Vista is the future; time to just let XP go

Microsoft plans to discontinue sales of Windows XP on new computers on June 30, completing the company's transition to Windows Vista. The end of the XP era was originally planned for late 2007, but Microsoft gave its old operating system a stay of execution after listening to feedback from consumers and industry partners.

InfoWorld, a technology industry publication, is hosting a petition that allows consumers to pledge their support for Windows XP being sold beyond June. At press, more than 111,000 people have signed it.

Microsoft will continue providing tech support for XP through April 2009 and security updates through 2014. The significance of the June 30 deadline is that anyone purchasing a machine from Dell, HP or any other major manufacturer will be forced to adopt Windows Vista as the operating system.

I assure you, it won't hurt.

It's frustrating to read other technology columnists and magazines recommending that consumers keep installing XP on their new machines. XP was released in October 2001. As a point of reference, the original iPod was released in the same month.

The first generation iPod had 5 gigabytes of storage, a black-and-white video screen and was as thick as a pack of cigarettes. Today, it's much thinner and has 160GB of storage. Or, you can buy the more advanced iPhone.

The amount of innovation between Vista and XP is no less. Vista introduced improved search and browsing support in the Windows shell, improved stability and sidebar Gadgets. More important than the superficial updates, Vista is a more secure system than XP, which can help reduce malware and viruses.

Vista is the foundation for the future of Windows-based computing. Recommending to someone purchasing a new computer, one that he plans to use for the next three to five years, to install XP is irresponsible.

One of the main arguments against Vista is its speed compared with XP. Most PCs shipping today are built with a minimum of 1GB of memory and a graphics card capable of running all the bells and whistles offered by Vista. XP will run faster on these machines, but only because it was designed for machines running on 2001 hardware. Pentium 4, anyone?

Others argue that Vista isn't compatible with all printers and third-party accessories purchased in the past decade. Look at it as an opportunity to upgrade your antiquated hardware with the latest offerings.

If you're still using a peripheral that doesn't connect via USB, it's time to send it to the recycling center.

For those who remember, the jump from Windows 3.1 to Windows 95 was just as substantial. We all survived then, and I promise we will get through Vista together.

Vista is not without its flaws, but it's not the worst operating system Microsoft has ever released (I'm looking at you, Windows Millennium).

If you are purchasing a new machine, stop fretting over Vista and start embracing it.

Justin Williams is a local blogger and the owner of Second Gear, a local Web and software development firm. He can be reached at justin@secondgearllc.com.

Originally published in The Evansville Courier & Press

Price cut is just a start in repairing Vista image

Microsoft has announced price cuts for versions of its Windows Vista operating system. They are planned to go into effect with the release of Service Pack 1 later this month and will be applied to Vista Premium ($129 instead of $159) and Vista Ultimate ($219 instead of $299).

The cuts are the latest attempt by Microsoft to improve sales of the much-maligned OS. After many delays, Vista shipped in January 2007 to subpar reviews and a plague of compatibility problems.

One user uploaded a video to YouTube showing him putting Vista into a paper shredder after he was unable to install it on his new PC.

"It is the only machine I can successfully load it into," he said.

A year later, local computer shops are offering to downgrade new computers from Vista to Microsoft's previous offering, Windows XP. While downgrading a new machine from Vista to XP is unwise, I can understand the sentiment.

If Microsoft wants to repair Vista's image, a price cut is only the start. The entire Vista product line is confusing. Microsoft needs to consolidate to a single version. Currently, there are four versions of Vista with varying features and prices.

Computers are complicated enough without having to approach purchasing an operating system as if selecting an options package on a car. A single version of Vista with every feature enabled would cut down on the confusion and put all users on a level playing field.

Microsoft also needs to ensure that Service Pack 1 is a solid release, resolving many of the major complaints users have had with Vista's poor networking support, confusing user account management and slow performance.

More important than trying to repair the relationship users have with Vista, Microsoft needs to ensure that Windows 7, the next version of Windows, is a home run.

Hiring an all-star team to focus on improving the user experience of Windows going forward should be the priority. Ensuring that anyone can use the new operating system out of the box without having to consult a manual is key.

Microsoft also should remove all traces of legacy support in Windows 7. Vista has the ability to run software that was developed for Windows 95 and DOS.

There's no reason someone should expect software they purchased 13 years ago to work on a new machine. Rather than trying to embrace the past, put those resources toward improving the user's experience going forward.

If the next version of Windows is as big of a dud out of the gate as Vista, you can guarantee that Apple's market share will continue to rise and Microsoft will have something other than Google to worry about.

Justin Williams, a local blogger and the owner of Second Gear, a local Web and software development firm. He can be reached at justin@secondgearllc.com.

Originally published in the Evansville Courier & Press

Backup is vital and may be getting a bit easier

At a client job last week, I was discussing their current backup regimen — backing up their data three times each week to an external hard drive. This isn't uncommon in a business environment, but finding a similar setup at home is rare.

Backup is a lot like flossing: You know you're supposed to do it, but few people do it consistently. I can't blame them. Backing up a computer has always been difficult for novice users.

Both Apple and Microsoft have tried to ease the burden with their latest operating systems. All you need to get started is an external USB2 or Firewire hard drive.

Windows Vista includes the Backup and Restore Center, which has the ability to back up documents and photos to either an external drive or writable CD on a schedule the user defines. If the machine is running Windows Vista Ultimate and Business Edition, it also has the ability to do a complete backup of the system, which can get it back up and running quickly if the entire drive were to fail.

Apple's latest OS, Mac OS X Leopard, introduced Time Machine, a completely hands-off backup solution. I like Time Machine more than Vista's Backup and Restore Center because it's much easier to set up. Once you plug an external drive into your Mac, OS X will ask if you want to use that drive for Time Machine. Leopard will then take care of scheduling and backing up data automatically.

Time Machine and Vista's Backup and Restore Center can provide peace of mind against hard drive death and accidental file deletion, but it does little to protect against fire or other disasters.

Until recently, off-site backup was too expensive for the consumer market. As the price of hard drives and bandwidth drops, so has the cost of off-site data storage.

Amazon offers a cheap online storage service, S3, that costs pennies to transfer gigabytes of data. S3 was designed with developers in mind, but a company called JungleDisk offers a backup service for both Mac and Windows using S3.

JungleDisk allows users to schedule backups much as you can using Vista's Backup and Restore Center. It will then transfer files over your high-speed connection to Amazon's S3 servers. Depending on how much data is being transferred, the initial upload can take a few days, but subsequent backups will transfer only files that have changed since the last backup.

I may be more paranoid than most when it comes to losing data, but that's only because I have been the victim of it before. Once you lose something important, you want to ensure that it never happens again. A good backup regimen is the best way to do that.

Justin Williams is a local blogger and the owner of Second Gear, a local Web and software development firm. He can be reached at justin@secondgearllc.com.

Originally published in The Evansville Courier & Press

1Password is good tool to manage accounts

Ask anyone who knows the basics of computer security, and they'll recommend having a unique password for each Web site — it creates an extra layer of protection should a given account be compromised.

Unfortunately, most people have accounts on dozens of sites, and remembering a unique password for each of them isn't easy. I've been using an application on my Mac called 1Password (www.1password.com) to help manage the more than 200 accounts and passwords I have scattered around the Web.

1Password allows me to keep track of multiple logins for the sites I visit. For instance, I have multiple Paypal accounts, and I can store each account's password in the application for later reference.

1Password is both a stand-alone Mac application and a browser plug-in. Its usefulness shines when you see how it integrates in your Web browser. The application adds a toolbar button to Safari, Firefox and all other major Mac browsers that will detect login forms on a Web page.

When I go to the Paypal site, I can click the 1Password icon in Safari's toolbar and select which account I want to login with. 1Password will then pull the respective login and password from its database and automatically log me in. It is such a timesaver.

Beyond just passwords, I'm also able to store my identities (business and personal) and credit card information in 1Password for easy retrieval when I want to purchase items online. I'm more trusting of an application on my Mac to store my credit card information locally than I am keeping it stored at various online stores around the Web. It's also easier for me to update my credit card information if I lose my card or it expires, because I have a single place to edit it.

There are similar solutions for Windows users. RoboForm (www.roboform.com) offers an excellent alternative to 1Password for the Windows platform. It seamlessly integrates with both XP and Vista machines and is browser neutral. RoboForm integrates with Firefox, Internet Explorer and several other browsers available for Windows.

RoboForm is great for mobile users because it saves passwords and identities to Windows Mobile- and Palm-based PDAs. 1Password can also synchronize with Palm-based PDAs, as well as Apple's iPhone.

RoboForm offers both a free and pro version. The pro version has the added benefit of letting a user store more than two identities in the application, among other features. Most home machine users will be fine with the free version.

Both RoboForm Pro and 1Password retail for $29.95 and offer a free 30-day trial. Just as we've become accustomed to relying on our cell phone's address book rather than remembering individual numbers, after using a password and identity management application for a few weeks, I find it's hard to imagine using a computer without it.

Send e-mail to Justin Williams at justin@secondgearllc.com.

Originally published in The Evansville Courier & Press