I myself was a huge XP lover.. and swaped to vista for DX10(some games just demand it for the looks)
Vista uses more memory .. that is true.. but if you know how to strip it down(just like i did with xp) you can get it to within a reasonable amount(you can push vista into 1gig of ram Running decently) XP could do the same on 500 megs ram.. given the differences.. i dont see that as much of an issue..
To those of you running old comps(Fuzzy yours is a dino btw) my 8800gtx vid card sits in my Media PC.. i use it for DVD's i wont even load SoaSE on it. I have a 4400x2 2.2gig based system as well.. had to drop a 4870x2 in it to make SoaSE even playable the way i like it(max res everything on and lots and lots of planets 10 factions 200 plus planets) I consider this 4400x2(clocked up to 2.4 gigs btw) old as hell.. my wife plays just wow.. and i wont even give it to her when im done with it.. its 4 years old.. for gameing.. thats a Relic.. tommorow i get a new Phenom2 955.. and the first thing im doing is clocking its bus speed up to 210 from 200 just for that extra pinch.. and thats from an XP perspective. In all seriousness.. you should not be gamming on anything under a 2.7gig system.. id consider 2.6gig bare minimum for an xp system.. 2.7gig for a vista.. its no wonder you have issues with vista running that old beast
While im on Ram.. XP.. limited to 3gigs of ram.. Vista64 limited to something like 12gigs.. and yes im aware that most games can only access 2-3gigs.. the fact that background tasks can use up the rest. and leave a full 2 gigs to play with.. i love. XP i had memory issues primaraly with SoaSE(forgive me if i like 200+ planet maps and max AI players. XP just wouldn't handel it.. 4 gigs ram and a 4870x2.. would slow down to like 10 fps on big fights.. on vista worst i get is like 30fps at the same points)
Vista Security.. I cant complain about.. yes its annoying for us decent users who know how to avoid problems.. however the extra features are excelent for when friends or fam use the comp and maynot be so pimp at avoiding crap. Added on the fact you can disable the entire set of security systems from vista and make it run everything just like XP.. i cant complain.
Driver problems.. none existant.. i have not found anything in my home that wont run on vista.. even loaded up Warcraft1 on it(admitedly thru a Dosbox app) hardware.. even my old Soundblaster live i have in a box.. works on vista. The driver update feature for Vista is a huge improvement.
Startbar, dont like the vista Startbar.. change it to classic mode.. all the features of XP's bar.. in a 98 looking bar.. and it works.
As for Resorces.. i disabled Areo glass the day i got vista home.. with that running i lost lots of frames.. turned it off.. problem solved.
For those of you looking to grab windows 7.. the speedtests on it.. have shown.. its almost the same as vista.. very very slight improvement over vista in performance.. and uses compairable ram.. benchmarks are showing less then 5% overall performance gains on a Dual core 2.6 gig Core2 running with 4 gigs of ram and a standard 9500gt..
even testing the marks on it on my system with a 4870x2.. came in at just over 5%.. thats on a RC.. the betas for it were awsome. Odds are the offical release will be even less of an improvement.
Hands down.. in less then 6 months XP will stop getting updates.. and XP users will have to upgrade or fall prey to more Attacks. Added on the fact that some DX10 only games will be comming soon.
Lastly.. just as with 98 i had to upgrade to XP to gain access to all the Harddrive space and dual cores(98 wont run a dualcore rig native that is) i am sure that XP to will have issues at some point with multicore systems.. it already has issues with the Dualcores in terms of balanceing the load out. 8 Cores are comming out by end of the year.. and both intel and AMD have 16 core's planned for 2010.. how much will XP use .. Vista was designed around multicore.. xp had it patched in. Altho towards that im sure windows 7 will handel it even better