This polava seemingly originally had its roots with Intel; who at the time Microsoft were brown-nosing and falling over backwards to please in every way possible. Intel moaned that Microsoft had plans to exclude Intel’s 915 chipset from the Vista-capable scheme, which would cost the chipmaker billions as a result.

The upshot was that Microsoft lowered the required standards for the scheme to accommodate Intel’s wishes.

HP, who had already ploughed a lot of money into development in accord with Microsoft’s original standard of Vista-Capable requirements, went ballistic, and asked why they had had to make the effort and spend the cash while Intel simply had expressed that there could be some difficulty and Microsoft had caved in as a result straight away. HP’s Senior Vice President, Richard Walker, moaned:

"Now we have a situation where PC manufacturers (and processor/chipset suppliers) can claim Vista Capable in a ‘good’ mode just because it will run. What kind of consumer assurance is that? Hardly one that puts any credence behind your desire to create the ‘best possible customer experience for the Windows Vista update’".

Inside Microsoft itself, the then Co-President, Jim Allchin, hit the roof after reading HP’s complaint, and took up the matter with CEO Steve Ballmer.

Ballmer blamed Microsoft executive Will Poole, who probably blamed someone else…Which possibly ended with an office junior being used as a scapegoat and fired?

Microsoft is denying misleading customers with this Vista Capable claim.

The way I see it is from two or more angles: As I said above; the sticker is actually correct in a couple of ways – But it does fail to state that it’s in fact indicating that the equipment is at worst-case Vista Home Basic capable. Everyone is rather pissed off with Microsoft over this fiasco; customers and partners alike. Even Intel with their special dispensation have turned against M$ in a way by refusing to upgrade their own machines to Vista.