Here's the deal.

My next PC more than likely won't be around until way later, but it never hurts to start planning for one early.

How does Vista respond to XP software (i.e. older PC games designed for XP)? Can you play them on Vista using XP compatibility mode and that way tell the computer it's an XP game? I'm not sure how Vista treats old software, even for DOS.

I assume Vista will still be around when I get one, or they might even pull the plug on it and make a new OS, I don't know. It will be kinda old by the time I can afford a new PC. Even the ok gaming computers never come cheap these days, so hopefully I'll have enough saved by then.

All input is appreciated.

Vista runs most games that I've tried well, but there could be the occasional glitch here and there, if the game company doesn't fix any vista compatibilities. Some games will require you to actually run in admin mode, especially when they have autopatchers built in.

Vista takes a lot more resources than XP though. You may need 4gb of RAM to get the max out of vista, while you can do really well with 1gb of RAM in XP.

The only game I had problems with was PSO Blue Burst... the game itself run fine, but the typing/keyboard features didn't work at all... So, you couldn't type to people..

I believe vista will be around for awhile, because they're kind of using a different distribution method. There are probably 20 different distributions for the price range and options you want with it. Each new distribution will have just a few various other features that MS thinks justifies costing a few dollars more, and I believe you can actually pay for and download the upgrades online, as opposed to just buying the full or upgrade retail versions in store shelves.

You've got me. All I've heard was bad stuff about Vista. It's like ME.