Windows activation has been controversial from day one. Tomorrow, my friend Brian Livingston, will demonstrate a simple process that will enable any user to delay Windows Vista activation indefinitely.

WHAT?!

No software to install, no special hardware to buy – Microsoft has provided the activation workaround for you, according to Brian. His webcast is scheduled for tomorrow at 11am PDT (2pm EDT) – and the information will be posted to Windows Secrets at some point shortly after Midnight. I’m highly skeptical, but I also trust Brian to provide accurate information. Did Microsoft set the stage to reverse its activation policies? Only one bit needs to be flipped, apparently – but we must wait with bated breath for the tweak. All of my Vista installs have already been activated, but this is interesting news (nevertheless).

Microsoft Provides Windows Vista Activation Workaround

As a follow-up to the Windows Vista Story, Lockergnomie Jerry Whelan just sent me an update about Windows Vista’s audio bugaboos…

It’s unbelievable that Microsoft would dump the HAL Layer for sound cards because doing so kills all the advanced features of all the cards. The real problem comes with home recording – ALL the controls, such as volume mixer, reverb, panning, graphic equalizer, noise removal, EAX effects, stereo tweaks, multiple inputs, and anything else you can think of that makes home recording possible and effective – well, they’re gone and you can no longer use them. In other words, you might as well make your recordings on an old tape cassette recorder.

I have a home recording studio that’s usually pretty busy, but now it’s dead, dead and gone, and all my expensive hardware is now mostly useless. I upgraded to Vista, got the driver for my Audigy 4 Pro sound card, was even getting ready to upgrade to an X-Fi card, when I discovered that the whole range of audio controls was no longer there, and will also no longer be there in the X-Fi card. When I called Creative tech support they informed me, with bitterness, irony, and some weeping, that Microsoft has removed the Hardware Abstraction Layer for advanced sound and has left us all in the dark – darkness and silence. All advanced sound cards have suffered a similar fate, and many video cards too, so everyone who shelled out the money for advanced hardware has been effectively told by Microsoft, “Too bad.”

As I said, it’s unbelievable. I have had to reinstall Windows XP in a dual-boot configuration with Vista so I can use my sound studio again, and am still trying to get everything to work right. Reinstalling Windows XP after installing Windows Vista caused horrible and terrifying disk error problems with conflicting partitions, which took me an entire day to fix, made ten times more difficult because Microsoft has tightened up the controls so severely on how you can install and upgrade the Vista OS. All of this is cold-blooded murder, and all of it relates to the well known tendency of Microsoft to go for the buck whenever possible (and they probably have enough bucks already).

I haven’t wanted to buy a Creative product in years – especially after one of their reps was a complete asshole to me. I have a high definition audio system built into the motherboard on this rig, and Vista’s software has been beyond impressive. I have more jacks than I know what to do with, although I can see how I’d want even more if I were doing anything advanced.

Creative Sound Windows Vista Audio Warning

I’m celebrating tonight’s Windows Vista launch in style – at home, on my computer, sitting in my half-finished home office, with the candlestick, watching the Plasma television screen (currently running an OS X RSS screen saver). Party of one! I’d turn on my new webcam so that you might celebrate with me, but… Microsoft’s LifeCam drivers are still wonky on Vista.

This is an event that you will remember for the rest of your life – or, at least, for the rest of this week. What will you be doing at Midnight? Where will you be? Are you heading out to stand in line at the store? Are you already waiting in line for Windows Vista SP1? Are you holding your own Vista launch party? I just finished responding to a series of email questions for an impending Vista interview (phoner) with German public radio – and that’s about as exciting as my Vista life gets tonight.

Windows Vista Launch