the one thing I did immediately with my husbands new laptop that has 7 on it is change everything on it to classic view so that it looks more familiar which has helped me a lot. Now I am not sure those options are available to you since on starter version you can not even change your desktop wallpaper. I did some googling for how to make windows 7 like xp and found a lot of good tricks that helped me.

MS Office '97-'03 should install just fine on Vista. My Office 2000 version did. So, maybe if you have an old version of office, you could install that, then use the XP upgrade Office disk. If PhotoShop 6 will install and is compatible with Vista, then you could install it and use the PhotoShop CS upgrade disk. I guess you'll just have to try and see what happens. Vista will let you know if anything is not compatible during the install.

My knowledge is limited so take the following with a grain of salt. I'm going to throw out some thoughts based on a hunch that could be wrong. Hopefully others will help direct the conversation. I think your issue is a router issue and not a Windows one. It's software question not a hardware one. Not all routers have the firmware to host a printer. Maybe the printer has it? I don't know for sure. If your router can handle the job, and if so it would need some installation steps and be unlikely to be plug and play, the printer becomes visible as a Network Printer to other PCs on the network. Just the same as if the printer were connected to a PC and you designate it as a Network Printer and not a Local Printer through the Printer Setup Wizard. The PC stations on a physical network need not be "networked" in a MS sharing system or group sense to use a Network Printer. If your connection (software setting wise) is effective, using the "Connect to Network Printer" option in the Printer Wizard on each PC will show this new printer as an option. Each PC may need to have printer drivers for it to work. A printer connected to a PC can always be shared, and the mix of Windows versions is a non-issue in my experience with the same setup. But, the PC the printer is connected to needs to be on for the printing to work. If it's off, the queue is held until it's turned on. Thoughts from others?

You could go back to XP by saving all you data files on external media. And then, the fast way to wipe your disk is to reformat it and that probably is a good move to start over with a clean hard drive. But before you wipe everything, check to see what copy of XP you have. If it is the upgrade version, it will not install on a clean machine. It looks for an earlier version of Windows before it will install. Maybe, as in earlier versions, you can get it to go by inserting a CD that has an earlier version of Windows. After XP has been installed, you will have to install all your software and get updates. XP itself will need at least 30 to 60 MB of updates. You will need to load in your data files as needed. There is an issue you should consider. In the not too distant future, you may wish to upgrade to Windows 7 bypassing Vista. (I plan to do this.) An upgrade from XP to Win7 can not be done directly. A clean, freshly formatted disk is required. As I understand it, you can perform a direct upgrade from Vista to Win7. A cautionary note about memory sticks (thumb drives). These may not be dependable as permanent storage devices. I wathced the development of these devices and noted that they contained a lithuim cell to hold the states of the storage cells also known as a "keep alive" cell. At that time, those cells were rated for a 10 yr life. After that, the stick may go bad. I do not know the construction and limitation of newer memory sticks. That limitation could have been extended. Research your memory stick before you depend on it for long term storage. For my use, I transfer all my camera pictures to other media and I advise to use new sticks for new data. I consider thumb drives as a temporary storage. Sticks older than 4 to 5 years old should be tossed and replaced with new ones. The price of these devices have reduced enough to make replacement practical.