I had my laptop for less than a year and Vista didn't give me too much trouble. Just very annoying features and sub par performance. Vista is such a resource hog! Well couple of days ago I tried to move a file in My Documents (Not even a system file, just a file I created to store things) and it told me I need permission. Great, another annoying little feature Vista has to frustrate the user. Then I tried to move it again and then my whole system crashed and it won't even boot up! Not even in safe mode. The check disk function comes up and does the test and says there is a critical failure. The error is this: 0xc00000e9 an error for hardware. I've regularly scanned for viruses and keep the anti virus on all the time so I'm thinking it's not a virus but the OS itself. What a piece of crap, I will never buy a PC again and I'll avoid anything made by Microsoft if I can help it. Vista and Xbox 360 problems I’ve had just left a really bad taste in my mouth. Thanks for listening, I'm done venting.

1. you can turn off the permissions prompt
2. You should have 4gb+ ram to keep vista smooth, and computers designed for XP with vista installed over it later are know to have serious problem
3. sorry to hear that maybe best buy or someplace can repair it

Ummm... You don't realise that error has nothing to do with the OS?

It's not Vista man, you computer has a problem: Hardware.
From the description I'd say you have a problem with your hard disk. I'm sorry,, but that happens and it's not your OS. Get an Apple and it happens there too. In fact no computer known to man is exempt from hardware failures.

-The other irritations you mention help keep your stuff secure. You're really being a bit silly about those.

... What you can try doing now is putting in your Vista disk and when it asks whether you want to install or whatever, choose "repair".
Hopefully that can help get things back on track. But if your hard disk really IS badly borked I'm afraid you'll need to take it to a shop for repair, since you don't sound like an expert I wouldn't advise you try it yourself.

That will cost, but it's cheaper to fix a borked disk in a Windows PC than an Apple PC

If you've had it for less than a year, it's more likely to still be under warranty or insurance, no? And if that IS the case, and it's a hardware issue, it's not unlikely that you can get the broken component replaced if you complain.

If that is the case...

If you're asked if the laptop or screen is scratched or damaged, NEVER say "there are a couple scratches" or "just the usual wear and tear." Just say no.

If they restore Vista/reinstall the drivers and send it back still broken, be really firm about ensuring that the same thing doesn't happen again.

My friend's laptop was shipped back and forth for months, 'restored' twice and having its RAM replaced when the problem was the HD. Knowing it was still busted would have been merely a matter of trying to turn it on, and yet we got it back, still screwed up, time and time again. Best Buy for the lose :\

Hope you have better luck if it's insured/warrantied.

I like Vista. I'm confused why so many people hate it. I am looking forward to Windows 7, though. I've heard it has some great features.

darn it ozone, i was hoping to point this out. i dont like that you're 12 hours ahead. i never get a chance to point out others flaws....
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the only problems i ever had with vista were fixed in patches...last year...(late '07). and the only problem i had with a 360, was with the first releases. after aforementioned problems, i havent had one yet.

I have issues with the clunkiness of certain functions like opening the task manager. It annoys me to no end how I end up having to go through extra menus for things like that when I used to just hit ctrl+alt+delete. Stuff like that seems counter-intuitive to me.

Other than that I personally have no issues except for it randomly bluescreening when I go to shut it down. I updated all my drivers so I suspect that that issue is being caused by hardware myself. One of these days I should actually think to jot down the error message number so I can identify it.

I think a lot of the Vista hate stems from early on in its life when it was really awful. I've heard it's not so bad now, thanks to a bunch of updates. I've still never mustered up the courage to install it since I'm waiting for Windows 7 as well.

I know everyone hate Vista, but honestly I haven't had too many problems with it. Definitely no problems managing or moving files. It does seem like the Task Manager is slow as all get out, though. Once I switched to Firefox (had been using IE, then Safari) a lot of my problems with "non-responsive" programs and windows freezing up went away. (Navigating DD with IE was... impossible.) Sometimes my laptop will just go black- for no reason- it seems fine when I reboot. Dunno if that's just my machine, though.

i'm a bit eager for windows 7 because of the memory hoglessness. and my mobo is pretty old and could only support up to 4gb of ram. so is my main HD...

although i hate it when my comp blue screens when i'm no where near it/ out of the house, so i can't determine what caused it and it never happens when i'm around. D:

Ha, I still have Windows 95 and it hasn't crashed once.

I've been trying to uninstall vista and downgrade back to xp, and it seems to be impossible to do that...

That's because it is. XP is no longer available to purchase. If your computer comes equipped with vista, it's staying that way.

Can't buy XP anymore? Well poo.

Four gigs of RAM to keep Vista running smoothly? Seriously?
...Then why did my mom's laptop only come with one? e_e Why short-change us to start?!

lol, Vista + Firefox's memory leaks.

I crashed Vista within a few hours of first setting up my mom's laptop, but both my 5 year old Windows machine and my 3 year old Mac have only crashed twice in their time, and not in recent memory.

Because 4 gigs will run anything fine, it's excessive. And for a laptop it's also very expensive. Realisitcally Vista only needs half that to run smoothly. Try 2GB of memory. Otherwise you might as well throw your money into a river or something. It's not that it's poor advice, more RAM never really hurts, but not everyone has the money to massively beef up their system.

Likewise it has 1GB because that's the minimum. Vista Basic only needs 512MB to run, with an additional 512MB to handle other processes that ARENT Vista. As it stands I can run photoshop, AIM, and the net all on my 1GB vista. With another gig I can run much more since you're subtracting only a quarter of that to run the OS. An additional 1.5GB will make a noticable difference.

Here are the specs for Vista in case youre wondering, right from their website:






Even the more advanced versions only need 1GB of system memory to operate, meaning even 2-2.5GB will allow them to run smoothly.

Also try running a defragmentation. It will organize files that are out of order, or remove temp files that you no longer need. When youre downloading something online it's going to send quite a bit over to sort the download, and it will leave little bits of information unorganized on your computer. This can cause your system to run slowly. A defrag will take a little while, but will help fix these files and speed up your system.

Hope this helps. In the end it's your wallet, just be smart about it. : )




http://www.compusa.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2571830&CatId=306

CompUSA would like to have a word with you.


EDIT: I am very dissapointed with everyone in this thread. It took me two searches. One for "Vista specs" and one for "Buy Windows XP". :/

Mom certainly doesn't need more than a gig of RAM on her machine, but it'd be nice to be able to start out with more than just the basics.

I'm upgrading my own machine soon, because I can't do anything comfortably on it anymore. No idea how I ever used to run like 8 programs simultaneously while working on artwork on my old, OLD computer. Also sad how Vista running on its bare minimum chokes and gags on its own spit as much as XP does. (My XP has 512 RAM)

(Defragmentation never improves my machine's performance, and as it is I can't do it anymore because there isn't enough remaining disk space. D: Mom shouldn't have to defrag hers, as she barely uses it.)

Vista actually pushed me over the edge to become a full Kubuntu user. Still having to work with Wine to get Photoshop to work better though.

XP was vomiting because again you're only using about half extra of what the OS needs. If you double it, then you'll be fine. 1GB for XP, 2GB for Vista. If that's still slow for you, buy another, and so on. Otherwise youre burning your money for no reason.

Or y'know, go get Linux, either way.

I need enough RAM to comfortably run Photoshop, Maya, Firefox, and my music player simultaneously. :D

Yeah, I want to get a laptop, but I cant get a decent one with JUST XP on it...they all hock Vista. I think I might just wait until windows 7 comes out.

I've heard good things about Windows 7, but it seems too soon for there to be another OS. The world is moving so quickly around me~

Ahh missed the beta...

This reminds me of the Windows Mojave thing that I was too lazy to look into what it really was. I still have no idea.

2GB. Currently at 1GB and I can run Firefox, Music and sometimes Photoshop. An extra gig will easily allow Photoshop and Maya to run. Trust me on this, buy ONE MORE gig. if youre still having problems, go from there. But dont waste your money needlessly smacking more components than what you need.

It's wasteful and stupid.

I can back up 'farce's statement here. I'm only running 2 gigs and I can run all of Creative suite, internet, media player and still have room to run another program. The reason mine seemed to be slow was just a driver issue that I fixed by updating one of the drivers that got outdated.

I still want more RAM so I can handle a bit bigger files, ( Among other things. ) but I don't actually need it. Vista business runs perfectly well on just the 2 GB.

Thanks for all the advice. Maybe it's not the OS itself. It could be even a virus that destroyed my hard drive nevertheless I guess I'm just looking for excuses to get a Mac :P Well they did get my files from the hard drive but they have to replace some hardware.

Is that even taking in mind Firefox's crazy, amazing memory leaks?

Hey, having any camera above 6 MP is "wasteful" too, but plenty of them are nowadays.

Actually... that's a really bad comparison. For those just taking snapshots, anything more is overkill. But for those who use it for reference or art photography it's a godsend. Just like a graphic artist likes to have a bit of extra to run on. Only difference is, you can get a decent 9 MP camera for $60 so that extra few megapixels isn't too expensive. It costs about double that for a good 2 gig stick of RAM. And when you're paying for it yourself you have to wonder if you really need it when you're not actually running a huge amount.

4 gigs.

but i had this when i was running xp too. i just didnt want to upgrade in the close future (further than near, obviously not as far as distant)

i run auto cadd 2002, photoshop (elements 6.0), music, internet explorer (memory leak that), and random tidbits here and there. now all on vista. i upgraded when i crashed the harddrive.

Look, whatever the hell you want to do with your own money is your business. Just stop trying to prove me wrong on this point. You do not NEED 4GB to JUST run Vista SMOOTHLY. You do not just need 6MP to take a picture. But by all means if you want to grab wads of cash and throw it at people, knock yourself out.

I didnt NEED a brand new Zune that could play video, my iPod already plays music. But I spend 80 bucks anyway.

I know most DD users are fucking retarded but this is really not hard to figure out.



I... I'm sorry are you actually boasting about using Internet Explorer?

That's like bragging about living in a mobile home.




EDIT: FireFox does NOT leak a "crazy" amount of memory. In fact, it's fairly average. Unless you're running an insane amount of plug-ins/add-ons, or skins. IE, however, uses more memory than FireFox just to run. So long as FF is updated and kept "slim", you'll have no problems.

Looking it up on 32bit vista 2gb does the best, for 64bit 4gb is best. What i like about the 64bit is you can run a ton of programs like photoshop/painter/word/sai/firefox and whatever else at the same time and switch between them all with zero lag. I read 32bit is more for 1-2 programs, don't know if it lags with more programs.

OK, that's just not cool, man. I never understand people who like to get power trips by hiding behind a computer and insulting others....