Windows Vista vs. Windows XP?

[RedFlow]

I need to know which has better performance. Windows Vista or Windows XP?

I am debating whether to update to Vista or not. I have 1GB of RAM with a P4 Processor.

Will Vista run slower than XP? Are there performance tests to prove this?

[ViperAFK]

Vista's drivers were the main problem for gaming performance, and they are getting better, all my games run perfectly. Vista has alot of changes under the hood that can improe performance, like better multi threading/handling of dual core processors, more advanced memroy management, and revised driver models. Also things like making explorer multi threaded alleviates alot of performance problems I had with in in XP (On window freezing freezes all other explorer windows) On High Performance computers with alot of RAM Vista probably can run faster than XP because it has new technologies to take advantage of that hardware power.

Also wasn't the SP3 vs SP1 test one ONE office benchmark (Correct me if I'm wrong), I wouldn't say better performance in one benchmark automgically makes sp3 way faster.

I'd say right now, whether or not Vista is faster or slower than XP largely depends on hardware configuration and driver quality.

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http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-...ista/page4.html

No tests prove it huh?

I love how you've apologizing yet you still seemingly haven't read my posts.

Oh well, at least this time you're being a bit more rational so I can debate this.

The funny thing is that you're listing games as the testing criteria and ignoring exactly what I said about a test of all the operating system aspect. Most games are highly dependent on two things; framework and hardware. The framework being DirectX, this was recently 'beefed up' in Vista with the introduction of DirectX 10 which introduced mandatory changes to how DirectX does virtually everything. Even though a game may not be built for DirectX 10 if it's under Vista it will use the aforementioned framework eventually (through a series of proxies put in place for dX 10). Now I will concede that Vista will have a slight performance change due to inbuilt GPU acceleration. The rest is completely dependent on the host computer. This is not to mention that Vista has inept support for multiple core processors, it will handle multiple processors better thus resulting in faster and better game-play. Unfortunately most game developers seem to be adamant in thread usage when it comes to games, I'm assuming you didn't know that either.

Now let me make something abundantly clear to you since you seem to have selective vision; Vista can be better given the correct hardware. Why? Vista can utilize advances in hardware natively, this is like comparing Windows 95's third-party support for the PE4 format (32-bit) to XP's handling of it. Although XP may be able to accommodate for certain hardware advances after third party modification it will never be able to match Vista's inbuilt compatibility and system-wide utilization for such functions. This means that Vista will be able to handle things better due to hardware and coding advances, this does not necessarily mean it will be faster but in most cases where hardware is the issue, Vista will excel. The thing you seem to be failing to a acknowledge is that once a computer is good enough to make the OS' workings seamless the code and the hardware is all that's left.

[Hurmoth]

I love how you've apologizing yet you still seemingly haven't read my posts.

Oh well, at least this time you're being a bit more rational so I can debate this.

The funny thing is that you're listing games as the testing criteria and ignoring exactly what I said about a test of all the operating system aspect. Most games are highly dependent on two things; framework and hardware. The framework being DirectX, this was recently 'beefed up' in Vista with the introduction of DirectX 10 which introduced mandatory changes to how DirectX does virtually everything. Even though a game may not be built for DirectX 10 if it's under Vista it will use the aforementioned framework eventually (through a series of proxies put in place for dX 10). Now I will concede that Vista will have a slight performance change due to inbuilt GPU acceleration. The rest is completely dependent on the host computer. This is not to mention that Vista has inept support for multiple core processors, it will handle multiple processors better thus resulting in faster and better game-play. Unfortunately most game developers seem to be adamant in thread usage when it comes to games, I'm assuming you didn't know that either.

Now let me make something abundantly clear to you since you seem to have selective vision; Vista can be better given the correct hardware. Why? Vista can utilize advances in hardware natively, this is like comparing Windows 95's third-party support for the PE4 format (32-bit) to XP's handling of it. Although XP may be able to accommodate for certain hardware advances after third party modification it will never be able to match Vista's inbuilt compatibility and system-wide utilization for such functions. This means that Vista will be able to handle things better due to hardware and coding advances, this does not necessarily mean it will be faster but in most cases where hardware is the issue, Vista will excel. The thing you seem to be failing to a acknowledge is that once a computer is good enough to make the OS' workings seamless the code and the hardware is all that's left.

You don't read either though. You keep bashing me, but you're doing the same thing.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-...ista/page6.html

There's more than one page there, which tests more than just games. I posted that link because you specifically said all areas of the OS (see I do read :laugh: ).

It also tests Audio: http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-...age5.html#audio and Video: http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-...ista/page5.html.

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You don't read either though. You keep bashing me, but you're doing the same thing.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-...ista/page6.html

There's more than one page there, which tests more than just games. I posted that link because you specifically said all areas of the OS (see I do read :laugh: ).

It also tests Audio: http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-...age5.html#audio and Video: http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-...ista/page5.html.

I already read the other pages :) I've already made it clear where and why Vista can/is better. So please, you're saying you've actually started to read posts?

https://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?show...amp;p=589049149

Oh wait... :)

EDIT: Mistake on my part in regards to the audio tab.

[FATILA]

That is a very outdated comparison, many performance aspects suffered due to sub standard vendor support. Things are better now, who knows might be room for more growth especially in x64.

[Hurmoth]

I already read the other pages :) I didn't even think to rub the "Audio" page in your face, why? It's not a valid point, even if it's going to credit me. I've already made it clear where and why Vista can/is better. So please, you're saying you've actually started to read posts?

https://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?show...amp;p=589049149

Oh wait... :)

How exactly does the audio page give you credit? Maybe I'm missing something? The encoding time is higher, albeit not by much at all, than XP.

I'm tired of this argument, you're obviously not going to argue with facts either, just your opinion and your own personal experience. I've posted several benchmarks that show Vista performs poorly against XP and you still argue the same old thing.

Show me your benchmarks that prove otherwise. Without those, your posts are merely opinions and not fact.

[EDIT] I see your edit now. My mistake.

[Psyph3rium]

Use server2008. I'm sorry, what? no, shut up. use server2008. lol. look it up, and then, just try it, trust me, set it up right and, yeah, you'll be ok.

[Evolution]

I don't think it's valid to use the tom's hardware benchmarks.... considering that they're nearly a year old.

Let's wait till we see some Vista SP1 comparisons..... btw the office benchmark wasn't valid since it's been stated that numerous extra checks have been added b/w operations, where under a normal environment the user wouldn't notice.

[Hurmoth]

That is a very outdated comparison, many performance aspects suffered due to sub standard vendor support. Things are better now, who knows might be room for more growth especially in x64.

Now that is an argument I'll agree with to an extent. There are still benchmarks that prove XP is faster than Vista, on newer hardware. However, there is room to grow for Vista, there's no arguing that point and the 64-bit version will definitely be better than XP, even XP x64 (only because XP x64 had development hurdles that I think Microsoft just left band aided).

Everyone is arguing about what's currently happening with Vista vs XP and no matter how you try and spin it, Vista looses against XP every time (albeit in some tests by a small amount, it still looses). Future Vista (talking 6 months, maybe a year from now), Vista will probably out perform XP in certain situations. But I don't think Vista is going to win XP over on all things very often.

That's my opinion, and no one can argue that opinion with facts because the future isn't here yet. If I'm wrong in 12 months and Vista is blazingly faster then I'll apologize, but only then.

[spaceelf]

Calm down people. Sometimes stupid fights are started by a simple mistake.

Lets put another point of that article forward

But as long as you don't need to finish workloads in record time, we believe it makes sense to consider these three bullet points:

Vista runs considerably more services and thus has to spend somewhat more resources on itself. Indexing, connectivity and usability don't come for free.

There is a lot of CPU performance available today! We've got really fast dual core processors, and even faster quad cores will hit the market by the middle of the year. Even though you will lose application performance by upgrading to Vista, today's hardware is much faster than yesterday's, and tomorrow's processors will clearly leap even further ahead.

No new Windows release has been able to offer more application performance than its predecessor.

Vista should be better in handling when MORE than one app is running, due to its improved threading/context switching/visual interface/everything else. But for single app benchmarking, not so much. Now I don't know about any of you guys, but I never run one just app, unless I'm gaming where Vista has been shown to be about the same so far.

Calm yourselves. XP is good. Vista is good. A lot of people don't like Vista because it changes too much, or they have stability issues. Whatever works for them.

But overall, it's definately a better OS, whether it's had a rocky start or not.

[Hurmoth]

I don't think it's valid to use the tom's hardware benchmarks.... considering that they're nearly a year old.

Let's wait till we see some Vista SP1 comparisons..... btw the office benchmark wasn't valid since it's been stated that numerous extra checks have been added b/w operations, where under a normal environment the user wouldn't notice.

I'm not using just Tom's Hardware though: https://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?show...amp;p=589049325

I also used a fairly recent article from CNET News.

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Vista RTM is essentially on-par with XP despite a sub-par PC, faltering drivers, etc.

http://techgage.com/article/windows_vista_...ormance_reports

Forget the reports you might have read about SP1 resulting in no performance boost. That story was based on a silly artificial benchmark involving scripting of Office applications. Back here in the real world, where gigabit network connections are now commonplace, you?ll see at least one huge improvement when transferring files over network connections.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=336

Your 'statistics' are based on arguably pointless tests derived from times in which the operating system wasn't even officially released, sup-bar drivers and a horde of other problems which come with a brand-new operating system.

[LunarFalcon]

Back to the original post, I ran both XP and Vista on a machine with the same specs as yours. While Vista Home Premium ran pretty well with Aero and all other features turned on, XP definitely ran faster with fewer complications.

Of course if I had more RAM and a faster processor/stronger graphics card, that probably would have been different.

[Hurmoth]

Vista RTM is essentially on-par with XP despite a sub-par PC, faltering drivers, etc.

http://techgage.com/article/windows_vista_...ormance_reports

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=336

Your 'statistics' are based on arguably pointless tests derived from times in which the operating system wasn't even officially released, sup-bar drivers and a horde of other problems which come with a brand-new operating system.

He offers file transfer benchmarks as a retort to Office benchmarks? That's one aspect of the OS and he doesn't compare it to Windows XP, he only compares it to Vista RTM. This thread is about comparing XP to Vista, which would be better for the topic starter.

[piehouserat]

for a long while i was a vista hater as a result of a bad experience when i installed beta2 on my old comp (athlon 2500+ 512 ram), it was horrible, ran slowly and i didnt like some of the changes ms had made from xp.

i bought crysis recently and decided that i'd throw vista business x64 (free from university) on my new machine (q6600, 2gb ram, 8800gts) so that i could experience the game in dx10 as it was intended. im much happier with vista now and my system doesnt run noticeably slower than when i had xp on it.

I have noticed a few things i dont like about vista and a few things vista does worse than xp although im sure these things will be fixed with sp1/sp2. the most annoying thing is the way it lays out folder contents and doesnt remember the way ive set it and the second worrying thing is that i think it takes longer to copy things in vista than it does in xp (i have installed the performance and reliability packs).

the other day i got the following error "Explorer has crashed, etc..." after 10 secs or so explorer restarted itself which is quite disturbing as i wasnt doing anything intensive, i believe i was on the desktop with only winamp running. as i said, im sure all these bugs will be squashed when sp1 is released.

from my experience so far (ive been running it for about a week) i think ill stick with vista, especially as sp1 rc is being released to anyone who's interested this week hopefully.

to answer your initial question, no i wouldnt install it on your current hardware. for a nice experience youll need at least a core 2 duo and 1/2 gb(s) of ram.

[spaceelf]

Does anyone REALLY care about how Office performs? As long as it works, that's all most of it's userbase gives a crap.

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He offers file transfer benchmarks as a retort to Office benchmarks? That's one aspect of the OS and he doesn't compare it to Windows XP, he only compares it to Vista RTM. This thread is about comparing XP to Vista, which would be better for the topic starter.

No, it was just to further squash one of your old points and to show an example of Vista outdoing it's predecessor.

Anyway, I've already argued against your benchmark types but you keep on bringing the same type up; graphics statistics will hardly be viable due to Vista's inbuilt use of the GPU. In one of the links you posted it's clear that Vista does outdo XP in fields which I've already mentioned but you are seemingly oblivious to that too...

To prove your fallacy wrong I'll code a few applications made solely for this purpose to do speed tests :)

[Evolution]

I am certain that Windows XP is indeed faster than Vista when performing benchmarks relating to processing speed, and time to completion. However there is no doubt in my mind that Vista feels faster on the same notebook that I had XP on... maybe that's mostly due to Superfetch allowing application starts to have almost 0 perceived startup time, or maybe other people have drivers that are inefficient. All I can say is that the trade-off feels fine and I wouldn't go back to XP.

[htwho]

Vista > XP.

Majority of people are complaining about performance issues because the drivers have not come out yet or because their system cannot handle Vista smoothly.

[ObiWanToby]

That statement will never be true, it can't be. Newer doesn't always mean better. XP is much slimmer than Vista, doesn't require the hardware that Vista does; thereby allowing XP to always run better on better hardware.

Stick with XP and go with Windows 7 when it comes out. I have faith in the new guy running the Windows team. Jim Allchin was a joke :laugh:

Vista does run better on newer hardware. In CPU intense tasks it handles it better.

Don't you remmeber when XP came out how XP was slower than 98, we've since have moved on. Don't say never, because saying never means that your statement will infact never be true.

Evolution, I totally agree with you, but as we all know, benchmarks don't tell us much. I'm not sure what they tell you.

[Hurmoth]

Don't you remmeber when XP came out how XP was slower than 98, we've since have moved on. Don't say never, because saying never means that your statement will infact never be true.

I wasn't going to continue posting in this thread, but since when has XP ever been slower than 98? How can you even compare a 9x OS to a NT OS?

If you were to compare 2000 to XP, that'd be a better argument. :rolleyes:

[cooky560 Veteran]

You couldnt pay enough to switch to Vista. XP is far better. If Vista was so good then why are so many people switching back. Hell even Dell is offering free downgrades from Vista to XP.

how exactly do I get this free downgrade, I've looked all over thier site and not a sausage. All I can find is instructions, not the CD itself.

[phantasmorph]

how exactly do I get this free downgrade, I've looked all over thier site and not a sausage. All I can find is instructions, not the CD itself.

Exactly right. All they offer is instructions past the point of sale. If you want to purchase a new system with XP, that they will do, but not offer you a completely different OS at no charge. Yet again, another shining example of people on this site that have no idea what they are posting about and end up spreading misinformation.

Edited December 11, 2007 by phantasmorph