Vista Ultimate Extras update

If you’re one of those high-end PC users who sprung for Windows Vista Ultimate hoping that the promised Ultimate Extras would someday amount to something, you might have to keep waiting after today. Microsoft released a precious few updates for the Ultimate Extras package via Windows Update today, including new sound schemes, updated language packs, and three new DreamScene animated desktops. These make Vista Ultimate users’ wallpaper turn into distracting nature video loops, playing like screensavers on your desktop behind your icons and windows. Click Continue below for an in-depth look at what you get.

The two sound schemes consist of Ultimate Extras Pearl and Ultimate Extras Glass, both sets of noises we could do without while trying to get some work done, but pleasant and well-done nonetheless. “Glass” turns Windows system sounds into effects that resemble that singing sound you make when you run a wetted finger around the rim of a crystal glass. The various plinks, plunks, and glassy whines are actually ethereal and beautiful, if you’re looking for that kind of stuff to waft from your PC. The “Pearl” sounds have an elegant feel to them, more muted with less reverberation and edge, with strings lulling you to sleep when you exit Windows.

DreamScene Content Pack #3 takes the total number of video loops distributed by Microsoft to 12. Of these three new 1280x720 (hey, that’s 720p HD!) animations, the best is a dripping leaf, a really sharp-looking video file with its background nicely racked out of focus. Then there’s a dripping icicle that's equally clear but by the time we saw that one, we felt like heading for the nearest bathroom. The third is a few months late, diffuse autumn leaves shimmering in the sun. It’s a soothing shot, but makes it hard to see any icons you have on your desktop.

DreamScenes use up a token amount of resources on our test system here, with CPU usage idling at 1-2% without an animation running, and 3-5% with it on. There are third-party animations available, too, called Stardock DeskScapes, and many of those are even more exquisite than these from Microsoft. You can even shoot your own videos, preferably in HD, to use as looping animations, too. These DreamScenes are excellent. Too bad you must own Windows Vista Ultimate to run them.

There were also unspecified updates to the Language Packs, letting you switch languages with different user accounts. This brings the total number of languages supported to 35. Overall, maybe there are more Vista Ultimate Extra coolnesses on the way, but so far, these noises and animations, along with the previously-released Texas Hold ‘Em and BitLocker encryption accessories, aren’t exactly a bargain given Vista Ultimate's premium price. But then, if you already own Ultimate, free is good.

10 lies you need to stop believing about Windows Vista

We've all heard the litany of complaints about Microsoft Windows Vista. The blogosphere reverberates with Vista schadenfreude (DVICE occasionally included), perpetuating assertions that the flagship Windows operating system is expensive, unwieldy and generally a disaster. It's time for a fact check.

We wanted to approach this project from the only angle that counts — one of experience and first-hand knowledge of Vista. To do this, we've been extensively testing the current version, Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1, both Ultimate and Home Premium versions), using it on everything from a dinky laptop to a dual quad-core monster desktop workstation. We've been putting it through its paces all day, every day for six months.

We set out to test the Top 10 Vista criticisms we found, determining if those complaints held true with how Vista works today. Is it really as bad as everybody says it is? Or is it all just perception based on a few initial problems and Internet propaganda? Hit the Continue jump to read the 10 biggest lies you need to stop believing about Vista.

1. Plenty of Bugs and Glitches
This one is pure propaganda. In our experience, the only crash we've experienced happened when we installed the new version 8.0 of iTunes (how ironic!), and even that didn't result in the dreaded Blue Screen of Death — just a hard lockup that required a cold boot. System Restore blew out the problem, bringing everything back to normal in minutes.
Lie Meter: 10 (Key: 10 = total lie, 0 = everything you've heard is true)

2. Upgrading Is a Hassle
Using Vista's original version, we encountered a weird anomaly with HP printer drivers where Microsoft Word would mysteriously re-launch after we closed it, but no crashes resulted. We've had another issue with M-Audio, where its USB preamp for our podcast microphone has no Vista-compatible driver, to this day. In its first days after initial launch, 29% of Vista's driver problems are allegedly the fault of NVIDIA. While we're using NVIDIA graphics cards on both the notebook and desktop, we've been lucky not to experience any video-driver troubles. And on the notebook with Vista pre-installed, the driver troubles have been nonexistent.
Lie Meter: 5

3. Nagging Security Prompts
The dreaded User Account Control, or UAC, does nag you incessantly, wanting to know if you're sure you want to do this or that. But it's easy to disable those prompts, so much so that if you can't do it, you're not even trying. The one's a favorite complaint from those who are completely clueless about Vista.
Lie Meter: 9

4. There Are Many Versions — Expensive Versions
Microsoft is brand spamming us with all those multiple versions of the Vista operating system, and we wish there were just one. The pricing is high, too, retailing at $319.95 for a non-upgrade copy of Vista Ultimate (upgrade for $219.95), and $259.95 ($129.95 to upgrade) for the most popular version, Vista Home Premium. Cheaper versions don't even have that sweet, gorgeous Aero interface, so we're not even counting them. Keep in mind that these are retail prices, and all Microsoft's future service packs and updates are free, so you could get away with only buying Vista once and keeping it for years without paying any more. Taken in context, it's not a bad deal, and unless you're using Ubuntu (our fave OS) or other open-source software, a modern OS isn't going to be cheap no matter how you slice it.
Lie Meter: 8

5. It's Not Simple or Intuitive
This is so subjective, one person might think all computers are near-impossible to use while the person next door thinks they're all simple. We've found Vista to be full of usability enhancements, and see no difficulty using it. We particularly like the way menus stay on the top of an application window, and not at the top of the desktop — this is especially useful when multiple apps are open across our dual-monitor setup. We also like the two mouse buttons on our Vista laptop.
Lie Meter: 10

6. Windows Defender Slows Everything Down
It's true that Windows Defender is a memory hog, but that's the case with most antivirus software. It's unfair to single out Vista's software on this one. And if you're careful (like us), you don't need antivirus software, anyway. It's like closing the barn door after all the horses have already run out. Virus paranoia is a trumped-up piece of fear mongering planted for propaganda purposes. Are we just lucky? Windows Defender doesn't slow us down, because we shut it down without consequence. Maybe it's because we know better than to click on strange attachments (and use Gmail), we have a hardware firewall with a strong password, we always use Firefox, or we just don't wander around sleazy websites — but virus trouble on Vista is rare.
Lie Meter: 5

7. It's Generally Slow
If you have an old PC, just about anything you do short of MS-DOS is going to seem slow. Yes, Vista and its Aero interface require more resources, and Vista needs a modern processor and multiple gigs of RAM. But hey, this is 2008. Also, Microsoft made a mistake in quoting the minimum system requirements way too low. But overall, in my tests of XP vs. Vista on the exact same machine, Vista was 15.28% faster.
Lie Meter: 10

8. Slow File Transfers
This was a problem with the original Vista, but it's been largely solved in Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1). When we tested SP1 (a pre-release, not the shipping version) file-transfer speeds, they felt slower than Windows XP's, but a lot of that difference had to do with the way the transfer is displayed on the screen. When XP's file-transfer window closed, the transfer wasn't really complete, but Vista was more true to the actual transfer and the subsequent file checking that goes on. But yes, the file transfers aren't as fast in Vista, but in the shipping version of SP1, the difference is hardly noticeable.
Lie Meter: 6

9. Activation Issues
Windows Vista must communicate with the mother ship in Redmond if you want to keep on using it, or you must enter a special activation number after you contact Microsoft. But it's really no big deal. On the laptop we received with Vista already installed, activation wasn't even an issue at all — it was already done. On the desktop machine where we installed Vista Ultimate, the activation was done online in about two seconds and if we weren't looking, we would have hardly known it happened. If we were constantly swapping out a lot of hardware, this would be annoying, but usually, complaints about activation come from only the most inept software pirates who aren't aware of numerous activation workarounds.
Lie Meter: 10

10. Start Menu Is Hard to Navigate
This is a really lame complaint. If the start menu is hard for you to navigate, it's probably pretty tough for you to operate a close-and-play record player, load a DVD, and start your car, too. We saw this complaint in a lot of places all over the web, and find it to be vacuous.
Lie Meter: 10

Conclusion
Most of the disinformation floating around about Windows Vista is simply not true. Yes, you've been fed a pack of lies, accompanied with a healthy dose of "truthiness." Sure, a lot of that static originated at Vista's clumsy release 18 months ago, but since SP1 was rolled out, Vista is a different animal now. We originally planned to dump Vista after we finished this half-year test, but now that we've experienced it first-hand, we're sticking with it. In fact, we like it. A lot.

Microsoft turns a bus into a mobile office

How's this for a double-edged sword? Microsoft is providing free bus transportation to work for some of its employees in China. Hey, that's great! It saves money as well as the environment. The downside? The bus is full of workstations, meaning everyone it picks up gets to work that much longer every day.

I mean, this is all well and good if the commute time is counted as part of the eight-hour workday or whatever, but I doubt that's the case. Commuting is a precious time to zone out, listen to music, and fantasize about quitting your job and/or killing your boss. Don't take that away from us, Microsoft.

Windows Mobile 6.5 cell phone OS unveiled

Well it's about time fuddy-duddy Microsoft hopped up with the hepcats and finally redesigned that stodgy Windows Mobile interface. And what a bang-up job the Redmondians have done with this version 6.5 of its cell phone operating system. It's not quite new-feature-packed enough to be called 7.0, but an earnest effort nonetheless. Look for it to find its way into cell phones sometime in the second half of this year.

We like that honeycomb layout and the Zune-like atmosphere. Also appealing are the one-handed interface, no-waiting voice mail, the cloud-syncing MyPhone online service, and a new app store. Sound familiar? Let's just hope the writers of the upcoming collection of Windows Mobile cell phone apps are infected with the same enthusiasm as those aligned with Cupertino.

Windows 7: Minimum hardware reality check

Windows 7 has suspiciously low minimum hardware requirements — a 1GHz processor and 1GB of RAM. Would such a lowly PC would be usable? To find out if Microsoft is quoting a realistic minimum for a Windows 7 machine, we installed the latest beta onto a nine-year-old 1GHz PC with 512MB of RAM. Let's see what happens.

The first thing we quickly noticed: This 1GHz Dell Dimension XPS 1000 box, which we thought was phenomenal when it was new back in early 2000, is dog-slow. We also knew from the start that its 32MB Matrox Millenium 400 graphics card wouldn't be able to handle the minimum DirectX 9, resulting in an inability to enjoy that Aero eye candy of Windows 7.

Just how slow is this old dog? Comparing it with a shiny new HP xw8600 workstation with two quad-core Xeon X5492 processors, 16GB of RAM and 64-bit Windows 7, if this 1GHz machine were going any slower, it would be at a halt.

Check out the unscientific comparisons in the table above, and notice how far computing hardware has come in nine years. To get an idea how your machine stacks up, you can download the free CineBench R10 graphics and processor benchmarks here.

Okay, okay, we get it. This machine is slow. With those strikes against it at the start, we settled back for a long evening of operating system installation. The fresh install took over three hours to accomplish. And even when the OS was securely ensconced in its shabby new home, Windows 7 didn't recognize its old codger graphics card, nor had it ever seen a network card as ancient as that 3Com 90x on board. After a tedious search and installation of legacy drivers for both, the machine was locked and loaded.

So what did it feel like to run Windows 7 on a machine that was even lowlier then the bare minimum? Surprisingly, the battered box browsed web pages in Firefox and Internet Explorer admirably. Even though our RAM was a half-gig below Microsoft's minimum requirement, it could still run a browser without using up all its RAM.

Take a look at the performance monitor above, and you can see that the machine was keeping up nicely, even when we were browsing websites in Firefox and downloading a Windows 7 update at the same time.

When that Windows update was downloaded and started to install, it was a different story. We shut down Firefox to let the installation occur unfettered, and then quickly changed our minds, and re-launched Firefox. We could tell we had reached some kind of limit, because Firefox took 82 seconds to launch.

It's not going to break any speed records, but if you're looking to run one or two applications at a time on such a meager machine, and don't mind living without the Aero interface's glassy and shiny edges, or the cool new taskbar previews of Windows 7, Microsoft's 1GHz/1GB requirement is barely realistic

Mini-Review: Microsoft Arc Mouse gets more colorful

Microsoft improves its fold-up Arc mouse in a subtle way today, piling on the organic colors to its 2.4GHz (not Bluetooth, thank goodness) wireless pointer and giving us one less excuse to avoid buying one of the somewhat-pricey $50 devices. Normally we'd skip writing about such trifles as a color addition, had we not placed our own hands on this mouse just the other day.

Our take: It fits the hand surprisingly well. The click feels just right, the wheel scrolls comfortably without too much noise or resistance, and the thing folds up into a tiny travel size. At first glance, it seems like its portability would diminish its usefulness, but no, it wins our admiration on both counts.

Verdict: If you can find it on sale, it's a must-buy for touchpad-eschewing travelers.

Microsoft shrinks Sidewinder Mouse; now here's Sidewinder X3

Okay gamers, Microsoft heard you whining about how too-big and too-expensive its fancy BlueTrack laser Sidewinder X8 mouse is, answering your calls with the Sidewinder X3. While it still has facilities for macros galore — and enough room for eight buttons — it's a few orders of magnitude smaller, fitting even the wimpiest gamer's hand.

And hey you, lefty! The baby's ambidextrous, so either hand will do — even that southpaw of yours. But can it frag with the best of them? How's 2,000 dpi sound to you? Although that's half the 4,000-dpi rez of its X8 big bro, it's still the same as the original Sidewinder. That should do it. Oh, and the other thing that's small about it: Its price, just shy of $40 and probably heading lower as soon as it ships next month.

Here's another view: