Vista: Buy a PC Preinstalled or Upgrade Yourself?

Let me put it simply: If you want a machine with Vista on it, you're absolutely crazy if you purchase a computer now and try to upgrade it later. There's simply no reason to do it yourself.

First off, I don't see much (if any) difference in pricing among machines preloaded with either operating system. The price vendors like Dell and HP pay to Microsoft for licenses of Vista is likely about the same as they pay for XP, so consumers should not expect a huge run-up in cost as vendors are forced to upgrade their offerings.

But most vendors are offering free (or cheap) upgrade coupons for Vista for any machines you purchase now. So does it make sense to jump for one of these deals? I'd advise against it: Installing any Windows OS can present you with problems if you're a novice, and with a brand new operating system like Vista, the problems will be even bigger. Some expect that Vista's hunger for specs will make for a more copious wealth of upgrade headaches than ever before, and I tend to agree. Even if Dell sends you a disc designed specifically for your machine, with all the drivers intact, I am dead certain that a portion of users are going to find it buggy.

Let's say you're a tech pro and you are comfortable doing the upgrade yourself. Still, I wouldn't recommend it if for no other reason than I can think of a better way to spend the hour-plus it will take to run the upgrade. Let the people who sold you the PC do the upgrade for you.

This advice only applies to people intending to purchase a new PC in the near future. If you want to upgrade your existing PC with Vista make sure it can handle it: If it's more than a year old, you're advised to purchase a new computer with Vista preinstalled, and I'd recommend you wait as long as possible to upgrade if you're still sold on doing it yourself. The only people who may want to upgrade sooner are gamers. Vista will be the only way to get DirectX 10, which will power some of 2007's most coveted PC games, including Crysis. If you absolutely must play this game immediately and don't want to buy new hardware, well, Vista will be on store shelves on January 30. Good luck!