Windows Vista available for download

Looks like Microsoft now opened up Vista for everyone to try out.

Link

Download servers are busy.

Just a small quick 3.12GB Download... I think I'll wait

Hmm..

Any point to this other than just to try it out? How are the drivers, and would I be able to play my games ok? I was thinking about making a new partition for it.

What size partition for the core OS + extras?

15 GB minimum are needed for the OS. HL2 works with a little bit of texture errors.

Seeing as Vista has many different version come release time. Am I to assume that this one is the ultimate and they are trying to test all its features all at once?

Correct. This is the super duper ultimate voltron edition.

Edwin wrote:

15 GB minimum are needed for the OS.

Ahem. That's 3 copies of World of Warcraft ! Even if this is "required for install" space only, and the actual OS takes "merely" 5gb (which is one copy of World of Warcraft), it is still insane.

IMO Microsoft is straying farther and farther from the concept of Operating System being just that - an Operating System. A thin layer of software which provides basic memory management, a GUI, and a universal interface to your machine's peripherals - and leaves the overwhelming majority of your system resources FREE for the programs you install and run on it.

I'm sticking with my stripped-down version of XP forever. If a time comes when I can't run it anymore, I am going to migrate to Linux.

Correct. The merged windows tablet, media center, and all sorts of other stuff into the beta for testing. If you want the slimmed down version you can use the Vista update advisor thing and you pick your options. The tool will recommend the version with only the options you want. For me I will get it sans tablet/media center stuff.

Well, I let Vista install over night and now it's running as my main OS. My XP install got fubared so I might as well try it out. I'll post comments throughout the day as I use it for my everyday needs.

Daemon tools and Alcohol 120% do not work. Day of Defeat does work.

Edwin wrote:

Daemon tools and Alcohol 120% do not work. Day of Defeat does work. :)

Yeah any Drive imaging or CD cloning software is 100% not going to work until they update for Vista.. I think Nero had some patch or something that was working.. not sure though.

Looks like an old version of Daemon tools from 2003 (v3.33) is the only one that works.

Edwin wrote:

Looks like an old version of Daemon tools from 2003 (v3.33) is the only one that works. :)

ha! really? thats amazing.

Cuteftp is broke. Smartftp is busted as well. IE7 can't even do decent FTP.

This things runs like a pig. My CPU heatsink/fan is constantly spinning up and down. Hopefully the optimize the living sh*t out of this.

A few more things I've found.

Plugging in a USB thumb drive and turning on SpeedBoost makes Vista performance ALOT better. Sadly there are no drivers for my SanDisk Cruzer Micro 1 GB since it uses the U3 system.

Vista really needs more than 1 GB of ram.

Even if your PC does not have/need tablet and media center stuff, the services are on by default. I already turned these off for now.

WMP 11 uses 1.5 GHZ to play MP3s! Foobar2000 crashes when adding music. Sadly the best music player i've tried is iTunes. It even performes better in Vista than it does in XP. Crazy apple programmers.

Some programs once installed lose their icons.
IMAGE(http://img131.imageshack.us/img131/1821/untitled3dr1.png)

Even though the icon is set in the properties. Also sometimes parts of the UI's just turn black.
IMAGE(http://img60.imageshack.us/img60/8585/untitled7xy.png)

Edwin for the OOCT win!
IMAGE(http://redhawk.ad3pt.net/albums/hidden/Edwin.jpg)

So, I'm building a new box this week and since I need to reinstall my OS I thought I'd play with Vista for a bit. There are two versions which should I grab? Building an AMD 64 based system so should I grab the 64-bit or should I evade it like the plague like XP 64-bit.

Since its beta 2 your going to get some iffy driver support still.. and I'd imagine the 64 bit version will have even iffier driver support.

As its Beta 2 its not ready to run as your full time OS yet.. IMO

My SLi/AMD X2 on the 64-bit version was very, very iffy. Safe mode worked 9 out of 10 times and normal mode loaded but with a black screen and a visible mouse cursor 9 out of 10 times. Waiting for RC1 before I take that plunge again.

Thanks guys, x86 it is. GG, not planning to use it full time, just wanted to see what it looks like since I have to wipe my OS partition anyway.

I too had to wipe anyways so I figured I would use vista till some deal breaker popped up and required XP again.

new build was released post SP2 CCP program

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase...

I'm using Vista 5384 now, daily OS style. Pretty slick-even in beta it's miles ahead of any linux distro, and superior (at least on my box) to XP.

mateo wrote:

I'm using Vista 5384 now, daily OS style. Pretty slick-even in beta it's miles ahead of any linux distro, and superior (at least on my box) to XP.

Oh boy..here it comes

Keep in mind Mateo is a linux developer with his own version in the works.

Edwin wrote:

Keep in mind Mateo is a linux developer with his own version in the works.

While I did not know that (very impressive Mateo) I was referring to other people.

so edwin are you a month in and still running now?

I lasted a week.

heh...and here I was all ready to give it a try

mateo wrote:

I'm using Vista 5384 now, daily OS style. Pretty slick-even in beta it's miles ahead of any linux distro, and superior (at least on my box) to XP.

Out of curiosity, are you running as admin or as a normal user?

One of my roommates works at Microsoft and came home the other day with a couple copies of Vista, so I gave the new x64 beta a shot. No driver support for my Santa Cruz sound card (big surprise) so I'm running off my AC97 onboard audio. Doesn't matter that much, though, because Foobar2000 crashes when loading music, and iTunes won't install. I should have gone 32bit I suppose.

Other than that? Eh, it's okay. Needs to start up a hell of a lot faster.