Thanks for the detailed reply Moose. Good to hear the vote of confidence in
Vista.
I agree to the idea of 'have both' and in fact we're not short of computers
int his household.
Work provides me with an hp laptop which stays hooked up in my home office
except for the rare occasions I travel. And I acquired a Toshiba Satellite
which I lug around the house for any sofa browsing I want to do. Then this
ancient Dell sits alongside me in the home office managing the photos and
some personal stuff. And my wife has a newer Dell desktop with 17" LCD for
her photos and general stuff. Her display is now putting my trinitron to
shame.
All on wifi, and each (except the Toshiba) with an external USB2 backup hdd
connected (running Syncback thanks to recommendations from this list), plus
a network hdd for double backup of our photos.
So I think Plan A is still in place.
thanks and best regards
jez
On Nov 15, 2007 10:56 PM, Moose <olymoose@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Jez Cunningham wrote:
> > Hmm - thanks Nathan. Yeah, Vista being so new scares me, whereas XPpro
> has
> > been rock solid since I got rid of ME. I am rather conservative about
> it
> > (only went to SP2 a few weeks ago) but I'd like to avoid an OS upgrade
> in
> > the life of this next machine. I did go through it on this machine but
> it
> > wasn't 'a walk in the park'.
> >
> I try to follow the same plan you do, new OS pre-installed on new
> hardware, avoid upgrades.
>
> I bought a new desktop with Vista several months ago. Although there are
> a few, relatively minor interface/operation differences, it has been a
> fairly smooth transition. Biggest problem was drivers, which should be
> better as hardware makers get their drivers updated.
>
> Once I realized that most of the driver trouble I was having, which was
> only with a few, was with the driver installer, not the driver itself, I
> would set the installer app for compatibility with an earlier version of
> Win, it would then run and install the driver and all would be well.
>
> As to stability, Vista has been stable from the beginning, significantly
> more so than XP. I know everybody assumes each new version of Windoze
> will be flaky at first, then slowly get more stable over time, finally
> becoming really decent about the time a new version comes out.
>
> At least for me, that model has not applied to Vista.
>
> As to the desktop vs. laptop question, my answer is one of each, for a
> few major reasons:
>
> - They act as back-ups to each other. My life is now computer dependent
> enough, with on-line banking, bill payment, etc., that I am
> uncomfortable with only one. I backup my financial files to flash
> storage usable on either one. And the notebook runs XP, just in case I
> need something that won't run under Vista.
>
> - As others have pointed out, laptop screens in general are poor for
> image editing. I thought the one on my Vaio was pretty decent, better
> than a lot of others I looked at - until I tried some editing on the
> road recently. It calibrates OK, but the viewing angle is very narrow
> for accurate color. It's just not comfortable and useful for that
> purpose except in a pinch.
>
> - I actually use my notebook for travel - for on-line access and for
> image storage and review. And I am unwilling to carry around the
> "portables" with big screens, just too heavy and unwieldy for travel.
> With on-line financial connections, I can go on the road essentially
> indefinitely without having to have someone open my mail, pay bills for
> me, etc.
>
> - The flexibility and expandability of the desktop is just too useful to
> abandon. Simple example. With all the images I generate, I need lots of
> storage, both primary and backup. With eSATA, an external drive performs
> just like it's inside the box, no performance penalty at all. And a
> backplane header for eSata comes with the external enclosure. To use
> them with a portable, I would need to buy a relatively expensive PC card
> eSATA interface, and couldn't just leave it connected when I need the PC
> card slot for some other use. And it will be much slower than the direct
> connection on a desktop.
>
> Moose
>
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