Vista vs. Linux - Which is REALLY better?

I'm sick of this "just get more ram!" bullshit. My 286 did almost as much functionality-wise as my current multi-ghz machine. Yeah, really. Sure, there was no multi-tasking, but I did the mostly the same things as I do today.
Hello, fuckers, just because you can eat ram doesn't mean you should. It costs money and also reduces the number of programs you can run.
I can see it now: in another ten years programs will have minimum footprint of 1GB, but they'll just do more of the same.

In my honest opinion, Linux, and here's why.

I've been a loyal MS Windows user since the days of IBM XT's were barely able to run Windows 3.1...
I've used every version of Windows since then, including the abomination that is MS Windows Millennium Edition.
I was running Windows XP up until about a month ago.

I am the "go-to guy" for my family, friends, relatives, neighbors, friends-of-friends, coworkers, etc.
I know how to repair Windows, clean it, keep it clean, & generally all the things you need to do/know in order to make a Windows computer function at it's potential.

I have purchased *every* copy of Windows I have ever used, and refused to deal with anyone's system unless/until they had a legit copy on theirs, too.
(Because it's not worth the jail time & criminal record as far as I am concerned.)

I decided to give VISTA a try, and purchase a copy of Vista Ultimate.
As I always do, I simply remove the primary hard drive from my system, plug in a test hard drive, and install Vista to it.
Thus there's no risk of my primary HD becoming corrupted (it's not attached, it's not even in the case), and I get to find out if it works on the hardware I use every day.
(Otherwise I'd have a duplicate box with a blank HD to install it to, but I don't have that kind of spare cash.)

So in all my tests of Vista, it tells me that my system is "Barely Adequate" for the job.
It's a P4 3GHz system with 2Gigs of RAM, an ATI X600 Pro (512Megs VRAM, PCIe) video card, Intel Gb LAN, and 80Gb SATA HD.
If that's "barely adeqquate", then there is no way in heck it'll be able to cope with all the things I have to run on a daily basis.
Antivirus, Firewall, Spybot S&D, Firefox, Thunderbird, WinAmp, and Explorer are effectively "always on" because I bounce between them too frequently to want to launch/close them that often.

Sure enough, I install Vista and my system slows to a crawl.
I can watch it refresh window boxes.
I can sit & tap my fingers waiting for it to launch my common applications, listening to the drive thrash as it tries to load.
Constantly bugged by the UAC panel wanting me to authorize everything from twitching the mouse to editing the Registry.
(Ok, that's a lie, but it FELT like it was popping up every ten seconds to demand I authorize something or other.)
I know you can turn the UAC off, but that defeats a security layer of the OS, and that's almost NEVER a good thing to do.
I turn off all the eye candy, tweak the system so it runs as fast as possible, and generally do everything I can to make it do what I need in a reasonable amount of time.
In the end, it just wasn't possible.

Vista is so bloated, such a resource hog, that my system felt like I was back on an old 486DX2/100 running Windows 3.11...

So, fast forward to two weeks ago.
Exact same system, now running Ubuntu 7.04.
I can't believe how much faster this thing runs, even compared to my Windows XP!
Same hardware, but when I launch Firefox, it appears.
Not two minutes later, *NOW*.
Launch Thunderbird, and it's *BAM* there.
Launch Gnome Commander (a Norton Commander clone) and it's there, ready & waiting for me.
I click a button to have it do something, and 9 times out of 10,  it's open, ready, & waiting for my input before I can move the mouse to where the app will open to.

Watching FLV files from YouTube?
It auto downloads the files to my temp directory, and they launch as soon as it's done getting the file.
No hesitation, just "...97%...98%...99%...100 Perc-" window opens, file begins playing.

Opening twenty tabs in Firefox because I'm surfing for current events?
Not a peep, not a hitch, no slow down what-so-ever.

I currently have my media player, Thunderbird, Gnome Commander, Firefox, a firewall, and a document open in Open Office, and the Pricess Manager says I'm using *FOUR* percent of my CPU and *36%* of my RAM.

Windows Vista vs Ubuntu?
Ubuntu FTW.
=) 


So when MS pulled their latest "stealth update" BS & then told me my copy of XP wasn't legal, that was it.
The last straw, the one that broke the camel's back, the icing on the cake, the final kick to the crotch.