I understand what you're saying, cpburns, and know full well why WoW's graphics are what they are. It makes a lot of economical sense to have graphics that range low enough that just about anyone can play the game. And while I really enjoy the quality of the graphics in Guild Wars, and I miss that quality, it is the depth of the gameplay that chose WoW over GW for me. I play games with my wife, and we enjoy meeting people as we wander around the game world, which you can't do in GW, with its instanced environments.
However, I have a fairly high end system, and would love it if the graphics to WoW could be updated to take advantage of this. By no means should they lose the existing low end, and thus alienate users, but if they could raise the high end, that would be fantastic, and that doesn't just mean moving towards photorealistic.
I agree, there is beauty to be found in the game, but it could be so much better, and I'm all for that.