Hi
I am looking to buy a new laptop and a few companies have said they can install windows XP instead of Vista. I have heard many things about Vista so I am not sure what to do. Any advice would be welcome?
Regards
Paul

Ask yourself what critical apps and externals you currently have that are not yet Vista compatable (or may never be).
If it's going to cost you considerably more $ then just the laptop, go with XP. You can always upgrade later.
On the other hand, if you're Vista ready or can get there cheap, go Vista.

Thank you.
Can you tell me what ctitical applications are you talking about?

Only you would know the answer to that.
What I mean by "critical" is critical to you or your job.
Do a little homework and you'll be fine. Either way, get lots of memory in it. Wether you go Vista now or some time down the road, you'll need it.

hi,,, if you go vista do not get less than 2gig of ram,,, there are some very good laptops going cheap but with only 1 gig,,, dont touch it because it will cost you to up stick the ram to 2 gig,,, you can get a good speck core2 with 2 gig ram for about £450, but remember to shut all unnessory services down as vista has a lot of stuff that is always running in the back ground & contacting back to microsoft which is a pain in the arse & causes disc thrashing,,, go to the Black Viper's site to get guidance as to what to shut down,,,, reading that last bit seams like a good advert for XP,,,,lol,,,, i have a vista & an xp desk top, at first i was not keen on vista but after a few tweeks and some good updates it runs great,, very stable os once you have a play with it,,,,,,,,, good luck

Vista doesn't play well with older applications and hardware. If there's something older that you just can't live without - check to see if it has been updated to be Vista compatible. If not, then you'll want XP.

The most common older things are printers and extra programs that you've installed on your current system.

Many thanks everyone!