[Dx4win] DX4WIN 7.03 is running on Windows Vista

[Jim Reisert AD1C]

Hi Folks,

Late last week, I received my copy of Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit and I
installed it this weekend.  I purchased the OEM version (for installation on a
new machine) instead of trying to upgrade my existing Windows XP installation. 
I was curious how my existing programs would work with it.  Note that while
Windows XP came on a CD (~ 650 MB), Vista comes on a DVD (~ 4.7 GB).  But I
digress...

I have a homebrew computer with an Intel Core 2 Quad processor (Q6600), 4GB of
RAM, an NVIDIA 8600 GTS video card and a Creative Audigy 4 sound card.  Another
reason for wanting to try Vista was that 32-bit operating systems can't see all
of that 4GB of memory.  Even though they support a 32-bit (4GB) address space,
some of that address space is taken up by hardware.  The motherboard/BIOS has
the capability to remap that 4th GB of memory above the 32-bit address space,
but older operating systems still can't see/use it.

Anyway, the installation of Vista went fine, and I was fortunate that my
wireless networking device, video and sound cards all had downloadable 64-bit
Vista drivers.  I was especially worried about the wireless networking, since
everything else kind of depended on my having a network!  I still have a few
driver issues but no show-stoppers.

As far as software, my main applications like Eudora Mail and Quicken are OK. 
I can no longer install my Microsoft Visual .NET software, it's too old (2002).
 I downloaded a free "express" version of Visual C++ from Microsoft, but I am
having some trouble converting my existing projects (file permission problems
mostly).  Also, my Unix-like Cygwin environment is a little unstable, this is
the environment I use to maintain the country files, etc.

Having said all this, I was able to get DX4WIN 7.03 installed and running.  I
installed the program as a user (myself).  Every time I started the program, I
got a warning about the "vichw11" driver.  So I ran DX4WIN as an Administrator
instead (right-click on the program icon and choose "Run as Administrator") and
it was able to copy that driver into the Vista driver directory.  Now the
program starts without errors (even as a user).

I can manipulate my log and connect to packet (Telnet).  I can't test radios or
other interfaces because I am currently off-the-air.  Also, I don't have any
real COM ports, just a microHAM (USB) interface, which does not have Vista
driver support (yet).

Vista does not seem any slower or faster than Windows XP, even though I'm
running the fancy "Aero" graphics desktop.  Some things are in a different
place, "Add/Remove Programs" is now just "Programs <something>".  User Account
Control (which warns you when installing/running/uninstalling programs) is a
little annoying, but no so much that I need to turn it off.  I'd say the
biggest problems are driver and application support.  Some program icons just
disappear out of the system notification area on the taskbar.  It's not always
obvious whether the program is still running or not.  I hope most of these
issues are resolved in the coming year.  Intel is slowly killing off their
32-bit processors, so software developers will have to move into the 21st
century sooner or later.

I hope this report helps someone.  I'm happy to try to answer
(non-hardware-specific) Vista questions off-reflector.

73 - Jim AD1C


--
Jim Reisert AD1C, <jjreisert at alum.mit.edu>, http://www.ad1c.us