If you have a computer that runs the Windows Operating System, you may come to believe over time that the computer is slowing down. In many cases, this is true, but how can you really know that your computer is slowing down, or how sluggish it’s getting? Are specific drivers causing problems at start up or shut down? How would you know?

Vista Event Viewer Can Trace Start Up and Shut Down Trouble

If you run Windows Vista, you can access a report generated by the OS itself that will tell you exactly what’s happening when you start up and shut down your computer. The Event Viewer is good for determining whether you have a problem, and if so, where it is. This is an excellent way to track your Windows Vista operating system over time. If you pay attention to what your computer is doing, you’ll know whether the computer seems slow or really is slow, and better yet, you’ll know what’s the most likely cause of the delay.

The Event Viewer, which is built into the OS, maintains a log of the things your computer does when it starts up and shuts down, as well as at other critical times. The Event Viewer does much more than this, but it can be especially useful when you’re trying to monitor your computer’s performance.
To get to the Event Viewer, choose Run and type eventvwr.msc in the box. The Event Viewer utility will start up. Choose Applications and Servce Log\Microsoft\Windows\Diagnostics-Performance to get to the Diagnostics and Performance part of the Event Viewer.

Activate the center pane (marked Operational) and you’ll see a time-stamped list of “events” that have occurred at the most recent startup or shutdown. Select an event on the list. In the pane immediately below the Operational pane, you can get general or specific details about the event, when it occurred, what happened, what triggered the “event” and so on. Windows will keep track of what time it started to boot and what time the boot process ended. If you monitor this particular statistic, you can tell if your computer is booting more slowly over time.

Each event in the viewer is tagged with a numerical ID. Event numbers between 100 and 199 indicated events that took place at startup. Event numbers between 200 and 299 indicate events that occurred at shutdown. Events numbered between 300 and 399 are related to standby performance and events numbered between 400 and 499 are related to system performance.
If you haven’t played around with the Windows Event Viewer in Vista, take a few minutes to check out this useful system performance-debugging tool.

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According to published reports, Microsoft now says it will allow OEMs to license Windows XP as a downgrade option for six months following the introduction of Windows 7. The company has not said when it will release Windows 7 to the marketplace, but industry analysts believe Microsoft is readying the Vista replacement for a Fall 2009 release. There’s no word on how Microsoft will address the consumers’ big complaint with Vista: difficulty in finding software drivers.

XP Still Available On A Technicality

As a catch, new computers sold after Windows 7 is released must include the physical media for Windows Vista Business or Windows Vista Ultimate. Those two implementations of Vista are the only ones that permit a user to downgrade to an earlier version of the operating system. Another catch: OEM advertising must market the computer with the OS that is normally pre-installed on the computer. Computers with Windows XP installed must not display the Vista logo and vice versa.
Currently, OEMs can sell Windows XP on notebooks only. June 2008 marked the last desktop models shipped with XP pre-installed. Like Vista, downgrade rights for Windows 7 won’t be available in every version. Only the Professional and Ultimate versions will include downgrade rights, but users who have those versions can either downgrade to the corresponding Vista Professional or Vista Ultimate versions, or downgrade to Windows XP Professional.

Six months after the release of Windows 7, users will no longer be able to request downgrade to Windows XP. The only downgrade rights available will allow users to step back to Windows Vista. Currently, Microsoft will make Windows XP media available to OEMs only through July 2009. The new plan suggests that this deadline will be extended to accommodate the new Windows 7 release.
If this has you all confused, don’t worry. In simple terms, if you buy a new desktop computer today, it will come loaded with Windows Vista. If you’re buying a new laptop today, you can request that your notebook ship with Windows XP, but you’ll be required to pop for one of the premium versions of Windows Vista in order to get the right to back down to Windows XP.

If you buy a new desktop computer six months from now, there’s a good chance that it will ship with the new Windows 7. If you spring for the premium version of Windows 7, you can request the manufacturer back your system down to Windows Vista or Windows XP, but only for a limited time. In the spring of 2010, you’ll lose the ability to get Windows XP (which isn’t supported by Microsoft, except on a per-incident basis) and your only downgrade rights will be to a premium version of Windows Vista.

Photo Credit: Courtesy Dell

A new survey conducted by Dimensional Research shows that five out of six IT professionals don’t plan to upgrade to Windows 7 when the new OS is released sometime next year, and slightly fewer of the same respondents say they won’t upgrade to Vista at all, and will go directly to Windows 7 instead when they do their next upgrade. The survey was conducted among a variety of small, medium and large corporations and included IT professionals, IT managers and IT executives.

Some IT professionals expressed the concern that Windows 7 is just a revamped Windows Vista because Windows 7 is being built on Vista code. One of the issues that has plagued Windows Vista is the system’s memory usage. Another downside: the absence of software drivers.

Nearly three out of four respondents in the same survey said that they would be more concerned about upgrading to Windows 7 than they would be about staying with Windows XP, despite the fact that XP is outdated and no covered under Microsoft’s primary technical support. Microsoft says it will provide per-incident support on Windows XP through 2014, and will continue to patch the XP product indefinitely.

Home Users Take Vista, Business Users Stay Put

Home users have warmed up to Vista a bit, but Microsoft’s target market – the business users – remain cool to the ideal of upgrading, especially since Windows 7 is right around the corner. In terms of business computers, Windows Vista is operational on less than 10 percent of the deployed business machines. The company received strong pushback from Windows XP users, and agreed to continue selling licenses for the older XP product for a year after Vista had been available. Major manufacturers, including Dell, shipped Vista only as a customer option until XP licenses were no longer available, began offering Linux operating systems as a option to Vista.

The first Service Pack release for Vista, introduced in February, did resolve some of the performance issues. Microsoft is testing a second Service Pack release that it plans to make it publicly available sometime in the second quarter of ‘09.

The company is also testing Windows 7 though it’s not clear that a solid release can help the company recapture some of its lost market share. In April ‘07, when Microsoft debuted Vista, it held about 93 percent of the OS market; today that figure has shrunk to 88 percent. In addition to the market share slide, nearly 65% of XP users are still holding off on upgrading to Vista, more than two years after its initial release. Less than one-quarter of Windows users upgraded to Vista and the remaining 10%-12% of Windows users are sticking with products that pre-date XP.

Photo Credit: Microsoft