I used Vista for several years. Didn't switch even after 7 was released, even though I had a license (on account of being a beta tester). I'm using 7 now, and it's a little better, but not significantly so. The switch from XP to Vista was a much bigger upgrade IMO. It's a perfectly fine OS that's a little high on resource use. So far my sister has no problem with it, (and UAC is on).

For me and my sister using Vista was like pulling teeth. I go whimper in corner every time anyone asks me to fix computer with Vista installed. I'm starting to have same symtoms with Windows 8. Recondation to both is to install actual OS to replace the installed torturing device. Devs of both should be hanged for crimes against humanity. Is it too late to sue MS for pain, suffering and hair loss?

Windows seems to be getting it right on every other OS. XP was innovative and over time became very stable, Vista was the spawn of the devil, Win7 is what I'm running and it's the best so far. I've not used Win8 but having looked at various reviews from trusted sources, I'm not in a hurry to find out.

True, look at Win2K and WinXP, which were consecutive OSes. Oh, wait...
Also, the "Every other OS" only works if you discard half the versions of Windows, for various reasons (Server only, same as previous, I'll give you that one etc)

Why? Vista was crappy pre-SP1, though a large part of that was the lack of good drivers (or any drivers for some hardware). But I'd love to know what you hate about Vista SP2. Sure there are some niggles that Windows 7 solves, but I can't think of anything substantial.

By the way, I might upgrade my father to Linux instead of Vista. It all depends which OS will support its favourite card game collection better. Frankly I've always had a hard time with Linux, but a system with basic hardware should hopefully work without problem, and out of the box Intel graphics performance should be pretty good from what I've read.

Well technically I've only used Vista when I've been called to repair them (primarily my sisters vista laptop, that one probably more than 100 times by now) so I can't really comment much on use other than each and every one of them have been slower than any XP or Win7 machine I've ever tested/used. Slow startup and shutdowns, slow at starting programs, sometimes even running them. High memory usage even after system restore/reinstall with nothing else installed and after I cleaned it from useless programs (most odd was that before memory upgrade system reserved 800MB and after over 1GB). Unexplained system bloat over time. Numerous problems with windows update (never finished, numerous failures with installing updates). System gradually slowing down to the point half of the time shutting down involved forced shut down, starting up had to be done several times to get it to start properly and eventually they'll fail to start at all and had to be taken back to store for reinstall (no hardware problems or so they claim). Oh right, system restore never worked (actually, now that I think about it, for me it has never worked even on my own win7), the restore above ment from system backup disks.

All these in addition to all the gazzillion problems with UAC (fucking thing stopped installation of windows updates and even microsofts own Live SILENTLY after prompting half a dozen times do I really want to install). While UAC was toned down for Win7 it still works erratically at best (installing 7-zip in 2 different win7 laptops: 1st installs fine but for the 2nd program installs but I could not get the right click drop down menu options to appear. Tried 32&64-bit, install as adminstator, install outside program files et all).

Modifying registry entries requires elevated privileges. Install 7-zip normally, run it as administrator, select to add the context menu.
Or add it to registry manually (which will still require you to run regedit as administrator).

Obviously tired running the program as admin too, but no go. They weren't my laptops so I wouldn't have dared to touch registry even if I knew what to fiddle. Still does not explain why the installation works on some but not others (heck, it can workd differenly on same computer after system reinstall, probably different version of the program thought). It's probably UAC (altought, unlike with games, installing outside program files does not help any), but never figured out why same program works differently in different systems with same OS. Ahh, I missed the time when everyone was on XP and everything just worked.

Recently installed 7-zip and also had some troubles getting everything as it should be. Trouble is that 7-zip assumes everyone runs everything as super user and that normal accounts are non-existent. So finding what you have to run elevated and what not is a matter of experience and guesswork.

True, I recall the "fun" time I had trying to get power users able to burn CDs, took me only 3 days to do so. It was on Win2K instead of XP, but still...

As for adding stuff to right click, it's not that hard.

Yeah, right. Simple and easy ;-p. There was a time when I messed around with lot of stuff, registry included, as a hobby. But that was back when I naively believed I had more than snow balls change in hell of getting a job at IT field (have 3 degrees in IT, 9 years of my life wasted). Then I realised every company interested in 'hiring' me are only interested as long as they think I'll be willing to work for free. On top of that every relative and distant acquaintance expects me to come to solve their computer problem any time they need and might give me 5-10€ or food for half days work. Not that there's ANY work available these days. So thanks for the link but I doubt I bother with that stuff anymore.

I was also on Win XP before I switched to Win 7 x64. I was a bit skeptical at first but after a while I got used to it and I am very satisfied with it now. I saw Vista at my friends computer and it was awful. It seems like every second windows is good :)

For the first point, I mean this in the context of keeping with what works and not just blindly "chasing the rainbow" when you have something that already meets your needs. XP can play 99% of the games out there and would have full capability far into the future beyond what the naysayers and fearmongerers would have you believe.

I don't disagree with the point on technology advances, but most advancements I've seen over the past 10 or so years have been reinvention (EG - Facebook is really just public email. Twitter is just really stripped down concise-by-requirement public email. Touchscreens are just a cludgy mouse. The list goes on ad infinitum) rather than true innovation. I take umbrage with the trend-seeking that occurs as a result of some old thing being repurposed and people acting as if it's the greatest thing ever, because it's, you know, "new and shiny". In other words, the new technology must add objective value. This describes my sentiments well : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSSDeesUUsU

For the last point I haven't measured it to be able to give you some sort of percentage difference. But, consider the OS is not taking a constant file-reading/writing hit on due to the OS detecting there's been an alteration, updates don't occur at a time other than my choosing resulting in a bandwidth and the aforementioned read/write hit, and less ram and CPU are used on the PC overall. There's no free lunch and AV software are notorious resource hogs. So, if you're asking the PC to do something and there becomes a need for those resources to be used elsewhere (read as : on my demand), you won't be getting the full capabilities of your system. It's as simple as that.

But to attempt to answer your question, the effect is noticeable in a significant lack of lag in anything you do on the PC. A good car analogy is akin to turning on the A/C which forces the car to run an extra belt to the compressor which essentially robs horsepower. Removing unnecessary bs is part of the hotrodding process on a PC.

Yeah, IT is a shit field these days. 20 years ago it was a gold mine, now it's intensely over-saturated and competitive as hell. Jobs you used to get 80k+ for 20 years ago are now paying less than half that if you're lucky enough to beat the 20 other people applying for the position. Screw IT.