Windows Vista RC1 on a Macbook Pro: My distain is growing

I am the proud owner of a Macbook Pro.

As you may or may not be aware, this lovely incarnation of x86 hardware runs OSX flawlessly; however, it becomes less enjoyable once you decide you want to get some work done and slap Windows on the beast.

I hope this post will serve as a warning for those of you (like myself) who may want to endulge in some of the latest technology, on some of the latest hardware, while still seeking to maintain the ability to complete your job.

Now, I’m relatively experienced when it comes to fussing around with the betas microsoft offers it’s testers (and some they don’t). I was a willing tester of every client and server solution they’ve offered since the early versions of Windows 98.

Windows 98, wow was that a rough release through the earliest stages of development. Sure, they basically had to rewrite 95 to be rendered by a browser, but that seems like smooth sailing when compared to the hurdles Vista has overcome.

Vista’s release has been rough, very rough. Features have been hacked and slashed more times than the release date has been pushed back. Working subsystems based on proven code have been rewritten (from scratch) with an emphasis placed on compatibility. Fundamental usability guidelines have been broken time and time again, but Microsoft never was very good with consistency.

I mean, I guess I’m ranting here, but I’m pissed. RC1 gave me the feeling things were looking up. It was faster and more consistant then every build before it, and it maintained enough backwards compatibility that I was able to compile and run the entire Payscale system on the thing, I was excited!

But then it started to turn into tar, slowing down with every day I used it. I can recall expanding a 4MB zip file, and waiting for 2 minutes… 2 minutes! Speed was starting to irritate me, but I had enough patience to work through those issues, it was afterall, a beta. Well, stortly thereafter, the display began to corrupt, more artifacts appeared every day I used the thing, it was horrible, I wanted to cut my eyes out. I could not look at code without developing a headache, yet I continued. I had put myself in this situation, and I still had deadlines.

So I wake up today, on my telecommuting day, I was excited to begin a morning of code. To my suprise I was welcomed into the conscious workday with a BSOD. I uninstalled every new application, and disabled every device I could think of, one by one, hoping to find the culprit. Before long, safe mode wasn’t safe from the BSOD.

I speak to you today from my brand new install of Windows XP (I had to wipe out Vista AND OSX to install it). Bootcamp decided it did not want to resize partitions anymore and recommended I re-install OSX. Fuck em. I formatted the whole thing and installed XP.

I am a little annoyed at the situation, and the simple fact I lost almost 6 hours of would-be code. I won’t be touching Vista until RTM (At least, that’s what I claim today) and neither should anyone who does not considder themselves a masochist.