[cpg]

Microsoft did the same thing way back with CPUID .. when it was Intel, it worked well. Otherwise (AMD, Transmeta), they would use very inefficient operations instead of SSE (IIRC), slowing down benchmarks that used media (like players, etc) and Photoshop. This is from a distant life in the past, but I think it was not limited to use of SSE.

[21]

Are you sure you're talking about Microsoft, and not about Intel's C++ compiler?