I see your point about the Xbox. But as a Wii user myself I cannot really grasp the Xbox' influence. (The only Xbox game that interests me is a form of Pac Man I saw on it.)

But as a .NET developer (in a way), I think MS' greatest accomplishment in the last decade has been hiring Anders Hjeilsberg from Borland (now Embarcadero) and creating C# and .NET.

I find it hard to say "Microsoft" and "innovation" in the same sentence.

That being said, I go with Windows 7 for their accomplishment.  ME was only out a year before being trumped, but VISTA lasted 3 years.

Why? 

I'm curious as I really don't see anything all that impressive about it. It's ahead of xp obviously.  But it just feels like vista that doesn't suck---which I guess is great. 

Truth be told, a full time job, a side gig, and a 2 year old:  I don't really get much time for gaming.  But the thought has occurred to me to buy a wii for the house. 

I'm not sure what 'influence' ms and the xbox has over the industry.  Like I say:  more or less I think it's a big deal because by all rights, it should have been a flop.  I mean we've seen dedicated gaming companies get their asses kicked out of the industry and MS managed to get in and do well.  Ironically, they failed at something they were supposed to be good at:  vista

You answered your own question.  That is the reason.  Considering that at least for the short term, Windows is going to be on 9 out of 10 computers and we have to use it (almost every tool in my biz is built for Windows, with about 50% of them also have a Linux version), saying it makes "Vista suck less" means it is great for most people.