[Archived] Problems With Vista

[Biddy]

I'm having some grief with Media Center Edition and the Internet at the minute. Certain websites, especially MySpace, cause my system to freeze completely. Which is a massive pain in the balls.

Anyone else?

Media Center Edition, as in 2005 or Media Center within Vista?

[dj54nna]

2K5.

[Biddy]

Can't say I have a problem in MCE2005. Which browser are you using? Have you tried those websites in something else like Firefox (presuming you are using ie). If it's IE6, have you also tried updating to IE7, or indeed if you have updated to IE7, try removing that to go back to IE6.

All in all, it just sounds like something conflicting on your PC. I'm suprised you're not getting a Blue Screen of Death though. At least that would have given some indicator.

[dj54nna]

Can't say I have a problem in MCE2005. Which browser are you using? Have you tried those websites in something else like Firefox (presuming you are using ie). If it's IE6, have you also tried updating to IE7, or indeed if you have updated to IE7, try removing that to go back to IE6.

Was using Firefox 2. Tried downgrading Firefox to 1.5.x and using IE7, problem still occurs in both so I'm guessing it's a Windows/system problem. No idea what, mind.

[Cocker]

I took a new PC with Vista Business out of the box yesterday. Booted it up - it rebooted a couple of times while it did its stuff and though I didnt actually get a 'blue screen of death' it did give me a little vista notice telling me there was one Since that though to be honest its worked fine with everything I have installed though looking at it I cant see the immediate need to upgrade my home XP one to it.

[Biddy]

Fully agree. I can see no real advantage to upgrading for those that don't want to. I'm trying to get my wife used to it at the moment and I found her writing a document in notepad as she "couldn't find word". It's not that hard to find but it's the little things that do confuse people.

I think the best thing about it is the free Hold Em Poker that you can download

The most annoying thing so far has to be that when you try and delete anything, it sits there calculating how many files and the size before it does it. NO, just delete the bloody things.

[Cocker]

The most annoying thing so far has to be that when you try and delete anything, it sits there calculating how many files and the size before it does it. NO, just delete the bloody things.

To be honest it does that for any thing - "Are you sure" YES "really" YES

There must be a way to turn of the 'helpful' pop ups

[Biddy]

To be honest it does that for any thing - "Are you sure" YES "really" YES

There must be a way to turn of the 'helpful' pop ups

No, the pop-ups are their new "security" feature where you need to ask for admin privileges to do things. It's even worse if you are a non-admin user as you have to type in the admin password each time. It's not the pop-ups I'm complaining about though, it's just the time it sits there calculating files and sizes before it deletes them that winds me up.

[Cocker]

No, the pop-ups are their new "security" feature where you need to ask for admin privileges to do things. It's even worse if you are a non-admin user as you have to type in the admin password each time. It's not the pop-ups I'm complaining about though, it's just the time it sits there calculating files and sizes before it deletes them that winds me up.

Yes but being the admin user you shouldnt have to have the thing nag you everytime you want to do something - very anoying.

Stick with what you have people unless you need it to play the latest games of course.

[Flopsy]

and its only Supreme Commander that uses Direct X 10, and you need a stupidly powerful machine to run it at a decent FPS anyway

[Biddy]

Yes but being the admin user you shouldnt have to have the thing nag you everytime you want to do something - very anoying.

Stick with what you have people unless you need it to play the latest games of course.

Just a quick update on this. You can turn all the annoying pop ups off but it does lower security. I'm more than happy to do this on my home PC but it's something I wouldn't advise on work desktops (granted users shouldn't have admin accounts anyway!)

Anyway, to turn off most of these settings, go to Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Local Security Policy -> Local Policies -> Security Options.

At the bottom, there are a few options for the "User Account Control". The 3 main interesting ones are:-

Switch to the secure desktop when prompting for elevation - disable this to stop the screen going black whenever you try and do anything that needs authorisation.

Detect application installations and prompt for elevation - disable this to stop the pop up that prompts eveytime you install anything. This one however causes an annoying security alert to show in the task bar.

Behaviour of the elevation prompt for administrators in Admin Approval Mode - Change this to "Elevate without prompting" and it will get rid of 90% of the permissions prompts. Again, the security warnings will pop up in the task bar.

Hope this helps anyone who wants to make Vista that little less secure but easier to use!

[Cocker]

Nice one

[Biddy]

OK, I'm annoyed with Vista again. It's suddenly decided to not shut down properly it just hangs at the "shutting down" screen. Nasty, nasty flakey OS!

[Cocker]

OK, I'm annoyed with Vista again. It's suddenly decided to not shut down properly it just hangs at the "shutting down" screen. Nasty, nasty flakey OS!

I had this a couple of times. I am not sure if Windows update has anything to do with is because its not until you are shutting down does it try and install the updates.

I have also had a couple of blue screens of death when clicking on simple things like control panel and it just restarts.

[Biddy]

I had this a couple of times. I am not sure if Windows update has anything to do with is because its not until you are shutting down does it try and install the updates.

I have also had a couple of blue screens of death when clicking on simple things like control panel and it just restarts.

I've not had any BSOD's but I am now seriously thinking of just going back to XP until SP1 comes out.

I am also falling out with Office 2007, or more accurately Outlook 2007. I have 2 profiles on my machine and when I close Outlook for the first time, the process doesn't die. The application closes but outlook still lurks in memory. Then when I launch Outlook again, it doesn't ask for the profile, just goes striaght in with the last used. I have to actually kill the process for it to start working properly. I think Microsoft are seriously beginning to lose the plot.

[Wolverine]

Dell are sending my new laptop through on Friday, which will be running Vista.

Hopefully, there won't be problems...

If anyone is after a decent laptop quite cheap, check this out! (remember to remove the 3 year warrenty to get it down to £410)

Specs:

AMD® Turion 64 X2 Mobile Technology TL56,Genuine Windows Vista™ Home Basic - English,15.4" Wide Screen XGA TFT Display: 1280x800,2048MB 533MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM (2x1024),120GB (5,400 rpm) Hard Drive,ATI Radeon® Xpress 1150 256MB HyperMemory™,Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive including Software,4Cell 29WHr Primary battery,Dell™ Wireless 1390 802.11b/g Mini-PCI Card (for AMD Processors),

[LeChuck]

That will run Vista Basic with no problems at all. With that spec you should have gone for Vista Premium really.

[Wolverine]

Strangely, for Dell, there was no upgrade option...

Anyway, It's mainly for making websites and playing Footy Manager 2007!

Can an upgrade be purchased seperately?

[Flopsy]

yes, online I believe (there's options in the menu - should be about £36 I believe.

Has anyone used Office 2007 yet?

[cn174]

yes, online I believe (there's options in the menu - should be about £36 I believe.

Has anyone used Office 2007 yet?

Well I've used the beta version. There's not much difference in terms of what it can do really (well not in word anyway), it just looks different and buttons have moved.

[Biddy]

yes, online I believe (there's options in the menu - should be about £36 I believe.

Has anyone used Office 2007 yet?

See my note from earlier about outlook 2007. It's a right pain in the back side if you have multiple profiles on it. I currently have Outlook 2003 installed and the rest of office 2007.

I like Word altough they say they have moved the tool bars around to make it easier to use, I find it more annoying as I knew where everything I needed was and now I can't find them! The thing I do like is that it shows on the page the affect on things you are choosing like font size, colours etc.

The only other part I have used is excel and again, apart from not being able to find half the functions, not much has changed.

I honestly can't see any reason at all for people to upgrade from 2003. I basically have mine defaulting to saving in the old document formats as you know everyone else doesn't have 2007.