Windows Vista Ultimate & Marketing Falsehoods

[Jason Dunn]

<p>I was checking out an <a href="http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/computer_can_series.do?storeName=computer_store&amp;category=desktops&amp;a1=Category&amp;v1=Entertainment+powerhouse&amp;series_name=m9300t_series" target="_blank">HP desktop computer</a> because my latest Media Center computer upgrade is giving me a headache (more on that later today if I can manage to write about it), and I saw something that really frustrated me. It's not the first time I've seen it, but it's certainly one of the more glaring examples of it that I've seen:</p><p><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com//dht/auto/1216060257.usr1.png" border="1" alt="" /></p><p>That text is, for the most part, completely false. HP charges $190 USD extra to go from Vista Home Premium to Vista Ultimate. And if you were an average consume you might read that text and think "Yeah, ok, those things sound good, I'd better get Vista Ultimate." The problem is, that would be completely wrong. Let's break it down point by point:</p><ul><li><strong>"New Look"? FALSE.</strong> Vista Ultimate has exactly the same look as Home Premium.</li><li><strong>"Instant Search"? FALSE.</strong> Vista Ultimate has exactly the same instant search features as Home Premium.</li><li><strong>"Built-in Windows Media Center"? FALSE.</strong> Vista Ultimate has exactly the same version of Windows Media Center as Home Premium does.</li><li><strong>"Automated Security Features"? FALSE.</strong> I can't think of a single automated security feature that Ultimate has that Premium lacks.<br /></li></ul><p>What should the differences be listed as? Faxing capabilities, Bitlocker Drive Encryption, and Remote Desktop. That's pretty much it. Consumers very likely wouldn't care about the first two, and the third is a power user feature that someone like myself uses - but hardly worthy of paying $190 for when there are free alternatives. Windows Vista Ultimate promised to be the "power user" version of Windows Vista, something that geeks would want because it would allow them to do more. Instead, Ultimate Extras turned out to be a sham - nothing they've released to date, even taken together, is worth the price of admission.</p><p>I can't blame Microsoft for the inaccuracies in the above text - it was likely written by an HP person who decided to falsify the features in Vista Ultimate in order to sell copies of Vista Ultimate and bump up the sell-through price of online orders. Microsoft should pull Vista Ultimate from the marketplace immediately, because if an OEM partner can't accurately define the additional features of Vista Ultimate, that's a pretty good indication that there aren't any worthy of having a completely different version of Vista. I believe Windows Vista is the best version of Windows that has ever been released, and I use it on the majority of my systems, but releasing Windows Vista Ultimate was a mistake and Microsoft should take steps to correct that mistake.</p>

[alanjrobertson]

Very well put, Jason - I think Ultimate has been nothing short of a big marketing scam and the sooner it's pulled the better. Remember the Microsoft 'Plus Pack!' anyone?!

Alan
(still experiencing errors trying to install SP1 onto my Vista Ultimate box!)

[uzziah0]

It didn't really say (in the part you included) that it was comparing Vista Home to Ultimate; perhaps it was from XP to Vista? OR, maybe that's what they meant, because I think all those things are true for that comparison.

[Jason Dunn]

It didn't really say (in the part you included) that it was comparing Vista Home to Ultimate...

The very first line of the graphic I screen captured says:

"This series comes with genuine Windows Vista Home Premium..."

So it seems pretty obvious what they're making the comparison to.

[Hooch Tan]

Good idea, poor implementation.

I wouldn't exactly blame Microsoft for an HP marketing rep for getting the differences between Vista Home Premium and Ultimate wrong though. I've seen lots of other bad mistakes made on the promotional floor.

That being said, I completely agree that Ultimate doesn't really have anything compelling to it. The three differences you've listed are all easily added through other programs, not just RDP, and at a much lower cost than $190.

Of course, I've kept most of my machines on XP since for most of them, there wasn't any compelling reason to upgrade them. I will say that the Vista Media Center does look mucho nicer!

[Jason Dunn]

Of course, I've kept most of my machines on XP since for most of them, there wasn't any compelling reason to upgrade them. I will say that the Vista Media Center does look mucho nicer!

It's funny, when I use XP now I feel like I'm working much slower than with Vista. Vista's instant search, OS wide, is just a joy to behold - I cringe when I think how much time I wasted in Windows XP creating and managing program folders so I could find programs quickly. Now I just start typing and Vista shows me the program I want. For me, that's huge.

[EscapePod]

Yeah, but Vista Ultimate comes in a neat Black Box.

(Hey, wait a minute! ... my OEM/Builder version came in the same dumb white box as all my Home Premium OEM/Builder packs. Darn!)

[Eriq Cook]

I agree that Vista Ultimate is a sham. However you failed to mention one more important feature that Vista Ultimate & Business edition has: Offline Files. Offline files is a feature that's become impossible for me to live without, now. Since I work out of the home on a nice desktop system, sometimes I like to take my work with me. I enabled offline files on my Vista Notebook (running Business, not Ulitmate) which syncs with my desktop computer. It's nice being able to save a file on my desktop computer and have the updated file immediately available on my notebook PC within seconds, and vice-versa. If I'm out of the office all my data syncs as soon as I return. I actually use offline files as form of backup strategy now, since it replicates all of my data across multiple computers in real-time.

Anyway, Microsoft should have just had 3 versions of Vista: Home Basic, Home Premium and Business, and distributed certain features such as offline files across the two latter editions. Ultimate is unecessary IMO.

[Jason Dunn]

However you failed to mention one more important feature that Vista Ultimate & Business edition has: Offline Files.

Interesting - I didn't realize that was an Ultimate feature. I've never used it - why would you use that instead of something like FolderShare? Does it have advantages over FolderShare or another sync program? Microsoft mustn't feel it's very important, they don't list it in their comparison chart (which is why I missed it).

[Eriq Cook]

Interesting - I didn't realize that was an Ultimate feature. I've never used it - why would you use that instead of something like FolderShare? Does it have advantages over FolderShare or another sync program? Microsoft mustn't feel it's very important, they don't list it in their comparison chart (which is why I missed it).

It just works in the background in real-time without any required action or input from me. That's convenience. The advantage over traditional sync software is if I change just one file, only that one file is immediately synced with my other computer within seconds--or a minute at most. Traditional sync software requires you to run an entire sync process, which becomes time consuming to me. I know you could automate the sync process to run every day/night at a given time, but I'd rather have my files synced immediately as soon as a change is made on any computer.

I'm surprised that MS doesn't promote it more. It's actually the most important feature to me.

[Jason Dunn]

I've never used Folder Share. I usually like to use whatever features are built into the OS before dowloading additional software.

Does the sync work over the Internet? As in, you get on a plane, edit a Word document, get to your hotel, and boot up your laptop - will it sync the file back to your other PCs? That's what makes FolderShare killer for me.

I'm surprised that MS doesn't promote it more. It's actually the most important feature to me.

MS seems to have a very hard time explaining synchronization in general.

[bleeman]

Personally, I like Ultimate, but then I work in the computer industry as a consultant, so one other important feature that wasn't mentioned is Ultimate allows you to connect to a Windows domain. Yes, not necessarily important to a consumer but a very important feature for my use as I run an SBS server at home and it allows me to join the domain. Granted, I could have achieved the same thing with Vista Business, but then I would have lost out on Media Center.

In addition, to the above Ultimate has Shadow Copy support, and the backup offers "Complete PC Backup and Restore" (i.e. Image Backup). There are a fair amount of other differences between Ultimate and Home Premium and you can see them here, http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-vista/footnotes.aspx. Read through several of the footnotes and you'll see the various differences.

[bleeman]

Does the sync work over the Internet? As in, you get on a plane, edit a Word document, get to your hotel, and boot up your laptop - will it sync the file back to your other PCs? That's what makes FolderShare killer for me.



MS seems to have a very hard time explaining synchronization in general.

The only way the sync would work over the Internet would be if you had a VPN link back to your system. Offline folders is generally found in a domain with a Windows Server. I haven't played with this feature between say a desktop and laptop, but I use it everyday with my Tablet and Server. Essentially, my "My Documents" folder has been setup as an offline folder. So when I disconnect from network and hit the road I have a copy of everything in it with me. When I am out and about I still go to "My Documents" and everything is there. When I return to my network the Tablet will automatically sync back with the share on my server and when I open "My Documents" on my desktop everything is there from my Tablet.

For the most part I don't worry about syncing while I am out traveling between client sites, but if I have made a lot of changes and concerned I will bring up my VPN and then sync up.

Your FolderShare option is considerably more flexible and offers a great way to achieve the same functionality without having a server in the loop. Probably the biggest difference between the two is no need for a VPN in your scenario and my data is always controlled by me in mine as it isn't being stored on a third party system (i.e. one of Microsoft's FolderShare servers).

[Jason Dunn]

Probably the biggest difference between the two is no need for a VPN in your scenario and my data is always controlled by me in mine as it isn't being stored on a third party system (i.e. one of Microsoft's FolderShare servers).

Actually, no data is stored on FolderShare servers - not my files at any rate. There's sync data stored of course, but my files are only ever on my PCs. FolderShare is a peer to peer file sync solution, with encryption from point A to point B. You should check it out, you might like it. :)

[Hooch Tan]

It's funny, when I use XP now I feel like I'm working much slower than with Vista. Vista's instant search, OS wide, is just a joy to behold - I cringe when I think how much time I wasted in Windows XP creating and managing program folders so I could find programs quickly. Now I just start typing and Vista shows me the program I want. For me, that's huge.

I guess that's a difference in user needs then. With my work in general, I only have about a dozen (maybe less) programs that I use on a regular basis, so they're all listed in my Start Menu (via the "Pin to Start Menu" option) so any programs I usually need are two clicks away.

As for search in general, I usually don't use it for files, but only within Outlook for some strange reason. With that, Outlook 2007 combined with Windows Search does the trick for me.

I'll definately agree that Vista is nice and in many ways, an improvement, but I guess the biggest holdback for me is that with most of my computers, it'd involve lots of upgrades which I haven't budgeted for ... yet. :)

[Jason Dunn]

Some good news! HP updated their text with something 100% accurate:

http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/store_access.do?template_type=series_detail&category=desktops&series_name=a6560t_series&jumpid=in_r329_ad_HOMEtile2

"Upgrade to Windows Vista Ultimate for everything Windows Vista Home Premium has to offer, plus Windows Ultimate extras."

[Eriq Cook]

Does the sync work over the Internet? As in, you get on a plane, edit a Word document, get to your hotel, and boot up your laptop - will it sync the file back to your other PCs? That's what makes FolderShare killer for me.



MS seems to have a very hard time explaining synchronization in general.

No, it does not work over the Internet. That would be cool--but that would really put a strain on the OS (being that it's built directly into Vista unlike Folder Share) right now I think. I don't know. I've had some problems in the past with offline files and Microsoft is still working on some bug fixes for it. I'll have to check out the Internet sync feature of folder share though soon.