Someone whom Santa hadn't brought a new PC asked me about deals on computers for the New Year. But she was a little tapped out after her own gift-giving. So I looked at used PCs.
In the Twin Cities, one can buy a used "Vista-capable" PC for about $140-160. That's for a P4 or similar processor, 1.5 GHz or faster, with 512 MB or more of RAM and a 40+ GB drive. And the price includes a legitimate Windows 2000 Pro or XP Pro, so one could buy the upgrade version of Vista and save $100 off its full price.
With prices so low, it's hard to get worked up over the hardware requirements for Vista approaching its January launch. It's true that Vista wouldn't install on the lowest-end machine I tried to put it on, one bought in 1999. The 784 MB of RAM was fine, but Vista saw that the speed was only 667 MHz, and declined to install. It's hard to see that as a big problem, though, when the street value of such a PC is only about $50-60 at best -- with an upgradeable Windows OS to boot (pun not intended).
I'm not suggesting lawyers should go get Vista right away. The risk of compatibility issues bars that suggestion just yet. Even Microsoft's own Accounting Express 2007 warns on attempted install on Vista RC1 of an incompatibility. But lawyers who are finding that a PC bought before 2000 is too slow might be surprised at how little a better PC would cost. Even a new P4/3GHz/1GBRAM/80GB PC can be had with XP Pro for $600-700, as 2006 turns into 2007.