Findings
As part of the Vista testing effort, the Vista Task Force is testing and evaluating the compatibility of Vista with current applications and ITS services.
To better communicate our findings across all IT at Penn State, the ITS Vista Committee has created a Vista wiki for Penn State professionals to share their application testing. Your shared test results will help us make a more thorough recommendation.
Below is a list of ITS applications that we tested thus far.
| Application Name | Comments |
|---|---|
| 802.1x Wireless Access Points | Not compatible with Vista |
| Adobe Connect formerly Breeze | Works (may switch to Windows Basic mode when screen sharing) |
| Cisco VPN | Does not work |
| Creative Suite 2 | Works |
| Financial Information Tool (FIT) | The current version of FIT is not supported with VISTA. The Operating System compliant object engine is not available from the vendor (2-9-07) |
| JMP v6.x and earlier | Not currently certified for Vista |
| Microsoft Office 2003 | Works |
| Microsoft 2007 Office (beta) | Works, but can not read ODF (Open Office) documents. Claims the XML is corrupt. *Please see note below |
| Mozilla Firefox 2.0 | Works |
| Mozilla Thunderbird | Works |
| Open Office | Works |
| Oracle Calendar | Works |
| PACITS Version 9 | Multiple installers do not work |
| Real Player 10 | Works |
| SAS 9.1.3 and earlier | See Tech Support Notes |
| Secure W2 | Installs but doesn't work |
| Sigmaplot for Windows 10 and earlier | Not currently certified for Vista |
| SPSS for Windows V.15 and earlier | Not currently certified for Vista |
| Studio 8 | Works |
| Symantec Antivirus | Installs and runs but auto detect fails |
| WSFTP | Works |
| VMWare Player | Does not install properly |
Apple lists compatibility of their software with various version of Windows at this site.
The University of Wsconsin has extensive information about applications and whether they work on Vista at this site.
Microsoft has put significant effort towards their Application Compatibility for Windows Vista and has certification programs for both Hardware and Software .
*Note: ODF is OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications that is an open format for saving and exchanging office documents such as memos, reports, books, spreadsheets, databases , charts, and presentations. Please review the article on on Wikipedia, OpenDocument.
Recommendations
Fairwell Windows XP? Not Necessarily.
Based on ITS Vista Task Force initial testing, it is our recommendation that campuses, colleges and departments stay with their current XP machines if they are not Vista compatible; however, if you plan to purchase new hardware after January, 2007, we recommend you review our findings above or plan to do your own testing to determine if your internal applications work with Vista.
Because Windows Vista Ultimate requires a unique license key for activation, it should only be purchased if the features required are not available in the Vista Enterprise or Business editions. The unique features in Ultimate include the Ultimate Extras and Media Center capabilities.
Windows Vista Enterprise is ideal for power users, laptops, and where multi-language support is required. Additional features in Vista Enterprise include:
-
BitLocker T Drive Encryption allows the system drive to be encrypted with AES-128 or AES-256 encryption. If a laptop was ever lost the contents would be encrypted and provides a reasonable level protection to the machines documents and sensitive data.
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Power users that can take advantage of the subsystem for Unix Applications and 4 Virtual OS Licenses
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Any user needing multi-language support
Windows Vista Business is ideal for any standard business users that do not need the features of Windows Vista Enterprise.
