In this article, we provide you with what you need to know about upgrading to Windows Vista. You will get definitive information about released features and capabilities of the various versions of Windows Vista, learn when you can and cannot do a Vista in-place upgrade, and find out about tools to make your Vista installation easier and less prone to errors and crashes.

that was pretty much of no value...,
 
I thought you were going to outline like a way to dual boot or maybe create a ghost image in case you wanted to recover your old XP setup in case of severe failure (like I did and very happy to have had it).
 
Now those are parachutes.  this is just common sense and general guidelines.  Not up to the level of a toms...hardware guide.

I was hoping for dual-boot information as well. I had no success doing this with RC1 as the Vista install would always hang before the login screen. The only way I could get it to function was to tell my BIOS to boot from the Vista drive and then do a clean install on it. It works for testing, but not for permanent use.

I have read a couple of posts regarding some guys doing dual boot in the forums so I know its possible.  I have not had time to look into it and have not been very motivated to do so.  
 
I created a bootable ghost CD using barts then imaged my C: drive to an external USB 2.0 box, right before doing the upgrade of Vista Ultimate.  That was one of the smartest things I have done.   Vista killed most of my needed utilities. Drivers were bad on most things.  This is on a new top of the line system I had built.  
 
I got tired of messing with it and reghosted back, didn't miss a beat.  I will try later when driver support or maybe SP1 is out.

All you gotta do is partition it right. The boot loader will take care of it then. Two partitions, one for XP and the other for vista, with vista > 20-25gb (my recommendation). Didn't have any problems after RC2 with this setup.
 

 
Seems he's living in the wrong century. DDR2 is the standard now, and the next standard for the next few years, DDR3 is pin and electrically compatible with its predecessor. Not to mention that we stopped using SIMM with the advent of PC-100.  
 
This article seemed basically like a generic "How To" article for the "dumb" people out there who really haven't done this sort of stuff ever, and who are just getting into it. A lot of it is sage advice, erring on the side of caution, but certainly something I wouldn't like to see on the front page of a hardware enthusiast's site, but such is the way of the internet.  
 
Oh well, at least nothing in there was blatantly WRONG, as far as I could tell. I personally am not upgrading to Vista until next year. History+experience tells me to let Microsoft finish (what I term to be) their final beta test and release SP1. I wonder what's gonna be in that service pack...

I was looking for dual boot information.   The information on what version of vista to buy was lacking at best.  No mention of the OEM pitfall of 32bit vista only and can only use 4GB's or RAM.  No mention of the basic home vista pitfall of physical memory limit of 8GB's of RAM where your motherboard may support 16 or 32GB's.  The artical did suggest Windows Vista Home Premium but didnt mention its physical memory limit of 16GB's of RAM.  No mention of 2 and 4 socket CPU motherboard users need Windows Vista Ultimate for best performance.
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-gb/library/aa366778.aspx

I agree, this was not a parachute topic.  Parachute indicates a safety net to save you or recovery should something catastrophic occur.  A means to bring you back to XP before you tried Vista.  This article did nothing of the sort.
 
The only part I enjoyed was the part about the new transwer wizard but there was no detils on how this would operate.  Do I need two computers, can I collect all the data from my computer and put it on DVDs then bring it into Vista?  Actually I don't know the answers but I will be looking them up before I install my copy of Vista.
 
I have already ordered my parachute.  I bought another hard drive, identical to my current 300GB drive (no real reason for it to be identical except I'm thinking about playing with RAID stuff later) and I will use the new drive to do one of the following:
 
1) Duplicate my original drive to the new drive and install Vista on the new drive.
 
or
 
2) Place a fresh copy of XP on the new drive and then upgrade to Vista.  Make a bootable recovery DVD set (never want to do two OS install again).  Then install all my applications.  This is where I need to read about this new fangled wizard to see how it can help me.  And again, make another bootable recovery DVD set with my normal applications loaded.  Any other not-so-important applications will be loaded last.
 
I am leaning pretty heavily towards the second option as I like a clean install.
 
Joe

 
Yeah, It's called stick with XP.    
 
Sorry, Couldn't resist.

seems to be in more love with vista  
 
1. upgradeing XP to vista will probly not work alot of software that is on XP will most likey not work on vista or uninstall (thanks to .MSI based  installers)
2. the price between basic and perm is very small and Most users will buy OEM not retail or Upgrade unless thay whent to {PC world} (most users will not pay for an OS thats about the same price of an PC or an pc with no monitor unless thay have money to burn)
4. topic seems way to towards beening in love with vista ,  
 
when XP came out apart from securty problems that other users have with it i cant seem tomany ffaults with it, Vista simple things like  
 
Display has been Split up ,  
the power button now puts the pc in stand by ,  
it comes with IE 7 (Why did thay not put clasic mode layout in IE7 do you know how hard it is for me to explne to N00bs over the phone how to type an web site in now and it allso has confused alot of users and alot do not want it i norm thow on Opera on)
 
Wireless netowking, still not work out where Perfered order page has gone i found it 2-3 times on an customers pc by pure luck  (WHY was it removed from Found networks)Norton NIS 2007 + wireless = no network / uninstall = internet
 
Search, err i got my head around it now i think , i do think it better but i have to type something in so i can Pick adv serch , new users will be confused if the files are not in docs or desktop as it not find them
 
superfetch is good but most likey will make hard disks fail sooner (any free ram superfetch fills it with cache users do notices this as there hdd goers mad for 5-10 mins after desktop loads {Depending on how much ram more ram longer it take to fill it and may slow other programs down an little when its doing it} )
 
NO classic mode, Classic mode should be XP Not Windows 2000 or make an mode that makes all folders and start menu work like XP, with option for Glass maybe (Just an nit pic that one) alot of user are still on windows 98 ME or 2k, so VIsta is like going to an M$-Dos Mac OS X (but Mac there layout works)
 
contorle pannel > the Endless looop of menus that seems to made it overly compliclated with lots of icons (i mean i am an power user/gamer/  and things are not whare i am expecing them to be or do what explected)
 
offline files the Task bar Icon is Not linked to the Contole panel > offline option
 
new users going from all older vers of windows will just be confused with vista
 
UAC seems to work i not turnd it off yet but new users will priobly find it anoying very fast and find an way to turn it off (User accounts >UAC)
 
working with files seems to slow at times like Not been able to Use the folder window untill the file has opened (XP click click you can norm use the window strate away)
 
and on the topic of ghosting thay added an new step to make it longer if for say your RAID 0 setup failed and you had  
 
-------------
good points and some inbetwean points
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standby seems to work ({Sleep} most of the time so don't hold your breath)
 
Netowk icon is good it tells you are on line
 
start menu is nice (the sliding menu probly confues Slow users who have to think when clicking on All programs as it Mite switch back to the  main start menu by the time thay click on it) to me its Poor that you can move the computer network and search round as i prefer computer to be at the top my self
 
DX10 ? want some patchs to come put with support

Ok, I admit I may be a bit behind-the-times, and maybe the author of this article knows something new about vista that I don't, but there seems to be a huge glaring error in his suggestion for choosing a vista flavour.
 
Home Basic does not come with Aero!!
 
On the feature list, the author says it *does* come with aero, but I've double checked a few sources (wikipedia, this forum in Software -> Vista -> Home Basic - > What's the difference?) which confirm that Aero is *not* included in Home Basic.
 
Yet the author of this article makes it seem like Basic is a viable alternative to Premium if you're not interested in Media Centre.  Admittedly, Aero is just a bit of bling.  Still, it's a big piece of the whole vista experience.

After all the talk, after all the fuss, here comes out Guy with something like this:

"Just the price to pay for greater security"?! Whose security? This is just too much... Sad, sad, sad.
 
Also, since when has caution and reason become "cynical"? Frankly, a cynic would ask "still using windows? why?" and then laugh in your face. A balanced and reasonable person would actually take the time to educate you about the fact that jumping on a new OS just for the sake of some silly bling-bling is not the right thing to do. What would it feel to be working for a company that is still using XP? How about SANE? I'd really like to hear only 1 (one) reason for a company (any company) to install this OS on their business computers at this point in time. Come on. One?

Because its new :?:  
 
Sorry, thats the best I can come up with at this point in time for business environments.

if i was going to get vista basic better getting XP
 
Vista Prem is only an little bit more then basic (£20 if that talking on the lines of OEM prem vs basic)
 
HDMI will work with unprotected content as far as i know (as thats what i be useing any way so HDCP should not appy to me)
 
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Vistas UAC seems at times an little of an task in its own right some times, most user will not go out side of there Docs folders but some do and you be presented with 2-3 conferm boxs so you can do things
 
most users will not know how to make an program start with Admin rights all the time as well
 
i could Peck at vista all day but i haveing to do more to do simple tasks or get to somthing that was simple on XP (feals like linux control pannel but an little more messy)
 
still if i want to search for files on my server i resort to remotely logging into it and doing it from there
 
ON the Topic of Remote , M$ Vista Remote assist is plane and simple crap there is an 3-5 sec lag on the mouse, screen up dates allso are about that slow as well, Vista remote Does not turn off the vista's extra vis stuff so resulting in pure anoying remote speed, Realvnc is your frend here as long as you can get the other one to get it on

Although I do agree with you, but you have to look at this from
the editors POV. If you typing an article for millions of users to read
you would not want to type in something which might haunt you later on
by a bunch idiots who does not know how to use a computer.
 
 
Also not all version of Vista will have every backup feature.
e.g. Only the Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate will
have Complete PC Backup and Restore (image based).
(This is similar to Norton Ghost, but the way the program works
is really stupid).

 
Did you ever think to check Microsoft.com?

 
Huh?
 
You make it sound like if I had just taken time to read the microsoft website, all my misconceptions would've been washed away.
 
The microsoft page you linked to just confirmed the exact same thing that I've been saying. Aero is not included in Home Basic.
 
And, I did in fact check the MS website. I don't think it was that same page, but it was an MS article that explained the difference in vista flavours.

Hey Guys,
I can confirm that for dual booting it will only work (or at least i couldnt get it to work any other way) if you create a new partition or use a different HD to boot from.
Once i had partitioned a 25GB section off, dual booting was a piece of cake for me.
Having said that, i was using rc2 so maybe some changes have been made.  
I also think that its a waste of time using vista at this point. it runs significantly slower (just for everyday use such as loading programs, compresing files etc) and apparently has bugger all support for games at the moment.  
My official stance at this point is that its great fun to play around with but wont be replaceing XP pro as my main operating system for some time yet.

Ummm... isn't that always the way dual-booting has worked?  Who would seriously install two different versions of Windows on the same partition?  The best way to dual boot has ALWAYS been to use two different hard drives.  The second best, to use two different partitions on the same drive.  Trying to install two versions of Windows (especially one as radically different as Vista) in the same partition just seems like a recipe for disaster.