Windows XP SP3. Much better than Vista SP1

[Vettetech]

Ok if Vista is so good then why is Dell offering free down grades to XP. Vista also sucks for gaming. Anyone I know they say all games ran better with XP. You are not forced to get Vista so why spend 200 or more.

[Guest xiphi]

Ok if Vista is so good then why is Dell offering free down grades to XP. Vista also sucks for gaming. Anyone I know they say all games ran better with XP. You are not forced to get Vista so why spend 200 or more.

Same reason why people stick with XP: it suits their needs better.

[mrk Reviews]

Ok if Vista is so good then why is Dell offering free down grades to XP. Vista also sucks for gaming. Anyone I know they say all games ran better with XP. You are not forced to get Vista so why spend 200 or more.

Dell offer downgrades because DELL computers are generally lower spec than machines we pc gamers buy or build ourselves . They are machines commonly bought by new users who have only used XP (or below) before so they end up either messing Vista up or installing crap on there that slows it down even more.

I have 2 DELL machines here right now, one Dimension on XP which it came with and a new XPS with Vista home and it runs slower than expected (although very stable), this system has 1GB ram.

My own machine is one I built myself with Vista Ultimate (upgraded from XP) and I have absolutely no thoughts on going back to XP, it's faster than XP Pro, it does more than XP pro, my games run the same as XP Pro and I get 13,000 in 3dmark 06 and a 5.7 (everything 5.9 bar hdd) in the experience index.

My system hardly breaks a sweat with anything on Vista so I see nothing to prove your points that Vista is a dog-OS on the whole. All these "people" you seem to know are either non existent or are doing it wrong.

Heavy PC users and PC gamers like myself have no issues at all and we will tell people this. We will NOT force people to choose Vista over XP though because we know better than the hate bandwagon. It is a user's choice on what OS they want but I won't watch lies be spread about any product especially lies which have no evidence provided other than a graph of a BETA update and a bunch of people who read The Inq and join in.

[biffzinker]

I think HHD is very important for Vista, as we have a raid machine at work with Vista, it runs so smooth, but one at home same spec everything else, and better graphic card, only one hhd, and it's crap

Vista is running much more smoothly from the Raptor 150GB than the Hitachi 7K250 drive I first had it installed on here, to bad the Raptors head arm assembly make so much noise/Vista starts prefetching from the hd after a cold boot. :p

[chrispinto]

Dell offer downgrades because DELL computers are generally lower spec than machines we pc gamers buy or build ourselves . They are machines commonly bought by new users who have only used XP (or below) before so they end up either messing Vista up or installing crap on there that slows it down even more.

I have 2 DELL machines here right now, one Dimension on XP which it came with and a new XPS with Vista home and it runs slower than expected (although very stable), this system has 1GB ram.

My own machine is one I built myself with Vista Ultimate (upgraded from XP) and I have absolutely no thoughts on going back to XP, it's faster than XP Pro, it does more than XP pro, my games run the same as XP Pro and I get 13,000 in 3dmark 06 and a 5.7 (everything 5.9 bar hdd) in the experience index.

My system hardly breaks a sweat with anything on Vista so I see nothing to prove your points that Vista is a dog-OS on the whole. All these "people" you seem to know are either non existent or are doing it wrong.

Heavy PC users and PC gamers like myself have no issues at all and we will tell people this. We will NOT force people to choose Vista over XP though because we know better than the hate bandwagon. It is a user's choice on what OS they want but I won't watch lies be spread about any product especially lies which have no evidence provided other than a graph of a BETA update and a bunch of people who read The Inq and join in.

I applaud you for speaking the same sense as myself

Finally, secondary clarification.

[revvo]

There's absolutely no reason why someone should be on 1GB ram still, ram is so cheap now that you can pick up another GB for ?15 of DDR2 memory - no excuse whatsoever.

Tell that to businesses, that all their pcs running at 1GB would need 2GB if they're crazy enough to upgrade to Vista. Cost of having every pc @ 2gb? more than 15 pounds. Oh, and, there's no reason you say? How about this reason:Microsoft says so> Forget the amount at which XP or Vista runs best. People do not know that! People will look at the reccomended specs from the manufacturers, or ask one of us geeks who know this stuff.

Besides 1GB ram was what XP needed to "fly" and fly it did, with 2GB it ran /flawlessly/

XP is flawless on 1GB of ram, unless you game or run heavy development tools like huge SQL databases or whatnot, then alright bump the RAM but how many are doing that?

Besides, I can get XP running on a p3 400mhz with 256MB ram just fine, we have a few at work. Don't ask me why, that's what they've asked me to install and configure and I did. I would have prefered 2K for older computers but we didn't have 2K licenses left. XP is very scalable in that sense that it can run on a wide variety of old hardware.

Vista is the next generation up and rightly so it should have the base requirements that XP has as its "best" requirements.

Next generation? It may be the next operating system but it certainly ain't the next generation. Vista is what Windows 98 was to 95. NT was more of a "next generation" sort of version, as well as XP which ended the gap between 9x and NT systems.

[mrk Reviews]

Vista is next gen, it has several key features which are currently starting to be used (directx 10 for example, throughout 2008 efficiency and developer usage will increase tenfold, Crytek are paving the way for this as are Remedy with Alan Wake) and some minor features that Vienna etc will realise fully in 2009 when the next Windows is out.

Fact is Vista IS stable, it IS fast. The only reason it is not either of these things is when 1 or more of these 3 situations arise.

Bad drivers, Bad hardware, Bad configuration.

All of these 3 are either a user fault or hardware manufacturer fault for not providing a quality driver for Vista yet though the latter is more or less completely fixed bar a few 64bit vista drivers.

[hagjohn]

this whole thread sucks and isn't worth reading through... if you haven't don't bother.

[Setnom]

Well, I've tried Vista RTM way before it reached the stores (through not-so-legal ways) and was initially really glad it turned out so good. Average score of 4.2, Vista ran smoothly, Aero was beautiful, appreciated all the security improvements and memory handling... but that feeling didn't last long.

It was really slow at transferring files, I hate, HATE the default fonts, Firefox GUI was weird in it, Dreamweaver crashed on it, I got tired of Aero, games ran slower, UAC was getting annoying. When I tried Windowblinds, WLM strayed away of position when I restored its main window, some drivers weren't mature or even absent...

Skip past a year, and Vista is way, WAY better. Drivers work, Dreamweaver CS3 works, although I didn't try Vista with those performance enhancers patches, transfers of files have been corrected... But, guess what? I still use XP.

Why?

Aero is still boring, Windowblinds still screws up WLM main window, UAC is still annoying, default fonts are still ugly (sure, I can change them), games still run a bit slower.

Vista SP1 can't change all of those items because they are embbeded deep in the OS, personal nitpicks that make me stay away from Microsoft's latest OS. All in all, these are bad points that XP doesn't have. So I'm sticking with XP for now.

Altough I would propose to Microsoft to add extra themes in the Ultimate Extras. The default Aero theme is boring. If there were more visual styles in Aero (not WB themes because they screw up my Vista), I would consider making the change.

XP SP3, on the other hand, already shows signs of performance improvements. That is something of an achievement, and a really welcomed one. Let's just hope it also applies to other applications and overall OS improvement and not just Office.

To conclude: there really hasn't been any breakthrough that made me want to stick with Vista. XP runs, feels, looks awesome, where Vista only runs, feels, looks average.

Edited November 26, 2007 by miguel_montes

[Malisk]

Tell that to businesses, that all their pcs running at 1GB would need 2GB if they're crazy enough to upgrade to Vista. Cost of having every pc @ 2gb? more than 15 pounds. Oh, and, there's no reason you say? How about this reason: Microsoft says so Forget the amount at which XP or Vista runs best. People do not know that! People will look at the reccomended specs from the manufacturers, or ask one of us geeks who know this stuff.

XP is flawless on 1GB of ram, unless you game or run heavy development tools like huge SQL databases or whatnot, then alright bump the RAM but how many are doing that?

Besides, I can get XP running on a p3 400mhz with 256MB ram just fine, we have a few at work. Don't ask me why, that's what they've asked me to install and configure and I did. I would have prefered 2K for older computers but we didn't have 2K licenses left. XP is very scalable in that sense that it can run on a wide variety of old hardware.

Next generation? It may be the next operating system but it certainly ain't the next generation. Vista is what Windows 98 was to 95. NT was more of a "next generation" sort of version, as well as XP which ended the gap between 9x and NT systems.

What you say about Vista's higher RAM requirements is true, but it's also true that there's a regular software/hardware lifecycle at companies. They usually already have the IT costs budgeted, and I'd guess that RAM that's so cheap these days is well covered as they do their regular rounds of other hardware upgrades. At least I know they are over here. It's not like you see companies typically still sit on Windows NT 4 still tearing their hair over upgrading, and even Windows XP is actually common today since a good while back on many companies, not that many really need it over Windows 2000. The need is surprisingly often not a deciding factor.

Companies upgrade their systems as they need to for all sorts of reasons. Hard drives getting old, faulty motherboards, PSU's going bad, etc. At least over here, when it happens, we tend to purchase whole new systems because it's just not worth the man power to fiddle with systems that are a mix of old and new hardware, not to mention hardware incompatibilities that starts to develop over time. You don't really want to find a workstation here that suddenly doesn't support USB 2.0, don't support SATA drives, etc, and we try to keep them at least reasonably updated with the outside world. The costs are also quite cheap these days if you just do major upgrade every 4 years or so.

And if you purchase new business computers today, they're already delivered with 2 GB RAM, pretty much. Then you have your Microsoft partnership to cover the licenses on a larger scale, and you automatically get Office 2007 and Vista for those. Or XP if you choose that. It's really not a big deal IMHO. We already have Vista systems around here and they're working just fine. And of course those have at least 2 GB RAM too. And over 100 GB drives. :p I think hardware is cheap at least if you're making some kind of reasonable profit.

Sure, XP will run on a 400MHz CPU and 256MB, but I feel sorry for the guys having to use it... :p I remember the days of XP, and that I preferred 512 MB or 1 GB even if I didn't play games.

Edited November 26, 2007 by Jugalator

[ANova]

Vista is a bloated hog, period. It's not rocket science people, when an OS has close to three times as many processes running at any given time, there is more happening and that requires more resources across the board. Throwing a much faster system at it and then proclaiming older systems to be trash is backwards thinking. Why does a new os have to be slower and use more resources? Are none of you Vista defenders familiar with the concept of efficiency?

Fact is, XP is faster, and it runs faster still on those new systems then Vista ever will until it gets a major overhaul. Claiming otherwise does not make it so.

[mrk Reviews]

Fact is, XP is faster, and it runs faster still on those new systems then Vista ever will until it gets a major overhaul. Claiming otherwise does not make it so.

You've clearly never used Vista on a day to day basis and are merely echoing what you've read on forums and various questionable tech-news sites. Why do you people even bother to reply with things like this is beyond me and it's not worth it for the power user (people with common sense like myself and others in this thread) to actually spend good time having to justify why we consider something to be good to people like you.

If you take your statements by the value at which you claim then you MUST feel the same way about Windows 98 and XP because 98 will runs much faster than XP on newer hardware and be akin to the exact same development over the previous OS given the hardware available then as to now.

You fail to understand that software develops as does hardware, as software gets more complex faster and more powerful hardware is needed. That's like someone complaining because Half Life 2 Episode 2 doesn't run very well on their 6 year old PC....it's just an update of a previous software title afterall.

I go by facts and there is no factual evidence to prove Vista a bad OS, on the contrary a quick NEOWIN survey will reveal the number of people who are happily using Vista whilst others are using XP and Vista at the same time without issue.

This place is filled with more people by the day but intelligence gets lower and lower.

Edited November 26, 2007 by mrk

[Chode]

Vista is a bloated hog, period. It's not rocket science people, when an OS has close to three times as many processes running at any given time, there is more happening and that requires more resources across the board. Throwing a much faster system at it and then proclaiming older systems to be trash is backwards thinking. Why does a new os have to be slower and use more resources? Are none of you Vista defenders familiar with the concept of efficiency?

Fact is, XP is faster, and it runs faster still on those new systems then Vista ever will until it gets a major overhaul. Claiming otherwise does not make it so.

By this logic, XP is a hog compared to 2000.

By this logic, 2000 is a hog compared to 98.

By this logic, 98 is a hog compared to 95.

By this logic, 95 is a hog compared to 3.11.

By this logic, 3.11 is a hog compared to older versions of windows.

By this logic, older versions of windows are hogs compared to DOS.

By this logic, DOS is a hog compared to machine code.

Seeing the flaw in the logic?

With time, computers have more uses. With more uses arises the need for new functionality. With the need for new functionality arises higher resource usage.

[MrKuro]

By this logic, XP is a hog compared to 2000.

By this logic, 2000 is a hog compared to 98.

By this logic, 98 is a hog compared to 95.

By this logic, 95 is a hog compared to 3.11.

By this logic, 3.11 is a hog compared to older versions of windows.

By this logic, older versions of windows are hogs compared to DOS.

By this logic, DOS is a hog compared to machine code.

Seeing the flaw in the logic?

With time, computers have more uses. With more uses arises the need for new functionality. With the need for new functionality arises higher resource usage.

okay, but what vastly new & improved functionality does Vista provide us being a resource hog, that XP does not provide using less resources in the process.

the funtionality and usability is basically equal between xp and vista (ie, many people won't gain funtionality other than a fancy ui, and dx10 for gaming)

Question: what "more uses" are provided by vista that xp can't do?

answer: none really, so why use Vista( bloated and slow) to do the same things you can on XP (which runs faster in the same hardware)

[ANova]

With time, computers have more uses. With more uses arises the need for new functionality. With the need for new functionality arises higher resource usage.

Ok, what in Vista offers new or better functionality over XP? What programs can you not run in XP that you can in Vista? Please, do not say UI changes because Vista's UI is a scrambled mess. Btw, the performance differences between 95 and 98 as well as 2000 and XP are much smaller from that of any of them and Vista.

Why does OSX and some linux distros such as Ubuntu (that have features similar to Vista) run much better?

You've clearly never used Vista on a day to day basis and are merely echoing what you've read on forums and various questionable tech-news sites.

Oh clearly. Or maybe you're just another Vista defender who wants to justify his purchase but has no legitimate argument so instead chooses to insult other people so he feels less inferior about himself. Please don't go down the road of who has less intelligence.

Edited November 26, 2007 by ANova

[briangw]

this whole thread sucks and isn't worth reading through... if you haven't don't bother.

Thanks! I haven't read everything and I don't know why this is an issue. Like I stated before, in the comments of the main page, Did anyone think about comparing XP SP1 to Vista SP1 since SP3 is two generations ahead of SP1? Of course it's going to be faster! Let's wait to compare Vista SP3 with XP SP3.

[Morpheus Phreak]

Ok, what in Vista offers new or better functionality over XP? What programs can you not run in XP that you can in Vista? Please, do not say UI changes because Vista's UI is a scrambled mess. Btw, the performance differences between 95 and 98 as well as 2000 and XP are much smaller from that of any of them and Vista.

Why does OSX and some linux distros such as Ubuntu (that have features similar to Vista) run much better?

Oh clearly. Or maybe you're just another Vista defender who wants to justify his purchase but has no legitimate argument so instead chooses to insult other people so he feels less inferior about himself. Please don't go down the road of who has less intelligence.

Yes we wouldn't want you to feel bad once we go down that road would we? :D

[mrk Reviews]

Oh clearly. Or maybe you're just another Vista defender who wants to justify his purchase but has no legitimate argument so instead chooses to insult other people so he feels less inferior about himself. Please don't go down the road of who has less intelligence.

Blaa blaa blaa more statements without any facts.

[libertas83]

okay, but what vastly new & improved functionality does Vista provide us being a resource hog, that XP does not provide using less resources in the process.

the funtionality and usability is basically equal between xp and vista (ie, many people won't gain funtionality other than a fancy ui, and dx10 for gaming)

Question: what "more uses" are provided by vista that xp can't do?

answer: none really, so why use Vista( bloated and slow) to do the same things you can on XP (which runs faster in the same hardware)

Most real innovations in an OS are not directly noticed by end users and compromises are usually made for compatibility, security, reliability, and new features. The advances end users will see is in how they use the system day in and out, it won't be direct features they use.

In Vista, one example of increased use of resources is in rendering the window. Microsoft is now actively keeping in memory the window contents so that you don't get that white screen when an application doesn't update its contents and looks like it is hung.

There is always a battle between the die hard peformance people who want every small drop of peformance they can get out of a system and those who like newer features. I remember a popular tweaking recommendation was to turn off wallpaper because it can slow down the system. Well I happen to like wallpaper so I enable it.

[Chode]

okay, but what vastly new & improved functionality does Vista provide us being a resource hog, that XP does not provide using less resources in the process.

the funtionality and usability is basically equal between xp and vista (ie, many people won't gain funtionality other than a fancy ui, and dx10 for gaming)

Question: what "more uses" are provided by vista that xp can't do?

answer: none really, so why use Vista( bloated and slow) to do the same things you can on XP (which runs faster in the same hardware)

Things Vista can do that XP can't. Let's see, allows me to modify what the contents of a window are sorted by via menu instead of requiring dialog box (and finally stopping the old "arrange icons by > modified" problems in My Music folders). Instant search. A Start Menu that I don't need to even consider sorting or rearranging, since I only need to remember the name of the program I wan't. Instant search. Faster install, and better integration of updates into the installer. The ability to install without a cd key (coming in xp sp3). Multithreaded explorer.exe, System Virtualisation to protect key system files and sitll allowing legacy applications to function in these guidelines. Live thumbnail previews (pricelessly useful when running multiple video streams simultaneously). Per application Volume Control (also priceless for shutting up programs with bad design and annoying sound). IE7/WMP11 in a clean install. A much more stable IPv6 implementation than XPSP2. Faster suspend/resume. Much more logically designed Task Manager, meaning I don't need to visit the processes tab anywhere near as much. UAC (which is no more annoying than the "send error report" dialogs which countless people bemoaned in XP but in reality people just got used to it and shut up whinging ultimately) which has saved my ass once or twice already, the ability to view a calendar in a single click, multiple clocks (priceless when doing business internationally), default interface that requires next to no tweaking to be aesthetically pleasing and user friendly right out of the box, the ability to restart the display driver without restarting windows (aka, when overclocking a gpu and it overheats and the display driver locks up, instead of hanging or resetting the whole system it will instead restart the display driver instead...massive massive massive timesaver). Dynamically sized icon, perfect for reducing desktop clutter (much the equivalent of jumping on the contents of a rubbish bin to fit more stuff in). Games explorer which surprisngly is actually useful. Default dedicated folders for Downloads and Videos, simplifying migrating a profile from one machine to another. Improved network authentication UI's. Improved File-sharing methodology. Ratings/tags from explorer itself without requiring another program to open. Superfetch, which has learnt my computer habits and now opens everything I regularly do faster than on fresh install. A "Problems and Solutions" dialog which is also surprisingly helpful (eg, reported that a version of a video codec I was using was causing explorer to hang, and suggested I upgrade to a newer version). Stacking inside folders (100% irreplacable for me!). Every file been a thumbnail making it really easy when searching for a specfic image in a larger collection, especially when combined with dynamic sizing. Improved handling of wireless networks. The ability to generate a network map by itself (great when connected to an unknown network).

And that's just stuff I use on a daily basis on my home machine, and miss dramatically when I use an XP machine.

Ok, what in Vista offers new or better functionality over XP? What programs can you not run in XP that you can in Vista? Please, do not say UI changes because Vista's UI is a scrambled mess. Btw, the performance differences between 95 and 98 as well as 2000 and XP are much smaller from that of any of them and Vista.

Why does OSX and some linux distros such as Ubuntu (that have features similar to Vista) run much better?

Oh clearly. Or maybe you're just another Vista defender who wants to justify his purchase but has no legitimate argument so instead chooses to insult other people so he feels less inferior about himself. Please don't go down the road of who has less intelligence.

OSX is dedicated hardware, different kettle of fish. And 98 was 2-3 years after windows 95, same with 2K > XP. Vista was 5 years after XP. Performance wise the evolution is about on par.

[duntkno]

you guys make me laugh. thank you.

[Miuku.]

Things Vista can do that XP can't.

I only with it taught you how to use paragraphs.

Multithreaded explorer.exe

This is outright bull - you want to see how your precious Vista chokes completely? Map a network drive and close down that machine or pull the cable - then navigate to the said device. So much for the "multitasking" and "multithreading".

I just couldn't bear myself to read the rest.

[mrk Reviews]

I only with it taught you how to use paragraphs.

This is outright bull - you want to see how your precious Vista chokes completely? Map a network drive and close down that machine or pull the cable - then navigate to the said device. So much for the "multitasking" and "multithreading".

I just couldn't bear myself to read the rest.

Anyway...I decided to do that anyway, I am on a wireless G network at home, fired up a Dell machine downstairs and logged onto its network share folder and went back a folder so the share folder is still there.

Turned off the machine, and clicked the forward button so it tries to go back to the share folder and recorded this video...

http://robbiekhan.co.uk/root/videos/networkvista.wmv

Not what I'd call "choking" since there are 3 more cores left for explorer to use for gaming/video playback/photoshop etc etc so no slowdown.

So yes, the statement which you dissed down was in fact correct, multithreading is just fine.

Edited November 27, 2007 by mrk

[)-(orus]

I'm starting to notice a new "fanboy" sub-division here in the Neowin forums. There have always been the staunt Lunixists, Macists and MSists the MSists certainly seem to have a sub culture of XPists these days.

As the somewhat infamous Jack Nicolson quote says "Why can't we all just get along?".

[mrk Reviews]

I'm starting to notice a new "fanboy" sub-division here in the Neowin forums. There have always been the staunt Lunixists, Macists and MSists the MSists certainly seem to have a sub culture of XPists these days.

As the somewhat infamous Jack Nicolson quote says "Why can't we all just get along?".

Well this would not be the case if it were not for the people who appear to flame it without any facts being provided!