I do see your point and I can see why people think it's a user error.
However, I think I have exhausted nearly every option available to me.
I reinstalled Vista a total of five times, using different versions (Ultimate, Business, and Basic). Each version had the same problem - once I install the nVidia drivers, my pc locks up - and booting up becomes impossible.
I do think the problem lies in drivers - either Vista doesn't like nVidia's drivers (doubt it) or Asus's own Vista drivers are incompatible with nVidia's Vista drivers etc, etc.
I am frusturated mainly in that it took me a whole day messing around with Vista, but still no go whereas a 30 min install of XP resulted in ZERO problems.
Vista isn't so bad - it's just that it shouldn't have so many hardware incompatibilites.
And for the record, Vista was my first choice - having a 9800GTX meant that I really wanted DX10, but for now, I'm stuck with XP and DX9.