Windows 7 May Not Be Much Faster Than Vista

[raj11650]

Windows 7 May Not Be Much Faster Than Vista

Though Windows 7 edged out Vista in our lab tests, you may not notice much of a difference.

Improving performance is one of Microsoft's design goals with Windows 7, and many early reviewers have said that the new OS seems peppier than Vista.

But tests of the Windows 7 Release Candidate in our PC World Test Center found that while Windows 7 was slightly faster on our WorldBench 6 suite, the differences may be barely noticeable to users.

We loaded the Windows 7 Release Candidate on three systems (two desktops and a laptop) and then ran our WorldBench 6 suite. Afterward we compared the results with the WorldBench 6 numbers from the same three systems running Windows Vista.

Each PC was slightly faster when running Windows 7, but in no case was the overall improvement greater than 5 percent, our threshold for when a performance change is noticeable to the average user.

The largest difference was 4 points--102 for Vista versus 106 for Windows 7 on an HP Pavillion a6710t desktop. Our other two test machines showed similarly minor performance improvements:

A Maingear M4A79T Deluxe desktop improved by 1 point (from 138 on Vista to 139 on Windows 7), and a Dell Studio XPS 16 laptop improved by 2 points, from 97 on Vista to 99 on Windows 7.

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[Airbot]

ehh, just wait till 7 is finalized then we'll see.

 

[Termana]

I will guarantee, even if the numbers show that its not much faster, end users will still think its way faster. Little thing called the placebo effect.

 

[Jacee]

I'm doing just fine with both OS's

 

[YupYup]

Well one of the things to consider is that on lower end systems that have to run XP because the older hardware is slow on vista, win 7 performance is much closer to XP and certainly better than vista on these lower end systems.

 

[raj11650]

i guess windows 7 may not be faster as we would have thought

but the thing is its some what lighter as it runs well even in netbook!!!

 

[SIW2]

Yes, I don't see any noticeable difference , but you might appreciate the smaller footprint on a netbook.

A lot of it is perception as opposed to reality - like many things in life.

 

[segobi]

well on low end systems 7 is def. a lot faster than vista. however on modern system vista sp2 runs perfectly and its not slow.

 

[YozMan]

yes I agree, my current laptop would only be able to run vista basic (maybe) but I'm bale to run Windows 7 without a problem!
[specs that matter: 1gb ram]

 

[Hans23]

I certainly find Win 7 much faster.

 

[napilopez]

Rawr.

Windows 7 is not much faster than vista in raw power and benchmarks and stuff. It's mostly about the UI responsiveness, and things like memory management as opposed to vista. In other words, the OS isn't much faster, but the way it is presented to the user, and the way it maintains its performance is vastly improved.

I believethere are two main reasons Windows 7 feels faster than vista, and its not the placebo effect.

First, it definitely performs better than vista on lesser hardware. Try installing vista on a netbook and then install 7. The performance gains are clearly there. It has a smaller memory footprint.

Secondly, read this: Gizmodo - Why Windows 7 Is Snappier Than Vista - windows 7

That article best explains why windows 7 is snappier. Benchmarks cant attest to to little things like that.

 

[jeremy7]

Confused

i ran a system ratings on my laptop on windows7 and i get poor 3.9 points which is 1 point behind when i'm still using vista on the same system. what confuse me is i noticed that my system runs faster on win7. can somebody explain this to me?

 

[RST101]

jeremy the wei rating in windows 7 is different because it is taking into account hardware of the future. It therefore stands to reason that you will get a lower rating than you did in vista.

Windows 7 is far more responsive than vista imo, it's cleaner, sharper, sexier, and just a whole buncha things better.

Windows 7 ftw.

 

[Airbot]

I agree. Windows 7 is nice. You can install it, pet it, caress it, care for it, love it, talk to it, tell it that it's very fast and efficient and tell it that's it's special.

 

[RST101]

Which of course we do.

 

[Night Hawk]

The RCs each went on in 20minutes here. They still load up and shutdown much faster then Vista even XP. For seeing Vista installed only to the destop you were looking at 40-45min.! Yet both were a much needed improvement security wise over any previous version.

 

[jimbo45]

Hi all
Doing 50 Km / hr in a Porsche or a cheap family saloon car most people would probably find the ride more comfortable in the cheap family saloon.

Doesn't say anything really about quality / construction of the relevant vehicles etc etc.

What is "Speed" as far as normal users are concerned. -- They start Word or Power point and expect to get their documents up within a reasonable time.

We don't need "sub second" response time on Windows.

In normal Working environments most of response time delay is in accessing and retrieving data from corporate / office Networks -- and your desktop W7 or Vista or "Mickey mouse" or whatever OS you choose)" doesn't have any control over this.

Home users can measure this to their hearts desire but MS has got its sights on the work place where there are an incredibly large number of aging PC's (some well over 3 -4 years old) still running XP.

Comparing W7 with Vista for these customers is a 100% non issue since they won't do an XP==>VISTA==>W7 upgrade - especially with XP compatability mode, other server virtualisation systems and cloud computing.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[andythecurefan]

I have 2 low end PCs running Win7. I find it much faster than Vista on my eMachines Desktop W3503 with a WEI score of 1.8 and am amazingly surprised that my mom's old custom build pc with a WEI score of 1.0 can run it.

 

[murphy25]

it may not be faster but it does seem like it.
im using 7 mainly because its so easy to use i havent found any programs that dont work (as of yet) i like the idea of installing a OS and being able to change the look and feel without the need for 3rd party apps,saying that though it will only be a matter of time before skinners start making skins for 7 so WHY cant ms patch the uxtheme by default?
anyway back on topic if 7 is not faster can someone tell me why when using utorrent in xp/vista my download speed would max out at 800KB down and 85KB up yet the same utorrent settings the same connection in 7 i download at 840kB down and 95kB up,im not complaining its just i would like to know where the boost came from????

 

[Night Hawk]

Speaking of virtualzation there's nothing like hearing one of the golden oldies(8bit) in 5.1 surround sound on the 64bit RC!



That being something small as it was is slight comparison to how 7 feels up against the previous two versions in some areas. But what most are now likely to find out is that not all of the services and features were active and available in anything prior to the RCs themselves.

Things like the XP mode now being available and other services will now tend to place more background items into the active ram. When people start wondering why build seems a bit slower then the previous you have to look things like that. That's another reason why the WEI is higher on 7 then seen for Vista there.