Rumours that hardware requirements will be excessive for Microsoft’s new Vista operating system have swept through websites and blogs, causing alarm among PC users. Figures such as a minimum spec being a 4GHz dual-core processor, 2GB of Ram and a 1TB hard disk abounded.

But there’s really no need to panic. The new operating system will run even if you don’t have a dual-core CPU and high-end graphics card. Practically all new computers are quite capable of running Vista.

However, unlike earlier versions of Windows, the new operating system can scale with the hardware’s capabilities.

For example, if you have a high-performance 3D graphics card you will be offered more advanced graphical interface features than if you’re running Vista on a laptop with an older integrated graphics adapter.

Direct3D for the desktop
Many Windows users look enviously at the transparency and transition effects in Apple’s Mac OSX.

You can get effects like these under Windows XP, but only by using special add-on programs such as Windows Blinds or WindowFX from Stardock. However, these effects have nowhere near the same fluid and elegant visual impact as those on the Mac.

Windows Vista is supposed to change this with its vector-based graphics engine, codenamed Aero. It takes care of translucent frames and shadow effects around windows, and animated transitions when minimising or maximising windows (see screen 1); it even has a 3D-effect clock speed adjuster.

There are two flavours of Aero: Aero Glass is the fully featured interface with all transparency effects, while Aero Express has a similar theme but doesn’t use the demanding 3D effects and is designed for use on older systems.

To make use of Aero Glass, your graphics card must support DirectX 9 and the Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM), and it should have at least 64MB of memory. If these requirements are not met, Vista will use Aero Express. You’ll also be able to use the ‘Classic’ Windows 2000 theme if you really want to.

Benchmarking built in
To enable Windows Vista to adjust itself to the hardware in the computer, the developers have integrated a sort of benchmarking tool, the Windows System Assessment Tool (Winsat). This program is run automatically during Vista installation and every time hardware is added or changed.

Vista uses the information to work out whether the PC’s graphics card is up to running the Aero Glass interface, what the PC’s 3D capabilities are and whether HD (high-definition) videos will play smoothly.

The resulting data, which includes information about the processor, Ram and hard-disk performance, is stored in an XML file and is available to other applications. So a game could read the data obtained by Winsat and set the numbers of AI (artificial intelligence) opponents or the level of graphics detail accordingly.

Further diagnostic functions are supposed, above all, to increase stability. For example, defective regions on memory modules can be recognised and excluded from use, to avoid system crashes.

Vista is also reputed to be able to detect imminent failures on hard drives, a feature that obviously uses the industry-standard Smart (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) information built in to most hard drives. Under Windows XP, you need third-party software to do this.