Should I upgrade to Vista?

I get a lot of questions like "Should I upgrade to Vista? I hear it sucks!".

First off, I get annoyed at "I hear..." comments. They haven't even seen, much less used Visa, yet they have decided that it "sucks"... I'll get more into that subject later.

As to whether or not you should upgrade to Vista, I'd have to say the short answer is "No, unless you need to." Vista's requirements basically rule out most existing PC's out there that are running Windows 95, 98, 2000 and XP. To be able to install and run Vista with reasonable performance will almost certainly require upgrading the hardware. They don't have sufficient memory, hard drive space, video card and CPU. The cost of upgrading quickly becomes more than it's worth. Better to buy a new computer.

Even if there is sufficient hardware (or the upgrade cost is low enough), now you have to be concerned as to whether your software and peripherals (scanner, printer, etc) will run. If you are lucky, there are updates that will let it work. In some cases, you will have to buy a new version of a software program. In any event, there could be a lot of work that many people are not prepared to do.

Another factor is that Microsoft will almost certainly release Windows 7 which is a newer operating system., later this year (early next year at the latest). Those of us who have used the betas will say that it seems very robust and better than Vista.

If you are thinking of upgrading, and can wait, I would suggest waiting for Windows 7 (probably in the 4th quarter). If you are thinking of buying a new computer, you might wait until July. the word out is that PCs shipped after June will include a free upgrade to Windows 7 when it is available.

Bottom line is that it's seldom a good idea to upgrade an operating system unless necessary. Either do a "clean" install (wipe out everything) or buy a new computer.

Hope this helps....