If I were Microsoft, I wouldn't have even bothered with the lower-end Vistas, they should have just made a push for the higher-end systems, and leave the old machines out in the cold
I can see why you said this, but its that kind of thinking thats sending this planet down the pan.
Why does vista NEED to be so high end. If it was coded more efficiently it would run regardless of hardware. As picklesworth so pointedly proved above.
When computers are replaced unneccassarily it generates MOUNTAINS of toxic waste, including freon, hex chromium, lead, a number of heavy metals, silicon... the list is endless.
In the oldskool days of the amiga, the programmers got better and developed new ways to push the hardware they had, with amazing results.
Now, its the other way round. I doubt any of the past pc platforms have ever really shone to their full potential, 2/3/486 pentium1234 etc. simply because the code gets lazier, bulkier and not as efficient as it can be.
At the end of the day, if i wasn't into graphics and games (ie. most people), most of the stuff, i would be using my new laptop
(which not long ago would be classed a 'supercomputer' with such power.)
for is now reduced to some eyecandy, email, word / spreadsheet and browsing the web. Most of which i might add was possible (ok, a lot more unrefined) on my olivetti 8086 pc1 with 512k ram and a 20mb harddisk (except the web as it didnt really exist back then).
(Ok very extreme examples but you an see my point.. i hope)
Im not against progress, but im against uncessacary progress in the name of making some already obscenely rich guys (and his 'friends') more money than the GDP of a small country.