I'm growing to like Vista. Fair enough, I've turned off some services to make it run like I want it to (superfetch, readyboost, a few others I can't recall right now) but it's a damn fine OS.
I don't bother with all the graphical niceties (no aero for me) because let's face it, it's an OS, not a damn art show. If I want to look at cool stuff, I'll download a decent desktop background. Window resize gadgets should be functional, not pretty.
Finding good, compatible anti-virus and firewall software is a bit of a challenge. Hell, we went through the same story when XP hit shelves, so I'm hardly going to complain too much just yet. If it's the same situation in 6 months, then I'll be annoyed. A new version of F-Secure was given to my by their tech-support guys. Seems to be working fine, for now.
If I was buying a new PC and had the option of Vista Home Premium or XP Pro, I would go for XP Pro. I know it's stable and I know it's well supported. If it was a gaming rig with 2G of RAM, I would go for Vista (though probably Ultimate, rather than Home Premium). DX10 support is a selling point.
In conclusion, I wouldn't recommend an upgrade (from XP) unless you need or particularly desire some of the Vista specific features (of which there are scant few). If you are still stuck with Win98, you likely will need hardware upgrades before you consider Vista. If you can pick up Vista for cheap, go for it. It's at least as stable as XP, slightly better usability, slightly worse compatability (so I'm told, I haven't hit any problems yet), slightly more RAM consumption (2G is cheap).
I don't bother with all the graphical niceties (no aero for me) because let's face it, it's an OS, not a damn art show. If I want to look at cool stuff, I'll download a decent desktop background. Window resize gadgets should be functional, not pretty.
Finding good, compatible anti-virus and firewall software is a bit of a challenge. Hell, we went through the same story when XP hit shelves, so I'm hardly going to complain too much just yet. If it's the same situation in 6 months, then I'll be annoyed. A new version of F-Secure was given to my by their tech-support guys. Seems to be working fine, for now.
If I was buying a new PC and had the option of Vista Home Premium or XP Pro, I would go for XP Pro. I know it's stable and I know it's well supported. If it was a gaming rig with 2G of RAM, I would go for Vista (though probably Ultimate, rather than Home Premium). DX10 support is a selling point.
In conclusion, I wouldn't recommend an upgrade (from XP) unless you need or particularly desire some of the Vista specific features (of which there are scant few). If you are still stuck with Win98, you likely will need hardware upgrades before you consider Vista. If you can pick up Vista for cheap, go for it. It's at least as stable as XP, slightly better usability, slightly worse compatability (so I'm told, I haven't hit any problems yet), slightly more RAM consumption (2G is cheap).