redmond has let me down.
if you’re a nerd like me, you understand what it is to get bitten by some kind of tech bug. it could be “i want to install linux for no reason”, or “i want to wipe my drive and re-install for no reason”. you never know! well, yesterday, i felt compelled to do a fresh install (and downgrade) to windows xp.
why xp? no good reason, really. except that i was beginning to feel my somewhat new install of vista getting a little sluggish to startup. i guess this got me thinking about how fast xp would be on this machine. after all, i upgraded to 2 gigs of ram and a faster/bigger hard drive, long after making the change to vista.
the first hitch in my plans for a flawless tech victory was the copy of xp that i used. now, i’ll be the first to admit that ever since losing my original dell operating system disc, i’ve been using a “special edition” copy, if ya know what i mean. that particular copy has worked time and time again. however, yesterday, i did not have that copy, cause carla borrowed it to fix her dad’s computer.
instead of waiting, like any reasonable human might do, i decided, “well, crap, i’ve got this mysterious cd that says ‘winxp’ that i don’t remember making. i’ll just use that!”
it wasn’t as horrible as it sounds. haha. but, it was bad. in hindsight, i think this was a slipstreamed version that i made a looong time ago. there were no services, no themes, no eye candy, nothing. and, at first, i rejoiced! i was at a usable desktop in roughly 20 seconds! but, then, came the problems.
my pro tools mbox didn’t work. i had to tweak my services to get the damn wireless from continously showing “aquiring ip address.” and, the best/worst, it wouldn’t recognize my generic usb hub! wtf? did we regress to windows me, or something? it was usb hell, i tell ya!
it was at that point that i decided, “well, crap. as long as i’m having to re-install my os, why not try that fancy new windows 7 that even leesha didn’t have huge issues with?”
so, i headed over to the microsoft site, where i was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to download a fully legit version of their newest and best operating system.
long story short, windows 7 was a nightmare on my machine. at every instance, it failed to properly shut down/log off/restart. magicdisc (virtual drive) didn’t work, so i wasn’t able to install rosetta stone. my external drives would sometimes show up and show their contents, and other times just freeze windows explorer. even my system drive would mysteriously disappear from windows explorer.
i’m sure with enough work, i could’ve figured out how to get everything to work, but for me, it wasn’t worth the time. i immediately uninstalled that and went back to vista. right where i started. haha.
other thoughts on windows 7:
- you CAN get classic mode. just go to your system properties, advanced tab, performance, and select the “adjust for best performance” option. this was one of the first things i did, because the default visual settings are hideous.
- the dock is atrocious and needlessly complicated.
- the default “action center” is distracting (you can disable it, fortunately).
- it wasn’t as fast as people claim.
- the loading page was so fucking amature. like, spinning orbs in glorious 256 colors. and like 5 fps, tops. i felt like i was about to play return to zork.
i’ll tell you what, though. i’ve really come to appreciate vista, especially with sp1. it only took a few hours to install and update, and that’s not meant to sound sarcastic. it hasn’t crashed once. all of my software/hardware is working (except for my webcam, for some reason). which goes to show: you don’t know what you have, until you’ve lost it! haha.
