The preferred edition of Windows for home desktop and mobile PCs

Product Information

Windows Vista Home Premium with Service Pack 1 is the preferred edition for home desktop and mobile PCs. It provides a breakthrough design that brings your world into sharper focus while delivering the productivity, entertainment, and security you need from your PC at home or on the go.

Windows Vista with Service Pack 1 and improvements delivered by hardware and software partners increase the reliability, performance, and compatibility of Windows Vista-based PCs.

Windows Vista Home Premium is the operating system for homes with advanced computer needs. It will help you use your laptop or desktop PC more effectively as well as enable you to enjoy new, exciting digital entertainment experiences - all with the benefit of added security and reliability.

It has a new user interface named Windows Aero, which is both efficient and beautiful. This new interface makes it easier than ever before to find your way around the operating system. It even makes it easier to accomplish multiple tasks at once by providing a three-dimensional, real-time, animated view of all of your open applications and documents. Additionally, Windows Vista Home Premium helps you quickly find and organize large collections of documents, pictures, movies, videos, and music. By integrating search throughout the operating system, Windows Vista Home Premium helps you quickly find exactly what you are looking for.

Vista Home Premium makes it easy to take your home computing experience with you wherever you go. For example, Windows Vista Home Premium includes Tablet PC technology that enables you to interact with your Tablet PC-compatible computer with a digital pen or with your fingertip instead of having to use a keyboard. Computers that include Windows Vista Home Premium and an auxiliary Windows Slide Show display will also allow you to access key data even when your computer is off. It is also easier than ever to share files between other PCs in your household and to manage your laptop computer settings to more securely connect to your favorite WiFi hotspot.

• Most secure Windows ever with Windows Defender and Windows Firewall
• Quickly find what you need with Instant Search and Windows Internet Explorer 7
• Elegant Windows Aero desktop experience with Windows Flip 3D navigation
• Best choice for laptops with enhanced Windows Mobility Center and Tablet PC support
• Collaborate and share documents with Windows Meeting Space
• Experience photos and entertainment in your living room with Windows Media Center
• Enjoy Windows Media Center on TVs throughout your home with Xbox 360 and other devices

Improve every aspect of your digital entertainment experiences including viewing and sharing photos, video, TV, movies, music, games, and more. For example, Windows Vista Home Premium enables you to create your own DVDs and edit your own high-definition movies. Most significantly, Windows Vista Home Premium includes all of the Windows Media Center capabilities for turning your PC into an all-in-one home entertainment center. Windows Media Center in Windows Vista provides new ways for you to enjoy your music, photos, and DVD movies. You can also use Windows Media Center to record and watch your favorite TV shows (even HDTV) and to access new kinds of online entertainment content. You will also be able to connect Windows Vista Home Premium to your Microsoft Xbox 360 to extend your Media Center experience to multiple rooms in your home.


Product Highlights

Security - Windows Vista is engineered to be the most secure version of Windows yet. The new features in Windows Vista help to give you the control and confidence you need to get the most out of your PC.

Search and Organization - Windows Vista gives you more flexibility when you search and organize your files. New controls, like the Quick Search box and Enhanced Column Headers, make it simple for you to manage large amounts of on-screen data in any way that you want.

Windows Internet Explorer 7 - Windows Vista enhances the Internet Explorer experience. The upcoming release of Internet Explorer 7 not only adds important new security and privacy features, but makes everyday tasks easier through features such as tabbed browsing, inline search, and shrink-to-fit printing.

Sidebar and Gadgets - As you use your computer to access more information, perform more tasks, and interact with more software applications, you increasingly face information overload. You open a Web browser just to check the weather, open an application to view your calendar, and open a calculator program to simply add numbers. You need simple, specialized, and lightweight mini-applications that put information and tasks at your fingertips - no matter what you're doing.  Windows Sidebar boosts your personal productivity by providing instant access to gadgets—a wide variety of engaging, easy-to-use, and customizable mini-applications that offer information at a glance and provide easy access to frequently used tools.

Performance - Windows Vista is designed to help make you more productive, with new features including Sleep, SuperFetch, External Memory Drive (EMD), and Hybrid Hard Drive. SuperFetch helps manage memory to get the most out of available RAM. EMD technology helps boost performance without adding RAM. Windows Vista also takes advantage of Hybrid Hard Drive technology to help improve battery life, performance, and reliability. With Windows

Windows Backup - Windows Vista provides valuable new innovations to help ensure you never lose information that is important to you. Windows Vista offers multiple layers of backup and restore protection from hardware failure, user error, or other issues. These innovations include system restore enhancements, a new feature called Windows Backup, and a related feature: Volume Shadow Copy, which was first introduced with the Windows Server product family and is now available for PCs.

Networking - Windows Vista includes new networking features that make your network easier to set up, easier to use, and more secure and reliable. Connect wirelessly to your company's network, share an Internet connection and printers, copy files between computers, or enjoy your favorite entertainment around your home. Whether at home, a small business, or a large enterprise, Windows Vista makes connectivity easier so you can focus on what matters to you.

Windows SlideShow - If you use a laptop computer, you know that starting up your laptop just to check a message or find an address or phone number isn't always practical.

Speech Recognition - Speech Recognition in Windows Vista empowers you to interact with your computer by voice. It allows you to significantly limit your use of mouse and keyboard while maintaining or increasing productivity. You can dictate documents and e-mail messages in mainstream applications, fill out forms on the Web using voice commands, and seamlessly manage Windows Vista and applications by saying what you see.

Help and Feedback - With a number of features to streamline problem resolution, Windows Vista is designed to provide better self-help and improve centralized tools for support professionals.

Windows Update - Windows Update helps to keep your computer up to date and more secure by providing Microsoft Windows Vista software updates. You can configure Windows Update to automatically download and install updates for you. You can essentially “set it and forget it.”  In Windows Vista, the capabilities of Windows Update are extended beyond the features available in Windows XP and make updating easier and less disruptive.

Sync Center - The new Windows Vista Sync Center gives you one place where you can manage data synchronization in several scenarios: between multiple PCs, between network servers and PCs, and with the devices you connect to your PC.

Product Features

• Windows Vista in your home - Windows Vista delivers better personal productivity and digital entertainment on your PC through its improved reliability, security, and performance. Windows Vista helps you to accomplish tasks faster, with a rich new interface and new ways to organize and find the information stored on your PC.  When it comes to having fun, you can enjoy more entertainment with live and recorded TV on your PC. Windows Vista also gives you the ability to access all of your photos, music, movies, and recorded shows on other PCs throughout your home, and even through your Xbox 360.  Take a look at some of the features of Windows Vista that will change the way you use your PC at home.
  
• Family Safety Settings - Nothing is more important to parents than their children's safety. Windows Vista introduces a rich and powerful set of parental control features to help parents monitor, manage, and administer their children's computer use - and help keep them safe.
  
• Windows Mail - For many people, sending e-mail is the most important thing they do on a computer. As e-mail's popularity and importance have grown over the years, some annoyances and risks have also emerged. Windows Mail is designed to help you meet these challenges so your e-mail experience is as productive and fun as possible. Windows Mail includes features that help you reduce the risks, while enjoying the many benefits, of e-mail.
  
• Windows Calendar - Sometimes it doesn't feel like there are 24 hours in the day. As the pace of life speeds up both at work and at home, many people find it helpful to use a PC-based calendar to manage their time and coordinate schedules with family, friends, and colleagues. Windows Calendar is a flexible, easy-to-use calendar built directly into the Windows Vista operating system. It lets you plan and manage all of your activities and coordinate your schedule with others. Windows Calendar also lets you create a personal task list and receive automatic notifications and reminders about specific tasks and upcoming appointments.  Windows Calendar has a broad range of features to help you manage your personal schedule.
  
• Windows Photo Gallery - The Windows Photo Gallery in Windows Vista gives you many tools for your digital photos and videos. You can organize, find, and view your photos and videos, as well as edit, print, and share them from within Windows Photo Gallery. Windows Photo Gallery also makes it easy to transfer your photos from your camera to your computer, using a simple import process.
  
• Windows Media Player - Windows Media Player 11 for Windows Vista gives you an easier way to enjoy and manage your digital music, video, and pictures on your PC. See things the way you want to see them, by CD cover art or in lists - the choice is yours. Connect to networked media devices around your home or seamlessly sync up with your portable digital media player to enjoy all your entertainment wherever you are. Sporting an improved look and feel, Windows Media Player delivers a high-quality audio and visual experience both on the computer and around your home.
  
• Windows Move Maker - With the new Windows Vista version of Windows Movie Maker, you can quickly and easily import, edit, and organize all of your digital home videos. Get new tools to help you manage and edit videos like a Hollywood director, including new effects, transitions, improved graphics performance, and support for high-definition video. When your movies are just the way you want them, you can easily transfer them to DVD to share with others.
  
• Windows Media Center - Enjoy all your favorite digital entertainment - including live and recorded TV, movies, music, and pictures - in one place with the easy-to-use Windows Media Center menu system and remote control. Windows Media Center in Windows Vista includes enhancements for expanded support of digital and high-definition cable TV, an improved menu system, and the ability to create a consumer-electronics-quality living-room experience, as well as new options for multi-room access to your entertainment through Media Center Extenders, including Xbox 360.
  
• Gaming - If you are a parent, you now have a rich set of controls to ensure your children are only playing games that you consider appropriate. You can allow or restrict your children's access to games according to game title, rating, category, or content. Windows Vista supports six international rating standards and makes it easy for parents to manage and monitor their children's gaming experience.
  
  

Windows Requirements

• 1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
• 1 GB of system memory
• 40 GB hard drive with at least 15 GB of available space
• Support for DirectX 9 graphics with:
  • WDDM Driver
  • 128 MB of graphics memory (minimum)
  • Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware
  • 32 bits per pixelAudio Output
• DVD-ROM Drive
• Internet access (fees may apply)
• Actual requirements and product functionality may vary based on your system configuration.
• TV tuner card required for TV functionality (compatible remote control optional).
  Windows Tablet and Touch Technology requires a Tablet PC or a touch screen.