should I get vista?

[str8ballistik]

I'm seriously thinking about buying two more gigs of memory for my computer right now, and then buying windows vista on my next paycheck. I dont know if I should. My brother in law is determined not to buy windows vista. He's a genius with computers and even he doesnt want to get it, so I almost want to just stay with my windows xp according to him. but I would appreciate other peoples input since I am seriously considering it.

I have a 5600x2 AMD
2gb's Corsair XMS
8800gts 640mb
M2N Sli-Deluxe Mobo

if this matters at all

 

[notherdude]

Vista is running fine now - not sluggish, not buggy, not a hog, games run as fast and stable as XP, and so on. Vista is a very popular choice right now among gamers and enthusiasts which tells you all you need to know really. There are still die hard XP fans who, despite having not tried Vista or else having given it a quick look early on, will tell you authoritatively that Vista sucks. Trust me, these people are stuck in the past. Don't even think about trusting the Mac vs. PC ads on the subject. This is pure advertising BS from a very untrustworthy source but unfortunately this is all you ever hear on TV and is the dominating voice in the media. Steve Jobs also got up in front of a national audience recently and implied that Mac had an 18% market share when in fact it is less than 4% worldwide and about 8.1 % in US sales.

There was some truth to the criticism early on - pre-SP 1 - when the drivers were immature but those days are over. There are also issues in enterprise computing which have a very complex ecosystem that in some cases is still not compatible with Vista.

Having said all that there is no compelling reason to move to Vista because it just doesn't do enough for you that XP doesn't. You will get DX 10 for advanced game graphics, much better security, and a much more attractive appearance, and some other under the hood improvements of marginal value. The usual rule of thumb is that when buying new PCs get Vista but stick with XP on older systems. Some older systems may also have hardware that is incompatible but you usually have to go back 3 or more years ago to run into that.

Now if you want to use all 4 gig of ram you will need a 64 bit OS. With either Vista 32 or XP 32 you will only see about 3 to 3.5 gig of usable ram (in your case probably only 3) and there is no way around this. This fact has led recently to the great popularity of Vista 64 as an enthusiast platform. XP 64 will do it too but support for XP 64 has never been very good and isn't getting a whole lot better because there just are not enough installs out there. Vista 64 is fast becoming the new standard and support for it is nearing 100%. A trip to Best Buy will show you that. Most of the machines on the floor are Vista 64. There are also a lot of so called geniuses out there who will tell you 64 bit is too new and incompatible for the average user and this also was true some time ago but times have changed and 64 bit has arrived.

You can download a trial version for free. I would recommend you try it first and see for yourself. There are also some older versions of popular software out there that may not work with either Vista or 64 so you might want to do a quick search on the subject if you have any pet pieces of old software you need to run.

 

[kal20mx]

OK so I was going to start a new thread and have a couple questions my self.

I am upgrading my current rig. I am getting a radeon 4870 and the only reason is because I want DX10. Thats the future right? correct? Well then all I hear is people complaining about Vista and dissin it. But I havent seen alot of actual screenshots or proof that xp would be better then Vista. People Diss Vista and say stick with Xp but arent like 80% or more pc gamers already have DX10 Videocards? then why in the fu**** world are you still running Xp? Bioshock, crysis, etc all this games support DX10 then why stick with xp and not take advantage of DX10? So having this said I already have a Windows vista cd but its only 32bit. wich means I am only gona get 3-3.5 GB ram right? is this enough to play games like Crysis on high and stuff? or should I get Vista 64Bit so i can take adavantage of more ram? If so would I see a more noticeable increase on performance? and my last question a AMD athlon x2 4600 is a 64bit cpu right? ISNT this the questions we should be askin instead of dissing VIsta. OMG I was so blind before F*** that dude I going with Vista. 64 or 32 is my question. PLease MODs and people help me with this question.

 

[Dougx1317]

I like vista, but I wouldn't say it's worth the extra money. XP and Vista are just too similer to be worth $100+.

 

[rasmasyean]

Windows Vista vs. XP

Note that Vista is mostly a "technology update", even though it "looks different".

These are some of the features I personally like about Vista compared to XP.
• Major technology upgrade from XP (finally after 5 years…).
• Direct3D 10.
• SuperFetch makes my "free" RAM not go to waste (esp. with 64-bit).
• Persistent Defragger - No more need for defrag software.
• Backup Utility - No more need for other backup software.
• Instant Search Box all over the place (wish it were same “functionally” in IE though).
• “S3” Sleep (only using 2 watts and only takes like 5 seconds to resume)
• I like the fact that it asks me when things run so I can stop it.
• Windows Media Center.
• No need to download and update “Activesync”. It has an improved Windows Mobility Center.
• Dictation with speech recognition sometimes faster than typing long stuff.
• Performance Monitor much improved over XP.
• Windows Presentation Foundation (I haven’t made anything yet myself, but it seems like a leap from the old days hehe).
• All other business and developer technologies seem so cool too but I guess they won’t be used much until more people migrate to Vista for developers to sell stuff to.
• Makes me feel safer with the security upgrades (esp. with 64-bit) at least, but it’s hard to tell what would it be like without it because I knew what I was doing with XP anyway and had updated protection software.