Windows 7 May
- Thread starter bigd54
- Start date
tlarkin
VIP Member
I mean to be fair every OS adopts anything that is innovative, but these last few years it seems more people are taking a hint from Apple than most other OSes.
A lot of times a new feature will be put in Windows that has been in Linux for years. Windows may not implement it the same way but the results of the technology are always the same and they do the same task under the hood, just you use them differently.
Bodaggit23
Active Member
Well, most cars have 4 wheels, shiny paint, a speedometer, engine, trunk, etc.
It's just the way it goes. And just because someone comes up with a good idea
doesn't mean someone else can't do it better.
It's just the way it goes. And just because someone comes up with a good idea
doesn't mean someone else can't do it better.
tlarkin
VIP Member
Well, most cars have 4 wheels, shiny paint, a speedometer, engine, trunk, etc.
It's just the way it goes. And just because someone comes up with a good idea
doesn't mean someone else can't do it better.
Well I agree with that, but I have yet to see Microsoft do it better except with a few different things, and none of them are in the end user OS. Their server side products are great. Microsoft makes some real robust and great server side products. They totally ripped all their modern networking technology from Novell, and then put them out of business by a more aggressive marketing technique.
There is something to be said about a company that just eats up and swallows smaller companies and still can't make a good product. It happens once a company gets too big and it happens to lots of companies. I can parallel this to Cisco, their products are getting worse and worse and are still freaking expensive.
Look at American cars, and one reason why they failed is their business model. I recently read that most Asian car makers lived by a rule that every new model you could only do up to two major engineering changes. Meaning that they only changed two major things to work out all the bugs and create a more reliable car.
Microsoft buys companies every day that make a great product but are small fish. Whether or not MS implements the technology they buy to make it useful or just buy it and shelf it to control competition is not known.
So when you have an OS and platform like apple, which has gained over 8% market share in the past 7 years (which is a HUGE increase for only 7 years) yeah MS is going to look at what they are doing and they are going to copy what they thing they are doing right to try to keep their market dominance.
Just because something is the most widely used does not mean it is the best, it just means it is the most marketed.
Bodaggit23
Active Member
I think Microsoft makes a fine product. Many of them.
Nobody's perfect.
Talk about "control"? Look it up in a dictionary and you'll see a picture of Steve Jobs.
Nobody's perfect.
Talk about "control"? Look it up in a dictionary and you'll see a picture of Steve Jobs.
tlarkin
VIP Member
I think Microsoft makes a fine product. Many of them.
Nobody's perfect.
Talk about "control"? Look it up in a dictionary and you'll see a picture of Steve Jobs.
You mean Steve Balmer?
speedyink
VIP Member
While I completely agree with the market dominance problems I think for what Microsoft is doing they are making a pretty good product. My options are pretty much Windows or Linux, since Mac doesn't just sell their OS (and I'm not paying the premium for the hardware, I'm all about the savings
). Since I don't want to screw with my OS all the time or have any problems installing software or hardware like I had in all my linux experiences, I went with Windows. So for my price point and for what I use my computer for yes, Windows is the best for me. Kind of like how some of us drive Porches and some of us drive Pontiacs
Last edited:
dubesinhower
New Member
thats like saying the original xbox ripped off the ps2. its a generation gap. it wasnt ripping anything off, these are just the new technologies of the time.
bomberboysk
Active Member
Well, if anyone here wants to know, windows wasnt the first os to have a gui either, microsoft created windows to compete with apples os.
dubesinhower
New Member
but the apple os wasnt the first os either.
tlarkin
VIP Member
While I completely agree with the market dominance problems I think for what Microsoft is doing they are making a pretty good product. My options are pretty much Windows or Linux, since Mac doesn't just sell their OS (and I'm not paying the premium for the hardware, I'm all about the savings
Kind of like how some of us drive Porches and some of us drive Pontiacs
However, you do pay the premium for premium items. A Sony TV versus a Poloroid TV costs a lot more. A Porsche costs more than a Honda Civic. A filet mingon cost more than ground beef.
MS makes a mediocre product for the the price, and they run the market. Trust me, 10 years ago SMS and other Windows technology could not hold a stick to Novell and Zen works. It really has to do with marketing more than anything else. You can kind of parallel it to pop culture, and yes Apple definitely does the same thing with marketing which has given them the +7% market share over the past 6 years. Marketing has a lot to do with it.
When it comes down to the core robust features, Windows technically delivers the least amount, however, they appeal to the masses and the masses are used to it. We live in strange times, times where half the people on this planet don't know anything about technology and some straight up fear it.
I would really like to see 300 years into the future, what will happen then? When technology is so integrated into our lives everyone is just plain tech savvy.
Windows did make a very straight forward and easy to use product up to XP, but even myself, a veteran of technology, found Vista clunky and hard to navigate. It took me over 20 minutes to just turn a feature off the first time I touched it.
However, Windows delivers an ease of use system that most OSes can't quite reach and I will give them that, however, they are far from the best OS in my personal opinion.
Bodaggit23
Active Member
No. I mean Steve Jobs.
Anyway, I must congratulate everyone posting in this thread. Although
it has turned into another Mac/Windows debate, it's remained civil and pleasant. :good:
Anyway, for me, Windows is the nicest looking, most versatile OS I can buy
to put on my PC.
Seriously, I can't even buy OSX and put it on my PC (legally), and that leaves Linux...
tlarkin
VIP Member
No. I mean Steve Jobs.
Anyway, I must congratulate everyone posting in this thread. Although
it has turned into another Mac/Windows debate, it's remained civil and pleasant. :good:
Anyway, for me, Windows is the nicest looking, most versatile OS I can buy
to put on my PC.
Seriously, I can't even buy OSX and put it on my PC (legally), and that leaves Linux...
You have seen Compiz Fusion right? Anyway, it is all a rip of Sun's "Project Looking Glass," and all the eye candy for all the OSes ripped off their innovation first. Windows is not even close to the best looking eye candy out there, in fact they are probably bottom of the barrel in many people's opinion.
[YT]_ImW0-MgR8I[/YT]
Droogie
New Member
what do you mean by core robust features? i find it hard to believe that windows is the most popular simply because of the marketing. ease of use is a good thing, sure linux has a lot of cool eye candy, but for me that isn't a major selling point (for lack of a better term since linux is free
). when it comes down to it, i want my os to be compatible with all my hardware, software, games, etc. and windows by and far (for my needs) delivers the best. like you said though it's all really just a matter of opinion, i'm used to windows, been using it since windows 95. it most likely will always be my main os, unless i deciede to quit gaming, lol.
Andy-
New Member
I cannot talk about how technology was 10 years ago, because I do not remember.
But I do know that Microsoft was a very good corporation until Vista's release.( Trying to get the topic back to Microsoft )The phase starting from W95 and ending with XP was a terrific and not to mention profitable phase for Microsoft.
It got expensive right after XP, I'm pretty sure that XP was expensive itself tho, not really sure.
Back to comparing Linux to Windows:
Linux is way better because of it's power, and simplicity( simple yet effective tho ), Windows loads a bunch of processes without any permission from the user to do so. Dual boot, that was a terrific boost for Linux...
Anyway, enjoyed the discussion, would be nice if it could be continued tho
tlarkin
VIP Member
what do you mean by core robust features? i find it hard to believe that windows is the most popular simply because of the marketing. ease of use is a good thing, sure linux has a lot of cool eye candy, but for me that isn't a major selling point (for lack of a better term since linux is free
Kernel > Shell > GUI, POSIX, and a command line interface for everything you do makes it way more robust and way more secure. It is how the OS handles requests and commands by the end user, or say a program, or say even a virus.
Why are there no self propagating viruses in the wild for Unix, Linux or OS X? That is because by nature they really can't exist. I am sure there are kernel hackers out there that find zero day exploits but it doesn't happen. The argument of that they have a small market share is a fair one, but also moot. Unix runs the internet, Unix runs DNS for everything, it isn't Windows. If you wanted to crash the whole internet you would have to bring down all the Unix DNS servers world wide.
As far as ease of use goes, OS X trumps Windows on that front so much. The lack of a clunky, retarded, bloated registry makes it easier to use by far. The Mac is the king of ease of use, but most people are sucked into the marketing that is Windows. Windows marketed itself to every single machine manufacturer world wide, and then got into every market. Once you are the main desktop OS you can market your way into Networks and servers rather easily.
Back in the early 90s, probably before you used a computer heavily, Apple had clones you could build and load their OS on, and other companies besides apple made them. You can still find them for sale and some people still like them, I could care less. Apple lost so much money and almost went bankrupt because of it. This was because Microsoft already aggressively marketed to a wide variety of companies and put Windows 3.11 on everything they could. The technology boom was hitting and all these start up companies wanted to sell computers, but didn't necessarily want to build the own OS.
When you look at the term 'robustness' it goes along the lines of what the end user can do, from the most novice of novices to the expert power user. Windows offers very little in this area for the most advanced users. Users that want to write shell scripts and want to automate things, run things over ssh and what not. Sure Windows has batch files, but the API for them sucks big donkey balls. Sure you can develop in C+ but that requires programming knowledge, where as every other OS out there has the command structure built in.
Which allows for developers to do lots of cool things and share resources. I mean Compiz-Fusion is leagues beyond Aero and Aqua. It is because there is a following of talented developers, robust APIs and command lines features, and open source codes that allow them to develop such things.
It is a perspective I have gained after many many years of using computers. I have been using Linux for many years but it was never really my main OS, and until OS X 10.4 I was pretty much still a main Windows user.
Microsoft does do somethings right, they do. However, their new marketing scheme just pisses me off. Why would I want to pay for feature limits? It is dumb. They should just make one OS, period.
Bodaggit23
Active Member
TLDR.
Ease of use...I can't buy OSX and put it on myPC. I'd be forced to buy Apple hardware. You can put Windows on almost anything really. What does that say for Apple marketing?
Also, if there was just one Windows version, people would complain that they're paying for features they don't need. Not everyone needs a Business or Ultimate package, so why make them pay for it.
You have a choice to buy what you need. Who cares if there's versions that have less features if you're not going to buy it anyway? lol
tlarkin
VIP Member
You are confusing hardware and OS, which are two separate entities. You can say PC versus Mac or OS X versus Windows. We are comparing OSes to OSes, not hardware to hardware.
What is the difference between home vista and business vista? the ability to connect to a domain and receive group policy, and what is the price difference?
What is the cost of any other pay for OS? What do you get when you buy those OSes? Oh yeah you get everything.
It is a marketing scheme.