Download speed differences XP & Vista

GraemeUK

GraemeUK

GraemeUK

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Bit of a weird problem here.

When downloading from a private FTP server the max speed I get downloading on XP is a steady 1500kbps but when I boot into Vista 64bit I get a steady 2200kbps.

Both using the same FTP software on each OS.

Does anyone know if this is just a setting I need to change or install something.

Both are clean installs of each OS and no special proxies etc.

Thanks in advance.
 
Vista has a revised TCP/IP stack that significantly improves TCP throughput performance - especially if the opposite end also supports the same protocol enhancements.
 
NathanE said:
Vista has a revised TCP/IP stack that significantly improves TCP throughput performance - especially if the opposite end also supports the same protocol enhancements.
Click to expand...

My God that's a big difference though. Why isn't there more news about this??
 
I notice quite a nice speed bump aswell maybe not as much as the OP, but networking in general is much quicker than XP for me :)
 
Even so I wouldn't have thought it will give such an advantage at the 'low end'.

Essentially if you are only getting ~2.2mbit in Vista then I'm amazed you don't also get 2.2mbit in XP as well. Might be worth checking a few settings for that network device like MTU and RWIN, but even then I wouldn't expect such a huge discrepancy (only 70% of the throughput). Is the NIC running in full duplex mode under XP?
 
HangTime said:
Even so I wouldn't have thought it will give such an advantage at the 'low end'.

Essentially if you are only getting ~2.2mbit in Vista then I'm amazed you don't also get 2.2mbit in XP as well. Might be worth checking a few settings for that network device like MTU and RWIN, but even then I wouldn't expect such a huge discrepancy (only 70% of the throughput). Is the NIC running in full duplex mode under XP?
Click to expand...

Vista has much better MTU discovery and window scaling behaviour than XP, which could also be a factor in this case.

Recommended reading: http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/b/4/4b455e48-72c4-4a04-b9a5-892fd497087a/TollyResults.pdf

joeyjojo said:
My God that's a big difference though. Why isn't there more news about this??
Click to expand...
No idea. It seems to me that most websites/users are more concerned with bad mouthing Vista than actually doing some reading/research, or hell, even just installing it and using it for more than 60 minutes. I was raving about the new networking stack years before Vista even RTM'd on this very forum :/
 
The thing is though, I'm struggling to see why one would be getting such poor throughput in XP (in actual terms, not relative). 2.2mbit is such a low value that it almost certainly must be the limit of the internet connection, even if he's only running a 10mbit internal network. I've messed about (at a fairly novice level) with MTU and RWIN in XP in the past, and I found that the gains were minimal, on a faster connection than the OP has. If it's all been left at default I can't see it crippling download speed to 1.5mbit.

If we were talking network speeds at the high end then I could understand a discrepancy (say 95mbit from Vista but only 80mbit from XP), I could maybe put it down to the OS, but not 2.2mbit / 1.5mbit.

Have you got latest drivers for the NIC in XP?
 
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Yeah the drivers are the latest from the nvidia website on XP and Vista. Its a remote FTP server using my internet connection (20mb Virgin). I log onto XP download at 1.5mb then log off and log straight back on to Vista and downloads at 2.2mb. Its not the internet connection because I've tried it at various times and I'm only talking matter of 30 seconds between each boot testing. They are both fresh installs, I havent changed any network settings from default in either OS.
 
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