XP can run multithreaded applications (how many are there?) and it also can use both cores or multiple CPUs, no doubt!
But it does not benefit that much from it. When both CPUs are used for one multithreaded application (like Photoshop, 3DS-MAX or other professional, very hardwareintensive programs), XP always is slower in the benchmarks than Vista, especially in the comparison of XP64 and Vista64. Even with packing- or video-tools and also loading times for games.
And if you assign the program to 2 cores, you'll get stutters. That's not only true for IL2, but also for modern titles like UT3, which even supports multiple CPU and GPU.
But if it was just the game, why does it run smooth as silk with Vista and 2 cores assigned?
Same is for BlackShark. It basically uses the same engine from LockOn1.0, so it wasn't expected to get any performance-gain in Vista and infact the devs always said they take no guarantee it even runs without problems.
People learned it did run and it ran faster with 2 cores assigned. Not only faster than on one core, but most of the time much faster than with XP.
There is a thread about this, with some people reporting a 30% advantage with Vista64bit SP1 over XP SP3!
There's just one big difference between those benchmarks mentioned by CaptStubing and those reported there: AERO.
If you install XP and Vista and run the game on the same system with the same hardware, you will have a slight advantage with XP still. I tested it for weeks with different programs and games. BUT if you activate the option to disable desktop-design while running the program, the advantage is noteable with Vista.
Remember, we have 3 Service-Packs for XP and we all know what things to enable or disable with XP to get the most out of it. But most people running these benchmarks know little about Vista, most of them can't even be neutral, enable sidebar and AERO with full transparency and I've seen no test on a Vista-Rig that is optimized for gaming, except that thread over at the DCS-forums.
Maybe Microsoft is going the wrong way, optimizing their OS for users, not for gamers, but this whole thing has become a holy war: Prejudgements, 3rd hand information and based on test with biased circumstances, with very few people willing to test it first hand.
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