New laptop+Vista = will stuff work?

[Trekkin and Birdin]

My laptop has been dying a slow death for months now, so today I went and bought a new one. Since all my mapping software and GSAK and all that is written for Windows, I couldn’t do what I *really* wanted and buy a MacBook.

So……will my programs work with Vista? Probably should have asked first, but for non-techies such as myself, that’s about my only choice anyway. You’ve gotta laugh when even the techs and salespeople tell you “Vista isn’t THAT bad now,” then go on to share their stories of Vista issues and how they were fixed quickly.

[Team Deejay]

Everything should work ok. For GSAK, be sure to NOT install it in the Program Files subdirectory. Instead, just install it in C:GSAK, which will bypass some of the Vista security nonsense. If you get a new copy of GSAK from the website, this should happen automatically, but don’t forget to write down your registration number before you wipe out your old machine.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

Thanks, that’s good news. And thanks for the tips. GSAK is such a bargain for what it can do….I didn’t even have to pay to add it to a second computer. Wouldn’t it be great if all software companies followed suit? (Are you listening, MapSource?) LOL

[marc_54140]

I believe it’s the Palm which will not run under Vista. MS knows about the problem, but has no intention of dealing with it.

Ask the dealer where you buy it if they have Windows XP – and buy that to be installed.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

We’ll just continue to load the Palm on the desktop for now. Thanks for saving me a little work!

Now…where did I put my disk for my Photoshop program, anyway? 🙄

[gotta run]

Palm hotsync will not work with Vista. I have to upload the palm using a different XP machine. You could install XP and Vista on one machine and choose which OS to load up. Either way it’s a major PITA.

On the Left Side of the Road...

[gotta run]

Also, Vista will not run the Lowrance (LEI) mapping software program. Oh, and I can’t run the Garmin Forerunner (our GPSr field backup unit) on it either.

Other than that, Vista is just great! 😕

On the Left Side of the Road...

[K0rpl]

Microsoft already knows Vista Blows. Buy the MacBook, and Use Parallels, or VMWare Fusion, Or BootCamp, to Install Windows XP, and have the Best of both worlds. 🙂

[uws22]

depends on the palm… i found a patch for my old one and it worked just fine… vista will also hotsync with my Palm Centro phone to load cachemate, no patch needed.

[gotta run]

@uws22 wrote:

depends on the palm… i found a patch for my old one and it worked just fine… vista will also hotsync with my Palm Centro phone to load cachemate, no patch needed.

You got a hotsync patch? From where? I have a Zire 72 but the hotsync program is supposedly the same among many different versions.

On the Left Side of the Road...

[Mathman]

My Palm does not sync with VISTA either. There are 3 or 4 models that do not sync and my model (Tungsten) will not work despite the advice others offered.

[hogrod]

You can get some palm models working, though I can’t be of much help beyond posting a link to the Vista hotsync software

http://www.palm.com/us/support/windowsvista/index.html

I have Vista running on two of my computers and have only found a small handful of programs that wont run in vista, but I have 98% of the time been able to get those working by changing a few settings.

Basically if you have issues with a certain program go into its install directory and locate the .EXE file that starts the program. if you right click the file and select properties, now go to the compatibility tab. you can now set the program to run as administrator, or try running in XP, or other OS compatibility mode. If there are any other .EXE files in its directory you might have to change these too.
Thats the Real issue why most software wont run in Vista, it doesn’t want you running everything as an administrator, but you can if you need to to get things working.

[hogrod]

@K0rpl wrote:

Microsoft already knows Vista Blows. Buy the MacBook, and Use Parallels, or VMWare Fusion, Or BootCamp, to Install Windows XP, and have the Best of both worlds. 🙂

I disagree, The only thing that really blows about Vista is the Stupid UAC(user account control), which can be turned off or replaced with a better alternative. As long as your PC has at least 2gb of ram vista runs very well.

I really don’t understand the whole Mac fad. Why would I want to spend over twice as much for a new computer, only to have to also buy and install Windows in a virtual machine just to run my PC software?

You may be more secure running a Mac right now, but thats only because the user base is still small that it doesn’t pay to create malware for them, YET. As soon as more and more people begin using them you will see all the people who switched because they couldn’t keep their PC clean of Viruses and spyware start infecting their macs.

[K0rpl]

I only bring up the thing about Vista being horrible due to the fact that I work in the Industry, and 3rd party Vendors are not choosing to support Vista. Alot of 3rd Party Hardware manufactures, are not writing Drivers or support software to make there devices work under Vista. Microsoft already announced, that there won’t be any more updates to fix Vista Problems, and have already listed a Release Date for Windows 7. Microsoft is giving Microsoft Vista Users Free “Downgrade Rights” Certificates for a consumer to step from Vista down to Windows XP. XP, even with it’s flaws is a much more stable Operating System. This is the reason for the Latest Windows XP Service Pack 3. They have to step up a service Pack, so that they can use a new keygen algorithm to create the activation codes. That is how many copies of that OS have been sold.

I Bring up the Mac Issue, as that platform is much more secure, as well as stable than the Microsoft offerings. Yes, I will agree that the User base is smaller at the present time than PC User base, but that is rapidly changing. Mac OS is much more difficult to write Viruses, or Malware for, as it is completely based on the Unix Kernel. People won’t take the time to write a virus or Malware, to something that could only effect a few.

I have no problems spending more on something that actually works. I have used both Mac’s and PC’s, as well as multiple flavors of Unix/Linux I just choose to use something that I don’t have to “reboot” because it has excecuted a Illegal Function! I will say that Mac OSX takes a few minutes of playing around with to get the hang of all the functions, but once you do, you will see that it is laid out in the way that it makes the most common sense.

Yes, Palm does have some software that will allow you to patch some devices to allow some of them to work with Vista, but not all. Why o’ Why, should I have to buy a New PDA. because I bought a new Laptop, or Desktop??? Doesn’t make any sense to me.

These comments were in no way meant to discredit Windows or the previous Posters. I am just posting Common Knowledge to the Original Posters Question about Products working with Vista.

[Team Black-Cat]

The only thing I have found that doesn’t work on my Vista laptop is syncing to my (very old) pocket pc. I can still copy files using an SD card. It’s faster that way anyway. GSAK works well even when installed to the Program Files directory with Hogrods suggestions above.
Microsoft’s “Downgrade Certificate” has been around even before XP. Nothing new there. Microsoft is still releasing updates to Vista including SP2. Windows 7 isn’t even into full Beta testing yet.
As for device drivers, the only ones that I have not been able to make work are either very old, or from very small vendors that can’t afford the development of updated drivers.
Mac’s get viruses. There will be more, and only 7 out of 100 computer techs would have any idea how to fix them.
There’s still very little application development for Macs.
Sorry… it’s the same as it’s been since the Apple/PC war started years ago.

Good luck with the new laptop T&B. If you need any help, let us know.

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