Avid's site recommends Vista Business, but I can get a deal on the home edition. Is there any compatibility issues or reasons to go with business? I'll be using the 64-bit versions of either software. Thank you.

Simple rule of thumb GO WITH WHAT IS RECOMMENDED.

Obviously there is a reason Windows charges a heap more for Buisness than for either Home or Premium Home. Avid makes use of some of those extra features.

Some may take the time and make the effort to make Home work.... but will it be reliable?

To echo Andrew's statement, Vista business is the ONLY Vista OS qualified for Avid. Note the word, not recommended, QUALIFIED. Others have tried to use Vista Home and have not been successful. Avid software is some of the most demanding ever written for a desktop environment and will push your computer right to the edge of it's performance limits and beyond. Always use the qualified OS as required by Avid, or you will face a world of problems.

Expanding on the home variants of MS software:  You may very well find that you can get Avid running apparently reliably on Vista Home.  Down the track you will inevitably encounter permissions issues which Windows Vista Home or Home Premium does not have the tools to allow you to fix.

Bottom line?  A cheap solution is usually the most expensive.

 I would go so far as to recommend rolling back to Windows XP Pro, SP 2, 32 bit instead of using Vista Home. But Vista Business will let you use more RAM than XP Pro will allow. So in your case, upgrade to Vista Business.

Excellent. Thank you all for your help.

Larry Rubin:

But Vista Business will let you use more RAM than XP Pro will allow

 Yeah, I think that's the reason why I'm seeing more and more people with Vista based systems loading their platforms with 8 gigs of RAM.

What about Vista Ultimate? That includes everything Business has, along with the Home Premium stuff...

Still not 'qualified' but in theory that should do the trick, right?

 Yes in theory, it should. But given the sometimes quirky nature of Avid's software and the demands it puts on the operating system, I suspect there must be some conflict issues regarding Ultimate or Avid would qualify it.  If there are any Avid Vista Ultimate users out there running it successfully perhaps they can chime in.

 I have Vista Ultimate and can't get Avid to run on it, so i would recomend Vista Business.

... and I'm running the supported Vista Biz 64, and no Generic DV Devices are recognized or installed.  Vista asks for a Driver that the manufacturers say isn't required or available.  Go figure.

I just did this and got it to work. Seems it was my Video card. I have Vista Ultimate.

http://community.avid.com/forums/p/61507/358400.aspx#358400

After hearing much about the NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT and how it doesn't work on some systems I have found a way to ensure that it works.  I have tested this method on 4 different systems, with MC 2.8 and 3.0 and here's how you get it to work:

Most people are experiencing a stall with MC at the point where ACPL loads. 

You will first need to download RiveTuner (do a Yahoo search)

To stop ACPL error on startup, open RivaTuner.  On MAIN tab under "Driver Setting", click on "customize" next to FORCE WARE DETECTED.   Click on option  "OPEN GL".  Look under "Compatibility" tab for "Open GL Version String Override".  The options on the pull-down begins with "no override". Click on "1.5" and then click out of RivaTuner and restart Composer 3.0.

 Just to follow TylerBush's comments, I am running my Media Composer on Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit. It works with a Mojo with absolutely no problems thus far!

Note that if you do go 64-bit, you will be losing a small percentage of performance with the 32-bit emulation going on, but you will also gain the ability to grant up to 4gb of ram directly to MC.  If you're working with a Mojo/MojoDX/NitrisDX, this can be extremely beneficial!

Also, for a more specific answer on differences between Vista home and Vista Business/ultimate,  Vista Home has simplified file sharing options and less adiministrative access than the two higher up versions.  This is to help make multimedia access and file sharing easier for home users, but ultimately makes media management a nightmare with Avid.  Windows XP had the same problem, and it would literally make it possible for you to get locked out of your own files WHILE WORKING ON THEM(!!!) and the only way to get access to them again was to access the hard drive via an XP Pro machine and delete ownership policies!  What a PITA that was!  Definitely don't skimp on the "business OS" over the home ones.  If you want a good deal on an OS, buy a 2 dollar IDE cable and buy an OEM license from ZipZoomFly or Newegg and save a bundle ;).