# Sign the Save Windows XP petition **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 14, 2008, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290 "2008-04-14T13:51:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/1 "2008-04-14T13:51:31Z")
If you don’t want Vista rammed up your nose, or other orifices… [http://weblog.infoworld.com/save-xp/](http://weblog.infoworld.com/save-xp/) (I think this is the right place for this message; if not, would a passing mod please relocated to where it should be?) ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/2 "2008-04-14T14:15:59Z")
Signed, but can’t see it making any difference. ---
**Author:** ![UncleRojelio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unclerojelio/32/3160_2.png) [@UncleRojelio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleRojelio)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/3 "2008-04-14T14:33:27Z")
I was reading some financial articles that out-and-out called Vista a failure and likely to affect the MS bottom line. Is Redmond still backing this horse? ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/4 "2008-04-14T14:46:38Z")
In a couple of years, after Vista has been stabilized by a variety of Service Packs and updates and people are screaming that they don’t want to switch to Windows 7 because “Vista is so much better!”, I’m going to laugh and laugh. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/5 "2008-04-14T15:11:33Z")
I’m already laughing. Vista - at that point in time - might well be better than whatever they push on us next, but that doesn’t necessarily make it better than XP now. ---
**Author:** ![Uncommon\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Uncommon\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncommon_Sense)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/6 "2008-04-14T15:11:49Z")
[QUOTE=Justin\_Bailey] In a couple of years, after Vista has been stabilized by a variety of Service Packs and updates and people are screaming that they don’t want to switch to Windows 7 because “Vista is so much better!”, I’m going to laugh and laugh. [/QUOTE] That’s kinda what I’m thinking too. I don’t recall, but I’m sure XP wasn’t lapped up by everyone as soon as it was released. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/7 "2008-04-14T15:14:15Z")
[QUOTE=Uncommon Sense] That’s kinda what I’m thinking too. I don’t recall, but I’m sure XP wasn’t lapped up by everyone as soon as it was released. [/QUOTE] As far as I can tell, the main reason for that was loss of legacy functionality - despite efforts on the compatibility front, XP forced a lot of older programs (all the way back to Win 3.1) to be discarded. Not sure if the same thing is true of Vista now though. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/8 "2008-04-14T15:38:58Z")
I’m totally Mac-centric but give XP its due, it is (was) one of the best Microsoft operating systems ever. And I sympathize about Vista. If it weren’t for Vista, more folks would be pointing at Leopard in perplexity, glancing back at Tiger and Panther and saying “what happened, Stevie?” I don’t think ours is quite as bad as yours but it’s not the upgrade we were waiting & hoping for. ---
**Author:** ![LionelHutz405](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lionelhutz405/32/536_2.png) [@LionelHutz405](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LionelHutz405)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/9 "2008-04-14T15:49:50Z")
[QUOTE=Justin\_Bailey] In a couple of years, after Vista has been stabilized by a variety of Service Packs. [/QUOTE] I don’t see what’s so funny. “Stabilized by a variety of service packs” means that they finally fixed all the stuff that doesn’t work now. People don’t want to move to a newer version of Windows if the newer version still needs a lot of bug fixing. They didn’t want to move to XP until it was fixed, they don’t want to move to Vista until it’s fixed and they won’t want to move to the next version of Windows until that’s fixed too. No need to laugh at people who are behaving in a sensible manner. They don’t want to move from a stable version to a newer, buggy, version. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/10 "2008-04-14T15:56:26Z")
[QUOTE=LionelHutz405] I don’t see what’s so funny. “Stabilized by a variety of service packs” means that they finally fixed all the stuff that doesn’t work now. People don’t want to move to a newer version of Windows if the newer version still needs a lot of bug fixing. They didn’t want to move to XP until it was fixed, they don’t want to move to Vista until it’s fixed and they won’t want to move to the next version of Windows until that’s fixed too. No need to laugh at people who are behaving in a sensible manner. They don’t want to move from a stable version to a newer, buggy, version. [/QUOTE] But no one is forcing anyone to switch. Bill Gates doesn’t personally come to your house and hold you up side down until enough change falls out to cover the cost of a Vista upgrade. It’s voluntary. And my wife’s laptop came preinstalled with Vista and I’ve had absolutely no problems with it. Even the supposed “nany features” where Vista is supposed to double-check you want to do something only appear when installing a new program. For word processing/Internet/email, Vista works perfectly fine. If it’s not good for your specialized needs, then don’t upgrade. ---
**Author:** ![JSexton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@JSexton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JSexton)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/11 "2008-04-14T16:01:38Z")
[QUOTE=Justin\_Bailey] But no one is forcing anyone to switch. Bill Gates doesn’t personally come to your house and hold you up side down until enough change falls out to cover the cost of a Vista upgrade. It’s voluntary. [/QUOTE] It’s vountary…unless you want to buy a new computer. Only Dell still offers XP, and only on a few models. Yes, you can wipe it and install XP, assuming you have a copy already, but good luck finding XP drivers for a lot of the newer hardware. ---
**Author:** ![LionelHutz405](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lionelhutz405/32/536_2.png) [@LionelHutz405](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LionelHutz405)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/12 "2008-04-14T16:05:01Z")
[QUOTE=Justin\_Bailey] For word processing/Internet/email, Vista works perfectly fine. If it’s not good for your specialized needs, then don’t upgrade. [/QUOTE] If you are buying a computer and you can’t buy one with the same operating system you already had then you have been forced to upgrade. The only choice you have now is what you are going to upgrade to. Staying with XP won’t be a choice if it is no longer available to purchase. ---
**Author:** ![Jayn\_Newell](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Jayn\_Newell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jayn_Newell)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/13 "2008-04-14T16:05:35Z")
[QUOTE=Justin\_Bailey] But no one is forcing anyone to switch. Bill Gates doesn’t personally come to your house and hold you up side down until enough change falls out to cover the cost of a Vista upgrade. It’s voluntary. [/QUOTE] Not entirely. It’s only voluntary for as long as you can still get copies of XP. If you need a new copy for some reason (certain computer upgrades will force this) and you can’t get XP, then you’re forced to get Vista. Even on new computers, some people would prefer XP to Vista–I’ve still yet to see any benefit to Vista over XP for most people, and several drawbacks (the main one being reduced speeds on the same machine. Hell, it’s supposed to be a better gaming OS, and even in that area it supposedly lags behind XP. I imagine for corporations with myriad machines, this is a bigger problem, because it’s easier to get them to talk to each other if they’re all running the same software. Frankly, from all I’ve heard, Vista is in virtually no way an ‘upgrade’ to XP. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/14 "2008-04-14T16:05:47Z")
[QUOTE=JSexton] It’s vountary…unless you want to buy a new computer. Only Dell still offers XP, and only on a few models. Yes, you can wipe it and install XP, assuming you have a copy already, but good luck finding XP drivers for a lot of the newer hardware. [/QUOTE] I guess my point is, why would you buy a brand new computer if you don’t like the software that runs it? Why not upgrade the hardware in a machine you’re already using for a fraction of the price? Beyond that, if you’re buying an off-the-shelf computer, what could you possibly be doing that makes Vista a poor choice? It’s just an operating system. ---
**Author:** ![Ximenean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/aca169/32.png) [@Ximenean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ximenean)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/15 "2008-04-14T16:08:19Z")
> [@](#): > > no one is forcing anyone to switch Microsoft have leant heavily on PC manufacturers to offer Vista and nothing else, only relenting recently. We’ve had batches of laptops where we just could not get them with XP pre-installed and had to create a company XP build from scratch. Not satisfactory because you never know what little manufacturer-specific drivers and settings you might be missing, and sure enough our roll-your-own XP versions of those laptops do not run quite as well as the factory built XP ones used to . We tried getting some XP factory disks out of the manufacturer, but they took four _months_ to arrive and turned out to be unreadable. ---
**Author:** ![Jayn\_Newell](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Jayn\_Newell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jayn_Newell)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/16 "2008-04-14T16:11:21Z")
[QUOTE=Justin\_Bailey] I guess my point is, why would you buy a brand new computer if you don’t like the software that runs it? Why not upgrade the hardware in a machine you’re already using for a fraction of the price. [/QUOTE] Last time we upgraded my husbands machine, we had to get a new OS. Because he was swapping out for a new mobo and CPU, it wouldn’t recognise it as the same machine, and his old code didn’t work. If XP weren’t still on the shelves, we’d have had to get him Vista. ---
**Author:** ![Purgatory\_Creek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/74df32/32.png) [@Purgatory\_Creek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Purgatory_Creek)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/17 "2008-04-14T16:22:02Z")
Interestingly, my employers just sent me a new PC (as my original one had apparently become disheartened by several years of residents saying “utilize” when “use” would do), and lo and behold, it is running Windows XP. I am quite pleased. No doubt I’ll be forced to use Vista at some time, but I’ll hold out for as long as possible to let those smarter than me figure out how to make it stop doing all of the annoying things Microsoft designed it to do. ---
**Author:** ![cormac262](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f14d63/32.png) [@cormac262](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cormac262)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/18 "2008-04-14T17:31:26Z")
[QUOTE=Mangetout] As far as I can tell, the main reason for that was loss of legacy functionality - despite efforts on the compatibility front, XP forced a lot of older programs (all the way back to Win 3.1) to be discarded. Not sure if the same thing is true of Vista now though. [/QUOTE] Not sure if it is to the same extent as the pre-XP to XP move, but “obsoleteling” my old applications is my single biggest gripe against Vista. This is particularly true with Adobe products (had to upgrade my Premier, and though I could get Photoshop to run, I was annoyed by the “this may not work correctly” warnings, so I upgraded Photoshop as well). There was a very conscious effort to make changes in Vista that would prevent older applications from running. MS is aware of this, and very conveniently informs you that you can no longer run your application (as opposed to attempting to, and crashing). The problem is, it doesn’t appear that MS informed all these other software producers that this change was coming about, or about the timing of the release. So if you go to software producer’s websites looking for an update, more times than not you’re SOL. I had a number of “utility” programs for all kinds of things that I had to dig around to find Vista compatible versions. And in some cases, I couldn’t find any. So I bought this fancy, high powered laptop thinking I could move over all my applications and work. And the bottomline is that I still need to keep my old computer around to be able to do certain things. I also develop software, and a number of 3rd party development tools (cross compiler, DEs) don’t run under Vista. So again, I’m still using my old computer. ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/19 "2008-04-14T17:35:01Z")
[QUOTE=Justin\_Bailey] I guess my point is, why would you buy a brand new computer if you don’t like the software that runs it? Why not upgrade the hardware in a machine you’re already using for a fraction of the price? [/QUOTE] Because my computer so old that upgrading every single thing individually is not worth the effort (and would, in fact, rival the cost of a brand new computer). I need a new mchine. I was planning on doing that this fall or winter, but instead - I’ll be doing it sometime in June. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2008, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290/20 "2008-04-14T20:40:34Z")
[QUOTE=JSexton] It’s vountary…unless you want to buy a new computer. Only Dell still offers XP, and only on a few models. Yes, you can wipe it and install XP, assuming you have a copy already, but good luck finding XP drivers for a lot of the newer hardware. [/QUOTE] And that’s where I am right now. We were burglarized a couple of weeks ago, lost the laptops. When I went to replace them, all I could get was Vista. So I said, okay, I’ll give it a shot. Piece of shit. I’m wiping it tonight. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sign-the-save-windows-xp-petition/445290.md?page=2)