Vista makes multi-tabling easier

With Microsoft's new release of Windows Vista multitudes of people, from businessmen to every day home users, have debated about upgrading to the latest operating system. If you are one of these people in the "debating" stage and play poker, then debate no longer.

The new Windows Vista features some impressive new ways to manage multiple windows that once cluttered your Start bar. Some of these new ways of managing these windows might be just eye candy to your everyday user, but as a poker player I can see many advantages for Vista's new features.

First, this is the new Windows+Tab view. When you press the appropriate keys, Vista allows you to scroll through multiple windows and stop at which ever one you want. You can even hold the Windows Key+Tab down and use your scroll button for faster selection. This can really be beneficial when you are trying to manage multiple tables on a small monitor. The best thing about this feature is that the windows update while your in windows+tab mode, allowing you to quickly scroll through your tables and look for the one that's prompting you to act.

The second new addition to Vista is built off Windows' previous versions of PowerToys. When you press Alt+Tab a new Tab Window appears giving you little icons of which windows you have available. As with the previous feature, these icons update, which again helps you find the table prompting for your action. I find this feature a great benefit when I am playing 3-4 rooms on a small monitor. I can easily switch rooms with no hassle, and keep an eye out on all of them at once.



The third, and final, benefit to Vista's new multi-window management is the ability to just simply mouse over a window icon on your start bar for a snapshot of it's contents. As before, these snapshots stay updated. I find this feature useful when I am in a large tournament and sort of in "premium hands only" mode while playing a SNG. I will have the SNG on my screen and keep my mouse over the MTT's icon (watching for my turn to act). This allows me to better focus on my SNG as I wait for premium hands on my MTT.

I believe with enough practice these added features of Vista can really help a poker player with managing multiple windows at once. I've definitely have grown fond of all these features and will continue to use them as time goes on.