>I think reference counting is a HUGE plus and fairly mandatory to a good OOP language. I don't know how you would get by without it.

Well, the C++ world manages to muddle along. :)

That said, you obviously have to be quite careful to avoid memory leaks in C++. Garbage collection is a frequently asked for feature (and explains much of the popularity of Java). Some programmers simply manage reference counting on their own (I believe the Standard C++ Library string class uses reference counting to avoid unnecessay copying).

But you _can_ get by without it. And if you can, your app will be faster, as a result.