Interesting. Never had any problems with Vista and runs like a charm for me. I've had many more problems with linux (different distributions), especially during installation. Fedora, as example did not even want to install. It crashed right there every time I tried to install it.
Vista, while it needs some getting used to it time, runs at least for me, stable and reliable.
I also noticed that you had already pretty made up your mind against Vista from the beginning, that might be a problem too that enhances your frustration.
