It's about knowing where to start
I have a quick update on the current status of NVIDIA graphics drivers and that is not much has changed. 8800 users are the only ones able to use SLI in Vista still and the drivers for Vista still need work for features like overclocking and video out. Games are quite playable, don’t get me wrong, but there are a lot of specific instances of in-game issues that need be fixed in various games. No date yet for WHQL certified drivers, but be sure that we will keep you posted about them when they are ready.

Update: As this was going to be published I received an email from NVIDIA stating that within days their WHQL Vista drivers should be ready for users to download and that it should fix many, but probably not all of the current issues out there with their cards and Vista.

And now on to some Vista related goodness!

The ever-so-familiar start menu has been with us since Windows 95. It has since become a staple of our Windows experience and has been something we have either grown to love or hate, sometimes both. It has been pretty much unchanged for a good 12 years now, through various versions of Windows. While the start menu was previously labeled as such, it’s now replaced by the Vista "globe" logo. Windows Vista puts a new twist on how the start menu functions and adds some new features at the same time, most noticeably the built-in search option.

One of my favorite features of Windows Vista is the new search option on the new start menu. A simple press of the Windows key on your keyboard and you can begin typing in your search query. You don't even have to select the search field with your mouse, thus allowing one button searching (plus whatever you type in for text) of your entire computer.


For example, take a look at my search for Half Life on my computer. As I have indexed specific folders on my computer I can get the results I want when I search. As we can see in this example, not only do my programs “Half-Life 2” and “Half-Life 2 Episode One” show up at the top but so do files containing those words. We see some Excel work books that contain those words from benchmarking for GotFrag Hardware and some emails at the bottom from Gamespy that also contain those words. And this isn’t a Windows XP “click on search, search locations, type, wait, wait, wait, wait, here’s some results, not what I want, wait, wait, there it is” style of searching - it is incredibly fast. It is more like, “Hit your Windows key, start typing, there’s results, but wait I am not even done typing yet”. I can open almost any application in about a second and half because as soon as the results come up if you hit enter it will auto-open the first search result (or you can scroll your results without ever taking your hands off your keyboard with the arrow keys). I still find myself browsing the menu out of habit, but I am trying to force myself use the search more often, as it is much faster than browsing sub folders.


In the next picture I have detailed how to access the Indexing Options so you can configure what exactly you want Vista to search. Simply hit your Windows key and type indexing and hit enter and it will bring you to the Indexing Options in which you can select the folders and applications that should be indexed - extremely easy and very handy.


The other main overhaul of the start menu is that the folders within All Programs act more like the Windows Explorer sidebar and stay within the main start window pane instead of the branching out, expanding columns like in old versions of Windows. See my images below and you can get an idea of how it works.


The next feature is still taking me some time to get used to. The Windows Explorer in Vista has been tweaked with a "favorite folders/searches/locations" section in the upper-left corner and the new bread crumb navigation bar. It’s hard to explain without using it and seeing it, but check out the pictures below.


Out of habit I always used to navigate from the left side pane, opening and closing folders in the folder tree. However, the bread crumb bar is far more intuitive and faster. As you hover over your current folder you see all the sub folders so you can access them right from there without clicking in the main window. Or, you can move further back on the bread crumb bar and access any folder further up in Explorer. It’s fast and efficient, but it may take some getting used to for many people used to the old Windows ways.

The "favorite links" menu allows you save any search results, drag any folder in this pane to make a quick shortcut, or view recently changed items.

Thanks for stopping by and joining me for another article with Windows Vista. Stay tuned for my next issue with some gaming benchmarks of my rig on Vista against XP SP2 to see how the new OS stacks up to the old standard in gaming performance.

Related
Life With Windows Vista: Issue 1
Life With Windows Vista: Issue 2
Vista Coverage