What Will You Need For Vista?

Although Microsoft's Windows Vista is still months away from general release, your customers and users are most likely pounding you with questions about the new OS now. In this Recipe, I'll offer some answers to help you (and them) plan for a smooth transition to Vista.

In this Recipe, I'll cover the known hardware requirements for the upcoming OS, what components you need to be looking at for the new systems you'll be building, and what updates are likely to be needed for existing systems to run Vista at its full potential. I'll also walk you through installing and running the Windows Vista Upgrade Advisor to get a better sense of what version of Vista will be best for your customers.

But first, there's the timing issue. Namely, when will a final version of Vista ship? Well, Beta 2 was released in June, and Microsoft now says final Vista products will be available to businesses and OEMs in November. General release to consumers, Microsoft says, is now set for January 2007. But some industry analysts say a more likely ship date is mid-2007.

Regardless of when Vista is finally released, there's enough available now to examine Vista's major selling points: ease-of-use, top-notch security, robust search, and improved management functionality. Microsoft has posted a good summary of Vista's features on this page.

For example, on the ease-of-use front, Vista's user interface has been redesigned to be intuitive and visually appealing—taking a cue from Mac OS X—and it also features a slick new graphical user interface (GUI) called Aero. But Aero is optional and isn't even included in the base version of the OS. Still, it's certain to be one of the reasons that people are drawn to the Vista in the first place. Aero looks great, with lots of rounded edges and translucent windows. All this beauty comes at a price, however; Aero requires some hefty graphics horsepower.

On the security side, Vista is more tightly integrated with Microsoft's anti-malware tools than WinXP is. Also, Vista supports advanced security features, such as hard-drive encryption and a new feature called Windows Service Hardening, which helps prevent virus, spyware and other malware from messing with critical system-level components. Vista also includes features to make it easier and faster to find files, manage wireless networks, and integrate with backup and system-recovery tools.

Vista System Requirements

For starters, check out Microsoft's recently launched Windows Vista: Get Ready site, which compiles lots of material about Vista, including features, functionality, and minimum system requirements.

But minimum system requirements are a funny thing. Microsoft doesn't want to dissuade users of older or lower-end PCs from upgrading to Vista. Yet at the same time, the company doesn't want to over-promise to high-end users, either. The result: recommended minimums are way too low for a true production system.

For the Vista launch, Microsoft is pushing two main systems requirements categories: Windows Vista Capable and Windows Vista Premium Ready. This lets manufacturers and system builders build and sell systems today that will support all or most of the Vista functionality as it's released.

Any system that is Windows Vista Capable will be able to install and run the OS and its core new features, such as security enhancements and search improvements. What it probably won't do, however, is run the Aero GUI, which requires a higher-end graphics processor. It's also likely to be pretty sluggish, due to the slower main processor and the less-than-ideal RAM included.

In any event, here are the official Windows Vista Capable minimum requirements:

• 800 MHz processor
• 512 MB RAM
• 15 GB of free hard-drive space
• DirectX 9-capable graphics card (An old-school Super VGA graphics card will work, but the graphics and resolution won't be as rich.)

Next, a system called Windows Vista Premium Ready supports all of the main features, including security enhancements and search improvements, as well as having the capacity to run Aero. Here are the Vista Premium Ready minimum requirements:

• 1 GHz processor
• 1 GB RAM
• 15 GB of free hard-drive space
• DirectX 9 capable graphics card with 128 MB of memory and support for WDDM and Pixel Shader 2.0

The main difference between Capable and Ready is a lot more RAM—and I believe Microsoft's recommendation of 1 GB is conservative—and a more robust graphics card. A system with an integrated video card sharing system memory is almost certainly not going to cut it.

Bottom line: The more RAM and graphics horsepower you're willing to throw at Vista, the better your customer's experience is likely to be.