Oh it was released you say? No, what we have now is still the beta right? OK a bit of sarcasm here but after 5 years in the making I’m just a tad disappointed. After the initial wow of watching the windows swell open and throb closed, I’m left deactivating annoying security features that seem to get more in my way than the hacker’s way. Now to be fair it takes time for a new operating system to settle in. I know this. I didn’t expect all my software to run and most of it does. I did expect Microsoft’s software to work though. That is why I was surprised when after installing the Fingerprint Reader (by Microsoft and “Vista ready”) software I started getting Internet Explorer errors. Whenever I shut down IE, I get an error that says IE has shut down (duh, that’s why I clicked the X) and is looking for a solution. Sometimes the solution can’t be found, other times IE just restarts. I have made a game of guessing which it will do. Uninstalling the Fingerprint Reader software solves the problem. It’s not just me, I’ve read forums where others are having the same problem and it isn’t just caused by the Fingerprint software.

Did they not test their own software on Vista? What about the Windows Mobile Device Center? So far it is just ActiveSync in a new suit. I have had trouble getting it to work at times and yes, it is out of beta too. People are opening up ports and other things to try and solve problems. This is fine for us geeks here but what about the person who just wants stuff to work and thinks a port is where a ship comes in?

MS can’t help 3rd parties lack of drivers but I can get mad about them. Creative Labs (I have their sound card) sill has beta drivers that are almost alpha drivers. What have those folks been doing for 5 years? We are not talking about some tiny company with two guys working in a garage. Actually they might have already gotten the job done. iTunes doesn’t work right though Apple says a fix is on the way. My Roxio Disc Creator application has seizures and just crashes sometimes. Did Vista just sneak up on these developers?

Am I being unreasonable here? The thing that keeps playing back in my head is “They have had 5 years.” All of them have had that and while I know the early builds don’t really count, we could say that Vista was in near final form in the last year. Judie and I will soon be attempting to upgrade our Fujitsu Tablets to Vista and I must say I have some trepidation about doing it. Not that it will stop us.

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