Microsoft made an uninspired decision in 2005, when they lowered technical requirements for Windows Vista at the request of Intel, as a series of e-mail showed. A couple of years later, Microsoft found itself in court over the decision to include an older integrated graphics chipset in the ‘OK’ list for Vista Aero interface.

The company released a statement explaining the decision: “The e-mails reflect part of an active discussion about how best to implement the Windows Vista Capable program. What the e-mails don’t show is the comprehensive education campaign … (that) armed consumers with the information they needed to choose a PC that would run the version of Windows Vista that fit their budget and their computing needs.”

The discussion ran around giving ‘green Vista light’ to Intel’s 915 chipset, despite the Aero incompatibilities, which was a mistake, as Microsoft executive John Kalkman said: “In the end, we lowered the requirement to help Intel make their quarterly earnings so they would continue to sell motherboards with the 915 graphics.”

The long series of e-mails shows that both Microsoft and Intel are just as responsible for turning the Vista experience into a unpleasant customer experience. After all, spending once thousands of dollars on something that proves to be useless tow hours later isn’t exactly an experience one would want to repeat.

Unfortunately, it’s been a great business for the two, but an unfortunate acquisition for customers who were let to believe that PCs that normally wouldn’t be able to run Windows Vista were now capable of doing that. “It was a mistake on our part to change the original graphics requirements,” Kalkman also said.

If Microsoft at least admitted to making a mistake, Intel representatives not only refused to comment on it, but also said Mr. Kalkman shouldn’t have made those affirmations, as he was qualified to speak about Intel’s financial status or products. At the same time, Microsoft denied deceiving consumers, saying their offer included different versions of Vista for different PCs at different prices.