I am using Vista Ultimateon one computer and I do not find it that bad.

BTW you do not have to log on to shut down.

While I feel it is not business friendly due to lack of drivers for some equipement, for the average home user it is not bad.

There are some really nice visuals, much better file organization, security improvments, and some great integration that was missing in XP.

If I had to choose I would stick with XP Pro at this point.

For the problems make sure you have the latest patches (game) and you can always have the option to run the programs under XP parameters in Vista.