Windows Vista thread

[Munish]

I read that someone (I think DebbieM) was having issues with WV. I am actually moving to WV from 1 August next week and so would like to know what the issues are, positive and negative. Also any practical tips in running it would be welcome.

Thanks

[Bayfield]

I have had no problems, but I have a new, if cheap, laptop.

Except when I tried to load an old version of Quickbooks and it did not like it.

If you have any key programmes check compatibility.

[Sharon]

Dah, Sill me

I thought you were moving to West Virginia for a mo

[Munish]

Dah, Sill me

I thought you were moving to West Virginia for a mo

No thanks! I heard they marry their cousins.

[Munish]

Update.

Vista is working well and am quite happy with it. Seems a lot simpler than XP so far.

For anyone thinking of putting it on an old computer make sure you get the 32-bit version of Vista as the 64-bit is highly unlikely to be compatibale with some of the hardware components, particularly if it is more than a couple of years old.

I have an old 2002 laptop, but it was high performance in its day. I boosted the RAM to 1.25MB (Vista Home Premium requires 500KB I think - but I would settle for no less than 750KB if you run various programmes simultaneously). I also updated my hardrive to 80GB (from 40GB previously). Essentialy it is a "new system" so anyone going doen the same road, buy the OEM version of vista and not the full retail pack which is four times more expensive for what is in essence the same thing.

Anyway this was all substantially cheaper than buying a new laptop at the moment. My old hard drive started clicking last year, which meant it was coming to the end of its life. I had no backup disks of the software so when I lost it I had to do get a new operating system disk and decided to try out Vista and the trial edition of MS Office 2007.

For anyone with an old computer who thinks it's not working as it used, consider a refurbishment of the computer rather than replacement. Also with laptops, after about a years use, the fans tend to get clogged up with dust (causing slower performance and a much hotter computer) so open it up, clean it out and it the computer should run much cooler and faster. My laptop used to get so hot after a year that it turned itself of (as a safety mechanism). Very frustrating until I learned about cleaning the cooling fans.

If you have parts that are damaged, eg. the hard drive, consider just replacing that. Much much cheapter than buying new IMHO.

I'm not ready get a new laptop just yet and would prefer to wait until 2009 because a lot of new technology is being introduced into laptops over this year and next (e.g. wifi-N receivers (apprarently five times faster than current broadband standards), new memory systems are coming in, possible quad processors for laptops, HD-DVD/blu-ray recordable optical drives etc etc). I think because of that buying a computer before then is not a good idea, especially if it's a more expensive high performance one.

[britcan]

If you are running Quickbooks- you are going to need 2GIG of Ram!!!!We have it- be prepared for numerous updates!!!

[DebbieM]

Sorry I missed this thread -I have been having a few issues with my PC;)

I actually purchased a new Desktop via Dell - an Inspiron 5315. Nothing wrong with my old one (only 18 months old another Dell) but my space was being invaded by two teenaged girls and MySpace and iPods and You Tube and ............ I decided to upgrade and Dell convinced me Vista Home Premium was the way to go. I have 2 MG RAM and 350 GB hard drive. I decided to add a wireless router so that the old PC could still connect to the Internet via cable broadband, purchased the Office Small Business 2007 and wanted to continue to use AOL as my ISP. I have no idea on what the sound/graphic cards are but didn't upgrade for gaming ect as I have no need. Did get a CD burner upgraded to a DVD burner at no extra cost. I also opted for an upgraded 19" wide screen monitor.

Moving to Vista immediately put me out of my comfort zone (I'm a huge fan of XP Professional) and the Office 2007 package was just presented so differently to Office 2003 that I couldn't figure out how to do anything. For the first couple of days I hated it.

When I tried to hook up the wireless router the whole system crashed, a 3 hour telephone call to Dell on Call in the Philipines (I had 30 days foc) and I was back to the original settings undoing all the previous 24 hours worth of work. Whilst the operator was very helpful and was able to remotely control my PC which was very scary, it seemed that the main purpose of the operator was to upsell to a full years on call pack at at cost of $365 which came down to $110 because I was 'such a nice person" great sales pitch eh, no mention of the benefit it would have with problem solving etc !!!!

AOL needs a specific Vista ready program which has to be downloaded from the internet and completely screwed up the Internet Explorer program, it also logs me out and back in again approx 6 - 8 times each morning before it settles down. I get the dreaded blue screen at least once a week, almost every other day I return to the PC after not using it for a while to find it has locked up completely, requiring me to actually unplug it to re-boot it. And the most irritating thing I find with Office which I use more than any other program (Word, Excel, Publisher and Powerpoint) is that you cannot directly import a document from the scanner any more (unless someone knows different) it has to be scanned via another program, saved then imported as a file - real pain.

So my experience with Vista is not the 'XP on steroids' that I was promised by the Dell Sales rep, more one of not completely trusting the thing and, my God if it crashes how much work is that going to cause me?? I am however now more familiar with the presentation and therefore warming to it although give me XP any day.

I run Quickbooks Pro 2007 without any problems and I did purchase at a cost of $40.00, a Belkin transfer cable for Vista which you hook up to both PC's and you can chose which files you want to transfer over to the new PC - I did everything via this method with the exception of Quickbooks which I just restored my latest back up copy. This was a real bonus as it saved me both time and money in burning info onto CD's - its amazing how you accumilate! It took about 45 minutes in total which included lots and lots of photographs - I think I would have been looking at a pack of 20 CD's and a day of my time otherwise.

If anyone is considering moving over, my advice would be to wait a while, I'm sure there are problems that are still being ironed out and for those in the US who have seen the add with the Windows Vista PC and the Mac talking and the PC having to ask Vista's permission to do anything - it is no joke!!!!!

Still battling on:confused: .

Debs

[Kriz1]

My husband is a tester...and when you are one of the first to buy new software...you become one too...we buy nothing new...it took us years to drop windows 98....I'm not looking forward to getting a new PC...and I'm putting it off for as long as I can...let everyone else find the bugs and have the problem...:)

[OberonSH]

I love my little pooter, except our wireless is actually too slow to print the postage labels we need from ebay - one of the main jobs it's for. Considering I already bought one set of wireless thingys that didn;t want to talk to each other, I'm not going to go out and spend another £70 on a 3rd set. So we're looking at another PC, or laptop that has the power we need but it's getting hard to find a new one that doesn't come with Vista - I'm just about used to XP now, so I'm not going to go through the hassle.

[kirtida8]

OK guys, I have just had a lengthy chat with quickbooks tech support as I was unable to get my payroll updates, and basically I have to keep a copy on an XP computer to get the updates unless I want to fork out for a newer version ( I have 2006). Don't really see the point in upgrading quickbooks yet - so my next question is "what payroll services do most of you use? and what are the costs involved?" Thanks

[JakeCastle]

I recently tried to switch from XP Pro to Vista 64 bit edition.

A good analogy is replacing your entire wardrobe becuase you bought the latest sock. Vista 64 bit being the Sock!

Majority of your peripheral devices (scanner, webcam, bluetooth adapter, etc.) just wont work. Despite running old programs on Vista compatability mode and with Administrative priviledges more than half of the programs you had wont work. To further rub it win, vista 64 bit ed. jsut wont support 16 bit applications.

The reason being is that Windows Vista 64 bit edition relies on custom code for every program to make the compatibility mode work (although I could be wrong, heck no hacker has ever really gotten his hands on the source code... yet).

As an operating system, Vista 64 it is just awesome.

MY setup is as follows AMD Athlon 64 bit Dual Core Processor running at 2.4 Gigaherz per core. 2 Gigabytes of RAM, 1 160 Gigabyte hard disk on IDE, anohter 250 Gigabte HD on SATA, and a DVD burner.

The only way I get by is because I configured my poor man's PC to dual boot. One HD is set for XP and the other for Vista via BIOS boot priorty.

I consider myself as a Techie kinda guy, after having worked for a company that outsourced for AT&T business and freelanced as a PC technician for the past seven years.

I apologize for one of my compatriots working for DELL. Truth is he/she is compelled if not forced by the company to sell you stuff so he/she can keep her job.

Good thing you were such a nice person, after being given access to remote desktop connection requires that he/she be granted Administrative priviledges ergo he/she had access to all your files on that machine. You could always say, "your doing a great job, but no thanks".

CONCLUSION:

Take my word for it, unless your planning to use your PC exclusively to play the latest ang greatest although resource hogging GAMES, stick with XP.


So that's my review, hope it helps.

[fllion]

was with paychecks plus for 4 yrs ,had 9 staff on payroll ,cost was about $46.00 a week to prosess payroll ,wages was direct desopits into there accounts ,they did our 940.941 ,1/4 returns ,so was worth it ,also we used them for workers comp ,as we had trouble getting it else where .after i got GC ,i downsides my workers ,iam now with suntrust payroll ,cost is $35.00 a month ,all payslips can be printed online .email from them ,after payroll as been paid ,worth the money as it saves us quite a bit ,

hope this helps Kay

[kirtida8]

Thanks fllion. I am now opening a new business and would like to pay the employees via a debit card system - ie I would pay into an account setup exclusively for each employee into which their payroll would be credited, and they could then use the debitcard to withdraw funds etc. Has anyone else used a similar scheme. It would avoid the need for an actual paycheck and seems simpler to me and the employees would have access to their funds immediately on payday.

[britcan]

Kay-try

googling "payroll debit card"

http://www.tfgcard.com/paycard_testimonials.php

[kirtida8]

Thanks Britcan :)

[Ranana_Tago]

My cousins computer laptop which has windows vista and explorer 8 has been having connections issues. It asks to diagnose the problem, which it never does. The thing is slower than hell starting up. Once again Microsoft invented a piece of crap.

Now im having the same issue with my aunts computer which just upgraded toi E8 last night. Anyone else having these issues?

[kirtida8]

Try using a different engine like Mozilla or Google Chrome