Thanks for the advice.

For the fisrt time in many years, I'm buying a PC, not building it myself. Therefore I'm relying on the supplier to ensure that the hardware plays nicely with the OS. I'm more concerned that all my software will run under Vista.

I'd overlooked the amount of memory Vista Ultimate can address so I've adjusted my ideal spec accordingly.

A dual boot system is tempting but these days I have client deadlines interfering with my techie tinkering so I stick with a simple one box, one OS philosophy.

Thanks for the compatibility link which is very useful (even though it won't run in Firefox!).

Cheers,
Mark

Just realised I have a licence for XP 64 bit as part of my Microsoft Partner deal. So I can buy a box with Ultimate installed and try to make time to configure a dual boot system. If I had my time over I'd go Mac.

Cheers,
Mark