Security – Act 1, Scene 2

The outcome was almost preordained. Baron Vista lies in a crumpled heap on the floor, having been unable to penetrate Count OS X's armour.

It's hardly surprising -- Windows' susceptibility to hackers and malware is well-documented. If your PC is connected to the Internet, there's a good chance digital nasties are forcing their way in. If not, your PC probably has the back door wide open anyway.

Microsoft is trying, though -- it has added the User Account Controls (UAC) feature, which prevents dangerous software from making changes to your PC. If Vista thinks a program could compromise its security, it'll suffer a panic attack, produce a dialogue box and tell you something bad might happen. It's effective for the most part, but the level of intrusion is infuriating. We almost hope the cybercrooks get through UAC so Microsoft has to invent a better solution.

Microsoft should be able to keep its OS safe by now, but out of the box, Vista is a sitting duck. Microsoft recommends you update its main shield, Windows Defender, every week, however with thousands of new spyware strains created every month, how can you be sure this is enough to protect your system? Virus protection is non-existent out of the box, too -- you'll have to buy that separately. 

Buy an Apple PC and you can be confident of safety. It ships with all communication ports closed. Native services such as FTP access, remote login and printer sharing are all switched off by default so the chances of a hacker attack are minimal to say the least. Even without all this fancy protection, nobody's bothering to make viruses for Macs anyway, so it's the best bet for digital hypochondriacs.

Score: Mac OS X-1, Windows Vista-0