Diogen, didn't you say you had some netbooks available?
I have. Half a dozen of them (or so).
But I don't want to get into this debate. For many reasons.
First, I don't use XP anymore.
Second, it is very hard to compare them properly. Again, for many reasons.
For example, boot-up time.
It is known that Win7 boots faster than Vista. But if you really look deeper into that, it doesn't.
It just shows you the desktop faster, before everything is loaded and actually allows you to start programs.
Another example: RAM consumed by Chrome.
It has been shown that Chrome takes RAM
when unused and returns it as soon as there is use for it by other programs.
They (Google) claim it is efficient use of memory and it is really hard to argue with that.
I used Norton antivirus since around 1995, the corporate version for the last 5-6 years. Had no reason to complain.
When starting to use Win7 and having access to Morro (what later became MSE) I compared them (and some others)
as good as I could. It was no contest. Moving to v.2 that now runs on servers (I run dozens of them).
I'm old and conservative, don't live on the edge.
If I find something I like, I stick with it. Especially in the field of security...
Diogen.