Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Jj0909jj (talk | contribs) at 05:30, 15 March 2007 (moved Features removed in Windows Vista to Features that was removed in Windows Vista over redirect). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

While Windows Vista contains many new features, a number of older technologies and obsolete capabilities that were a part of Windows XP are no longer present. The following is a list of removed features:

• Starting with Windows Vista, all Windows applications including GDI and GDI+ applications run in the new compositing engine, Desktop Window Manager and therefore cannot be hardware-accelerated. However, due to the nature of desktop composition (internal management of moving bitmaps and transparency and anti-aliasing of GDI+ being handled at the DWM core), operations like window moves and resizes can be faster or more responsive because underlying content need not be re-rendered.
• Since Windows Vista features a rewritten audio stack and does not inherit the Hardware Abstraction Layer for audio that was present under prior versions of Windows, there will be no hardware acceleration of DirectSound and DirectSound3D APIs. DirectSound is emulated entirely in software. As a result, hardware 3D algorithms for audio spatializations such as EAX, HRTF etc. using these APIs will be lost. An alternative is to use OpenAL for 3D audio spatializations.
• Links to the Backgammon, Hearts, Reversi, Spades and Checkers games on MSN Gaming Zone have been removed. Pinball has also been removed.
• As with x64 editions of Windows XP Professional and Windows Server 2003, in x86-64 versions of Windows Vista, NTVDM, the subsystem for running (emulating) 16-bit applications is no longer present.
• Version 6.4 of Windows Media Player (mplayer2.exe) is no longer included.
• Clipbook Viewer is not included.
• Removed Shell-related features:
  • The taskbar can no longer be dragged to the bottom of the screen to hide it manually.
  • Folder cannot be dragged to the edge of the screen to turn into a toolbar.
  • The user interface for advanced file type functionality (such as manually defining a new file extension, defining/editing custom secondary actions for file types, showing extensions only for specific file types, or customizing the icon for file types) has been removed. Windows Vista-compatible applications are expected to use the new Default Programs API which allows per-user file type associations for applications.
• The following features and capabilities have been removed from Windows Explorer:
  • The Toolbar button in Explorer to go up one folder from the current folder.
  • Ability to add a password to a zip file (compressed folder).
  • Filmstrip view is replaced by the icon view feature which supports multiple sizes, and a new full-screen slideshow mode
  • The ability to view and edit metadata stored in a file's secondary stream through the "Summary" tab of the file's "Property" dialog.
  • Web Publishing Wizard.
  • Support for enabling a folder for web sharing with Internet Information Services via the Windows Explorer interface.
• The following functionality has been removed from Internet Explorer 7.
  • Internet Explorer is no longer integrated with Windows Explorer. This can also be seen in Internet Explorer 7 on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003.
  • HTML source is more easily accessed through a browser than through the protocol.
  • Several old and little-used technologies have been removed from Internet Explorer: DirectAnimation support, Direct3D Retained Mode, XBM images, CDF, telnet protocol handlers and 40-bit SSL ciphers.
  • Image toolbar has been removed. Most of the commands that were on this floating toolbar—Save Picture, E-mail Picture, Set as Background, etc—are now in the context menu that appears when an image is right-clicked.
  • Offline Favorites, a feature that automatically synchronized and stored web pages for later perusal when not online, was removed in favor of using RSS feeds.
• Removed or changed networking-related functionality and applications:
  • The Gopher protocol, an old protocol now considered obsolete, is no longer supported.
  • Rarely used protocols such as Bandwidth Allocation Protocol and X.25 support for SLIP have also been removed. SLIP connections are automatically upgraded to use PPP.
  • MS-CHAP v1 protocol is no longer supported for VPN authentication, in favor of MS-CHAP v2.
  • Unlike Outlook Express, Windows Mail has no support for HTTP mail via the WebDAV protocol (used by older Hotmail accounts and Yahoo! Mail); the addition of Windows Live Mail Desktop is likely to be required for similar functionality and there is a link to this from the Welcome Center.
  • IPX networks are no longer supported.
  • rexec, rsh, finger, and some other command-line tools primarily used to communicate with UNIX-based systems have been removed from the default installation. The Subsystem for Unix-based applications (SUA) (previously known as Services for Unix) still provides them as an optional component.
  • Windows Messenger is being removed entirely; no replacement for it is expected to be included, in favor of a link to Windows Live Messenger on the Welcome Center.
  • Support for built-in H.323 Voice Over IP (VOIP) capabilities has been removed. NetMeeting, TAPI H.323 TSP, HyperTerminal and Phone Dialer all are no longer included. Windows Meeting Space is the replacement for NetMeeting.
  • Due to unpopularity, IP over 1394 (FireWire networking) support has been removed.
  • Services for Macintosh, which provided file and print sharing via the now deprecated AppleTalk protocol, has been removed.
  • FrontPage Server Extensions has been dropped and is being replaced with Windows SharePoint Services client support.
  • NetDDE, a technology that allows applications using the DDE transport to transparently exchange data over a network, is no longer supported.
• Windows XP's well-known Luna theme has been removed.
• Motherboard support for ACPI is required for Windows Vista; as a result, older motherboards supporting only Advanced Power Management will no longer work. Other "legacy" hardware technologies no longer supported include: EISA buses, game ports, MPU-401, AMD K6/2+ Mobile Processors, Mobile Pentium II, and Mobile Pentium III SpeedStep; ISAPnP is disabled by default.
• The Startup Hardware Profiles feature in System Properties has been removed.
• SerialKeys, an accessibility feature for augmentative communicative devices is no longer supported.
• Support for reading .DOC files has been removed from WordPad, and is instead done with Microsoft's Word Viewer.
• Built-in support for *.HLP help format has been removed to discourage software developers from using the obsolete format and encourage use of newer help formats. When starting an application which uses the .hlp format, Windows will display a warning saying .hlp is not supported any more. A downloadable viewer for viewing .hlp files will be available from the Microsoft Download Center.

See also

• Security and safety features new to Windows Vista
• Development of Windows Vista
• Criticism of Windows Vista
• History of Microsoft Windows
• Microsoft Windows
• Windows Server "Longhorn"
• Windows Vista

Notes and references

1. GDI is not hardware accelerated in Windows Vista
2. WPF - Graphics under the hood
3. File types tab removed
4. MSDN: Property System
5. "Release Notes for Internet Explorer 7". Microsoft. Retrieved 2007-03-08.
6. MS-CHAPv1 support dropped
7. "Discontinued Support for IP over 1394". Microsoft Hardware Database Compatibility. Microsoft. December 8 2004. Retrieved 2006-04-24. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |year= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)
8. NetDDE is not present in Windows Vista
9. See Microsoft Windows and the Plug and Play Framework Architecture for a discussion on ISA PnP technology.
10. Serial Keys support removed.
11. Shell Revealed forums: No DOC support in Vista WordPad
12. WinHelp and Windows Vista

External links

• Microsoft's Windows Vista homepage

• Windows Vista