Ask Lifehacker: Should I upgrade to Vista now or wait?
A well thought out response from one of my favorite sites.
Should you upgrade your current machine to Vista? That really depends on your current hardware and how willing you are to be a beta tester for Microsoft.
- Is your current PC hardware SMOKIN’ FAST? (It needs to be)
- Can you deal with living on the “pre-service-pack-one” bleeding edge? (You WILL bleed at some point)
- Do you NEED Windows Vista for any pressing reason in particular? (Hmmmm…. uhhhh… hmmm….)
If you are perfectly happy with Windows XP on your existing computer then I would hang tight and then go to Vista on your next computer. Speaking as an IT guy who has created a lot of work for himself by needlessly upgrading systems in the past: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! Just keep your XP up to date and make sure you renew your anti-virus subscription.
If you REALLY want to spend some money and upgrade, go buy yourself an Apple Macbook Pro and spend some time in virus-free, secure, and intuitive Mac OS X. Then fire up Parallels and install XP or Vista as a virtual machine if you absolutely must run one or two Windows applications like MS Access or Visio. I know lots of people who have switched to Macs and I don’t know any who would go back to Windows full time…
