Date: 2007-12-24 11:01 Subject: Vista - "Wow" it's Hard to Use Security: Public Tags: john wilson, mac, microsoft, vista, windows, xp

John Wilson tells a tale of Windows Vista that mirrors my own experience. A friend of mine asked me to help install broadband on her machine which turned out to be a much bigger problem than I was really expecting. The broadband modem had a USB interface, but of course no drivers that worked with Vista. Many vendors seem to have taken this approach, to not spend the necessary money on making their drivers Vista compatible, since they don't consider the market to be big enough yet to care. This is of course a paradox, as new machines come bundled with Vista and you have to make a serious effort to get a machine with XP now.

For me the Vista interface is painful and unfamiliar. I've used XP since it was first released, and I am familiar with all the diagnostics available in XP. Not so Vista, where they seem to have made a big effort to hide or change a lot of the functionality I would use when diagnosing a network problem. Also the infamous nagging messages get you down after a few installation attempts, as you have to choose Allow/Cancel pretty much every step of the way.

I know quite a few power-users that have chosen at this juncture to jump to Mac, and I'm beginning to see why. Having had a great success with XP (which was a big step forward from the earlier Windows Me and Windows NT/2000), Microsoft have definitely stumbled over this one.

Date: 2006-12-14 22:04 Subject: Blog Tag Security: Public Mood: amused Tags: 5 things, blog, blog tag, blog-tag, dan york, five things, ivan pope, john wilson, neville hobson, pulver, shel holtz, tag

Having been tagged by my friend Dan York, it's my turn to reveal 5 little known facts about myself:

1. I am named Martyn after my paternal grandfather, Edward Martyn Davies. Similarly, my son has the name Thomas after my father, Thomas Windsor Davies, who in turn had a grandfather Thomas.
2. My family is Welsh, I grew up partially in Wales. My family goes back many generations (on both sides) in Wales.
3. I once flew a Tiger Moth over Maidenhead (where I now work).
4. I have run three marathons, my best time is 3:57.
5. I worked in Australia at the end of the 80's, where I learned to Scuba dive.

Now who can I pick to pass the baton to? It seems every VoIP/telecom blogger I know is already in play, so I need to reach out to some of the people I'm reading in Bloglines right now:

Ivan Pope, John Wilson, Neville Hobson, Shel Holtz, and, oh number 5 just got fired