The best operating system in use today is Windows XP

Running Head : Windows XP

Windows XP

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With an installed customer base of four hundred million users , the operating system known as Windows XP is , as its marketing-designed code name eXPerience ' suggests , truly an experience . While much of the consumer technology press is still abuzz over the myriad of new features and aesthetic improvements introduced by its successor , the highly touted Windows Vista , recognition must be given to the fact that in spite of the love-hate relationship many individuals maintain with Microsoft products , it

is currently the best operating system on the market (Fruhinger , 2006

Part of this has to do with the fact that at present , Windows Vista is currently a bit of a resource hog . Despite the fact that in 2005 Microsoft made the claim that nearly all personal computers on the market had the sufficient hardware necessary to run Vista , some features , particularly the sleek aesthetic of the Aero interface , which justify the purchase of Vista in the first place require high-end hardware . As such , the very components which incentivize an upgrade are actually unavailable to casual users . In time , sufficient advances in hardware will probably make this far less of an issue , but at the moment , Vista is a less than ideal choice for the average consumer who does not have the financial means to justify purchasing a high end machine , let alone require one (Spooner , 2005 Judge , 2006

The Mac OS X fares no better in this regard . While Apple products are frequently touted for their ability to keep up with the changing standards of pleasing aesthetic design , this is sometimes done at the expense of system performance . While both XP and OS X make use of modern graphic effects such as anti-aliasing , alpha blending and drop shadows the latter is more pronounced in this regard , which allows it to conform with the brand-associated aesthetic sensibilities of Apple 's entire line of products . However , Saarinen (2001 ) opines that Mac OS X performs abysmally when compared to Windows XP , despite the latter being produced by a company that is notoriously purported to produce operating systems bogged down by excessive code bloat

Between the prettified interface , digital rights management and security improvements , the attention given to Windows Vista significantly overlooks what has always been the core strength of Microsoft 's operating systems : its software ecosystem . Between its broad support for various hardware components , far-reaching backwards compatibility for legacy devices and the ubiquitous availability of third-party software for a variety of purposes , Windows XP is superior in terms of customizability of `eXPerience ' This means that it is ideal for people who are still trying to figure out their own computing experience as opposed to gear heads who have chosen Linux for homebrew software tinkering or multimedia creativity enthusiasts favoring Apple 's OS X for its excellent portfolio of digital media production software For those who require an operating system that can flexibly adapt to their own needs , Windows XP is the best choice...