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DEL.ICIO.USVista: The surprise is on you
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I was an advertising copywriter for years. One skill of that trade is turning a negative into a positive. So when I was selling bland-tasting bacon made from turkey, I wrote a headline for the package that said: Bacon without the guilt!
Microsoft doesn’t need my help, but I’m going to give it anyway by suggesting a headline for the packaging for Vista: Surprises inside the box!
Vista sure has some surprises, and today we’ll talk about how I’ve dealt with them. That way you’ll be prepared when one of them jumps out of the box and says “boo!.”
I’ve used Vista since its early days of testing and I am finally used to it. That’s not exactly a raving endorsement. But considering that it was as troublesome as a new puppy for the first months, this is a big shift for me. Vista is tolerable now that I’ve dealt with those surprises.
The Catch 22 of upgrading
If you’re installing Vista on a PC you own now, you’ll need to upgrade the machine so it has enough oomph to run Vista properly. The catch is, the upgrade can bring problems of its own. Some video cards and printers - even those that claim to be Vista compatible - get along with Vista only in the way dogs and cats get along.
After literally months of messing with my new ATI Radeon video card, I finally got everything working correctly last Sunday. I should have done more research before buying. My mistake? I read reviews but didn’t check out user opinions.
Do a Google search before buying a “Vista-ready” component and pay attention to comments from individual users. Often this will turn up problems not mentioned by the experts. Do your search by including the name of the product you are considering along with Vista. Sandwiched in with the reviews, you’ll find rants and raves from users.
If I had kept reading about my video card I would have found several sites complaining about problems installing the software. A search after the fact turned up a personal Web page that linked to a bug fix contained deep on the manufacturer’s page. I would have never located it on my own. Listen to experts, but don’t ignore users.
The most secure Windows ever
That’s true. Vista is more secure than XP. But not secure enough.
One feature of Vista - touted by reviewers and Microsoft alike - is that Vista includes a firewall that monitors both incoming and outgoing traffic. It’s a half truth.
To understand my point, you need to know that firewalls are a big deal since they reduce the chances that an outsider will break into your machine or plant programs that monitor your online activity.
Some firewalls, like the one included with Microsoft XP, have a one-way firewall. It just checks traffic coming into your computer. It doesn’t monitor outgoing traffic that could contain information being sent out by some spying program that slipped into your computer.
Vista’s firewall is supposed to be two-way. But even the experts have trouble correctly configuring that feature. Even then, it isn’t a topnotch firewall. Don’t just take my word for it. Do a Google search for “Vista firewall” and read about it yourself.
You can buy better commercial security programs. For instance, these two programs: ZoneAlarm Internet Security Suite 7 ($50) or Norton Internet Security 2007 ($70) are terrific.
But all this represents another Catch-22. These security suite bundles are all-in-one programs that include anti-virus protection as well as the firewall. So, to use them you need to remove any free anti-virus software. That’s becaue it’s not a good idea to run two anti-virus programs at the same time.
Truth is, using a security suite makes sense. That way you know that all the security programs will work together.
But it leaves you with a choice. Stick with an anti-virus program that is free and compromise on the firewall, or pay for a suite program that includes a better firewall.
Personally, I’m sticking with my free Grisoft AVG antivirus and using the so-so firewall included with Vista. I feel OK with that since my router also serves as a hardware firewall. But if security is a paramount concern for you, you’re better off with one of the commercial packages.
Browsing around
Another feature of Vista is the new Internet Explorer 7 (which you can also download separately and use with XP). It is another security improvement claimed for Vista. The claims are true, but - surprise - IE 7 has some flaws that make it subject to attacks.
The problem here is something called ActiveX. It is designed to let programs from the Web run on your computer. Vista monitors the use of ActiveX and goes a long way toward fixing the obvious security hazards of that capability.
But some experts- the people at PC World for instance - think any use of ActiveX is too big of a risk. If you want to close that potential doorway into your computer, here’s how to do it.
Click on tools, Internet Options, Security and then Custom Level. Scroll to the heading “Run ActiveX controls and plug-ins” and select Disable. That means that you won’t be able to use some features of Web pages that depend on ActiveX, so the decision is up to you.
The good news? Vista is an improvement over XP now that I’ve shaken out some of the bugs.
Just keep in mind that one of the features of Vista isn’t listed on the box. You won’t see my headline: Surprises inside the box!
And that’s no surprise.
Permalink | Comments (14) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns
Comments
By Adrian
April 20, 2007 9:54 PM | Link to this
Some good words about Microsoft Vista. My computer is Pentium 4.2 ghz with 1 gig of ram , ATI Radeon video 9600 80 harddrive. Nothing special. Have tested Vista for 12 weeks and it Worked very good. I use Vista Home premium full version, updated windows-xp home. I like Aero , Gadgets, Super Fetch, Ready boost ,media center,snipping tool And very good backup. I give it 9 out of 10 Adrian Australia
By lrd
April 21, 2007 6:35 AM | Link to this
My wife has owned a Mac for almost a year now and it has run flawlessy.
Our Sony on the other hand started giving us cryptic error messages within the first few hours of using it.
By lrd
April 21, 2007 6:35 AM | Link to this
My wife has owned a Mac for almost a year now and it has run flawlessy.
Our Sony on the other hand started giving us cryptic error messages within the first few hours of using it.
By Rod
April 21, 2007 12:30 PM | Link to this
Ok,Im tired of reading these same old views about vista written by these authors,,microsoft dosent need to make your pc more secure,YOU have to!! YOU also have to maintain it daily as you do your car and you have to recoginze changes in YOUR pc when something looks or runs differently in it.Now for the bottom line when it comes to opoerating systems,Macs os 10 tiger right now is the prettiest and the least resource intensive.Vista plain out sucks!I run both systems on 4 different pcs of similiar hardware xp is 18% to 24% faster on running applications,If You can run a clean xp as I do ALL of the time it blow bill gate’s vista and i say bill gates vista as it dosent feel like my vista, out of the water in every way except one and thats,pretty,big woop.if i want pretty ill find me a nice pretty blonde or a new mac but for now until gates stop rippin people of,ill stick with ole horse xp that runs properly ater years of fixes its a fine OS.And as for you authors of theas articles try writing something we dont already know…
By Rod
April 21, 2007 12:37 PM | Link to this
Sorry about the spelling in the above article..Thats what happens to you when you sit in front of pcs 16 hours a day…;)~
By leo
April 22, 2007 9:39 AM | Link to this
IE7 is the worse browser yet, takes up to much space, cannot hide address bar, cannot arrange tool bar the way you want like you can in Firefox or Opera. Would love to use IE but just can’t the way it is designed.
By GSU1010
April 22, 2007 12:40 PM | Link to this
People need to stop going on about how much better macs are and that in comparison to macs, vista sucks. The fact is that not everyone is willing to go out and spend a whole lot more money on buying a brand new mac which isn’t compatible with any of the old software. It’s just not practical. So, though Mac’s may be better, for those people who just want to have a very versatile computer for everyday jobs, Vista is your better option.
I don’t have a mac, and im not about to buy one. So shush about mac!
By GSU1010
April 22, 2007 12:41 PM | Link to this
People need to stop going on about how much better macs are and that in comparison to macs, vista sucks. The fact is that not everyone is willing to go out and spend a whole lot more money on buying a brand new mac which isn’t compatible with any of the old software. It’s just not practical. So, though Mac’s may be better, for those people who just want to have a very versatile computer for everyday jobs, Vista is your better option.
I don’t have a mac, and im not about to buy one. So shush about mac!
By Shannon, M.Div.
April 25, 2007 2:05 PM | Link to this
I had to laugh when I read your comment, GSU. I’ve known Mac users, and they do count among themselves a number of rabid apologists—as if using a Mac instead of a PC is a moral imperative (and I hate calling it a “PC,” as if a Mac isn’t a type of PC anyway). You just can’t get around price, though—Macs are simply more expensive. Competition apparently does drive down prices. Who knew?
Bill—I’ve been running Vista for a couple of months (on a Dell XPS dual-processor that’s about a year and a half old now). I didn’t have to upgrade anything, because the XPS was a glory machine when I bought it and is still at the upper end of most reqs. But the OS, Lord have mercy. I was running Windows XP Media Center, which is the most unstable OS I’ve ever run. I did an upgrade to Vista and I love the look of Aero. I love gadgets, too. Thankfully, Vista has been rock-solid as a platform with hardly any problems.
I’m a fanatic about my MMORPGs, especially Guild Wars, which I play for several hours a day. I’m also using other programs for school, and of course, a lot of websurfing. Vista has rocked my world.
By Bill
April 25, 2007 3:29 PM | Link to this
My gosh Shannon - I play Guild Wars about the same amount of time each day.
Look for Just Axe Me in the game and message me. How do you like the new hard mode?
And yes, now that I’ve ironed out most of my problems - mostly related to upgrading a machine. Vista has been solid for me too.
No kidding - message me in the game some time and say hello.
By Filipe
April 26, 2007 1:56 PM | Link to this
I’m running Vista Business on a 3+ year old Toshiba Satellite A60-122 laptop smoothly and I didn’t have to upgrade anything to use Vista. Plus, I also prefer ZoneAlarm Firewall Pro, but ZoneAlarm costs $50, Vista’s firewall costs $0 and it’s actually a very powerful firewall for people who know how to configure it (that excludes the writer of this ignorant article, of course). It’s no surpise to me either that an advertising copywriter knows so little about Vista, next time you should choose someone who actually knows somwthing about computers, like an IT guy.
By Filipe
April 26, 2007 2:10 PM | Link to this
And by the way: nothing that came with Vista was a surprise to me (at least not a negative one). Maybe to people who don’t know that much about computers there are surprises, but not for the rest of us, no.
By Susan1
April 26, 2007 4:01 PM | Link to this
Boy Fillipe - I sure found some surprises, just goes to show that a decent EE degree didn’t prepare me for life.
By Theo
April 26, 2007 6:39 PM | Link to this
Vista is spyware. What I don’t understand: why pay to upgrade to Vista. Windows 2000 is remarkably stable and there is enough free software out there to get anything done. XP is,perhaps, marginally more stable than 2000. If you are really worried about security, run a BSD ‘nix product. If you want eye-candy get someone to install Enlightenment on a ‘nix box.