Many network admins (like myself) have been avoiding Vista like the plague. From my tests of it, it was just a hassle. My users have enough trouble figuring out how to deal with XP. So the last thing I want to do is throw something new at them, that includes it's own set of new quirks that my team has to learn, figure out, make infrastructure amendments for, and support.

I'm not usually the "if it ain't broke don't fix it type", but with Windows XP, I am. Vista just isn't "great" enough. So, even though there's SP1 for Vista, I'm still not ordering it on new PCs.

Yesterday I bought two new Dells and noticed XP wasn't an option. But there was an option for Vista Pro with an automatic downgrade to XP. That's what I chose. It's kinda neat in that we'll get both XP and Vista CDs, but XP will be loaded by default.

Turns out I can't live like this forever. June 30, 2008 is when MS will no longer be selling or supporting XP. It won't be available in retail stores after that date. It will, though, be available by makers like Dell as an "automatic downgrade" until January 31, 2009. After that, we may not have a choice.

So netadmins, you're on notice. You have six months to figure out how to properly integrate and support Vista. My plan is to grudgingly do so in the autumn in a test environment, starting with a Vista VM on my Mac joined to the Active Directory.

For more on the topic: http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,146330/article.html