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I’ve been working on getting Windows Vista Business Edition loaded this weekend. Currently, I have it setup in a dual boot with Windows XP. I ran the Vista Beta for a few months, and enjoyed it even though it was a bit slow. I’m pleased to say the final release of Vista seems to operate a lot faster than the Beta did. Here are some of the things I’ve ran into during this initial setup.

1. The start menu of course has changed, and I believe for the better, no more pop-out menus. Hooray!!!





2. Windows Mobile center automatically detected my Dell Axim, and after I deleted current partnerships it started syncing up just fine. I like the Interface here also.





3. I keep getting these pop up messages about switching my color scheme. Currently I’m running Windows Aero, but anytime I open Macromedia Fireworks, Trillian, or any web page with Active X content it switches my Color Scheme to Windows Basic. It’s somewhat annoying, but the good news is as soon as I close the program causing the problem Vista automatically goes back to Aero.





4. Vista has some black and white wallpaper choices…finally. I don’t like my wallpaper to be noisy and generally I stick with just a plain color, but now Vista has added a few black and white selections.





5. Vista Help and Support is actually helpful. I had to search for where to change the hidden files settings and when I went to Help and Support there was an option that Vista would do it for me. I clicked and boom Vista changed the setting. I was shocked.





6. Of course there are some program compatibility issues that I have noticed. Zone Alarm gives a big warning and I had trouble installing AVG. My AVG Resident Shield still will not load, even though it ran in Beta and AVG claims it should work.





7. Adobe Illustrator fussed a little after install and told me I did not have privileges. I went to help and support and Vista suggested I right click the program icon and go to the Compatibility tab. Once there I could tell it to “Run this program as an administrator” and what do you know……..Vista Help and Support came through again.

My overall Vista satisfaction rating is about an 8, even though Vista only rates my experience as a 2.6.





I would still recommend people wait 6 months to upgrade and give software companies time to work out these minor issues.

Tara Hunt riffs on the idea of Higher Purpose:

The concept of Higher Purpose has grown from an inkling of a gut feeling for me to a full-blown important meme for what I’m thinking…even more important than embracing the chaos. As I’ve said before, this is not your mission or vision statement. It is not akin to Guy Kawasaki’s mantra. It’s not an exercise in exploiting people’s desire to believe in something.

Do you have a Higher Purpose?