I am about to get a new PC from work, and it will include the option to have either Vista Business as the OS, or a downgrade to XP Pro. Aside from a tiny bit of testing, I have never used Vista, but overall I have heard many more bad reports than good regarding Vista. I don't think that hardware will be an issue (Intel Core Duo T9300, 4GB RAM, 256MB NVIDIA) in terms of performance. I am just uneasy about using Vista for my main dev system given its history, when I have the opportunity to keep on using XP.
So is there anyone here who has experience with both Vista and XP as the OS on your dev machine? If you could choose one over the other, which would you go with? I will need to use Visual Studio 2003/2005/2008, SQL Server 2005, Virtual Machines, Office, as well as lots of multi-tasking and multi-tab web browsing.
(Note: I am not interested in Microsoft-bashing. If you haven't used Vista but have just heard bad things about it then you have the same level of experience as me and you probably shouldn't be answering the question).
Edit: As I am getting this computer from work I would prefer to use one of the operating systems offered: 32 bit XP PRO or 32 bit Vista.
If you run into problems with Vista and Visual Studio 2003 or 2005, try running it as administrator (Right-click, Run as Administrator). That solves the vast majority of the issues, especially when working with IIS, BizTalk, etc.
I have just purchased a new 'barebones' box that came with Vista as the OS. I was apprehensive, having heard much bad press over time about Vista, but it runs just fine here.
On that basis, I'd say save the extra money you (probably) get charged for the "downgrade" and buy some more RAM instead.
An important thing to note is that Vista does not support Visual Studio 2003, check out Visual Studio and Windows Vista
With Vista SP 1 you no longer waste the 0.5-1GB RAM, it now able to see the full 4GB. Though having said that, this microsoft site doesn't say that it can use all of the 4GB RAM. It says that it can report on all of it. :)
Although Vista doesn't "support" Visual Studio 2003 it does work fine - I spent a year working on web-forms, win-forms & windows service projects using .net 1.1 in VS2003 without any problems. MS have an issues list at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vs2005/bb188244.aspx
Vista64 would definately be my choice.
I use Vista Business on my home rig, and do a lot of development there and love it.
My work rig is XP, and its fine too.
I use Vista x64 on my primary development machine. It runs everything from Visual Studio 6.0 through 2008 with no trouble.
It's not a giant leap forward, but I prefer it to XP.
If you ever need XP for anything, Virtual PC is free and works well. I keep an XP VPC image handy for testing in XP, IIS6, and IE6. The best of both worlds.
Of course, you could always get Windows Mojave instead!
In response to the question edit: I used Vista x86 for about 6 months before switching to x64. Same opinion.
Just keep in mind that you'll be wasting 0.5-1.0gb of your RAM with x86. You should be able to get nearly free x64 media here. Your license is good for both editions.