"I have a mind like a steel... uh... thingy." Patrick Logan's weblog.

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Saturday, January 07, 2006

Linux and Windows (and Mac OSX)

Here's a funny report on Linux from Microsoft. Not funny "ha-ha" but funny "sad".

First of all I did not even have to read the report to laugh, or cry as it were.

I have a couple of computers that are about 5 years old. They are set up for dual boot to either Windows or Linux. The only facts I need to know about them are these: I can run the latest Linux on them. Every time there has been a new version that I wanted, I was able to upgrade with no problem.

On the Windows side, I am still running Windows 2000. I am unable to get XP running on them. Oh, maybe someone will respond with a statement like, "All you have to do is X." But any value of "X" that I have run into appears to be at best an unknown amount of time and possibly money.

Let me say right now, I'd like to run XP on them just because the other Windows systems I have around do run XP. I could not tell you the reason why XP is better than 2000 other than there are probably some significant security differences. I am actually fine running Windows 2000 when I need them to run Windows at all, which just further makes the point of incompatibility absurd. Did they really screw up Windows NT and then Windows 2000 so much that a significantly incompatible rewrite of the OS was required? Or just an opportunity for more revenue?

I can also run Apple's latest Mac OSX on my six year old Macintosh very well. I have all the facts I need. I have no expectations that anything will get better over the next few years with "Vista". Apparently Microsoft is only looking forward to getting more revenue and not looking at the real value for the customer. To date, that has worked out well for them because they either don't have as bad a reputation as I think they deserve, or they don't have a customer base that cares about bad reputations. And that's a pretty darn big customer base, so I would have to go with what works if I were them, too. Will it catch up at some point? I think it has to, but I have never been successful at predicting these things.

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About Me

Portland, Oregon, United States
I'm usually writing from my favorite location on the planet, the pacific northwest of the u.s. I write for myself only and unless otherwise specified my posts here should not be taken as representing an official position of my employer. Contact me at my gee mail account, username patrickdlogan.