Windows Vista may be the next big thing, but it still contains enough quirks and unaccountable behaviors to vex anyone. This unique guide not only discusses the most irritating features of the latest Microsoft operating system and how to get around them, but also explains how to improve Windows and do more with the software than Microsoft intended. You'll find information on setup, installation, upgrade from other Windows versions, the revamped interface, new security features, user accounts, troubleshooting, and the markedly improved Internet Explorer 7. Other chapters cover a wide range of key topics:

• Media Center - tips on photos, videos, music, TV tuners, HD, and the media center engine

• The Registry - explains the background and tools for working with Windows' database of settings

• Tinkering Techniques - offers hacking-style customization and problem-solving topics

• Networking and Wireless - includes LAN setup, WiFi sniffers and access points, connection sharing, firewalls, routers, and FTP

• Scripting and Automation - introduces simple programming using the Windows Scripting Host for automating repetitive tasks

No other book takes our patented cranky, solutions-oriented approach. Our collection of tips, tools and techniques will improve your experience with Windows Vista, so you can control the OS -- rather than the other way around.

Amazon.com® Reader Reviews (Ranked by Helpfulness)

Average Amazon.com® Rating:  Based on 15 Ratings

Think you're annoyed with vista? Wait till you read this.! - 2009-02-12
Reviewer Rating:
I got this because it was one of the newest Vista books at the time and it's nowhere near as good as any of the previous Vista books I bought. The author doesn't even bother to cover any of Vista's multimedia features in any real depth. Like the rest of the book, he chapter on multimedia, Chapter 4, is a mishmash of half talk and psuedo tips that don't actually help anything. If you think Vista's annoying, this book with it half hearted attempt at humor and irreverance is ten times as annoying.

If you already have a Vista book this book won't add anything. If you are already familiar with Vista this book won't add anything. If you've never seen a computer before this book might help you --- if you can dig through pages of nonesensical sideways talk to find anything of import.

Worst of all, it's proceed at your own risk if you dare attempt anything this guy promises is going to improve anything. Examples? Plenty. Pages 71 to 73 on deleting In-Use files. Hello, log off. Pages 73 to 75 in disabling Zip. Hello, why in the world would you want to? Any zip program you install will likely extend, tweak or modify the basic zip anyway. 70 pages on the registry with mostly useless tidbits but 2 pages on optimizing your computer to make it boot faster ?! DOES THAT MAKE ANY SENSE?!

The entire chapter on performance tips could be summed up as: Turn off all Vista features. Oh yeah, and get Vista to shutdown quickly by hacking the registry to override features meant to protect you from being a dumb *ss in the first place. Pausing to make sure you want to really want to kill Word when you have a document you haven't saved is a good thing, not pausing and dumping everything is bad. Not to mention it could make your computer unstable.

Windows Vista Annoyance- Superb book! - 2008-09-26
Reviewer Rating:
This book like all the O'reilly books brings you nothing but quality material as you need it. David Karp covered almost every problem you might encounter using Windows Vista, and of course the Solutions to these problems. This is a large book and it's not like the many other tech books that you read and get bored along the way, no it isn't, David has done a great job of entertaining and yet getting to the point.

This is a must have book for anyone using windows Vista. I highly recommend it.Windows Vista Annoyances: Tips, Secrets, and Hacks

Yes useful, but... - 2009-10-01
Reviewer Rating:
I treat this book as one might treat an encyclopedia - there are topics you can pick and use, and others too esoteric to get into. Author Karp provides an arsenal. Depending on how you approach the task, you might feel that you can get a handle on Vista. But time after time the "annoyances" theme kept coming back. And from that to "aggravation" and on to "aspirin." And then as I was using up the words beginning in "A" to describe Vista, I finally got to Anger. I never made it to Defective and Detestable.

Yes, I made some progress with Vista, and I derived some obscure pleasure in being able to "hack" and modify an ill-conceived and enormously complex product. Karp made a few of the changes pleasant, in the way removing a splinter from your hand offers some relief from pain. But at the same time I grew to hate Vista all the more.

Every OS has some issues. Even my Mac friends (well, they are sort of friends) have their difficulties with their Snow Leopards or whatever they are cutely called. In the distant past, Windows would seem to be just a bit deficient in capabilities. Now, at least in the case of Vista, it is so clumsy and bloated that in spite of what tweaking you can do, it remains a pig, and a difficult pig at that. And you know what they say about arguing with a pig. Mr. Gates' place in hell is assured for his part in releasing Vista. Perhaps his publicized loss of $7 billion last year is an attempt to normalize his karma.

In the history of product failures, we often hear about the Ford Edsel. The Edsel was actually technically not a bad machine for its time, but it looked funny. Vista goes one better. It is a product that neither looks good nor performs well.

In the end I took my new desktop hardware to another platform and resurrected a copy of XP Pro. And then I got Karp's other book, on XP annoyances. Some annoyances are easier to deal with than others.

Good for Aspiring Power Users - 2009-05-26
Reviewer Rating:
I'm not completely sure who the target audience for this title is, as a book that in one section covers automated registry search and replace and cloning your hard drive via a SATA/IDE to USB device and the next switching the Windows Media Player skin will probably not be 100% useful to most readers.

This is one of the first in this series that I think is a little off topic. Like its predecessors, the book does offer solutions to many bugs and issues Vista presents, but for the most part is focused on familiarizing users with the normal administrative settings and features of the OS; taking the reader to a Power User level. A few of the chapters provide information readily available (free) from the Annoyances web site (and in a few instances I've found provides downloads and how-to's the book says you can't actually do), as well as what you could find via a Google search, but there is enough unique content to the release to make this a good purchase.

As a side note, the book has 60 pages dedicated to scripting: MS-DOS, VBScript, and PowerShell. Although I'm glad to see this introduction being made to readers, no one should be under any illusions about the information provided: it is a very glossy overview and you will absolutely need to read other dedicated guides before you will be able to script any of the languages they cover.

Good book - still annoyed with Vista - 2009-02-04
Reviewer Rating:
This is a good book but I am still annoyed at Vista. I still have not been able to solve my biggest peeve regarding explorer menus that won't stay still.

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