'Vista Capable' lawsuit against Microsoft now a class action

[OhioChick]

Source: Seattlepi.com

Saturday, February 23, 2008

In a blow to Microsoft Corp., a federal judge granted class-action status to a lawsuit late Friday alleging that Microsoft unjustly enriched itself by promoting PCs as "Windows Vista Capable" even when they could only run a bare-bones version of the operating system, called "Vista Home Basic."

The slogan was emblazoned on PCs during the 2006 holiday shopping season as part of a campaign by Microsoft to maintain sales of Windows XP computers after the launch of Windows Vista was delayed.

At a hearing two weeks ago, lawyers for Microsoft argued that because each consumer who bought a computer touted as "Windows Vista Capable" had different information at the time of purchase, the lawsuit should not be granted class-action status, while plaintiffs' lawyers said that all individuals who bought "Windows Vista Capable" PCs were united in that "each person in our class did not get what they paid for."

In her ruling, Judge Marsha Pechman granted class-action status, stating that "common issues predominate."



Read more: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/352442_vista23.html?source=mypi

[MindPilot]

1. I do desktop support for a major corporation; if I ever have to write a suicide note...

it's gonna mention Vista.

I think the payout should go not just to people who bought the PCs but also to every IT professional who has to face a client and say "that shit you just bought doesn't work."

[sam sarrha]

6. if Microsoft releases anything thad doesnt suck for the first 3 or 4 yrs it'll be a vacuum cleaner

[Prophet 451]

14. SECONDED!!!

I work in IT too, I'd echo your experiance exactly except my version would have more expletives in it.

[MindPilot]

17. I spent the better part of the past two days trying to get imageX to work

The hot new imaging tool for Vista is totally command-line and truly one of the most over-complicated things I ever seen from a company that prides itself on unnecessary complexity. Has anyone actually gotten that thing to work?

There are literally a couple dozen commands to enter just to create an iso to make the boot disk. And if that wasn't backward enough, the aforementioned commands in Microsoft's own documentation are full of SYNTAX ERRORS!! There were dashes that should have slashes, quote marks in the wrong place, incorrect spacing and wrong bracket usage. They can't even document their own goddamn commands and get it right.

I had to basically re-write the published script to make it work. And then after finally getting a boot disk to work, I set about creating an image of the machine I just built, writing it off to a 250GB drive. Around 40 minutes later at about 85%, the process quits with an insufficient disk space error!

Exactly what the fuck am I supposed to do with a 250+GB image file?

[Prophet 451]

65. Spam Bill Gates with it?

I'll confess that I've never known imageX to work either. I mean, I hated XP when it arrived but compared to Vista...

[Kutjara]

21. Vista is a wonderful OS.

I've just purchased a new lapop with Vista Home Business Basic Premium Ultimate with extra cheese, and after no more than twelve hours of tweaking, uninstalling, reinstalling, optimizing, switching off unnecessary services, running antivirus, antispyware, antitrojan software, defragging, and switching off 90% of the "Aero" eyecandy, I now have a machine that runs almost half as fast as my slowest Linux box. That's real progress for M$.

[BootinUp]

35. lol nt

[Occulus]

50. Did I hear linux? Have you checked out the compiz-fusion package?

Compiz makes Aero look like the two-bit amateur hack job it truly is, and it has more eyecandy than Aero can hope for. The eyecandy is actually even functional to a degree, like the desktop cube feature, and the Maclike features like the desktop wall and window previewing are actually very useful.

[JeanGrey]

36. I've been running Vista for six months without a single solitary

problem. It is stable and fine.

[JTFrog]

41. Then fortunate for you, you won't have to be part of that lawsuit. n/t

[JeanGrey]

67. Nope, I see no reason to be.

[Jawja]

43. I ran Vista for 10 months on a new laptop

and the laptop has crashed and won't reboot. Vista is wonderful when it is working.

[JeanGrey]

68. Maybe the laptop didn't have enough memory to handle it.

[ryanmuegge]

48. lol

[CRF450]

2. Forcing a demanding OS on a low end shitty computer equals...

Not a good thing. One of my friend's parents bought an Emachine computer from wally world, because its such a crappy comuter, it cant even run Vista Home Basic good at all. And his parents are not even computer literate at all, they just went for the cheapest new pc instead of asking for advice.

[Jawja]

44. Yes. I think that's

what the deal is why my laptop. It was a Best Buy shelf model HP with an AMD Turion chip. BIG MISTAKE.

[kineneb]

63. ahh, solved that exact problem

A "senior" friend was having great difficulty with her e-machine (w/Vista Home Basic), which she purchased a year ago.

The solution: Kubuntu Linux- loaded perfectly, found all of the hardware, got the box back on DSL...happy camper. Nice desktop with lots of toys and games she likes ("mahjongg"). I walked her through the basics and had a few calls for help when I got home. But since then, no calls.

I now have a Red Hat sister who is whizzing away on her much faster computer.

[Cronus Protagonist]

3. I'm very happy with Vista myself

Best operating system Microsoft has ever made.

[papau]

4. LOL - guess the 2/22 forever loop update with your anti-virus program didn't happen - lucky you!

[Cronus Protagonist]

8. Anti-virus is not needed with vista

Vista asks for permission for each install. I never give a virus permission.

[Occulus]

12. I call BS on that

"Anti-virus is not needed with vista"

I am so glad I know better than that.

"I never give a virus permission."

That you know of- they tend not to ask. I'd rather have the extra layer of security- as recommended by just about every computer professional I've ever spoken to, read, watched on TV, or even heard casually referred to. Ad-aware, Spybot S&D, Teatimer (comes with S&D), and the tools recommended here.

If you're going around telling people Vi$ta needs no virus protection, I sure as hell hope you're not in the business of repairing/administering PCs, because you're only doing your customers damage by saying that.

[Tiberius]

13. As an IT Professionial

I recommend Grisoft's AVG antivirus - one day about three months ago I found a process called "taksmanager.exe" in my task manager. I proceeded to install and test every major vendor (I have access to the full blown versions of everything) and AVG was the only one that found it. While I'm forced to run Symantec at work - home users go with AVG.

And yes, I would agree with you and never recommend you run without antivirus no matter what your OS. Some of this stuff is VERY sneaky.

[LTR]

30. What's your opinion of Avast?

I've been running it for awhile (after I wised up and kicked Norton and their bloated POS software that extorts money from users once a year to the curb). I also ran AVG on another one of my systems. I kinda prefer Avast, but like both. Surprisingly, both are free, and they're certainly much better than the expensive bloatware that loosely passes for security suites.

Between Avast and AVG, which do you prefer?

[sellitman]

33. I use ESET NOD 32 on my old Windows PC

But.....Last February I bought a iMac and I will never buy another Windows Computer again.

It may sound snobby bit Apple makes amazingly stable computers that are almost virus proof.

[Thor_MN]

40. Yup, the best way to protect yourself from virus is to buy a system that has little marketshare

No thief targets the big expensive house, when there are thousands of mid priced houses, admittedly with doors open, ripe for the picking.

[sellitman]

42. Yes but...

I always have a problem with "market share" Analysis .

I cannot remember seeing one that does not confuse market share with installed base.

[Thor_MN]

46. Whatever, the most available (and open) target is Microsoft OSes.

I'm not saying MS is better, just that if a car thief is presented with a parking lot full of mid sized sedans with the doors open and keys in the ignition, most are not going to play much attention to the handful of sports cars with the doors locked (but the windows half open).

The relatively lower risk of viruses with a Mac has a large component in that it is not targeted. If Mac OSes were as prevalent as MS, the discussion of virus vulnerablity vs. OS would be much different.

[Occulus]

49. ...and with Spore coming out for the PC and Mac simultaneously this fall,

Mac gamers- both of them- will finally have a great game that runs native on the Mac.

:D

[icnorth]

52. I use Avast and have for several years,

also used AVG. My preference is Avast.

[Zhade]

66. AVG rules, great recommendation.

NT!

[Cronus Protagonist]

58. Haha

What an idiotic statement you made. I speak for myself and I have never had a virus and never will. You can have the "extra layers of protection" if you want, and that's fine by me. Personally, I don't care to bother with stuff I don't need.

[Occulus]

70. Um, no, it's not idiotic

It's repeating the advice of literally each and every certified computer professional I've ever encountered. I do mean all of them, 100% of the professionals I ask, 100% of the time. You're the very first person I've ever heard from- and I mean this in all honesty- who both claims to know about how viruses/trojans work and who thinks a M$ OS doesn't need externally provided virus protection.

It is asking for a virus to not do so. At the very least, you should install Spybot and AVG today. It doesn't matter how careful you are- M$ can't possibly protect against every virus out there; it's virtually guaranteed that they will miss something that another company will catch. It doesn't matter if you use a RAID array to protect your data; the virus will reside there as well. Furthermore, viruses are becoming more and more clever (did you visit the link in my previous post?), to the point that you can format the entire hard drive and still not get rid of the virus.

Please take the advice we're all trying to give you, here. The memory-CPU overhead is minuscule and the effort to set it up virtually nonexistent compared to the extra protection you'll have. I've learned the lessons the hard way, by having a hard drive full of important stuff go "boom" right in front of my eyes because of a virus. I've seen things fly right past Window$ firewall. Now I sit behind a router and run an AVG scan daily. Will that catch everything? Probably not, but at least I'm realistic enough to understand that since virus scanners aren't perfect, the more angles of protection you have, the better.

In all honesty, the only people who advocate against having additional virus/trojan protection are the people who know next to nothing about how viruses work and how they spread. It's incredibly naive- not to mention dangerous, if other such people hear/read such incorrect information- to think the M$ scanner will find everything under the sun. Even computers completely isolated from any network or online activity should have good virus protection just in case. You never know what might be on your colleague's flash drive.

It's not idiotic... it's completely realistic.

[Kutjara]

19. Nonsense.

Running any Microsoft OS without antivirus/antispyware/firewall is an invitation to disaster. Not all viruses knock on the door of Vista's UAC and ask nicely to be installed. Not all malware are "viruses" anyway.

Even if UAC was able to catch every attempt to install malicious code, it's so intrusive and ubiquitous most people just click "Allow" as unconsciously as Pavlov's dog salivates. And that's just the folks who haven't used msconfig to disable it.

Should I even mention the rootkits supposedly legitimate software vendors regularly install, which provide handy backdoors for malware? Didn't think so.

[Cronus Protagonist]

59. Ah, you're talking about worms and such like

Different thing. Apples and oranges. Worms never have and never will be prevented by Anti-virus software. If you think an anti-virus package is going to block holes in the operating system, you are misinformed. A firewall might do better at that, but it's not going to be perfect either. And spyware, malware, etc is easily prevented with windows defender, built right into windows vista.

http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx

Windows Defender is a free program that helps protect your computer against pop-ups, slow performance, and security threats caused by spyware and other unwanted software. It features Real-Time Protection, a monitoring system that recommends actions against spyware when it's detected and minimizes interruptions and helps you stay productive.

[Kutjara]

62. Windows Defender is an enormous resource hog.

It's another piece of M$ bloatware (like their OneCare shambles) that provides questionable security at the cost of drastically compromised performance. Personally, I use SpyBot S&D, which does a better job, is updated more frequently, and consumes a fraction of the system resources of Defender.

Similarly, I don't use Windows firewall, since it only blocks incoming connections and doesn't watch for malware trying to dial out. It also allows some of the higher ports to respond to pings, making it useless for truly stealthing a PC.

I use SpyBot, ZoneAlarm, and AVG antivirus, along with sundry specialist ad-blocking, trojan sniffing, rootkit detecting and phishing filtering apps. I would no more connect to the Net without these running than I would leave the house without my pants.

As usual, M% is a day late and a dollar short in the security game. There is still huge scope for third-party vendors to plug the enormous gaps in the Windows security model. While Vista may or may not be good at catching traditional viruses, their solution to the rest of the malware ecosystem is to either cripple the user experience with intrusive and unhelpful clickboxes, or to require every more powerful machines simply to run all the apps necessary to ensure a basic level of security.

[totodeinhere]

39. But sometimes you might not know it's a virus.

Or perhaps you are savvy enough to know it's not a virus, but many less computer literate people are not. As we know, one of the main ways that viruses and trojans get installed is to trick the user into voluntarily installing them.

[Occulus]

51. Prime example: the Sony rootkit.

What a disaster that was.

Then there's 2K Games' Bioshock, which will break if you run Process Explorer on your PC. Reason? The copy protection used on the Bioshock CD just doesn't like Process Explorer- but (more to the point) the Bioshock installer doesn't make mention of the copy protection rootkit, nor does the EULA, the manual, or the box. It's more than likely that, if you've installed anything at all that "requires" a CD (quotes because of the existence of www.gamecopyworld.com), you very likely have a rootkit or rootkits installed that you know nothing at all about. Worse, some of these "legit" rootkits conflict with one another, or even with previous versions of themselves.

It's almost as though you should download and run the pirated version of the software even if you bought the damn thing, just to avoid the "legitimate" rootkits that the "legitimate" licenses of the software use.

Then there are the funny attempts to use a system something like a rootkit, such as Sony's attempt to copy protect their music CDs with a hidden track that wouldn't copy if you copied the CD. They spent millions developing the system.

It was defeated by a $.59 felt tip marker drawn around the outer edge. :rofl:

[Cronus Protagonist]

61. No anti-virus prevented that root kit exploit

And none can, other than that written by Microsoft for Vista. You're talking about an open hole in the operating system, which is not a virus, although could be used by a virus, should someone run one on the computer. Nonetheless, there is no anti-virus protection that can prevent a worm or a rootkit attack, althugh Windows Defender and the new security model of Vista makes me feel more secure than ever on a Microsoft machine.

As I said before, Vista is Microsoft's best operating system so far.

[Occulus]

71. Actually, I was talking about any and all malware of all types which get invisbly installed

through legit products.

Vi$ta is the first Micro$oft OS I'm aware of in which they're actually allowing users to downgrade their license to the previous generation of M$ OS. Thus, Vi$ta is actually worse than any other M$ OS released thus far. Time will tell if it ends up being better than XP, but that just isn't the case yet.

Vi$ta is the ME of the 21st century.

[Cronus Protagonist]

60. True, I know what I'm doing

And windows vista has anti-virus built in anyway and I'm happy with that. It also has anti-phishing and a firewall should one want that too. I don't need them, though.

[CRF450]

11. I havent had any problems with Vista either.

The main problems I'm seing with Vista that other people are having is software and hardware issues. They're holding onto older sofware and hardware thats not compatable with Vista. The same thing happened with XP and look how much it improved with a couple of patches/driver updates, along with more powerful cpu's, memory, graphics cards, etc etc over time.

[kirby]

15. Then why the logo?

You say problem are related to software and hardware. Yet the article is talking about brand new machines that are labeled/certified as Vista capable. The class action has nothing to do with older machine, but machine that are certified with the Vista capable logo but cannot run anything at a decent speed.

[CRF450]

28. Because most of them were low end computers

And the fact that computers were still coming with hardware without good driver support, the hardware makers were draggin their asses on releasing driver support. When Vista was first released, half the computers under a grand didn't come with anymore than a gig of memory, and a sub-par cpu, which is barely enough to get Vista movin. Not saying that Microsoft totally isn't at fault here, but they screwed up on the system requirements, requiring so little for such a demanding OS to make it appeal to those with older computers. My newly built gaming system runs Vista superbly, it costed me over $1800 in total to built. Two years from now, your gonna see sub $800 computers spec'd out about the same as mine, while higher end $1500+ computers are even more powerful, and Vista will run better and better as time goes by while advances in hardware speed increases.

In case you wanna know, my specs are...

Core 2 Duo Q6600 overclocked to 3.4ghz
MSI P6N SLI 650i motherboard
4gigs pc800 memory
150gig Western Digital Raptor 10,000rpm hard drive
500gig storage drive
2x EVGA Geforce 8800gt video cards
Tuniq T-120 cpu cooler
Thermaltake Soprano case
Thermaltake 700w psu
22" Acer LCD widescreen monitor
Logitech MX518 gaming mouse
Logitech Ergonomics Wave Keyboard

[jmowreader]

31. What's the second video card do, since you only listed one monitor

That's some serious shit you have there, but do you seriously need 4GB RAM to run this operating system? Wow.

[CRF450]

56. The 2nd video card is for whats called an SLI setup (for Nvidia video cards)

This increases gaming performance on many games, but not all. Some games arent made to take advantage of SLI so their would be no increase of speed except at higher resolutions. ATI is another major video card maker, and they use similar setups like Nvidia, only they call it Crossfire. One game that I particularly built it for is Crysis. So far its the most realistic ever, and it the most demanding. I cant get anymore than 35fps tops with the graphics maxed out, and it averages around 28fps. Heres some pics of the game. http://www.crysis-online.com/Media/Screenshots/screenshots-ingame.php Other than Crysis, it runs other games silky smooth.

I only got the 4gigs to help future proof it. But unlike the 32bit Vista OS, the 64bit version make full use of the 4gigs, where as the 32bit cant take anymore than 3gigs.

[Thor_MN]

45. Minimum requirements to Microsoft means that it will run, but

you better be stuck in a time warp/drug induced state such that you experience the outside world happening in 8x speed. And it has always been that way. Anyone who expects a PC that just meets Microsoft Minimum Requirements to be workable should not be operating anything more complex than a zipper.

I don't mean to say that Microsoft is blameless, they should be required to have a Surgeon General warning stating that, as someone pointed out upthread:

"MS Minimum Requirement computers have be associated with increased risk of suicidal and homicidal urges. Do not use if you have been diagnosed with signs of depression. Some people using MS MR PCs have experienced unexplained damage to their office walls. Do not use with sharp or heavy objects within arm's reach. Consult your IT professional to see if Vista is right for you."

[MindPilot]

20. Then I would hate to see the worst..

And yes, I remember DOS 4.2.

Vista has still not corrected what I consider the three most fundamental flaws in Windows.

It is still totally network-centric in that it cannot deal with a slow or dropped network connection in the background. If you have eight mapped drives and the connection to one of then hiccups, the entire machine locks until that connection is either restored or times out.

It is too stupid to know that the next drive letter may be assigned to a network share so when a user plugs in a flash drive, it gets the same letter as the network share.

There is still no error trapping in Explorer. Can't copy one file out of 15,000? The process just stops and you get to figure out, which file, why and then start over. DOS xcopy has more functionality.

A Vista installation with Office uses about 30-40 GB of drive space and even with a 4Ghz processor and a couple Gigs of RAM, it's still slower than an XP box with half that hardware.

[JeanGrey]

37. Ditto! But I was smart enough to buy a system with some oopmh

in it, and I've had no problems at all with ANYTHING. Even my five year old printer works fine.

[Yael]

5. Not only that, but on laptops, it cuts the battery life in half

unless you disable certain features/services.

Micro$oft deserves what they get with this one.

[unblock]

7. one thing i've always wondered about microsoft

why did bill gates name the company after his dick?

[sakabatou]

9. DUzy!

[54anickel]

10. That's an oldie but goodie. Years ago someone made a similar comment to

my now DH about a Microsoft cap I gave him. The following week he had a cap custom embroidered with "Macrohard" in the usual Microsoft font.

[cliffordu]

16. Man, I just love Linux...

Since, oh, maybe 1996....

:hi:

[MindPilot]

22. Welcome to DU, Cliff!

Unfortunately those of us do this for a living have to work with what's stuck in front of us.

:hi:

[cliffordu]

25. Thanks, MindPilot!!!!

I was fortunate to get involved with it relatively early - I was talking to my first internet provider in late '95 and HE gave me 12 floppys with Redhat 2.0 (?) on them. I felt like a brain surgeon when I finally got it booted, signed in and got a command prompt. I had NO idea what to do next, so I took a class......I wound up at IBM for a while when they first started the Linux Technology Centers. I was in Austin. Loved Austin, but didn't really fit at Big Blue....

I tried to work as tech support in a couple of Microsoft houses, and I couldn't do it......I have nothing but respect for those of you who do it professionally. I have a friend who owns an internet cafe and HE has the patience of a saint....I DO catch him swearing under his breath, though.....And of course I have to ride him constantly about Internet Exploder and Outbreak Express...... :argh:


Well That's a lot more than you wanted to know....Anyway, Thanks for the welcome!!

[bowens43]

32. I'm with you

I moved to linux about 3 years ago and have never looked back (but I prefer Fedora).

As tux would say "It's about freedom, man".

Welcome to DU

[kineneb]

64. welcome, fellow penguinista!

I have been using various varieties of Linux since around 1998, after I had bad problems with 98se. I ran a home office with Linux thereafter. Hubby and I started going to LinuxWorld in SF, several years before it moved to Moscone Center.

Right now-
on laptops: Kubuntu (IBM TP-T30, and TP-600e!)
on desktop: openSuSE

I rescue "aging" computers by loading Linux on them, Ubuntu variations (install CD) for those with high speed internet connections, and openSuSE 10.2 (on CDs) for those with no connection or only dial-up. Both are easy to use and configure.

[Aviation Pro]

18. For those of us who've slogged the Bataan death march....

...of Micro$oft operating systems here's a good one:

http://blimptv.blogspot.com/2007/11/vista-sucks.html

[MindPilot]

24. Brilliant!!!

:toast::beer::toast::beer::toast::beer::toast::beer::toast::beer::toast::beer::toast::beer::toast::beer:

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

38. "We combined Windows CE, ME and NT for Windows CEMENT."

:spray:

[billyoc]

23. I'm very satisfied with Vista. Best OS Microsoft has ever

BWAHSHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:


Oh, man, I really thought I could type that shit with a straight face! :rofl:

It's the 21st century, folks, we don't need Microsoft anymore. Get linux.

http://www.ubuntu.com/

[cliffordu]

26. Ya got me....

:rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl:

[MindPilot]

27. You had me there for a second...

I'm thinking "another one? What are there a bunch of people posting from the International Brotherhood of Coders, Local H-1B?'

And then I read it. :rofl::applause:

[Divine Discontent]

29. ready for a LAUGH?

I know a guy who works at M$, and he was bragging, and still did the last time I heard (6 months ago), about how good Vi$ta was going to be! And how it was like MAC OSX!

BWAHAHAHAHA

dude's delusional.

they musta gave him kool-aid with special ingredients.

[mrdmk]

54. You want Mac OSX, there are broken copies of the OS out there

that run just fine on a PC based machine. BTW the machine will need a 10Mb video card to run the OSX operating system. Vista needs a 128Mb video card (minimum) to run properly.

[Divine Discontent]

55. are you cereal? pm how! eom

[RoccoR5955]

34. Good... Vista is the Penultimate Operating System by Microsoft...

The FINAL Operating System to be made by Microsoft, will be Windows, Hasta La Vista!

In the interim, Microsoft is going to integrate Windows CE, Windows ME, and Windows NT, to make another Operating System, Windows CEMENT! It will sink any computer.

Seriously, Vista stinks. There is little driver support, and the product is over a year old. It's buggier than a lower east-side tenement. Service packs are addressing these bugs, but not soon enough. Vista is still prone to attacks using VB scripts, web browser BHOs, and other things INCLUDING viruses.

As a tech for a local county government agency in NY, we polled all the counties in NY, and only a few are implementing Vista, and those only in testing. It has been a miserable failure.

I agree with the comment that IT professionals who have to deal with this carp every day, should be compensated as well.

FYI -- I have been a computer tech for the past 20 years.

[Unca Jim]

47. Am I the only old computer dork?

Every single Windows product is released full of bugs and with no support. After about 2 years it works fine. Soon after, they switch to a new one. Windows 3.0 anyone?

Vista works great with today's medium-to-high-end computer and will work fine on all computers produced commercially in a year or so. XP has been through a lot of fixes and works great right now on everything down to a P3. Use XP on your crappier machines. As always, add memory for better performance.

That said, *never use Internet Exploder*! That thing is so buggy and full of security holes it's like a screen door on a submarine. I cannot believe that piece of crap is still around. Use anything else. I like the Mozilla stuff like Firefox myself, but Opera's OK or whatever you prefer.

I also send out mad props to AVG. Truly the best virus protection -and free. Don't forget SpyBot Search and Destroy for your spyware protection, which is also free.


I debated not continuing because I know how this argument goes, but Linux has plenty of problems that keep it from becoming the main desktop OS. It's not just the illegal shenanigans of Microsoft keeping it down. And now, the Clinton/Obama sock puppet fight can move to OS dorkery!
:hide:

[CRF450]

57. Agreed

Yet no one will accept that XP and older OS's were the same way on their first release. Vista will be an awsome OS in the coming years as harware speed increases.

[fedsron2us]

53. MS recently ran a SQL Server training course at my company.

Their consultant was using a laptop running Vista to demonstrate the exercises. It crashed on the first morning and he took the best part of two days to get it working again. Needless, to say all the students on the class offered to help him out by lending him some Linux distros and suggesting he taught us MySql instead. He was not amused.

[dysfunctional press]

69. vista is the best Mac sales gimmick that apple has ever come up with...

they are the ones responsible for it, aren't they?