I hate it with a visceral passion.
We hates it, we does.
Slow, clumsy, awkward. Paranoid. It's an updated equivalent of Windows ME.
I remember trying to use the original release of XP. Nothing worked then, either. I avoided that until SP2 was released -- now I'm relatively happy. I may be making the Linux switch as soon as I have some time to dedicate to it.
I am running Vista Ultimate on a high-end Alienware laptop and it runs pretty good. I had to disable the account verification thing where it asks that "are you sure" shit with every mouse click. You can search the Internet for the procedure to access the REAL administrator account and login as the admin. One thing that DID impress me is Vista's wireless connectivity. I travel a lot and in every airport, coffee shop, and hotel connecting to their wireless systems is a matter of opening the wireless connection window, selecting the detected wireless network, verifying it as a public network and I am connected.
As for Linux, I have been a long time DOS/Windows user but recently switched one computer to Ubuntu running the Beryl desktop interface and it is impressing. You need a fairly powerful video card though and will have to use open source drivers for it.
Check out the comparison between Vista and Ubuntu running Beryl:
[youtube=425,350]xC5uEe5OzNQ[/youtube]
The whole thing about administrative access being a pain in the ass wouldn't be a problem if users (and yes, even admins) weren't retarded.
Ever since I can remember, way back in my formative years using Windows NT 3.51, standard procedure was to log in with user privileges for run-of-the-mill computing, and only log in as an administrator when you need to for some specific purpose. This is a very easy, very basic security measure, one that Microsoft has strongly suggested for the lifespan of the NT product line.
Vista's Administrative Access Control, or whatever the official name for it is, forces the user to do this, but also makes it easier by eliminating the logoff/logon procedure or the necessity of assigning administrative access to specific apps. Yes, it's a pain-in-the-ass if you're used to being always logged in as an administrator. But then, you've always been doing it wrong.
This idea of security isn't Microsoft-specific either. UNIX/Linux admins are (at least theoretically) not supposed to be logged in as root all the time, rather they get one-time root access for those tasks where it's required. Plenty of lazy admins avoid this, sure, but the principle is sound.
