Deal with Windows Vista?

Question

I'm wondering what the deal is with windows vista. I want to buy a laptop for college, and all my options for a laptop come with vista. I always hear people complaining about vista, so I'm wondering what's so wrong with it? And if there's a way to change the laptop to have it run on xp instead?

Answer 1

vista is good but it has many problems right now and it is not too much stable but it is fine you can work with it

also many people who have problems with vista or don't like it they can dual boot with XP so they can work on both and enjoy XP stabelity and Vista new features

or you can by a Mac and but vista with it so you can work on both Mac osx and Vista os(Mac books are really good laptops you can go and check it on apple.com if you wish)

good luck

Answer 2

Vista is actually getting better now.

Since the Service Pack 1 release, it's slowly getting better.  As far as interface options, you can change it to look and operate more like Windows XP.

If you *need to*, you can format the computer entirely and do a fresh install of Windows XP.

I suggest giving Vista a shot, and if you hate it, get one of your savvy computer friends to format and install XP.

Answer 3

You'll find that the nay sayers when it comes to vista are the people who are either afraid of change, or their computers aren't capable of running vista smoothly. There's some new features people don't care for in vista but they could stop complaining and disable them (i.e. user account controls).  

Answer 4

I hate ALL types of software from Microsoft. Buy the laptop, wipe Vista, and install Ubuntu. For XP you have to buy the CD and install it over Vista. Vista takes up much more memory then XP, has more bugs, and has less driver support.

http://www.ubuntu.com/

Answer 5

Complaints about Vista:

Hogs memory (no, it caches with it like Linux and OSX do)

Incompatible: Yes, but mostly with proprietary business apps and real old games. Don't cry if you have to pitch a webcam or scanner, though

User Interface: Well, it's slower, and also unintuitive. Some stuff can be disabled, but power users will still be disoriented

Slower: If you have a fast computer, only disk transfers are bad

So you want to downgrade:

First step is to write down all hardware in laptop. You can get a list from the drivers on the site of whomever made the machine. Then get versions compatible with XP from all the various Taiwanese OEM sites like Realtek. Install Windows XP, either alongside or over Vista. Then install your drivers and applications.