XP versus Vista

Im planning on using bootcamp to run windows on my macbook pro so I can play games. Can someone please tell me the pros/cons of both Vista and XP. Also, can I get some advice on which version is better? as in, Windows Home edition, ultimate.....and all those other different versions that are available.

Im aiming to play current, next-gen, and old games
my video card is compatible with DirectX10.

thanks for the help

XP Professional is probably the best option if you want windows since the driver support is better and it isn't a resource hog by default. Vista, with lots of tweaking, can be made to run decently though if you need it for anything in particular (like DX10). I got Vista to run quite smoothly in a virtual machine on a desktop computer of mine running Linux w/ an Athlon XP 2500+, but also bear in mind the computer has 2.5GB of RAM and the VM had 1.5GB to it. If you have 2GB of RAM or more, you should be ok and look for websites that have good Vista tweaking guides; I got Vista Ultimate to boot with only about 310mb used after tweaking. What helps the most is using the classic skin and turning off Windows Defender as well as auto updates and UAC (user account control; i.e. the annoying popups that tell you you are doing something as an administrator yet don't ask you for a password...). Good luck!

Right now, XP is your best bet. Vista is a resource hog, and perhaps not as stable or as well supported yet as XP.

Would also recommend XP Pro.

At this time there are only a couple DX 10 games and many game developers are not using the DX 10 api's. Valve (Half-Life, Counterstrike) as a case in point.

MS tied DX10 to Vista only to force the gaming community to buy Vista. Well, the gaming community is taking to it about the same as it took to Win ME a few years ago. Valve has recently done an anonymous study on more than a million users of it's gaming service and found less than 3% are using Vista.

From the current issue of Maximum PC - not verbatim:
Valve's director of marketing says "There is no difference between running Orange Box games (HL2-Ep2, TF2, Portal) on Vista versus XP, but there are benefits to having a DX10 GPU." Users with DX10 cards will see more sophisticated features, but it is not due to using DX10 api's (which they are not), but is due to the unified architecture only available in DX10 cards. So except for only a couple of games out there right now, there is no difference in gaming between Vista and XP and you will see a video improvement in either one with a DX10 capable card.

And if you haven't yet gotten an external drive for backups - your local Fry's (among others) will sell you an OEM copy of XP Pro ($140) with the purchase of a drive.

I hope Vista is a huge flop