Choosing Windows Vista...

Windows Vista has been around for a while and while many users tend to avoid it at all cost because of its resource hog, Microsoft step-by-step has "forced" users to switch to windows vista platform by announcing end-of-life of windows xp. Except the famous aero GUI, Microsoft has less to argue with customer about the new features in Windows Vista. Most users commonly will show any hesitations to switch to new platform, include me of course :P. Vista, being outperform by windows xp, makes many end users who still use old hardware decide to stick with windows xp.

But we cannot neglect the fact that windows vista has its advantages too, for example, better memory management and better multitasking support. Maybe in two or three years, in the advent of eight core, the performance advantage of windows vista will take into effects. But for right now, the wisest choice is to stay away from windows vista unless you own a very state-of-the-art hardware which has taken any single penny from your wallet :).

So for candidate windows vista users, you will face 5 editions of windows vista to choose, i.e :

1. Windows Vista Starter Edition
2. Windows Vista Home Basic
3. Windows Vista Home Premium
4. Windows Vista Business
5. Windows Vista Ultimate

Actually there are other windows vistas like windows vista entreprise, but it's for different market segment and end users are not advised to use them :).

Let's begin with windows vista starter edition. Again, just like windows xp starter edition, windows vista starter edition shares the same fate as its predecessor. Windows vista starter edition is purposedly built and marketed for poor countries like Indonesia (sigh-my country), India, Russia, etc.

But even with its price tag ($45) which Microsoft says it's really affordable, most of Indonesian people still hesitate to grab it. The wealthy one will tend to purchase windows vista ultimate or windows vista business since they have spent their almighty dollars for their dream machine. While the poor with poor hardware will drop any idea to use windows vista starter edition because their hardware simply cannot fulfill the requirement.

Of course for all of us, we use computer for making our work easier. So it's essentially very important to have computer system which won't become bottleneck itself. That's why although windows vista starter edition has been around for a while, the fuzz is not so popular here. I think Linux has better fame than windows vista starter edition in Indonesia ;).

For average home users, you simply have to choose of whether to grab windows vista home basic or home premium. If you don't want DVD playback capability bundled into the operating system and want to save more penny to buy third party movie playback software, then you can choose windows vista home basic. But if you like media center idea be integrated into your operating system, then you can go and buy windows vista home premium.

And yet, there are two editions left, windows vista business and windows vista ultimate. As we can read from its name, windows vista business is marketed for business user. So the feature integrated there are mostly for ensuring data integrity. Microsoft has decided to remove some entertainment capability exists on windows vista home premium from windows vista business. So in short, windows vista business is only meant for business user. Simply like that!

The others who are business users but also want some extra entertainment capability from windows vista home premium, can spend extra cash and buy windows vista ultimate. Just like its name, windows vista ultimate is the highest edition in windows vista, means it has the highest number of features integrated and bundled with the highest price that will suck up any hard-earned money you have from your wallet. Enough said..;)

Choosing Windows XP...

Do you know that there are 6 editions of windows xp? Most of us usually only know two editions of windows xp, i.e : Windows XP Home edition and Windows XP Professional edition. But actually there are 4 other editions, as follows :

1. Windows XP Tablet Edition
2. Windows XP Media Center Edition
3. Windows XP Professional 64bit edition
4. Windows XP Starter edition

Then end user are prone to be confused of choosing which windows xp that's right for them. For tablet user, it's easy since there is only one edition of windows xp. For desktop users, they must choose between 5 edition of windows xp. Failure to choose them will cost unsatisfaction (and money too). Through this article, I will try to provide some guide for choosing the right version ;).

If you are a home user and use your desktop pc only for entertainment, then the options can be narrowed down to 2 edition, i.e: Windows xp Home edition and windows xp media center edition. Choose windows xp home edition if you want to buy third party Movie player that you think better than windows media center have. Choose windows xp media center edition if you want to build HTPC with windows in your living room.

For power user who use computer in networking environment and needs remote access capability, then windows xp professional and windows xp professional 64bit edition are the options for you. How to choose them? Simple. If you need memory support more than 4GB, then you must choose windows xp professional 64bit because windows xp professional simply cannot recognise 4GB memory. If you insists to install 4 GB memory on pc with windows xp professional then it will be recognised as 3 G+ memory. Because 32 bit addressing will limit your usable memory address for 4G as a total in your system.

And what about windows xp starter edition? This version is only shipped to poor countries like Indonesia (my country :P), India, Srilanka, etc. This version of windows is released by Microsoft to provide people in poor country for "cheap and affordable" windows. However, this windows has been castrated and users are left with limited capabilities which make this edition is quite unpopular. I, myself, will simply choose Linux over windows xp starter edition, if somebody urges me to make decision :P. Well, $45 is still too much for limited windows edition anyway....

Windows XP End of Life on June 30, 2008

Microsoft has announced that some of its windows product will endure end of life per June 30,2008. Among those products that will be EOL-ed are :

1. Windows XP Professional
2. Windows XP Tablet PC Edition
3. Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
4. Windows XP Home Edition
5. Windows XP Media Center Edition

Windows XP has been known as the most fragile windows in terms of security (well speaking of numerous trojan and virus attacking this platform at every seconds, what can I say....). And it has been hampered by slow booting time if your pc has too many programs installed and run at startup. But, we cannot deny the fact that Windows XP is really a breakthrough jump from previous Windows 98SE. There are features in XP that're really helpful. And Windows XP can be considered lightweight if we compare it with Windows Vista products.

This movement is seemed done by Microsoft for pushing sales of its Windows Vista products since even Microsoft has obliged every system builder to incorporate Windows Vista for bundling with their hardware, many customer decide to downgrade to Windows XP later on because of performance issues. Windows Vista is really good in terms of advanced GUI. I really like the potential of having Aero in my pc but for most of us which use computer or notebook for business, the most important thing is ease of use. And we have used Windows XP for years, making us slightly hesitate to move to Windows Vista platform, haven't we?

For me personally, this is really a bad news since I have already used to windows xp GUI. I think at the end of the month, I will grab one of this oem license for my future HTPC since I have already buy a sound card which only has official windows XP driver. Time to to dig my savings :P....