What makes Windows Vista better than Windows XP?

The people who whine about Vista not being stable can barely run XP and they expect to run all the Vista bells and whistles without a hiccup. What they dont know is that Vista is more secure and 10% faster than XP SP3.

Vista has DEP, UAC (annoying as it may be, and its the future OS no matter how many people complain.

 

My ancient XP x64 as well as 32 SP2 have DEP as well. I would rather have past OS if future comes at the cost of speed and stability.

 

They dont have DEP unless you have a hacked OS. Vista was the first to have it. Like I said its more stable than XP. Everyone with XP experiences random crashes and data loss. Its a proven fact.

On the other hand I have never had a BSOD in Vista even after its release in the 2 years I have had it. Like I said 90% of the time people try to run Vista on a POS computer that cant even run XP and they expect to have a fully operating and stable OS when in fact their computer is obsolete.

I also said and can prove that Vista is 10% faster. There have been plenty of benchmarks that have been released that prove this.

 

http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=kb;en-us;875352&x=18&y=4

 

The DEP in XP is not true DEP. All of the drivers and everything run out of the kernel in XP. If DEP kicked in and shut something down the entire OS would need to be restarted. That is not the case with Vista. The GPU drivers as well as many others are outside of the kernel. When DEP kicks in it targets that specific program and shuts it down and it only. True DEP was in Vista first.

 

Y/W They have also released the Linux x64 8.10 as well

ATI Catalyst™ 8.10 Proprietary Linux x86_64 Display Driver

 

Actually you have not listed not even a single vista feature that I consider an improovment. (and it does has a lot of improovments)
The OS performs copying, moving, deleting files all the time. Input/output operations are a constant activity of any OS. And the I/O in vista was terrible; it became better with SP1 but still has a lot of room from improovment.
But guys like you, that have only use vista for the last 3 months did not have to deal with it for a year like the majority of us...

I've been using vista 64 for a year and a half. And I use it only for specific 64bit applications which cannot run on my xp pro.

Post like yours are only nonsense.
Be happy and use your vista. But don't try to convince all that is the best OS outhere.
It is a good OS but not better than XP and noway better than linux.

Panagiotis

 

If you use the policy AlwaysOn it is

 

Why oh why do ppl argue? Just use what you like/prefer - if you like XP, use that. Prefer Vista? Guess what, use that. No matter how many threads are created asking why is a better than b, ppl will always argue their own corner. Yes - I know that's why we have forums - i use XP at work and Vista at home - I'm happy with both but personally prefer Vista (and yes - I've had it since it was released early 2007).

I look at this way - go with what you know - life's too short to bicker - you can use the best of whatever in the world but still search the web and find someone slagging it off - no one should try to convince you to use something you don't want to and change from what you're happy - use your own mind and make your own decisions.

 

Hello Mrk:

Agreed, the answer I have for the OP is nothing, for the average user there is nothing that makes vista better than xp. Yes, I have to use both, only because clients got PC's with vista forced on them. If they would let me I'd wipe their PC's and install xp for them.

 

I'd like to thank midway40 and kerodo for expressing their views the best they could albeit I agree only minimally with what they say,and I'd like to thank DasFox,lodore,Mrkvonic and pandlouk for expounding my thoughts,too.

I cant agree with those who in a very arrogant way close the Vista matter by surmising that 'those who are not fans of Vista' must own an old,outdated machine.

It happens I am now using an Intel Core2 Duo T5550, 1,4 MHZ, 2GB RAM bought since 4 months running XP Pro (upgraded from Vista Business)which is so fast booting up that it has just completed installing MS updates when an equivalent AMD Turion 64X2,a 64bit machine,2GB RAM, 1.90 MHZ bought 11 months ago,running Vista Premium is only half way.

Oh,I was forgetting, I've just finished making an Acronis 11 image on the Vista notebook listed above, and then I rebooted....I mean....I tried to reboot,as it just froze just before completion, forcing me to make an other reboot.....it did that on other occasions,especially when making an image.

I cannot remember an instance when XP was so stressed by an Acronis or Paragon image session to the point of not eventually completing a reboot.

I guess,given all these ensuing Vista troubles,I am not alone in the world to plan ordering a new pc before January with XPPro on it.(And dual booting with a Linux distro as well).

 

Natural progression.
The facts.
Keep an Open Eye:
" Dell offers Windows XP Downgrade."
... and: " Shhhhh ... HP is Pre-installing the Vista Downgrade ".

# http://theopensourcery.com/wordp1/

 

Hey, that's just what you're reading into my posts...

Nowhere above or anywhere have I said that Vista is the best OS out there. In fact, I did mention that I percieve XP x64 to be faster... I'm just saying I like Vista, and I have to argue a little when someone bashes it and calls it a "crap OS". Linux is another story. I won't even go into that, but suffice it to say that for home desktop OS purposes, I choose to use Win most of the time, and I think most others do too. What's best and what's not depends on it's use. But let me just say that if Linux were best overall, we'd all be running Linux as our primary OS long before now....

Feel free to disagree...

 

I wouldn't be surprised if, when all the dust finally settles in this Vista vs XP debate, that XP comes out ahead by a wide margin.

I don't need Vista myself because my XP Pro already has all of Vista's "Bells and Whistles" but without the drain strain overhead and demand for a higher end CPU. (1250Ghz)

And with all the MASSIVE innovations designed for XP "FIRST!" and continuing i might add, security is Rock Solid, period.

It gives me great pleasure to sit back and wait MS out for their next generation O/S instead of jumping to Longhorn , uh, aka: Vista just to divert attention from all the fantastic softwares still being developed for XP.

EASTER

 

Yep, saw that too, thanks Midway, I updated my OzOS drivers also.

 

Faster at what? A blanket "faster" statement doesn't say much of anything. And I have to disagree, based on my experience with both Vista x64 and XP x64, I have to rate XP x64 faster in all regards, no contest... although both do well on new hardware...

 

Karad, you make a good point and I apologize getting caught up in the exchanges of this thread. It is just I (and a lot of others) am getting tired of the needless bashing and there comes a time when you cannot look away anymore but have to respond. And guess what, I used to defend XP in the same way years ago in 2001.

Anyway I did answer the OP's question about the advantages of Vista over XP by posting the link to the Wikipedia article which does a good job in listing all the features in categories. What I didn't say is why I like Vista so here are ten reasons in no particular order:


1. Problem Reports and Solutions—this has came in handy several times, especially with the x64 install. It found all the x64 drivers I needed for my machine.
2. Start Menu Search—I miss this sorely when I am at work on XP machines. With this you never have to know where such and such is in the menu anymore. Just type “power” and Power Options open. Type “services” and your Services list comes up. Type “wilders” and the WS forums appear (if you have it in your Favorites which I think most people here do). I don’t know why they haven’t done this years ago.
3. Reliability and Performance Monitor—this is a useful tool in which your daily usage is graphed and you can see a history of events such as driver failure, unresponding programs, etc. My score would be higher on the desktop if it wasn’t for the ATI driver failing at times. 8.10 seems to be more stable than past versions so far.
4. UAC—I know a lot of people despise this but I like it. I have more control over what is going on in my computer. Plus a couple of times it prevented a webpage from installing crap (I guess it is the last line of defense when something gets past the AV and Protected Mode). I do not mind a couple of seconds it takes to click a button just to have more security.
5. The Overall Look of Vista—this is the first time I have ever kept the default look in Windows. I like the dark menus and taskbar and the Aurora theme. When I first installed XP the first thing I thought of was “this Fisher-Price theme has got to go!”, lol.
6. Network and Sharing Center—I know the minimalists will think this is frivolous but I like the Network Map (see pic) in NSC. This shows a map of your network and when the cursor is placed over a computer or device icon it gives you info on IP address, MAC addresses and such. I just recently was able to have my WHS server to show up on the map. Since it is based on Server 2003 SBS it does not have the Link Layer Topology Discovery responder which is needed for it to show up in the map. There is a hack in where you can fool the XP LLTD version into installing on a Server 2003 machine thus giving it the LLTD protocol.
7. Windows Update—it has its own window and is not depended upon IE anymore.
8. Protected Mode –IE7 operates with lower permissions so anything that tries to install has to be approved by you. This is really effective on “drive-by” downloads (and please, I know there are add-ins and such for both IE and FF but this is the first time it has been incorporated into the OS).
9. Logical Disk Manager—the added feature is that you can shrink or expand partitions on the fly without needing third party programs.
10. Games Explorer—another frivolous item but I used to put all my games in a folder on the desktop. This more or less puts it in the Start Menu instead.

There are undoubtedly more but that is what I can come up with right now.

 

hey Midway, you have some good points there.
i gotta say overall i prefer vista and wouldnt want to go back to XP but i just wish it was faster. hopfully service pack 2 will fix that. i am looking forward to windows 7.
one thing im hoping will improve majorly in windows 7 and maybe partly in vista SP2 is less need to reboot. other OS's only need a reboot if you update the kernel and im hoping the same will be true for windows 7 or at least less reboots needed than now.

quite alot of the problem with vista is third party drivers. at the end of every few songs,memory usage will hit 100percent and freeze the OS for awhile i know this is the fault of the lastest creative drivers for my x-fi sound card.


if windows 7 really is vista but faster and uses less disc space and more reliable as in uptime and less crashes. then i will definatly buy it. what i want is to look like vista and is fast and reliable as linux. this includes less rebooting.

you know when you buy a printer and it doesnt plug and play you need to install all the bloated software pack from HP or epson? dont you find it really annoying? wouldnt it be better if say once a month all the major printer companies sent the drivers for there printers to microsoft so microsoft can update the plug and play? so all you have is a standard printer driver and scanner driver without all the crap? same for sound card,wireless card,graphics card etc.


there is one problem which affects both xp and vista that i find annoying. ndis filters are reccomended by microsoft to filter traffic for security programs firewalls\antivirus yet sometimes the ndis filter can prevent me from seeing computers on the same workgroup. this prevents me from accessing shared files and printers.

if you havent already i surgest you try out windows powershell. it works on both xp and vista and sure makes accesing information about the OS faster.

 

I am very familiar with HP's "bloaty" software, lol. I have a HP PSC 1510 All-in-One. I wanted to install it onto the server so I can have centralized printing but HP does not provide 2003 drivers for it. Friday I was looking around NewEgg and ran across this refurbed Brother for $29.99. I checked Brother's support and this printer does install on 2003 using the XP's Add Printer Wizard. I also noticed that Brother gives you the option for either downloading full software or just the driver installation. I have never owned a Brother before (except an old typewriter) but going by the user reviews it seems to be a nice printer and the replacement cartridges are cheap too.

It will arrive at work tomorrow

 

Faster overall. It has better benchmark scores (not Vantage. Vantage was designed for Vista). It boots faster. It shuts down faster. It opens programs faster. It renders in 3D design faster.

 

Fully agreed there, from app loading, performance and I/O XPx64 with its NT 5.2 core rules the roost.

 

that hasnt been my experience. when im not doing much programs do load fast but when i have multiple apps open it does slowdown fast. somedays it can be really fast but other days using the same programs its not its quite strange.
hopfully sp2 sorts that out.
as i said above i like vista just wish it was faster. and of course more reliable. when it gets slow it thinks the program has crashed and ends it... even thou if it just waited slightly longer it would of been fine. i think if vista was faster that wouldnt happern.


surely thou in windows 7 less services means less things to go wrong?
if microsoft is really listening to customers and making sure only services needed are there and only run when they need to. plus making sure everything uses less harddrive space,less memory and less cpu usage it should be a great OS.

 

As per the question in the topic title:

Customer's (electronic consumer goods buyers) = us, expect anything manufactured newer to be better then their respective predecessors before.

I would say what makes Vista better than XP for those who follow this trend is firstly and simply: LOOKS = Appearance

For better or worse, something eye-catching gives rise to high expectations that other features will be equal to it's looks.

Security is for the majority taken for granted and not really looked on in the same light many of us might see it, and that is, it's importance. Because no matter how lightning quick the newer O/S might be, plus attractive GUI features, it only takes but a single file to completely interrupt all of what makes up those nice features.

Vista has some welcome additional safeguards that XP doesn't, however, the XP security market is much more seasoned and still growing after all this time in spite of Vista's added security measures.

EASTER

 

Would you mind posting your benchmarks so we can all see and comment?

Thanks....

 

I agree. Like to see some concrete screenshot results.

I might point out also: OF COURSE, Vista is going to run quicker because it DEMANDS HIGHER END componants AND MEMORY in order to run the darn thing

Has nothing to do IMO with it being faster.

I would like to see Vista vs XP Pro with the same hardware componants go toe to toe and i garner a wager that XP would return the highest scores.