[Ammalgam]

From what I understand about Aero, this is what it's about "Windows Vista Aero provides spectacular visual effects such as glass-like interface elements that you can see through."

It sounds like Microsoft considers this a really big deal and they are removing it from some versions, locking it away from pirates etc etc..

My question: In 2006, is it me or is it a little silly to make a big deal out of a crsip graphics UI? My take on it is, we can now all afford really decent graphics cards. Why doesn't MSFT just focus on making the basic UI graphics and features as good as possible and avoid all this drama?

just my 10 cents

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My take on it is, we can now all afford really decent graphics cards. Why doesn't MSFT just focus on making the basic UI graphics and features as good as possible and avoid all this drama?

Thats almost a contradiction in itself, the windows basic UI cant get alot better its simple and effective and hasnt changed very much since windows 3.1 when you strip away the pretty themes adden in XP and Vista.

So they have developed a new UI to make use of the higher end gfx cards that are now common to most people, why have them if you cant use them to make your OS look and feel better.

So basically they have the foundation of windows they are just taking the GUI experience into another level making use of modern hardware, as far as i know its going to be in some way in all the versions, and what does it matter if they remove it from pirated versions thats what i would do if you had a key feature like that and it wasnt to difficult to deactivate it on pirate releases. They will eventually get round it but that wont affect legitamite users. Removing or deactivating the Aero interface is hardly a big deal just the same way as turning of the XP interface and using the classic one isnt a big deal.

Its certainly as a whole a very nice UI from what ive seen and is just taking the things that 3rd party apps have been trying to do for a long time in XP and other OS. Glass effects for example are quite easy to get in XP you can use g2k(works quite well) or windowblinds but what they are doing is integrating this into the OS which saves resources and makes the OS better seems logical thing to do in a next gen of your OS.

[warriorscot]

My take on it is, we can now all afford really decent graphics cards. Why doesn't MSFT just focus on making the basic UI graphics and features as good as possible and avoid all this drama?

Thats almost a contradiction in itself, the windows basic UI cant get alot better its simple and effective and hasnt changed very much since windows 3.1 when you strip away the pretty themes adden in XP and Vista.

So they have developed a new UI to make use of the higher end gfx cards that are now common to most people, why have them if you cant use them to make your OS look and feel better.

So basically they have the foundation of windows they are just taking the GUI experience into another level making use of modern hardware, as far as i know its going to be in some way in all the versions, and what does it matter if they remove it from pirated versions thats what i would do if you had a key feature like that and it wasnt to difficult to deactivate it on pirate releases. They will eventually get round it but that wont affect legitamite users. Removing or deactivating the Aero interface is hardly a big deal just the same way as turning of the XP interface and using the classic one isnt a big deal.

Its certainly as a whole a very nice UI from what ive seen and is just taking the things that 3rd party apps have been trying to do for a long time in XP and other OS. Glass effects for example are quite easy to get in XP you can use g2k(works quite well) or windowblinds but what they are doing is integrating this into the OS which saves resources and makes the OS better seems logical thing to do in a next gen of your OS.

[admin]

Here's the difference. Vista with Aero is a 100% 3D desktop. It relies heavily on your GPU (graphics processor unit) to render the desktop - just as 3D games do. This allows some cool features in the Vista interface, and will allow third party applications to do even more. Microsoft was pretty conservative in their Vista design. A 3D environment opens all kinds of new design possibilities, but a non-Aero desktop also has to look and function similar to the full 3D version.

[yurimxpxman]

What the...?! G2K and Windows Blinds have nothing similar to AERO Glass. Those apps don't have the advanced textures and control that AERO Glass has. (Have you ever even used Vista, warriorscott??)

AERO Glass is very pretty and has some nice looking effects that make me feel like this guy:

That being said, AERO Glass is a poor excuse to waste your precious clock cycles on. I still have it enabled on my copy of Vista, but this is because I don't do any heavy-lifting work when I boot Vista. I just do it to explore the new OS.

AERO is very slow. This has improved since the original beta, to be sure, but it is still slow. I am hoping that this will be a non-issue in the final version.

Another one of my complaints about Vista is that it still does not have a built-in ISO reader or writer. We must still rely on 3rd party applications to deal with this commonly-used file format and our ISO mounting software does not yet work in Vista.

I'm very skeptical of Vista. It may turn out to be what XP was to Win98, or it may be a pretty version of WinMe. My jury's still out on that one.

[warriorscot]

A glass effect is a glass effect both very similar the interface isnt the same but the effect of Glass is accurately reproduced.

[Ammalgam]

I definitely don't see the value in AERO at this point. I see it as a nice to have at this point and a waste of precious clock cycles.

My attitude is make the s*** work, make it fast and only then make it pretty.

I would rather have (all versions of) Vista extremely fast and intuitive with no AERO and then have AERO as a separate optional product for people with more time on their hands..

[yurimxpxman]

dittos. Gray chrome is fine with me if it's faster. I personally prefer XP's Luna theme because it's comfortable to look at and it's fast

[warriorscot]

As far as i know they are still going to have a "performance"mode for windows with either minimal or no Gui initially it was put across as a new knid of dos but there hasnt been alot mentioned of the feature.

Also the 3d OS is designed to help productivity especially given that speed isnt a huge factor as its a rare occasion for most people to need all there cpu power, not everyone runs 3d apps and compilers and vid editing all the time and given current cpu powers and what they will be like inside two years not really a huge issue at all, you design an OS to run on what people will have not that they had. Also Aero should help when the 3D displays start hitting the market at a more reasonable price, at the moment they cost alot of money but like all things the prices will come down.

[yurimxpxman]

3D displays? I've never heard of that (unless you're referring to GPU's).

Yes, you're correct about the performance tweaker. It automatically adjusts the appearance settings based on what your hardware is capable of.

It is also true that most of the visual effects can be disabled, but I personally find the whole thing a complete waste of resources. It's the same reason I use Gaim instead of AIM Triton.

Call me utilitarian if you like. I don't care. (Because I pride myself at being utilitarian lol.) I'm just not into the gimmicks and trends. ;-)

[warriorscot]

When its finished it should be a viable productivity boosting method as well as being pretty which is still something nice to have.

Yes 3d displays are just coming out there are a couple of different methods but the most effective is probably the philips 3d LCD however they cost somehwere along the line of $5000 for a 17" but they are really just early productino prototypes there isnt alot of them and no large scal production hence the high price. Its an interesting technology and one thats sure to be popular,and there is other 3d systems as well that would make good use of it.

I dont mind if it wastes resources because frankly ive got alot of resources on this system and they may as well be used to give it all a nice pleasant look, and you can turn them off or replace them as you see fit as you always have been.

[Ammalgam]

I think one of the main problems here is creating features just for the sake of creating features. Scot, you said it should help boost producitivity but I disagree. What does an aero display do for me? Features boost productivity not fancy graphics.

Applications that boot up in 5 or 6 seconds boost productivity. Features that work reliably boost productivity.

I am confused at the strategy Microsoft have used to lay this all out. I havent really heard anyone articulate properly ( or actually in a concise manner) why the need for Vista and what it will really do for productivity.

In my opinion, XP could have been upgraded and 90% of the features we see now could have been added as aftermarket addons/standalone products.

Here's the truth as I see it. MSFT have an interesting monopoly and they are able to get apps in front of consumers. They therefore can bundle a whole bunch of applications and call it an OS.

Look at Windows Mail, or Defender, or IE7. All really interesting products that should be sold as standalone products

BUT

Who can honestly say that without being bundled with the OS, IE7 has a chance against Firefox? People will use IE7 because it will be bundled with Vista, period.

I guess the jist of my rant is the strategy for introducing Vista to the world is not crisp and clean. The decision to have 7 versions out the gate was not ideal. The graphics strategy is just another example of that. There may be really great reasons to have the Aero feature but apart from "it's cool", I haven't heard em.

I want Vista to work and I am sure MSFT will smoothe out these wrinkles but I honestly don't remember XP's launch causing this much drama.

My 10 cents

[warriorscot]

Ive got one word for you "superfetch" new technology developed by intel and Microsoft, it uses flash memory as a second set of RAM flash memory is cheap and effective and using it for this purpose significantly boosts performance.

The intel chip that uses it goes under the name Robson, but Vista can use any bog standard thumb drive so you dont need a robson cpu. The effective of flash memory on a system with it reduces load times from 5-6 seconds pretty average for something like adobe reader or word, down to half a second, pretty good isnt it.

Mail and defender could be sold as standalone products but your getting them with the OS thus saving money, IE7 maybe people will use it, i wont i know better although ie7 i supposed to be alot better ill stick with FF and so will most people who use it. There no good reason not to use IE7 and its always nice to have the IE backup.

What Drama, a few people are creating a drama, mostly its based on assumptions on there part and it spreads around, i dont get how you think it WONT work, they wouldnt release it if it wasnt better than the current product that wouldnt make good business sense they would put the resources into the next OS for further down the line. Alot of the features could be put into XP and alot will, most are jsut inclusions of things 3rd party apps do for XP allready, but by designing them into the new OS they improve the performance of those features and also adress issues in XP that would be harder to fix and fundamentally alter components that would cause XP not to work. Vista has alot better security than XP does, its alltogether a tougher nut to crack than anything previous things like that they learned with experience from XP but cant be effectivley implemented in the code of XP which is in parts many many years old.

[yurimxpxman]

I completely agree with Ammalgam.

One can say as much as he likes about how one would never need the resources that AERO consumes, but my argument is this: Why bother wasting resources at all? There are over a million things that I'd rather do with my resources (such as getting producing more WU's for Folding@Home).

So far, the only programs that M$ has produced in this new wave of "modern" software that I actually find useful are Windows Defender Office 2007. That's because the ribbon actually saves me time. I've found that most of the changes in Vista waste my time and resources.

IE7 is - and probably will also be in the final version - utter crap compared to Firefox. I have to major bones to pick with IE7. The first being that the new layout buries the controls that I use frequently that I NEED to have at my fingertips 24/7. The other major problem I have with IE7 is that it still lacks extensions. Toolbars and extensions are two very different things. IE7 cannot block ads, does not have mouse gusture functionality, does not have a smiley sidebar, does not have the directory up button, does not have the weather in the status bar, does not show my adsense status, does not take advantage of my unused bandwidth to preload pages, does have manageable tab sessions, does not have a gmail notifier, and does not have all of the tools I now can't live without that are included in the Web Developer extension. That's a lot of functionality that IE7 is missing, and that's only the beginning!

I don't mean to turn this into a flame thread, so I'll finish this post on a happy note lol. I absolutely love Office 2007. I never would have believed that I would ever have a reason to switch from Open Office to M$ Office, but Office 2007 may be just that.

[Ammalgam]

I don't mean to turn this into a flame thread, so I'll finish this post on a happy note lol. I absolutely love Office 2007. I never would have believed that I would ever have a reason to switch from Open Office to M$ Office, but Office 2007 may be just that.

Good one Yuri..

Funny how we start out fine and then get pissed off and then become civil at the end again...

Thats why I love MSFT...Only their software brings this side of me out....

[warriorscot]

Lol, you dont have to tell me about IE i wont defend it anytime soon, its FF forever ive been using it since it came out and i put it on all my systems

One can say as much as he likes about how one would never need the resources that AERO consumes, but my argument is this: Why bother wasting resources at all? There are over a million things that I'd rather do with my resources (such as getting producing more WU's for Folding@Home).

See your in the performance at all costs, from what i see there is two camps when it comes to your OS, 1. performance at all costs 2. Pretty things are always nice. Alot of people use skinning apps and fancy features that dont neccesarily add to it but make it look better which is important to alot of people and they like, not everyone folds as well in fact few do also the Aero interface doesnt actually use alot of CPU cycles itself, it uses the GPU its a graphics intenesive interface and is almost totally reliant on the GPU not the CPU. So for alot Aero is a good step in the right direction for them as they enjoy the pretty features that are generally superflous but nice to have.

Office 2007 is pretty good though, i do like it myself its a big step ahead, i just really want to try it on a tablet it looks very table friendly.