I bought my pc just a few months ago and it came with win xp preinstalled. This is a standard nowadays for Pc's. It was easy enough to setup and configure to my personal preferences. I am still unimpressed with how Micorsoft works around the acitvation part of its installation. It gives you only 30 days to activate your version which i found a niggle with the software because i needed some time to install a router to enable me to connect to the internet. I would have preffered if this time had been extended in vista, but it appears not so.

The improved search features in XP are ok, but i have heard better things about the index searching in Vista . The default settings within search are not very well setup if you are trying to work at a deper level than just seearching your my documents folder, this is becuase "seaching in system and hidden folders" is disabled as default. This may, however, just be a personal thing i have with Windows as i feel it is more sutied to users who are not overly competent with computers, although there are tools out there that allow you to edit win xp, for the more technological savvy of you out there!.

Windows Xp home is very well endowed to deal with the new craze - wireless networking. When i configured mine, all i had to do was install the drivers for the wireless card and after a reboot, it recognised the wireless connection instantly. The only thing stopping me getting on the net, was the stupid utility that came with the card that was trying to intefere with the windows settings. The utility was useless, windows was very competent at gaining a connection to my router and very, very rarely loses this connection. I have only lost it once and this was a fault with the router, not win Xp!

Microsoft have also made changes to the use of the CTRL + ALT + DEL key combination. Before, in Me and so on, this key combination just got you out of the program you were in, and two of these restarted the Pc. Not very useful. In the new edition they have made this more useful. It now brings up something called Task manager, whcih enables you, at a basic level to close any programs that are non responsive and also view any running process. This is also useful , i found when your computer starts running funny, watching the running processes can help you establish if anything is running that shouldnt be. This is only helpful if you know what you're doing, and i would advise you check what ytour doing first if you have never done this before.

So in conclusion., I would reccomend Windows Xp to most users of PC's who want basic use to people who want more advanced use of their PC. To a greater degree, Win XP is more capable than previous versions of catering for your needs. Of course if you are not satisfied by Windows level of technicality, you could get linux But thats another can of worms!!!