VISTA Brief

What you see first

The new Start Menu Note the search dialog at the bottom left Note at the bottom right how to enter sleep mode, lock the computer, restart, switch users, etc You can edit what is shown in the Menu Right-click on the taskbar and select properties Select Start Menu and click on Customize

Customizing the desktop Right-click and select view select icon size De-select align to grid Right-click and select Personalize Windows Color and Appearance Select windows colors At the bottom: Open classic appearance … let you choose the desktop interface – AERO, Classic, etc.

Windows sidebar Area at the right of desktop for applets

What else is different? Administrator account is disabled (fix?) Power Users are mostly gone Boot.ini replaced by BCD – boot configuration data stored in \Boot directory edited using bcdedit.exe. boot configuration data \Documents and Settings replaced by \Users User Account Control (UAC) prompts for admin password (just like in Linux) even if logged as admin Run not in Start Menu – add or user the search area Command prompt to run admin applications now require to be started as Run as administrator IPv6 is installed together with IP v4. No problems in small networks but conflicts with Active Directory. Longhorn should fix System Restore now restores (undelete) files not only programs like XP does. Neat stuff: Flip (Alt-tab) and Flip 3 D (Windows-tab)

Network settings - ipconfig

Network settings - graphical

System Restore - Versions

Security policies refined

Many more details …