[rolling smith]

I need to get a desktop (home use) this week and the wanchai shop is offering Xp or Vista (20 dollar difference). I am planning to get a PC that would match the requirement of Vista but i'm not sure if i want to have Vista installed at this very moment. Would like to know what you would do if you were in my shoes.

Thanks in advance...

[jimbo]

Part of it is dependant on what you will be using your p.c for and also whether you will be installing any older software that may have compatibility issues with Vista.

Is there any chance of you being able to play around with a laptop/pc with vista installed for a while and get the feel of it?

[A-J]

If ever there were an opportunity to skip a Windows upgrade cycle, the XP-to-Vista transition is it. XP may be showing its age, but its age is mainly skin deep: The new challenger is flashy, but also slower and heavier, and it lacks a killer combination of compelling features needed to unseat XP.

At the end of the decade, when Microsoft's executives look back at the debacle that was Windows Vista, they'll see that simply slapping a fresh coat of paint on an otherwise aging Windows architecture wasn't enough to fool anybody. Let's hope they also realize that, as with any major update, they needed to make their case to IT. Focusing on consumers while ignoring their enterprise customers, and assuming IT shops would simply fall in line, was no way to execute a platform migration.

Here's hoping that Microsoft indeed learned its lesson, and will engage us early and often when pitching the promise of Windows 7.
Randall C. Kennedy is a contributing editor of the InfoWorld Test Center, and he writes the Enterprise Desktop blog.

Death match: Windows Vista versus XP | InfoWorld | Analysis | 2008-03-17 | By Randall C. Kennedy

XP it is baby

[vmlinuz]

"Would I get a Vista or XP desktop?"

Nope

[Master]

I'd get a Mac.

[FilipH]

I'd get a mac as well. No doubt it is the best choice.

Should you insist on a windows machine, I'd take windows xp for a more smooth experience then Vista.

[raydio]

I use both. I prefer XP.

I find Vista to be slow, cumbersome and incompatible with lots of (older) software.

When I start Vista and XP at the same time, I find that I'm ready to start working with XP far sooner than Vista (and my Vista machine is newer and more powerful than my XP machine). Vista's Service Pack 1 did not seem to remedy the issues. In fact, I find it even slower.

I agree with the posters above. MicroSoft has to take responsibility and provide value for money with its new iterations of Windows. Windows ME was a big disappointment several years ago and Microsoft followed up with a tremendously successful Windows 2000 and XP. Hopefully they can repeat this after their hugely disappointing Vista.

[mengfei]

Vista nope!
XP yes
Mac

[KnowItAll]

XP for sure ...

[Lammarite]

If you have to run either- I'd get a Mac and run Bootcamp. Vista runs faster and more stably on it than it does natively on a PC.