Just wait 'til Vista decides it's not an "authentic" version -- and shuts itself off *immediately* after telling you to go to Shaitan-im-Redmond's homepage to revalidate your O/S.

Now imagine the fun you'd have if you'd had to do that from Pakistan.

You'll notice that no one has ever seen a picture of Bill Gates and Beelzebub together...

Vista isn't very good. I do like the glitz I really am that shallow I guess but it's a black box operating system which assumes every user is thick as a plank stupid. The disk management tools stink which I've had to find out the hard way.

The new office has an odd interface which hasn't yet really gelled with me either.

You could try openoffice which can import and export office files. I find myself using it more and more. You could replace Vista with linux too but that's a bit more involved.

I have beliefs about the environment but Al Gore is definitely not an ideal poster child.

From the start, Vista had bugs and I refused an offer for a free computer because it had Vista on it. Microsoft always rushes to market in an effort to seem competitive and they always get bit in the ass because of it. The lack of stability has caused many companies (Dell leading the way) to offer new computers with XP as a means of mitigating the problem and to retain customers.

End all of the hassle! Abandon Microsoft!

Go to www.ubuntu.com and download the desktop edition. Write the resulting .iso file to a CD.

Boot from the CD. Try OpenOffice and see if it will suit you as well as Office 2007. OpenOffice will read and write the Microsoft created files. You will hsve the choice of saving new or modified files in Microsoft's format (.doc, .xls, etc.) or the native OpenOffice format. If it works for you, install it on your hard drive. All it will cost you is a little time.

I enjoy the farm tales. Keep it up.

Don

What Don said.

When I next have to get a new computer the odds are good that I'll simply go straight to Ubuntu on it. I had a notebook lose its hard drive. Put in a new drive, loaded Ubuntu. It's the second oldest computer we have running and it appears to be the fastest.

Or, to put it more succinctly: when you work for a major company and your code is bloated, buggy, and slow: it ships Tuesday because that's what the schedule says.

When you're part of an open-source project and your code is a little 'off': programmers around the world laugh at you and rewrite your code.

Stay away from the latest beta and you should be fine.

Just wait until you wade into Excel. It too is a "treat". And you will "love" (not) the native 2007 file formats. Is it because we are not 19 any more and don't embrace everything new and different just because we don't know any better (or rather because it annoys the elders?). I don't think so. As each release of Microsoft product I see come out, I see a reflection of attitude of IBM of the 80's.

I worked as a contractor at Microsoft and the better portions of the development community there actually works in the more profitable centers. I expect that in the nine years since they actually had problems getting Windows 2000 out the door they've forgotten the Operating Systems are important and require serious consideration. Also implicit in the equation is that many of their best people retire at age 30 or so, and that nobody great enough may be at the helm.

Yes, Vista sucks, and I will not be purchasing it now or ever. I can get by with Linux and old XP installs for game if I have to. My advice is to decide what you need and work with that. I am of course available for consultation if you need help with software matters, Beth.