It's still there in the final version, but now it's a lot less intrusive. Instead of stealing focus, UAC calls for attention in the task bar, letting you finish what you're doing first. Once you've finished configuring a PC and installing software you'll hardly see the UAC dialog at all, and it shouldn't be part of your day-to-day Vista experience.

Microsoft makes it clear when you're going to see a UAC dialog: look for a little shield on an icon or in a menu. Hardware choices Vista's performance is nothing to complain about; it's mostly similar to Windows XP on the same hardware.

You'll want more than the 512MB that XP requires to operate smoothly; with 1GB of RAM Vista is speedy and responsive, and if you plug in a flashdrives that is fast enough to use for ReadyBoost you'll notice extra speed - and a little extra battery life on portables. And with Windows Defender watching for spyware and taking care of automatic disk defragmentation, you shouldn't find performance degrading substantially over time.

Once you get used to integrated search in the Start menu, you may fi nd you gain some speed by getting to what you want faster too. Apart from memory and a reasonably modern processor - a PC you've bought in the last three years will have no problems.

Startup speed is dependent on your system and connected devices; dropping the graphical boot screen saves a few seconds but we'll need to wait for devices with Vista logos to see if Microsoft can push hardware manufacturers to deliver faster boot times.

But as Vista runs well on many existing systems, that's where we recommend you use it to start with. Buying a new PC is one way to get Vista; you'll get either a voucher for a free or cheap upgrade, or Vista preinstalled with most new systems. But unless you were planning on a new system, or your kit won't cope with Vista even if you add a gigabyte of memory and a new graphics card, we wouldn't suggest buying a new PC just to get Vista.

If you can run Vista on your PC, Home Premium is a bargain. Home Basic, on the other hand, is not. It's £50 less than Home Premium, but the only reason for buying it is if you have an old PC that won't manage the Aero interface. Think of it as a pricey security update with the search-based interface thrown in to boot. We say put the money towards a new system instead. Simon Bisson and Mary Branscombe