R
raylopez99
Vista will run your applications 2x as fast as XP, but your processor
needs to be 4x as fast, and certain programs, like file copy, actually
sometimes are slower in XP.
My informal tests show this between an XP machine I had before
(Pentium 4, Northwood 130nm process, 2.X GHz) and what I have now, a
2.3GHz Core 2 Duo E6550 (65 nm process). According to my Tom's
Hardware analysis and surfing the web, the chip itself is about 4x as
fast as before, and I'm using lots of RAM and SATAII drives (as
opposed to IDE) with a better video card, yet my applications seem to
run only about 2x faster, because Vista is a resource hog.
Also Vista (ultimate in my case) has a performance bug in that the
file copy is sometimes slower (it works in fits and starts) which
Microsoft has acknowledged and says it will be fixed in the next Vista
service pack.
All in all, Vista is not that big a jump over XP, but has smooth
glassy features in the "Aero" look and you can do cool stuff like
change the opacity of overlying windows (an aesthetic feature, I won't
buy the program just for that). Supposedly it's more secure too, but
I'm not entirely convinced of that (just downloaded a bunch of
security patches today to fix holes that are popping up in Vista).
Conclusion: unless you want the latest and greatest, or are a gamer,
I would wait a bit before switching from XP to Vista, at least until
chip prices come down (though my chip I got cheap while shopping in
Asia, and it's not pirated either).
BTW all my programs in Vista all work in 32 bit mode, so it's not like
the programs are optimized for 64 bit Core 2 Duo chips--it will
probably be 5 years before MSFT releases a 64 bit consumer version of
Microsoft Office IMO. And perhaps ditto for the gamers (I play chess,
which in fact does have a 64 bit version of the game "Fritz" optimized
for multi-core machines, but most chess games are still 32 bit)
RL
needs to be 4x as fast, and certain programs, like file copy, actually
sometimes are slower in XP.
My informal tests show this between an XP machine I had before
(Pentium 4, Northwood 130nm process, 2.X GHz) and what I have now, a
2.3GHz Core 2 Duo E6550 (65 nm process). According to my Tom's
Hardware analysis and surfing the web, the chip itself is about 4x as
fast as before, and I'm using lots of RAM and SATAII drives (as
opposed to IDE) with a better video card, yet my applications seem to
run only about 2x faster, because Vista is a resource hog.
Also Vista (ultimate in my case) has a performance bug in that the
file copy is sometimes slower (it works in fits and starts) which
Microsoft has acknowledged and says it will be fixed in the next Vista
service pack.
All in all, Vista is not that big a jump over XP, but has smooth
glassy features in the "Aero" look and you can do cool stuff like
change the opacity of overlying windows (an aesthetic feature, I won't
buy the program just for that). Supposedly it's more secure too, but
I'm not entirely convinced of that (just downloaded a bunch of
security patches today to fix holes that are popping up in Vista).
Conclusion: unless you want the latest and greatest, or are a gamer,
I would wait a bit before switching from XP to Vista, at least until
chip prices come down (though my chip I got cheap while shopping in
Asia, and it's not pirated either).
BTW all my programs in Vista all work in 32 bit mode, so it's not like
the programs are optimized for 64 bit Core 2 Duo chips--it will
probably be 5 years before MSFT releases a 64 bit consumer version of
Microsoft Office IMO. And perhaps ditto for the gamers (I play chess,
which in fact does have a 64 bit version of the game "Fritz" optimized
for multi-core machines, but most chess games are still 32 bit)
RL
