Okay, I suppose I should make some kind of post on here… heh.
Anyway, I went ahead and took Windows Vista off of my main PC a few days ago, and reinstalled Windows XP Professional. As much as I liked Windows Vista’s UI over XP’s, the lack of functionality I was encountering was beginning to bug the hell out of me. When Release Candidate 2 came out, I had hoped that at least one or two of the issues I encountered would be fixed. Instead, things got WORSE. The main issue I came across involved networking; whenever I tried to copy data to my network share, the machine’s networking capabilities would completely fail, and the only way I could fix it was via a reboot. I found that out the hard way when I was trying to copy a 2 GB folder over, and networking crashed within the first few seconds of the copy. The only way I could save the folder onto my server was to use WinSCP.
So, a few days ago, I wiped the system and put Windows XP on in its place. I had forgotten how long it takes to format a 640 GB filesystem… heh. I’ve pretty much gotten the system to back how I like it, complete with Logitech SetPoint software, WindowBlinds software to change the theme, and all of my games reinstalled. Fortunately reinstalling everything was relatively painless, and I was back up and running within a couple of days. The best example I could find for how well the system works now is the fact that Defcon actually plays properly, as opposed to being almost like on a Pentium 1 machine while in Vista.
So, for now, I think I’m going to have to stick with XP until such time as Microsoft, Logitech, and ATI get their collective act together and make it where I have a fully-functional machine in Vista. As much as I like a good-looking interface, I prefer function over form, and Vista wasn’t cutting it for me.