They kind of got a huge backlash when Vista was first released, as it had many many compatibility problems when it was released. Just like XP did, just like 98 did, just every windows that has ever been made did for the first few months before things got ironed out. Problem is that these days the internet news and slander is so big that what everybody read from a few geeks mouths a few years ago still holds true for them today. Most of the people I know that say "Vista sucks!" have never even used it, and they just trust the word of someone they know that probably also hasn't used it. I was one of the people who adopted Vista early and was disappointed with the compatibility issues enough to convert me back to XP for a while. Now I've been happily on Vista Ultimate 64 bit for over a year and haven't had a SINGLE problem yet... I love it.
Also, don't let the Linux nerds fool you, you'll never get half the common things you use and love to work as well on Linux as it does on Vista these days. Especially if you're a gamer. I currently dual-boot Ubuntu 9.04 64bit on a secondary drive with my Vista 64 bit computer. I would switch to Linux permanently but I can't get core things to work. The only thing the Linux driver for my all-in-one Canon printer does is print... no scanning... no copying... just print. I can't play a good 75% of my games on Linux reliably, if at all. I can't update my iPhone on Linux. So on, and so forth.
They are trying to get away from the typical windows stereotypes with 7, reinventing themselves. While I personally haven't used it, as I'm not big on being a beta tester and running into problems on purpose, I've heard great things about it so far.
