Improvements are seen, Mac similarities noted

To summarize, the pundits and reviewers describe Windows Vista as beautiful, elegant and a clear improvement over its predecessor, Windows XP, in security and user interface. They also note its similarities, both in features and appearance, to OS X for Macintosh.

Some excerpts:

"I believe [Vista] is the best version of Windows that Microsoft has produced. However, while navigation has been improved, Vista isn't a breakthrough in ease of use. Overall, it works pretty much the same way as Windows XP."

— Walt Mossberg, The Wall Street Journal, Jan. 18

"Windows Vista is beautiful. Microsoft has never taken elegance so seriously before. Discreet eye candy is partly responsible. Windows and menus cast subtle shadows. A new typeface gives the whole affair a fresh, modern feeling. Subtle animations liven up the proceedings.

"If the description so far makes Vista sound a lot like the Macintosh, well, you're right. You get the feeling that Microsoft's managers put Mac OS X on an easel and told the programmers, 'Copy that.' "

— David Pogue, The New York Times, Dec. 14

"While Windows Vista is an ambitious total overhaul of Windows XP, in the end there's no big gotta-have-it feature or functionality, unless you're a big fan of Aero, its considerably improved and more elegant interface.

"From a user perspective, there are literally thousands of mostly small advances, but the sum of the parts isn't greater than the whole. Yet Vista is clearly a better operating system than XP.

"... The vision behind Vista was in many ways about laying the groundwork for the future. So it could well be that the benefits will play out over time. In the meantime, the two big selling points are presentation and security."

— Scot Finnie, Preston Gralla, Computerworld, Nov. 10

"Security is vastly improved, but at times that's going to make the software frustrating to use. It could be especially frustrating shortly after Vista is released, if other software companies haven't updated their applications to work smoothly with Vista's more restrictive settings."

— Brier Dudley, The Seattle Times, Nov. 20.

"As a whole, Vista feels more evolutionary than revolutionary. That's not all bad; one of Microsoft's strengths has been its commitment to backward compatibility, which continues with Vista.

"Vista's real competitor, though, is Windows XP. For many users, XP is good enough. And for all the advances in Vista, it's hard to avoid seeing the things that aren't as good as they could have been.

"So what's our verdict? Vista is good — in some respects very good — but not spectacular.

"Call it a nice-to-have product rather than a must-have."

— John Clyman, PC Magazine, Dec. 20

Pogue, of The New York Times, added this nugget of perspective: "[I]t doesn't matter what you (or tech reviewers) think of Windows Vista; sooner or later, it's what most people will have on their PCs.

"In that light, it's fortunate that Vista is better looking, better designed and better insulated against the annoyances of the Internet. At the very least, it's well equipped to pull the world's PCs along for the next five years -- or whenever the next version of Windows drops down the chimney."