I hated it when my TI-80 wouldn't fully read the cassette tape after 5 minutes of listening to that awful sound. Jimhttp://www.hifisim.com/banners/hifi-community-sigbanner.jpghttp://www.hifisim.com/

>Yes- Vista never gets to a 100% working state-it tries to>update itself during the install process-then corrupts>itself..so it is bum from the start.>Starts with a black screen with a cursor on it-then after>hours of work doing Dos stuff will go to update itself and>give and error message that it can't be updated. Then it>gradually trashes all the credentials or whatever they are so>slowly many of my add ins stop working-and I often get>unexpected surprises on boot up.>>It is again, a documented problem, and MS can't figure out why>it does this to certain computers (mine a pk5/e6750). Me-I am>left with a bum operating system and a hope it will hang on>enough to be able to do most of my simming without having to>reformat and reinstall everything from scratch every couple>months-which is all the techs after working for 3 weeks at a>time can recommend.>>Geofa>My blog:>http://geofageofa.spaces.live.com/Geofa, Is it safe to say I should stay away from Vista for my new PC I am building? Regards, Randy

I am sure I am a small minority that has this problem-but if I had it to do over I'd stay away.GeofaMy blog:http://geofageofa.spaces.live.com/

I went with XP on my new machine. I have yet to have problem number one in about thre months.Bob (Las Cruces, NM)XP-Home, With FS Genesis Terrain MeshLogitech G15 Backlit Game Keyboard and18 Programmable Macro/Keystroke KeysAsus P5N-D MotherboardIntel E8500 @ 3.16GHz (Now)CPUThermaltake MaxOrb Enthusiast CPU FanCorsir XMS2 PC6400/DDR2/800 Dual, 4GigsSATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDDEVGA Geforce 8800 GT/512 (OC'd Version)Dual Flat Panel Monitors

>-------"$50 to $100 for an addon plane you can fly everyday>for, what, years?>$50 to $100 for addon textures you can gander at for, what,>years.>That being said, you can get overwhelmed, there's so much>stuuuuuf you can buy. And lets not forget all the freeware>offerings."--->----------->My simple solution- set a rigid budget of $100 per year for>addons- that are no less than 6 months on the market! You get>to thoroughly learn what you've paid for, and you avoid the>grief of being perpetually on the bleeding edge of>technology.>(You wouldn't buy a new car in its 1st year of production>would you?)>Works for me.>Alex Reid >That is a solution. Problem is I'm like a crack addict with this stuff. I need an "intervention". LOL.

I just had a new machine built last month. I went with Vista 64 Home Premium. While I cannot say that I haven't had any problems, I can't not recommend it I guess. LoL...does that make sense? It isn't THAT different from XP, just more bells and whistles. Aside from my USB problems (of which I haven't had one now in my last 5 hours of simming) and the awful Windows Explorer and the issue with not having access to many of the folders/files on YOUR computer, Vista is okay. If you go with Vista, expect to spend several days looking around and trying to tweak it to work how you want it. I went with Vista 64 as from what I understand, makes better use of multicore CPU's.Huh...rereading this post, I seem to have listed more negatives then positives with Vista....lol...maybe you should go with XP. :)Another option.....dual boot. XP for when you want to flight sim....Vista for when you what to get frustrated.

>I am sure I am a small minority that has this problem-but if>I had it to do over I'd stay away.>Geofa>My blog:>http://geofageofa.spaces.live.com/Geofa, if I'd been through what you have I'd probably be looking for another pastime.I run 2 setups, one with XP Pro and a newer box with Vista 64 and I've had the occasional problem with XP over the years and a few with Vista (but after a few adjustments to the OC to get it more stable it's performing very well with FSX/Accel - no blue screens, CTD's or freezing, much smoother, much higher fps - of course, newer, faster hardware). I haven't reformatted the XP box in over 2 years. I'm also certain at this point you've probably tried the 1,000th suggestion all to no avail so I won't offer any.All the same it stinks, here's hoping your next build is the charm.

I have more add-ons than I care to count (or tell my wife about). I bought Vista 32 either last year or early this year. Anyway, just as the original poster reported. Vista would see my USB controllers intermitintly. I had to restart several times. I also experienced CTD's and substandard performance. Well to make a long story short, I just gave up on Vista. I went to Best Buy and purchased WinXP Home SP2. I formatted my hardrive and started from scratch.That was not an easy decision to make either. I had just installed all of my software add-ons for FSX and FS9. I had typed in all of those license keys etc... Nothing is perfect. I am not going to say that I do not any problems anymore. But, I spend most of my time flying now and less configuring and tweaking. All of my hardware such as Saitek, Go-Flight, Ch, Desktop Aviator, Track IR....seems to play nice with XP. As I said, that was not the case with Vista.For you guys having problems. If you really prefer flight simming to trouble shooting and tweaking (and swearing LOL), you might want to consider just moving back to XP. I can only speak for myself of course. But my blood pressure and heartrate have all lowered since converting back.Just my two cents, ymmv.Nick

Why would anyone use Vista for flight sim? Toms Hardware showed how Vista runs almost everything 33% slower than XP, not to mention all the bugs.

>Why would anyone use Vista for flight sim? Toms Hardware>showed how Vista runs almost everything 33% slower than XP,>not to mention all the bugs.>I tried Vista 64 on my new box because I wanted to see what all the squawking was about both pro and con. The Vista versus XP Pro discussions have been about as incessant as the FSX versus FS9 discussions over the past 2 plus years. Once I saw what FSX was capable of visually, there was no going back for me, (I can even remember it was tutorial # 3 on a stock FSX setup that sealed the deal: birds, lawn sheep, AI air traffic, cars and trucks in some other missions, but most of all the landscape itself, and that was without UTX, GEX, etc.). And I

OK, I'll bite. I use Vista and am happy to not have had the problems you all seem to be having. I really feel for you, Geofa, What a bummer. As for Vista being 33% slower. All I can say is that as I upgrade my Vista machine, I put those parts in my XP machine. Then do a little benchmarking. Nothing fancy. I have seen no difference between the two systems using the same parts. I expected XP to be faster, but I did not see that. I can not say that Vista is better, but, come on, it's just an OS and can be delt with. Well, except in Geofa's case, I guess.Bob

I have to agree-I saw no difference speed wise between Vista and Xp when I upgraded.GeofaMy blog:http://geofageofa.spaces.live.com/

Vista 64 bit has one advantage over XP: no OOM errors. Saw them all the time with XP32, not once yet with V64.Now concerning the "bling", V64 will turn off the Aero desktop when you fire up FSX and the sidebar can be easily shut off. 64 bit is the future.

#11 -2nd list: Ctrl + .:)Yeah, I have similar issues at times.I normally fly in the pattern, at my local airport, with a GA plane. I have a CH throttle and MS FFB2 stick. Sometimes the switches on the throttle takeover the switches on the joystick argh...The only other flying I do is on VATSIM - short hops <30min

What I do..A typical perfect...flight:1. Turn on PC (New Vista Quadcore computer that works most of the time, but usually have to mess with USB stuff to get it to work. Then, spend the next 30 minutes trying to figure out why... I don't want to sound like I am complaining. I'm really not. In my flight simulation enthusiasm, I have just added too many things to FSX... Anyway, that is a typical flight sim session for me.Anyone else have stories like this?:)

HA! I hear ya. I can completely understand your situation here. There are a FEW times when this is what happens, or worse, when running a full size sim. My full size LJ45 is actually very stable and has about a 95% dispatch reliability I'd say. The funny thing is that the remaining 5% chance always seems to occur when I have a visitor over who's never seen the sim in person, and FlyTampa MDW decides to lock the whole sim up (Memory leak?) or for some reason a switch is deciding to not be responsive for a critical function!Fun reading your post here!