There is some confusion here between operating systems and browsers. I guarantee that Vista, which is an operating system, is not the problem. An operating system has nothing to do with being able to properly display web pages and use interactive functions on them, other than allowing you to install and run a browser. A browser is a program that has the capability of displaying (and enabling use of functions on) a webpage.
There are several browsers (probably about 20 or more), but for Windows users the most well known are IE (Internet Explorer, which is a browser that is included in all versions of Windows), Firefox (sometimes called by the name of its predecessor Mozilla), and Chrome (a product of Google). Micorsoft created a brand new browser named Edge that is part of Windows 10.
If a browser is the problem with viewing (and/or using interactive functions on) a website then these are the possible causes:
- You don't have the newest version of whatever browser you are using. Some websites, that want to be at (what we call) the bleeding (instead of the original "leading") edge of technology, use the newest html (the language that browsers can interpret and display for a user) features but have (very unprofessionally) not included alternate code to allow older browsers to be able to display their web pages.
Please note that if you use an older operating system, like Vista, your computer may not be capable of using the newest version of one or more browsers, so this will limit you. This is the ONLY way in which your operating system impacts anything about displaying a website!!!
- Many websites are designed for display in 1 particular browser. In these cases, hopefully they at least tell you that on their home page if you are using a different browser that will not be able to display and/or use functions correctly for that site.
It has always been a major headache for web developers to ensure that all browsers on all platforms (that's mac and several unix versions, in addition to windows) are able to nicely display web pages produced by their software. All browsers do things differently, so a website must be able to detect which browser is being used by the currently connected user who requests a webpage in order to send the version of the webpage that is optimized for display in that browser. That headache has increased by a few orders of magnitude now that we have phones and tablets, often each having their own built-in browser and very different screen sizes and capabilities - touch screens are one example of this. Nonetheless, I am shocked to see the number - and caliber - of websites that do not ensure that they handle all browsers and all devices smoothly. It is not uncommon to see problems like this on websites of major companies, including banks, insurance companies, stockbrokers - places that conduct e-commerce. If they are so inept that their website programming is what I consider incompetent then they have unmitigated gall when they expect me to trust them to properly protect the security of my financial information to handle transactions!!!
- The new Edge browser has a special example of this. Edge has several new features, not all of which work as smoothly as they should (read that as still a little buggy). Edge adds a few new quirks to the pot - it has a few brand new ways of differing from all the other browsers and is a royal pain (trust me on this - I have first hand experience coping with this) to developers. The result is that it is not rare (when using Edge) to see a notice on a website telling you that Edge is not capable of displaying it and recommending which browser they would prefer you to use. I happen to think that the REAL problem is that their programmer is not capable of making it display properly in Edge, rather than Edge not being capable.
In all these cases, in my opinion the fault is with the programmer of the website - it is his/her job to produce software that will display and function in whatever browser - and whatever version of it - that a user has.
That said, after making sure that you are using the most current version of each browser you have installed, if you are faced with a display problem in one browser then your best bet is to try another one ... until you find one that displays it well. You can grumble (and I could probably teach you a few new words to use for this purpose) or you can write a nastygram to the company that owns the offending site - however, both those courses of action will probably be equally ineffective at solving the problem.
