I can't argue against the theoretical validity of your original comment, but theoretical maxima are moot when you're trying to sell a volume product such as Vista.

I'll help you out with an argument: It is not that XP would be incapable of running more than two graphics-cards (or rather two gpus) as seen with the previous incarnation of quad-sli (2x 79x0GX2). It's an artificial limitation.

I recall 7950 Quad SLI on XP to be pitiful with no game supporting it:

 

If you recall NVIDIA

Hm, does it have something to do with pre-render-limits? I thought they were resticted in DX10, not 9? However, I may be totally confusing things

Edited April 9, 200817 yr by samm

No i'm just sick of hearing people say that XP is faster for games. Vista is truly the fastest for games if you have the hardware. XP just doesn't have the capability to take advantage of more than two videocards, while Vista is coded so it can sli 3 or 4 cards

that's not an argument for vista being faster, it's an argument for vista allowing faster (well, more) hardware. apples-oranges comparison. vista isn't faster by this statement alone, it is simply enabling better hardware and hence, a faster overall system. build two identical hardware platforms (that XP can take advantage of), then compare vista and XP. as samm noted, its a mixed bag, so the people that are griping are probably running the programs that do run slower on vista.

 

IMO, vista is bloated because of the extra layer of abstraction they've added to automate a lot of things that XP and win2K left up to the user (and i'm sure there are other "features" they added that i haven't run across yet). it's certainly bigger on my HDD, and it boots slower on my laptop, but that's also partly due to the malware that HP installed to make their product work the way they want it to work (some of which i need, some of which i have permanently deleted, some of which i haven't identified as good or bad yet).

 

once i'm done with school, one of my priorities is to get all my pooter issues worked out (that and i need to clean my office). by june i'll have a better idea of the trades involved.

 

taks