VistaBillGates.com | Vista!

By JOE KIRBY
STAFF WRITER

It is safer. Faster. Better-looking. And, according to Bill Gates, just what your PC needs.

It is Vista, the long-anticipated overhaul of Microsoft’s operating system (OS), the chassis and foundation to roughly 90 percent of the world’s laptops and desktops. Released this week to much fanfare as the most powerful and polished version of Windows yet, the much-delayed Vista arrives more than five years after the introduction of XP, the current industry standard.

New on store shelves, Vista has been in the hands of millions in beta form (a limited test version) since November, downloaded for free from Microsoft. Also, Christmas and post-holiday shoppers may have purchased PCs already loaded with Vista. As a result, online message boards, blogs, industry publications and Web sites are awash with commentary on tinkering to the product that put Microsoft on the computing map.

Should you be among the early adapters?

E-mail: kirby@northjersey.com

FAQ for the home computer user

Window shopping The Record’s PC Guy (Peter Grad) and cnet.com, the online reference to all things tech, recommend that users of Microsoft XP hold off purchasing Vista — for now. Both say that while the new OS is a significant improvement over XP, it isn’t a quantum leap that justifies an immediate purchase. Moreover, all the bugs and kinks have yet to be found and worked out.

Where and how should I buy Vista? Vista is the first operating system to be offered for sale online (via download from Microsoft), but most will purchase the software at a major retailer. Best Buy, CompUSA, RadioShack and other computer outlets have been preparing for the changeover, offering training to their sales staffs on the finer points of Vista. Of course, these stores also will sell PCs with Vista pre-installed.

Which version is right for me? There are three versions of Vista. Home Basic ($199 for the complete version; $99 for the upgrade), is a bare-bones product that does not include Aero, the snazzy new interface. So, most will want to opt for Home Premium ($239; $159), which features the new visuals and multimedia entertainment tools, or Home Ultimate ($399; $259), which contains high-end networking and security capabilities. Before installing any software, make backups of all important files!

Will Vista affect my current software or peripherals? Maybe. Some online users report that Vista may conflict with other software programs, including Quickbooks, Lotus Notes, iTunes, some anti-virus utilities, some Adobe and Roxio products, and even Microsoft Media Player.

It’s probably best to first check a reference page on the Vista Web site (windowsvista.com) and download a utility that will scan your system and let you know which hardware and software components may or may not work. In the case of glitches, consult the software makers’ Web sites for updates, tools and patches to rectify Vista-specific issues.

Will I need to do anything to my computer before installing Vista? You may. Vista has steep hardware requirements ?

IT WAS billed as the Jack and Bill show with the First Minister and the richest individual on the planet signing an agreement to help young Scots adopt skills to make them more attractive to the business world.

Then it was the Gordon and Bill show, as Bill Gates said goodbye to Jack McConnell and joined Chancellor Brown to bring to a climax the Microsoft Government Leaders Forum in the Scottish Parliament. A first for the UK.

The Microsoft founder had landed in Scotland on the last leg of a schedule that had taken in Switzerland, New York and London, during which he had promoted good causes and the latest addition to the Microsoft family, the Vista software package.

The man reputedly worth ?27bn swept into Edinburgh in an ordinary people carrier, accompanied by just one security guard, to meet Jack McConnell at Bute House.

Gates can lay claim to having changed the way that many of us work and his Foundation has contributed millions to help fight poverty and disease. Even so, he does not receive universal acclaim. He may retain boy-next-door looks but he also attracts critics who see him as the head of an organisation exploiting the very people he is setting out to help. Opponents say his Foundation invests in those who create the problems in the first place.

It is an accusation Microsoft refutes and Gates himself now contributes more than ?760m each year to a range of charities and agencies.

He believes in the power of the PC to change lives and the world’s “richest geek” was in Scotland to engage the public sector and the country’s young people in computer skills, specifically to help those not in education and employment. Gates believes computers empower people and he was keen to play his part in improving the condition of those he sees being left behind.

At a press conference he told journalists that Scotland had punched above its weight in some growth sectors, such as life sciences, and noted its “long history of innovation and top universities”. He left promptly to receive an honorary degree from Edinburgh University and meet with Ian Wilmut, the scientist whose team created Dolly the Sheep.

He departed with a warning that the competition for blue chip investment is high and that further investment, on the educational front for example, is needed for Scotland to stay on top of its game.

But on the big issue of the moment - independence - Gates refused to comment, particularly on whether Microsoft would alter its investment strategy in Scotland if it broke away from the union. “I’m not here to answer political questions,” he said.

And so to the Scottish Parliament, where his arrival must have looked to the bemused passer-by as something akin to a royal visit. This time, though, the police presence was a bit heavier.

Gates shared a platform with Gordon Brown to address an audience of international politicians, business people and the global press in the debating chamber, but the event passed off without living up to its high billing, and the odd assortment of representatives, which included the president of Iceland and the prime minister of Albania, left some wondering what it was trying to achieve.

Gates and Brown were preceded by a series of warm-up acts - Gerri Elliot, a Microsoft public sector contracts boss, Augusto Lopez Claros, a South American economist, and Eberhard Sinner, a state minister from Bavaria. A hush descended as Gates and Brown entered the chamber and sat down at what looked like a daytime TV studio set - two maroon chairs and a table with a bottle of water.

First, the man tipped to become the UK’s next prime minister took to the podium and spoke with his usual exuberance about Adam Smith and Andrew Carnegie and the need to get the UK’s workforce better educated, while Gates sat casually, his arm looped over the back of his chair and an inscrutable smile on his face. Gates followed with a lecture on how the internet and websites such as Wikipedia could help more children to get educated, while Brown brooded and occasionally remembered to smile.

A handful of prepared questions followed, but without any sparking the remotest controversy. The closest anyone came was a member of the Scottish Youth Parliament who secured a pledge from Gates to look at the idea of incorporating a young person’s forum into the next Microsoft Government Leaders Forum.

Upstairs, the gallery was packed with the world’s press and other interested observers, including the tyres tycoon Sir Tom Farmer.

But there was a degree of confusion, even cynicism, about the purpose of the event aside from providing a worldwide audience for Microsoft’s Vista platform. The announcements appeared fairly random - one on Scottish schools, another deal between Microsoft and the Albanian government.

One observer said: “I am here because Microsoft paid for me to come and I wanted to see Edinburgh. But I’m still not sure what this is all about.”

Speaker after speaker praised Microsoft for its efforts in helping spread technology and Gates for his philanthropy. There was nothing resembling a debate.

Microsoft paid nothing for the use of the parliament building, the first time a working parliament has been used for one of the software company’s annual Government Leaders Forums.

But the company did meet the cost of flying 300 delegates and 70 journalists to Edinburgh, feeding them and supplying them with drink and accommodation in the city’s Caledonian Hilton, Balmoral and Radisson hotels for three nights.

Whether or not the event will have any lasting benefits for the good causes it promoted, at least all those who took part now know about Vista.

This article: http://business.scotsman.com/technology.cfm?id=183382007

By Steven Levy

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Feb. 12, 2007 issue - Is Vista, Microsoft’s latest version of Windows??eleased last week with press events, parties, rock bands, a circuslike “human billboard” in downtown New York City and a multimillion-dollar ad campaign??he last operating system to launch in a sea of hype? Clearly, we’re no longer in the era when the rollout of a computer OS is greeted with the hosannas showered upon a conquering army returning home. At one of the events last week held under banners declaring that with Vista the wow starts now, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer sat on a stage with five other middle-aged executives, all of whom worked for chipmakers or computer manufacturers, in what seemed to be a contest over who could say the word “excitement” the most. But the midnight release of Vista did not generate blocks-long lines serpentining around computer stores to buy an upgrade. Ballmer himself explained that only a small percentage of Windows users would be sufficiently thrilled by Vista to purchase an upgrade. Instead, people will get Vista when they replace their current PCs with a new one, a process that will occur over a period of years.

True, that’s not terribly different from the way that systems like Windows 95 were adopted. The difference is that in 2007, operating systems, however important, aren’t where people seek the wow factor. Obviously, OS upgrades are essential for helping our computers keep pace with mightier processors, gluttonous storage, skyrocketing use of media and persistent high-speed connectivity, among other mileposts in the march of high tech. And Vista indeed is an improvement over its predecessors (especially in terms of securing your PC from malfeasants). But the real excitement in technology in recent years has come from Internet-based start-ups that take advantage of the aggregate power of a connected population, like Google, Flickr or YouTube. We’ve also been wowed by devices dedicated to delivering a single experience so well that they transform our behavior??he BlackBerry, the iPod or game consoles like Microsoft’s own Xbox. In comparison, operating systems are infrastructure, and wildly feting a new version is like throwing a party for scaffolding.

So will this Vista launch be the last OS rollout that comes on like an MTV “My Super Sweet 16″ on steroids? (In fairness, Microsoft paired the Vista celebration with a launch of its revamped productivity suite, Office 2007.) Chairman Bill Gates, who jetted in from Davos for the events, insists that it won’t be. “People have said that at every major Windows release,” he says, citing predictions that the Java programming language would obviate the need for Windows, or network computers would kill the PC. “People don’t seem to have a good memory about having cried wolf every single time. Will the [next] operating system advance so that speech and vision and ink are built in? Well, you can bet against that, but the breakthroughs that Microsoft research is making in these things [will be] very advantageous to users.”

Gates does admit that with Vista, Microsoft may follow the industry trend of doing significant upgrading every couple of years, maybe even yearly. But he won’t budge on his insistence that the era of the big release isn’t over. He says that the major decisions on Vista’s successor will be made before his departure from a full-time role at Microsoft in mid-2008, and the release of this newbie in 2011 or whenever will generate just as much hubbub as previous launches. At that time, he jokes, “we’ll tell you how Vista just wasn’t good enough.” Oh, wow.

According to security researchers, Windows Vista’s speech-recognition feature is flawed and hackers could use it to remotely force a PC to execute commands.

Security researchers began offering details on how pranksters could exploit the speech technology just a day after the consumer launch of the new operating system.

A malicious Web site, for example, could load an audio file that shouts commands to shut down the operating system without the user’s authorization, they say.

While some security researchers believe Vista’s first public flaw is serious, Microsoft has downplayed the risk, noting that a targeted system’s speech-recognition feature would need to be configured correctly for the attack to be successful.

Microsoft insisted that Vista’s User Account Control feature could not be circumvented by speech commands. The new feature is responsible for not giving rogue programs administrator-level access to key operating system functions.

Windows Vista offers a high-end speech recognition feature in the built-in speech-to-text conversion software, which controls the Windows interface and dictating text.

Posted by Marc Wagner @ 4:35 pm