R.I.P. Windows Vista

If anyone says "The wow ends now", they can expect to be torn to shreds. Combined with Start9's continued Vista support, that should give you a sense of how I feel about Vista.

I do agree with a lot of that, but there were still a lot of good things Vista introduced.

- The volume control on Vista is undoubtedly better than XP's. The ability to control the volume of individual applications is simply a wonderful feature. I use XP on my main laptop, and I keep forgetting I don't have this feature.

- Vista's Task Scheduler is miles ahead of XP's, providing many more options for creating scheduled tasks. The only real issue I have with it is it's easy to lose track of certain tasks compared to XP, as it has many different folders.

- Vista also greatly improved on security. Like you said, UAC was a good security feature, even if its frequency quickly became annoying for users (Windows 7 fixed this issue by giving you options to control how often UAC will prompt the user).

- As much as I love the Windows 2000-style classic login screen, Vista's login process is more secure with features like Session 0 isolation. (regardless, I'd still like replacement LogonUI.exe that gives you a login screen that LOOKS like the classic Win2k one, but done using the Vista+ login process).

- Windows Update was also superior to XP's, as you had all the advanced options for unhiding updates and such it right there instead of having to open Internet Explorer to do it like you did in XP.

- The shell folder layout is more intuitive than XP's. For example, the user profile folder is actually put to good use in Vista, and stuff like Pictures and Music are no longer thrown into "My Documents". The Application Data/AppData folders are also more organized in Vista, so you can access the Local and Roaming AppData folders easily.
GRANTED, this behavior can be re-created in Windows XP and even Windows 2000, but it takes a lot of work just to set up (still, I tend to take the time to set up my 2000/XP/2003 machines this way).

- Vista introduced DWM. It could be disabled if the user wanted to do so. Enough said.



Now when it comes to things like the file manager, I actually do agree with more or less everything you said. But even with all that, it did bring some improvements.

Even if you don't use it, it is nice to be able to resize icons to just about whatever size you'd like under 256x256px for each folder. The only real issue I have with it is, like you mentioned, the removal of the classic behavior for 32x32px icons. That is something that I really dislike.

Another positive with Vista's file manager are the added keyboard shortcuts, such as Alt+Up (which can be added to XP with AutoHotKey). I also like how backspace actually brings you back to the previous directory instead of 'up' a directory, but to be fair, that's more my own personal taste than it is anything else.


As for stuff like the command bar and the NavBar and the TreeView? Yeeeaaaaaaaah, the removal of customizable features like that is one of the worst things about Vista for me. And unfortunately, a lot of that can be seen in the file manager.

Oh, and don't get me started on those damn folder thumbnails. Such an annoying 'feature'! I mean I'd be okay with it if it was only for icon sizes that were, say, 96x96 or higher (which was pretty much Windows 2000/XP's behavior) or even 64x64px or 72x72px. But on 48x48px and 32x32px icons, it's borderline pointless. The only thumbnails that are good at those sizes are file thumbnails (such as for pictures, videos, etc.) but certainly not on folders. And I hate how it's 'all or nothing' with thumbnails too. Something like that should really be controlled by the user.



I'm okay with changes. Really, I am. But only as long as the user is given the choice to customize/change things the way they want. And one change I'm almost never okay with is the removal of customization. XP handled its changes really well, allowing the user to use an interface that's close to identical to Windows 2000, or even Windows 95. Vista was the first version of Windows that didn't allow for this, and unfortunately Windows has only become less customizable since then with every new release.

Vista did improve on many things, but it also took a lot of steps back in many areas too. You can say that Vista was the "beginning of the end" in terms of quality for Windows if you'd like. But I still like to recognize the good things as well as the bad. Overall, I really don't think Vista is a terrible OS. I'm just not a fan of the removal of customization.

Totally agree with you anixx

I can't vouch for vista, but when you drag an icon in classic theme on xp you see a transparent icon under the mouse cursor (or group of icons if you multi-selected).

If you do the same in 7 you see a little rectangle instead of the icon.

omg they ended vista support i will cry myself to sleep every night now ..

I liked vista, however 7 was clearly an improvement, 8.x a step back and then 10 a step forward but with more bloat.

At least Windows Vista is still better compared to what we currently have *cough* *cough* Windows 11.