Vista Upgrades Require Presence of Old OS 561
kapaopango writes "Ars Technica is reporting that upgrade versions of Windows Vista Home Basic, Premium, and Starter Edition cannot be installed on a PC unless Windows XP or Windows 2000 is already installed. This is a change from previous versions of Windows, which only required a valid license key. This change has the potential to make disaster recovery very tedious. The article says: 'For its part, Microsoft seems to be confident that the Vista repair process should be sufficient to solve any problems with the OS, since otherwise the only option for disaster recovery in the absence of backups would be to wipe a machine, install XP, and then upgrade to Vista. This will certainly make disaster recovery a more irritating experience.'"
do we really care? (Score:2, Interesting)
How about a little confirmation? (Score:2, Interesting)
Perhaps Ken should have included a link to his information. It is the web after all. Until then I think Ken's full of shit and spreading FUD. Where did this information come from? Has Microsoft been given the ability to respond to the criticism or was this just hack/ambush journalism? Ken is the worst blogger on Ars (I hesitate to call him a journalist).
Re:Are you surprised? (Score:1, Interesting)
There are multiple options.
1) Buy an upgrade version that requires a previous OS version to already be installed.
2) Buy the full version to install however the hell you want.
3) Use an alternate OS other than MS.
Where does it say that users who have recently bought new "Vista" PC's will be receiving upgrade versions of Vista and not a full install? If I buy a brand new PC that comes preinstalled with XP because Vista wasn't ready yet, but says I get a free Vista OS, I sure as hell expect a full version. If I don't get that then I take it up with MS customer service. If they don't give me a full version then I go to the vendor or my state attorney's office. One way or another I get the full OS.
Re:Another reason to keep backups current. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Are you surprised? (Score:3, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Are you surprised? (Score:3, Interesting)
Great, what about the three sentences that precede your quote? "What does Microsoft hope to gain out of all of this? I can only speculate. First, the change prevents a dual-license situation with all of the free Vista upgrade coupons out there."
Let me emphasize the quote, "I CAN ONLY SPECULATE.". I still see NOTHING in the article that says users buying a new PC with XP but advertised as getting Vista will receive an upgrade version of Vista instead of a full version. They will receive AN upgrade to XP. It doesn't say that the Vista version they get is an upgrade only version. In fact, since MS is intending to push internet copies of Vista as much as possible, I would assume the opposite. Your assumption doesn't fly even based on previous MS behavior.
They Had To Discuss This At Microsoft (Score:5, Interesting)
"We're Microsoft and we can do as we damn well please because few of our customers know they have options?"
I do wish that more people would move to Linux and/or that Apple would port their OSX to PCs. (which I believe Apple has expressed no or little interest) If Microsoft had more real competition, they wouldn't be so smug and willing to hang their own customers by the short and curlies.
Re:Disaster recovery (Score:4, Interesting)
I remember the version check on an early version of Word (6.0? Maybe earlier). It came on floppies, and the 'full' version cost 3 times the cost of the upgrade version.
Trouble was it would accept its own installation floppy as 'proof' you owned the earlier product! So it was a no brainer that nobody got the full version..
More of the same... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:thank u bill (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Are you surprised? (Score:1, Interesting)
Actually, I'm pretty sure Vista is not the first time this has happened. I seem to recall some 2000 Upgrade Editions requiring you at least insert an older MS OS CD at some point, I'm I know many XP upgrade versions required the OS be installed. So Microsoft continues to make their licensing a PITA to deal with, each edition has gotten progressively worse. Microsoft is playing chicken with the IT pros who are their bread and butter with their increasingly annoying schemes.
Ubuntu has gotten a bit ... fat. (Score:4, Interesting)
There are other distros, even other Ubuntu variants like Xubuntu, that are better choices for the hardware you're discussing. In my case, I grabbed an Xubuntu install CD and it ran perfectly, and the old 600MHz is now a nice light-office workstation.
Ubuntu has diverged from some other distros in that it's no longer what I would consider "lightweight." In some ways, it's even topheavy; for most people, this is an OK tradeoff, because it makes it feature-comparable with a modern XP system in most cases. But it also means that it doesn't do well, or sometimes run at all, on less-than-modern hardware (with some exceptions -- sometimes it works great). As a general rule, I'm hesitant to install mainline Ubuntu or Kubuntu on a machine that wasn't designed or previously running Windows XP; Xubuntu is a better match for Win98-era systems, and DSL, Vector, or Puppy are best if you want a snappy, responsive GUI on "Designed for Windows 95" gear.
Re:Well... (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe not for the first 6-12 months, but if you think that no game company is going to embrace directX 10, you are mistaken. How many current directX 9.0c only games are there? Like... most on the shelves released within the past 12 months...
Media users? You mean the ones who buy shit on iTunes? They're going to use Linux? Right....
Regular companies? Running Win2k? Maybe those with less than 30 employees - any bigger than that and they're going to be running Vista by the time XP is end of life.
Re:Are you surprised? ppc ubuntu (Score:4, Interesting)
Now for the Vista Part. I am really thinking M$ is headed in the wrong direction. Anyone that uses Google docs, calendar, etc, can see that the OS is becoming less and less important. If internet connections will be getting faster and faster, then the Google world approach should mean that computer OS's would be getting lighter and faster.
To bad BeOS isnt around any more. Firefox, Thunderbird, Gaim, on BeOS would really be the bomb.
People will continue to whine about the DRM laded pig Vista, but maybe the time is getting near for a quick, light, new OS.
How bout a nice little ARM based lappy with a zillion hours of battery life, and
Cheers
Re:Well... (Score:2, Interesting)
Im thinking of the people that I've set up machines to output video and audio in their home theater. We're talking about 1.5 TB nicely shuffled away but with a pretty interface to transfer all those DVD's to their library.
You'd be amazed how much people will pay for a nice machine that shares them over the network, and can play on their basement home theater.
---Regular companies? Running Win2k? Maybe those with less than 30 employees - any bigger than that and they're going to be running Vista by the time XP is end of life.
I dont think so. I still know of companies that STILL use Win98 because their software doesnt require buku hardware to run. And to top that off, I know only of 1 company (light industrial, ~50 machines) that uses XP, and thats from the japanese laptops.
Many, if not all companies will stay away from Vista, mainly for the remote root exploits (built in "feature").
Re:Well, I'm not the first (Score:3, Interesting)
The Ultimate Edition is already a best-seller at Amazon.com. #6 on the list for the Upgrade, #17 for the Full Version.
Re:Are you surprised? (Score:3, Interesting)
A quick Google for "Windows Vista Rebate" yielded this [bestbuy.com] from Best Buy.
I didn't go to the effort to track down the rest of the major retailers & manufacturers, since I believe it's not necessary. I've seen enough of these rebates to feel safe assuming it's the standard case.
To quote the link: "...Customers with Windows XP Home will receive a Windows Vista Home Basic Upgrade DVD. Customers with Windows XP MCE will receive a Windows Vista Home Premium Edition Upgrade DVD. Customers with Windows XP Pro will receive Windows Vista Business Upgrade DVD..."
As a side note, I've heard rumors that since it's technically an upgrade license, it technically voids the CoA/license key for the XP install... so once these folks go Vista, they can't choose to go back to XP if they so desire.
Business cares (Score:1, Interesting)
This means transferring over to them is a non-starter for many businesses. Especially businesses that handle legally confidential information.
If you run a law or doctor's office you have confidential information, that either you are legally required to keep confidential. It isn't your choice. Once you turn that information over to a third party (e.g. stored on Google's servers) you have just driven your liability thru the roof. Google doesn't guarantee the confidentiality of your information. In fact Google is pretty upfront about telling you they'll look through your confidential information (to aid with Google Ads). So, for all those businesses they can't switch to Google even if they want to.
Then you have the many business that need to store information that is confidential only in the trade secret sense. Once again, they loose rights when they turn information over to a third party. Maybe if the information is disclosed they can sue the 3rd party, but the information is still out there.
Also, you have the Google Mail delete issue that occurred a month or so ago. A few people's GMail email was deleted. Now Google was nice an tried to restore it, but they were also upfront about the fact that even though te deletion was due to a bug in Google's system, they had no obligation to restore it from backup. In a real business that just isn't acceptable.
There is an advantage to having your data under your direct control.
Google needs to sell their server software not just offer it on-line. Many would use theior software if it was on the INTRA-net but not over the INTER-net.
Irritating XPerience? (Score:3, Interesting)
Doesn't this mean you can't ever reinstall? (Score:5, Interesting)
To use the upgrade, you need the previous version installed. However, the licence agreement for Vista says:
13. UPGRADES. To use upgrade software, you must first be licensed for the software that is eligible
for the upgrade. Upon upgrade, this agreement takes the place of the agreement for the software
you upgraded from. After you upgrade, you may no longer use the software you upgraded from.
The last part seems to indicate that you are not allowed to reinstall the previous version. Thus, if your hard disk gets trashed, you can't install the previous version in order to do the upgrade.
Many Recommend Fresh Windows Installs Yearly (Score:2, Interesting)
Microsoft heralded Vista as a "new" OS but the word out these days is it's just a flashier XP with more nag dialogs, etc. Maybe it won't be as likely to benefit from yearly fresh installs, but if it does, anyone doing the "upgrade" version will be forced to slog through two installs instead of just one and entering a previous authorization code.
Full installations also require reinstalling all of your applications. Not on the first but definitely on the second for Vista. So be prepared for reinstalling all of your applications and two operating systems yearly. Not my idea of an easy to maintain OS.
Maybe Norton will be able to Ghost a full backup so the pain only happens once, but do people really want to buy and sequester another hard drive just to store a backup image? And go through keeping track of and applying all the interim patches to make the sequestered image up to date? I know you might also be able to partition but that puts the backup at risk running on the same computer and doesn't address the patches issue.
Anyone who thought Linux was hard to administer might want to look again now that Microsoft has decided to come out with their own version of "New Coke".
Re:"Backup" Utility (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:"Backup" Utility (Score:2, Interesting)