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+--- Thread: So I've been thinking about MS Windows lately... (It's not that bad, really) (/showthread.php?tid=9684)
So I've been thinking about MS Windows lately... (It's not that bad, really) - Black Aeronaut - 03-22-2009
I'll admit it - I simply don't like Vista on general principal. When I bought my new Toshiba Satellite A355D series laptop, Vista was a very twitchy
critter. This wasn't several months ago, mind you. More like two weeks ago, so it's not like it didn't come with fixes for all the major bugs.
Dissatisfied, I went back to XP and the only regret I have is that it took me several frustrating days to find appropriate drivers for the GPU. Toshiba and
Microsoft performed some kind of wankery that prevents ATI's Catalyst system from working right. I had to find a modder to work some magic over the driver
files between when they were extracted and when they were installed. Worst yet, I have yet to find ANY drivers for the mainboard chipset - not even on
AMD's website!
Thing is, though, I now have a stable copy of Windows XP 64-Bit Edition running on a laptop that, going by contractual agreements between Microsoft and
Toshiba, is only supposed to run Vista and Vista alone.
This is what leaves a bad taste in my mouth about Vista, really. Not all the crying wolf over DRM and bloatware - they've actually gotten better about
that. No, my issues are with Microsoft trying to make Vista as proprietary as Macintosh is.
What puzzles me the most is that Toshiba and AMD/ATI both supposedly support Linux OSs such as Ubuntu (especially Ubuntu!), yet why am I finding such
lack-luster driver support? There should be no reason for me to not get the Gnome GUI when I boot, yet instead I'm always booted into Terminal with nary
an amennity (I can't even get X going). Is this Microsoft's doing in trying to limit avenues of escape to other OSs? Part of me would like to think
so and salivates at the idea of the anti-trust lawsuit THAT would bring. The other part certainly hopes not.
For now though, I'm sticking primarily with XP - at least I have the 64-Bit version so I can take full advantage of my resources.