Operating System: Linux

It doesn't matter how much money you spend on hardware, you still need an OS to run everything, and this leads to the question: which is best?

While the beardy weirdy brigade might keep banging on about how great open source is and how we should all cuddle a penguin, Linux is simply crap for gaming. Yes, you can play games in Linux, and certain games are now being released for Linux, usually several years after they appeared on Windows, but it's not for the faint hearted.

While we might complain about Windows foibles until the cows come home, really there's nothing to complain about compared to Linux. If you can remember the bad old days when you had to configure multiple config.sys and autoexec.bat files, just to get different games working, and you actually enjoyed it, then you are probably a Linux user. For the rest of us though, the only logical choice is Windows.

Which of course begs the question, which version? Only Windows Vista offers the visual delights of DirectX 10, but its brutal hardware requirements means that you end up spending more money than you would for the equivalent performance from a Windows XP rig.

There's also the issue of hardware drivers. Even a year after release, there are still many drivers missing, or not working correctly in Vista. There's also the issue of cost. Windows XP is a lot cheaper than Vista, although it's not going to be available for much longer. Let's not forget that in Crysis, many of the so-called DirectX 10 features have been unlocked in Windows XP.

For now, we'd say, unless you absolutely have to have that Aero interface, Windows XP is still first choice, while it's available.