UK Greens Declare Vista Bad For Environment

schwaang writes "The UK Green Party says that Vista's DRM requirements will force many unnecessary hardware upgrades. Quoting: 'There will be thousands of tonnes of dumped monitors, video cards, and whole computers that are perfectly capable of running Vista — except for the fact they lack the paranoid lock down mechanisms Vista forces you to use. That's an offensive cost to the environment. Future archaeologists will be able to identify a "Vista Upgrade Layer" when they go through our landfill sites.'"

Linux is bad for it too

[suso (153703)]

Linux users probably use more CD-Rs because versions of Linux have come out more frequently than versions of Windows. Think of how many Linux CD-Rs you've written since Windows XP came out years ago. Probably enough to make plastic to make a monitor casing?

Re:Linux is bad for it too

[ap0 (587424)]

Plus, since many people keep around old computers and throw Linux on them instead of properly disposing of them, they are sucking up power unnecessarily.

Re:

[somegeekynick (1011759)]

sudo apt-get dist-upgrade :P Btw, why use CD-R's when you have CD-RW's. P.S. I haven't gone through all the comments, and I don't care if the two lines above are redundant. ;)

Re:

[Directrix1 (157787)]

BTW, I ran the Vista RC on a P4 1.9GHz, 512 MB RAM, and integrated Intel video. No speed problems at all (just no Aero). It ran about the same as 2000 did before it.

Re:

[slashbob22 (918040)]

No speed problems at all (just no Aero). It ran about the same as 2000 did before it.

Where have I heard this before... Wait, Windows ME, is that you?

Re:Linux is bad for it too

[jimstapleton (999106)]

4 RWs, cycling. 2 For FreeBSD (x86, x86-64), and 2 for Linux (whicheverdistro someone has convinced me to try out recently).

They don't go in the trash.

Re:Linux is bad for it too

[cortana (588495)]

I've burned more copies of Windows to slipstream in hot fixes, service packs and new device drivers, all because MS are too retarded to make Windows try to load drivers off anything other than a goddamn floppy disk. :)

Re:Linux is bad for it too

[Lodragandraoidh (639696)]

I've 'rescued' many computers from the dump - all of them put together from mix and match parts, and a brain transplant (Linux). I've got all the Pentium II or better machines I've owned, and even rescued a 486 laptop and shoehorned Slackware 10 onto it - and grafted a curses based window system (twin) onto it for added usability.

So I plan to hit the used computer store and garage sale market hard now that Vista has come out. I'll be able to finally put together that 100 node Beowulf cluster I've always been wanting...cheap!

Re:Linux is bad for it too

[the plant doctor (842044)]

For Ubuntu try this:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/install.exe [ubuntu.com]

For Debian, the sister project of Ubuntu's project:
http://goodbye-microsoft.com/index.html [goodbye-microsoft.com]

*disclaimer, I've not tried either one. Just thought they might be of use to you in this situation.

Strange...

[tgd (2822)]

I didn't have to upgrade a damn thing... on a two year old Celeron system.

Maybe MSDN Vista is missing the "upgrade all your crap" bit being set.

Re:Strange...

[Corporate Troll (537873)]

Two year old isn't really old, is it? My main desktop is from beginning 2003 and it's still a nice machine.

I found a perfectly functional P-IV 1.9GHz/512Meg RAM/40Gig HD/Dual-headed-matrox in the dumpster at the recycling centre. Booted it up, and a spyware infested Win2000 popped up in my face. That was fixed with a Linux install. How old is the machine I just described? It's perfectly capable of running WinXP. Vista, probably not all that much....

People throw away the nicest machines if for them it "behaves broken" or "because a newer version is out".

Those greenies may have a point, but I foresee golden times for dumpster divers....

Re:

[tgd (2822)]

Thats actually how I got the machine in question. A company was getting rid of it because it "didn't work" -- it was spyware infested. Its actually, I believe, a 1.8ghz Celeron or something like that. The drive is bigger, 60gb perhaps, and its got on-board video and sound. Nothing special. I bet the machine didn't cost $500 two years ago.

Vista runs fine on it. The "experience" score was a bit low, but everything worked fine.

People who want the latest and greatest whiz-bang crap may need to upgrade, but thos

Re:Strange...

[paganizer (566360)]

This will probably be flamebaited, but...
"vista is 5 years more advanced than XP", huh? what, exactly, are the features of Vista that make it a "upgrade" from WinXP, or better yet, Win2k?
Is there ANY feature of Vista that will improve my ability to do ANYTHING AT ALL I currently do on my Win2k machine?
NOTE: Due to Microsoft failing to release the software after developing it (except to a $6000 version of Win2k Server), my Win2k machine does not fully make use of a 64-bit CPU, or a "hyperthreading" intel CPU. I'm aware of this, and don't consider it a problem as there are no 64-bit apps or games that look interesting; and my dual AMD CPU motherboard unclogs it's nose at hyperthreading, it's a silly concept. The only thing that makes me even consider changing operating systems is the 64-bit thing; eventually, software developers are going to start using it... I just hope Debian & WINE will be up to the task by then.

So, I repeat, to the parent & everyone else who even begins to consider "upgrading" to Vista: Is there ANY feature of Vista that will improve my ability to do ANYTHING AT ALL I currently do on my DRM-free Win2k machine?

Re:

[paganizer (566360)]

Remote Desktop is made available by installing netmeeting on a win2k machine. if you would rather use it than VNC, that is.
Fast User switching is a good feature? huh. my kids like it, but I can't figue out why; the only XP machine in the house is my uberfast new laptop, and it takes essentially the same amount of time to log out then log back in as it does to do the switching thing.
and yeah, I capitilize too much when i'm feeling particularly fed up with something. sorry about that.

Re:

[CastrTroy (595695)]

Up until about 8 months ago, I was running a PII 266 I got back in 1998. It fulfilled all my needs. But eventually all the RAM chips started dieing, and it would have cost almost as much for new RAM as it did to buy a new computer, so I bought a new computer, which cost more than the RAM did, but I wanted another computer that would last me 8 years. It's actually cheaper to buy a new PC than to buy even just Vista, so I think a lot of people will take this option.

Re:Strange...

[dbIII (701233)]

With ReadyBoost you should be able to haul the performance up significantly with a large memory stick.

Read the technical description of it on the MS site to cut through the hype - it is a horrible idea and won't help.

Vista Experience on older systems?

[Midnight Thunder (17205)]

We all know what Vista is stated to require, but I would really be interested to find out what the minimum anyone has been able to run Vista on, while still have a satisfactory experience. For example has anyone managed to get it running on P3 with 512MB RAM.

they forgot to mention

[by Anonymous Coward]

that running a desktop in hardware accelerated 3d mode all the time also means more power consumption...

Am I missing something?

[Erwos (553607)]

I'm kind of confused. You see, the laptop I bought a couple years ago, which apparently has no support for HDCP or any of those other copy-protection measures, actually runs Vista _just fine_. In fact, my desktop, which is a relatively old AthlonXP 2500+ machine, ALSO doesn't need to be upgraded, beyond maybe getting a little more memory.

Look, DRM sucks. But DRM is no excuse to just start making up FUD. Vista is a hog, but blaming it all on DRM seems pretty inaccurate. Saying that everyone is going to start filling landfills just because their video card doesn't support HDCP seems like it's crossing over into "deliberately lying".

Re:Am I missing something?

[a_nonamiss (743253)]

The whole DRM thing concerns high definition media. Have you tried playing Blu-Ray on said laptop? HD-DVD? If you did, I think you'd find that you can't play it in high definition. It will downgrade the signal if you try to play it on your 2-year old Celeron, and will not play in full 1080p glory. That's what all the bruhaha is about. It's not a big deal to some people (like myself, who has a 50-inch HDTV and could care less about playing it on his PC) but to others this functionality is important. The bottom line is we aren't getting what we paid for.

Re:Am I missing something?

[kjart (941720)]

Have you tried playing Blu-Ray on said laptop? HD-DVD? If you did, I think you'd find that you can't play it in high definition. It will downgrade the signal if you try to play it on your 2-year old Celeron, and will not play in full 1080p glory.

I doubt that a two year old laptop will have a Blu-Ray drive, so no, I don't think it would be able to play one. People will have to upgrade to enjoy such things, but this has nothing to do with Vista.

The bottom line is we aren't getting what we paid for.

Yes, I would tend to agree, but I don't think this has anything to do with the features in Vista or any other OS for that matter. It is the content producers choice to use DRM on their content and they are rightfully to blame for it.

Re:Am I missing something?

[BFaucet (635036)]

You should only have to upgrade your optical drive to view HD content. If you're running Vista, however, your older monitor that is missing the HDCP (that has absolutely NOTHING to do with quality) will have to be replaced despite it's full ability to display HD content. THAT is the concern. Not that you'll have to upgrade the whole laptop.

A lot of folks like being able to upgrade only what's needed on their system. Vista is just making it so you'll need to upgrade stuff for the sake of getting their DRM shit working. Even if your system is already capable of doing all the whiz-bang stuff.

Fuck it. I've been using Win2k/Ubuntu and have yet to have a reason to install XP. I doubt I'll feel the need to move to Vista. I'll just drop Win2k when things stop supporting it. Why should I drop $200 for something that'll require me to drop another $1000 for no new functionality?

Re:Am I missing something?

[RzUpAnmsCwrds (262647)]

You should only have to upgrade your optical drive to view HD content.

Wrong. Decoding H.264 at HD-DVD or Blu-Ray bitrates requires some serious horsepower. My 2.2GHz Athlon 64, for example, just can't hack it. You either need hardware acceleration (high end GPU) or a fast CPU (probably dual-core).

Try downloading a 1080p trailer from Apple sometime. Notice how, even with the fastest software decoder (CoreAVC, although libavcodec comes close), your formerly fast CPU can barely manage to keep up. Now consider that Blu-Ray/HD-DVD have considerably higher bitrates.

If you're running Vista, however, your older monitor that is missing the HDCP (that has absolutely NOTHING to do with quality) will have to be replaced despite it's full ability to display HD content.

IF said content uses the image constraint token, then yes, you will need HDCP, or your content will be downscaled to 960x540 (the same resolution as many "HD" XVID HDTV rips, mind you). It works the same way on a standalone HD-DVD or Blu-Ray player. Apple's implementation will doubtless work the same way as well, because it's mandated by the HD-DVD and Blu-Ray licensing groups.

Re:

[westlake (615356)]

If you're running Vista, however, your older monitor that is missing the HDCP (that has absolutely NOTHING to do with quality) will have to be replaced despite it's full ability to display HD content. THAT is the concern.

Your monitor is an aging 17 to 19 inch 4:3 display. Your monitor is a power hungry fifty pound glass bottle. Which will in not so very distant future be making the trip to the dumpster anyway.

Tell me that there is anything which will hold you back when the big screen HDCP monitor become

Re:Am I missing something?

[mysticgoat (582871)]

It is the content producers choice to use DRM on their content and they are rightfully to blame for it.

I won't argue with blaming the content producers for DRM. But they aren't the ones who are paying for it. The people who buy Vista are paying for it— through the additional monetary costs of the hardware needed solely for the Premium Content pipes, and through the obligatory CPU overhead of running the processes that assure the OS that you haven't sneaked any non-DRM hardware onto the machine in the last few milliseconds.

The people who buy Vista are paying for all this even if the box will never be used for Premium Content. Even if the only thing they will ever do is run spreadsheets, word processing, Blender, and Tetris— they will stay pay to protect DRM Content Providers from the possibility that a copyright might be infringed on in their box.

Vista is a great way to spend a lot more money on a new box that will give you marginally better performance on the job than your old WinXP box. If you think that the appropriate design goal of an OS is to provide the user with the most cost effective means of utilizing cost effective hardware to get his computing tasks done, then Vista is "defective by design".

Re:

[mobby_6kl (668092)]

>Have you tried playing Blu-Ray on said laptop? HD-DVD? If you did, I think you'd find that you can't play it in high definition.

Have you? I think you'd find that the current HD-DVD movies don't have the flag that turns on the degradation requirement. But still, the 2-year old Celeron won't play movies in their full 1080p glory, because my 3 year old P4 can't properly play even 720p video without choking.

Re:Am I missing something?

[massysett (910130)]

Have you tried playing Blu-Ray on said laptop? HD-DVD? If you did, I think you'd find that you can't play it in high definition.

Have you tried it? The non-HDCP signal degradation is optional, at the disc maker's option. My understanding is that most discs being shipped now do *not* have this degradation option enabled, because the studios know that most equipment out there right now does not have HDCP. A link from the article below claims that Hollywood promises not to enable the degradation until 2012 (take that promise for what it's worth.) So if your ancient laptop actually had a Blu-ray, it would probably play fine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image_Constraint_Toke n [wikipedia.org]

I'm no DRM or Vista fan, but a lot of people on both sides of this debate are spreading misinformation.

Re:

[Goaway (82658)]

Vista isn't stopping you

Incorrect. It is stopping you.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_Video_Path [wikipedia.org]

Re:

[heroofhyr (777687)]

You didn't mention whether or not you've tried running any high-definition video playback on the machine. Nobody said Vista itself won't run on a computer/laptop that lacks DRM support in the display, just that HD video playback will be impossible. The quality will be automatically downgraded to quasi-DVD quality even if your non-HDCP monitor supports HD-DVD. In other words, you can probably play HD-DVDs on your laptop, but I'll bet the video looks exactly like a regular DVD.

stupid

[otacon (445694)]

Future archaeologists will be able to identify a "Vista Upgrade Layer" when they go through our landfill sites

No we won't...the same reason we don't have a mainframe layer or black and white TV layer and the same reason we don't have a sword layer...people aren't going to buy new stuff to run software that does the same stuff...if you are going to buy a new computer and it comes with vista great, but people are really overestimating the market demand as far as the average PC user and even most 'advanced' (I use that term loosly) users.

oh please

[YrWrstNtmr (564987)]

Future archaeologists will be able to identify a "Vista Upgrade Layer" when they go through our landfill sites

Number of people wo will buy Vista retail - tiny
Number of people who will upgrade an old PC just to run Vista that they just bought - tinier
Number of people upgrading who will toss out perfectly good vid cards/monitors rather than building a secondary PC - all 3 of you.

Re:

[KiloByte (825081)]

No, ordinary folks toss out the whole perfectly good computer.
Already a lot of them prefer purchasing a new machine instead of paying a sizable part of the price to have it "repaired" by removing spyware.

Vista defaults to Standby, not Power off!

[xaxa (988988)]

The "Shutdown" icon in Vista no longer shuts down the computer -- it just puts it into standby! To shutdown properly you have to select the option from a tiny menu. This is going to waste a lot of energy, since people won't realise the difference.

You can change it

[by Anonymous Coward]

I managed to change it back to shutdown by going through the advanced options in Power Options in the control panel. I'm not in front of my Vista machine right now so I can't give you the details, but you should be able to find it.

Wow

[Headcase88 (828620)]

Windows Vista -- Our OS boots up so slowly that shutting down the computer is an advanced option.

CompSci students - heads up!

[Rufty (37223)]

Free linux workstations coming soon to a dumpster near you!!!

(Worked for my Masters, could work for you, too...)

GUI landfills?

[ciaohound (118419)]

Why would a landfill upgrade to Vista? Are they currently on XP? Are they even x86 architecture? I could see putting Java on them, for the garbage collection.

Kittens

[MyNameIsEarl (917015)]

As if being bad foor the environment wasn't bad enough, everytime someone upgrades to Vista God kills a kitten.

FUD

[cybrthng (22291)]

Vista isn't negating all that hardware, the Movie Studios are. You have the same problem of not being able to run protected content no matter WHICH platform you choose. If Linux ever gets High Def DVD or if MAC's ever get Hi-Def DVD you bet they too will be DRM'd

What a load of rubbish.

[Toby_Tyke (797359)]

They might have a point if millions of people were going to rush out and buy Vista. But thats not going to happen, so the Green Party is, sadly, talking rubbish.

Far and away the vast majority of PC users will be sticking with their current XP install until they buy a new PC, which will come pre-loaded with Vista. And even then, people don't tend to throw away their old PCs if they still work. They tend to keep it around as a second machine, or pass it on to a relative (instant recycling).

I hate DRM as much as the next Slashbot, but come on. Thousand of people dumping perfectly good hardware so they can watch HD-DVD movies? I don't think so.

Faster PC's may be good for environment?

[Knutsi (959723)]

It seems to me that faster PCs in the past have brought them more and better functionality, making them replace other, potentially more enviromentally unfriendly technology. Not sure how the math on this works out tho'.

EU gets Vista-N, no media player = no DRM

[Marbleless (640965)]

Since good Europeans would be buying the -N editions without media player, they can't play DRM content anyway!

So why would they need to upgrade their monitor? ;)

Get Serious

[Luscious868 (679143)]

I hate sensationalist crap like this. Vista won't require a hardware upgrade for relatively new systems unless you want to experience all of it's bells and whistles. IMHO that's beside the point completely since most consumers will stick with the operating system they have until they buy a new PC that will be preloaded with Vista anyway. I know I'm in no rush to upgrade our systems where I work (and I'll never do it at home since I ditched my PC a year ago in favor of a Mac). I won't even bother taking a look at Vista until it's been on the market for two years. Let others deal with the inevitable bugs, security issues, driver problems and software compatibility issues. I'll stick with XP as long as possible. I just don't see very compelling businesses reasons to justify an upgrade to Vista. I see a lot more reasons for consumers to make the leap but as I mentioned above they'll do so whether they need to or not when they buy their next PC.

The Real Environmental Issue

[giafly (926567)]

The real environmental issue is, from the article:

Vista requires more expensive and energy-hungry hardware, passing the cost on to consumers and the environment

I don't think anyone could seriously argue with that. But assuming most people don't upgrade until they would have bought a PC anyway, the following claim is exaggerated:

There will be thousands of tonnes of dumped monitors, video cards and whole computers that are perfectly capable of running Vista - except for the fact they lack the paranoid lock down mechanisms Vista forces you to use.

Computer-related activites already spoil the envir

[Electric Eye (5518)]

While their claims MAY be a bit exaggerated, you have to look back and see how destructive widespread computer use has really been. Remember 10 years ago or so everyone was saying more computers would = paperless society? Quite the opposite has happened, actually. The use of paper has skyrocketed to new proportions since 1995. Billions of tons of computer scrap has already been dumped, but mostly in China because they'll take anything we send over there. There have been plenty of articles about the mercury-laden landfills and communities there, with people scavenging around looking for valuable metals, etc. while the environment is ravaged by all the contaminants present in older computers that have been dumped.

I still don't see why the world is going to rush out and buy Vista. I wouldn't recommend to ANY of my customers to even consider upgrading for a minimum of six months because there is going to be quite the bug-fest with Vista 1.0. Besides, what's the real upside over XP? Security? Ha!

Re:

[BeardsmoreA (951706)]

Because of the foulness of HDCP and friends

Re:How many dgrees

[by Anonymous Coward]

Vista's DRM will support High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) which will regulate what types of periferals (monitors, sound cards, video cards, etc.) that can show, play, encode, decode, etc. the content. For example, you may not be able to watch a movie (or only be able to watch it at lower definition) unless your video card monitor and sound card are all approved by Mircosoft. HDCP will only be supported by new components hence the need to upgrade. Monitors are paricularly harmful to the environment because they contain quite a bit of lead. http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/question678.h tm [howstuffworks.com]

Re:How many dgrees

[Waffle Iron (339739)]

Monitors are paricularly harmful to the environment because they contain quite a bit of lead.

I've never quite understood all of the concern about monitors and lead. Almost all of that lead is vitrified in the glass, just the same way that leaded crystal drinking glasses are chock full of lead. If the lead is immobilized enough to drink out of, it wouldn't seem that monitor glass would pose a major threat.

Moreover, monitors would generally end up in a landfill with some kind of containment system. People fret about the 5 pounds of lead frozen in glass and buried in a landfill, yet anybody can go down to Wal-Mart, plop down a couple of bucks for a pound of lead airgun pellets, and indiscriminately scatter them around the environment. Why no comparable outcry about that?

Re:

[vertinox (846076)]

Almost all of that lead is vitrified in the glass, just the same way that leaded crystal drinking glasses are chock full of lead. If the lead is immobilized enough to drink out of, it wouldn't seem that monitor glass would pose a major threat.

If the monitors were crushed in the trash compacting process the glass may become shatter and/or more powder like. Most land fill companies don't really sort monitors or at least the curbside trash pickup guys mostly don't. There might be a group down the line that att

Re:

[teh_chrizzle (963897)]

nah, stallman is god the father, torvolds is god the son, and the GPL is god the holy spirit.