Lorgor

A link from ITsVISTA pointed to an article on Windows Vista still requires reboots after Windows Updates, that said.

I seem to recall one of Vista’s features being that it doesn’t need to reboot after Windows Update, unlike XP. Seems this is just another promise Vista was to bring that Microsoft just couldn’t deliver.

If espinoza could remember what Jim Allchin announced on PDC 2005, you may realized that Microsoft implemented new technology called ‘Restart Manager’ or ‘Reboot Manager’ to reduce number of reboot not to eliminate.

We’re also reducing reboots, we believe, at least by 50 percent in terms of configuration, that’s also something that you should work on, and let me explain why. We’ve added something called a Restart Manager or Reboot Manager in [Windows] Vista, and if you call that, it can help you decide whether or not certain .DLLs  it will shut down certain parts of the system, and keep the rest of the system running, so you can replace certain .DLLs without the system having to reboot

More info from Windows Vista TechCenter:

Windows Vista also includes platform technology that can be used to prevent reboots or reduce the impact of reboots, in cases where they cannot be avoided. This new technology is used by the Windows Installer, so adding or removing applications with the Windows Add/Remove programs feature will be less likely to require a reboot.

While new applications are being installed, applications currently in use may be automatically restarted. To reduce the disruption caused by the installation, some applications, including key Microsoft Office 2007 applications and Internet Explorer, can automatically restore their state after installation. And in cases where reboots cannot be avoided the same technology may be used to restore the application’s state after the reboot.

Let’s see the fact that Vista user still need to reboot sometime after install certain updates but it not much as you faced with Windows XP. You can compare by running Vista side-by-side with XP or running XP as guest on Virtual PC, you will see the result.