Embracing Vista

From a dogfooding perspective, I have been a laggard on getting Vista installed….but I finally took the plunge and upgraded my system last Friday. Basically, the whole day was a loss, as I had major performance and integration issues after the upgrade. Of course, I expected issues, because I run a lot of special apps, but I was also going against the grain by upgrading rather than a clean install, which was recommended. So this week, I backed up my important files and settings, exported my favorites, and gave it another try — this time with a clean install. And since I was going through this effort a second time, I decided to load up Vista Ultimate. Why not?

Wow. I can honestly say that I love it, and this isn’t just the kool aid talking. Even with the aero user interface (translucent template, 3D folders, etc), the performance is excellent. I am very impressed. Of course, I am also running the beta 2 technical release of the Office 2007 apps, which rock. For example, I’ve been editing a couple docs this morning using Word 2007. There are just so many little things to praise. I’m getting used to the ribbon context windows — makes sense, actually really like it. But my favorite utility is the new 2-page view. I made it my default view when opening files. Love it. Plus, with all of the Office and SharePoint integrations, it’s easy to push a file wherever I need it, whether to my desktop, to a network drive, or to a SharePoint folder.

The main downside: a known integration issue with LiveMeeting, which I rely heavily upon. I can still create sessions by going to the portal or using MeetNow, but the handy dandy Outlook integration is not working right now. The product team is well-aware, so I hope to see that fixed prior to release.

Christian Buckley

Christian is a Microsoft Regional Director and M365 Apps & Services MVP, and an award-winning product marketer and technology evangelist, based in Silicon Slopes (Lehi), Utah. He sits on the board of TekkiGurus, is an advisor for both revealit.TV and WellnessWits, and provides channel and marketing services for Microsoft partners. He hosts the quarterly #CollabTalk TweetJam, the weekly #CollabTalk Podcast, and the Microsoft 365 Ask-Me-Anything (#M365AMA) series.