
-c
More windows news from MDN….sigh…
Why do have to keep reading the same old same old from MDN.
Get some Apple news or forget it.
I liked his review, but think these comments were not called for,
“The stand-alone version of Vista Ultimate retails for €600, or $780 here in Ireland. Amazon.com is selling this $780 version to Americans for $380. Or, to put it another way, Europeans are subsidising Americans by $400 on every copy they buy”
“I bought the Home Premium upgrade for this series of reviews, and paid €250, or $325. Amazon sells it to Americans for $154, or €118. Still, I’m content to subsidise American consumers, who are watching their currency sink steadily to the status of third-world company scrip. I’ve always believed in being generous with foreign aid.”
MS is not subsidising American consumers, Gates just used KY jelly with the Americans, and just used a little spit with the rest of the world when he and Ballmer bent everyone over.
Otherwise, everyone is getting F**ked in the A*s, just with various levels of pain
Old article, in terms of internet time, at least. I love the term “craplets.” The whole thing is a steaming pile of shit: security, DRM, tiltbits, EULA, version-madness, driver deactivation, degraded media, craplets that invade your screen with obvious information and/or requests to cancel or allow…. Remember all those acronyms we made up for Vista? None come close to describing how ‘orrible it is. It’s volcanic. What you’ve seen leaking out is connected to a vast chamber of molten crap deep in the bowels of the earth – a terantic mass accumulated over the years by the boys from Redmond.
I think that’s enough for now :’@=== </pre>
Dave,
I don’t agree, MDN is reporting what the PC bias media is now saying about MS.
The more they talk, the less new Dells will be sold and the more Macs will be considered. What we need are enterprise business stories about the Mac.
Productivity, ROI, Cost of Ownership, less IT costs and so on. A small company in
St. Cloud, MN was one of the largest users of Xserve and Xraid in the midwest. The company was Riskwise and it did credit card scoring for all the major companies.
Here’s a small article about it.
http://www.computerworld.com/hardwaretopics/hardware/server/story/0,10801,88952,00.html
Keep the faith
The new // software is working extremely well on my Macs and I must say having XP and OS X on the same computer is simply fenomen-all. While Vista may not be all that great as an earlier version of OS X, it will appeal to those who buy new machines which do not have XP, and that’s fair.
But all in all, having two operating systems running at the same time has got to be REALLY BIG, as there is really no need to choose. We Intel Macs we have both with //, which has just been updated. Again. Speaking for myself, I don’t actually use any of them there Windows Apps, but for those who want to or need to, they need to know they can get Vista Plus by moving to an Intel Mac and buying Parallels which will accept various versions of Windows. With Compressor at work, the dual operating systems at work is simply amazing.
The thing is a PC person can now run all that PC software on a new Mac. Apple’s advertising doesn’t seriously advertise this major advantage yet, but it has been a major impediment in the past for those considering conversion to Mac from PC. The impediment has gone, but Apple hasn’t stressed that. Tell me I’m wrong.
Cool word, Connor MacBook! For a moment, I felt like a complete dumkoph!
“Don’t pay to be a beta tester.”
Like we all did with 10.0? ;P
-c
Um, 10.0 was available for free, IIRC, and it was 10.1 that was the first pay version.
Well, I did kind of feel like a beta tester for OSX 10.1- but hey that was 5 or 6 years ago. . .
MDN: Didn’t you already post this story on the day it was published (February 14, 2007)?
Why the repost?
Just bought a new MacBook Pro yesterday, didn’t think twice. I was planning to load up Vista in future just for fun, but from what I’ve been hearing, I’ve already got it.
One thing is that the Flip 3D is nothing but a glorified alt-tab with some eye-candy. It does not add anything new to the experience.
Expose, on the other hand, improves efficiency, going beyong the old alt-tab (which I find more elegant in Mac OS X than in Vista) In fact, one of the reasons I moved to from Panther to Tiger was Expose and it’s still one of my favorite features. When I saw Flip 3D, my first reaction was “are these people joking?”
Too much for “an answer to Expose”
DLMeyer, did you really mean to say that “The two OSs have nearly reached parity?” Or am I missing a context or new news here. Here, let me do a quick virus count… Hmm. Nope. Mac OS X hasn’t caught up yet. I’m certain Apple is working on it though. I guess that the VoiceOver equivalent and a bunch of other stuff is working great on WIndows. Nonetheless, I can see that Apple has more work to do to catch up to WIndows. I lost track but isn’t it up to 140,000 more virii that Apple doesn’t have yet and needs to add? But I know that anytime we can expect to hear that Apple has finally caught up to Windows. Then, we will have parity at last!
As I recall…
My iMac Indigo 500 came preloaded with 10.0. I rarely looked at it.
I got 10.1, for the cost of standing in a short line at my Mac reseller and signing a form stating that I picked up a copy. I loaded it, and would periodically look at it.
I bought an eMac 700 a short time later. Booted into 10.2, and was hooked. I might have booted into 9.2 maybe four more times. [Virtual GameStation, and fixed a font issue]
> I bought an eMac 700 a short time later. Booted into 10.2, and was hooked.
I was using Mac OS 9 regularly until Panther 10.3 was released. At that point, Mac OS X became far superior to the “classic” Mac OS.