Lawsuit filed against Microsoft's "Vista Capable" certification

[POGE]

Lawsuit filed against Microsoft's Vista Capable certification

A federal lawsuit has been filed against Microsoft, claiming that thier "Vista Capable" stickers are misleading. Many of the computers sporting them will only run Vista on the lowest, most basic settings. The lawsuit has been accepted by US District Judge Marsha Pechman. The issue is whether or not Microsoft tried to sell more "Vista Capable" computers by misleading customers.

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[Duxx]

Well they don't claim it runs very well... they just say it runs, and to which it seem they do run albeit on the most basic settings..

 

[das müffin mann]

it will either be dismissed or settled out of court

 

[ShadowFold]

Wow thats pretty retarded.. Tooken from dictionary.com
4. Computers.
a. (of software) capable of being run on another computer without change.
b. (of hardware) capable of being connected to another device without the use of special equipment or software.

and im pretty sure any computer with a single core Pent4/AMD XP + 512mb of ram and a Dx8 card would be fine.

 

[CrAsHnBuRnXp]

Wow thats pretty retarded.. Tooken from dictionary.com

Taken.

 

[PVTCaboose1337]

I can run vista on my PII with 6800gs, but that does not mean it RUNS. It can run but fails.

 

[strick94u]

A friend of mine got a laptop celeron with 512 megs of ram and it used 256 of that for video
vista ready sticker on it I call bullshit that don't meet the minimum standerds Question is though who is at fualt MS or HP I say Hp they are the ones that did not meet the minium.

 

[TheGuruStud]

Anything less than 1 GB ram cannot run vista in any functional manner. That's like installing XP on a win95 system. It's just plain stupid and pointless.

M$ should be sued.

 

[pentastar111]

Stands to reason that a number of people would.(and should) be angry over the misrepresentation...case in point...There was a Chevrolet dealership in Burbank Ca...and back around 1988 some slick and underhanded salemen, yes plural, decided to sell a number of cars to some very unknowledgeable shlubs...ie, telling them they were buying 6 cylinder cars when in reality these boneheads were sold 4 bangers.:shadedshu The dealership got sued. The people never went after Chevrolet, they went after the dealership. This dealership, which owned two other car lots; ended up settling and losing 2 of the other lots as a result. I realize this comparison is a stretch but I hope you can see my point. SOMEONE is responsible for taking advantage of these PC illiterate people. I'm not sticking up for Micro$oft, but they don't make computers! Whether Micro$oft is involved in this is not really the question... the responsibilty seems to be in the laps of the manufacturers, or the retail stores and SALESMEN!! who convinced these morons to buy those underpowered hunks of crap.

 

[unsmart]

I just got a 400w mATX PSU that was Vista certified[ or capable I don't remember] but I don't think it can run Aero glass

 

[jbunch07]

when they say vista ready or vista certified they mean that it has drivers and it will run but doesn't say anything about not having to upgrade to more mem or something like that

 

[lemonadesoda]

I think the "Vista capable" sticker WAS misleading for MOST PEOPLE... and therefore DID mislead people into buying computers for features that were not available.

Remember, MS spend MILLIONS advertising Vista features. So then everyone has an impression of what Vista is and can do, including all those "candy features" that make it look as good as a Mac. (Note... a lot of non-tech people are attracted to that... you have to admit it). So although, in theory, Vista can "work" on these computers, it only works with most of the "features" not being available or turned off. Sometimes the computers dont even meet the minimum recommended spec now that Vista is released.

Therefore the stickers WERE misleading.

I dont think its right that companies are allowed to mislead the public. (Or lock them into misleading contracts). I think we should resist it as much as we resist any government that misleads the public.


PS. How would you like it if you were sold a SATA2 compatible HDD, only to discover than it will work on a SATA2 interface, but was actually only SATA1 !!!

Or a new graphics card that boasted a PCIe x16 v2.0 interface, but in practice, was only slot compatible, and only gave you PCIe x4 v1.0 electrical connection, and the drivers DID WORK, but not for DX10

Or a TFT with DVI interface, that was actually only a VGA interface with a DVI dongle.

Or a car than could do 100mpg. But that 100mpg was only available while driving downhill.

Or a government that promised free elections, but every ballot box was rigged.

 

[pentastar111]

I think the "Vista capable" sticker WAS misleading for MOST PEOPLE... and therefore DID mislead people into buying computers for features that were not available.

Remember, MS spend MILLIONS advertising Vista features. So then everyone has an impression of what Vista is and can do, including all those "candy features" that make it look as good as a Mac. (Note... a lot of non-tech people are attracted to that... you have to admit it). So although, in theory, Vista can "work" on these computers, it only works with most of the "features" not being available or turned off. Sometimes the computers dont even meet the minimum recommended spec now that Vista is released.

Therefore the stickers WERE misleading.

I dont think its right that companies are allowed to mislead the public. (Or lock them into misleading contracts). I think we should resist it as much as we resist any government that misleads the public.


PS. How would you like it if you were sold a SATA2 compatible HDD, only to discover than it will work on a SATA2 interface, but was actually only SATA1 !!!

Or a new graphics card that boasted a PCIe x16 v2.0 interface, but in practice, was only slot compatible, and only gave you PCIe x4 v1.0 electrical connection, and the drivers DID WORK, but not for DX10

Or a TFT with DVI interface, that was actually only a VGA interface with a DVI dongle.

Or a car than could do 100mpg. But that 100mpg was only available while driving downhill.

Or a government that promised free elections, but every ballot box was rigged.

My pointg exactly...Although I am still finding it hard to understand why it is against MS? While I'm not a MS fanboi, I don't think they did anything wrong. The RETAILERS and MANUFACTURERS knew the requirements for Vista, They are the ones who put together and sold these underpowered mullets.:shadedshu Keep in mind that in this day and age a 256 or 512 stick is damn near obsolete except for older machines or XP rigs. 256 has no business being in a Vista capable rig. And unless there are four sticks, 512's shouldn't be sold in them. On the other side of the coin these consumers should have done at least SOME research before buying. I started a out as one of those consumers...Two years ago I was not as computer savvy as I am now...(And I've only scratched the surface)...I went to best buy to get a PC that could run DOOM3...I was sold a 939 socket 4200X2 Gateway with on board video, under the premis it would be able to play it with no problems...needles to say it wouldn't... Long story short...I went online looked for sites such as this one, found out about video cards and adding ram. In the last 2 years because of this first and frustrating event: I've put together 3 fairely powerful rigs that are still going strong as I'm typing this. (THANKS TechPowerUP!) The "who's at fault" in this situation is a double edged sword. On one side you have companies willing to take advantage of average joes who's idea of a hard drive is going home from work in rush hour traffic and on the other side you have those same "joes" that don't do ANY research and take the salesman's word at face value. Going to be a little interesting to see how this plays out.

 

[lemonadesoda]

No. It's a MS certification programme. You had to BUY the sticker from MS.

Its correct to sue MS. If MS failed to "police" how its distributors were using the sticker... thats MS problem to solve. Then can countersue distributors if necessary.

MS had a "quality" or "service" guanantee sticker than it needed to police and didnt. OR it allowed a policy of misrepresentation, by design. OH DEAR.

 

[Steevo]

Kill those who engage in these petty shitheaded lawsuits and you will rid the gene pool of the toxic waste that is killing humanity.

 

[pentastar111]

Kill those who engage in these petty shitheaded lawsuits and you will rid the gene pool of the toxic waste that is killing humanity.

LOL

 

[panchoman]

i hope that ms loses this lawsuit... it serves em right for trying to shove vista down our throats.

 

[Triprift]

Errr if they were trying to shove Vista do your throats they would of ended xp support ages ago and would of made every new game Vista exclusive.

 

[panchoman]

Errr if they were trying to shove Vista do your throats they would of ended xp support ages ago and would of made every new game Vista exclusive.

they're doing both of em now....

xp is gonna stop sellin gin a lil while and you've already for vista only dx 10.

 

[Triprift]

Yeah i no that but im saying it could of happened alot earlier if ms wanted too.

 

[tiys]

so you'll never use vista? what will u do when there are no longer any updates for xp, no more xp compatible software, or anything? then you'll have to move to vista.

btw, i dont think its right for ms to get sued because those systems can run Vista. they never stated what version they can run, but as long as it has the minimum specs (800mhz cpu, 512mb ram, and i forgot the video) it'll run. it just wont have as many features while running at a slower speed, but it will still run.

 

[Black Panther]

I'd agree, but what is 'vista capable' is like what they say which specs are capable to run a game for example.

If you look at the back of the Oblivion dvd packing, you'll see that the minimum requirements include 512MB RAM, 2Ghz Pentium 4 and a direct3D compatible 128MB video card. It even mentions the Geforce FX series as being supported.

I tried to run that game on a pc with slightly better specs than the above (with 768MB RAM and FX5500 256MB)
Got a phenomenal 3 - 4 fps..........

Sure, they can't say that it doesn't run. It's HOW it runs that makes the difference.

What I can say is that I definitely don't agree with the way software is being marketed.

 

[Triprift]

A slideshows running but seriously yeah thats pretty poor.

 

[tiys]

I used to play BF2 with a FX5500 256mb

 

[TheGuruStud]

Someone produced and handed out all of those stickers and told OEMs to stick them on every machine. I wonder how that would be?

Agreed that the OEMs should have the balls to defy M$ and the decency to not screw customers over, but if someone needs to take a fall for it, it is definitely M$ before others. They made the POS OS and now they can deal with it instead of releasing another craptacular windows next year.