Clearly they didn't use Catalyst 7.6 because the performance isn't as high as it should be for the 2900XT. And they should be using Vista for benching now. 2900XT is a lot better under Vista, the OS it was designed to use. 2900XT > G80
Only K8L can save AMD. Of course budget gamers will still prefer AMD, since Core 2 is still new and prices are way up. But in a few months the Core 2 line will be a lot more affordable. A system purely for gaming isn't going to have much of a difference if a Athlon 64 X2 4600+ or a Core 2 Duo E6300 is in it. Of course if you happen to have Quad SLI, X1900 Crossfire, or 7900 GTX SLI, there is going to be a noticable difference because the 4600+ at stock speed would be a bigger bottleneck than the E6300 at stock speed. Overclocking might help the AMD, but what it comes to is AMD's K8 micrarchitecture is becoming obsolete. AMD might be able to catch up with Intel with K8L and the 65nm AM2's (AM3), but Intel will hold the performance crown for a while. Also, AMD needs to stop axing so many CPUs. Socket 939 is understandable, but all the dual core, 1mb per core CPUs (except FX-62) is insane. (By the way, I favour neither AMD nor Intel, it's what gives you the best performance for your money. And my new system with an AM2 Athlon 64 3500+ (I'll overclock) should be here soon :) )
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