HexManiac

You could 'get by' with everything except the HDD. 10GB is not enough to load Vista. Your cousin's friend probably has a bigger HDD. Vista will not run well, even if you add a new HDD. You will constantly hear about how Vista sucks and does not run worth a dang.

Vista uses the graphics processor to offload all graphics tasks from the CPU, allowing it to run faster and more efficiently on what are considered 'high-end' systems. Without an adequate graphics processor (the mx440 is not adequate), your CPU will have to handle the graphics subsystem (default in Home Basic), running slower and bogging down constantly.