Vista: Not Cutting Edge, But Bleeding

On Vista, the magnitude of the revisions to Windows' Graphical User Interface (GUI) has ramped up the requirements for the PC's video hardware appreciably. I am reminded of the days when we switched from the DOS text-based command line interface (CLI) to the new Windows GUI. This is when a high-performance video card first became necessary; it was called the Windows Accelerator because at the time, that was (for the most part) its only real purpose.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. With Vista, even PCs intended only for business use will need a fast 3D video card with at least 128 MB of video memory. These are hardware specs that until very recently were seen only in high-performance rigs used by video-game enthusiasts.

In fact, if you intend to rely on a video chipset that is integrated into your chosen motherboard, be sure to verify that the drivers are Vista compatible. Also, verify that you've got enough memory to handle the Vista GUI. And finally, verify that you also have enough graphics processing power. Vista needs a lot of hardware power.

Also, since integrated video often shares the main system memory, you should go ahead and build your systems with 2 GB of total system RAM. My recommendation: Do not fool around with anything less.

As far as a motherboard goes, I recommend Intel parts. To save you some time in the planning stages, here is a link to the list of Vista-compatible Intel motherboards.

The following tables illustrate my point about the substantial increase in hardware resources required to run Vista. They compare the system requirements for different versions of Windows, using information taken from Microsoft's Web site:

As you can see, the hardware requirements and recommendations jump dramatically from Windows XP to Windows Vista. The jump is much more dramatic than the one required for, say, Windows Millennium to Windows XP.

Experienced system builders also know that real systems will need much more RAM than these tables indicate. These RAM specs are minimums; for truly smooth performance and effective multitasking, you'll need much more.

The end result: Business users will likely spend much more on their Vista PC hardware than they did for prior Windows releases. In fact--and much to the chagrin of IT managers at large organizations--upgrading the hardware of pre-Vista computers is often either cost-prohibitive or not operationally feasible. Most users will instead purchase new systems if they want to use Windows Vista.