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Stupid Stupid Microsft!

W

WaterB

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"Yesterday, Microsoft announced another sweeping modification of their controversial new licensing policy. Under this new policy, companies that buy volume software and site licenses through their various corporate programs would no longer be able to purchase indefinitely upgradable software.

Its new program, called Software Assurance, doles out licenses on a time-limited basis. Customers who cannot afford to continue upgrading are not eligible to continue with the program and must purchase their next software upgrade at full-retail prices.

Microsoft claims that this reduces costs for enterprises that update their software more than once every two years. However, according to many surveys, the vast majority of companies take between 3 and 7 years between software upgrades and the new Software Assurance Program could cost them as much as double for their software. "

what the hell are they doing? are they trying to **** people off on purpose?

http://www.anandtech.com/news/shownews.html?i=14488&t=an
 
Shoot, my last two jobs are still running WinNT Workstation and Win98, respectively.

Once again, I can safely say that MS is pushing me right towards Linux.
 
i haven't touched linux in a couple years.. but i have become quite familiar with Solaris 8. I think I might study for the SCP exams as well.. :P
 
I've never tried anything else but Windows, I'm probably too stupid to run anything else and wouldn't need to anyway, but that doesn't stop me hating Microsoft.
 
PIT> It's just a matter of sitting down and using it. No one knew how to use Windows until they sat down and became familiar with it. Linux is the same thing.

The nice part about Linux is that once you learn it, you can go on and be fairly proficient in several other operating systems, like Solaris, HP-UX, and just about any other UNIX-based OS, with little transition.
 
Depends on what you mean by "benefit".
UNIX is a very robust OS. It's fast, stable, resource-efficient, not prone to virus attacks, and very powerful. Linux is free, as is most of the software available to run on it.

If one has any intention of working in an IT-related field, UNIX knowledge is almost a requirement, since most large corporations are using UNIX in some major capacity or another.

It's certainly more difficult to use in many ways, but only because it's not familiar. Underneath everything, it's still a command-line based OS, which means learning new commands and their syntax. But that was required with Windows as well to do most things, and there are many different GUIs available for UNIX OS's that help to ease things.

Honestly, if I were a little more proficient in it, there would be almost no reason whatsoever for me to use Windows anymore.
 
So how would I go about getting it?

and would it still be possible to use it, but boot in Windows? (my dad struggles with Outlook Express, let alone Windows)
 
There are a ton of ways you can get it.
  • Download it
    You can pick a distribution and just download it. Even companies that sell it, like RedHat, allow you to download it for free right from their website. When you buy it in the store, you're paying for the cost of the CD, manuals, packaging, and support from RedHat. Downloading it youself allows you to get it without any of the things that cost money.
    Be prepared - the downloads are in the form of CD ISO images, which are usually around 650MB each. Some distributions come on more than one CD.
  • Buy it
    You could either buy a retail package from a store, or buy it from a place like Cheap Bytes that just sell distribution CDs for like $1.50 per disc.
    edit - yes, Cheap Bytes will ship to Australia.
  • Have someone burn you a copy
    Linux is freely distributable. If you know anyone who already has it, they're legally allowed to copy it for you, provided that they do not alter the distribution.

And yes, you can still run Windows on there. It's called Dual-Booting. Linux has a partition loader, called LILO. It's basically a menu option that appears at bootup that lets the user select which partition to boot to.
It's entirely possible, with some tweaking, to make it so that, other than the menu at bootup, the presence of Linux is unknown to a user using Windows.

I would recommend that, if you should choose to do this, you investigate it first, and put the Linux install on a seperate hard drive than the Windows install. It makes things infinitely easier, and somewhat safer, since a slip-up during LILO installation could render the Windows install unbootable.

It's not difficult to do, but there are caveats. However, I would say that discussion is more apropos to another thread.
 
Thanks...I'll think about it, and if I decide to do any more about it, I'll create another thread. Now, back to ****ing about Microsoft. ;)
 
Right now, I still use 98SE, but I figure that the days of the 9x OSes are numbered, but I absolutely refuse to go to XP. That OS and it's registration scheme are pushing me more towards LINUX or Solaris....but....games are available mainly for Microsoft platforms.... :(
 
I'd have switched to Linux or something that doesn't suck by now, but until my father either a) learns to use a computer, or b) stops using this one, I'm stuck with Windoze. He whinges about not knowing how to use this enough already.
 
PIT> Not sure about what your resources are, but a decent system could be built for under $500. That would certainly alleviate the problem of you sharing with your dad. ;)
 
<$500 if you're in the US.. price gets upped about 20-30% when your in .au.. and that's if you know where to buy.. people in australia get screwed on computer parts.. i dunno what they're charging you guys.. a tarriff or some kind of sales tax?
 
Facts

Everyone hates Microsoft because they are the embodiment of a creative idea being hijacked by corporate culture.

I mean it used to be be about choosing the better OS/App once upon a time. Now it has come down to which is the most compatible. In most cases (bearing in mind that that is what is most important to the home user) it is always Microsoft and people will always resent that they are not being given a choice.

What you need are concrete facts that display that you do have a choice, but that you are being misled by MS's preference to stay on top through putting other people down, rather than being better than other people.

Here is one:

If you install MS Office over Lotus Notes, you are told you have to remove Notes before continuing with the installation. Change the name of the file notes.ini and it installs fine.

There is no conflict. Surely you should modify software so that it can be compatible with newly released software, not modify it so that it is incompatible.

Can anyone furnish me with some similar MS-fantasies so that I can argue passionately on the subject for 3 minutes rather than 2 next time.

:furious:
 
Originally posted by WaterB
<$500 if you're in the US.. price gets upped about 20-30% when your in .au.. and that's if you know where to buy.. people in australia get screwed on computer parts.. i dunno what they're charging you guys.. a tarriff or some kind of sales tax?
Click to expand...

You're spot on. Yes, there's a sales tax (thank god it's election time so we can get rid of these ****s), but Australians generally get screwed on all that sort of stuff - computer games, electronics - and always have.

A friend of my brother's said she could put a top-of-the-range computer together for him, for $1000...I don't think you'd get much cheaper than that out here. Maybe a little cheaper if you go around the swap meets...but not by too much.
 
Just got this in email...
Computer Geeks is selling an HP system - 600MHz, 256MB, 10GB, 48x CD-ROM - for $183.

Comes with modem, speakers, sound, video, etc.
Only thing it doesn't include is a monitor. Hardly top-of-the-line, but certainly a steal for a budget system.

Surely, one could purchase this system, ship it over to Australia, and add on a monitor for a total price well under $1000.

And yes, they ship to Australia.
 
That doesn't sound too bad...

How far away from top of the line is that? Like would it be able to play decent games, etc?

and then there's the exchange rate..
 
It could certainly play games at 600MHz (Celeron, BTW).

One might need to upgrade the video in it to something a little better than the built-in stuff to get decent performance, but that's not what we're talking about here.

The complaint was that you couldn't load on another OS because your dad was using the system.
I said one could easily put together a decent system on the cheap.
Several comlaints were raised about the price and availability of decent components in Australia, preventing the possibility of getting a system for under $1000.
I showed that one could purchase a cheap system that would be more than adequate for the aforementioned usage for well under that amount, including shipping from the US to AUS.
 
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