"Vista Capable" Lawsuit Is Now a Class Action

An anonymous reader notes an update in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reporting that the lawsuit against Microsoft's "Windows Vista Capable" marketing campaign has been granted class-action status. We discussed the company's internal misgivings with this campaign a while back. The suit alleges that "...Microsoft unjustly enriched itself by promoting PCs as 'Windows Vista Capable' even when they could only run a bare-bones version of the operating system, called 'Vista Home Basic.'" In the 2006 pre-holiday season, Microsoft had placed "Windows Vista Capable" stickers on machines to keep the sale of Windows XP machines going after Vista was delayed. Microsoft didn't lose out totally in the recent ruling — the article notes that the judge "narrowed the basis on which plaintiffs could move forward with their claims."

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

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[obstalesgone]

AH! This explains the claim that Vista is faster than XP. All this time I thought it was just marketing nonsense.

Re:Its not a lie!

[Alcoholic Synonymous]

He's just a little sore from having to post quickly between crashes.

Re:

[Javagator]

Wish they would have some tort changes here in the US

If this is like most class action lawsuits, then the "victims" will get a certificate for a 10 percent discount on a Zune, and the lawyers will get $3,000,000 in legal fees.

Chair Warning.. Watch yourself..

[LingNoi]

you can always tell who the people are that pretend to run MS OSs in order to slam them. it is obvious by the statements you make, that you have never even run vista... what a stupid thing to say, are you retarded? If what you say is true for you, you just need to learn some computer skills. Vista doesn't crash. Where do you get your info? from reading slasdont? you speak without knowledge

-Signed Steve B.

MS selling hardware?

[Anonymous Coward]

Since when is Microsoft selling PC's? Or did they send someone around to go put those stickers on the machines?
I'd have thought the hardware manufacturers would be the ones who didn't want sales to fall.

I remember the same sort of campaign when XP came out. The laptop I bought then had an "XP capable" (or something that sounded similar) sticker on the box, even though it came with ME installed and with a voucher for a cheap XP Home upgrade when it came out. After having upgraded it and having seen the pe

Re:MS selling hardware?

[kripkenstein]

Since when is Microsoft selling PC's? Or did they send someone around to go put those stickers on the machines?
I'd have thought the hardware manufacturers would be the ones who didn't want sales to fall.

I agree that the hardware vendors should also share part of the blame. However, Microsoft designed the campaign, and in addition is responsible for the capabilities of Vista (for all the hardware manufacturers knew, it might get faster before it was released to the general public). Therefore, on the face of it, the case might have merit.

I remember the same sort of campaign when XP came out. The laptop I bought then had an "XP capable" (or something that sounded similar) sticker on the box, even though it came with ME installed and with a voucher for a cheap XP Home upgrade when it came out. After having upgraded it and having seen the performance under XP, I reformatted it and downgraded. Not to ME, but to Win2000, which it still runs fine.

Yes, this isn't entirely new. But that doesn't justify things in any way. In fact Microsoft should have learned from past experience and done things better this time.

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[memfrob]

In fact Microsoft should have learned from past experience and done things better this time.

Well, let's see... last time they made money hand-over-fist, so why would they change things around?

Re:MS selling hardware?

[paganizer]

For some reason it still bothers me when people claim to have "downgraded" to Win2k. it's like saying you "Downgrade" from Vista to XP. How can it be a downgrade when your computer runs faster, you have less problems, etc?

Re:MS selling hardware?

[jawtheshark]

Use Windows 95, or perhaps even DOS. It runs faster and you have less problems.

Except, only one part of that statement is true....

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[paganizer]

actually, the plateau is around Win2k, and is slowly moving towards WinXP pro 64. Dos is sometimes difficult to run on modern hardware, and while Win95 OSR2 is still pretty usable, it's not a good overall platform for applications and games and far from trouble free. So I guess you could say that going to win95 is a upgrade from Vista in terms of basic performance, but it's counter productive overall. Much better to stick with the best currently available, Win2k & WinXP Pro 64.

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[asd-Strom]

Well, 2k is faster than Vista because it has a lot less features. If you don't use any of those features, then sure, ok you can stick with the older stuff. But I personally benefit from Vista features and thus I'm also using Vista.

Re:

[DarkOx]

Drivers in user space sure is great. Now when my video driver has issues, which is about twice a week, the screen blinks 3 times. Between each blink Vista tells me in a little ballon that it reasted my video driver. Well great except that after the 3rd time it BSODs anyway. Keep in mind this is a brand new HP right out of the box. Factory image the only things I have installed are litterally firefox and MS Office.

No hacks no new drivers, just sucks.

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[ozmanjusri]

* The new sound system, with per-application volume control * The kernel transaction manager * Drivers running in user mode * The new windows update

Ok, let's say each of those features requires a gigabyte of compiled code to implement. What do you reckon the other eleven giggabytes are being used for?

Re:

[Zeinfeld]

I have a Vista system and a MacBook. The two systems are pretty much the same when it comes to usability. Windows Vista has the edge in some ares, Apple in others.

Apple definitely has the edge in configuration. Microsoft has to get its act together and recognize that UPnP is dead. Bonjour is deployed, works and is supported by a huge number of hardware providers. It took me minutes to hook my Mac up to my network attached printers and Windows Home server.

Microsoft has the edge when a configuration goes

Re:

[unlametheweak]

Any legacy operating system is not a good idea for running on modern hardware because the driver support will be non-existent. This ironically enough was / (is?) Vista's main problem, along with some applications that were not specifically designed to run on Vista.

Built in virtualization would have probably been a better approach than what M$ has done thus far: trying to tweak Vista to support the most popular XP applications. I wonder how many people even bother to try and use the Compatibility Wizard.

I wo

Corporate path: Windows 98, Windows XP.

[Futurepower(R)]

That is moderated insightful?

This Slashdot story is part of the complaining about Microsoft's abusiveness, and so is the class-action lawsuit. At present, Windows 2000 will be completely killed on 7/13/2010 [microsoft.com]. However, that is only because people complained intensely. The original death date for Windows 2000 Professional was 2007. That's why it is so important to complain.

See a quote from this comment [slashdot.org] on an earlier Slashdot story: "Microsoft's customers were forced to upgrade to Windows XP because Windo

Re:

[SCHecklerX]

Faster, yes, less problems, likely not.

Re:MS selling hardware?

[jbengt]

Use Windows 95, or perhaps even DOS. It runs faster and you have less problems.

Not quite.
MSDOS was a clunker, all the way.
Windows 95 (and its' Service Pack, Windows 98), while the first usable OS from MS, was rife with problems
You would not want to go back to struggle with its' drivers, miserable attempts at plug'n'play, and frequent BSODs
For example, '98 seemed to have terrible memory management. When I was using 98 at work, I would frequently have Excel, Wordperfect, e-mail, and AutoCAD open at the same time. One particular job I was working on, a zoo, had particularly large and complicated CAD drawings, including several external references to other trades' drawings, and the exhibit designer's naturalistic fake trees drawn with the detail of every branch and twig. This slowed down my computer considerably, but the real problem was that after I closed the AutoCAD drawing and went back to Excel, I would soon get an error about illegal memory access that would crash the program. It only occasionally caused a BSOD, but it would require me to close all open programs and windows, and restart them. I figure that 98 somehow allocated the same memory to more than one program, and freed it from all of them when AutoCAD closed. More physical memory may have helped, but I never had that problem with XP. In fact, I almost never have had significant problems with XP.

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[zippthorne]

"Cheap XP home"?

Name one thing XP pro can do that XP home cannot that home users would be interested in.

remote desktop

[way2trivial]

home can not server up itself under remote desktop.

perhaps not a majority, or even 10% but significant numbers of people would like the ability to rdc into their home machine from work or on the road.

Re:

[zippthorne]

That's hardly worth doubling the price. Especially as VNC or VNC+SSH (tightVNC & PuTTY are nice, free options) does the job more securely anyway.

It's neither an option that home users are going to be interested in, nor is it an option that they are particularly excluded from. The "remote assistance" feature has nearly the same functionality, though it's a little harder to initiate. Furthermore, if you've ever run remote desktop sessions (like, say, remote X) you'd know that "on the road" really isn't

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[jbengt]

Name one thing XP pro can do that XP home cannot that home users would be interested in.

1. Remote desktop
2. Multi-processor (2) support
3. IIS web server
4. File-level access controls
5. Multi-language support
6. Various networking features (granted, in 2001 these wouldn't have been very popular at home)

Oops, you only asked for one. Anyway,

Some more here: http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_home_pro.asp/ [winsupersite.com]
and here: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/howtobuy/choosing2.mspx/ [microsoft.com]

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[zippthorne]

1. Remote desktop
See my other reply. It's useful, but not a home user feature. And it doesn't even accomplish what the people using it really want, anyway.
2. Multi-processor (2) support
At the time XP came out, and for about half of its life cycle, multi-core processors weren't even available to home users, and multiple processor mainboards were squarely in the realm of professionals and en

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[TheLink]

Better access control.
Group policy to help lockdown accounts on a shared PC.
Automated System Recovery (but does that really work? :) ).

Some home users might be interested in encryption but I don't have much confidence in EFS being suitable.

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[nodan]

Of course, MS is not selling hardware. In a reasonable world, users should not care too much about the operating system but should care about the hardware performance and the applications they can run. However, the world is not reasonable at all and the "Vista Capable" campaign is the usual spread of fear and exploitation of computer users. Fear, because it implies not having Vista might be a disadvantage, and exploitation, because people are asked to pay for stuff they don't need at all which even works t

Ugh...

[rindeee]

I hate class action suits. They do next to no good for the consumer save for putting a couple (literally) bucks in the pocket, benefit lawyers almost exclusively and in the end make products cost more. I hate Vista, and I don't care for (and therefor do not use the products produced by) Microsoft but this is going to do little good in the long run.

Re:Ugh...

[DustyShadow]

True but without class actions are really the only way to punish companies when it would be way too costly for a single person to go after them. I consider class actions to be necessary evils.

Re:Ugh...

[Tablizer]

[CA's only benefit lawyers] True but without class actions are really the only way to punish companies when it would be way too costly for a single person to go after them. I consider class actions to be necessary evils.

Agreed. It's about the only way to punish big greedy companies enough to make them think twice the next time. I wish we could find an alternative, but so far none exists. If somebody can come up with a better way, please state it. What we have in CA's is better than fly-spec individual suits. Basically this is the current options:

A. Move a very little bit of perpetrator's money to consumer (individual suits)
B. Move a lot of perpetrator's money to lawyers and a little bit to consumers. (class-action)
C. Don't do anything.
D. Make Gates and Balmer do the Chicken Dance on American Idol.

Until E is invented, B is the best choice. (Okay, D is not viable, I admit. Besides, Balmer seems to like dancing funny.)
     

Re:Ugh...

[MikeyVB]

E. Revoke their charter of incorporation.

I bet they would start to get the point after the first few.

Re:Ugh...

[Solandri]

B. Move a lot of perpetrator's money to lawyers and a little bit to consumers. (class-action)

Tier the rate lawyers get paid. For awards up to, say, $1 million, they get 33%. For the fraction of awards between $1-$10 million, they get 10%. Between $10-$100 million they get 3%. Over $100 million, they get 1%. Over $1 billion they get 0.1% ($1 million per $1 billion awarded). Right now they get 33% of everything, which is flat out ridiculous. A class action reduces the lawyers' workload by taking advantage of efficiencies of scale, their compensation should be reduced to reflect that.

Also, punitive awards should go to the government - either regulatory agencies or law enforcement, not the victims. The victims already get compensatory damages to compensate them for their suffering. The punitive damages are designed to punish the guilty, and should go to society as recompense for violating the public trust. The U.S. court system is currently biased against punitive damages because often even when the defendant deserves to have to pay, the victim doesn't deserve the money so the court system errs on the side of the defendant. This change would help fix that.

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[jamesh]

Also, punitive awards should go to the government - either regulatory agencies or law enforcement, not the victims.

I've had the same thoughts before, that the defendant deserves to get punished, but that the victim doesn't deserve to be rewarded to that degree. My solution would be that the victim gets to nominate a charity and the money gets directed to them.

I wonder how that would change our court-happy society - if the victim knew that even if they won, they'd only more or less get compensated for their

Re:

[Solandri]

Uh, your numbers create perverse incentives. Break 1 million and get 10%, if you had kept it under just by a bit you'd get 33%.

I said fractional. So if you were awarded $200 million, the lawyer would get:

• 33% of the first $1 million
• 10% of $9 million (the $1-$10 million portion)
• 3% of $90 million (the $10-$100 million portion)
• 1% of $100 million (the $100-$200 million portion)

And this was an example so the numbers could be sliced any other way. I'm a big fan of continuous functions but it seems the law

Re:

[mpe]

True but without class actions are really the only way to punish companies when it would be way too costly for a single person to go after them.

What about lots of small claims? The plaintiffs can file these in person, but the corporation must pay a lawyer to deal with them.

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[Detritus]

They can just not bother showing up, receive a default judgment, and not pay. How are you going to collect on your judgment?

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[cerberusss]

cases like this only punish consumers. Any costs incurred by Microsoft will surely be passed along to their customers

The passing along of costs is indeed one of the disadvantages. But are you sure this disadvantage is big enough to just let it slip?

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[cerberusss]

OK, but then they would assume they'd get away with anything. Also, your premise that management 'just passes on the cost' is true, but there are other factors involved. This costs money and while not significantly, cuts into the company fund set aside for these matters. If this happens too much, that fund will be higher than that of MS its competitors, which will be noted by analysts. I think it's still worth it.

The winners don't matter. The losers do.

[graymocker]

The only winners of a class action lawsuit are the lawyers.

This is very true. But class actions lawsuits - when successful - also create deterrent effects by making some companies into very big losers. The potential threat of class actions lawsuits, and the fiscal liability they represent, must thus be accounted for in a corporation's cost-benefit evaluations when they decide whether or not to shaft the consumers in some way. There should be more of them, frankly, and I say that as someone who once qualified for a trivial class-action award and never bothered to c

Re:

[level_headed_midwest]

The risk of being shafted by a company with or without class action suits does differ quite a bit:

1. If there are a ton of class-action suits as there are today, companies may be deterred from pulling a few fast ones. However, there is a CERTAINTY that the customer will be shafted because the increased cost of the much larger legal team needed to deal with class-action suits isn't free and is passed on in the form of higher prices.

2. If there are no class-action suits, companies may feel less of a deterrent

Re:Ugh...

[jtownatpunk.net]

I guess you don't understand the purpose of a class action. The purpose is never to benefit the consumer. The purpose is to punish the target of the class action. That is a valid purpose in a situation like this where the individual losses of the consumer were negligible but, in aggregate, add up to a significant amount.

No reasonable person is going to file an individual lawsuit against Microsoft because of this because the amount of money they could recover (if they win) is less than the value of the time it would take to file in small claims court, prepare the evidence, take a day off work...heck, it's not even worth the effort of typing it all out. But does that mean Microsoft should be off the hook? No. That's where the class action comes in.

Re:

[Bios_Hakr]

In this particular case, the consumer would be best served by filing a Small Claims Court action. At most, the consumer lost $300.

A class action would be perfect for things like drug companies failing to test a drug and killing people. Or insurance companies dropping coverage after a disease is discovered.

However, in 99% of class-actions, the *best* situation would be to have a Federal prosecutor charge the CEO and Board Members with committing a crime. Throw their asses in jail and you'd see a lot of co

Re:Ugh...

[Jerry Rivers]

Yeah but if the suit succeeds everyone will win $25!

Re:

[SCHecklerX]

All well and good, but why, then, do the lawyers profit from the punishment more than those who were actually hurt by the problem? I wouldn't even care about making money from the deal, but to get a few dollars or a coupon in the mail over something that may have cost me hundreds of dollars while the bad behavior was going on is insulting and is certainly not just.

Re:Ugh...

[coaxial]

I hate class action suits. They do next to no good for the consumer save for putting a couple (literally) bucks in the pocket, benefit lawyers almost exclusively and in the end make products cost more.

You don't understand the point of class action lawsuits.

It's not compensation, it's punishment. Punishment for bad behavior is good. It makes companies think twice about conducting bad behavior in the future. It's essentially a civil fine. Lawyers making money? Well look, for members of the class, it is essentially free money. You fill out online form, and then you wait for a check. That's it.

but this is going to do little good in the long run.

If it makes them not knowingly [slashdot.org] engage in an extremely confusing (at best) and deceptive (at worse) campaign, then it would have achieved it's goal.

"B-b-b-but it's a lawsuit! and Lawyers are Evil(tm)!!!11!eleventy-one!11!" you say. If you don't bring civil suits, how do you expect private citizens assert their rights and correct the behavior of those who have wronged them? Unless of course, you think that people shouldn't be able to defend themselves. Do you believe that?

Re:Ugh...

[rtb61]

Entirely false. Class action law suits do not add one cent to the price of a product. I am sick of this same lie being spread over and over again, just like piracy does not add one cent to the price of a product. It is all supply and demand, greedy corporations charge as much as they possible can, there is absolutely no limit to their greed, 100%, 1000%, 10000% markups not a problem at all.

It is well known that M$ puts a huge margin of the price of windows, which is why it so agressively and currptly purseus a monopoly to protect the absurd profit margins. So the more 'profit' eating, capital reserve draining class action law suits the better, who cares if it only enricghes a bunch of lawyers, as long as it bleeds M$ dry, and maybe, just maybe, finally forces some respect out of M$ for the customer.

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[HardCase]

Yeah! They're currpt! Enricgh the lawyers!

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[toddestan]

Entirely false. Class action law suits do not add one cent to the price of a product. I am sick of this same lie being spread over and over again, just like piracy does not add one cent to the price of a product. It is all supply and demand, greedy corporations charge as much as they possible can, there is absolutely no limit to their greed, 100%, 1000%, 10000% markups not a problem at all.

You may be right in cases like MS Windows, where Microsoft has the market wrapped pretty nicely for Windows, and charge

In other news

[iamacat]

Judge granted a class action status to a lawsuit of customers against a company selling an "under a thousand dollars" TV for $999.95

Re:In other news

[vux984]

Judge granted a class action status to a lawsuit of customers against a company selling an "under a thousand dollars" TV for $999.95

It would be a more apt analagy if said TVs were could only average 10 frames per second, american idol was too taxing on the set for it even to start. This line of TVs was also heavily advertised as having 5.1 surround sound playback, a remote and very shiny sexy digital knobs going to 300 channels but when you got it hom and set it up there was no remote, and you had to change channels by turning a 13 channel knob. Oh, and there was no sound either. none. not 5.1, not even mono.

Such a unit may meet the barest qualifications of being a TV, but any reasonable consumer who got such a thing home would feel justifiably ripped off and return it immediately.

But the insidious part of Vista capable, was that they bought it on the promise that it would run vista when it came out, and when Vista came out, they found out that their reasonable expection of 'run vista' was not met, but they were now entirely unable to return the computer, and even downgrading is a 'reformat from scratch' procedure.

They feel ripped off, justifiably, in my opinon, and they want their money back.

If bought a computer that "ran Vista", and ended up with a computer that could only run Vista Home Basic... and did even that poorly, then I'd take it back. These people can't. And hence there is a lawsuit.

Re:

[Tony Hoyle]

Can't they return it? I don't know about US consumer protections, but here in the UK an item must be 'as described'. A computer described as vista capable that could not run vista would not fit this description and be able to be returned for a full refund.

Re:

[Detritus]

You would probably have to go to small claims court to force the merchant to accept a return or pay damages. Otherwise, they will just point to the sign that says "no returns after N days".

Re:

[David Gerard]

In the UK, such signs are actually illegal if they attempt to give the customer less than the law does. (Pointing this out mid-dispute is usually enough to get them to change their tune, particularly if they in fact pointed to it mid-dispute. http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/ [tradingstandards.gov.uk] is the best website ever.)

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[vux984]

In the case of 'vista capable' computers, it will have been multiple months. So returning to the merchant is not really feasible.

Re:

[toddestan]

I don't see it as that unreasonable, since it would be pretty much impossible to actually acquire that TV for under $1000.00 after paying tax/shipping/fees etc. on the purchase. While the TV example isn't the best, I can think of other examples, such as phone service or new cars, where the advertised prices are nothing like what you actually pay to get the service or item.

Just so I've got this right..

[QuantumG]

1. Honey, should we buy a new computer now?
2. No, Vista is about to come out, we should wait.
3. But this computer over here says "Vista Capable" on it.. we can upgrade when Vista comes out.
4. Ok, let's trust the advertising and buy now.
5. [time passes]
6. [more time passes]
7. [yet, MORE time passes]
8. Honey, Vista has finally come out.
9. You're fucking with me.
10. No really! Let's upgrade.
11. Ok, which of the 400 versions of Vista should we upgrade to?
12. Oh, seems that our machine can only run Vista Basic.
13. Those bastards!! Call the lawyers.
14. Meanwhile, the rest of the world makes it blatantly obvious that *all* version of Vista blow, not just Basic.
15. ???
16. Profit.

This did not really happen.

Re:

[Tony Hoyle]

This did not really happen.

Bet it did. Thousands of times.

Well, apart from step 16 (unless you meant the profit that MS made).

oh yeah...

[DSVaughan]

Recently bought a laptop that came with vita home premium. Look at the "Windows Experience Index", and am getting about 60 percent of what I could be. Brand new laptop, meets all recommended requirements (except video card) for vista ultimate, and I still only get a 60%. I also see computers that are less than a quarter as powerful as that laptop being sold with vista on them. There should be at least a minimum spec increase to certify the hardware as vista enabled. Like you can run XP Pro on as low as a 233 MHz core, with 128 Mb ram, and 1.5 GB of hard drive. It will run, just about as fast as the mold growing in Antarctica. It runs, but you can't do more than idle without it freezing up on you. Therefore, in my opinion, you should change the minimum system requirements so that you could at least open notepad within 5 minutes.

Re:

[Tony Hoyle]

Try SP1. They seem to have removed quite a bit of the bloat... no seriously. SP1 is what *should* have been released as Vista. The UI still blows and it still runs at half the speed of XP on a brand new laptop, but compared to the original it's like night and day, as the base footprint is down to about 350mb so it's not constantly thrashing with 2GB of RAM.

PC World Tests Final Version of Vista SP1

[transporter_ii]

http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/07/1911213 [slashdot.org]

"PC World ran the final version of Windows Vista SP1 through a first set of tests last night. Here's the bottom line: 'File copying, one of the main performance-related complaints from Vista users, was significantly faster. But other tests showed little improvement and, in two tests, our experience was actually a little better without the service pack installed than with it.'"

Re:

[Tony Hoyle]

Odd. I'm no lover of Vista but pre-SP1 it was *completely* unusable in 2GB. Post SP1 it's still very slow but the reduced memory footprint means that it's not in swap all the time, so it seems better. Plus they've fixed some of the more annoying bugs.

I don't get the file copying bit at all. The problem was it didn't work, not that it was slow - copying multiple files would abort halfway with no warning, and trying to copy would invoke about 6 UAC warnings. Copy speed was *not* the issue.

Have you actual

Re:

[TheLink]

"I might have to revise my stance of refusing point blank to support it if a friend asks for help"

Heh, if a friend/relative asks me for help on Vista, I'll only help if their hardware supports Windows XP. Go figure :).

In theory I could install a Linux distro for them, but so far I don't think Linux is suitable for them yet.

But setting up Windows XP properly on a _personal_ computer does take quite a lot of time - the amount of updates you have to download, configuring it decently, installing drivers, codecs

Re:

[SEMW]

Look at the "Windows Experience Index", and am getting about 60 percent of what I could be.

Ummm, 60% of what?

There is no maximum value. To quote Raymond Chen: "Imagine what the world would be like if there were a max value. What happens if the max is 10 and you buy a 10 computer, and then an even faster computer comes out next year - what rating does that computer yet?" (source [msdn.com]).

The max you can get on today's absolute best hardware may be around 5.9, but that's not the top end of a scale -- it will certainly increase with time as better hardware comes out and WEI is updated with newer benc

Re:

[toddestan]

At some point, you're going have a computer so fast that everything is going to be pretty much instantaneous with everything maxed out. You might as well set that to be the max value, because at that point, it doesn't matter how much more hardware you throw at OS, the "experience" is going to be the same. I think that's part of the problem with Vista, as we've already reached that point for XP, and people are used to that level of responsiveness.

Class Action Blows

[Flash0424]

There are so many things in this world that fall into this similar pattern, but it's always (mostly) MS that gets hit with it. It annoys me, because the judges that OK these lawsuits don't have a clue about technology (mostly) and are making decisions based on guesses and their 'gut feeling' that day. It scares me because these same judges are dismissing real law, or not allowing things into the courtroom, arbitrarily (and again, depending on their mood)... As an example, I recently purchased a car stere

This is shite

[Toreo asesino]

Vista Home Basic is basically Vista minus Areo.

So directly comparable to Windows XP Home. It's for people that don't have 3d acceleration, but want the rest.

Therefore it's still Vista, and Vista 'capable' seems like a reasonable tag for me.

And apparently 512 MB RAM is "Vista Capable"

[mathnerd314]

I bought a computer with a "Vista Capable" sticker, which had only 512 MB of RAM. Now, according to Dell [dell.com], such a configuration is "Great for... Booting the Operating System, without running applications or games".

Which, incidentally, was pretty much all I could do.

Turing Machine

[Detritus]

Why not just put a "Turing Machine!!!" sticker on the computer, saying that it can theoretically run any software, via emulation, if you are willing to wait long enough.

A 400mhz P3 should be "Vista Capable"

[billcopc]

Not too long ago, I decided to install MacOS 10.4 on a crappy little test machine at work, an old 400mhz G4. I was expecting very cut-down graphics and little-to-no effects, but the ancient thing actually picked up my widescreen LCD's native resolution (something Windows still struggles with), and all the smooth eye-candy was intact. Windows slide and fade in and out of view, transparency works like a charm, even the dashboard runs pretty smoothly (slight stuttering during the fade, but nothing terrible).

Re:

[Jeremy Erwin]

I ran 10.4 on a 500 MHz G3 iBook with 384 Megabytes of Ram. It was usable, but it wasn't a joy to use. Because the graphics card couldn't accelerate Quartz, Expose was kind of slow..

10.5 can't be used on such a machine. I have 10.5 it on my 1.2 GHz G4 with 1280 Megabytes-- and the extra memory is very useful here. At the same time, however, it's not 100% up to speed. Most of the "eye candy", is turned off. I don't really miss it. Every so often though, it slows down to a crawl-- it's probably the fault of t

Re:

[SEMW]

Not too long ago, I decided to install MacOS 10.4 on a crappy little test machine at work, an old 400mhz G4. ... and all the smooth eye-candy was intact. Windows slide and fade in and out of view, transparency works like a charm.

Your point? Alpha transparency has been supported in Windows since Windows 2000 and certainly doesn't require hardware acceleration. Ditto sliding and fading -- both things that Windows XP menus did by default way before hardware accelerated window management. But any effects that require hardware acceleration -- e.g. pixel shader 2.0 blurring, as used in Aero Glass's title bars or OS X 10.5's top menu bar -- won't work: if you installed Leopard on that PC, the menubar won't be blurry-translucent, and i

The penalty I would like to see is ...

[Skapare]

... that the judge orders Microsoft to do all testing for all versions of Vista and all versions of the next OS they market on these computers they identify as "Vista Capable".

It would never happen. Microsoft will test the next OS home version on dual-socket octal-core 4-GHz 64-bit processesors with 16-GB RAM and 4-way RAID-0 SATA-6 drive arrays.

It's a sham.

[rhadc]

By my recollection, you need a computer built more than five years after the Windows OS you want to run. My 2007 work PC still struggles a little with XP. The Windows Vista Capable program should have started in 2011.

A word of consumer advice

[sjames]

Microsoft has lost several court cases on multiple continents over it's unfair business practices and various consumer frauds. to put it into terms of a natural person, it's out on probation. Would you buy a car from someone who's currently on probation for crimes in connection with selling cars?

MS has piles of money and STILL hasn't been able to buy it's way entirely out of trouble even though the prosecution has mysteriously torpedoed itself more than once. They're like the richest man in town that ever

Note to consumers

[Captain DaFt]

How to get a better working computer:

If the computer you bought doesn't work to your satisfaction, return it to where you bought it, and raise hell until you get a refund!

Remember, you're not Microsoft's customer, You're Dell's, Walmart's, Target's, Best Buy's, whoever you bought the computer from's customer.

THEY are Microsoft's customers. If THEY have to keep refunding THEIR sales, THEY will raise hell with Microsoft, and then Microsoft will either listen, or THEY will switch vendors.

(Notice how many compu

Depends

[jd]

Vista means view. Nothing in the name about running anything, stability, or whatnot. Narf.

Now, seriously...

[Anonymous Coward]

The whole point of me (and maybe some of us) searching for alternatives (OS/2 etc.) and eventually come to know and use Linux is that I (and perhaps others) find "Windows capable" a lie -- not just Vista.

How many did not feel frustrated remembering an old computer could do things a Windows one could not? How many didn't feel restrained by having a tumor-growth-like GUI posing as OS? In which you have to use an entire application to change OS settings? In which capabilities are not available on a system-wide

Re:

[RobertM1968]

How many did not feel frustrated remembering an old computer could do things a Windows one could not? How many didn't feel restrained by having a tumor-growth-like GUI posing as OS?

Me. Still today. I still have an OS/2 network in our office - but administer Windows 2003 Servers for clients. With OS/2 Warp Server for e-Business (and earlier versions), network management is simple drag-n-drop. Create a share, drag it on a user or group. Drag a user onto a group. Drag a directory onto a user. Drag an application onto a group. Drag a resource onto a different server. Drag a server into a domain.

WinServer2003, it's dialog box after dialog box after tab after tab - and numerous "Apply" o

Re:

[CSMatt]

Not everyone has a choice as to whether or not they can get Vista. What if their school or workplace has some policy where Vista is mandatory for all of the students'/employees' machines? I know that my university forces every incoming freshmen to buy a software bundle, which depending on the college may have either something sophisticated and expensive or just Microsoft Office. If the bundle is never purchased you're just charged with it anyway, and are then taken to honor court (the same disciplinary s

Re:

[silverkniveshotmail.]

The Dell I wanted only came with Vista, and Dell wanted $100 for an extra gig of RAM. Within an hour of plugging the computer in I was given at least ten security prompts (every single time I opened task manager!) And it was using 870MB of the 1GB simply running nothing but Firefox with a few tabs. I went onto thepiratebay and version of XPsp2 and it uses 380MB of RAM in the same scenario. If I could only get home networking to work I'd be happy, but it refuses to talk to initiate any communication to my ot

If Vista is unusable...

[CustomDesigned]

just install a Linux distro. (Or even a retail XP if you *really* need Windows.) It isn't hard if you don't have to worry about dual boot and shrinking partitions and stuff. Just stick in a Fedora or Ubuntu LiveCD, and if GUI runs, click the install to disk icon. Onboard wireless will most likely be broadcom and require you to download an XP driver and install ndiswrapper from the livna.org (Fedora) or Ubuntu unfree repository. In many cases, I don't bother, and buy a $40 USB wireless dongle with a sup

Re:

[dominious]

Reminds me of Microsoft Works

Re:

[ThinkingInBinary]

Link is MyMiniCity, please treat post with utter disregard and contempt.

Re:Ridiculous.

[tomhudson]

What ever happened to researching products before buying them?

So people shouldn't be able to make manufacturers and vendors live up to their promises? Of ot saus "Vista Capable", with no limitations, no "fine print", no disclaimers, then it should be capable of running Vista - not some crippled version.

Re:Ridiculous.

[IBBoard]

But it is "Vista capable", just not "Full Vista-with-all-eye-candy-features capable".

As much as I dislike Microsoft products, I can't see how they have a basis for this law suit.

Is the machine incapable of running Vista? No, just the flashy bits that aren't a requirement of the OS. Did Microsoft have a separate designation for machines that could run Vista better? Yes, it was "Premium Ready [microsoft.com]". Is Vista completely unusable because of their system specs? No (or not any more than normal).

It isn't as if they've been sold a "High Def capable TV" that only has 640x480 res, they've been sold the equivalent of a 720i/p TV - it is capable of what is classed as "High Def", just not the really high HD because it is only "capable" of some minimum requirement to be called what it is called.

As a similar situation: Am I capable of running a marathon? Probably. Would I do very good at it? No, because I'm not ready, not trained and not fit enough.

People need to get a dictionary and learn the definition of the word "capable".

Re:

[Xelios]

If they were only selling one version of Vista, where eye candy was just an option, that'd be fine. But they're selling multiple versions, and Vista Ultimate costs quite a bit more than Vista Basic. So Joe Sixpack buys a "Vista Capable" computer, then decides he wants to go all out and buys Vista Ultimate to go with it, only to find out he wasted money on Ultimate because the computer can only handle Basic.

For people with little knowledge about computers and hardware specs it was a very misleading label

Re:

[IBBoard]

If they were only selling one version of Vista, where eye candy was just an option, that'd be fine

Instead they're selling half a dozen or more version of Vista where eye candy is an option - more so in some than others.

Vista Ultimate costs quite a bit more than Vista Basic.

And that doesn't hint at anything? TBH I wouldn't expect my new £50,000 sports car to run well at all on the £60 each cheap tyres I bought for my Fiat Punto.

it was a very misleading label, and should be enough for a lawsuit

Onl

Re:Ridiculous.

[Xelios]

Instead they're selling half a dozen or more version of Vista where eye candy is an option - more so in some than others.

Not quite, only the most expensive versions have the eye candy as an option. And that's the problem. You pay more specifically for the eye candy then aren't able to run it on your Vista Capable machine.

And that doesn't hint at anything? TBH I wouldn't expect my new £50,000 sports car to run well at all on the £60 each cheap tyres I bought for my Fiat Punto.

No, it doesn't hint at anything, certainly not in the way your analogy makes it seem. Microsoft has a history of charging more for versions that can do more, but in the past it's had nothing to do with computer specifications. XP Pro will run just as well on a computer that supports XP Home.

Only if you take marketing at their word and assume (naively) that "capable" means "fully functional of everything" rather than taking the more normal meaning of "capable" which is "it can do it in some way". Capable has an implied undertone of "and not much more". Some of its synonyms imply more than a basic level, but I would always take capable to mean capable, not capable and exceeding the minimum.

I would too, but I still think it's a basis for a lawsuit, and obviously the judge in this case agrees. I just don't think they'll win, for the reason you mentioned.

Re:

[David Gerard]

The problem here is that Vista was heavily marketed as this thing with tons of eye candy, etc. So they can reasonably claim Microsoft's marketing was deceptive here. (I know, who'da thunk.) The pissed-of executive's memo would be a sufficient smoking gun to LART them thoroughly in the UK, dunno about in the US.

Re:

[jawtheshark]

I have one of these " Vista Capable [slashdot.org]" computers. To be honest, I bought it because I knew what the sticker meant. Of course my intention was to run Linux (which it does, thank you very much). I mean, it was extremely cheap and that was the sole reason to buy it.

That's not why I posted this. The box did came with fine print (added later as a sticker), and I am still pissed that I didn't copy the whole text because it really basically said: "Don't run Vista on me".

Re:

[Toreo asesino]

it should be capable of running Vista - not some crippled version.

The "Cripple" basically is sans Areo.

Like most people are even going to notice.

Gotta love the blame shifting

[walterbyrd]

It's just the old blame-shifting game: if anybody is deceived by msft, it is the fault of the deceived for being stupid. It is never msft's fault.

Sure, the stickers only mentioned Vista. Nothing about Basic. Never mind that the FTC had ordered msft in 2001 not to engage in such deceptive practices.

Honesty is too much to expect from msft. Any msft shill will tell you that. Msft advocates seem to believe that msft should be allowed to lie. According the msft advocates, that is just good 'ol American capitalis

Re:

[jawtheshark]

Do people really expect a $500 desktop or laptop to run Windows Vista Ultimate at the same performance as a high-end gaming machine?

No, but they do expect to be able to use all features. My laptop is Vista Capable (bought it because of the sticker, but not for the reasons you might think), but it cannot run Aero. Hence, it cannot run Vista Ultimate with all features on, hence you can't really call it "Vista Capable".

Re:

[IBBoard]

...hence you can't really call it "Vista Capable".

Why not? Taking the definition of capable [reference.com] ("Permitting an action to be performed" or "Having capacity or ability") then can your machine run Vista? No, not "can it run Vista with all the flashy bits", but can it run Vista without falling in a heap? (Excluding any normal Windows crashes but instead aiming at "will it install and run and be functional to some degree")

Okay, so it is slightly under-handed to make people expect Aero when they're going to get core

Re:

[jawtheshark]

Well, that's just shows that the problem is their version policy, isn't it? The fact that "Vista" is an encompassing brandname for a whole bunch of different OSes with different capabilities makes it extremely hard to say what "Vista" is. As anyone, I'd expect it to meet the requirements to run "Vista Ultimate" with everything on, because it's "Vista".

Okay, so it is slightly under-handed to make people expect Aero when they're going to get core Vista, but that's just marketing.

It's not "just marketing",

Re:

[IBBoard]

No, that's a problem with the customer's assumption of the version policy ;) I wouldn't touch Vista anyway (my wife has it on her laptop and it is okay but not great) but if I saw "Vista capable" I would read it as "it is about capable of running Vista". If I saw "Vista Ready" then I'd read it as "it can handle more Vista or be decently quick while doing it" and if I saw "Vista Premium Ready" then I'd assume it could run Ultimate with everything.

Vista Ultimate isn't Vista. The lowest common denominator of a

Re:

[IBBoard]

But the important point is why did Joe Sixpack expect to run everything including all of the flashy bits? Does Joe Sixpack expect to buy any game off the shelf (including Crysis) and run it on full res with all of the effects or does he expect to have to make do with older games/lower settings? And even if he does buy it and not get full, doesn't he get effectively laughed out of the shop and told "I'm sorry sir, but it has minimum requirements listed"?

I don't know much about cars, but if I saw "150mph capa

Re:

[IBBoard]

Two different things: in one case he gets hardware with the promise that the software will run, with the latter, he buys software and disregarded the minimum system requirements.

Okay, so it was the other way around. To be a bit more accurate it is like buying a PC labelled "Crysis capable" and then trying to sue when you find "capable" means "it can run it, but without full detail, without maximum resolution, without bloom lighting effects etc". You're still capable of running it, just not with all of the f

Yes you are missing the fine print

[SmallFurryCreature]

I don't actually have the Crysis box but every game I seen with a minimum set of requirements on it ALSO listed a recommended spec.

MS with this Vista advertising campaign made a simple mistake, they designed a sticker that was not clear enough about what was promised.

With PC games, a reasonable person would assume that if you see who different specs then it is obvious that this means that the game will look perform less well on this lower hardware. You would only expect it to run well on the recommended

Re:

[KURAAKU Deibiddo]

Give it time, Google is already paying for work on getting Photoshop to run better in it [slashdot.org]. You might also check out Xen [wikipedia.org] or VMware [wikipedia.org]. Having helped a number of friends and customers migrate to SuSE [wikipedia.org] (now pre-installed by Lenovo) and Ubuntu [wikipedia.org] (now pre-installed by Dell), I'm impressed at the advances being made in desktop GNU/Linux.

Back to the main topic, though, at least for a moment: Personally, I'm glad to hear that the class action status was approved; Microsoft needs to be smacked into not deliberately mi

Re:

[walterbyrd]

The stickers only mentioned Vista. Nothing about Basic. The FTC had ordered msft in 2001 not to engage in such deceptive practices. Why would anybody assume that "Vista" does not mean "Vista" ?

What is hard to understand? It's like advertising that a car will 40mpg, and "forgetting" to mention that only applies if the car is going down a steep hill.