VistaKnowledge.com

Multi-OS options like dual-booting and virtualization software have made it easier than ever to use whichever OS is best suited to the task you need to perform. Here’s our take on the strengths and weaknesses of Windows Vista

Interface

• Still confusing to navigate, but in new and different ways. Some Control Panel apps contain useful new settings, but many are unchanged from XP and lurk in new locations.
• Transparency, animation, and other effects provide helpful visual cues about files and programs.
• Flip 3D program switching lets you scroll through a three-dimensional animation of all your running apps.
• Systemwide search and indexing finds files, programs, and Web pages on or beyond your PC’s hard disk.

Security

• Improves on XP’s security with User Access Control and ActiveX tweaks, but remains a major malware target.
• Still requires a third-party bidirectional firewall, since its own firewall settings for outgoing connections are for experts only.
• Includes Windows XP’s file- and folder-level encryption options. The Business and Ultimate Editions’ industrial-strength Bitlocker encryption protects your entire hard disk from tampering.

Software

• Includes enhanced versions of Media Player, Media Center (except in Business edition), and Movie Maker, plus new mail, calendar, and DVD authoring tools.
• Won’t run 16-bit apps and some 32-bit utilities written for XP. Otherwise, it runs most existing Windows software.
• Current game performance is particularly slow compared with XP, perhaps due to still-buggy drivers.
• DirectX 10 promises a dramatic boost to 3D gaming when supporting hardware is more widely available.

Hardware price/performance

• Requires significantly more memory and hard-disk space, and runs slower than XP on the same hardware.
• Minimum system requirements are an 800-MHz processor, 512MB of memory, and 15GB of free disk space.
• The Aero interface works best with recent graphics accelerators and requires an additional 512MB of RAM.
• The sometimes difficult upgrade process means you’re better off buying a new PC with Vista preinstalled.

Virtualization

• Same capabilities as Windows XP, but higher memory requirements could either reduce performance or prevent Vista from serving as a host or guest OS on systems where RAM is tight.
• License prohibits running anything but the expensive Enterprise or Ultimate Editions under virtualization software like Parallels or VMWar

Bottom line

Get it if you’re buying a new PC; XP users, though, have few urgent reasons to upgrade. Windows Vista’s interface is alive compared with XP’s relatively flat scheme, an innovation that could get you more excited about your daily computing tasks. Vista also includes some useful new tools and is safer to take for a spin around the Internet. Does that justify the hefty upgrade price and even more costly hardware requirements? Probably not, but if it’s time to buy a new computer anyway, you won’t be tempted to reinstall Windows XP.

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