I've had enough of this.
The computer pipeline had a lot of units with 512 meg of memory that had already been produced prior to Vista. At the time, any moron with half a brain knew it was not enough and most sales reps indicated the same, but some did not and it turned into a complaint. The complaint was valid, and the situation rectified, but to blame MS for putting out a bad OS is total crap.
I bought VISTA at this same time, included in a laptop. I already knew that 512 meg was not nearly enough as it was also problematic on XP. I bought 2G before I put the laptop in service for the cost of about 120 dollars more. I also informed the sales people about the problems I saw coming.
The faults lie with the computer makers who attempted to hit a price point that was competitive. They were all doing it on XP and when VISTA came out, they continued for a very short time until the supplies of the cheaper units were exhausted.
This is not the fault of MS, but I'm sure they would take it back if they could, but whatever......They had to get the OS out there, and the computers in the stores were not quite ready for them.
BTW, after the most recent updates regarding some third party vendors who have been very slow getting their product updated for Vista, the OS has been fantastic. It manages the computers assets extremely well with no crashes, and no difficulties. I can download multiple video and audio streams and aggregate, organised and save simultaneously and with speed, as I run multiple apps that push the dual core processor to 100% plus, on a 24/7 basis for what has amounted to more than a year. I am very pleased with this OS. Very pleased indeed.
I never turn it off, except to reboot on some updates or installs, and it runs flawlessly. Absolutely flawless.
See, that's where some of us disagree. MS didn't "have" to do anything. They certainly didn't "have" to release bloated and buggy code, CPU cycle eating DRM, high hardware requirements, and poor driver support.
They chose to. And I don't see them taking anything back. Hence, the problems can't be blamed on anyone but them....