I made the full head-long plunge into Windows Vista recently, and I must say that I am really, really impressed with this operating system.  You need to understand that I'm the kind of guy that is very skeptical of "new and improved", particularly with a new OS from Microsoft.  I love XP and it has been rock-solid for years now.  So when Vista was released, I figured, "who needs it - XP is fine".  Well, have seen the light... I've been converted, Vistaricized - however you want to put it.  Even running full Aero, my T60 runs Vista faster than XP.  Yes, that's right - faster.

One of the cool features is the sidebar.  Yes, I realize that you can get a Google sidebar, or a Yahoo sidebar, but the Vista one was my first exposure to is, and it certainly is convenient.  A great add-on is from Frameworkx called the "Remote Desktop Sidebar Gadget".  It places a small interface in the sidebar to quickly launch an RDP session to any Microsoft desktop/terminal server.  I highly recommend checking it out...

Download:    Frameworkx Remote Desktop Sidebar Gadget