Customer Reviews

Windows Vista Secrets: SP1 Edition

5 star:		(34)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Somewhere inside these 645 pages is a terrific computer book desperate to get out.

Unfortunately, the useful tidbits are buried by the jargon, disjointed outline, and the wince-inducing writing. The authors say "functionality" instead of feature, "enabled" instead of On, and (I kid you not) "circular in nature" instead of "round."

But it's even worse that huge chunks of Windows Vista get no coverage at all! Here are a few topics that don't appear in the book, or at least the index: Scanning. Faxing. Flash drives. Monitors. Dial-up connections. Safe Mode. Hibernation. Filename extensions. Network projectors. ReadyBoost. Dynamic disks. Shadow Copy. Burning CDs or DVDs at the desktop. Problem reports. Driver rollback. Driver signing. Ease of Access Center.

And there's no information at all about Vista's amazing new speech recognition--only a passing reference in the Tablet PC chapter, even though it works on any Vista PC.

So if you get this book, you'll also need ANOTHER book if you want comprehensive coverage of Vista.

Meanwhile, huge swaths of the book are padded by pointless tables and listings. Do we really need *26 pages* of symbol-font printouts?

Or a half-page table that explains the difference between Small Icons, Medium Icons, Large Icons, and Extra Large Icons? (The table says that "Medium Icons are similar in style to Large Icons, but smaller." Wow, really!?)

There are lots of illustrations, but most are full-screen shots, shrunken down to to fit the page. The result is that you can't read any of the text in them.

The authors of this book clearly know a lot. But they should have been paired up with writers, editors, and indexers who could help them set that information free.

I really had high hopes for this book as I read Paul Thurrott's articles and am on some of his email lists.

My conclusion about this book is that it is more the missing user manual than a real techie book with good insider's technical knowledge. The last time Microsoft included a concise user manual with windows was with Windows 3.11. This book perfectly fills that void. If you are a home user or are trying to enhace your BASIC knowledge of vista, this is a good book.

If you are a technical professional in the field, this book is not going to give you any epiphanies. I also didn't like that there seemed to be a healthy dose of filler in the book as well. There are pages upon pages about fonts including many more pages of font character sets. I would guess that less than 1% of the people that buy the book will have any interesting reading that many pages about fonts nor will many people use the font character sets that the authors printed over many pages.

I'm Sorry to say that I'm pretty let down by this book. Especially considering that about 90% of the "Secrets" in this book are not secrets but are fairly common knowledge to advanced home and technical users.

Please gentlemen, you both have the technical skills and contacts to make a much better book than this. Instead it seems you've made a book that was stuffed with filler and basic info so that you could be one of the first to market after the release of vista.

I bought this book before I upgraded to Vista. I am glad I have it. The book covers everything from which version to buy to upgrading- including some insights about the gotchas found in every microsoft product. The book is well organized. There are plenty of screenshots which are useful because Microsoft has completed changed the look and feel of the Windows Operating system. Everything is different, and this book is useful for finding all the right buttons, and getting up to speed on the operating system without too much developer speak or needless rambling.

I find myself turning to this book to figure out how to do a certain task- burn a DVD,CD, transfer files, make a movie, download music, etc....

I especially liked the tips throughout the book as it's often the subtle insights that lead to wasting less time wondering how to do something!

If you are planning to upgrade or have acquired a machine with Windows Vista, this book is a must have.

This is everything but a tech book, most of what is inside can be discovered by anyone who's a literate computer user. It's full of screen capture of Vista usage, but if you're new to computer and need a step by step guide to understand what you can do in Vista, this can be a solution ... If you're literate or an ITpro, forget it.

I bought this book because of Brian Livingston. I read his weekly ezine called Windows Secrets and have learned a lot from him and his cohorts over the years. After installing Windows' Vista I wanted to do so much more with it so I bought the book. After reading the entire thing, not one of my questions was answered. If you are looking for a book that just gives the highlights of Vista, buy the book. If your looking for a book that reveals the secrets of the techy side of things, keep looking.

If you are skilled with computers this book is not for you. I was very disappointed. No "secrets" here. Just common everyday stuff I already knew. Previous Windows Secrets books were MUCH better.

A lot of the information is as relevant to XP or OS X as it is relevant to Vista. Mundane topics such as enjoying digital photos, ripping CDs, composing and sending email, managing your calendar... There are seventy-three pages covering fonts and character sets. Only six pages of narrative are dedicated to PowerShell. Yet fonts are not new to Vista and PowerShell is.

I was introduced to this book while listening to the Windows Weekly (TWiT) podcast with hosts Leo LaPorte and Paul Thurrott. Both Paul and Leo talk reference this book on occasion in the podcast. So I decided to purchase it and give it a read. This book is fantastic. Even though it is a book on Windows, it is very good to read. This book isn't necessarily designed for the absolute beginner. It is for the user that wishes to get a little closer and under the hood of Windows Vista. I do recommend this book those of you who wish to understand Vista more. I have learned a lot about Vista I didn't already know. There is a wealth of knowledge in this book. In fact, it has inspired me to purchase an additional book and seek a Vista certification.

This book is a decent overview that seems to be aimed at the home user preoccupied with using media; music, photos and video.

As pointed out in another review, many components of Vista are not covered and the many pages of font minutia seem like padding. Not for the seriously technical types.

It was amusing to find that their secret for IE7 was that Firefox is still a better browser!

This is a nicely written book which covers Vista very well. It is the perfect book for the experienced user to find out what is new in Vista. It's not for the complete beginner, and not for those who want lots of registry tricks. I recommend this book highly.