Aviran's Place

[KilleRabbit]

In a web seminar I watched recently, Microsoft answered some Q&A. I thought you might find this useful information.

Q: Is vista available in both 32bit and 64bit?
A: Yes 64 bit will be the standard for Vista, and 32-bit will be considered legacy.

Q: Will there be 16 bit support?
A: No

Q: Will you be able to upgrade from 32bit to 64?
A: Not sure at this point in time

Q: Does Vista work better with Intel or AMD processors?
A: Both companies are good and Vista will work well with both.

Q: Will Vista include features from MCE?
A: Some of the Vista versions will

Q: what's the video card requirement for Vista?
A: Most video cards will work under Vista, however, Vista Beta 1 supports a wide range of graphics cards with LDDM driver support enabling the use of the Aero Glass theme. Some of the latest cards including the NVidia 6800 and 7800 were not LDDM verified at the time of Vista Beta 1 release, but NVidia and ATI both put out Alpha versions of their drivers for Vista for those who own unsupported cards.

Q: when will vista be on the market
A: Next Fall

Q: How many Vista versions will there be?
A: Still up in the air, but looking at 6 or 7 right now.

Q: Will there be an embedded version, like XP Embedded?
A: yes

Q: Will there be a server version?
A: Vista server is Longhorn (which is a 2007 release)

Q: Can XP and Vista be installed on same workstation for dual booting?
A: Yes

Q: Do we need any Antivirus software for Vista?
A: AV is always needed...unknown if something will be built in

Q: Will it be possible to upgrade Windows 2000 Pro To Vista upgrade?
A: Yes

Q: Will Visa have better drive support than Windows XP Pro 64-bit, like printer and scanner drivers?
A: Unfortunately, driver development is up to the 3rd party devices companies, not MSFT.

Q: will there be any vista version without DRM
A: Probably Not

Question: Will vista cost more than XP?
Answer: Depends on the version.

Q: Will the firewall be improved from the one in XP Pro?
A: Yes

Q: Does Vista have the new file system WinFS?
A: No...WinFS will be an after release feature pack

Q: Is vista a new kernel or based on xp?
A: No, it is based on Windows 2003 server

Q: Will boot time be faster?
A: Yes, and also faster resume from hibernation and standby

Q: Where can I check the hardware requirements for Windows Vista
A: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/windowsvista/evaluate/hardware/default.mspx

Q: What is the RAM Requirements for Vista?
A: PC systems should have 512MB of memory or more.

Q: How can I get access to Windows Vista Beta?
A: Beta 1 is restricted only to selected people however Beta 2 will be broadly available to all in Winter 2005.

And one last thing - Windows vista will have 3D desktop view (will be available in Beta 2)

[TheHog]

Cool

[donashton]

You indicated that MS would have us choose between the 32 bit and the 64 bit versions of Vista. Yet I have read elsewhere that MS says that the migration to 64 bit will be easier and less messy than the migration from DOS (16 bit) to 32 bit. I don't understand

Also, elsewhere I have read that Vista is backwards compatible to 32 bit and even 16 bit programs. Your source however indicated pretty clearly that we would have to choose between 32 bit and 64 bit versions. Does anyone know what the real deal is?

I'm trying to decide about buying a new computer that will need to last for 3-5 years, and don't want to get trapped in legacy software, but don't want to unnecessarily speculate on what MS may or may not do.

[Aviran]

donashton, Vista will NOT support 16 bit applications, but as for 32 bit apps, it will support these without any problem, so you can work with both 64 and 32 bit apps.

As for hardware that will last for several years, I would suggest (and so is microsoft) to buy a 64 bit processor, even if you are not going to run a 64 bit OS to begin with, but you can always upgrade later to a 64 bit OS.