To Vista or not to Vista that is the ?

[MrCrispy]

The AnyDvd page says it will let you watch movies over a digital connection without HDCP, but it doesn't say what happens if you do have HDCP. I'm pretty sure having HDCP will enforce DRM since its built into the standard. I've never heard anything about Vista's media layer DRM being bypassed by Anydvd or similar programs, so I'm a little skeptical.

However, all the fuss over Vista DRM is a little over the top. Its all there, and you can easily verify by playing wmv content in Windows media player. You will see mfpmp.exe (Media Foundation Protected Pipeline) running in task manager and happily eating away all your cpu. Thats DRM in action. However, play the same file in any other player (vlc, mpc etc) and it plays without DRM.

Hardware DRM is going to be harder to bypass.

[Hirudin]

Well, I don't think AnyDVD is trying to claim they let you watch non-HDCP protected content without HDCP hardware... "Buy our product, it'll let you do what you could do anyway" isn't really a very good marketing slogan. It lets you watch HD-DVDs (which are all HDCP protected AFIK) and BRDs (which are also all HDCP protected, also AFIK).

I reread your post MrCrispy... I see what you're saying now, I think. You're saying that AnyDVD HD may run into additional problems if you have HDCP enabled hardware, like an HDCP enabled video card. Right?
I definitely don't know enough about HDCP to make a guess as to whether this would actually be the case, but I'd guess there would be many posts about it on the Slysoft forum. I took a quick look, but I didn't see any. I unfortunately don't have ANY HD computer hardware, so I can't come close to testing the software myself.

[Curt]

Not all are having doubts about Vista or not:

40M Vista copies sold

Microsoft has sold nearly 40 million copies of Windows Vista so far, Bill Gates told a crowd of hardware developers Tuesday.

That's more than the total install base of Windows' largest competitors, Gates quipped as he began his keynote at the Windows Hardware and Engineering Conference.

"As of last week, we've (sold) nearly 40 million copies," Gates said. "That's twice as fast as the adoption of Windows XP, the last major release we had."

-OutlookPower Magazine

[Darwin]

I wonder how many of those 40 million copies are sitting on retail shelves? This *may* be remininscent of inflated sales figures for records wherein the labels report the number of copies shipped as the actually sales figures... so, they are/were? reporting the volume of shipments to the middlemen rather than sales numbers to the buying public. Don't know when this practice started and if it's still being done, but a very easy way to garner a gold/platinum record for an artist and to create a lot of hype around them to create actual sales! Well, that and buying playtime on radio stations...

[Hirudin]

It took me longer than I'd normally like to admit to realize that the sudden rise in Mac ads is more than likely because they're running scared.

I mean, Microsoft releases a new operating system and what do you see on TV? Mac ads.

[Darwin]

Excellent point - Hirudin. Hadn't made that connection, either.