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[DaveLister]

I bought a new HP dv9500t fully loaded for engineering use. After about a week of trying to get pro apps running I dumped Vista and loaded XP. It took me two days to find all the drivers but now that I have it I am very glad I did it.

My issues:

1. Vista sucked up too much memory given the apps I was running.

2. I hated the new window manager, and there was no way to get back to XP's Luna without shelling out more money

3. The folder views have no way of adding buttons for common tasks as in all Windows OS's in the past down to Windows 95.

4. Increasing complexity of configuring the machine for a engineering power user as opposed to an office worker or gamer.

5. Still more services running in the background.

Note that many of these would be trivial for Microsoft to fix. Will they?

[Inferno_str1ke]

As far as background services are concerned do remember that the basic "safe" level for background stuff is set by the OS - whilst I would be aghast if I had 45 processes on boot with XP thats about the minimum you'll get with Vista, so the same as always just make sure random crap isn't starting up needlessly.

I'd never thought about the adding buttons thing but now you mention it it does seem silly, though in general I like both the look and the usability of the new explorer - I always used WindowBlinds for XP but haven't done any skinning away from individual apps with Vista. Incidentally what type of Engineering use is it being put to?

[DaveLister]

I run chip and FPGA design tools in many various flavors.....I'd run Linux but the tools are all more expensive for Linux than for Windows. When I need Linux I use cgywin or run Suse in a Vmware machine.

[xpgeek]

With services tweaked, a bunch I just don't need running, anti-virus totally shut down, and nothing running, "gaming mode" I call this, 16 active process' on XP. Same situation on Vista, 32. Literally twice as many.

Doesn't really bother me tho, except, when actually gaming. I did actually notice my big games, like a very heavy resource using huge game like Company of Heroes, running MUCH better on XP. I've been dual booting for a while just to play with Vista every once in a while, but its definitely still XP Pro as my main.

[Ryan Wagner]

The thing you need to understand with Vista and memory usage is that Vista likes to use the available memory. It preloads your most used programs into memory so that they start almost immediately after clicking on an icon. If an application needs the memory that Vista is using for that the OS will release it.

[xpgeek]

Thats all nice and improved yada yada, but as I've experienced myself, and any PC gamer will tell you, games still run MUCH better pn XP.

[Michael Dobrofsky]

The thing you need to understand with Vista and memory usage is that Vista likes to use the available memory. It preloads your most used programs into memory so that they start almost immediately after clicking on an icon. If an application needs the memory that Vista is using for that the OS will release it.

Not for me, it doesn't I stopped it super-fetching and it's much better without it on a low-end memory laptop. The superfetch thing bugged the hell outta me. And also, I found the "release" of memory if an application needed it, with superfetch going, mighty s-l-o-w. Just my experience.

[DaveLister]

I don't want the OS prefetching a bunch of programs. The startup time for most of my programs is IRRELEVANT. I'm most interested in performance once the program is running. XP kicks Vista hands down so far.

[Ryan Wagner]

I don't want the OS prefetching a bunch of programs. The startup time for most of my programs is IRRELEVANT. I'm most interested in performance once the program is running. XP kicks Vista hands down so far.

You can always disable the Super Fetch feature though.

[OldManDeath]

I don't want the OS prefetching a bunch of programs. The startup time for most of my programs is IRRELEVANT. I'm most interested in performance once the program is running. XP kicks Vista hands down so far.

You can always disable the Super Fetch feature though.

How is this done?  Also is this why I see the path bar in Windows Explorer doing a green bar running across from left to right (like a progress bar) whcih causes any file transfer to stop and wait for it to finish?  This is irritating the hell out of me.

[Ryan Wagner]

No, I don't think that would be why that green bar takes so long. I think that is a networking issue. Not sure if you've tried SP1 yet, but I bet that will solve the issue.

To disable Superfetch just go to the Start Menu, and type in Services. Then from the list of services find Superfetch listed. Right click on it and choose Properties, then under Startup choose disabled. Then restart your computer.

[OldManDeath]

No, I don't think that would be why that green bar takes so long. I think that is a networking issue. Not sure if you've tried SP1 yet, but I bet that will solve the issue.

I have SP1 installed thinking it would fix it, but it did not.  It could be the crappy AT&T DSL service I have as it has the combined DSL Modem/Switch.  I'm thinking of separating it and putting my own switch in and disabling the built in switch and see if that takes care of it.

[Inferno_str1ke]

Thats all nice and improved yada yada, but as I've experienced myself, and any PC gamer will tell you, games still run MUCH better pn XP.

I get a frame or two per second extra on XP, that's about it. This is on my Athlon 64 3000+ with 1GB of RAM and an x700 pro so it isn't exactly a gaming ninja. I prefer the way Vista works, even down to the fact that it doesn't add "My" to every folder that I keep stuff in.

[Ryan Wagner]

I prefer the way Vista works, even down to the fact that it doesn't add "My" to every folder that I keep stuff in.

Ha, that's just one thing I took for granted in Vista. I know that I've noticed it, but I don't think that it really sank in that they removed "My" from the folders.

[El Guru (Al)]

No, I don't think that would be why that green bar takes so long. I think that is a networking issue. Not sure if you've tried SP1 yet, but I bet that will solve the issue.

To disable Superfetch just go to the Start Menu, and type in Services. Then from the list of services find Superfetch listed. Right click on it and choose Properties, then under Startup choose disabled. Then restart your computer.

Your directions assume people are using the 'Vista' (default) Start Menu, not the 'Classic' Start Menu. At least I recalled this from when I had disabled Superfetch prior.