Popular programs: Windows Vista compatibility tests

Date: 06/04/2007

Introduction

All the IT world and common users have waited for the release of Windows Vista for years. Finally, Microsoft made all happy. On January 30, 2007, the release of the long-awaited Windows Vista was launched. But those who are using Windows XP are not hasty at purchasing the new operating system - they are thinking twice as to if all the programs they are using in Windows XP and earlier versions will run trouble-free under Windows Vista.

The developers were doing their best to create a more secure and stable operating system, which moved some programs to the list of the incompatible software. The major cause of their incompatibility is use of insecure and unreliable enough technologies. We believe it is quite a just decision. Why do we need applications which may allow for installation of malicious software or result in periodic failures in the operating system?

The goal we pursued in this article is to tell the future buyers and users of Windows Vista on the compatibility of popular applications to the new operating system.

Since many software developers released new versions of their programs simultaneously to the release of Windows Vista compatible to the operating system, we decided to test a few outdated versions of programs. That was done to check those versions to which many have got used to and in order to represent a more general idea of the situation.

We checked all the processes visually - from installation to the the validation of features up to the uninstallation. If the system displayed a message of incompatibility and suggested to proceed, we continued. If a program added any "malicious" drivers or services into the operating system, we installed the program only for the purity of experiment on a clean operating system. We did not look for any solutions in the Internet even when Windows suggested that we should do that. Let's get down to describing the process of testing the programs.

Testing the programs

Microsoft Office XP, as its later version Office 2003, did not cause any issues during installation and operation, and uninstallaiton also ran correctly. Perhaps their complete compatibility is because they were created by the developer of Vista.

In almost any organization of Russia, accounting and inventory transactions are performed with 1Ñ. We couldn't help passing by it. 1Ñ: Predpriyatie 7.7 (build 7.70.027) was running trouble-free at all the stages of tests.

So were Adobe Acrobat 7.0 and Adobe Acrobat Reader 7.0 which passed all the tests. Socrat Personal 4.1 (translation program) caused a server registration during installation and on uninstallation, but despite that it did its major job.

Punto Switcher 2.9.9, on the contrary, installed correctly but did not fix the texts typed in a wrong keyboard layout.

The all-known mail client TheBat! 3.60 did install but on launch it reported compatibility errors and hung sometimes while connecting to the mail server.

By the way, on the moment of writing the article Ritlabs S.R.L. announced having released a new version fully compatible to Windows Vista. The new compatible version of TheBat! causes no issues.

FlashGet 1.70 and the Internet browsers Opera 8.50, Mozilla Firefox 1.0.6 caused no issues, nor did the programs for Internet communication: Rambler-ICQ, QIP 2005 (Build 8000) and Skype 2.5.0.130. The popular FTP-client CuteFTP Pro 7.1 closed periodically during operating without any warnings.

WinRAR, WinZip, and 7-Zip did their job packing and unpacking files in various modes.

Multimedia programs like Winamp 5.1, CyberLink PowerDVD 5.0, WinDVD Platinum 6.0.6.56, Light Alloy 4.0, and QuickTime 6.5.2 played audio and video files trouble-free, but QuickTime wouldn't uninstall in the regular way.

During installation, Sound Forge 8.0b asked for the installation of Microsoft.NET Framework version 1.1. It wouldn't install even though Windows Vista has a newer version. The probable cause of that is lack of succession in NET Framework versions, but we did not install version 1.1.

All the tested applications for creating and processing films were running correctly. We verified the following programs: Adobe Premiere Pro 7.0, Adobe After Effect 6.0, Pinnacle Studio 8.4, and Ulead MediaStudio Pro 7.0

Adobe Photoshop and CorelDraw are regarded as the most popular programs for handling raster and vector graphics. Their versions CS 8.0 and 12.0, respectively, are compatible to Windows Vista. We paid enough attention to them the make sure they worked correctly and stably. Not all the features of 3DS Max were operative and on closing it the application reported missing components.

No issues were found in Xara3D 6.0 and Macromedia Dreamweaver 8.0 (to create 3D texts and web pages, respectively).

ACDSee 8.0.39 worried us with a lot of errors both during installation and on attempts to launch.

On the other hand, the integrated viewing and editing features are quite enough.

Frankly, we did not expect compatibility from antivirus programs at all, which was confirmed by the tests of outdated versions 5.0.237 and 6.0.0.300 of Kaspersky antivirus.

But we also tested the most recent versions Kaspersky Anti-Virus 6.0.2.614 Vista, Kaspersky Internet Security 6.0.2.614 Vista and they showed quite a stable operation in Windows Vista.

"Heroes of annihilated empires", "Hitman Contracts", "Constantine", and "Moorhuhn Winter» - these are games which installed and were running successfully. "Diablo II" also installed and was running despite the compatibility error upon the start-up.

The popular arcade "Need for Speed Carbon", unfortunately, wouldn't start up after the installation and asked for DirectX 9, although Windows Vista DirectX is already of version 10.

Of the file managers, we checked Far 1.705 and Total Commander 6.53. The only found issue in their operation - they wouldn't open some protected directories - perhaps the enhanced security of the new operating system caused that.

The popular program for recording CD/DVD discs proved incompatible, was abundant with errors on installation, launch, and even upon uninstallation. These errors were caused by Nero Premium 7.0.1.2

The first place at destabilization of Windows Vista can be given to Alcohol 120% 1.9.5.3105 that emulates CD/DVD disks. During the installation, Vista reported that it couldn't verify the publisher of the installed driver.

After the attempt "to install the driver anyway" Windows Vista showed a "blue death screen", returned error 10000007å and rebooted. We were able to recover Windows Vista only using the last most successful configuration.

Delphi 7 and Turbo Pascal 7.0 did not cause much of any issues neither during operation nor while running the programs. This should be a good news for programmers.

Utilities in Windows Vista were not running correctly. Perhaps they access the hardware passing by the system drivers or introduce changes to the system registry. For example, the system even wouldn't let RegCleaner 4.3 start up.

HDDlife Pro 2.5.74 was unable to detect disks that support the S.M.A.R.T. technology and it wouldn't uninstall from the system.

Summary table

To visualize it, we gathered the results of tests for all the programs into the below summary table.

Final Words

Let's recap the results of our tests. On the whole, of all the variety of tested programs we found quite a high level of compatibility. Most of the popular programs were running stably in Windows Vista.

With some outdated programs there were issues, but if we recall the release of Windows XP and migration to it from other systems, in our case the situation is much better. Windows Vista, as we mentioned in the beginning of the article, is more secure and stable unlike its predecessors. On the example of outdated versions of Kaspersky antivirus, we see that Windows Vista takes more care of installation of derivers and services which can destabilize it.

We can make the conclusion that most of the popular software is compatible to Windows Vista. Besides, many large software developers are either preparing or have already released new versions of their programs and games, fully compatible to the new OS. We think migration to the new operating system will not take long to appear.

In conclusion, we'd like to share Microsoft's useful link to the regularly updated list of programs which have already acquired the "Certified for Windows Vista" or "Works with Windows Vista" logos.

The list is growing visibly, and on the moment of sales launch it amounted to hundreds of utilities and suites but now it takes thousands of items.

What we'd like to stress is that Microsoft is constantly releasing patches and updates for Windows Vista, so maybe after another update your good old formerly failing program may work. Good luck!

Program name and version	Setup	Features	Uninstall
Microsoft Office XP	V	V	V
Microsoft Office 2003	V	V	V
1Ñ: Predpriyatie 7.7 (release 7.70.027)	V	V	V
Adobe Acrobat 7.0	V	V	V
Adobe Acrobat Reader 7.0	V	V	V
Socrat Personal 4.1	X	V	V
Punto Switcher 2.9.9	V	X	V
TheBat! 3.60	V	X	V
FlashGet 1.70	V	V	V
Opera 8.50	V	V	V
Mozilla Firefox 1.0.6	V	V	V
Rambler-ICQ	V	V	V
QIP 2005(Build 8000)	V	V	V
Skype 2.5.0.130	V	V	V
CuteFTP Pro 7.1	V	X	V
WinRAR	V	V	V
WinZip	V	V	V
7-Zip	V	V	V
Winamp 5.1	V	V	V
CyberLink PowerDVD 5.0	V	V	V
WinDVD Platinum 6.0.6.56	V	V	V
Light Alloy 4.0	V	V	V
QuickTime 6.5.2	V	V	V
Sound Forge 8.0b	X	X	V
Adobe Premiere Pro 7.0	V	V	V
Adobe After Effect 6.0	V	V	V
Pinnacle Studio 8.4	V	V	V
Ulead MediaStudio Pro 7.0	V	V	V
Adobe Photoshop CS 8.0	V	V	V
CorelDRAW Graphics Suite 12	V	V	V
3DSMax 5	V	V	V
Xara3D 6.0	V	V	V
Macromedia Dreamweaver 8.0	V	V	V
ACDSee 8.0.39	X	X	V
Kaspersky Anti-Virus 6.0.2.614 Vista	V	V	V
Kaspersky Internet Security 6.0.2.614 Vista	V	V	V
Kaspersky Antivirus 6.0.0.300	X	X	V
«Heroes of destroyed empires»	V	V	V
«Hitman Contracts»	V	V	V
«Constantine»	V	V	V
«Moorhuhn Winter»	V	V	V
«Diablo II»	V	X	V
«Need for Speed Carbon»	V	X	V
Far 1.705	V	V	V
Total Commander 6.53	V	V	V
Nero Premium 7.0.1.2	X	X	X
Alcohol 120% 1.9.5.3105	X	X	X
Delphi 7	V	V	V
Turbo Pascal 7.0	V	V	V
RegCleaner 4.3	V	X	V
SpeedFan 4.23	V	X	V
HDDlife Pro 2.5.74	V	X	X

The material is placed with permission from the editorial board of "Internetiya".