Windows Vista: Is It Time To Upgrade?

By Mike McGann
Posted Monday, January 29, 2007

When Microsoft releases an operating system upgrade, well, it’s hard to miss. Undoubtedly, the debut of Vista, more than five years in the making, will likely be splashed all over the Super Bowl, probably with some rock anthem, such as “Start Me Up.”

So, you might ask, should I upgrade my computer? In the short term, the answer is probably no. That’s one of the reasons corporate America has been slow to switch to Vista, even those business or enterprise customers have been able to buy the new operating system since the end of November.

I have to say “probably” because unlike Windows 95 (of which I had an early press copy) and Windows 98, (which I beta tested) I haven’t used Vista myself yet — as I wasn’t one of the lucky bloggers to be sent a free high-end laptop. Thankfully, the company has released a lot of detail about the OS — the most telling of which are the hardware requirements which are considerable for all but the most barebones version of the operating system.

And the fact that there are so many versions of the operating system is more worrisome. With Windows XP, there were three versions: Home, Professional and Server, the last very expensive and primarily for use in enterprise environments. To be blunt, even with the service patches and upgrades, XP Home is something of a mess — and I actually prefer Windows 2000 Professional to it (which is what runs on my old Dell laptop, used for video measurements with a Sencore 5000 color analyzer). The more expensive XP Professional is much more sturdy and recommended, as it is mostly Win 2000 with a nicer interface.

As such, the educated Windows user knew that for any serious work, you bought (and didn’t upgrade, either, as that seemed to open a whole new can of worms) XP Pro from the get go. XP Home is good for kids and causal users who could endure the “blue screen of death” from time to time.

There seem to be five distinct flavors of Vista, although all will ship on the same disc. Users will be able to upgrade their version by entering an upgrade code, when purchases from Microsoft.

There seems to be analogues to XP Server (Vista Enterprise) and XP Pro (Vista Business) and then three versions for the home: Home Basic, Home Premium and Home Ultimate.

None are particularly inexpensive and all require a lot of current PCs to add more RAM and possibly an improved video card. Home basic, the least expensive upgrade package ($99 for an upgrade from XP, $199 for a start from scratch install), has been called something of a stripped OS by some and even Microsoft says its basically only okay for surfing the Web, using e-mail and looking at digital photos. Despite this, you’ll still need 512 MB of RAM and at least 32 MB of graphics memory, which locks out a number of PCs from just a few years ago with onboard graphics.

The Home Premium version of Vista is what Microsoft calls its “preferred” edition, meaning most of the cool new stuff in Vista doesn’t come with Home Basic. Still, Premium adds Windows Media Center and the new cool “Aero” interface. The upgrade version is $159, while the full-blown stand alone version is $239. But the big hit is the graphics requirements: 128 MB of graphics memory, Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware and 32 bits per pixel. No on-board graphics card (at least ones out there now) are going to meet this requirement. In fact, a number of dedicated graphics cards don’t meet this standard. Of course, you also need 1 GB of RAM.

Then there’s the Ultimate version, which adds the ability to run a full-motion desktop, everything in Vista Premium and everything in Vista Business, plus Texas Hold ‘Em poker. While the hardware requirements are the same as for Premium, the price jumps to $259 for the upgrade, and $399 for the stand-alone package.

Whew. In the short term, the average PC user might find themselves shelling out $600 or more between the software and the needed upgrades. Is it worth it?

That’s the big question, of course. Microsoft says that Vista offers improved protection from viruses, bots and trojans, but only time in the field will be able to prove that one way or the other. If true, it might be worthwhile to consider either upgrading or buying a new PC.

On the flipside, there’s also concerns about how severe the new digital rights management scheme is in Vista and whether it could keep you from your music and other files. That’s another case where letting others discover the truth, whatever it is, might be the smartest course.

Until then, most sensible people will watch and wait. While the excitement of finally having a new Windows operating system for the first time in five years is obvious, with all of the issues of the past half-decade, this is one time you might not want to be too close to the bleeding edge.