So here's something interesting.

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

Co-worker was setting up a laptop for a user that we had purchased from HP. It came with Vista Business on it and he set about wiping the drive and installing XP, since we have software that can only run on XP (Cisco call manager, etc). He starts the boot process and it takes 3 and a half hours for Vista to finish loading everything and show a desktop. Then he restarts, and the XP install stalls because it can't find the hard drive. Then, as he's trying once more to correct that issue, the os locks up because it can't load the scheduler. Turns out, he had to take the sata drive off of native mode, but regardless of that, why oh why does it take Vista 3 and a half hours to show a desktop on first boot?


xposted to my blog http://docskurlock.blogspot.com/ where there might even be a picture!?! gasp!?

Comments

[gholam.livejournal.com]

It's not Vista, it's the HP "unattended installation" script. Regular Vista install takes 20-30 minutes.

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

Nah, I was watching, it was most definitely Vista, since it was asking Vista related questions. It did also have him set up the recovery partition, amongst other things. HP does have the automated script thing going, but that didn't take that long, maybe 30 minutes.

[freakbarman.livejournal.com]

Actually it was HP script. It's loading all the bloatware and setting up the recovery partition that take so long. It will ask Vista related questions, but in those 30-45 minutes of you just sitting it's loading everything else.

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

It wasn't just 30 minutes, it was 3 and a half hours. It was Vista, because it loaded the desktop background, but was still loading something, and I'm fairly certain it wasn't the HP script.

[brownizs.livejournal.com]

IT IS THE HP Script. Nothing to do with Vista.

[compwizrd.livejournal.com]

sounds about right, i've had to go through that on two laptops/desktops so far.

[xforge.livejournal.com]

Because Vista is a screaming piece of shit that should not ever be installed on any computer anywhere ever.

= )

[asbrand.livejournal.com]

+1000000000000...



-Az

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

I agree a hundred percent...well, right now, I agree about 99.02 percent, mainly because I'm so tired from having just woken up...(if that sounds bad, I am really tired this morning...)

[xforge.livejournal.com]

We were shipped two laptops last week with Vista preinstalled. We... don't support Vista. We may never support Vista, at least not until after Service Pack 3 or so, which I'm sure will cure Vista's problems by harshly castrating about 75-85% of its worthless fluff and nonsense feature set. Be that as it may, we started them up and set about wiping the drives and installing our site-licensed copy of XP Pro. Except we couldn't, because apparently Vista writes something to the boot sector of the hard drive that makes it practically impossible to revert it to XP. Cool, huh?

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

That's interesting. We don't plan on supporting Vista anytime soon, but we're gonna roll out a test pc with Vista and see what we can figure out.

[freakbarman.livejournal.com]

why don't you use a 3rd party imaging software and wipe the drive that way. Then you don't have to mess with vista at all.

[brownizs.livejournal.com]

Vista does not write anything to the Boot Sector to make it impractical to revert to XP. I do not know where you got this piece of info. As for Vista not being supported, after SP1 next year, you will start to see companies adopting it, same with XP after it went SP1.

[moopet.livejournal.com]

The SATA native mode issue is present on about half HP's laptops. Some you have to turn on... weirdly. Some (most) you have to turn off.
And if you want to feel better about your wait, try firing up an Acer. Their recovery disks take about an hour, and then the system runs an unattended script for a further hour and a half which fucks up if you accidentally walk within three feet of the computer. It's evil, I tell you.
The number of our customers who say, "I just bought this and office, can't you just install it for me because I don't know how?" withers me.

[pyrtolin.livejournal.com]

I nominate the Thinkpad x41 tablet as the most painful factory-rebuild that I've ever had to deal with. About 3 hours just to get the system back to a useable state.

[phyrewall.livejournal.com]

I just spent an incredibly long time staring at your avatar... I ignored two $user help requests because of it even... LOL

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

Why was that? I know it's entertaining and informative and educational, but why so long?

[phyrewall.livejournal.com]

1) It's really tiny text at 1920x1200.
2) I'm not wearing my glasses like I should be.
3) $Users suck

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

Ah, that makes sense. Are your $Users military? If so, I'm sorry, those are pretty much the worst you can think of. I know, I spent four years in the Marine Corps and had a sergeant open the iloveyou virus after being told explicitly not to.

[jsbillings]

Co-worker was setting up a laptop for a user that we had purchased from HP.

That'll teach you to purchase users from HP.

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

I was tired when I was writing it. I know that my grammar wasn't the greatest and in fact, I'll most likely edit it later so that it's a little clearer.

[jsbillings]

I wasn't trying to mock you, I just love misplaced modifiers.

Anyway, I screwed up. I meant to say, "That'll teach you to not buy users from HP. Mornings suck.

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

Oh, believe me, normally I'm very pedantic and try to speak at least grammatically correct as much as possible. The last couple of hours and last night, I was exhausted and was unable to correctly formulate a proper sentence. Now, how about them users from HP?

[xforge.livejournal.com]

Snerk.

[docskurlock.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I thought that was amusing.