Vista vs. XP Performance in games

[Boogle]

HardOCP have a new article covering ATI, and NV in Vista with the latest drivers (but not the latest cards).

Article is here: http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTM0NywxLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==

I'm wondering where HardOCP were when XP was released. It was a lot slower than Win98 for a long time.

Seems to be a trend with both HardOCP and Anandtech. HardOCP are just losing the plot, while Anandtech are attacking OEMs and producing some somewhat suspect articles.

 

[bfar]

I'm wondering where HardOCP were when XP was released. It was a lot slower than Win98 for a long time.

Not to mention compatibility problems.

 

[tereu5]

Not to mention compatibility problems.

Yes,

But this problem was solved faster then Vista now ...drivers came right away (same as games ,unlike ghosty DX10)
And remember to run even smoothly on Celeron 300 and 256MB of memory , what was low for that time

 

[esiemi]

i been using vista 32 bit for two months now and tbh i havent noticed much defference, vista is a bit slower but only by 1-5 fps. so nothing to worry about

 

[Boogle]

Yes,

But this problem was solved faster then Vista now ...drivers came right away (same as games ,unlike ghosty DX10)
And remember to run even smoothly on Celeron 300 and 256MB of memory , what was low for that time

Windows 2000 was originally going to be XP, in that it was the OS to replace Win9x. However, it didn't work out like that. OEMs had the entire lifespan of Win2k to get drivers working properly for XP which had an almost identical driver model

Vista throws the curve ball be dramatically replacing the entire display subsystem - instead of the GPU being used in one place at one time - it can now be used like a CPU, anything can access it at any time. Then there's DX10 which while not replacing much high up for the developer, changed a lot underneath (mostly in support of the multitasking GPU stuff). So yeah - the fact there's only a few fps difference between Vista and XP is incredible.

Plus like esiemi said, the difference is hardly noticeable, and I'm on Vista x64

 

[Chronictank]

560 difference in 3d mark 06, a few fps in games difference
I do get occasionaly jumps when vista does something retarded in the background but other than that no problems really
Xp SP2 to Vista Ultimate 64

 

[Pottsey]

Surly sound would explain some of those scores. If the game is using D3D sound or EAX in XP and software in Vista as they didn’t swap it OpenAL then you would expect a drop in FPS.

 

[Chronictank]

Surly sound would explain some of those scores. If the game is using D3D sound or EAX in XP and software in Vista as they didn’t swap it OpenAL then you would expect a drop in FPS.

When looking at the 3dmark scores it wasnt because of the gfx it was because of the higher load on the cpu

CPU: Intel Core 2
GPU: ATI RADEON X1950 CrossFire Edition

@ 3036 MHz
OS: Microsoft Windows Vista
Driver Version 8.380.0.0
Main Test Results
3DMark Score 5972 3DMarks
SM 2.0 Score 2485 Marks
SM 3.0 Score 2800 Marks
CPU Score 1548 Marks

@stock
OS: Microsoft Windows XP
Driver Version 6.14.10.6631
Main Test Results
3DMark Score 6325 3DMarks
SM 2.0 Score 2492 Marks
SM 3.0 Score 2760 Marks
CPU Score 2096 Marks

Not entirely fair test as different drivers and speed but notice the difference in the CPU score