XP or Vista?

[Da6onet]

I will sign up if someone can answer me this question. I'm using the pre-installed Vista on my new computer right now. I'm debating whether or not to clean install XP or if I should just stick with Vista. It is a pretty looking OS, but I know it will run slower.
so...
Keep Vista, clean off all the crapware and install MxO
Install XP and have a dual boot setup with MxO running on XP
Clean install XP

?

[Ash]

speaking from experience I would agree with Bell's suggestion.

[Jeyk]

I vote for dual boot, just so long as it's not a major inconvenience to you.

[Da6onet]

I vote for dual boot, just so long as it's not a major inconvenience to you.

I guess my only hang up is that I don't have a purchased copy of Vista Ultimate whereas I have XP Pro (both 32 and 64 bit versions).

So once I wipe out Vista, it's possible I may never have it again! I guess I just need to know if I'm doing something wrong by wiping it's existence from the hard drive.

[Tecknik]

I've been told that a lot of the newer hardware does not have available XP drivers, so that people can't just wipe Vista and install XP.  My ex-girlfriend's father did that to her laptop.  Bought a brand new laptop that came with Vista, wiped it, and installed XP.  It never ran properly.  Would lock-up, and blue screen.  I'd look into drivers before doing anything.

[Anonymous]

I have split this topic so that we can keep Broin's original on target.

And Da6, I would keep Vista.  If you have a decent enough (mid range) system it will run fine, and you'll enjoy the new features.

[Lithium]

I've recently been debating this myself.

I ran into some XP troubles a few weeks ago. My laptop would crash when trying to load the login screen and basically start an infinite loop. Safe mode failed to load also. So I ran a recovery off the install disk. It redid all my system files and put me back into the year 2005 probably... lol. But there in lies the problem. Windows Update fails to work. I searched google for solutions and found nothing. I manually upgraded WMP and IE but there are 90+ security updates and I sure as hell am not going to download them one by one. I also started to experience some weird glitches with my mouse lagging even after reinstalling drivers.

I have a Dell XPS M1210, it is not slow by any means. I get a near free copy of Vista Ultimate from school. So I am debating between a few things, upgrading and hoping that it solves the problems, doing a clean install of XP and going thru the hassle of reinstalling everything not to mention key validation on one time use software.

I was also thinking about building a mid-range desktop again and trading my XPS for a Tablet PC since I wouldn't need so much graphics power in a laptop. Except I am not sure what Tablet PC to go for. I like the  HP tx1000 but the passive digitizer scares me since it is less accurate than an active digitizer. So if I decide to trade in I want to save my Vista copy for the Tablet instead of waisting it on the XPS.

I know I wrote a lot, heh, but I really am looking for some advice and opinions. So any replies would be awesome!

[Anonymous]

Don't upgrade XP to Vista, it's not worth the headache.  Back up your personal files, wipe and install - Vista has not crashed once on me yet but I had all sorts of user profile crap when I originally did an upgrade before I wiped and restarted.  Like you I had previously had XP die on me again and refuse to update many programs for no reason whatsoever.

[NoCry]

i have dual operating system; works well.

[Subb]

Don't upgrade to Vista.

What's in your wallet? (sorry just had to!)

Erm, I'm no expert! But from what I've heard... XP's better.

[Anonymous]

Also if you do go Vista Lith, it can't hurt to get a 4GB USB disk to use for ReadyBoost (make sure it's certified for speed), I do and it really does make a difference when gaming or reading forums with laggy sigs.

[Lithium]

I was really leaning toward a tablet too... any experiences with different brands or anything?

[Pirus]

Don't upgrade to Vista.

What's in your wallet? (sorry just had to!)

Erm, I'm no expert! But from what I've heard... XP's better.

It's not that XP is better its that vista is just new.  In all honesty XP was slower than ME in the beginning.  Then all the updates came crawling in and its performance sky rocketed.  Vista too was a bit slugish it is now getting better and better.  I personally have it and have had no troubles other than a slight video card problem but thats a compatability issue with the 8800's and vista.  The 7 series and under cards work fine. From what I have read Vista has the potential to be far faster than xp... then again having potential and reaching it are 2 different things.

[Tbone]

I have a hard time believing XP was slower than ME. Did you ever use ME? I did. The memory leak was insane!

[Lithium]

Well the good news is I fixed the windows update problem. Seems I had to reregister a bunch of windows update dll files... pretty dumb lol. Now I need to see if the updates fix my mouse lag or if that is something else... I'll probably keep XP now for a while.