I demonstrated Windows Vista to a small group of senior computer users this week. I did my best to make them say "Wow!"

I began my demonstration by giving a short history of Windows. I discussed how successful Microsoft had been at both standardizing and simplifying computers. Many of them had used computers in the DOS days and could appreciate what Microsoft had done.

I discussed how Windows 3.1 made it possible for people to use the computer without having to memorize commands. Windows 95 introduced stability and multimedia. Windows 98 Introduced new file structures and modern Internet capabilities. After a short misfire with Windows ME, Microsoft more than made up for it with the stable, self-healing Windows XP.

Which brought us to Windows Vista. I couldn't tell them that it was faster, or more stable than XP. I couldn't point out many tricks that would allow them to skip steps so I pretended to love Vista and sell it on it's prettiness and a few interesting features.

I began by opening up the Start menu. "Look," I explained, "Vista has simplified the Start menu by getting rid of the word 'My' before My Documents and My Computer!" They were unimpressed. I didn't show them the search feature at that point because that was part of my big finish.

"OK, then watch this," I demonstrated how I could hover over task bar buttons to bring up thumbnails of running programs. Their reply, "That's so small, how can you tell what they are?" I was shot down again.

"If those thumbnails are too small you can hold down the Windows button and press TAB and it will bring up this pretty large 3D view of all of your running programs." I couldn't get them to say "Wow!" on that one but two of them said, "Hmm."

Then came the question, "Where is my Windows button?" The only person who had a Vista machine said,"I tried that on my system and it didn't work," it turns out that she was running Windows Vista Home Basic edition which does not have that feature.

"Here's something you'll really like!" I went into my desktop and changed my wallpaper to a video of a bear catching a salmon from a river. The video looped over and over behind my icons. I explained that this ability was only available in the $300+ version of Vista. "Can you change that?" one student asked, "It’s giving me a headache."

I could tell that they were less than impressed so I pulled out the last two big guns I had. I showed them how you could type in all or part of a file or program name in the Start search box. "That's nice," a few of them said. But still no "Wow!"

There was only one bullett left in my pocket, the Windows Sidebar. I had turned it off previously and it took me about five minutes to discover where to turn it back on in the Control Panel. "Watch this!" I added the clock and calendar to the sidebar.

"Don't you have the time and date at the bottom?" someone asked. "Yes," I admitted. "Why do you need it on your desktop then?" I tried to think what a Microsoft representative would say to that. "It's not just the time, you can also add slideshows, notes, stock tickers and resource monitors," I demonstrated.

"Hmm," came the reply.

I have decided that Microsoft chose the slogan, "The Wow is Now" because they couldn't think of any clever phrases with words that rhymed with "Why?" or "Hmm."