VISTA information

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VISTA information

Vista has been with us for a while now and you might be wondering what all the fuss is about. Or more importantly you might be wondering whether or not your organisation should upgrade to it. Vista is a memory hungry operating system and so it will not be worth while upgrading your operating system to it as a rule. Simply put, new computers with powerful processors and lots of memory can handle it, but older machines don't run it well as a rule.

However, you may be faced with buying a new computer which may come with Windows Vista pre-installed. It comes in many versions, the most commonly supplied being Vista Home Premium which will be suitable for most organisations as well. However, if you don’t have dedicated technical support consider who is going to install all the programs that you normally use (MSOffice etc) and who is going to sort out any of the issues in setting it up. If you are not computer literate, at this stage you may wish to consider staying with Windows XP. There is an option to downgrade Windows Vista to XP. Ask when you buy your computer.

However, inevitably, people will get machines with it on, so here are a few links, tips and tricks:

Links
TweakVI www.totalidea.com
TweakVista www.tweakvista.com/tweakvistautility
VistaBootPRO www.vistabootpro.org
What you need to know about Vista www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,2009768,00.asp
Customising Vista http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,2106626,00.asp
Microsoft Tips http://www.microsoft.com/windows/using/windowsvista/tipsandtricks/default.mspx
How to (with Vista)... http://www.howtogeek.com/tag/windows-vista/

Loads of Tips http://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=499870

Tips & Tricks

If, for some reason, the Vista installation gets interrupted due to an unintentional shutdown or reboot, start the computer without booting the Vista DVD. Windows Vista's installer should pick up where it left off. If it does-n't, then restart the installation over from scratch.

When you perform a search with Vista's new, instant search feature, you can save the search in a special folder. This powerful feature allows you to create a virtual folder which, by default, is saved in your \\Searches\ folder. Every time you open such a folder, the search results are updated.

If you upgrade your graphics card in preparation for Windows Vista, be sure to get a new card with as much local memory as possible. Since Windows Vista renders everything—even the desktop and windows them-selves—as 3D surfaces, local 3D memory greatly improves performance...sometimes even more than a more powerful GPU.

If you are using an older computer, or your graphics card is older, you may find in some cases that Windows Aero does not perform optimally on your computer and seems sluggish. A lot of work has been done recently in the aspect of Windows Aero performance, but if you find things are still slow, we recommend that you switch the theme to Windows Vista Basic. While it isn’t as flashy, it doesn’t look too bad, and you should find that your display performance will increase a bit. To switch your theme to Windows Vista Basic:

Click on Start, and then click on Control Panel.
Click on “Appearance and Personalization”.
Under “Personalization”, click on “Customize colors”
Click on “Open classic appearance properties for more color options”.
In the “Appearance Settings” dialog that appears, under “Color Scheme”, choose “Windows Vista Basic”.
Press OK.

If you want to make the icons on your desktop bigger, then Click on your Desktop, press Ctrl + Scroll Up (this works in any folder). Now you select Large Icons from the menu (Right Click -> View -> Large Icons).

There are hundreds of keyboard shortcuts in Vista, plus many for Internet Explorer 7 ,to see them all. Or else to get a compact list to print out.