The saviour that was meant to be, Vista Service Pack 1, isn’t. In some cases it’s actually a performance decrease for an operating system already grinding up-to-date PCs to a halt. XP fans (for the most part) are happily using Service Pack 3, and Windows 7 (formerly known as Blackcomb) is barking at the gates (or should that be Gates?), ready for an early release in Q3 2009. Windows Vista never stood a chance.

Not much has gone right for Microsoft’s fledgling OS. First it was delayed over three years (initially it was meant to be a stopgap between XP and 7, but then turned into a fully fledged OS), then stories of incompatible software and drivers surfaced. Most recently Vista Service Pack 1 was pulled from Automatic Download. Now that it’s back up and running it could very well be the one and only service pack ever released for the struggling OS.

Microsoft has shot itself in the foot in two ways with regards to Vista. Firstly, it went ahead with the release of Service Pack 3 for the hugely popular Windows XP. Secondly, its progress on Windows 7 and its potential release ahead of schedule has been extensively covered by the media. What this means is that consumers who were reluctant to switch from a perfectly reliable XP SP2 to Vista now have no reason to. They have a fresh upgrade in SP3 that should be able to see them through the roughly 1.5 years until Windows 7 hits shelves.

No matter what kind of reluctant computer user you are, swapping to Vista just doesn’t make sense anymore. There are a few different perspectives you can look at it from. It’s hard to come up with reasons for broad groups of computer users, like gamers, business users and home users to migrate to Vista as well.

Gamers especially should be running for the hills whenever they hear the word Vista. Yes, it’s the only way you can get DirectX 10, but is that really a big enough carrot to dangle in front of gamers? Not by a long shot. While DirectX 10 delivers a significant improvement in graphics, Vista provides a significant drop off in performance, even with SP1. In fact, it’s been proven that installing SP1 could actually make your PC slower. What’s more, over a year after Vista was released, there still isn’t a compelling enough library of games that make good enough use of DirectX 10 to justify the upgrade (around 20 only if Wikipedia is to be believed). It’s no wonder gaming PC manufacturers like Alienware and NRG by Altech have only just switched over to supplying their machines with Vista.

Business users are in the same boat. Most important to them is reliability and security. But Vista isn’t any better than XP in either reliability or security. Most of the security issues with XP were fixed with SP2 and even more have been fixed with SP3. Any additional problems are more than likely to have been dealt with by third party tools and applications. Reliability is a non-contest. XP has a five-year head start. Add to this the fact that the reason SP1 was pulled from Automatic Download was an issue with Microsoft’s Dynamic RMS software used by small to medium businesses and the Vista doesn’t seem all that welcoming.

Furthermore, business users are well aware of the fact that there are still plenty of drivers and software that won’t play nice with the OS, a particular problem for small businesses requiring obscure software. Financially, it wouldn’t be a smart idea for them either. The cost of upgrading an entire company to Windows Vista can’t be justified if another operating system is just around the corner.

Even general home users have no reason to upgrade. This is the group that doesn’t mind using technology that’s not at the forefront. They use PCs for email, music, the Internet and minesweeper. Upgrading from XP to Vista will likely turn a working PC into a sloth if users have less than 2GB of memory, and it can become quite costly if they need to upgrade their PC’s specs to handle the transition on top of purchasing the OS.

If they wait a year and a half they’ll have a new computer with Windows 7. And so far the signs are good that Windows 7 will definitely be worth the wait. Rumours suggest that it will include a completely new user interface, inbuilt virtualisation to run old software (please let it be true), and an all-new kernel. The simple fact is Microsoft can’t make the same mistakes as it has with Vista. Those boys and girls at Redmond are smart cookies, even if they do make the odd slip up (what the hell was Windows Me?), so you can expect Windows 7 to have learnt from its predecessor’s mistakes.

Vista hasn’t been a commercial flop though. Since it went on sale in January 2007, Microsoft reports that it has sold over 140 million copies of the operating system. But as Mark Raby of TG daily pointed out, Vista sales actually defy consumer demand. If you buy a new computer you get a copy of Vista, whether you like it or not. The demand for downgrading has been so strong that HP, Dell, Lenovo, Fujitsu and Gateway, among others, have all jumped on the downgrade bandwagon. Fujitsu even included an XP disc with some of the Vista computers. But to downgrade you first need to buy a computer with a copy of Vista. Game, set, match, Microsoft.

The cat’s out of the bag now, you simply don’t need Vista. Microsoft could have kept the gravy train going quite easily by abandoning XP SP3 and/or concealing its release plans for Windows 7. For some reason Microsoft decided it would be a good idea to publicise a possible 2009 release for Windows 7 while giving off mixed signals with XP by halting sales of new computers with the OS but releasing the SP3 upgrade. Consumers should probably be thankful for this though. Without SP3 and knowing the release date for Windows 7 it would have been a safe assumption that Vista would have a long shelf life, considering the delays and the amount of money that went into its production. Initially it was earmarked as the next big thing for Microsoft, indeed the next Windows 95 almost. Instead, Microsoft has just created Windows Me 2.
Source- GadgetZone