Shut up. All of you.
Yeah, so I went to the Vista and Office 2007 launch event in DC, and while there I had the chance to talk to an old friend from a previous job who's now working at Microsoft. Of course I took the opportunity to plaster him with grief about my Vista issues on my Vista Capable D620.
He casually mentioned the seven updates released for Vista on launch day.
So, I soldiered back to the front lines and reinstalled Vista, plus updates, and my VPN still wouldn't work properly. But this morning, however:
So, obviously there will be more updates coming. I had worked around my VPN issues by removing the default gateway on the VPN connection, then setting static routes for our Richmond network; I've remvoed all that, and I'll see if it works if I switch between networks. So far, so good.
...
Then, my cell phone started beeping.
Back when Sprint finally released the RAZR (a year after every other major carrier, but I digress) I hopped all over it. Yeah, it's a phone everyone has and carriers are giving away for free, but it beat the crap out of my LG Sprint phone - their first with Bluetooth. What was even better was that I can charge it over USB and transfer MP3s to it as ringtones.
Of course, I couldn't install the drivers for my RAZR in Vista without some trickery: I had to enable the local Administrator account and install it as local admin.
Nice of Microsoft to disable that gaping security hole, and I won't be complaining about UAC, either. But, the hardware and software manufacturers still have a lot to do, and this driver installer is just a perfect example.
(For those who want to know, if your computer is a domain computer and you have administrative rights on the machine, you can just go into the Computer Management MMC, go to Local Users, then set a password for the Administrator account and uncheck the Disabled checkbox. Then switch users and install the drivers. When you're done, I'd disable the account again - there are reasons its disabled - and repeat if you ever need to try that trick to get difficult software to install.)
Sometimes, I hate being a beta tester of released software...
< 09:49 AM >
So, this has been an interesting Saturday.
First, see that post down there about Vista? Forget it. I just finished reinstalling all my work apps on my laptop, after getting rid of Vista and putting XP back on it.
(Thanks to thehotfix.net forums and the work of the fine individuals there, I even got a cumlative post-SP2 pack. I know, I know - ancient news to most - but I'm so used to maintaining Ghost images that I forget about things like this. Shame on me for not making an image of this Latitude...)
In short? The straw that broke the camel's back yesterday was the four times Vista just decided to disable both my wired and wireless network adapters, and the only way to enable them involved reboots. Screw it; I'd had enough problems with having to disable/enable my adapters when waking from sleep that I'd taken to shutting down - despite the fact that Vista is supposed to have better laptop support as a major selling feature.
I hate Windows.
Second, I've been playing with my PSP. A lot. That little thing is great; movies and TV shows, games, music. I'm sold.
(And paranthetically, I would hope so after I bought the damn thing, right?)
Last, we've just been busy, as usual. So, my online little sparse blog thingy is even sparser. No promises to update things with any increased regularity, either. I'm heading to the Vista/Office 2K7/Exchange 2K7 launch event in DC on the 30th, then to San Diego the following week. I might have some time during/after to write. Maybe not. Heck, I'll even try to take a camera!
...
Believe me?
I have to admit that I love Netflix, and have for several years.
This weekend, we decided to switch from Netflix to Blockbuster's online service. Not because we're unhappy with Netflix's service - quite the opposite. They have the uncanny ability to cause me to not worry about renting movies, and a selection that's better than anything we could find in town.
So, why did we switch?
It all started with an offer Blockbuster had: bring in your Netflix address label, and get a free rental.
Seemed innocent enough - try to woo Netflix subscribers by offering them free rentals, and hope they'd check out Blockbuster's service. So, I did.
For the same monthly fee, I get the same one-at-a-time rental, and I can take the movie to the store to return and get a free rental when I do.
What's the downside?
Okay, before you go and think poorly of me, realize that I have to use Windows.
Now, on to why I'm writing.
I just installed Vista RTM over the weekend on my laptop. I went whole-hog, and put Office 2007 RTM on there, too. I've been using both off and on for a while (see my Outlook 2007 woes for an example) and unless I hit a show-stopper, I think I've migrated for good.
First impressions? Vista's just as finicky as XP, and it feels like they've changed file locations just to change file locations. Does the fact that there's a Users folder make sense? Sure, but why wasn't that the option in Windows 2000, or XP? It just seems arbitrary now, especially once you add the partitioned profiles (Local, Local Low and Roaming) and think about having to deal with the abstraction layer ("Do Firefox bookmarks go in Local Low or Roaming?") on a regular basis. Hopefully developers will update their Windows applications to deal with the changes.
It seems more stable, but faster is up for questioning right now. As a laptop user, it sleeps faster, and it wakes from sleep faster too. Not that it was hard to do better than 2000/XP, but still. We'll see how well that stands up six months from now, once the Windows Cruft has set in.
<strikethrough>Aqua</strikethrough> Aero seems to be fairly useless eye-candy. Flip3D is nice, but again, useless. I've yet to see anything that makes me think "WOW! I'm glad I can run Aero!" and more than one application where Vista still has to disable Aero to work. In all honesty, what gives?
::sigh:: In all, a fairly useless upgrade, aside from riding the security train. UAC is still annoying, but necessary. Users still do stupid things, and Windows needs to provide at least a better level of protection. It can be turned off, too, so that's good as well.
Office 2007? Now, that's a good upgrade...
Okay, so the Christie's Star Trek auction has come and gone, and I didn't make any absentee bids.
Not that it would matter if I had:
Christie's Star Trek Auction Results: Lots 451-541
FYI, the Ressikan Flute was lot number 537; originally estimated to sell for between $800 and $1,200, it sold for $48,000.
Yes, it suffices to say that Christie's has zero geeks on staff who understand the value of kitchy Trek crap to a bunch of nerds with too much idle cash.
Oh well. Now I don't feel like I missed a chance to own it.
