Ill never go back to XP, gees my crossfire setup never worked in XP but in 7 it works flawless. Thumbs up for micro corrupt this time, they really proved they can still make a good OS.

Win7 > WinXP

That is all.

Nice article, I've been wondering about gaming performance. Looks like I'll save my money. No reason to upgrade, XP has been rock solid and looks like their is little to no improvement in game performance.

another microsoft PR article. great going guys!!

I have 6GB RAM, 1GB DDR5 HD4870 and Vista Ultimate x64 edition. I'm getting more than satisfactory performance.

Not every gamer has a monster PC ... so use your head and then jump the Windows 7 ship.

This is all DX9 performance. I know for a fact Far Cry 2 in DX10 out performs the DX9 build. And if anyone is using a NV 8xxx or ATI 3xxx or better card it'd be foolish to stick with XP. I understand that growing pains are always there with MS and it's hard to get over XP being stable as it is (well after SP1 at least) but 7 so far has been more than impressive in synthetic as well as real world benching.

Is this the failtrain?
Firstly, it is long known that XP64 has worse performance than XP32.

Secondly, why write this:
"Can Windows 7 deliver equal or even superior performance to Windows XP service pack 3?"

When XP64 obviously has no service pack 3.

XP64 is a very uncommon setup, which does not reflect what the majority of people think is XP.

Perhaps it's time to do a new test.

Agreed with SNigel. I run xp 32 and would like to compare that with Win 7....

Other than hardware and software compatability, and initial installation there really is little difference between XP/Vista/Windows 7/a decent Linux/Mac. Pick the cheapest and fasted hardware that supports the OS needed for your hardware and software. All the rest is just hype aby writers that like to play with what is new.

An interesting aspect. I was provided Windows 7 Professional that was $25. I have a Mac with OSX and currently XP. I purchased a Mac because I returned 3 computers using Vista that made my laptop a paperweight. Until then I never thought about buying a Mac at all. But during that time, nothing using Vista would work and the OS was so bad all the manufacturers installed their own software to try to keep it from crashing. I checked all the stores if I could buy a computer with not O/S and was told MS had forced them to not allow that. They also said I would have to pay someone to remove Vista and install XP even if they never installed Vista. I needed a computer that works then and frankly, I've been alive to long to let MS force me to but an O/S they developed that was actually worse than their previous one that was still selling.

I found a Mac that had a Matte screen that I liked better and had all the exact hardware I wanted and because a new model was coming in, I was able to buy the laptop for less than the price of the same Laptop without Vista. The O/S was great and it could run my old XP and it would run all my old PC software.

I called the MS help desk for help with trouble shooting and they directed me to the manufacturer saying all three laptops I purchased from different manufacturers were failing in the identical ways because they installed software incorrectly. When I said my warranty stated that MS was supposed to support me, they said we don't care what your warranty says, we are telling you this.

So I told them then, I had been a lifetime user of MS products and been through them through their worst times. I was a power user on their products and trained people how to use them for years. I was one of their most dedicated customers and was actually fixing some of their factor settings that was significantly reducing crashing and complaints. I had give my builds to retail stores that were using them to make Vista runs cleaner and quicker and had a few questions. The MS customer service lady refused. At that time, I told her that MS would not ever see me buy any of their software for 10 years (one generation). If someone bought it for me as a gift I would return it and never keep it unless it would cost the buyer less than $25. I told her I was packing of the laptop while I spoke to her and was returning it to the manufacturer where I bought it from and it was entirely because of her and they crappy software I was wasting my time troubleshooting. I was going to write a not to each of the manufacturers that if they offer that Windows only computer, I would never buy from them again because it doesn't account for MS trying to sell vaporware. It was a product I would never give my worst enemy. She was not amazed that I, in particular said that, but because she had been hearing that with virtually every phone call she picked up. To her, it was one of thousands on phone calls she had received.

I have XP on the other side of my partition. When people have trouble with Vista, I no longer have the time or care. Now I will upgrade that side to Windows 7, 32 bit. That is because unlike Apple, MS still doesn't have 64 bit software it has made that will run on it. If they are developing Windows 8 that is supposed to run like Apple does in two years, I can wait. All I know is MS still doesn't have drivers for it's 64 bit Windows 7 and its been a year since Windows 7 was released.

Now that You hear that, I will tell you MS positives. It appears MS got the message: Because Open Office was almost as good as Office 2003, MS came out with 2010 (office 2007 was almost as bad as Vista) and that is a little better than 2003. For the 2003 user, it really isn't the version that will force you to upgrade, but it's a nice release. I have gotten that for $9.95. It looks like MS maybe moving in the right direction. With Open Office competing with MS on the office Suite and Apple and google, MS is being forced to improve their software. With Apple offering a better O/S, MS now understands it must now actually make better products that work right out of the box instead of having the entire US population beta testing their software.

One of the problems MS has is that hardware is now far ahead software. More so than ever. That mean regardless if intel come out with a 500 core processor with a 500 million G processor, it will not mean anything to the average person since the software applications require a 2.0 dual Processor at the most. That means Intel is not going to be making a lot of money going forward and the money will be at developing software. That is what MS must do. It must now innovate and not steal from small businesses like it has in the past. It must also be quicker about it of competitors will again soon be nibbling at their heals. MS has 7 years to go from me.

Vista has pushed Apple sales up considerable and by itself helped it increase its market share. MS just cannot afford to fall asleep at the switch especially when the computer gaming community is switching to consoles that don't require the heavy duty video card expenses.