So I installed the final version of Vista from a friend of mine, and I've been running it on my laptop for 48 hours. I have 3 days left until it becomes crippled and I have to buy a key. It's a very nice upgrade from XP. The look and feel is completely different, but you can still tell it's Windows. "Security" seems to be a big priority at Microsoft these days and I can't change anything without getting a popup confirming that I was the one who requested the change, or program install, or server connection, etc etc. It can all be disabled though.
As far as stability goes, I wouldn't install it on any work machine that you depend on just yet. The OS itself is extremely stable but 3rd party apps are not. Even the ones labeled "Vista Ready" are crashing all the time. My touchpad drivers, video card drivers, Firefox (big surprise?), and a few other apps like my file explorer, FTP program. I'd give it a few months till everything calms down.
The UI is pretty. Very colorful, and the glass effect is real cool. All actions are animated, but really smoothly now. The sound theme is no longer obnoxious like it was in all the past Windows. These features in combination provide a very pleasant experience.
As far as stability goes, I wouldn't install it on any work machine that you depend on just yet. The OS itself is extremely stable but 3rd party apps are not. Even the ones labeled "Vista Ready" are crashing all the time. My touchpad drivers, video card drivers, Firefox (big surprise?), and a few other apps like my file explorer, FTP program. I'd give it a few months till everything calms down.
The UI is pretty. Very colorful, and the glass effect is real cool. All actions are animated, but really smoothly now. The sound theme is no longer obnoxious like it was in all the past Windows. These features in combination provide a very pleasant experience.
