Actually Vista runs great and is one of the most bug free OS on the market. But to make it run well it helps to have a minimum of 2 GB of RAM and a PCI-Express Video card, not an onboard one that most low end systems use. Basically the same requirements as Windows 7. The majority of problems relating to Vista systems are related to the garbage that system and laptop manufacturers install, and people using outdated programs and drivers on their systems.
When it comes to a laptop, look for one with video by either ATI/AMD Radeon or nVidia, avoid anything with Intel graphics.
Windows 7 does run faster than Vista, in fact it runs faster than XP on my system.
But I wouldn't think of running it on a system with an onboard video card or under 2 GB of RAM. If you want to really enjoy it, bump your system to 8GB and install the 64 bit version if you have a 64 bit CPU, which almost all systems sold in the last 3 years are equiped with. And RAM is cheap these days...a friend picked up a 4GB kit yesterday, 2x2GB, at Microbytes for $50, tax in. So there is not much of a reason to be running under that amount of RAM in any system today.
Techman
PS: The system he is offering for sale is a good laptop. It's not too heavy to carry around and seeing as it came with Vista Premium, and has onboard Radeon video, it will have no problems running Win 7 with all the graphics goodies. I would just bump the RAM up from 1 GB to at least 2 GB. It's a fair price and it's much better value than spending around the same money for a netbook which are all the rage right now. Just my 2 cents.