1) I didn’t want my OS to look like a Mac. If I wanted a Mac-look, I would of bought one; why is MS worried about targeting Mac users? People that can’t deal with issues or challenges in life and want to feel good about themselves and be apart of a feely-good subculture tend to get Macs (in my opinion). If you have a mental breakdown with the BSoD, then get a Mac, but don’t force a Mac-like OS such as Vista on your loyal PC customers… what horrible marketing that is!

2) I have no need for all the extra bells and whistles that come with Vista, and despise how Vista has rearranged all the locations of applications and everything else from drop-down menus to all the MS applications (Word & Excel 2007 etc); why should I be forced to relearn where everything is again? Talk about frustrating… Again, bad marketing. You shouldn’t force that on customers and shut of producing/installing XP in new computers without fully vesting your market research in a new product such as Vista.

3) Having a 64-bit system is enticing though, but I think I’ll skip the Vista broken-band wagon and wait to see if Win 7 is an actual improvement from my point of view.

Are there programs, that require specific versions of vista?

Personally I have always made my Windows installations look like Windows 95. Should I have stayed with Windows 95? I look forward to a thoughtless response or two.

It is easy to make Vista look like Windows 95/2K/XP. All the options are built-in to the desktop management. The issue with Vista for XP users is hardware. Either you upgrade to a decent shader-model 4 video card and a dual core processor (or better) or you remain on XP. Obviously the question remains, why are you not using a MAC or some other game-less environment if you are not gaming? Seriously though, if you only use Windows for business applications like word processing and email then stay with XP.

For users who do not need, or want, the Aero interface (and I am one of the few) you should get the Vista Home Edition Basic. This is the only edition that uses the old XP GDI interface for the desktop and is very fast compared to the other versions. Home Basic is fast because it can do nothing but run DX10 games and Windows applications like Office. It has none of the extra bells and whistles of the other versions.

http://computertrainingfree.blogspot.com/2008/05/how-to-make-windows-xp-look-like.html

I think what would have made Vista better is a better performance tweak on operations and allowing programs to run smoother and faster on a smaller system size.

I also think had they been smart enough to put the Windows XP theme (blue) into there personalization work, more companies and people at home would find it much easier to use and if they didn’t want to cover to the look at least, they wouldn’t have to, yet they can still have some of the better security and speedier system processes of Vista.

but that’s just my opinion.

vista would run without activation for a month without needing the activation key , so that user could see if it were worth a s***t …

if you dont like it , then you would get option of clearing vista & installing a new instance XP on the machine, which would come with full support & updates until the next version of windows came along.

how fast do you think microsoft & other vista supporters would drop vista if given the actual choice between the 2 O/S s ???

only when this is done will we ever see another O/S that is useful out of the box without updating first.

until M/S is faced with a product not selling , will they build a better product.
95 was about 30 mb.
98 was about 1/2 a cd
xp was a full cd
vista is on a DVD

with blu ray set to be the standard, imagine the dislike & problems when windows is a 20 gig install !!!

i thought a 20 gig drive was big for 95.
vista wont even run bare bones on a drive that small.
95 ran on less hard drive Than i have ram now…
plus started faster, plus i had the same cable internet then as i have now.
if all the apps require more resources these days , why are we buying newer faster computers just for the O/S ???

dont tell me linux either.its only good for typing a letter or playing card games

if microsoft wants a good O/S , give me an updated win 95/ NT that supports the new equipment.
95 had a lot of hidden programs that were useful.
like being able to send a simple message directly to another computer on a network without installing a 100 different messengers.
i still say , 95 ran on 256 meg quite nicely.
imagine how fast it would be on 4 gig systems.
nock off the BS , give me an updated 95

but i prefer XP.

vista slows my laptop down like crazy and i can’t get use to interface..

now everyone is saying on her why upgrade.. what was the point in buying it…. well ppl here in the uk.. all computer laptops.. get vista on it.. its like we don’t have a choice.. if i could have bought a good laptop with win XP
i would have jumpted at the chance… but to buy a good 1 for what i wanted it for all had vista on it… so like u r all saying why upgrade… its not why.. we have to.. when buying a new computer/laptop.

so think theme i think i’m gonna love!… thank you who ever did it

GUI is entirely based on personal preferences. That’s true!!

But WHY hell microsoft just gave us one alterative to the new vista GUI??

If the GUI is only based on personel beaviours, and it is, why we only have the Classic GUI choice in Vista?? Why don’t we have XP style theme built in in vista? An why not more theme?? And why microsoft does not gave us more theme built in?

Second, the whole point in downgrading vista’s looks to XP is to make it not defult take away 500 megs of ram, it slows down gamers WAY too much unless you close Explorer before loading every single effing game. And who wants to do that?!

We upgrade to vista because our computers are getting old and its the only option esspecially for gamers. No linux distrubutinos have the same compatablity even if you run via WINE and mac just plane sucks. Vista is a forced upgrade for gamers due to Direct X 10 and the fact like 95/98 to 2000/XP the Vista-Xp change will mean that all games will REQUIRE vista.

Another thing, the 64 bit version of XP is still in its infancy so the only way to get a good 64 bit operating system without swapping to Linux is Vista. Personally, I dont want to be limited to only 4 gigs of ram when I could have MUCH more, as a gamer I need to think into the future.

Being forced into vista sucks, but making it like XP is good. The new vista interface sucks, I still prefer 95 to XP;

Because the theme is a very small nonessential part of the upgrade. The actual upgrade is a kernel upgrade, the theme is only a graphical user interface change.

You do realize that the operating system is not the GUI? Right?

The operating system is the “kernel” not the appearance such as the desktop themes and icons.

The way it looks is irrelevant to the system upgrade and is entirely based on personal preferences.