Summary:

VISTA does work for some people, mainly those who have new machines, with no old software or hardware to be supported. OK for newcomers to PC.

But there are many cases in which it does NOT work:

1. Software
a) A lot of old software will not run 'out of the box'
b) Some can be persuaded to run by downloading updates.
c) SOME MICROSOFT PACKAGES WILL NO LONGER WORK, due to a deliberate decision by Microsoft. This includes Visual Basic 5 or 6. The only VB supported is VB.Net, which is totally incompatible.

2. Hardware.
a) Many 'OLD' devices will no longer work, including my HP USB printer/scanner which was purchased AFTER Vista was released.
b) For some, new drivers can be downloaded. But even the downloaded Vista driver for my HP printer does not seem to work properly. (It reinstalls itself every time I connect, but as a new instance, so I have multiple copies installed).
c) For other items, NO Vista drivers are available. I am not sure if my ROLAND MIDI player (driven from the serial port) will work under Vista.

I do not think I should have to buy new hardware, new software and rewrite 150,000 lines of program code (HARMONY) just to get a prettier interface.

(If it ain't broke, don't fix it)

Luckily, the old HELP file program still works when downloaded, otherwise I couldn't offer users any online help for my programs.

So yes, it works, and no, it doesn't.....

As to the 'new' ideas like preventing direct access to the hardware, this was standard practice on mainframes from the 1970's, but all the industry knowledge and experience got thrown away by the newcomers. There is a good reason why QDOS was called 'Quick and Dirty'.

There is a huge knowledge base available from old mainframe developers which is unknown to most people who grew up working on PCs. (We find that we constantly have to advise developers and system designers on good practice and technique).