MS launches Vista compatibility tool

Author: Gareth Halfacree
Published: 9th July 2008
Comments (26) Stumble
The compatibility database - when it eventually gets fixed - will hold information on products suitable for Vista.

The compatibility database - when it eventually gets fixed - will hold information on products suitable for Vista.

Microsoft launched a new tool yesterday designed to test your hardware and software for compatability with Windows Vista. Not everyone is happy with the news, however.

CNet blogger Ina Fried posted about the tool yesterday, and makes some points that Microsoft will be hard-pushed to deny. As Fried points out, Vista has been available in fully-finished form for a year and a half now, and there is still enough software and hardware that won't operate under the new OS that Microsoft feels the need to release an updated tool to warn users.

Fried quotes Michael Keigley, manager in charge of the Vista Compatibility Center [sic] at Microsoft, as admitting that when Vista launched the company experienced “incompatibilities in the system” which left many Vista users stranded without support for their hardware – hardware that, it must be said, works fine under Vista's predecessor, Windows XP. While it's not all Microsoft's fault – after all, it's the manufacturers who have to get off their backsides and write Vista-compatible drivers – it's certainly an embarrassing admission that support from manufacturers for the next-generation OS is still, eighteen months down the line, less than perfect.

Although the official launch date for the tool was yesterday, Microsoft seems to be having compatibility issues of its own – at the time of writing, visitors to the site are treated to a message saying the tool is “currently unavailable.” Once the bugs are ironed out, the site will play host to a database of around 3,000 software products and 6,000 pieces of hardware which are known to work fine under Windows Vista. While many of the products are from companies that have ponied up the cash to be part of the Windows Vista Certified programme, around half are uncertified but guaranteed to work anyway – which sort of mocks the whole – expensive – certification process, really.

Have you found any of your beloved hardware or software misbehaving since switching to Microsoft's latest and greatest, or has it all been plain sailing? Is the presence of the compatibility checker going to make XP fans more likely to upgrade, or less? Share your thoughts over in the forums.
Quote Woodstock 9th July 2008, 09:18
ive only found one piece of software that didnt work in vista that i use, and i cant even remember what it was, but hardware wise my laptop did orginally come with vista so, it would have been shocking if something didnt work
Quote Buzzons 9th July 2008, 09:19
That article is quite biased ... Software that doesn't work is nothing to do with MS -- it's the software's designers that are at fault. Hardware that does not work is nearly ALWAYS due to bad drivers, again, NOT an MS issue but the developers for that hardware. I for one like the MS signing of drivers as it means that they have had extensive tests done to them and they wont cause system instability -- the main cause for most XP crashes.
Quote Gareth Halfacree 9th July 2008, 09:21
Quote:
Originally Posted by Buzzons
That article is quite biased ... Software that doesn't work is nothing to do with MS -- it's the software's designers that are at fault. Hardware that does not work is nearly ALWAYS due to bad drivers, again, NOT an MS issue but the developers for that hardware.
Biased? You mean like where I state:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Article
While it's not all Microsoft's fault – after all, it's the manufacturers who have to get off their backsides and write Vista-compatible drivers[...]
Quote CardJoe 9th July 2008, 09:30
At least half my collection of games won't work on Vista and that annoys me. Not even old games - Deus Ex 2, Chronicles of Riddick, Fahrenheit, No One Lives Forever (1 and 2) - none work on Vista.
Quote wuyanxu 9th July 2008, 09:36
it was plain sailing... only a few classic games doesn't work with Vista 64bit, but those can be missed as it's always the time to move on.

the old devices that are not compatible is manufacture's fault, if anyone ever find such manufacture, i urge you to never buy their software again. it is simply a sign of irrisponsible driver support, thus a sign of bad manufacture.
Quote liratheal 9th July 2008, 09:46
Quote:
Originally Posted by CardJoe
At least half my collection of games won't work on Vista and that annoys me. Not even old games - Deus Ex 2, Chronicles of Riddick, Fahrenheit, No One Lives Forever (1 and 2) - none work on Vista.

I think, more importantly, Red Alert 2 still doesn't work on Vista! :(
Quote samkiller42 9th July 2008, 09:55
Quote:
Originally Posted by liratheal

I think, more importantly, Red Alert 2 still doesn't work on Vista! :(

Wrong, i play RA2 on both my Vista machine and XP machine.

Sam
Quote amacieli 9th July 2008, 10:05
Gareth, yes, biased. Throwing in the odd "while it's not TOTALLY MS' fault..." once in an otherwise blistering article can, in fact, be considered biased. The only issue I've had with Vista is that C&C3 doesn't run on Vista x64. Well, that and that some of my HP peripherals don't work in Vista, but then that's HP's fault. HP is totally crap at writing drivers even for XP. Or 98. Or 95. Or anything. HP is the one that needs to get blasted, not MS.
Quote hawky84 9th July 2008, 10:14
Still got an issue with the Asus P5K-E wifi driver where I get blue screen of death happening everytime I set a static IP in 64bit Vista
Quote Delphium 9th July 2008, 10:29
Quote:
Originally Posted by samkiller42
Quote:
Originally Posted by liratheal
I think, more importantly, Red Alert 2 still doesn't work on Vista! :(

Wrong, i play RA2 on both my Vista machine and XP machine.

Sam

Indeed, RA2 will run on Vista, however multiplayer will not, as RA2 uses the IPX network protocol, which has been removed from windows since xp64bit.
I genrally get round this by using an xp virtual machine, as saves having to reboot pc.

Only other issue with Vista I experience is with the sound card driver for the Soundmax onbard sound for my mobo (Asus P5N32-E SLI) which is a bit flakely to say the lest, but only for 64bit, 32bit driver works very well.
Asus/Soundmax have been very slack on the drivers for this. :(

Thankfully I managed to get a cheap Creative X-FI card from a friend at work for just £10, which seems to have improved things.
Quote wuyanxu 9th July 2008, 10:35
Quote:
Originally Posted by Delphium

I genrally get round this by using an xp virtual machine, as saves having to reboot pc.

what virtual machine software do you use?

VMware only have a 6MB crappy video card emulation, im not sure if it can run any game at all. (haven't tryed)
Quote Delphium 9th July 2008, 10:43
Quote:
Originally Posted by wuyanxu
what virtual machine software do you use?

VMware only have a 6MB crappy video card emulation, im not sure if it can run any game at all. (haven't tryed)

I use the free Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 which emulates a 8mb S3 Trio 32/64.
Once you have installed the guest OS, be sure to install the VirtualPC addtions pack (included in the base install).

I find it plays RA2 flawlessly on my system, infact im often the one who hosts the multiplayer games (up to 8players, no lag).
Ive not tried it with many other old games.
Quote LeMaltor 9th July 2008, 10:48
Long live XP :D
Quote wuyanxu 9th July 2008, 10:56
cool, 8mb S3 Trio 32/64...... does it have 3d acceleration? pixel shader? (worth a try)
Quote Cptn-Inafinus 9th July 2008, 11:03
I know it's not software, but the only thing that has never worked for me on Vista, is X3.

That really messed up my system. It stopped it booting for god sakes...
Quote Delphium 9th July 2008, 11:53
Quote:
Originally Posted by wuyanxu
cool, 8mb S3 Trio 32/64...... does it have 3d acceleration? pixel shader? (worth a try)
Code:
Video
•	Emulates the S3 Trio 32/64 PCI Super VGA (SVGA) card.
•	Implements 8 MB of emulated video random access memory (VRAM) for a maximum screen resolution setting of 1600 x 1200.
•	Fully implements S3 Trio 32/64 graphic acceleration features and is compatible with S3 Trio 32/64 drivers.
•	Supports 1600 x 1024 and 800 x 512 16:9 aspect ratio modes.
•	Backwards-compatible with VGA, monochrome display adapter (MDA), color/graphics adapter (CGA), and enhanced graphics adapter (EGA) video modes.
•	Compliant with VESA 2.0.
Note For a virtual machine to correctly recognize 8 MB of video RAM, the Virtual PC Additions must be installed on the virtual machine.

Is all I could find.
Quote Timmy_the_tortoise 9th July 2008, 12:18
My PC Monitor is Vista Compatible... It has a big sticker saying so.
Quote diasam 9th July 2008, 12:25
The only annoyance I had with Vista is that I have to run every game in dx9 mode to get a better performance, so I have to modify the shortcut for every single freakin' game... :(
Quote Sebbo 9th July 2008, 13:06
Software wise, i have only had a problem with TrueSpace 3.2 not running, which was probably meant for Windows 98 (though it runs fine on XP, which i resorted to in this case). With hardware, I have had basically no problems, though most of my hardware is fairly recent (oldest piece i have is the SB Audigy 2). only problem i've really had is with my SATA controller driver preventing me from going up to SP1 (a bit off-topic, but if anyone else reading this has an ASUS A8R32-MVP Deluxe board and have gotten past this, pls pm me ;-)). However, this comes down to ASUS and the board now basically being "too old" to release updates for. I think anything released since January 2006 should surely be well supported with drivers under Vista, and anything older that is still widely in use the manufacturers need to be hounded to get their arse in gear
Quote Ninja_182 9th July 2008, 13:36
Getting a new XP machine in at work for the accounting department on Sage's reccomendation. Apparently they are having minor problems with Vista.

Not going to do well in the business market if Sage is recomending XP
Quote GoodBytes 9th July 2008, 15:45
I wonder if this tool will work under Vista... you know to certify that my Vista machine will run Vista fine.
Quote capnPedro 9th July 2008, 16:55
In what way is this different from the upgrade advisor app which has been out for like 2 years?
Quote Cupboard 9th July 2008, 17:05
Quote:
Originally Posted by wuyanxu
the old devices that are not compatible is manufacture's fault, if anyone ever find such manufacture, i urge you to never buy their software again. it is simply a sign of irrisponsible driver support, thus a sign of bad manufacture.

As I am sure I have said before, Microsoft's own fingerprint reader doesn't work with 64 bit Vista. I am sure I will buy another MS OS though.
Quote Delphium 9th July 2008, 17:08
Quote:
Originally Posted by capnPedro
In what way is this different from the upgrade advisor app which has been out for like 2 years?

I had wondered the same tbh :S
Quote r4tch3t 10th July 2008, 05:45
Most things run fine, but some older games (read most) don't work, wanted to play the three Homeworld's as I have never got around to completing Cataclysm so haven't started Homeworld 2.

When I get a new HDD I can free up some space on the main rig and dual boot with XP.
Quote MrMonroe 11th July 2008, 15:01
No software is perfect 18 months after release. What's really appalling about this is that people aren't complaining that the software doesn't work, they're complaining that it has compatibility issues with certain programs and hardware. (The vast majority of which is also not compatible with OSX, incidentally)

The one thing that really gets me is that Vista won't recognize my old XP partition on an older HDD. That's unreasonable.
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