We never really thought that Vista would make XP disappear overnight. We still hear of people running Windows 98 (even, shudder, Me) and that was a much bigger leap. But there is still that worry that sticking with XP will leave you disadvantaged in some way.

The reality is probably not. At least until Microsoft decides to stop security updates but that isn't likely to be for a long time yet.  Support for Windows 2000 was extended beyond the original plan and there's no reason to suggest that XP will be anything different. If anything it may even be supported for longer. The real deciding factor is whether businesses decide to upgrade to Vista. It would be very unlikely that Microsoft would try to force their hand by ending support.

There's some very helpful advice over at Computer World for giving Windows XP another 7 years of life. That might be a little optimistic as I think the only piece of hardware or software of mine that has survived that long is an old CDROM drive I keep for sentimental reasons.

Regardless, this should give you plenty of time to save up for a computer that can run Vista comfortably while not missing out on some of the new features of Vista. Er, perhaps to make that make sense, they're new to Windows, not new to computing.