Pictures pixelated when zoomed in on (smoother in XP)

Well, along with my videos being pixelated and grainy (working on this in separate threads), my pictures get grainy when zoomed in on as well. It appears as if Windows 7 isn't using smoothed transitions at all, while the same picture zoomed in on in XP doesn't have the same blocky/pixelated effect.

I have found my problem replicated in the thread below which shows exactly what I'm talking about:
Pictures gets "pixelated" when I zoom in. - Vista Forums

Apparently no one there has a resolution, so I'm hoping someone in here might. Any help is much appreciated.

Try irfanview. It does similar smoothing as XP picture viewer.

http://www.irfanview.com/

I will try that out. I'm just getting a bit frustrated with having to use/install all these 3rd party things just to get the new Win7 to work as well as XP does. It's a bit unnerving that it requires this and was hoping for some sort of simple tweak within the OS to get it working properly.

Any other ideas on why any scaling (zooming/enlarging) above native resolution for any picture/video in Windows 7 is terrible? There has to be some underlying reason/setting.

Bump for anything.

Downloaded and tried both IRFanView and Fastone Image Viewer, both showing the same pixelation in zooming.

I suggest you go back and re-read this part:

FliGi7 said:

...It appears as if Windows 7 isn't using smoothed transitions at all, while the same picture zoomed in on in XP doesn't have the same blocky/pixelated effect ...

The same picture in XP zoomed in the same amount, does not appear as pixelated and blocky. It is not a "superficial" effect when the quality differs across operating systems.

FliGi7 said:

I suggest you go back and re-read this part:

FliGi7 said:

...It appears as if Windows 7 isn't using smoothed transitions at all, while the same picture zoomed in on in XP doesn't have the same blocky/pixelated effect ...

The same picture in XP zoomed in the same amount, does not appear as pixelated and blocky. It is not a "superficial" effect when the quality differs across operating systems.

I just got a Dell Inspiron i525 computer with Windows 7 at Best Buy last week and I noticed that issue with the images as I zoom in. IT IS NOT like that with my old computer with XP and it's very frustrating. In fact, it sucks!

I'm thinking of taking it back and just getting a used one with XP...