Vista, Some slick new features…

Friday, December 22nd, 2006 | Helpful

I am very impressed with the small touches that have been put into vista, I mean simple things like when you can’t copy one file and copying would give you an error and crap out (in every previous version ever). Now it tells you about it and asks you what you want to do with that file and then finishes the operation.

There is a search box that as soon as you hit the windows key on the keyboard you can type in, it is FAST to find programs and also doubles as a run box…

The control panel had a major overhaul with TONS of new things you can do, and again more little touches like the fact that disk defragmenter is already scheduled to run and does it without screwing up things you are working on.

Drivers…. OH this is huge… 1) You can have the new driver install search subfolders of any folder. This will save me SOOOOOO much time. 2) Windows update ACTUALLY updates drivers with ones from manufacturers and finds them. It downloaded a new video driver for me, and after that I did an experiment. I choose my “generic plug n play monitor” and told it to search windows and it found and installed my BenQ monitor driver. Technically since that was not identified already as a BenQ monitor, that feat alone is very impressive.

Aero… Ok, not a small feature. You can’t use this unless you are using Vista Premium or Ultimate… Once you are you still can’t use it unless you have a video card that was written for direct x 9. That means that if your video card was made in 2005, you are SOL to see aero. Aero is not only a gorgeous hardware rendered semi-transparent blur along all the windows and applications, but also has some other features. Like hitting Windows key and then tab opens a 3d looking program switcher.

I put Vista on my laptop to try it and see if it could work on only 512 mb ram. It does, though it gave me a 1 out of 10 for performance on their rating system and I can’t use Aero. In the same vein, games now require a performance rating to play them. Vista comes with a bunch of games and all of them run on a 1 performance, but recommend a 2. A lot of people will be very happy to see they have added a mahjong game to the list of old classic solitaire games.

I like the fact that menus don’t show up on any of the windows or internet explorer etc.. until you hit the alt key. This will probably confuse the crap out of some people for awhile since I know most people only use the mouse and don’t learn shortcut keys, but I think overall they show the most needed features with various toolbar buttons.

Volume control is now application based. So a new program could add it’s own volume control to the snap-in interface which will let you pick all your favorite settings and not get blasted by audio on websites.

Overall, I am very pleased. There are some very annoying things about it too, but I will get to those in the next post.