I began my ordeal all for the want of the use of five minus read and write digital versatile disc (DVD-RW). You must understand I am not preternaturally obsessed with minimalism as is my enlighten sonofapigfarmer friend Lance. I am however heavily influenced by his and my wife’s own desire to conserve.
But in all honesty I was perturbed with Microsoft for producing such a royal piece of dung that is Windows Vista. Since the first day I installed it to present I’ve encountered one disappointment after another. Vista has failed to perform well with everything from my nifty USB Skype phone to reliability with media center extender for my XBOX 360.
Over time though I became use to the quirks, hick-ups and other eccentricities that is half backed Vista. While not fully satisfied with user interface and feeling constantly nagged by the constant annoyance of security alerts I muddled my way through basic task. What I did not realize is I began to avoid using my home pc. Using applications became a chore to just get them to run. Finding files became complex. Cryptic error messages would appear and reappear unbidden. I was plagued by some evil COM SURROGATE ghost that would constantly appear if I ever browsed to a folder with video files. Ultimately I was using a power house machine (3.2 GHZ CPU, 2 GIG RAM and etc.) as a web browsing appliance. What a waste and for what? Areo? Enhanced security vulnerability?
But once I discovered that Microsoft decided that my investment in DVD-RW was not worth their trouble I decided to boot Vista. Well more like dual boot my PC. I really didn’t need Vista after all. Windows XP MCE 2005 SP2 was working well. But my furor over the trivial was at its apex so I decided to revert to my inner geek for solace. But before I could rid myself of the horror of Vista I had to get my second internal hard drive converted from a dynamic to basic drive. There were some hacks that alluded to the possibility that I could do the conversion without losing data. Alas Vista had it iron grips of sadism so tightly wound around my computer that no amount of hacking was going to pry Vista merciless grip away from my second drive.
After spending nearly two days backing up my data onto DVD-R (thank the geek gods that Vista could read those disk) I was ready to wipe Vista off the face of my hard disk platters. Fait accompli I was ready install the salvation to my miserly wants.
Ah but the specter of Microsoft would not give up its haunting so easily. It tempted me with the allure of XP. Like the want of forbidden fruit it succored to my inner geek. Calling forth visions of happiness from a world where applications played happily and media ran hither and thither in data fields of resplendent glory. I was enchanted. Perhaps I did not need Linux; perhaps I could revert back to a happier time where my love for Microsoft was unbounded and full of joy and fulfillment of digital desire.
I succumbed to its caressing tendrils of pleasure. Instead of cutting the hard cold edge of Linux into the metal platter of my hard drive I spilt the silky smoothness of XP onto its metallic core. XP spun and the reassuring comfort of the familiar warmed me in its digital luminescence. I plopped an unlabeled DVD-RW disc into the DVD drive and with spectacular release of awareness XP recognized the DVD and auto-launched the content.
The disc was not empty. Facing me with a kind of demonic irony was the Ubuntu splash screen asking me if I wish to install Linux. Sigh.
I still say that all these issues are hardware related. Vista rules.
Tom: You are right. Sort of. Samsung Firmware upgrade is required. The firmware install tool doesn’t work on Vista only on XP. Once I updated the firmware I could read DVD-RW on Vista.
I’ll post a technical howto because I notice this is bugging others on the .net.
Ah, the miracle of knowledgeable children, this MOM will NOT be acquiring the Vista Monster (thanks to my son’s learning curve), it is enough to be in the midwest and still have “DIAL UP connection. This delimina continues to annoy not only myself but my sons, by way of sending and receiving or if by chance they come to visit their mom the dreadful thought of OH MY GOD I have to use Mom’s computer !..So things can occassionaly be worse than the Vista Monster I suppose. Congradulations Richard on overcoming the power and annoyance of Vista.