I thought this section was non-phpbb related, yet the 3 other topics are related to phpbb. I am disappointed. I like cheese!
Anywho, who else is pissed off that you pretty much have to buy a brand new computer in order to run Vista!!
That my friends, is BAD business! If any other company in any other field were to release a product (assuming that this product has had different versions/revisions, as is the case with Windows) that needed to buy all new parts or whatever just to support the product, that company would go out of business, and fast. But since Microsoft has a monopoly over this *beep*, everyone is just saying "well, ok I guess I'll buy this, this and this... if you say so"
It's just individuals talking on this forum, but if you stop to think about it, large corporations all over the world will have to put hundreds of thousands of dollars (if not more) into upgrading their computers just so they can support the latest version of Windows, which in turn will allow them to run the latest software of whatever field they are in. All because Mr. Bill can't think for himself and wanted to copy the mac.... again. Yeah I went there! Mac had the glass effect before Bill even thought about dreaming about thinking about it (haha if that made any sense... if not, read it over again).
And before someone comes back and tells me that every time Microsoft has released a new version of windows, we had to upgrade our hardware, this is true, BUT not as drastically as this time around. If I had a computer from when Win98/WinME/Win2000 was around, I could easily install Window XP on those machines. It would need VERY minor upgrades (such as RAM or HDD), but nothing close to what Vista needs.
In my current state, I have 2 computers (1 at work, 1 at home). My work computer as it is right now can support Vista, with just a RAM upgrade. Right now I have 1GB of RAM on my work computer, and I would be looking at get either 2GB or 4GB, which is surprisingly almost the new standard. Although if I wanted 4GB RAM (which is not a large amount for Vista, bc from what I hear, the AeroGlass feature is pretty processor intensive), I would need to purchase a new motherboard, bc my motherboard only supports 2gb of RAM.
Now, when it comes to my home computer, I might as well trash it. It is only about a year and a half old and I would pretty much have to upgrade EVERYTHING; the video card, motherboard, processor and RAM. This is ridiculous because eventually EVERYONE will have to upgrade in order to keep up with the technology. I personally don't mind upgrading because I love computers and love speed and love the task of upgrading, but for other people who just want to do their work and not continuously spend money on upgrading will be left in the dust in just a few months.
This is, IMO, ridiculous (period). I cannot wait until Apple takes over the market, or at least matches Microsoft. Apple is growing and I love it. Uh oh, I don't want to start a Microsoft/Apple war here, but Apple would never release an OS that couldn't run on some of their current or older hardware setups. For example, Mac OS 10.5 can run on some of the older macs that were originally shipped with OS 8 and 9 (which are super old). Obviously they will have a slight performance lag, but overall it would be very usable still. I've installed OS 10.5 on a mac that was originally shipped with OS 9 and it ran beautifully. There was some lag, but it didn't affect the user experience or usability much.
Btw, I believe the recommended amount of ram for Vista is 1GB (You can see the Vista requirements here). Also, the OS alone takes 15GB... FIFTEEN GIGABYTES!!! I mean, I know we're advancing, but thats like 5x the size of XP. Ridiculous, IMO. If you read their minimum requirements, those are a joke, because if you remember, the min. requirements for XP is 128MB RAM, which is total BS, bc if anyone has tried to install XP on a computer with 128MB of ram, they know they are getting nowhere, fast (I guess thats an oxymoron). Even if you disable all the bells and whistles of XP.... Even 256MB on XP is slow, especially once you get all your preferred programs on it. 512MB on XP is an ideal amount (as suggested by MS), and even then there is sometimes a noticeable lag when running more than one program at a time. This being said, the minimum RAM for Vista, 512MB (stated by MS) is total and utter B.S.!
Anyways, I think I've done enough ranting for tonight. I would love to hear other peoples opinion's about this. Am I wrong or crazy?