Can anyone advise if the latest version of Xampp runs ok with this OS? Any other advice relating to installation is also much appreciated.
There have been some teething issues with Vista but usually for those who have migrated from XP and who have not quite got a handle on the new OS and it's nanny like approach for novice users.
From those issues, turning off UAC, or at least knowing how to control it, being an admin, or better a super admin, is essential to administer a web server on Vista.
Don't install to a folder with a space in the name ie.
Program Files, install to a drive like C: etc.
I recommend the
EXE(7zip) self extracting version and extract to the C:\ drive which will create C:\xampp with all the files in their right places, then simple run the setup_xampp.bat file in the xampp folder to set the paths - running the bat files and some of the exe files in the xampp installation requires admin rights.
Go to
http://localhost and test your installation by running the demos in the menu list.
Read the XAMPP For Windows home page and the FAQ also the readme_en.txt file on the Home page which will also be extracted to the xampp folder on install.
If you choose to use the Installer version then when asked to install the services elect to not do this as this has given some a major headache.
In the XAMPP Control Panel don't click on the MySQL
Admin.. button as this will cause major errors as the file it loads, WinMySQLAdmin, is deprecated. The file to use to admin MySQL is phpMyAdmin.
I believe that XAMPP is very stable if installed correctly and again my advise is don't tweak any configuration files or ini files until you know exactly the consequences of doing so.
I hope I have covered most things that have been presented to the XAMPP for Windows in the English forums but not guaranteed.
Good luck and I hope you enjoy using XAMPP as it's very useful for development use.