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IE9 implements too much of its modern HTML5 and security features using Windows 7. DirectX 10, which it uses for hardware accelerated graphics, text and video does not run on XP. XP is eons behind the times in security features. It's not just a marketing decision, at some point if they wanted to do these things they had to say "this version of IE will not run on our 10 year old OS."

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Hmmmm.... I wonder how other browser vendors are able to pull it off then?

This answer doesn't seem to carry much weight if Firefox and Chrome can do these things and still remain secure.

They use OpenGL instead of DirectX for hardware acceleration. Microsoft's obviously not going to do that; using DX plays to their strengths in every possible way, from what their developers and toolchain is already optimized for, to what's already rendering the entire desktop in WinVista/Win7... so it could even mean IE10 on Win8 tablets will be better on battery life than FF/Chrome. I'm not an expert on this, but DX is likely the objectively better choice for hardware acceleration on Windows -- the reason FF/Chrome use OpenGL is because they have to support other platforms IE doesn't, and doing everything twice in OpenGL/DirectX to get the best result on Windows while still supporting Mac/Linux has obvious downsides.

The latest version of Firefox does not run on PowerPC (my parents are both still on PowerPC Macs). Mozilla has no financial interest in people buying new Macs.

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