Got my laptop back and the Apple/Scientology connection.

I got a new 15" Macbook Pro (the gen-1 MacBook had served me well for a couple of years). After getting Leopard right the version of BootCamp that comes with 10.5 is superb - makes installing Windows a breeze. As promised a few weeks back I went back to XP and what a revelation. It seems like I've got my computer back. It's snappy - Explorer windows appear as you double-click and network copies feel like their going over a LAN rather than a modem. If you are still stuck in Vista-hell then 'upgrade' to XP and you'll see what I mean. I used no Vista-specific features and so there were no compelling reasons for me to stay with it.
In an attempt to keep this new machine looking nice I went to the Apple Store on Regent's Street to buy one of those second-skin covers. Got a nice red one but felt quite uncomfortable being in there - I imagine it's how you'd have felt at a Nazi Youth Rally - so long as you're on-topic they love you, but mention that you run Windows or Linux on your MacBook and......
I wonder how how many of the folks who hang out in the Apple Store are Scientologists - I think the degree of compliance is similair!

Why I'm ditching Vista

I really have tried to like Vista - I've been using it for a year now on my work laptop - a Macbook (2 gigs RAM, Core Duo 2Ghz, 80gig Windows partition). I quickly turned off all the eye-candy (Aero Glass etc) but even so for the last year I've spent more time gazing at the spinning blue thing whilst waiting for trivial things (opening explorer windows or files to copy). It put me in mind of what I'd read Nicholas Negroponte say about modern electronics;

Prices of electronics keep dropping, but if you keep handing savings to the consumer, then there won't be a high price or margins. So manufacturers keep adding features, so the price can stay the same. Laptops, cell phones, etc. So an obesity occurs and turns most things into SUVs. Most of the gasoline is used to move the car, not the person....

You can listen to his keynote at CES this year - I lifted this from The World Technology Podcast's coverage. I like the way he compares the bloat of modern hardware/software with an SUV. You think that the multi-processor machine of 2008 should be able to hand file copying etc. better than the 80486 I was running in 1994!
So there you have it - Leopard, Ubuntu, and XP all run brilliantly on this machine and there are no compelling reasons for me to stay with Vista.

Kumala, kumala, kumala VISTA!

After trying to carve out a half-day to repave my Macbook with Vista I eventually got the chance. So, I threw in a new 160gig drive, re-loaded Tiger and used BootCamp v1.2 (which now comes with all the Vista drivers) and installed the copy of Vista Ultimate that James Clarke sent me straight from Microsoft!
Given that I have really enjoyed using this little MacBook for the last six months - it's been the fastest PC I've ever had for work purposes - I was interested to see how well Vista would run. I haven't been disappointed - I shall review my experiences with Vista soon, but here are a few thoughts about BootCamp 1.2 as it applies to the v.1 MacBook (white, dirty-white!);

• Although BootCamp includes a proper keyboard layout it doesn't install it as default. Go to the Language Bar and install it as the primary keyboard layout.


• The mouse-pad is a load more usable - including a very neat right-click feature and two-finger scrolling (as under OS-X)


• The remote works with MediaPlayer - very good, I now need to retrieve that unused gadget from the depths of my rucksack!


• The eyesight camera works (even thought the release notes say it won't).

Mark Russinovich: From Winternals to Microsoft

All Windows users owe Russinovich a huge debt;

• He discovered Sony's root-kit shenanigans
• He used to run SysInternals - a great resource for admins and power-users. Thankfully Microsoft have maintained it as part of TechNet.
• He's now part of the Windows Core team - watch the 55min clip on Channel 9 - I feel better about Vista already! (AND - thanks to Mr James Clarke) I'll be installing Ultimate Edition on my MacBook in the next few days.

More Vista thoughts

One of the biggest challenges... is to fight that perception that old versions of software are good enough,

- Chris Capossela, Microsoft.

I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions and how you might paraphrase that particularly insidious bit of marketing speak! Anyhow - having decided I'd lay off Vista until at least SP1 (good advice with any Microsoft product!) I heard Paul Thurrott's most recent Windows Weekly podcast where he put to rest some of the fears over licensing and even suggested that on most hardware the Vista experience was a good one. My five month old MacBook seemed too under-powered (having motherboard graphics) to be a candidate but he reckons he's tried it and it's all good. Then I caught last week's Security Now! with Steve Gibson who had a totally different take on things. Oh well - I don't anyone who has build 6000 (the final RTM version) and so I can't get any real advice.