Make no mistake, I think eventually PC Gamers will be compelled to get Vista, simply because MS has insisted on placing DX10 only on that OS. However at the moment XP is faster and has wider compatibility. This is not hypocrisy, or me being a fanboy - in purely pragmatic terms, right now there is no compelling argument for me to take out my wallet. You go ahead and enjoy your whizzy partially-transparent 3D windows while I'll be £100 better off still with better or equal performance. As for DX10? I don't have a compatible graphics card yet, and I doubt there's a system yet invented that will use it to it's full capacity anyway.

I do not understand your conclusion. In several cases SP1 is actually slower than clean Vista, and in almost all cases XP SP2 is faster. It's not just 'not quite' the ideal gaming platform, it's still a long way off. I'm sticking with XP for the foreseeable future.

My top 5: 1. Publishers ruining games for the sake of expediency / releasing on time regardless of if it's finished / because they can. Not mentioning any names. Other than EA. And Microsoft. And you, Lucasarts... 2. Zero-Day patches. Have you considered finishing the game before going gold? 3. Poor collision detection, particularly in 3D RTS. Did anyone else notice how 12 squads would fit into the space normally occupied by one (with soldiers all clipping into each other) in CnC3's demo? Or the naval vessels passing through each other all the time in SupCom? Meanwhile, in Operation Flashpoint objects just vibrate like crazy when the collision detection can't handle something... 4. Highly anticipated games actually not being all that special. 5. Sneaky-sneaky sections in action FPS, ESPECIALLY those where you're instantly failed for being spotted. Special mention goes to the occasions when your character sees 5 soldiers and decides that it's impossible to take them on directly: You'll have to use Stealth. Despite the fact that you've just fought your way through a heavily defended fortress, killing thousands on the way... -PsyW

Have you seen the prices of the vista upgrades? You can be sure that I will not be upgrading until they actually stop making DX9 games, and it's not likely that anything's going to change my mind on that. I have to agree with Adrianathome: Does MS actually need to own all the money in the world? -PsyW