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Ask Your Vista Questions Here.
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AfterDawn Addict
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1. March 2007 @ 11:31 |
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Vista activation cracked by brute force
Sledgehammered
By Charlie Demerjian: Thursday 01 March 2007, 17:15
IT LOOKS LIKE Microsoft's unhackable OS activation malware has been hacked.
There is an active thread at the Keznews forums (account needed), and a summary on its main page about the crack.
It is a simple brute force attack, dumb as a rock that just tries keys. If it gets one, you manually have to check it and try activation. Is is ugly, takes hours, is far from point and click, but it is said to work. I don't have any Vista installs because of the anti-user licensing so I have not tested it personally.
The method of attack has got to be quite troubling for MS on many grounds. The crack is a glorified guesser, and with the speed of modern PCs and the number of outstanding keys, the 25-digit serials are within range. The biggest problem for MS? If this gets widespread, and I hope it will, people will start activating legit keys that are owned by other people
It won't take long for boxes bought at retail to be activated before they are bought, and the people who plunk down money for the mal^h^h^hsoftware for real get 'you are a filthy pirate' messages. Won't that be a laugh riot at the MS phone banks in Bangalore.
So, what do you do? There is really no differentiating between a legit copy with a manually typed in wrong key and a hack attempt. Sure MS can throttle this by limiting key attempts to one a minute or so on new software, but the older variants are already burnt to disk. The cat is out of the bag.
The code is floating, the method is known, and there is nothing MS can do at this point other than suck it down and prepare for the problems this causes. To make matters worse, MS will have to decide if it is worth it to allow people to take back legit keys that have been hijacked, or tell customers to go away, we have your money already, read your license agreement and get bent, we owe you nothing.
This is ugly for MS, and if it allows you to take back your legit keys, how long do you think it will take before people catch on to the fact that you can call in and hijack already purchased keys once you generate one that someone else activated?
No, this is a mess, and the problem is the very malware activation and anti-consumer licensing that MS built into Vista. Then again, it is kind of hard to feel sorry for them the way they screw their paying customers. We'll give it three days before there is a slick GUI version with all the bells and whistles. µ
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=37941
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AfterDawn Addict
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2. March 2007 @ 09:58 |
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Is Vista a Trap?
Posted by Zonk on Friday March 02, @12:43PM
from the please-keep-ackbar-quotes-to-a-minimum dept.
Microsoft Windows IT
logube writes "BBC has up an article about the trap of installing Vista in your existing desktop. Written by Tim Weber, a self-confessed 'sucker for technology', this article is a good introduction to the pain and extra money required to get going with the newest version of Windows. See how you can spend an extra 130 british pounds, and still have no working webcam! Says Weber, 'It took me one day to get online. The detail is tedious and highly technical: reinstalling drivers and router firmware didn't work, but after many trial and error tweaks to Vista's TCP/IP settings, I had internet access. Once online, Creative's website told me that my sound card was a write-off. No Vista support would be forthcoming.'"
Falling into the Vista trap
By Tim Weber
Business editor, BBC News website
Microsoft promises to wow people who are upgrading from Windows XP to its new operating system, but with the joys of Windows Vista comes plenty of pain.
I know, I know, I'm a sucker for technology.
The shiny new Vista disk was sitting on my desk, and I just couldn't resist giving it a try.
Even though I fell for Vista's promise - more security and certainly much more fun than tired old Windows XP - I tried not to be stupid.
I knew my four-year-old PC might have trouble coping with Vista, not least because of its wheezing graphics card.
When I bought it, my Dell Dimension 8200 was fairly state-of-the-art (a few stats for the experts: Pentium 4 processor running at 2GHz, 384MB of RAM, a 64MB graphics card, and a Creative SB Live audio card).
Since then I had added memory (to 768MB), a second hard disk, extra USB ports and a Wifi card.
A blunt message
But this was probably not enough, so I downloaded Microsoft's Vista Upgrade Advisor.
Microsoft's message was blunt but useful: Yes, my computer could happily run Vista, but it would need a few crutches and new body parts. Step-by-step instructions told me how to avoid problems:
* Get a new graphics card with at least 128MB memory;
* download new software for the Linksys Wifi network card, to sync my PDA with Outlook and to make good use of my multimedia keyboard;
* download the latest version of my Kaspersky Antivirus software.
* With a few minor exceptions, the rest of my set-up was given a clean bill of health, including my webcam and printer.
It turned out to be tricky to find the right graphics card. Most shopping websites were useless in providing information on Vista compatibility.
At least a dozen times, I discovered in the small print on manufacturers' websites that there were no Vista drivers for that particular piece of hardware. I finally settled on a Nvidia GeForce 6200 with 256MB memory.
Now here is the dirty little secret of all the expensive PC helpers out there. Upgrading hardware is really easy.
As long as you make sure the new hardware fits into the slots that come with your computer and does not overburden its power supply, it's usually just a case of carefully lifting out the old and slotting in the new piece of kit.
Do check the manual, though, to see whether you need to install the driver software for your new equipment before or after putting it in.
If you are still worried, go online. You can find plenty of videos and manuals providing step-by-step guides on how to do it.
Then I followed the task list drawn up by Microsoft. The Upgrade Advisor even provided direct links for downloading new drivers and other software.
Taking one more precaution, I made a full back-up of all my documents to an external hard drive.
A good start
Finally I was ready to go.
I had read somewhere that a Vista installation would take 20 minutes. Not if you upgrade from XP.
After three-and-a-half hours of churning, at long last the Vista logo filled my screen.
It was the beginning of a day of anguish.
At first sight, everything had worked fine: All user accounts, complete with documents and software, were present and accounted for.
Vista looked slick. Its user interface was clear and set-up seemingly easy. The XP gobbledegook had disappeared from dialogue boxes.
Installing the new wifi driver and anti-virus software was a cinch.
Software worked straight away - whether it was Microsoft Office, Firefox or my very old copy of Photoshop Elements.
Feel the pain
But soon the problems began to mount:
* Where was the internet? I could see my router, but nothing beyond - even after a full day of tinkering with various network wizards. My BBC laptop proved that this was not a problem with my router or ISP.
* Why did my Philips webcam refuse to work? The Upgrade Advisor had explicitly said it would.
* What hardware was responsible for the three driver errors flagged up by Vista? One seemed to be the sound card - oh yes, why did I have no sound? But which mysterious "PCI input device" was lacking a driver? And what was the "unknown device" flagged up by Vista?
* Why did I get a "disk is full" error message every time I tried to install my keyboard's new Intellitype software? Why did Vista refuse to uninstall the XP-version of Intellitype?
* I knew that Apple had failed to make iTunes Vista-ready, so I didn't even try.
* But why did Microsoft's successor of Activesync, called Windows Mobile Device Center, refuse to hook up Outlook to my trusty old Pocket PC?
Fiddling around with Vista's settings, I soon found myself deep below its slick interface.
And the deeper I got, the more the look and jargon of dialogue boxes took me back into the world of XP.
It took me one day to get online. The detail is tedious and highly technical: reinstalling drivers and router firmware didn't work, but after many trial and error tweaks to Vista's TCP/IP settings, I had internet access.
Once online, Creative's website told me that my sound card was a write-off. No Vista support would be forthcoming.
Grudgingly I ordered a new one. After installing it, the hardware error messages disappeared; the three different errors flagged up by Vista were all triggered by my old sound card.
I also realised that my computer really needed more memory. Annoyingly, my Dell uses an unusual flavour of memory, called RDRAM, which is rare nowadays.
Two lost and one successful eBay auctions later, I installed one extra gigabyte of memory.
So far the upgrade to Vista had cost me about £130.
Not cheap, but probably fair value, as it will have extended the life-cycle of my PC by about two years.
Bearing a grudge against Philips, Dell and Microsoft
But a few problems refuse to go away and are both expensive and aggravating.
My Philips ToUCam still doesn't work, and plenty of angry forum debates are testament to the distinct lack of Vista support provided by Philips.
Even worse, Vista still refuses to talk to my Dell Axim X5 Pocket PC, which is a mere three-and-a-half years old.
I like my PDA. It saved my bacon when my laptop died on a reporting trip. Over five days, I filed 14 stories using the Axim and its foldable keyboard.
I don't want to buy a new one - at least, not until I find an affordable smart phone that is both slim and has a slide-out keyboard (what's on the market right now is too bulky for my taste).
But my Axim uses the Pocket PC 2002 operating system, and Microsoft has decided that Vista will work only with Pocket PC 2003 and higher.
A top Microsoft executive, who does not want to be quoted by name, tells me that "the refresh rate on [mobile] devices is typically 18 months, from our research - hence the view that most Pocket PC 2002 devices would no longer be in use.
"Our view (which may be incorrect) is that those people using the latest Desktop [operating system] would potentially also be using later devices as well."
Well, I have a surprise for Microsoft: They are wrong, not least judging from the discussions on various forums I've been to while hunting for a solution.
While Microsoft leaves me out in the cold, Dell is no help either.
Delving into a Dell support forum, I realise the company practises tough love. Very briefly, a couple of years ago, Dell offered X5 customers an upgrade to Pocket PC 2003. Not anymore.
So I can either throw away my Axim and invest another £200 or £300 (for a PDA and webcam), or roll back to XP and wave Vista goodbye.
To Vista or not to Vista
I find myself caught in the Vista trap. Quite apart from the pain of having to reinstall XP, I do like Vista.
It's slick, it's fast, it is very user-friendly. I like its applications - for example, Windows Picture Gallery, which could become a serious competitor to my favourite image browser, Faststone.
However, there are still plenty of wrinkles. The Windows "sidebar" may look nicer than Google desktop, but it crashes regularly and infuriates me because its "gadgets" can not be customised.
I've had two Vista crashes so far - not a blue but a black screen - and that really shouldn't happen. I can't even remember my last XP crash.
And everywhere I look, there are blogs and forums full of people who have problems with software drivers and suffer the poor customer support of the hundreds of hardware and software vendors that make up the Windows ecosystem.
So would I do it again?
The answer is no. Do what I originally had planned to do. Wait for half a year until the driver issues are settled and then buy a new PC.
Once that's in place, you can upgrade and tinker with your old machine, to give to your parents or children.
You will probably enjoy Vista, but there's little reason to do it the hard way.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6407419.stm
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AfterDawn Addict
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2. March 2007 @ 10:47 |
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Microsoft Vista, IE7 Banned By U.S. DOT
Quote:
Microsoft Vista, IE7 Banned By U.S. DOT
Posted by Zonk on Friday March 02, @02:38PM
from the that-is-a-serious-buzz-harsher dept.
Microsoft Windows Software
An anonymous reader writes "According to a memo being reported on by Information week, the US Department of Transportation has issued a moratorium on upgrading Microsoft products. Concerns over costs and compatability issues has lead the federal agency to prevent upgrades from XP to Vista, as well as to stop users from moving to IE 7 and Office 2007. As the article says,'In a memo to his staff, DOT chief information officer Daniel Mintz says he has placed "an indefinite moratorium" on the upgrades as "there appears to be no compelling technical or business case for upgrading to these new Microsoft software products. Furthermore, there appears to be specific reasons not to upgrade."'"
Microsoft Hit By U.S. DOT Ban On Windows Vista, Explorer 7, and Office 2007
Tens of thousands of federal workers are prohibited from upgrading to the latest versions, according to memos seen by InformationWeek.
By Paul McDougall
InformationWeek
March 2, 2007 12:00 PM
Citing concerns over cost and compatibility, the top technology official at the federal Department of Transportation has placed a moratorium on all in-house computer upgrades to Microsoft's new Windows Vista operating system, as well as Internet Explorer 7 and Office 2007, according to a memo obtained Friday by InformationWeek.
In a memo to his staff, the DOT's CIO Daniel Mintz says he has placed "an indefinite moratorium" on the upgrades as "there appears to be no compelling technical or business case for upgrading to these new Microsoft software products. Furthermore, there appears to be specific reasons not to upgrade."
Among the concerns cited by Mintz are compatibility with software applications currently in use at the department, the cost of an upgrade, and DOT's move to a new headquarters in Washington later this year. "Microsoft Vista, Office 2007, and Internet Explorer [7] may be acquired for testing purposes only, though only on approval by the DOT chief information officer," Mintz writes.
The memo is dated Jan. 19. In an interview Friday, DOT chief technology officer Tim Schmidt confirmed that the ban is still in effect. "We're analyzing different client software options and also integration issues," says Schmidt. Among the options the Transportation Department is weighing as a possible alternative or complement to Windows Vista are Novell's Suse Linux and, for a limited group of users, Apple's Macintosh hardware and software, he says.
Schmidt says the Transportation Department hasn't ruled out upgrading its computers to Windows Vista if all of its concerns about the new operating system -- the business version of which was launched late last year -- can be resolved. "We have more confidence in Microsoft than we would have 10 years ago," says Schmidt. "But it always makes sense to look at the security implications, the value back to the customer, and those kind of issues."
The DOT's ban on Vista, Internet Explorer 7, and Office 2007 applies to 15,000 computer users at DOT proper who are currently running the Windows XP Professional operating system. The memo indicates that a similar ban is in effect at the Federal Aviation Administration, which has 45,000 desktop users.
Compatibility with existing applications appears to be the Transportation Department's major concern. According to a separate memo, a number of key software applications and utilities in use in various branches of the department aren't Vista compatible. Among them are Aspen 2.8.1, ISS 2.11, ProVu 3.1.1, and Capri 6.5, according to a memo issued by staffers at the DOT's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
Any prolonged ban on new Microsoft technologies by the federal government could have a significant impact on the software maker's bottom line, as Microsoft sells millions of dollars in software to the feds annually.
http://www.informationweek.com/news/show...cleID=197700789
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AfterDawn Addict
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2. March 2007 @ 15:01 |
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Survey: Vista Used Less than 1 percent of PCs
Windows Vista may yet prove to be an unstoppable juggernaut, but statistics released Thursday by a market research firm show that the new operating system hasn't even licked its nine-year old ancestor.
Eric Lai, Computerworld
Friday, March 02, 2007 02:00 AM PST
Windows Vista may yet prove to be an unstoppable juggernaut, but statistics released Thursday by a market research firm show that the new operating system hasn't even licked its nine-year old ancestor.
Vista was being used on less than 1 percent of PCs tracked in February by Aliso Viejo-based Net Applications Inc., making it the sixth most-popular operating system. That puts it behind Windows 98, which is still used on 1.5 percent of computers.
Vista's exact share was 0.93 percent. Windows XP continued to lead, with 84.3 percent, followed by Windows 2000, with 4.8 percent. Mac OS X on PowerPC machines had 4.3 percent, while newer Intel-based PCs running OS X had 2.1 percent.
Net Applications collects its data from the browsers of visitors to its network of more than 40,000 Web sites.
Vista's February share of PCs connected to the Internet -- a month after its consumer release and three months after its release to businesses -- represents a big leap over January, when it was used by just 0.2 percent of PCs. At the time, it lagged behind Windows ME, the 13-year-old Windows NT and various flavors of Linux.
"The big question is if and when are the masses going to switch?" Net Applications analyst Vince Vizzacarro said in a newsletter accompanying the statistics. "While Microsoft was late to market with Vista, Apple's taken advantage and is now up to a combined 6.38 percent market share. It looks like the market is buying Vista on new PC purchases, but there isn't a significant percentage of people upgrading existing PCs. I expect this trend to continue through the rest of 2007."
Some analysts have predicted that despite Microsoft's intention to spend half a billion dollars marketing Vista, conversions from XP won't be the norm until 2009.
Statistics for the first week of February -- Vista officially launched Jan. 30 -- were mixed. Current Analysis found sales of PCs -- with Vista preinstalled -- were up 173 percent from the week before. PC sales were also up 67 percent from the same time frame in 2006. But Current Analysis itself pointed out that the sales leaps were exaggerated partly by slowing sales as retailers and OEMs wound down their XP-based inventory.
By comparison, NPD Group Inc. found that first-week sales of boxed copies of Vista were down 60 percent compared with first-week boxed copies of Windows XP five years earlier.
Neither group has released statistics of Vista sales in subsequent weeks, though NPD analyst Chris Swenson is expected to release first-month retail sales of the new OS soon.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,129525-page,1/article.html
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Senior Member
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3. March 2007 @ 09:34 |
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It shows that windows xp still owns. The best os i ever used from Microsoft(it crash at least 3 to 5 times a week and have to format once a year). If people are not buying windows vista i'm not going to upgrade it. This is why I'm waiting cause if people say screw vista, microsoft will get a better os within two years or something. Even with windows xp been out for 6 years, It's still buggy. Where is that SP3!!!!! vista is just like windows xp except new theme and more buggy. I still feel like vista is not complete yet. The reason they don't want to fix xp is cause they want more money from people.
I got a question, I got microsoft office 2007. I figure it's what everyone is going to use soon. So how long does it take before people will start using microsoft office 2007? cause if it takes more than a year than i'm going back to 2003. Please let me know whoever is expert on software.
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Member
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3. March 2007 @ 19:28 |
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Unfortunately Microsoft will force Vista on the majority of people whether they like it or not. All new PC's are now packaged with Vista and the rest who don't have a clue will upgrade.
I will not be upgrading unless it comes to the point Windows XP or Linux will not do what I need. Linux is becoming my main OS of choice and will only get better.
Quote:
That's no rumor, that's a cold, hard fact.
Read some of irelands earlier reports in this thread for more info on it.
There will be all kinds of restrictionson copying dvd's, cd's, and ripping both of thoe to other formats.
So lets say you buy a Metallica cd, and want to make mp3's out of it for yer mp3 player, then with vista, that's not possible, or at least problematic or severely limited.
So, if you value your freedom of copying your owned cd's and dvd's, don't buy vista.
This is probably the only thing me and The_Fiend will ever agree on.
Quote:
Personally, i'm sticking with XP untill microsoft either makes PROPER new OS, or untill i become patient enough to use Linux for everything i do *and when slysoft starts making proper ports of it software for linux*
What is it you need slysoft for that you can not do in Linux, I may be able to help!
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AfterDawn Addict
4 product reviews
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3. March 2007 @ 19:36 |
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Originally posted by rihgt682:
It shows that windows xp still owns. The best os i ever used from Microsoft(it crash at least 3 to 5 times a week and have to format once a year). If people are not buying windows vista i'm not going to upgrade it. This is why I'm waiting cause if people say screw vista, microsoft will get a better os within two years or something. Even with windows xp been out for 6 years, It's still buggy. Where is that SP3!!!!! vista is just like windows xp except new theme and more buggy. I still feel like vista is not complete yet. The reason they don't want to fix xp is cause they want more money from people.
I got a question, I got microsoft office 2007. I figure it's what everyone is going to use soon. So how long does it take before people will start using microsoft office 2007? cause if it takes more than a year than i'm going back to 2003. Please let me know whoever is expert on software.
XP needs to be reisnalled every few months I hate that ><
by otherwise works nice *L*
Copyright infringement is nothing more than civil disobedience to a bad set of laws. Lets renegotiate them.
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The_Fiend
Suspended permanently
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3. March 2007 @ 21:12 |
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I very much doubt that you can help me on linux Ozzymarry *did i spell that right?*, it's not that i don't know how to work with ripit4me or similar stuff, i just want something that has the full functionality of AnyDVD without using WINE or other tricks.
Btw, i read your reply on how i told off your kids, how was i to know who i was talking to ?
one of your kids was posing to be you most of the time, and not to mention they broke the forum rules to the extent of 2 bans due to bad behaviour, *on account of insulting other members, asking for invites, etc.*
But i digress...
Anyone else tried that new authentication hack yet?
Worked fine on my testing beast X)
I think it's exceptionally amusing that MS's usual lack of support gets made up for by an abundance of support for OEM, even to the extent of creating an exploitable flaw that will enable millions of pirated installs *though those million of installs are a sad thing, i encourage piracy in this case, as i wouldn't REALLY run Vista unless they payed me for it*.
In so many words : Abso-F***ing-lutely Hilarious.
irc://arcor.de.eu.dal.net/wasted_hate
Wanna tell me off, go ahead.
I dare ya !
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Member
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3. March 2007 @ 23:20 |
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Quote:
Btw, i read your reply on how i told off your kids, how was i to know who i was talking to ?
one of your kids was posing to be you most of the time, and not to mention they broke the forum rules to the extent of 2 bans due to bad behaviour, *on account of insulting other members, asking for invites, etc.
Now I'm LMFAO you would never do any these things not to mention Rule#6 which you seem to break on a regular basis.
Have a nice day!
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The_Fiend
Suspended permanently
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3. March 2007 @ 23:30 |
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Hey, back then i WAS behaved...
It's just that dealing with too many moronic brats like those kids of yours drove me to insanity... X)
irc://arcor.de.eu.dal.net/wasted_hate
Wanna tell me off, go ahead.
I dare ya !
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AfterDawn Addict
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4. March 2007 @ 08:33 |
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i just found this article,
note: i do not believe in cracks. i pay for what i use...
Quote:
It's Official: Pirates Crack Vista
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 2007-03-04 13:56:14 UTC, submitted by danwarne
"A genuine crack for Windows Vista has just been released by pirate group Pantheon, which allows a pirated, non-activated installation of Vista (Home Basic/Premium and Ultimate) to be properly activated and made fully-operational. Unlike cracks which have been floating around since Vista RTM was released in late November, this crack doesn?t simply get around product activation with beta activation files or timestop cracks - it actually makes use of the activation process."
It's official: Pirates crack Vista at last
* 4th March 2007
* James Bannan
* Vista
A genuine crack for Windows Vista has just been released by pirate group Pantheon, which allows a pirated, non-activated installation of Vista (Home Basic/Premium and Ultimate) to be properly activated and made fully-operational.
Unlike cracks which have been floating around since Vista RTM was released in late November, this crack doesn?t simply get around product activation with beta activation files or timestop cracks - it actually makes use of the activation process. It seems that Microsoft has allowed large OEMs like ASUS to ship their products with a pre-installed version of Vista that doesn?t require product activation ? apparently because end users would find it too inconvenient.
OEM Emulation
This version of Vista uses System-Locked Pre-Installation 2.0 (SLP 2.0). It allows the ?Royalty OEMs? to embed specific licensing information into the operating system which Vista can activate without having to go back to Microsoft for verification. The licensing components include the OEM?s hardware-embedded BIOS ACPI_SLIC (which has been signed by Microsoft), an XML certificate file which corresponds to this ACPI_SLIC and a specific OEM product key.
Pantheon released a bundle which includes the certificate files from ASUS, Dell, HP and Lenovo along with OEM product keys for Vista Home Basic, Home Premium and Ultimate, and an emulator which allows the BIOS ACPI_SLIC driver for any manufacturer to be installed without requiring the system to be physically running that hardware. For example, you can install the ASUS certificate information on any machine, not just an ASUS.
And yes, the crack most certainly works. You end up with an activated, legitimate copy of Vista which passes all the Windows Genuine Advantage checks.
The release of this crack does make a bit of a mockery of the whole volume activation process. I was beginning to think the new activation process introduced with Vista might spell the end of easy and large-scale Windows piracy, and if the only way to activate Vista was to have it communicate directly with Microsoft, then that just might have been a possibility. But allowing such a workaround to OEMs just because their users might not like it has introduced a weakness into the system. Pirate groups are well known for exploiting any weakness no matter how small (as evidenced by the cracking of KMS), so once this activation process became known it was only a matter of time.
As the crack is tied to specific product keys, it remains to be seen whether Microsoft will be able to do anything about shutting out machines activated using this method. But their work will be made much more difficult now that such machines have completely bypassed the online activation process, and are connecting as legitimate copies of Windows.
http://apcmag.com/5512/pirate_crack_vista_oem_activation
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 4. March 2007 @ 08:34
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The_Fiend
Suspended permanently
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5. March 2007 @ 08:18 |
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irc://arcor.de.eu.dal.net/wasted_hate
Wanna tell me off, go ahead.
I dare ya !
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AfterDawn Addict
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6. March 2007 @ 04:33 |
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Vista codec Package 4.3.1
Author: Shark007
Date: 2007-03-05
Size: 22.4 Mb
License: Freeware
Requires: NT/200x/XP/Vista
With Vista codec Package installed, you won't need to install any other codec or filter. Many user suggested default settings are implemented. It does not contain a media player. It does not associates filetypes. With this package installed you will be able to use any media player (limited only by the players capabilities) to play DVD's, movies and video clips of any format. Streaming video (real and quicktime) is supported in web browsers. Visit the homepage to get a 64bitAddon which enables XviD, DivX and DVD playback in Vista's MediaCenter.
Codecs have always been a pain in the butt. This package takes from the best, all the big name creators, several small guys too, and compiles all this into a single pack. All possible conflicts are already dealt with, many user suggested default settings are implemented.
This package does not contain a media player. This package does not associates filetypes. With this package installed, you will be able to use any media player to play DVD's, movies and video clips such as quicktime, realmedia, AVI, mpeg, Flv, swf, wmv, etc. Streaming video can be played within web browsers. By default, you shouldn't need to make any adjustments to enjoy playback immediately.
Users now have the ability to choose what is installed using the public redistributable and after an unattended install, you can select to remove specific portions without removing the entire package. Future releases will recognize previous releases and perform upgrade installations.
Changelog:
- update QuickTime components to 7.1.5
- update FFDShow components to t996
YOU MUST UNINSTALL YOUR OLD VERSION FOR THE IMPROVEMENTS TO BE REALIZED
DOWNLOAD HERE
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download5326.html
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AfterDawn Addict
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6. March 2007 @ 04:42 |
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VistaCodecs x64Components 1.0.8
Author: Shark007
Date: 2007-03-05
Size: 5.52 Mb
License: Freeware
Requires: Winx64
Do you want to watch your favorite video in MediaCenter?
These components are tested on Vista Ultimate x64. This release is fully compatible with the 32bit codecs installed by the Vista codec Package. It is fully uninstallable through the Windows interface.
This release will not install on a x86 systems.
New in this version:
- minor updates - no functionality changes
- update shortcut icons
UNINSTALL YOUR OLD VERSION
DOWNLOAD HERE
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download5535.html
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AfterDawn Addict
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6. March 2007 @ 07:33 |
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Microsoft responds to DOT ban on Vista, Office 2007
Posted by Mary Jo Foley @ 7:11 am Categories: Vista, Windows client, Corporate strategy, Office 2007, Internet Explorer, App Compatibility
The Department of Transportation has put an indefinite ban on upgrades to Windows Vista, Internet Explorer 7 and Office 2007, as first reported by Information Week.
Here's the DOT memo outlining the Vista "moratorium," dated January 19.
"Based on our initial analysis (from internal recommendations and analysis by Gartner Group), there appears to be no compelling technical or business case for upgrading to these new Microsoft products," according to the memo from Daniel Mintz, DOT Chief Information Officer.
In fact, there are a number of reasons for not upgrading, Mintz said, including the hardware/software/services costs of upgrading; backward compatibility problems with Office 2007, specifically Word (I'm guessing he's referring to the new XML file formats here, but not sure); internal funding limitations; and a pending DOT headquarters move.
Quote:
What's Microsoft's response to the DOT's charges? A corporate spokeswoman sent me this statement, via e-mail:
"We respect the customer's decision. As with any of our other Federal customers, it's our job to help DOT maximize the value of its Enterprise Agreement through the adoption of our technology. We are engaged with large, strategic customers across government at every level, and are working closely with them on these products through their participation in our Technical Adoption Programs.
"Windows Vista, Office 2007, and IE7 are widely recognized by independent analysts to offer dramatic improvements in security, management features, new collaboration capabilities and productivity enhancements. Ultimately we think we can help DOT understand how these products can help its enterprise organization.
"As DOT goes through the natural process of exploring the new capabilities of these products we expect they will continue to embrace Windows and Office as the departmental standard of DOT.
"Overall our government customers are excited about the technology as well as our product pipeline. Just last week more than 500 Public Sector CIOs from across the country joined us for our annual US Public Sector CIO Summit. The Summit offered these CIOs to see firsthand how Microsoft is working to be a strategic partner to government and educational institutions of every size."
Anyone know of other companies and/or organizations calling for a similar blanket Vista/Office/IE 7 ban?
comments
The DOT are falling in line
... there is a long and growing list of end users who are finally waking up to just what constitutes a "forced upgrade". Forced upgrades are the province of monopolies. Forced upgrades have nothing to do with improving the quality of service to end users and everything to do with consolidating monopoly, locking users into proprietary tools and maximising the revenue extracted from each consumer. Vista is overblown cr*p. It's XP with me-too OS X graphics and mandatory, system-slowing DRM which has already been cracked in any case.
Whole governments are dropping Microsoft. The UK educational institution worked out last year that they couldn't afford to keep feeding the insatiable Microsoft monopoly with hard-earned budgets. Microsoft are yesteryears answer to the question "How can I dispose of the maximum amount of money for something which I will be forced to buy again in 12 months?".
Microsoftasaurus, the dinoasaur of the computer age
This really only makes sense. The average DOT user just needs SIMPLE word
processing and spreadsheets, email, web browser, etc. Their jobs do not revolve around computers. And, given the hundreds of millions that the DOT could save if they were to pay market prices for OS and office suite, they would do good to make sure that they move away from proprietary lock-in technologies, and insist on standards, such as ODF to start with. But, they need to make sure that they demand NATIVE support for ODF, NOT a translator that will cause problems and overhead.
Sure
But we are prohibiting Vista due to the draconian licensing. We strive to go beyond the call of duty when it comes to legal licensing. Still, MS wants to twist our arm and make being legal more cost/labor intensive and a bigger headache. We'll pass.
I also know that the incompatibilities of various web-based apps have forced some colleges to reccommend students/faculty/staff to not upgrade until further notice. The apps have to be rebuilt to be functional with IE7 etc....
Some for the list
Not really a ban, but similar.
Ipod users, heeding Apple's recommendation
BECTA (British Education...) strongly recommends no upgrade
FAA (sub-story to DOT ban)
Various Surveys indicating IT delays
MS's self imposed ban? $760 for Vista in Australia, double US price in Europe, etc.
I think that in general, not a lot of companies/organizations are making headlines with "We won't do Vista", they are simply quietly ignorning it and not currently planning for it.
I know Vista is a blib on the radar, evaluation likely to start a few months after SP1. Vista's WGA may be a dealbreaker though, however, if you have enough clout, you can get Vista with no WGA. Large IT groups just won't go through the hastle.
Can anyone imagine if Vista were not forced on home users, how terrible the sales would be? If you ask loud enough, you can get XP still with some machines. I visited the HP site and all corporate desktops have Vista/XP, but the basic home units ($600 or so), only Vista Home Basic.
I had heard that Dell Ireland backed down and will now offer XP instead of the Vista only option they tried to enforce after a large customer backlash.
I wish I knew what MS was thinking, there has to be a plan, but they seem determined to implode. Has WGA made them even 1/4 of what it has cost them?
TripleII
http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=301
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AfterDawn Addict
6 product reviews
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9. March 2007 @ 19:19 |
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I had written a thread about vista but this one has already been made so here are my thoughts on the new Operating System.
This is the link to the thread.
Just read the thread and i hope you find it benefiting for your research on the new Vista system.
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/478222#2895806
Thanxs.
Edited by DVDBack23
"the mediocre teacher tells. the good teacher explains. the superior teacher demonstrates. the great teacher inspires."- William Aruthur Ward
Website: http://www.ampleblaze.com |
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11. March 2007 @ 07:15 |
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Quote:
Prescription Meds For Vista Sleep Disorder
Posted by kdawson on Sunday March 11, @07:33AM
from the you-will-sleep-now-and-when-you-wake dept.
Windows IT
Arnold O'Connor writes "NeoSmart Technologies has compiled a list of hotfixes and patches provided by Microsoft for Windows Vista that address a large number of issues related to waking/resuming a Vista PC (both x86 and x64) from sleep or hibernation. Sleep-related disorders have plagued Vista since its release, though they were not present in earlier betas. Most of these fixes are due to be included in Windows Vista SP1 ? codenamed Fiji."
Windows Vista's Hideous Wakeup Support
Published December 10th, 2006 in Software Center, Operating Systems, Windows and Reviews. Tags: ACPI, ATi, Bugs, Drivers, Hibernate, Microsoft, nVidia, Power, Sleep, Vista, Windows.
While Windows Vista has a whole host of new features to offer, it has one major problem that just won?t go away: it?s totally FUBAR?d after you resume from sleep or hibernate. Unfortunately, many of these issues weren?t present during the beta stage, and were somehow introduced in the RTM build of Windows Vista. This exclusive NeoSmart Technologies report desccribes some of the symptoms in detail, and we even provide links to possible fixes by Microsoft. All issues have been duly reported and confirmed by Microsoft, so this isn?t just some figment of our imagination. A number of these patches are scheduled to be included in Windows Vista SP1 (Codename Fiji).
Few computer ?enthusiasts? turn off their PCs. Even with Bill Gate?s promised 6-second-boot (we?ve clocked an average of 12.6 seconds here on 8 different PCs), turning on a PC via a cold-boot requires waiting for all the various programs to load, the network to establish, the security policies to propogate; and you don?t get to brag about never turning off your PC - plus your uptime restarts. The alternatives were either hibernation (for laptop owners) or ?Deep Sleep? for the rest.1
Throughout the beta, Deep Sleep in Windows Vista went great. It?s the default option (so long as it?s configured in the BIOS) when you click the shutdown button.2 It would put your computer in a low-power mode that recovered in a matter of 2 or 3 seconds, and didn?t crash! But in the final version of Windows Vista, something is very, very majorly wrong. On 6 of the 8 tested systems,3 recovering Windows Vista from a hibernate or Deep Sleep results in one of the following:
* When recovering from a hibernate: ?Cannot find uxtheme.dll? appears whenever you attempt to run (almost) any program. No matter what you do, you can?t even run Task Manager. What?s worse, a restart doesn?t fix it, and because Windows Explorer also fails to launch with this error, you need to boot from the DVD and use System Restore - Safe Mode won?t work!4
* Failure to establish a network connection. Everything looks OK, but you can?t connect to the internet. Your LAN signal will be there, but the internet just doesn?t work. You must restart to fix it.
* Poor performance: though Task Manager will show normal CPU load, some of the drivers (they don?t appear in TaskMan) will attempt to use 100% of the CPU, resulting in a very laggy PC. You need to restart to fix it.
* No DWM. For no reason, DWM just won?t re-appear. This happens on ATi and nVidia, with or without the latest official drivers from the companies themselves. Manually running ?dwm.exe? doesn?t work, you need to restart to fix it.
* BSOD on recovery. This is usually caused by the video drivers, and may or may not indicate something wrong with the kernel itself.
* No sound. Vista goes mute. Nothing you can do about it, no way to revive it, you just have to restart and let the re-done sound-stack load-up the way it should.
All of the above errors and more occur randomly and make using hibernation down-right impossible (unless you?re willing/eager to run System Recovery from the DVD!) and Deep Sleep a waste of time (seeing as you have to restart to ?quick recover?). Most of the errors are indicative of a problem somewhere deep in the kernel, and it?s not going to be easy to fix it. Some people are blaming this on the PC/Hardware/BIOS itself, but it?s not the BIOS? job to support the OS,5 and the only thing to blame here is a buggy ACPI model.
We?ve notified Microsoft of each of these errors, we?ve been told they?re real bugs and a fix is in the works for some issues, others are just as much of a mystery. Some of these can be solved when ATi and nVidia release their final (hopefully bug-free) drivers for Vista. Others may not be as willing to go away. Either way, an operating system that you have to shutdown in order to save on power isn?t exactly the biggest business model. The only good news is, this bug only recently made its way into Vista, so that may just mean it won?t be too hard to squash. For now, if you really need to keep your PC on all day and all night, check the list below for hotfixes that may work for you.
ACPI, ATi, Bugs, Drivers, Hibernate, Microsoft, nVidia, Power, Sleep, Vista, Windows
1. ?Deep Sleep? is configured in the BIOS, and refers to the use of S3 power-saving mode instead of the default S1 setting. In S3, you?re machine actually kills the power to everything but the memory, and uses up about as much power as a single, tiny light (like those powering up your Christmas lights). And you get to instantly turn your PC back on, with all your programs running and in a matter of seconds (for real!). At least, that?s how it?s supposed to work. [back]
2. As opposed to using the shutdown menu, and selecting an option from there. [back]
3. All systems are modern, 100% x86 ACPI-compatible systems running Windows Vista Ultimate Edition, RTM. No systems are using non-signed Vista drivers, and no buggy software is installed. [back]
4. We obviously didn?t mess with uxtheme.dll, didn?t patch it, nor did we try to install any of XP?s theming software? [back]
5. Assuming, of course, that the BIOS conforms to the basic standards already defined and used by BIOS manufacturers everywhere [back]
Here?s a list of patches by Microsoft related to Vista and wake/resume problems. You may have to call MS directly for access to some of these patches. Stop errors are blue screens (BSODs).
* [KB-928135] - Windows Vista hangs on resume/wake
* [KB-929734] - Many problems on resume/wake
* [KB-927341] - ?Manage Discs? WMP feature slow to respond after resume/wake
* [KB-929685] - No audio upon resume/wake
* [KB-929577] - No bluetooth on resume/wake
* [KB-929762] - Stop error 0×9F on machines with firewire (IEEE1394) upon resume/wake
* [KB-929909] - Intel 945GM Chipset PCs won?t wake/resume
* [KB-930311] - No network with stop error 0×0000007E after resume/wake
* [KB-930495] - No firewire (IEEE1394) after resume/wake
* [KB-930570] - usbhub.sys stop error 0×00000044 on resume/wake
http://neosmart.net/blog/2006/vistas-hideous-wakeup-support/
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AfterDawn Addict
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11. March 2007 @ 07:24 |
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THIS IS A VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,LONG READ ON VISTA
Microsoft is only doing this because Hollywood/the music industry is forcing them to.
A Cost Analysis of Windows Vista Content Protection
Quote:
Peter Gutmann, pgut001@cs.auckland.ac.nz
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html
Last updated 18 February 2007
Distributed under the Creative Commons license (see Appendix)
(A note to readers: The reaction to what started out as an obscure technical post to a security mailing list has been rather unexpected and overwhelming, so I'm totally buried in Vista email at the moment. Please be patient when expecting replies, and apologies if I can't reply to all messages).
Executive Summary
Windows Vista includes an extensive reworking of core OS elements in order to provide content protection for so-called ¡°premium content¡±, typically HD data from Blu-ray and HD-DVD sources. Providing this protection incurs considerable costs in terms of system performance, system stability, technical support overhead, and hardware and software cost. These issues affect not only users of Vista but the entire PC industry, since the effects of the protection measures extend to cover all hardware and software that will ever come into contact with Vista, even if it's not used directly with Vista (for example hardware in a Macintosh computer or on a Linux server). This document analyses the cost involved in Vista's content protection, and the collateral damage that this incurs throughout the computer industry.
Executive Executive Summary
The Vista Content Protection specification could very well constitute the longest suicide note in history [Note A].
Table of Contents
Introduction
Disabling of Functionality
Indirect Disabling of Functionality
Decreased Playback Quality
Elimination of Open-source Hardware Support
Elimination of Unified Drivers
Problems with Drivers
Denial-of-Service via Driver/Device Revocation
Decreased System Reliability
Increased Hardware Costs
Increased Cost due to Requirement to License Unnecessary Third-party IP
Unnecessary CPU Resource Consumption
Unnecessary Device Resource Consumption
How Effective is it Really?
Final Thoughts
Acknowledgements
Sources
Use, Modification, and Redistribution
Appendices and Footnotes
Mini-FAQ
Open Questions
Microsoft's Response
About the Author
Glossary
Quotes
Footnotes
Introduction
This document looks purely at the cost of the technical portions of Vista's content protection [Note B]. The political issues (under the heading of DRM) have been examined in exhaustive detail elsewhere and won't be commented on further unless it's relevant to the cost analysis. However, one important point to keep in mind when reading this document is that in order to work, Vista's content protection must be able to violate the laws of physics, something that's unlikely to happen no matter how much the content industry wishes that it were possible [Note C]. This conundrum is displayed over and over again in the Windows content-protection requirements, with manufacturers being given no hard-and-fast guidelines but instead being instructed that they need to display as much dedication as possible to the party line. The documentation is peppered with sentences like:
¡°It is recommended that a graphics manufacturer go beyond the strict letter of the specification and provide additional content-protection features, because this demonstrates their strong intent to protect premium content¡±.
This is an exceedingly strange way to write technical specifications, but is dictated by the fact that what the spec is trying to achieve is fundamentally impossible. Readers should keep this requirement to display appropriate levels of dedication in mind when reading the following analysis [Note D].
A second point to note is that the term ¡°premium content¡±, or in more recent statements by Microsoft, ¡°commercial content¡± (I've used ¡°premium content¡± throughout this writeup for consistency) goes well beyond the HD-DVD and Blu-ray examples that I've used above and encompasses not just the obvious definition of ¡°HD content in any form¡± but even non-HD content, or as Microsoft put it ¡°commercial content generally, independent of resolution¡±. While premium content is currently still somewhat scarce, in five years' time it'll be hard to find a movie or similar content that isn't HD or similar premium content. So although Microsoft have tried to downplay the perceived impact of Vista's content-protection by stating that it'll only apply when premium/commercial content is present, this conveniently sidesteps the fact that Microsoft hopes that this situation will become universal in the near future. The whole future of Vista's content protection is predicated on this fact, because without near-universal premium content there's no point in having content-protection features in the first place.
Disabling of Functionality
Vista's content protection mechanism only allows protected content to be sent over interfaces that also have content-protection facilities built in. Currently the most common high-end audio output interface is S/PDIF (Sony/Philips Digital Interface Format). Most newer audio cards, for example, feature TOSlink digital optical output for high-quality sound reproduction, and even the latest crop of motherboards with integrated audio provide at least coax (and often optical) digital output. Since S/PDIF doesn't provide any content protection, Vista requires that it be disabled when playing protected content [Note E]. In other words if you've sunk a pile of money into a high-end audio setup fed from an S/PDIF digital output, you won't be able to use it with protected content. Instead of hearing premium high-definition audio, you get treated to premium high-definition silence.
Say you've just bought Pink Floyd's ¡°The Dark Side of the Moon¡±, released as a Super Audio CD (SACD) in its 30th anniversary edition in 2003, and you want to play it under Vista (I'm just using SACD as a representative example of protected audio content because it's a well-known technology, in practice Sony has refused to license it for playback on PCs). Since the S/PDIF link to your amplifier/speakers is regarded as insecure for playing the SA content, Vista would disable it, and you'd end up hearing a performance by Marcel Marceau instead of Pink Floyd.
Similarly, component (YPbPr) video will be disabled by Vista's content protection, so the same applies to a high-end video setup fed from component video. But what if you're lucky enough to have bought a video card that supports HDMI digital video with HDCP content-protection? There's a good chance that you'll have to go out and buy another video card that really does support HDCP, because until quite recently no video card on the market actually supported it even if the vendor's advertising claimed that it did. As the site that first broke the story in their article The Great HDCP Fiasco puts it:
¡°None of the AGP or PCI-E graphics cards that you can buy today support HDCP [¡] If you've just spent $1000 on a pair of Radeon X1900 XT graphics cards expecting to be able to playback HD-DVD or Blu-ray movies at 1920¡Á1080 resolution in the future, you've just wasted your money [¡] If you just spent $1500 on a pair of 7800GTX 512MB GPUs expecting to be able to play 1920¡Á1080 HD-DVD or Blu-ray movies in the future, you've just wasted your money¡±.
(The two devices mentioned above are the premium supposedly-HDCP-enabled cards made by the two major graphics chipset manufacturers ATI and nVidia). ATI was later subject to a class-action lawsuit by its customers over this deception. As late as August of 2006, when Sony announced its Blu-ray drive for PCs, it had to face the embarrassing fact that its Blu-ray drive couldn't actually play Blu-ray disks in HD format:
¡°Since there are currently no PCs for sale offering graphics chips that support HDCP, this isn't yet possible¡±.
In fact so far no-one has been able to identify any Windows system that will actually play HD content in HD quality, in all cases any attempt to do this produced either no output or a message that it was blocked by content protection. While it's not possible to prove a negative in this manner, it's certainly an indication that potential buyers may be in for a shock when they try and play premium content on their shiny new Vista PC.
The same issue that affects graphics cards also goes for high-resolution LCD monitors. One of the big news items at the 2007 Consumer Electronics Show (CES 2007), the world's premier event for consumer high-tech, was Samsung's 1920¡Á1200 HD-capable 27¡å LCD monitor, the Syncmaster 275T, released at a time when everyone else was still shipping 24¡å or 25¡å monitors as their high-end product [Note F]. The only problem with this amazing HD monitor is that Vista won't display HD content on it because it doesn't consider any of its many input connectors (DVI-D, 15-pin D-Sub, S-Video, and component video, but no HDMI with HDCP) secure enough. So you can do almost anything with this HD monitor except view HD content on it.
If you have even more money to burn, you can go for the largest (conventional) computer monitor made, the Samsung's stupidly large (for a computer monitor) 46¡å SyncMaster 460PN. Again though, Vista won't display HD content on it, turning your $4,000 purchase into a still-image picture frame (oddly enough, this monitor has been advertised as ¡°HDTV ready¡± by retailers even though you can't display HD images on it, although in practice the term ¡°HD-ready¡± has been diluted close to meaninglessness ¡ª 10-year-old 14¡å CRT monitors have a higher resolution than many ¡°HDTV-ready¡± TVs).
In order to appropriately protect content, Vista will probably have to disable any special device features that it can't directly control. For example many sound cards built on C-Media chipsets (which in practice is the vast majority of them) support Steinberg's ASIO (Audio Stream I/O), a digital audio interface that completely bypasses the Windows audio mixer and other audio-related driver software to provide more flexibility and much lower latency than the Windows ones. ASIO support is standard for newer C-Media hardware like the CMI 8788. Since ASIO bypasses Windows' audio handling, it would probably have to be disabled, which is problematic because audiophiles and professional musicians require ASIO support specifically because of its much higher quality than the standard Windows channels (you can get more information on Vista's audio architecture and the changes from XP in this post from Creative Labs).
Indirect Disabling of Functionality
As well as overt disabling of functionality, there's also covert disabling of functionality. For example PC voice communications rely on automatic echo cancellation (AEC) in order to work. Echo cancellation is used to prevent sound from a loudspeaker or headphones interfering with a microphone in the vicinity. This is rather tricky because the sound will be modified by the speaker and the surroundings that it's operating in, so it requires fairly sophisticated signal processing to remove, as well as a high-quality copy of the signal (if you get a degraded copy the signal, it becomes much harder to use it to cancel out the echo with it). Although it's not visible, echo cancellation is very widely used in applications like hands-free car phones, standard phones used in hands-free mode, and conference calling systems.
AEC in a PC requires feeding back a sample of the audio mix into the echo cancellation subsystem, but with Vista's content protection this isn't permitted any more because this might allow access to premium content. What is permitted is a highly-degraded form of feedback that might possibly still sort-of be enough for some sort of minimal echo cancellation purposes.
The requirement to disable audio and video output plays havoc with standard system operations, because the security policy used is a so-called ¡°system high¡± policy: The overall sensitivity level is that of the most sensitive data present in the system. So the instant that any audio derived from premium content appears on your system, signal degradation and disabling of outputs will occur. What makes this particularly entertaining is the fact that the downgrading/disabling is dynamic, so if the premium-content signal is intermittent or varies (for example music that fades out), various outputs and output quality will fade in and out, or turn on and off, in sync. Normally this behaviour would be a trigger for reinstalling device drivers or even a warranty return of the affected hardware, but in this case it's just a signal that everything is functioning as intended.
THIS IS A VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,VERY,LONG READ ON VISTA
GO HERE TO READ THE TOTAL ARTICLE..
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html#effect
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 11. March 2007 @ 07:28
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jazo132
Suspended permanently
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11. March 2007 @ 07:34 |
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I just downloaded this program that changes the XP graphics on your computer to the Vista ones. So, it gives you the cool look of Vista with all the advantages of XP. It works great.
(It's a free program so this isn't piracy)
Here it is if you want it:
http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/OS-E...tion-Pack.shtml
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Senior Member
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15. March 2007 @ 20:52 |
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my friend went back to xp. more and more people are switching back to xp. I also switched my microsoft office 2007 to 2003. I think windows xp and office 2003 is going to use for awhile.
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aabbccdd
Suspended permanently
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15. March 2007 @ 21:01 |
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jazo132, can you give us a screen shot of what it looks like , i am not sure i want to do it. and can you roll it back if you don't like it
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Member
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16. March 2007 @ 03:14 |
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Good morning all!!!
right682 what kind of problems were you having with office 2007???
just curious...
Chuck
"Men are slower to recognize blessings than misfortunes." Titus Livius (59BC-17AD)
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AfterDawn Addict
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16. March 2007 @ 07:52 |
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Vista Can Run Without Activation for a Year
Posted by CowboyNeal on Friday March 16, @07:22AM
from the procrastinists-in-luck dept.
Windows Microsoft
An anonymous reader gave us a heads up on this article for people who like putting things off. It begins: "Windows Vista can be run for at least a year without being activated, a serious end-run around one of Microsoft's key anti-piracy measures, Windows expert Brian Livingston said today. Livingston, who publishes the Windows Secrets newsletter, said that a single change to Vista's registry lets users put off the operating system's product activation requirement an additional eight times beyond the three disclosed last month. With more research, said Livingston, it may even be possible to find a way to postpone activation indefinitely."
How to run Vista legally without activation ... for at least a year
Microsoft calls it a 'hack,' researcher, a 'documented feature'
March 15, 2007 (Computerworld) -- Windows Vista can be run for at least a year without being activated, a serious end run around one of Microsoft Corp.'s key antipiracy measures, Windows expert Brian Livingston said today.
Livingston, who publishes the Windows Secrets newsletter, said that a single change to Vista's registry lets users put off the operating system's product activation requirement an additional eight times beyond the three disclosed last month. With more research, said Livingston, it may even be possible to find a way to postpone activation indefinitely.
"The [activation] demands that Vista puts on corporate buyers is much more than on XP," said Livingston. "Vista developers have [apparently] programmed in back doors to get around time restrictions for Vista activation."
Microsoft promptly labeled the registry change a "hack," a loaded word that is usually synonymous with "illegal."
"Recently it has been reported that an activation hack for Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system has been identified," said David Lazar, the director of the company's Genuine Windows program, in an e-mail. "Although these reports are purely speculative at the moment, we are actively monitoring attempts to steal Microsoft intellectual property."
"This is not a hack," Livingston shot back when Lazar's e-mail was read to him. "This is a documented feature of the operating system." To back up his view, Livingston pointed out links to online support documents where Microsoft spells out the pertinent registry key. Nor is it speculative; Livingston demonstrated the procedure live via a Web conference session today and claimed "we have run this dozens of times."
Livingston last month revealed that a one-line command lets users postpone Vista activation up to three times. Combined with Vista's initial 30-day grace period, that meant users could run Vista for as long as 120 days before they had to activate the OS. At the time, Microsoft seemed unconcerned with the disclosure and flatly stated that using it would not violate the Vista End User License Agreement (EULA).
"The feature that I'm revealing today shows that Microsoft has built into Vista a function that allows anyone to extend the operating system's activation deadline not just three times, but many times," Livingston said.
Microsoft documented the key on its support site in a description of what it calls "SkipRearm". In it, Microsoft explains that "rearming a computer restores the Windows system to the original licensing state. All licensing and registry data related to activation is either removed or reset. Any grace period timers are reset as well."
By changing the SkipRearm key's value from the default "0" to "1," said Livingston, the earlier-revealed "slmgr -rearm" command can be used over and over.
http://www.computerworld.com/action/arti...ticleId=9013258
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Senior Member
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16. March 2007 @ 13:25 |
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vista sucks, It just looks pretty. one of my problem that i'm having with 2007 is that after i change the settings it does not change. It's harder to use maby because i have to learn the new interface. But i do not see any improvements for VISTA and OFFICE 2007. Trust me stick with xp and 03
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jazo132
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18. March 2007 @ 13:48 |
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Yes you can change back to the XP style by simply changing your theme back to XP. It even changes the XP sounds to the Vista sounds. Sorry it took so long for those screenshots. Here they are:
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 18. March 2007 @ 13:49
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