if ya ask me, i'd say those who didn't get vista were better off...
Posted on 02/29/2008 10:56:53 AM PST by Sub-Driver
Class Action Suit Airs Intel and Microsoft's Vista Dirty Laundry Jason Mick (Blog) - February 29, 2008 1:07 PM
One of the most iconic images of Microsoft's Windows Vista launch in January 2007 was the small "Windows Vista Capable" stickers on computers months before, reassuring customers that when the new operating system came out, their computers could be updated to the latest and greatest. Unfortunately for the consumer it appears that the capabilities that these stickers promised were intentionally exaggerated to benefit Microsoft and chipmaker Intel.
A class action suit filed against Microsoft in April 2007 accused Microsoft of intentionally misleading consumers with the stickers, claiming the "Vista Capable" logos on computers that were anything but. The suit centered around several key points, among which was that the computers sold could not run Windows Vista's more impressive features such as the Aero user interface, and were left with only a bare-bones skeleton of Vista. The suit forced Microsoft to redefine its definition of what exactly "Vista Capable" meant, which included Microsoft's addition of a disclaimer that some of the PCs bearing the sticker could not run significant Vista features such as Aero.
Meanwhile, the legal case proceeded forward. Armed with internal emails obtained from Microsoft, the plaintiffs, represented by high-power attorney Jeffrey Tilden of Gordon Tilden Thomas & Cordell, took their case before a U.S. District Judge in order to gain class action status. In a significant victory for the plaintiffs U.S. District Judge Marsha Pechman granted the case class action status, with the primary focus being to determine whether Microsoft intentionally deceived consumers to sell PCs. The judge also opened the door for the suit to also encompass gripes about the lack of Aero if the plaintiffs found another named plaintiff...
(Excerpt) Read more at dailytech.com ...
PING!
“We set ourselves up [the bomb!]
If people bothered to inform themselves instead of just looking at a sticker, they would have seen that Windows Home Basic doesn't even include the Aero interface.
No one should be surprised that if they by a cheap, low end system, that it doesn't perform well with ALL of the features of the latest software, even if it meets the minimum system requirements.
If hardware meeting the minimum system requirements for the software not being able to take good advantage of all the features of the software is grounds for a lawsuit, you might as well just hand over all the assets of every company that ever published minimum system requirements to the trial lawyers.
It's not reasonable to expect that a cheap, low end system will perform as well as a more expensive high end system, and you shouldn't be allowed to sue because it doesn't and demand that you get the performance that you were unwilling to pay for.
Specifically systems with Intel video chipsets.
I’m glad I ordered a board with a NVidia set
Were they incapable of running Vista Home Basic, or just running the Aero interface which is part of the higher end Vista distributions?
if ya ask me, i'd say those who didn't get vista were better off...
“In the emails Microsoft executives discuss how the Intel 915 Chipset was to initially be deemed incompatible Windows Vista. The policy was abruptly reversed. Says one of the executives in charge of the decision, “In the end, we lowered the requirements to help Intel make their quarterly earnings so they could continue to sell motherboards with the 915 graphics embedded. We are caving to Intel. We worked the last 18 months to drive the [user interface] experience and we are giving this up.””
Consumers NEVER benefit from Class Actions; only lining the Lawyers' pockets, and raising prices for everyone else.
I’m with the law-suiters. Microsoft didn’t make it clear that those systems with the 915 wouldn’t handle aero, thus the consumer was left to conclude that there was no reason to upgrade. Microsoft also didn’t make it clear that you need twice the memory over XP for the same performance. Some computers (like mine) can’t be upgraded above 1GB of RAM and would be pretty useless running Vista.
Awww Geeezz...i’m suprised the mac yuppies haven’t shown up yet..lol
So Microsoft's development produced a feature set that didn't run well on a large chunk of the computers being produced, especially low end laptops which is a huge market both with business customers, and with college students.
Some people in engineering felt that they should just push the higher requirements anyway even though it might cut their new product out of the low end market and help form a larger market for competition such as cheap, low end systems running some version of Linux.
Marketing, probably thought that was a really stupid idea, and instead decided to instead make different versions at different price points. That would allow for a version that wouldn't have the nifty new Aero desktop, but would still address the bargain computer market.
There's little surprise that some people in Microsoft were unhappy that their new interface that they were proud of wasn't forced on everyone buying the new OS, or a computer preloaded with the OS. After all they designed that interface and thought everyone should have it.
The market wasn't ready to for Microsoft's new OS to force Aero down their throats, so they made a good marketing decision to provide options that better suited the market.
They ten informed the public that there were different versions with different feature sets, and that the Aero interface that they had been talking about was meant for higher end systems.
This wasn't a case where Microsoft tried to deceive consumers. They provided a range of products that met more customers needs than they would have if they would have forced Aero on everyone.
But certified those low-end systems anyway.
Marketing, probably thought that was a really stupid idea, and instead decided to instead make different versions at different price points. That would allow for a version that wouldn't have the nifty new Aero desktop, but would still address the bargain computer market.
Marketing (especially Microsoft's marketing) has no idea whether a system meets specs. They just want to sell.
The market wasn't ready to for Microsoft's new OS to force Aero down their throats, so they made a good marketing decision to provide options that better suited the market.
So they decided to deceive their customers.
This wasn't a case where Microsoft tried to deceive consumers. They provided a range of products that met more customers needs than they would have if they would have forced Aero on everyone.
They provided a range of products all right. From the OS to a sticker that says "Certified for Vista!" even thought some of the systems that they certified won't really run Vista.
The customer doesn't have dog in Microsoft's quest for market share. They customer just wants a machine that does what he's told it will do.
But removing the sticker from thousands of Intel-chipped systems would be admitting that they screwed up.
So they did what Microsoft always does when presented with such an ethical dilemma.
They lied.
They produced a version of Vista that would run reasonably well on them, and certified that those systems would run it.
So they decided to deceive their customers.
No they didn't. They made it clear that there were different versions of their new OS, and made it clear that Aero wasn't included in Vista Home Basic, and that lower end systems would have trouble running Aero well.
They provided a range of products all right. From the OS to a sticker that says "Certified for Vista!" even thought some of the systems that they certified won't really run Vista.
They run Vista. They just don't run all the pretty features of the high end versions of Vista.
Should people be able to sue because you can't use the media center TV recording features on systems that don't have a compatible TV tuner in them? They were certified for Vista, and they can't run all the features included in a version of Vista.
But removing the sticker from thousands of Intel-chipped systems would be admitting that they screwed up.
Microsoft disclosed that not all Vista certified systems would be able to run all features of Vista well before those stickers went on the systems.
You can argue that it might have been better for them to have not created the different versions, but Microsoft didn't screw those people over.
No worries, I am sure Bush2000 will be along shortly to explain away all.
B2K hasn’t posted in a couple of years. The newest troll (though it looks like he’s trailing off as well) is Golden Eagle.
But never said which one, and never pointed out that it wasn't just a matter of poor performance, some "Vista Certified" systems won't run certain versions of Vista at all.
You can argue that it might have been better for them to have not created the different versions, but Microsoft didn't screw those people over.
The stickers said "Vista Certified."
Not "Vista Home Basic."
Not "Vista Mostly Broken."
Not "Vista Ha Ha loser buy a real computer."
It said Vista.
If they wanted to exclude certain hardware, they should have a) removed the sticker or b) had different stickers for different versions of Vista.
Through the certification process they already knew what hardware would run which version of Vista so it's not like they had to do any more work.
Instead they stick the same sticker on crippled systems because the didn't want those low-end manufacturers to put something else on their systems. They wanted the marketshare no matter the cost.
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