Vista: Buy a PC Preinstalled or Upgrade Yourself?

Mon Jan 22, 2007 1:05PM EST

See Comments (52)

Reader Brian Tom writes: I'm looking to purchase a new PC in the near future. Should I wait for Vista to come out and purchase with it already installed or purchase now and upgrade. What are the pros and cons to each option? Will PCs cost more with Vista already loaded? Any advice would be helpful.

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!

Comments on Vista: Buy a PC Preinstalled or Upgrade Yourself?

Post a Comment

Join in the discussion. Here you'll see the comments in the order they were posted.

  • 26 Posted by hibbert415 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 4:18PM EDT Report Abuse

    Grandma: Go for XP. You do not need the expense or hassle of Vista right now.

  • 27 Posted by swedemommi on Thu Sep 3, 2009 9:50PM EDT Report Abuse

    Ive had vista for a week & a half...nothing new, just looks, which arent that different. Don't waste your money...or RAM.

  • 29 Posted by oihonvbere on Thu Sep 3, 2009 7:43PM EDT Report Abuse

    @twomomssib@sbcglobal.net Get one with Vista, there's no reason to get XP over Vista, if all things are equal.

  • 30 Posted by oihonvbere on Thu Sep 3, 2009 7:43PM EDT Report Abuse

    "Ive had vista for a week & a half...nothing new, just looks, which arent that different. Don't waste your money...or RAM." Read a couple of reviews on Vista, you obviously have no ideas what the changes are.

  • 31 Posted by star_fire_annihilate on Thu Sep 3, 2009 9:39PM EDT Report Abuse

    skiena i stick my tounge out at you. as for having a 15gig os, yha i think thats kinda excessive even for the preformance of my machines. even with 4 gigs of ram... and gramps a word of advice from my experiance: wait about 6 months and then go for the vista ready machines (usually after 6 months most of the bugs have been squished) this will also help. http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/upgradeadvisor/ default.mspx you mentioned that you had an older machine. this is the actual vista advisor from microsoft once you download and install run the scan it will take 2 to 10 min depending on how fast you computer is. the program will list the requierments you need for your specific computer. for example the laptop i am using is only a few months old but has a total of 8 requierments that need to be adressed most of them are software related. you should also remember that a computer is only as good as its usefulness to you. "it dosn't make much sense to have a gameing computer if you don't play games on it...."

  • 32 Posted by rdwalton on Thu Sep 3, 2009 8:33PM EDT Report Abuse

    Yeah, buy a MAC so you can void the warranty when you open the case to install memory or anything on the thing.

  • 33 Posted by lethasmith2 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 6:49PM EDT Report Abuse

    To all the people reading this and seeing these emails about go to a MAC. Worthless advice. If you are an average everyday user who surfs the net, does a little digital photography, doesn't play alot of games. Then upgrading to a MAC is a complete waste of money. They look cool, but are way over priced. The only have 3% of the worlds pc market which is a joke and there is a reason for that, think about it...and when people say that Macs are virus free, yeah because no one in the world wants to waste their time hacking something that barely anyone uses. As far as upgrading to Vista, personally if you have XP and your happy with it don't change anything until you have to. You won't gain anything if you are an average pc user like majority of people out there. I do comment the minority if Mac users for being loyal, but lets get over it, 3% of the WORLD uses them, and no one wants to waste time hacking something that most people don't own.

  • 34 Posted by pcwp212000 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 8:04PM EDT Report Abuse

    One would think that MSFT could provide a smooth working new operating system after 5 years of effort. I am sure that is not the case as my previous windows expericnce tells me. As I write this, I can not get the Window update adviser to run on my other machine. The other machine is running a 3.8ghz pentinum 4 with 2gb of ram.

  • 35 Posted by richodur on Thu Sep 3, 2009 8:40PM EDT Report Abuse

    Macs use an ultra-modern industry standard technology called EFI to handle booting. Sadly, Windows XP, and even the upcoming Vista, are stuck in the 1980s with old-fashioned BIOS. But with Boot Camp from Apple, the Mac can operate smoothly in both centuries :-)))))))))

  • 36 Posted by neit_jnf on Thu Sep 3, 2009 7:35PM EDT Report Abuse

    I've got a Gateway Laptop with Mobile AMD64 3700+, 2gigs of ram, ATI X600 with 256 MB hyper memory (128 in the card, 128 shared with ram)... Can it run Vista? Will Vista take advantage of the 64bit processor? Sorry for the newbie questions...

  • 37 Posted by slurpy_007 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 9:28PM EDT Report Abuse

    this article is useless. makes no sense, and will confuse the non tech savvy people. It makes it sound like even my pc will have trouble. AMD Athlon 64 x2 dual, 3 GB Ram, 7900 GT 256 MB ram, 400GB free HDD space. I was hoping more of what he thought of this OS.

  • 38 Posted by brotherjonah on Thu Sep 3, 2009 3:13PM EDT Report Abuse

    I use a REAL Operating System, Linux, which would mean any microsoft product would be a downgrade. If you are really serious about throwing your old machines away because Mr Gates says they are obsolete, and incidentally will, by an extremely good fortune incident, he will sell you a new one, then send the old machines to me.. I can get you a tax deduction for charitable donations http://brotherjonah.biz/ The Widows Might. I won't take the Windows installation off but will add Linux, which is a REAL Upgrade and then donate to educational support charities.

  • 39 Posted by miiiikeee on Thu Sep 3, 2009 7:19PM EDT Report Abuse

    I would just stay away from it period. Get a mac ! Why haven`t They got it together ,along time ago. How much money have u spent due to the fact of there issues. U comp crashes u lost the restore disks ,u use somebodies elses disk and then the want 90 dollars to make it legal. I did the vista test and half my programs say they won`t work. So now i have to hope the company comes out with a fix, if not i have to buy new. Guess who makes money of that for there copy rights. To me it`s only a scam to make money and i hope somebody put`s them in there place. Have u ever felt comfortable using ms and why should it be anything different now.

  • 41 Posted by sfsmiley on Thu Sep 3, 2009 9:14PM EDT Report Abuse

    One word........ OpenSuse. Download it today for FREE.... no catch..... http://opensuse.org free yourself from the clutches of microsoft. Use Linux.

  • 42 Posted by luciain98 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 6:59PM EDT Report Abuse

    I love you guys' suggestion. Later this year will get an IMac, while still will keep my lap-top with XP...or even Linux when I get time to make sure I know how to install and use it better. :))))))) No Vista this year for sure. And no buying for sure too!! :DDDD

  • 43 Posted by newdx4ever99 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 7:36PM EDT Report Abuse

    I am going to make this really easy for most people to understand. If you go back to the article and read the last paragraph, you will see this: "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." In my opinion, Vista is designed for people who constantly need to be seeing the best possible graphics. If all you use your computer for is surfing the net and word processing, stick with XP (or even 2000). IF, on the other hand, you are a hardcore gamer who desperately wants the best possible graphics quality out there, then you are going to want to get Vista for DirectX 10. Of course, what this article fails to mention is that there is currently one 1 graphics card out there that can even support DirectX 10, the GeForce 8800 Series (which is at least a $400 card). 99% of home PC users should just stick with XP for a while.

  • 44 Posted by jonmorandy on Thu Sep 3, 2009 4:40PM EDT Report Abuse

    Mac people just don't get it. Macs are for people who want brainless operation with word processors and email repositories. PC's are for people who want brainless operation with kick-butt 3-d video fog vertex light rendering anamorphic graphics in video games and rendering programs -- without the "Sad Mac" icons that MacAholics are all familiar with. Both machines crash for all sorts of reasons. I've worked on both for years. Mac is for Desktop publishing. PC is for everything else. There is no need yet to upgrade to Vista. Especially at the price that is charged for an operating system. The video card is the primary determination in graphic quality - not the operating system!

  • 45 Posted by neoleopoe on Thu Sep 3, 2009 7:35PM EDT Report Abuse

    I'm a older guy (52yrs.),getting 'deep' into the tech-world,all I can say is the 'world' is changing every sec.,don't wait around for 'stuff' and let it pass you by. Get the 'Vista',learn how to,up-grade,down-load,in-put;or what-ever else you have to do! The 'fun' part about the 'tech-world',is learning how to do things on your 'own',and problem solving.Get out there and get the new 'stuff',you'll have to get it 'sooner' or 'later' anyways! Don't put so much 'drama'into 'Vista',I think 'it's'. . "GGGGRRREEEAAAATTTEEEE!!!!!

Post a Comment

Sign In to Post a Comment

My Tech

Please enable your browser's cookies to activate the My Tech column.

Also on Yahoo! Tech

Computers Home Office Wi-Fi & Networking Phones & PDAs Cameras & Camcorders TV & Home Theater Portable Audio
 

Site Map | Tour | Subscribe to Yahoo! Tech

Question and Answer content at Yahoo! Tech is written by Yahoo! users at Yahoo! Answers. Yahoo! does not evaluate or guarantee the accuracy of any Yahoo! Answers content. For more information, read the Full Disclaimer.

Opinions expressed by the Advisors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of Yahoo! Inc. Yahoo! receives no compensation from any manufacturer or distributor nor does it compensate any Advisor for the coverage of any product or service in any Advisor's content.