I finally got around to installing Windows Vista on a test box (HP tc4200) and I'll have to say, I'm quite impressed! That's mostly because I've seen previous builds of Longhorn and I could only kindly describe those as catastrophically disappointing. The interface in Vista Beta 1 is greatly improved over previous builds. In fact, after tinkering with it for a few hours, I can pretty comfortably say it is more intuitive and aesthetically attractive than XP.
You might have noticed that I don't see the Vista interface as a revolutionary jump to replace XP, but I don't think it should be either. Users will feel familiar with the look, even though there are tweaks in almost every screen and dialog box. Lets take a look at some of the differences.
Control Panel (default view):
Parental Controls (while I can definitely see the market for this, I'm sure the "Collect information about computer usage" will have a LOT of people asking questions):
Trying to keep your "Hot Coffee" decaf?
Computer Management looks mostly the same, the Event Viewer menu has been reworked:
Windows Explorer has had a major rework. File and folder grouping are prominent features and quite easy to use. The directory structure has also changed somewhat:
User files are now housed in "C:\Users" instead of "C:\Documents and Settings\..."
The new "C:\Boot" folder is a departure from XP and 2000:
The File Copy dialog seems to start counting at zero. Well, they have to have something to fix for Beta 2! (I wonder where Beta 0 was):
Thumbnail images in the copy/replace dialog box add a nice (and helpful) touch:
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