Nowadays, computer hardware technology is developing at a never-before seen pace. Even though they follow at a considerable distance, Operating Systems (OS) are also part of the progress information technology has embarked on. While hardware issues are not much of a nuisance for online gamers and poker players, operating system changes and upgrades can indeed be quite a pain in the neck.

Compatibility issues between different operating systems have prevented Mac users and those who use the Linux platform, to fully enjoy the pleasures of online gaming for years. Even today, when online gambling operators are showing an increased interest in covering these platforms too, the quality of the gaming experience leaves a lot of room for improvement.
Windows Vista is the next big thing to come along, and compatibility issues are already starting to surface as far as online poker clients are concerned.

If you read around internet poker forums a bit, you’ll find all sorts of complaints about different poker clients. Apparently, Full Tilt Poker’s software runs slowly on some new computer systems, which run Windows Vista. With the 64-bit version, there seem to be even more problems. Obviously, most poker rooms have so far failed to optimize their client software for Windows Vista. Bodog too seems to be experiencing problems. Apparently, not even the biggest online gambling operations out there are safe from these compatibility problems. The temporary solution seems to be obvious, however. There are already no-download Java-based versions out there of most of the bigger online poker rooms. Since these Java-clients were specifically designed to bridge the compatibility-gap between different operating systems, they should work just as well under Vista, and apparently they do, too.

In the long-run though, it is obvious that much bigger changes will have to be implemented in each and every single online poker room out there. You see, it is predictable that in a few years time, Vista will pretty much be the most popular OS in the world. The good old XP will fade away just like Windows 95 and Windows 98 have.

Bottom line is: prepare for a poker software revolution, it will be coming to a poker room near you shortly…