I'm a Microsoft advocate. I love MSFT products. I was a Windows Defender long before the anti-spyware program was a twinkle in Bill's eye. I like Internet Explorer. I used it back when everyone else was using Netscape and I continued to use it when everyone else touted the supremacy of Firefox. I like the interface. I never had a browser-based security breach using IE.

I wanted to love IE 7. I love many of its features: its implementation of tabs that to me, is more intuitive than that of its competitors. Its anti-phishing filter and other security enhancements. Its built in RSS feeds and better printing support. So why is it that after upgrading to IE 7, I find myself using Firefox more and more often?

In a word: stability. All too often, IE 7 hangs up and just quits working on me, especially if I have many tabs open in a window, or multiple browser windows open, or when I'm trying to open links from within Outlook. Sometimes it happens for no apparent reason at all. It's pretty frustrating if I've been doing a bunch of research of a topic and have multiple tabs or windows open with info I'm switching back and forth in, and then suddenly it all goes dead and I get the dread "Internet Explorer has experienced a problem and has to close" message. Now I have to track down all those links all over again. So if I'm doing something like that, I just use Firefox, which almost never shuts down on me.

Likewise, I don't want my browser suddenly dying in the middle of a financial transaction, so I use Firefox if I'm going to buy something or do banking online. Better safe than sorry.

I keep hoping an update will fix all this, but so far, although other IE 7 problems (such as the "tiny fonts syndrome") have been corrected, the unexpected hangup/shutdown problem remains.

Now let me hasten to add that this quirky behavior with IE 7 only happens on my XP computers. My secondary workstation runs the Vista RTM and IE 7 seems completely reliable on it. Maybe they just weren't able to adequately retrofit IE 7 to the older OS. In any event, I am fully anticipating that once I have all my systems upgraded to Vista, I can go back to happily using IE as my browser most of the time.

'Til then, I guess I'll continue to sneak into the closet to use Firefox when I'm working on an XP machine.

DEBRA LITTLEJOHN SHINDER, MCSE, MVP
deb@shinder.net     www.debshinder.com

Why, oh why can't I have the nice Word Count toolbar from Office 2003 back? Sure, at first I thought it was cool that Word 2007 automatically displayed the word count down in the status bar. And it is cool - except when it doesn't.

Lately when I have a Word doc open, the left side of the status bar displays "Running virus scan." That's nice, but what would be even nicer would be if I could see my word count. Unfortunately, I can't find any way to turn this virus scan info off or to quickly and easily display the word count anywhere else. Yeah, I know I can click the Office button, select Prepare, select Properties, click Document Properties | Advanced Properties and click the Statistics tab to finally find out I've typed 850 words so far, but that is an unholy pain in the behind.

If anyone knows how to get rid of that "Running virus scan" message, please let me know and I'll be forever grateful.

 
DEBRA LITTLEJOHN SHINDER, MCSE, MVP
deb@shinder.net   www.debshinder.com

Link to Five reasons to love--and hate--Windows Vista - page 2 | Tech News on ZDNet

"Although many computers in use today will be able to update and run the new operating system, they'll only be able to run it in what Microsoft slyly calls 'Windows Vista Basic'. In this mode, you'll have the ability to search files but you won't have 3D Aero graphics, live animation along the Taskbar or smooth streaming graphics on your desktop. Unless you buy a new PC sometime in 2007, or add a high-end video card and some extra memory to your current PC, you probably won't get the full visual Vista experience."

Sure, there are a lot of computers out there that won't run Vista Aero -- but the categorical statement in this article implies all computers purchased prior to 2007 are incapable of running it. That's just not true. My mid-priced Dell Dimension that I've had for about a year runs Vista Aero with all the bells and whistles, without upgrading the video card or memory.

"If you're used to your laptop lasting on a long journey, you might want to reconsider upgrading to Windows Vista--that is, if you want the new Aero graphics features turned on. [snip] Unfortunately, changing from Aero to Basic is harder than it should be."

 How is it hard to change from Aero to Basic? Right click the desktop and choose Personalize, click Appearance Settings and under Color Scheme, click Windows Vista Basic. No, it's not a one-click operation, but I certainly wouldn't call it "hard." Today's computer users have become spoiled.

"In order to perform basic tasks, such as install or remove an application, even administrator account users must answer a series of pop-up messages, adding time to the process. Worse, whenever you are prompted to respond, the whole Vista desktop goes dark while the pop-up message remains on the screen, preventing you from doing anything else."

This is the default behavior, granted. But you can turn off the prompt for administrators, and you can disable the Secure Desktop (that makes the screen go dark and locks the desktop) with a quick edit of Group Policy. An article complaining about the features should at least mention that you're not stuck with them if you don't want them.

On the other hand, I agree with the complaints about driver support, and the article doesn't mention the biggest annoyance in Vista - the way multi-monitor support, which worked flawlessly in XP - has been messed up.

I installed the RTM last week, with high hopes that perhaps my big issue - multi-monitor behavior - had been fixed. No such luck.

Even though I'd jumped through hoops to get two monitors to display the extended desktop on the Vista betas and RC, when I upgraded to the RTM, I was right back where I started when I installed the first beta. Mirrored monitors, no option to extend the desktop in Display Properties.

A quick look at Device Manager told me that the RTM installation had rolled back my video card drivers to generic drivers, so I had to install the ATI drivers all over again. Now I was able to extend the desktop to my second monitor. But my third and fourth monitors, which are attached to a GeForce 7900 card that's supposed to be Vista compatible (and which work just great in XP) were still a "no go" no matter what I do.

There seems to be a conspiracy afoot, to force anyone who wants to run more than two monitors in Vista to buy a new computer (or at least a new motherboard) with multiple PCIe x16 slots, something that my Dells don't have -- and that Dell offers only on their very top of the line Dimension and Precision models (and only as an optional daughterboard riser on the latter).

The other thing that annoyed me, although it was a much smaller thing, was that the upgrade didn't retain my quicklaunch bar nor my sidebar gadgets. I had to redo those all over again.

One more problem that wasn't solved by the RTM upgrade: when the computer sleeps and wakes back up, my display settings are screwed up. My monitors think they're on opposite sides of one another, so that instead of the cursor going logically from the left monitor the right and vice versa, it goes off the left side of the left monitor screen and onto the right side of the right monitor screen. Again, it's more an annoyance than anything, since a few clicks in the Display Settings will fix it, but I'm not crazy about having to redo those settings every time I start to use the computer in the morning.

Okay, now, to be fair, other than these display problems, Vista RTM has worked fine and it is snappier than the betas and RCs. And I really like Vista -- but darn it, the display is the user interface, and unless/until they get that part right, Vista is going to continue to piss me off.

(It might not be so bad if I hadn't gotten spoiled by the fact that multi-monitors work so well in Windows XP).

 
DEBRA LITTLEJOHN SHINDER, MCSE, MVP
deb@shinder.net   www.debshinder.com