Comfortably Dumb

Office Beta 2 -> Office 2007 (Vista September CTP)

Required an uninstall but all my settings were there when I started the programs up. Thumbs up.

Office 2003 -> Office 2007 (Media Center 2005)

Completely painless. Thumbs up.

Office 2003 -> Office 2007 keeping Outlook 2003 (XP SP2)

This hasn’t been made very clear by Microsoft, but they dropped support for Exchange 5.5 with this release. So, if you work in an organization or for a client that does not like to upgrade make sure you keep Outlook 2003 installed. Everything works great and no issues to speak of, but the install could more clearly indicate what will be upgraded. The first screen says upgrade everything, install side-by-side, or manually select. The second screen is the standard “select which features get installed” screen. I was personally confused as to what would happen if I deselected Outlook from the second screen and selected upgrade everything from the first screen. Would it know I wanted to upgrade everything except Outlook? Rather than risk it, I manually selected everything but Outlook on the first and second screens. Like I said, everything works, so thumbs up.

Vista September CTP (RC1) -> Vista Ultimate

Upgrading in place to Vista RTM from the September CTP was successful and relatively painless. However, from what Microsoft called a “release candidate” there were some pretty big changes. For example, Vista required that I upgrade the BIOS of my Tecra M5 and several of the Sidebar gadgets I had loaded no longer work or now produce errors. Also, that Meeting Space thing looks brand new to me and I like the fresh icons for WMP and the Sidebar.. Overall thumbs up.

While I am at a few more items:

• Resharper option dropdowns now render properly.
• Medieval II (Gold) runs flawlessly.
• GoToMyPC works but doesn’t blank screen with Aero.
• Oxygen Xml 7.2 & 8 both do not run on any Java 5 JRE or even the Java 6 RC1 JRE.

Media Center 2005 -> Vista Ultimate?

I am still debating whether or not to perform an in place upgrade for this box. I’m worried about potential DRM issues. Has anyone done this yet?

-CP

Vista is available for download for those with an MSDN subscription Beat the folks that thought it got pushed to 11/17, because right now my download speed is at 700Kb. On second thought, why don’t you wait an hour for my download to finish.

-CP

I’d have to strongly consider a Windows Vista Media Center PC with a 50+ CD/DVD/HD-DVD/Blue-ray disc changer that’s cablecard ready. I’m not too concerned with processor and memory but I would like to see a 750 GB RAID 1 setup so I don’t have to worry about dealing with DRM issues in the event of a restore and I can safely store pictures without having them copied on different machines. Just a thought.

[OneCare 1.5 Beta fixes one of these issues but I’m going to rant anyway]

Microsoft continues to amaze me. Windows OneCare backup is missing some key functionality and what cracks me up the most is the Microsoft claims that missing this functionality is a feature. WTF?

The backup wizard only offers two backup targets: burning to CD/DVD and external hard drives.

Hmmm… what about network shares? From the feature perspective, Microsoft is trying to prevent, what could only be stupid users from backing up to a network share on the same computer. So, I guess I understand this. However, understanding their perspective doesn’t make it acceptable. Even non-technical homes are starting to get network shares stood up by wireless router vendors who are starting to allow users to hand-off USB drives from their products. In my case, I’d like to have my Media Center host my USB drive and expose it as a share for my laptops to backup to. Pretty common scenario I would think. I’m certain enough people complained that Microsoft has put the feature, although broken, into the OneCare Beta for Vista. Goodness.

The other backup target I’d like to see is a little more controversial, but I’d like to see it nonetheless… local drives. Once again, Microsoft is trying to prevent users from making stupid mistakes and reduce their support calls. For example, if a user is backing up C:\ to D:\ that could be a problem because they could be two partitions on the same physical drive. If the drive fails, then the backup is gone as well. However, I know the Win32 API can distinguish whether the partitions reside on the same physical device. OneCare should allow local drive backups to take place if it detects that they are separate physical devices for the following reasons:

Storage Area Network Devices: Netgear has a consumer model and the virtual drive shows up as a local drive to Windows.

Removable Caddy Drives: Users may be using removable caddy drives instead of USB drives to reduce desktop clutter and preserve precious power outlets.

I’m fine if they are want to limit the options regular home users have, but the user population in general is becoming more technical and they could always have advanced options with all the proper disclaimers for people who know what is going on.

-CP

The bits have been flying this week, and it is not just coming from Microsoft. Volume 3 is out for the Infragistics fans out there.

Toshiba recently posted updated NVIDIA drivers for the Tecra M5. This seemed to resolve my issues with Vista and the Medieval II: Total War demo. They couldn’t have better timing because the game is being released on Steam (my game distribution method of choice) on November 15th.

-CP

Microsoft released an update for Money 2007 and now it plays nice with Vista Aero or Vista Basic.

Get it before the rush! Oops, too late!

I’m looking for comments on this. Notice the second item in the offers section on the right. It may be just me, but I think it is saying I get a free Dell 24” LCD if I buy this box. I called Alienware and they disagree. They say it is an alert that the Dell 24” LCD is selected below as part of the configuration and thus part of the price. Hmmm… Why does it say “Limited Time Only!”? Why is it in the offers sections? Doesn’t the radial button below in the configurator show me that it is part of the price? If not then why does the price change when I select another option? Shouldn’t the section be called selected configuration then? If so, why is there an offer for “No interest for 6 Months Limited Time offer!”? Why aren’t other selected components listed here since they are also included in the price? I’m mean where is “Price Includes 4 GB RAM! Limited Time Only!”? …Goodness.

-CP