Got a Copy of Vista

[orangejello]

I recently bought a new Acer laptop. It came with XP Media Centre and a free upgrade/install of Vista. Unfortunately, the patch to make Dragon Pro 9 compatible has not yet been released, although the ones for the preferred and standard versions are out. I recieved the OS in the mail today. I am holding off on the install for now, although it is hard to resist my temptation. I am going to call Nuance to see if they can give me a ballpark date on the patch. I am toying with the idea of just installing it and running my old laptop until then. But I am not sure if that is a good idea.

I had the chance to play around with a friend's laptop that is running Vista. As a Mac person this is blasphemy I know, but I really liked what I saw. Unfortunately until Apple does a better job with their voice recognition, I am stuck with a PC. So I am learning to at least tolerate Windows for now. I played around with Vista's voice software, although not a lot because there is currently a major security risk in it (I hate to say it, but no surprise there). It seemed okay although it did some wonky things. I can't compare it to Dragon because I didn't use it enough. But I could tell that it is much better than iListen by a long shot.


Right now it has 2 GB of DDR2 RAM, which I am positive will not be enough. I think I will upgrade to 4. Overkill maybe, but I don't know how much would be needed to run both Vista and Dragon 9 and not have it crashing every three minutes. Anybody have any thoughts on how much would be needed? There is no pressing need for me to upgrade the OS right away, except that I want to play . Is anybody else who runs Dragon (or not) planning to switch?

[DA]

I recently bought a new Acer laptop. It came with XP Media Centre and a free upgrade/install of Vista. Unfortunately, the patch to make Dragon Pro 9 compatible has not yet been released, although the ones for the preferred and standard versions are out. I recieved the OS in the mail today. I am holding off on the install for now, although it is hard to resist my temptation. I am going to call Nuance to see if they can give me a ballpark date on the patch. I am toying with the idea of just installing it and running my old laptop until then. But I am not sure if that is a good idea.

I had the chance to play around with a friend's laptop that is running Vista. As a Mac person this is blasphemy I know, but I really liked what I saw. Unfortunately until Apple does a better job with their voice recognition, I am stuck with a PC. So I am learning to at least tolerate Windows for now. I played around with Vista's voice software, although not a lot because there is currently a major security risk in it (I hate to say it, but no surprise there). It seemed okay although it did some wonky things. I can't compare it to Dragon because I didn't use it enough. But I could tell that it is much better than iListen by a long shot.


Right now it has 2 GB of DDR2 RAM, which I am positive will not be enough. I think I will upgrade to 4. Overkill maybe, but I don't know how much would be needed to run both Vista and Dragon 9 and not have it crashing every three minutes. Anybody have any thoughts on how much would be needed? There is no pressing need for me to upgrade the OS right away, except that I want to play . Is anybody else who runs Dragon (or not) planning to switch?

my pc is vista ready, im missing 1 driver that is holding me back. i have 2 g ram, i think 4 would be better for vista.

[PN]

Hi Orangejello,

If you have Windows XP Media Center, then you have a free upgrade to Vista Home Premium. I would recommend wiping the Drive and then installing Vista so you do not end up with a hybrid. You can try to do the upgrade with Media Center on it but I just don't know how smooth the install will be. I expect to be using Vista and Dragon 9.0 Pro in a matter of months. You can run Vista with 1 GB RAM, but, from everything I have heard, 2 GB RAM is most likely the sweet spot. I will probably use 2 GB RAM with DNS 9.0 & Vista. I don't think you need 4 GB RAM unless you have money to burn. If you really like Vista, then you may want to go from Vista Home Premium to Vista Ultimate, which has all the features. I would recommend you go to Windows Marketplace to understand the new pricing. I used to understand the Windows Anytime Upgrade but it looks like now their plan has recently changed. For example, if you buy Windows Ultimate retail in a box and pay full price, you are entitled to two Vista Home Premiums at $49.99 each. I think it's sort of a family pack.

I would like to know how Vista looks when it is playing a movie DVD. It is my recent understanding that you will not be able to play premium content (Hi Def) unless your monitor is HDCP compliant. I wonder how many monitors are HDCP compliant?

[orangejello]

Thanks PN

If you have Windows XP Media Center, then you have a free upgrade to Vista Home Premium. I would recommend wiping the Drive and then installing Vista so you do not end up with a hybrid. You can try to do the upgrade with Media Center on it but I just don't know how smooth the install will be. I expect to be using Vista and Dragon 9.0 Pro in a matter of months. You can run Vista with 1 GB RAM, but, from everything I have heard, 2 GB RAM is most likely the sweet spot. I will probably use 2 GB RAM with DNS 9.0 & Vista. I don't think you need 4 GB RAM unless you have money to burn.

Yes I was thinking that a clean install would be a better idea, so that is what I am going to do. I am pulling the extra 2 GB of RAM out of a machine I will not be using once I get this new laptop up and running, otherwise I wouldn't be going with 4. But it is not going to cost me anything. I emailed Nuance about the release date for the Dragon Pro 9 Vista patch and was told somebody would get back to me with a date soon. I am not really expecting another reply though lol.

If you really like Vista, then you may want to go from Vista Home Premium to Vista Ultimate, which has all the features. I would recommend you go to Windows Marketplace to understand the new pricing. I used to understand the Windows Anytime Upgrade but it looks like now their plan has recently changed. For example, if you buy Windows Ultimate retail in a box and pay full price, you are entitled to two Vista Home Premiums at $49.99 each. I think it's sort of a family pack.

Thanks for the links. I have to spend some more time there because I don't really understand the pricing structure. But I do think now that I will upgrade to Vista Ultimate, which is what the laptop I played around with was running. I wasn't clear on the differences between it and Home Premium until I looked through the Market place site.

I would like to know how Vista looks when it is playing a movie DVD. It is my recent understanding that you will not be able to play premium content (Hi Def) unless your monitor is HDCP compliant. I wonder how many monitors are HDCP compliant?

The machine I was playing with was a friend's Sony Vaio AR 190 G that can play Blu Ray discs. We tried some and a regular dvd and they all looked very sweet with Media Player 11 and Vista Ultimate. But it is true that neither blu ray or hd will play on non HDCP ready monitors. To my knowledge (and I am nowhere near as on top of this kind of stuff as I was before my injury), most monitors and machines are not compliant and this is one of the few laptops out there that is (complete with a $4000 price tag).

[PN]

Hi, orangejello.

I was looking at a VR forum yesterday and you can read about this user's experience with DNS 9.5 and Windows Vista. After listening to Paul Therrott a few days ago, I am not so sure you really need Windows Vista Ultimate. It sounds to me as though Windows Vista Home Premium may be OK. With Ultimate, you get DreamScene along with BitLocker that will allow you to encrypt important files, and a few more extras. I don't know if Vista Ultimate is really worth the extra money. You do want to stay away from Windows Vista Basic and Windows Vista 64-bit because with the 64-bit there are too many hardware and software compatibility issues at this time.

I believe chess comes on all versions of Windows Vista. I think DA is going to get Windows Vista 64-bit and he may, if he hasn't already, go to Microsoft and use the Windows Vista Upgrade Advisor, which I am told does not catch everything.

Thanks for the feedback on the DVD with Windows Media Player 11 and Vista Ultimate. I am glad to know that it looks good, and this is reassuring news. Keep us posted on Vista and its SR (speech recognition) because this has the potential to be better than Dragon. User feedback is helpful, and I hope to hear more, whichever way the cookie crumbles.

[Andy]

Yes I was thinking that a clean install would be a better idea, so that is what I am going to do. .

I read a review that showed that an 'upgrade' over XP was the same performance as a clean install. Seems the installer is much better than the previous windows versions. Might save some money depending on the different versions (geeze, could they make it any more convoluted?)

Also, I read that an 'upgrade' package can be simply turned into a fresh install simply by using an XP disk in the CD drive vs. on the HDD, search around for that discovery (dont know if they patched it or not, but the media already shipped should work)

You may be giving up some performance though compared to XP, or at least the video benchmarks say so. Drivers are quite immature right now.

[orangejello]

I read a review that showed that an 'upgrade' over XP was the same performance as a clean install. Seems the installer is much better than the previous windows versions. Might save some money depending on the different versions (geeze, could they make it any more convoluted?)

Also, I read that an 'upgrade' package can be simply turned into a fresh install simply by using an XP disk in the CD drive vs. on the HDD, search around for that discovery (dont know if they patched it or not, but the media already shipped should work)

I read this too. But I don't know if I would be willing to take the risk that it would install properly over top of XP. If it didn't, a person would be back at square one. So my thinking is just wipe and do it properly the first time. A big pain, but my machine is brand new so for me it wouldn't be that much of a headache. If your hard drive is full of stuff and you don't have all the drivers handy, then it is a different story. But when the difference between the upgrade and full editions are a couple hundred dollars, then it begins to look like a very attractive option for sure. Convoluted? We are talking about Win-Dohs here...being convoluted is a given

I hadn't heard about that glitch. You can bet it will be patched right away lol. Too funny.

You may be giving up some performance though compared to XP, or at least the video benchmarks say so. Drivers are quite immature right now.

Very likely that may be true. But the chance to screw around with a new OS is just too tempting for me. I can always wipe and put Media Center back on if it turns out to be a big problem.

[DA]

yeah i agree. something new to screw around with is tempting me too. what is holding me back is my network adapter drivers. everyday netgear delays, the more i feel pressure to just go out and buy a vista64 adapter.

[Foolish Old]

A note to newbies that may be listening in on these bleeding edge adventurers...

If you only have one computer and it is a life-line communication device for you - new operating systems have a history of being buggy and can cause you grief. Solving these problems is part of the fun for early adopters. If you don't enjoy sleuthing and just want productivity, wait until the early bugs are exterminated. This usually takes six months to a year.

[Wesley]

have you seen the latest Apple ad with the pc guy having another guy standing beside him constantly asking for permission? They're already ripping Vista. it sounds like the pop ups are really annoying. I already have mcafee popping up all the time. Don't need any more.