Kudos to MicroSoft. They actually did something right.

[Dawggie]

I was a Beta Tester for Vista, Office 2007 and One Care.

Other than the new Office becoming far more intuitive than any other Office group in the past, the inexpensive OneCare kicks total ass in a Vista network environment.

As a beta tester I went ahead and bought OneCare today (at a 60% discount from retail) which allows you to add up to four computers to your "Circle" with one computer chosen as hub. Once you add the additional computer, it sets up everything from virus scans, defrags, and back ups. My laptop in one room backs up to a USB 250 Gig external drive attached to my main PC. It also found every damned printer on my network and installed the pretty much without my help.

If you have a home network or even a small business network, I would highly recommend a Vista/Office/OneCare package as a complete system that can run your company with the addition of their Small Business Accounting programme that costs only pennies when compared with like programmes.

I was truly amazed by what I got by adding another computer to a "OneCare" network. Super easy and user friendly.

[lynnertic]

1. That's good to hear, thanks.

[MadHound]

2. Even a blind pig finds an acorn now and again

Thanks, but I'll be sticking with my Mac. It does everything I want, first time, everytime. MS may have finally gotten one thing right, but Macs do everything right.

[Dawggie]

3. I understand.... But I just looked at the new Mac Pro and they want $27K for their top of the line

graphics box. Hell the video card alone runs $2700.

I've been building PC's for over 20 years now and could build a PC that would rip the new $27K Mac a new one for $20K or much less. Hell, at that price I would give you a choice of three different OS's. Linux, Vista or Windows and I'll bet that they would all do Photoshop or Video within a fraction of a second of the Mac if not better.

[MadHound]

5. Speed isn't the only consideration for the graphic artist

Color matching, rendering times, all this and more are priorities for anybody doing graphics work, not just speed. And while you might be able to build a box that comes close in terms of speed, that speed is of no use if the system stalls and crashes all the time. And unless Vista has some radical changes, it will crash, time and again. Whoops, there goes that animation project you've been working on for the past week.

As far as Linux, and to a certain extent Windows, when it comes to the graphics profession, both are seriously lacking in software, everything from programs to plug ins.

Sure, Macs are more expensive(though actually many of them are quite competitive with Windows boxes these days, the Mini, etc.), they are well worth it. Hell, I would still be using my PowerMac 6100 if the internet hadn't sped up and became so graphics intensive. As it was, I used it everyday for ten years until '03, and now have had an eMac for the past five years. Meanwhile I see friends and family going through Windows boxes every two or three years. Sorry, I can't afford it.

I used to be in the graphics business, and actually had to try and work on a Windows machine(with XP) for a while. It sucked, it was the most unproductive period of my career, all because of the machine I was on.

Windows may work fine for you, it may fulfill your needs. But not mine, and until proven otherwise, I'll stick with a proven winner, Mac.

[Dawggie]

8. regarding the color I am using 2xNividia 8800's. With 2x Princeton monitors

Speed comes into question on major reedits or filtering of very large graphic files. I can remember only a couple of years ago having to go get lunch while the computer worked its magic.


Regarding crashes? Since the betas I have had not one. I know it's not a popular belief, but Vista is an improvement in my book (as long as you have the system to support it).

I have the Adobe CS3 (Creative Suite Three) running on my Hub box (even on my laptop) and I am not working with Maya (which I have played with because I can't afford it) but the latest release of Maya plays fine on my system.

Hey, there are many of us who want to root for their machines. I suspect that we are both those kind of people.

:toast:

[TommyO]

15. Apple's memory prices are ludicrous

You can save over $6000 by getting your memory elsewhere, significantly lowering the cost of that maxed out MacPro.

[ClintonTyree]

4. This hardly makes up.....

for MicroSloth's other multitudinous shortcomings. And this little program will aid.....what....maybe 10% of their customers?

I'm not ready to sing the praises of MicroSloth because of this, that's for sure.

[liberal N proud]

6. Office 2007 sucks and Vista is just ridiculous

Mickysoft would have to come a long way to make up for those precious gems.

[Dawggie]

12. I disagree. Office 2007 rocks.

Easy email from anything, Publisher has taken great leaps and bounds, The new Excel "Ribbon" menus make things so much easier to find and use. The option to tie Outlook & SBA with a mysql database... Wow!

This was major upgrade from the previous office programmes.

[liberal N proud]

13. If you can find anything

It is like learning to use Office all over again.
Nothing is where it was before and many things are not where you think they should be. I have been on Office 2007 for nearly 6 months and still stumble around looking for everyday tasks.

[Dawggie]

14. I may have had an advantage over you in that I did get to attend many seminars

on Office 2007. If you did not have any training I can see why you feel this way.

The one thing I have found that is not realised by many is that you can click on the MS Icon in the upper right hand corner of all applications that will give you your most obvious choice of commands.

[liberal N proud]

18. I and 500 of my coworkers think it sucks

We are a Microsoft managed site and we get what ever software they want to throw at us when they want to throw it. They will send a sales lady around to do a dog and pony show then download it to our machines.

[MyNameGoesHere]

16. True it's a miracle

people actually went from slide rules to calculators. No way they can possibly move from office 2003 to 2007 it's way to difficult.

[conspirator]

7. Not paying for Office when OpenOffice is growing so popular

I am also moving from Visual C++ to CodeBlocks. People who bought the old Visual C++ 6.0 have to pay for 8.0 because it doesn't work on vista. Screw microsoft. Their days are counted.

[Wickerman]

9. The program sounds very useful

and I would love to network the family system thru such a thing but no way am I going to spend the money to upgrade 4 or 5 PCs to Vista needs then pay for vista licenses when we can limp along just fine with what we got in XP. Too high cost to go to Vista. If OneCare ran on XP I'd be all over it.

[Dawggie]

11. OneCare DOES run on XP!

[bluerum]

10. Right. Buy more of our stuff,,, and we will make the rest of it work.

A true triumph for captive marketing.

[MuseRider]

17. That sounds great!

One Care would be useful to me since I am adding a laptop. I have not looked at it or priced it yet but I will. I like my Vista machine and have had no real problems with it and I am a computer idiot. It works great for me and I have found nothing that I could not do on it. Thanks.

[Dawggie]

19. It sure makes setting up your network a lot easier.