No OneNote fix for Vista 64-bit- say what?
You may have seen me venting over Microsoft’s ridiculous failure to supply a 64-bit virtual printer driver for OneNote’s great "Send to OneNote 2007" feature. This is the feature that is a must-have for me as I routinely print documents directly into OneNote 2007 for reference. The HP tx2051 Tablet PC that I am evaluating came with 64-bit Vista Ultimate installed and this is how I discovered that the Send to OneNote feature does not work (nor install) on the 64-bit version of either WinXP or Vista. The GottaBeMobile guys were also surprised to hear this and this week since they were at the MVP Summit on the Microsoft campus they asked the Redmond folks if they are going to release a 64-bit driver for this feature:
64-bit support for the Send-To printer will not becoming until OneNote 14 releases to the public. There are no plans toaddress this with a patch or service pack. So, if you rely upon theSend-To feature in OneNote, I’d recommend sticking with or going backto 32-bit Vista.
So the answer is clear, if this feature is a must for you then don’t even consider 64-bit Windows because Microsoft not only doesn’t have your back but they’ve painted a big, red target on it.
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A few years ago Intel invited a group of us to a Montreal-Boston hockey game, and in return Intel asked for our thoughts on how best to introduce the 64 bit chips. Everyone else had suggestions about marketing various cool things that 64 bit chips could do. I, as someone who came primarily to see the hockey game, told them that the best way to sell 64 bit chips was to make sure that everything that worked on a 32 bit chip would also work on a 64 bit chip.
It sounds like someone wasn’t paying attention.
This does argue, however, for the importance of offering perks like hockey games, because the people who would come to hear about high tech chips would be less likely to offer down to earth advice like you get from someone who knew a bit about the subject but actually came to see the hockey game.
Unfortunately Intel didn’t pass on your advice to Microsoft…
As probably the largest mainstream OS/Applications software company, Microsoft sometimes doesn’t have a clue!
Microsoft’s own support for the 64 bit platform that it is trying to sell so hotly to enterprise customers is pathetic. Try finding a 64-bit JET driver so that you can access legacy Access databases in SSIS packages using SQL x64 – oops! Can’t. And now this, “sorry, our own Office product can’t be made to do this.” WOW.
It’s hard to believe it’s “can’t” be made to do this, so much as “won’t.”
I’m certainly not a programmer, nor a chip engineer, but I find it hard to believe that the faster, more powerful chip, and the software that controls it can’t be made to do something so obvious. If it’s “can’t,” I’d think creating pdf’s, scanning documents, and any imaging would be a “can’t.”
And if I understand correctly, running a 32-bit OS on a 64-bit machine takes advantage of half it’s speed, sort of like typing with one hand. Not my first choice. Or second. I don’t know anyone who buys a car for which there aren’t tires and spare parts available.
The Vista 64 website warns to make sure the software you load has the features you need available for Vista 64, and the Office website warns that not all the functions are available on Vista 64, but there is no list of what might be disabled, missing, or D.O.A.
I never noticed any real performance difference between 32 and 64 bit Windows. From everything I’ve read, the only reason you’d really want to run 64 bit Windows is if you have to push around ungodly amounts of ram. Otherwise, it’s pretty much just to say you can. So why bother? I have 64 bit chips all over the house and lots of copies of 64 bit XP and Vista. I’ve tried them several times but since I have to get real work done, I don’t use them except in a VM once in a while to either make something work or explain why it doesn’t work.
Hi,
I’m the Group Program Manager for OneNote. I responded to this issue on another site and on my blog to give people context on this. As is often the case, there’s more to it than you might realize.
http://blogs.msdn.com/david_rasmussen/archive/2008/04/21/onenote-64-bit-print-driver.aspx
We really aren’t idiots, nor are we malicious. There’s just a lot to this trade off that you need to understand.
By the way bluespapa, Mark is right. Running a 32 bit OS on a 64 bit chip doesn’t run it at half speed. It doesn’t work like that. Ironically in most cases for desktop applications it will run just the same, but sometimes the 64 bit version will run slower than the 32 bit (it has to move more bits around). For an app to run faster on a 64 bit it has to be able to take advantage of the address space, and most desktop applications today simply can’t use that much address space (that will change over time). It IS a big benefit on server for things like large databases though.
A friend is considering purchasing this computer, and I certainly covet such a powerhouse, so it’s good to know choosing the 32-bit OS for the main things I’d be doing isn’t a waste of resources. Thanks Mark and David.
I posted a How-To to restore “Send it to OneNote” functionality to OneNote. It involves installing a program called Zan Image Printer.
See http://blog.nils-kaiser.de/?p=5 for the full instructions.
Greetings, Nils
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