First, yes, it does make Vista faster.  Slightly.  More stable?  Can’t say yet.  BUT!  It may be faster, but it is still slower than XP.

Vista SP1 takes an eternity to install.  About an hour in my VM.

Vista SP1 cannot be slipstreamed into an already exsistant DVD.  This is a big fucking deal Microsoft.  It takes less time to install a fresh Vista than install SP1.

I actually lied slightly.  You can slipstream SP1 in one way.  But it’s a pain.  Let me explain.  My DVD has loads of versions on it (MS designed it that way of course).  To slipstream SP1 I have to install a version, install SP1, run sysprep and other crap, pack the installation, repeat for each install type and create a new DVD.  With the amount of time needed for SP1 to be installed each time you’d be there all bloody day!  Screw that!

Still a memory hog.  A fresh SP1 install starts with 360MB used.  It then increases to about 375MB and then slowly decreases to 250MB where it stays.  What the hell is going on in there?!?!?  I know it uses a new memory manager to keep the most used things in memory on boot, like OS X and Linux, but why the RAM dance at the start?  Oh, and it thrashes the hard drive while doing it too.

Hard drive activity.  Still thrashes that when it gets half a chance.
Open Media Centre then close it.  Good minutes trashing there.  Screen saver activate then deactivate, another good thrashing session.  Random thrashing still happens quite often, but appears to be slightly better.
On boot Vista is using enough RAM for three fresh XP installations, why does it need to access the HD so damn much?!?!

The activity lights in VMware says it accesses my CD drive every second or so when a disc is in it.  WHY?!?!?!  Hard drive too - obviously.

Vista is still ugly as sin.  I know SP1 was never going to fix that, but I think it needs mentioning.

Media Centre is still good.  Too bad you have to have Vista to use it.

Microsoft really dropped the ball on the OEMBIOS activation front.  SP1 was supposed to disable and remove the current activation hacks.  That works.  But, my (now deleted) install is still genuine after changing the type of BIOS attack used.  A modified Linux boot loader chainloads Vista to inject the BIOS information needed.  And it’s easier to install.  Fix that one Microsoft.  Why was XP never subject to these attacks?  Someone fucked up Vista.  As we know…

All in all,

The only good Vista is a virtualised Vista.  Clicks “Delete VM from Disk”.

Let’s hope Windows 7 fixes this train wreck.