Vista should have significant advantages over Windows XP in the areas of security and user interface. If she can wait until January, when the new Windows Vista will be available preloaded on laptops, then wait. It depends on when she needs the computer. There is one exception: If you purchase videos from Apple’s iTunes Music Store, you can only play them in either iTunes or QuickTime, not Windows Media Player.īefore we buy our daughter a laptop for school, should we wait until the new Microsoft operating system is released next year? If not, should we buy a laptop with a more powerful chip with the intention of upgrading once it is available? But, if you set its preferences so it isn’t the default player for various types of video files, and you set Windows Media Player as the default, you should be able to use the latter, as in the past. It can also be used on its own to play some video and audio files. QuickTime is an Apple program that is required by iTunes, even on Windows computers. Must I use QuickTime as a video player in order to use iTunes for music? I wish to use Windows Media Player as the default player. I do not want QuickTime to play video files.
With the iTunes software comes QuickTime. I have an iPod which uses iTunes software on my Windows computer. If you have a question, send it to me at and I may select it to be answered here in Mossberg’s Mailbox. This week my mailbox contained questions about speech-recognition software for Macs, whether Windows Media Player will play video files from iTunes, and if Vista is worth the wait. I have edited and restated the questions a bit, for readability. Here are a few questions about computers I’ve received recently from people like you, and my answers. Everybody has questions about them, and we aim to help. There’s no other major item most of us own that is as confusing, unpredictable and unreliable as our personal computers.