I want a refund from Microsoft!!!
Slider51
Michigan USA New
Windows 7 is like pouring salt in a wound for me...
My 2 PCs run on XP Pro SP3, and I basically love that OS - yep it has some problems but all in all I think it's been the most stable and trouble free OS I've ever run. Then Vista came out, and all I heard were problems problems problems, and Microsoft responding to them by running TV ads...SOOOoooooo......
About a year ago I wanted to buy a laptop, so I called my guy at Dell. I wanted nothing to do with Vista, especially since I run AutoCAD (many problems with Vista and AutoCAD). Of course Dell wants to sell me Vista on the machine (well, actually that's not true...the sales guy laughed and told me he WISHED he could just load XP Pro on it for me, but he couldn't.)
Long story short, the only way I could get XP Pro on the laptop was with a $100 "backgrade license"...basically I get the laptop with the OS I want installed and they send Vista CDs with the machine uninstalled. I objected to that big-time, but Dell sez Microsoft makes them do this - they want me in Vista and that's that, so they make me pay this penalty to stay with XP Pro...
Now here it is a year later and wow..guess what... it's Win 7 now - Vista is no longer MS's wonderful end-all greater than great OS!! This grinds my butt no end!! Just 12 months earlier I have to pay an extra bone to STAY AWAY from their loser Vista OS, and then they replace it anyway!!
Of course I'll never get it, after all I'm just a captive MS customer anyway, but the way I see it, Bill owes me a hundred bucks plus interest for a year! I would send back the Vista CD, but it made a great skeet shooting target last summer, so I guess I DID get SOME satisfaction from Vista....
Slider
My 2 PCs run on XP Pro SP3, and I basically love that OS - yep it has some problems but all in all I think it's been the most stable and trouble free OS I've ever run. Then Vista came out, and all I heard were problems problems problems, and Microsoft responding to them by running TV ads...SOOOoooooo......
About a year ago I wanted to buy a laptop, so I called my guy at Dell. I wanted nothing to do with Vista, especially since I run AutoCAD (many problems with Vista and AutoCAD). Of course Dell wants to sell me Vista on the machine (well, actually that's not true...the sales guy laughed and told me he WISHED he could just load XP Pro on it for me, but he couldn't.)
Long story short, the only way I could get XP Pro on the laptop was with a $100 "backgrade license"...basically I get the laptop with the OS I want installed and they send Vista CDs with the machine uninstalled. I objected to that big-time, but Dell sez Microsoft makes them do this - they want me in Vista and that's that, so they make me pay this penalty to stay with XP Pro...
Now here it is a year later and wow..guess what... it's Win 7 now - Vista is no longer MS's wonderful end-all greater than great OS!! This grinds my butt no end!! Just 12 months earlier I have to pay an extra bone to STAY AWAY from their loser Vista OS, and then they replace it anyway!!
Of course I'll never get it, after all I'm just a captive MS customer anyway, but the way I see it, Bill owes me a hundred bucks plus interest for a year! I would send back the Vista CD, but it made a great skeet shooting target last summer, so I guess I DID get SOME satisfaction from Vista....
Slider
0
Comments
You and Tim would be great friends.
Vista pre SP 1 was a miserable experience. What I will say is this, I do believe Microsoft learned allot from their failures there, and worked extraordinarily hard to correct the problems with the release of Windows 7. Windows 7 development was an extraordinary example of how it should be done. Make the beta free, make it open to any user, accept feedback, have open forums for issues before release, be transparent about the bugs and problems that need fixing, Microsoft did all these things this time out and it shows up in the polish of the final product.
Look, XP gave us eight good years, XP owes us nothing more. Vista sucked pre SP1, and your right, Microsoft's requiring users to pay a "downgrade" fee was a preposterous business model.
All that said, I assure you that Windows 7 is 100% worth paying for.
So 1 year ago you chose to buy a laptop, chose to spend $100 for an XP downgrade. You want sympathy for what exactly?
I knew this would bring EVERYBODY out of the woodwork...
Everyone has their own favorites, mine happens to be Win XP Pro. I'm an average user, don't game, but I do own a small business. What I need (and got) with XP was stability and very few unsolved problems. What I don't do is rush right out and buy the lates and greatest anything, including Bill's "NEW!!! Wonderful!!!!" Os's as soon as they come out. If it ain't broke, I don't like ta fix it.
What my rant is about is (1) being forced to buy a backgrade to get something that works, and (2) what was forced down my throat for the extra C note was a white elephant!
Oh eventually I'll be forced to change to 7 or whatever the latest and greatest is, but until then, chuggin along with XP Pro and luvvin' it...
To those who didn't get it - the "refund" rant was humor (maybe bad humor, but at least tongue in cheek). My only grind is, again, buying the Vista white elephant because Bill/Dell said I had to...I wrote it off as entertainment supplies, that and the 12 ga. shell...
Slider
It's just the free market. You paid what you paid because it was worth it to you. Good for Gates. However, at the same time, MS's market share among consumers has fallen noticably during the Vista mess, because many refused to be victims. I'm not sure MS will ever recover the market share they've lost, and they are not vicitims either.
Soooo...let me get this straight...(a) a year ago I need a tool, a laptop for my business, can't do without it any longer...(b) a year ago everyone I know who bought Vista is in a sea of hurt and Bill's response is an ad campaign telling everyone how good it is (c) XP Pro is alive and well and Cad sings under it (d) a year ago I at least had never heard of Windows 7 - not living at a forum I get all my Microsoft news from the Apple commercials (even though I'm a PC...) (e) the best-featured laptop for my needs is a Dell (f) but they tell me Bill wants me to buy Vista so bad he's going to charge me 100 beans not to...but wait...let's see this is "my choice", right?
Choice to buy the laptop with an OS that will cost me money every time the OS is having a fit...hmm..can't afford that. Choice to not buy the laptop..hmmmm..can't afford that either...Choice to bite the bullet, pop for the $100 penalty, get the tool I need for the job, and remember the day for later. I might be thick as a brick, but I fail to see any real "choice" there.
Sorry guys, I've tried but I just can't get that warm and fuzzy feeling about where my hundred bucks went, even if it is function of a "free market". If Microsoft wanted to do what is right, they would replace those clay pigeon Vista CD's with CD's of Win 7, if it is indeed "the latest and greatest", because as it stands none of us got anything for our money as a result of their "marketing tool" backgrade....
Truth be known, the answer I was hoping for when I posted this was "Hey dufus, don't you know you can go "here" and get a Win7 replacement for your white elephant? Duuuuhhhh...." I didn't see that option in the last Apple commercial...
Thanks everyone, I really DO appreciate the banter and playing the fool...beats Matlock reruns any day.
Ubuntu, everyone!!! Gotta go patch my jeans...think I'll use some legendary thread...
Slider
Also, nobody's sold a Vista laptop that wasn't provided a Windows 7 upgrade disk since what, June? So they're not selling Vista anymore; you can only get 7.
Can't be, I can actually understand most of what he is posting.
Not everyone hangs around on the internet as long as we do.
Dell jacked you over not Microsoft
In general there is far more pressing matters revolving around $100... Software is software & systems are systems. You could of bypassed Dell all together as many builders out there were offering XP still at no extra cost. So in the end it was your fault for not shopping around. I know how PR & marketing work & to be honest I am will to bet MS offered Dell at the time an extra discount on Vista to sell machines directly with Vista.
So go e-mail Dell and pull ont heir pants for the $$ you claim they owe you.
You ever buy a new car, and all of a sudden everybody sez "You shoulda gone to my uncle (or brother or ex-wife) or to XYZ or ABC? If you wanted something good, that's where you shoulda gone..." The Dell's been a great machine, zero problems and I abuse it in planes, trains, and automobiles, and I got a great deal on it. Am I a Dell fanatic? Heck no...I am sure they couldn't care less about my one laptop sale, but I bought the right product at the time for my needs.
All that being said...think about it - do you really think Dell needs to, or even wants to, charge me an extra Cnote to backgrade to XP? It's not like they had no XP licenses left... I kinda think Bill had already dinged them 60 to 75 beans premium for the OE XP licenses after the Vista launch, in a cut-their-losses drive to unload on the public as much Vista as they could before 7, and then Dell marked that up too. Mic, Dell, it's all Big Byte to me...
Ubuntu!
Slider
Slider's a victim.
End of thread.
(you'll have to verify your laptop can do virtualization)
As for your loss of $100 take it as a life lesson....and as Cliff said after SP1 Vista was just fine (I would say better then XP if you had ultimate) Most of the Vista complaints were mostly hype and people on a anti-vista band wagon then there was real issues.
Win7 is not the same experience as Vista was. Thanks to the long Beta for win 7 the release of win7 is more like the equivalent of a service pack 1, there was also a very long run for the RC release.
You'll find 64bit win7 much better and faster then XP. (Vista SP1 was also faster then XP but most people have been too caught up in the anti-vista hype to have ever experienced it) People I know in the ME world are all in love with the performance benefits they got with just an OS upgrade to Win7. (most upgraded to 64bit-win7pro) CAD, Revit, and solidworks are all faster in Win7.
Oh and I really didn't blast the Vista CD...that was a "metaphor" (Hey, I looked it up!) Want it? Half-price - fifty bucks.
Gee...imagine all the stress if this forum wouldn't have been here!
mtrox, I agree, the horse is dead, but if you don't mind, I'll end the thread...this one can go in the "resolved" section, good fun was had by all, with my thanks to Icrontic for providing the soap box. Oh also mtrox...absolutely love the avatar...reminds me of me on a good day..
ubuntu to all, and to all a good night...
Slider out..
Really out now...ubuntu!
S
But I am trying to be serious in this silly thread, I guess. Congratulations, such threads do not come frequently.
Why thank you, Grimnoc, but really, it comes easy for me...:D
32 years in automotive engineering, married twice for a total of 35 years....I've been abused by the best, and it wasn't here...
I gotta quit coming back to this thread...:rolleyes2
Slider
QFT
ubuntu?
your welcome, I'm glad I could offer some useful advice.
My last advice is get a new i7 mobile workstation with a discrete mobile workstation graphics card and 64bit-win7-pro. It will surprise you in the difference over your current system. (only downside is how heavy the mobile workstation laptops are....around 6lbs) For your work, having a system with a discrete mobile workstation graphics card will be a benefit; as the workstation graphics cards are certified for programs like CAD, solidworks, Revit, etc. and run more stable and faster for those programs thanks to the hardware and drivers designed for those programs (if your current laptop takes a discrete graphics card you could look into upgrading your graphics card with a discrete mobile workstation card, but the new systems with mobile i7 CPUs are much better then just the graphics card alone, you still want a discrete workstation card though)