Is anyone really surprised the 7 out sold Vista so fast. Vista had poor reviews even before it came out. 7 was already being called the greatest OS of all time by some shortly after the RC was released. There even people installing it on 10 year old computers with stock parts and reporting that it ran fine with all the bells and whistles disabled (but why would you want it like that?).
I will admit, that Vista x64 on at least 3GB of RAM isn't bad at all. Even a Vista basher like me wouldn't mind using it. But my cousins computer with the almost the exact same specs as mine except Vista 32-bit installed on it, has always been slower than mine. Whether is was XP, 7 32-bit, or 7 64-bit on mine, her's always runs slower in general. The OS is the only discernible difference.