I've read the few pages of the February mag and afterward I was left with a lot of questions. The main one is not WTF though it was close to it. The article was suppose to show the difference between DX9 and DX10, how a DX9 budget pc can still dish out the desired effect. Looking at the scores posted and the pictures shown it looks more like a budget pc compared to a state of the art number cruncher.
Looking at the lost planet section it shows how much smoother and refined the dx10 system handles. The comes the horrible score with dx9 falling far far behind that of dx10. Its not showing the performance or comparison between the direct x's but rather that of the systems used. Looking at the system specs all you should need to place the 2 systems neck on neck would be to give the budget system a midrange upgrade like the 8800gt. Yes the card is dx10 but the drivers on xp are only dx9. R1500 more and the performance gap should be less than 10% if the dx9 system doesn't run miles away.
I feel the article got just as sidetracked as my forums threads and didn't reach the conclusion the title indicated.