Why Vista Basic should be Microsoft's next big thing

It’s hard to believe, but the computer market was a much different place back when Vista was released. The cheap sub-notebook market had yet to be defined, and UMPCs were just being rolled out (to critical disdain). It was a world of power, with visions of mythical dual-core machines in every suburban home.

A year later and the whole market’s changed; the EEE PC is selling like hotcakes, a $200 desktop has just been released (with competitors on the way), and for a period of time even Walmart was selling a cheap linux PC in its stores (to disastrous results). All of these machines share a few traits: they use low-power CPUs, have small monitors, limited storage space, and they run Linux - despite the fact that their core market are people who think a Tux is a suit. None of these machines can run Vista, and even if they could the licensing fee would - in some cases - double prices.

Microsoft released Vista predicting the widespread adoption of powerful dual-core machines, when the reality was pretty much 180 degrees off. There’s a strong community of PC owners who did buy Vista boxes, only to find it too power-hungry for their machines. Companies such as Dell and HP are fielding requests to offer Linux support, and are starting to listen.

While the overwhelming consensus is that Vista sucks, most people will grudgingly agree that it works like a charm on a powerful enough system. The problem is that the OS comes with all this crap - DirectX 10, the Gadget sidebar, and Aero, for starters - that destroy weaker PCs.

In the midst of all this mess is the OS flavor that everyone forgot, Vista Basic. It’s designed for developing countries, so it’s cheap and built to run on lower end hardware; and because it’s built for developing countries Microsoft feels you shouldn’t be able to actually buy it in America (natch.) On the contrary, Microsoft, it’s the version we need the most. Despite the consumer reaction to the EEE, Linux is nowhere near a point where it can be used by tech-illiterate consumers; the consumer PC market is still a Windows dominated world.

When the next generation Windows 7 rolls out in 2010 Microsoft should swallow their pride and offer two versions: ‘Windows 7’ and ‘Windows 7 Light’. There’s a clear market for a feature rich, graphically stunning version of Windows. There’s even more of a need for a lightweight, dirt cheap version that works great on the kind of machine that would be considered slow back in 2004.

Vista is great, it just needs to stop sucking so much.