Beware of VISTA !!!

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Well…

I went w/ a two machine system, at the request of my DAW’s mfg. (who wanted me to keep my recording studio’s music PC off the internet).

Went out & purchased a Compaq Presario for office & graphic related tasks…& the internet. My ADK Pro Audio machine then became dedicated to digital audio.

Had the new PC…(which runs Vista Home Premium)…for a MONTH…hadn’t performed a backup yet; & had moved all my personal files, folders & data to the new machine…from an external hard drive… via cut & paste (very stupid on my part…I know).

So…I’m performing a simple disk cleanup…& up pops a message that tells me the OS is missing a critical file. The machine needs to reboot. I reboot; & a dalog comes up telling me I need to repair the operating system, w/ a list of options. I choose the least destrucvtive route…which is a REPAIR…from the very top of the list. The repair runs a long time. When the process is finished & the PC reboots…all my personal files & data are gone. The folder strucure is intact…but nothing is in the folders…nothing.

I take the machine to a data restoration specialist…who informs me that Vista did not ‘repair’…it ‘restored’…overwriting my personal data on every drive sector. So…I take my external backup hard drive to the same company…the one I used to move my personal stuff to the new machine…& they are able to restore everything that was cut…a ‘deletive restoration’ I believe they called it.

So…bottom line ??? I lost everything I had created or was working on for a month…everything.

The proprietor at the data restoration outfit tells me this is all too common…that Vista sucks (in this regard)…that it’s ‘buggy’.

Now…Mr. Gates…can you give me back the data I lost, some of which was very, very important? Can I sue you for my loss? How about you two guys…Mr. Hewlett & Mr. Packard?

Vista rots…& now I’m told I cant even go to CompUSA & buy XP Pro for the new machine…that MS has pulled it.

Folks…if you’re running Vista…back up your machine every day…this is my advice.

mark4man

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Mark,
I do NOT see anything here that would suggest that Vista is the bad guy. I see the method in which you did the transfer was what went wrong. I suspect that you selected the wrong folder in which to transfer the files to and did not see where they went.

The use of “Copy and Past” will NOT remove the files, unless one was to use the “Ctrl X” vs. the “Ctrl C” to do the copying.

I have been using Vista since Beta 2 and have done a lot of transfering from and to a external drive and have NOT had this issue.

DaveA I am so far behind, I think I am First
Genealogy....confusing the dead and annoying the living

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Dave…

Please…please do not defend Vista. You do not see an issue relative to Vista as the culprit ??? What about the fact that…out of a clear blue sky…an error message popped up telling me that a critical OS file was missing? What about the fact that…I selected ‘Repair’, but Vista chose to ‘Restore’, completely on it’s own initiative? This didn’t have anything to do w/ file transfer to the new machine…that had already occured & I was just in the process of doing PC business as usual. I already said I was an idiot for cutting & pasting (leaving myself without ample backup)…but that doesn’t excuse Vista.

Just a few minutes ago I tried to fire up Microsoft Streets & Trips (which worked fine on this Vista machine prior to the crash); & was told the registry settings were incorrect & to reinstall from the ‘original location’. I did so…but that error keeps popping up. I have no intention of now doing a complete Windows reinstall to fix everything back to the point where it used to work, especially in light of the problems Vista had in restoring rather than repairing.

Vista is a turkey; & a lot more folks than just me are saying it. If I do a reinstall…it will be w/ XP Pro & not this mess. Thanks.

MF

[also replied to yer other post…just found it]

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How were you doing the disk cleanup? Using some automated tool? Deleting files manually yourself?

I don’t want insult you or to get into a flame war. But there are millions of people using Vista very successfully. I’ve been using it for two years at home and almost a year at work. Never had a file deleted that I didn’t authorize. Never had a BSOD or any other OS problem with missing or corrupted files.

Unfortunately you’ve just run into what most ‘old time’ users of most any operating system have come to expect – if you don’t have a good backup then you should expect a disaster imminently.

Joe

--Joe

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MF,

That’s what was happened on your Vista computer: your user profile was corrupted, and Vista create for you a new profile with the same username. Because of it you think this is the same profile (the same My Documents, My Music, etc folders) but in fact they are different.
The same was happened with your installed programs. For example, you installed Streets & Trips only for you (only for your user profile), but now it’s completely different “you” ! You have to reinstall all programs which was installed for “current user only”: Microsoft Office, Streets & Trips and so on.

But the good thing is that your personal documents are not gone. They are still intact on your computer, but you can’t see them. To find your files:

Open Windows Explorer (for example, by pressing Windows and E keys on your keyboard simultaneously) and navigate to C:Users and look for another user profile(s). Your documents most likely are under C:UsersDocuments

If you don’t see another user profile(s), they are hidden from you. Click Windows Logo (Start) > Control Panel (on the right column). Control Panel window will open. Click “Classic View” on the left pane, then double-click “Folder Options” on the right pane. On Folder Options window, select “Show hidden files and folders” and uncheck “Hide protected operating system files (Recommended)”. Confirm your choice. I would also suggest to uncheck “Hide extensions for known file types”. Click Apply, OK. Close Control Panel. Now you can see all user profiles on your computer.

Good luck!

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Curious Loungers want to know …

Was kaplinb right? Were your files still there after all, just hidden away?

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no.

the data restoration folks told me that Vista overwrote everything I had (personal data-wise)…& that they also looked around on the drive in that machine before pronouncing my data officially gone. There was nothing under ‘all users’, ‘myusername’ or ‘default user’…everything was overwritten by the OS, in what was *commanded* to be a ‘repair’…but which Vista then decided on it’s own to perform a ‘restore’.

I still haven’t killed it though…I was hoping to be able to get all my programs to install before going that route. Microsoft ‘Streets & Trips’ will not load; & Adobe ‘Illustrator’ throws up a message that tells me that the OS cannot install two Adobe apps at the same time (???!@#$%^&*). It says to cancel installing the 2nd app & finish installing the 1st (& there is no 1st).

But the reason I was tooling w/ the idea of keeping Vista is because it came w/ NAV & the subscription service…& all costs involved…& also the pain-in-the-a_ _ associated w/ the install of a new system. I really don’t know what to do at this point, tho…to be honest…I cant use S&T or Illustrator…not sure which direction to go. This afternoon I’m going to try & update Windows Installer (as I’ve already used the Installer Clean-Up utility).

MF

Follow-Up: Well…scratch that…Installer is not relavent to Vista…it’s only for XP (& 2000, etc.)

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goodpeople…

I’m back on line…w/ XP Pro. All programs are now installable/operable.

Thanks for everyone’s help.

mark4man

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