The Arcane and the Obvious

You know I love you, right?

I pretty much hang on your every word, most every day. I love keeping myself current with up-to-the-minute news and rumors. I love it. Please don't stop.

But I ask of you one thing: Please do not assume with every product release that the product was designed with you and only you in mind. Not every one has the same set of constraints as you, nor the same needs, nor the same ability to use technology.

Further, if the product does not meet your personal needs, please do not use your dismay as a launching point into the attack of a series of products or manufacturers.

It's OK to say "It won't work for me. And here is why..."

Recognize that while your point of view is valid, your experiences are unique and not the same as mine. There is a reasonably good chance I don't agree with everything you outline.

Something that you may not appreciate very much is something that I may hold very dear.

Stop the anger, please.

Give me "pros" and "cons."

I attempted to install the Release Candidate of Vista Service Pack One.

I've been running Vista (non-Aero) on an old Dell laptop. It has been slow but stable. Mostly usable.

After the service pack allegedly reverts changes (I've tried twice) Vista doesn't do anything more annoying than tell me there is a new service pack update to install. There is no loss of data or functionality. No new error messages.

But it's pretty disappointing. The Release Candidate for XP SP3 worked like a charm on an even older laptop and Windows XP seems to perform as well as it always has, if not better.

At this point, the Vista laptop is looking like an excellent candidate for conversion to Ubuntu.