Archive for Rant

A tale of 2 upgrades

// January 11th, 2010 // No Comments » // Featured, Rant

Differences between Apple and Micrsoft explained

Differences between Apple and Micrsoft explained

A few months back, I elected to upgrade my MacBook’ operating system from Leopard to Snow Leopard, Apples latest and greatest incantation. I was a little apprehensive, having never done an OS upgrade on an Apple machine before (My MacBook is my first). Would it screw up my existing settings? Would my applications still work? Would it install useless crap that I’d have to spend days deleting just to make it useful? And most importantly, would have to find a free weekend in which to do it?

Not having a free weekend, and feeling a little bit cocky, I decided to install it while watching TV one night. Here’s how it went down…

  1. Insert DVD into MacBook and follow instructions on the screen
  2. Confirm with password that I authorize the update, yep…
  3. Churn, Churn, Churn (5 mins)
  4. OK a few questions about what options I want to activate or not
  5. Churn, Churn, Churn, Churn (30 mins or so…. was caught up in the show I was watching)
  6. Beep, Reboot… what the hey… it’s done?
  7. Test, everything works as it did before!

Less than an hour and I was completely done, no fuss, no muss.

Fast forward to this last weekend. My in-laws purchased a new HP PC in October with Windows Vista Premium on it. It came with a free upgrade to Windows 7, which we applied for right away. Last week, the DVD finally arrives in the mail and I go over there to help them do the upgrade. Here is how that went down:

  1. What the hey? There are 2 DVDs, one from HP labelled “Upgrade Assistant”, the other the Windows 7 upgrade. Hmmm…. and just why does the upgrade need an assistant I wonder?
  2. Review instructions
    1. Perform Full Backup…. that will take forever, let’s skip it
    2. Run Windows update to make sure Vista is full up to date… I have auto updates on, so why do I need to do this? Skip this step too.
    3. Run the Upgrade Assistant… OK
    4. Run the Windows 7 upgrade… OK
  3. HP Upgrade Assistant
    1. Churns away for 20 mins, then tells me I have to reboot and the start again.
    2. Reboot and start again…. churns away loading all the crap it did in the previous 20 mins and then takes a bit longer….
    3. Tells me to remove the Assistant DVD and insert, the Windows 7 Upgrade DVD…. OK, except it doesn’t tell you it has locked up your DVD drive and won’t release it until you cancel the message…. argh
  4. Windows 7 upgrade
    1. Churns away, looks like it’s doing something…. 20 mins…. still looks like it’s doing something
    2. 30 mins in, tells me I have 8 applications that may not work with Windows 7 and recommends I remove them… Bollock to that… this isn’t some ancient crap I loaded on, it’s a 3 month old machine…. OK, ignore and deal with the consequences later
    3. 60 mins in, prompts me to allow the program to run…. I wouldn’t have started it in the first place, but, OK… carry on.
    4. 2 hours in, some other function it is running now wants permission to continue… OK, go for it
    5. Over the next hour, 5 more prompts to grant permission to run… come on guys, this is painful
    6. 4 hours…. finally complete
  5. Post Upgrade Process (yes, upgrading is not enought_
    1. Run Upgrade Assistance one more time… wants to check for HP specific upgrades… OK, I guess
    2. Now wants me to run Windows Update again…. didn’t the upgrade program already do that, multiple times? OK, waste another 10 mins of my time.
  6. Finally done… 4+ hours

So…. with Apple I had a less than an hour experience, which pretty much took care of itself. With Microsoft, I had to sit and watch it (almost) constantly, for 4 hours. That’s 4 hours of my life I won’t be getting back, I have half a mind to send Steve Balmer an invoice.

Now I am not saying Windows 7 isn’t a good product, but come on Microsoft, you gotta stop burdening your customers like this.

So word to the wize, if you are considering upgrading to Windows 7, take a good hard look at a Mac.

Sad but true

// October 26th, 2009 // No Comments » // Featured, Humour, Rant, The business of IT

With the release of Windows 7. Microsoft has addressed most of the issues with Vista, but have still make things far more complicated than they need to. The graph below is a little tongue in cheek, but really…. in this day and age, why can’t we have an OS that is Stable, User Friendly AND customizable? Inquiring minds want to know.

song chart memes
see more Funny Graphs

I currently have a love/hate relationship with all 3.