Does Windows 7 really give a performance boost over Windows Vista?

[Prepared]

Now that Windows 7 is released by Microsoft, for World of Warcraft (WoW), is there really a performance improvement over Windows Vista? Awhile ago when Windows 7 was in Beta, many posted improvements to their gaming experience with multiple windows of WoW running.

In looking at the fine print from Microsoft, awhile back they claimed there was going to be a major improvement in performance in Windows 7 over Vista. However, now that it has been released, I can't find any specifics on how Windows 7 is better in performance over Vista from Microsoft.

The thing is, even if they said it was better I wouldn't necessarily believe it until I heard it from users that were actually experiencing a performance improvement. So I'd like to ask the community that runs software similar to the way I do which is multiple windows of WoW (I run up to 4 in each computer) to find out if it is really worth the upgrade to Windows 7.

NOTE: The ONLY reason I would want to upgrade is if there is a performance improvement in running multiple windows of WoW. I don't care about any of the flashy changes they've made in the operating system. I don't care about the security improvements they claim. I'm running Vista with all the latest security updates and I'm happy with the way the operating system works as a whole. However, sometimes during intense battles in Wintergrasp, Alterac Valley or in Dalaran, the graphics lags some on all of my systems.

I have one older duo core laptop with Windows XP 32bit that has 256mb of ram on the ATI Video card. The laptop is the Fujitisu N6420 and it can run 3 instances of WoW better than one of my desktops that run Windows Vista 32bit. The desktop is the m9060n from Hewlett Packard with the Quad CPU Q6600 3gb ram and the nVidia 9800GT. It has a base score of 5.5 in the Windows Experience Index. Both systems have a completely pared down environment with only Octopus and WoW running. This leads me to believe that Vista is worse in performance with graphics applications over Windows XP. Someone told me that Windows 7 gets back to the performance that Windows XP had.

I'm interested in hearing from anyone that has experience with performance improvements in Windows 7 over Windows Vista when running multiple copies of WoW on the same computer that has been upgraded. I'm looking at getting the Windows 7 family pack but don't want to do the upgrade if there isn't a performance improvement with running multiple WoW instances.

Thanks.

[burningforce]

tried xp, vista with service packs and windows 7. I prefer windows 7 due to the sleek look and peformance boost that I got over vista. its not a huge performance boost, I might add, but you can defiently feel it being smoother.

I do not know the ins/outs of windows 7 and what was changed from vista, but like i said things just feel a little more snappy.
but before you go out and buy windows 7, have you tried optimizing vista and turning off some services that thrash hard drives and run in the background?

I turn off "windows search", this indexes every file on your computer that you use or change so when you search in windows vista/7, searches will be quick. I do not need this so i turn it off.
another one which I think might be windows 7 only, but you can check vista, is "super fetch". having this enabled causes a lot of hard drive thrashing (starting/stopping, etc) so i just turn it off.

check to see if there is no scheduled defragging taking place. you can check this in the windows defrag section and click schedule. and change your power options to performance mode.

[Eggy]

I wish I could say I got a performance boost with win7 over vista, but fact of the matter is it's the other way around. No matter how I configed win7 I would see a performance hit with it. Tried running it on multiple occasions.

[Smoooth]

I'm not sure on the performance of win 7 but it seems to be the most polished of the windows so far. I never run into any bugs or crashes with it. I'm still running the beta and this may be the first windows that I actually pay for.

[defactoman]

I run windows 7 and love it. Performance boost? welllll i'm not running any benchmarks but it feels the same.

[Kromtor]

I ran benchmarks between XP and Vista and saw a 15% boost in XP. Haven't tried Win7 yet, no need since XP still works fine.

[Eggy]

I went from 60(capped) FPS on my main toon, and 20 FPS on my slaves, to being barely able to hit 30 on my main, and god knows on my slaves when I tried out win7. Trying to use flight points in nothrend was a total lag fest under win7. Once i turned down gfx from ultra to medium(No shadows) and my slaves gfx all the way down to bare minimum i was getting my "normal vista" fps.

Happy Fur? On another note, I'm pretty sure it varies from the amount of toons you run and what hardware you got installed, so this all doesnt mean squad.

[Sajuuk]

I went from 60(capped) FPS on my main toon, and 20 FPS on my slaves, to being barely able to hit 30 on my main, and god knows on my slaves when I tried out win7. Trying to use flight points in nothrend was a total lag fest under win7. Once i turned down gfx from ultra to medium(No shadows) and my slaves gfx all the way down to bare minimum i was getting my "normal vista" fps.

Happy Fur? On another note, I'm pretty sure it varies from the amount of toons you run and what hardware you got installed, so this all doesnt mean squad.

Was this an upgrade install or fresh install?

[Los]

Why is windows 7 better then xp?

http://www.digitaljournal.com/img/8/9/9/i/5/8/4/o/whopper.jpg

[EvoX]

I cant 5 box on my machine under Vista if spread across 2 monitors - main on one, alts in each quadrant of another.

[Dramoth]

Just before I start talking about windows 7 and performance, I will give you guys the spec's of my machine that I 5 box on.

ASUS P5B deluxe WIFI-AP mb
Intel Q6600 Core 2 Duo running at stock speed
8Gb ram
2x nVidia Geforce 8800GTS (684Mb video ram) in SLi mode
3 monitors (2x19" and 1x22")
2x320Gb SATA I hdd's
2x1Tb SATA II hdd's

My multi-box wow's are all setup on one of the sata 2 drives and the copy of wow that I use for solo boxing is on one of the 320's.

I tried 5 boxing on XP with 6Gb of ram installed but because it is a 32bit OS, it only saw the first 4Gb's and the video cards are taking approx 1.5Gb of ram out of that.

It was damned slow and gluggy with that setup.

I tried Windows 7 RC1 32bit with the same sorts of results. Very slow and unresponsive when 5 boxing. 3 boxing wasnt a problem.

When I stepped up to Windows 7 RC1 64bit and added in another 2Gb of ram is when I started noticing things start jumping. I still lose the 1.5Gb but my effective usable ram is not 6.5Gb and I have noticed that the games are running a bit smoother. The only problem that I have is that with my monitor setup, the two 19" monitors are analog (DB15) and the 22" is DVI which are running in different resolutions (1400x900 and 1650x1080) which does tend to screw up the frame rates. I will be looking at going to 3x22" monitors at some point in the future with a multi-monitor stand that lets me rotate the 2 side monitors into portrait mode.

But in terms of performance, I have found that windows 7 is a lot smoother than vista or xp and will happily run wow on my desktop easily as well as on my laptop.

[Coltimar]

On Vista 64x, SP2, with all eye candy turned off (it looked like Windows 2000) I ran 8 copies of wow on my box at once. I did a fresh install of Windows 7 64 (7600 beta build) and ran 10 with no tweaks.

Both versions were Ultimate.

[jak3676]

Keep in mind that both Vista and Win7 will spend several weeks "learning" your computing habits. Once windows has learned your habits then it tries to keep some of those programs, dll's, etc in RAM. So if you want to load and test you will have lower performance than you will a week or two later after running the same things.

I'll keep looking for the link, but I read a bit about this when bith Vista and the Win7 beta were hitting all the review sites.

A lot of the Win7 speed-ups aren't something you'll notice in-game either. Just simple things like a faster flash time on the UAC pop-up and better boot times are nice and make your computer "feel faster", but if you benchmark a series of steps most reviews I've seen say that XP = Win7 > Vista in terms of actual speed on machines with good hardware. (for older hardware their can be a bigger difference between all the OS's especially for underpowered, older, integrated gfx).

Other than the 32-bit vs 64-issue, I doubt anyone will be able to benchmark a noticable performance difference between XP, Vista and Win7 in terms of WoW multiboxing. You'll get more of a performance gain/loss by tweaking some of the different services that are running.

[heyaz]

One question about upgrading to Windows 7 - is it possible to use the upgrade version (which is like $100 cheaper) to do a clean install? I wonder if it can detect my existing Vista install before I blow it away.

Otherwise I guess I'll just get the full version... upgrading windows is fail

[Dramoth]

One question about upgrading to Windows 7 - is it possible to use the upgrade version (which is like $100 cheaper) to do a clean install? I wonder if it can detect my existing Vista install before I blow it away.

Otherwise I guess I'll just get the full version... upgrading windows is fail

I think that it will find your existing version of vista, but I am not to certain about whether it turns around and wants to do a clean install or whether it does the whole upgrade bit.

It could be that the upgrade path is limited to the version of vista you are currently working with and the version of win7 that you are trying to upgrade to.

Personally, I will be going to linux next year when the RC licence runs out and just install vmware and run multiple copies of XP in virtual machines.

Hopefully by then, I will have upgraded to an i7 920 process with 32Gb of ram with triple SLi cards :D

Should be a lot of fun then I think :D

[Bollwerk]

I just did an "upgrade" from Vista to Win 7 from inside Vista. It actually worked more like a clean install than an upgrade. It didn't wipe my hard drive, but it did move all relevant directories from Vista into a "windows.old" file structure. It moved directories like Users, Windows, Program Files, etc. I was actually kind of hoping I wouldn't have to reinstall everything, but I did. I suppose it is for the best though, since it gives you the peace of mind of a clean install without worrying about losing your data.

FWIW, you CAN do a clean install with an upgrade copy, as long as it detects a version of Windows already installed.

[Sam DeathWalker]

Im planing to go to win7 64 bit (upping my machines to 8G each from 4G and maybe getting a 1G video card for each). That should extend the life of my cpu/motherboard for awhile at least until cytaclisum. I am really happy with my 3.2 ghz athlons X2 and see no reason to change untill 24G i7 boards are proven to run 24G commonly, with 4G ram sticks, at some reasonable price.

Probably take a week or four to sort everything out and Ill give some results when done.

I got 3 copies from the pre sale for $50 each (home premium version) and you can get the home version now 3 upgrades for $149, so thats all I need for my 6 computers. Hopefully the "win XP compatability mode" won't be needed as its not in the home version.

No doubt you can (and should) do a clean install even if you just have the original disk to put in the cd rom of your xp/vista. I am very sure. Thats how it worked with xp iifc. I am very sure you can do a clean install with an upgrade copy no need to buy the full version and waste your money.

[dbhgnh]

Keep in mind that both Vista and Win7 will spend several weeks "learning" your computing habits. Once windows has learned your habits then it tries to keep some of those programs, dll's, etc in RAM. So if you want to load and test you will have lower performance than you will a week or two later after running the same things.

I'll keep looking for the link, but I read a bit about this when bith Vista and the Win7 beta were hitting all the review sites.

A lot of the Win7 speed-ups aren't something you'll notice in-game either. Just simple things like a faster flash time on the UAC pop-up and better boot times are nice and make your computer "feel faster", but if you benchmark a series of steps most reviews I've seen say that XP = Win7 > Vista in terms of actual speed on machines with good hardware. (for older hardware their can be a bigger difference between all the OS's especially for underpowered, older, integrated gfx).

Other than the 32-bit vs 64-issue, I doubt anyone will be able to benchmark a noticable performance difference between XP, Vista and Win7 in terms of WoW multiboxing. You'll get more of a performance gain/loss by tweaking some of the different services that are running.
I got 3 copies from the pre sale for $50 each (home premium version) and you can get the home version now 3 upgrades for $149, so thats all I need for my 6 computers. Hopefully the "win XP compatability mode" won't be needed as its not in the home version.

[zanthor]

Just before I start talking about windows 7 and performance, I will give you guys the spec's of my machine that I 5 box on.

ASUS P5B deluxe WIFI-AP mb
Intel Q6600 Core 2 Duo running at stock speed
8Gb ram
2x nVidia Geforce 8800GTS (684Mb video ram) in SLi mode
3 monitors (2x19" and 1x22")
2x320Gb SATA I hdd's
2x1Tb SATA II hdd's

My multi-box wow's are all setup on one of the sata 2 drives and the copy of wow that I use for solo boxing is on one of the 320's.

I tried 5 boxing on XP with 6Gb of ram installed but because it is a 32bit OS, it only saw the first 4Gb's and the video cards are taking approx 1.5Gb of ram out of that.

It was damned slow and gluggy with that setup.

I tried Windows 7 RC1 32bit with the same sorts of results. Very slow and unresponsive when 5 boxing. 3 boxing wasnt a problem.

When I stepped up to Windows 7 RC1 64bit and added in another 2Gb of ram is when I started noticing things start jumping. I still lose the 1.5Gb but my effective usable ram is not 6.5Gb and I have noticed that the games are running a bit smoother. The only problem that I have is that with my monitor setup, the two 19" monitors are analog (DB15) and the 22" is DVI which are running in different resolutions (1400x900 and 1650x1080) which does tend to screw up the frame rates. I will be looking at going to 3x22" monitors at some point in the future with a multi-monitor stand that lets me rotate the 2 side monitors into portrait mode.

But in terms of performance, I have found that windows 7 is a lot smoother than vista or xp and will happily run wow on my desktop easily as well as on my laptop.

What makes you think you lose 1.5gb of ram to your video cards on a 64 bit OS?

[Dramoth]

What makes you think you lose 1.5gb of ram to your video cards on a 64 bit OS?

Because I know for a fact that there is 8Gb of ram in the machine(installed it all myself :)), but when I look at windows I see 6.5Gb usable ram.

I have found somewhere on the net that windows and/or the bios will assign a big chunk of your main ram to cover as interface between the video ram and the rest of the computer.

In my case, I am losing about 1.5Gb of main ram. I am starting to think that it might actually be the motherboard thats causing the problems.

Might look at alternate MB's and see if that improves the amount of ram I have left at the end of the day/

[IkYiolul]

I mostly mobile quad-box on a Dell studio XPS 13.
Core 2 Duo 2.4ghz
4gb 1066
Nvidia 9400 GS Hybrid SLI
2 Wows on 1 core, 2 on the other.
Keyclone
Questhelper Mod (yep thats it, just one mod)

The system came with Vista Pro 64bit pre-installed.
Since then I have had the RC and now Win7 Ultimate 64bit.

The difference moving to Win7 is very noticeable. Swapping between toons is much snappier than Vista.
I run the main @ 40fps and the others @ 10fps. All settings are on min except view distance which is maxed.
Consistently getting peaked frame rates and quick swapping, the only important thing when running on a 13inch screen lol. Mobile boxing is the best!

And no it wasn't the bloatware, because I did a fresh install after a month of having the laptop.

[Freddie]

In my case, I am losing about 1.5Gb of main ram. I am starting to think that it might actually be the motherboard thats causing the problems.
That's correct but you may only need to change a BIOS setting. See the "Workaround" section of the following article, particularly "memory remapping feature" and the last bullet point:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929605

[Zzyzxx71]

In my case, I am losing about 1.5Gb of main ram. I am starting to think that it might actually be the motherboard thats causing the problems.


Yeah you got something screwed there buddy - I've been running 64 bit OS's for 2+ years now, always with 8gb of memory, never had an issue with reported memory.

Next upgrade will be to 12gb unless they start making non ECC 4gb sticks anytime soon... ahhh to have 32+g in a workstation.

[Dramoth]

Yeah you got something screwed there buddy - I've been running 64 bit OS's for 2+ years now, always with 8gb of memory, never had an issue with reported memory.

Next upgrade will be to 12gb unless they start making non ECC 4gb sticks anytime soon... ahhh to have 32+g in a workstation.

Yeah, I am going to check the video bios shadowing and video ram shadowing and video ram cacheable settings in the bios when I get home... see if I can get something better happening.

PS: I am getting an XFX motherboard that will mean that I can run the whole box and dice in SLi mode.

[jak3676]

Great article today on some Win7 vs Vista vs XP at www.anandtech.com (http://www.anandtech.com). For those wondering they did get TRIM support for SSD's (Intel G2 and OCZ Vertex only for now - others will enable support soon) into the final version of Win7 (it wasn't in the RC).

[Marious]

Dramoth I noticed the same thing, and was wondering what that was all about, I just chucked it up to something windows was doing running all the other crap they normally run in the background.

On another note I got my Family Pack Friday. I have been running Win 7 RC for like 2-3 months now and I must say I like it a lot, I can bring my toons to Dal with no issues, well some lag before on XP I was unable to do this. But I am running the 64 bit version as well as 8 Gigs of ram so that could account for all that, still only running a 9800.

I must say that I do like what they did with 7, hated all that they did with Vista, if it was bare bones with the option to up the graphics and everything I would of tried it out, but Microsoft killed it for me making it all by default, yes I know I can turn it off but why not just have a wizard when you install it instead of having it all be default. In Ubuntu which was actually a fun OS you could just install what you wanted and make it more flashy, but I am a geek and I like the option to do it myself not just hand me something that I might not like.

[Sam DeathWalker]

2x nVidia Geforce 8800GTS (684Mb video ram) in SLi mode

2 X 684 is about 1.5 G ..... what else do you expect?'



have found somewhere on the net that windows and/or the bios will assign a big chunk of your main ram to cover as interface between the video ram and the rest of the computer.

This is correct.

[Los]

How much ram memory do you have there?

I run run 5 wows on a 6gb box, even I dont have that kind of trouble, you can't even run 1? Sounds like you missed something tbh.

[Dramoth]

Dramoth I noticed the same thing, and was wondering what that was all about, I just chucked it up to something windows was doing running all the other crap they normally run in the background.

On another note I got my Family Pack Friday. I have been running Win 7 RC for like 2-3 months now and I must say I like it a lot, I can bring my toons to Dal with no issues, well some lag before on XP I was unable to do this. But I am running the 64 bit version as well as 8 Gigs of ram so that could account for all that, still only running a 9800.

I must say that I do like what they did with 7, hated all that they did with Vista, if it was bare bones with the option to up the graphics and everything I would of tried it out, but Microsoft killed it for me making it all by default, yes I know I can turn it off but why not just have a wizard when you install it instead of having it all be default. In Ubuntu which was actually a fun OS you could just install what you wanted and make it more flashy, but I am a geek and I like the option to do it myself not just hand me something that I might not like.

I had a play with my bios last night and found a setting for memory overlay and changed it... bam... straight 8Gb :D

Still doesnt change the fact that I have a new MB coming that will support SLi properly.

Might put the current MB into another case later and start getting ready for a 10man team :)

[offive]

Been running on release Win7 64bit. Clean install on a new SSD drive. All performace ratings above 7.1, new SSD is at max of 7.9. I have had no issues performance or otherwise since the switch. I like to refer to Win7 as a new improved Vista, not a new OS. The driver pain that was initial release Vista is not present this time so no major issues.

The boot up memory foot print is about the same as Vista (or at least nothing seemed shocking to me). The disk space footprint for the OS seemed a bit bigger, so I have installed slow speed apps like Office on a secondary terabyte drive.

I am still on an old Phenom 1 with 8 Gigs of DDR2. Waiting for the Intel i9s next year before my MB, Proc, and ram upgrade. I also don't mess with processor affinity any more, the 4 cores seem to balance just fine. I do set non active max frames on my team to 15, which I think helps the most out of all the tweaks.

Oh and I have also converted all my systems except my new laptop to Win7. The only one on the 32bit version is my media center, better compatibility with random media center plugins and capture card drivers.

I guess if your on old hardware and XP, I would not bother going to Win 7. But if your on newer gear and Vista, the move to 7 is not all that big of a deal.

[Tonuss]

Yeah, that's something to remember. Windows 7 has lower recommended requirements than Vista, but it's still more similar to Vista than XP. Its system requirements are higher than XP, particularly where RAM is concerned. "Faster than Vista" is like being faster than a slug... it doesn't mean you're fast.

[d0z3rr]

"Faster than Vista" is like being faster than a slug... it doesn't mean you're fast.

I ran Vista x64 for over a year, played copious amounts of games on it, and never remember it running like a slug. Just my experience.

[Tonuss]

I ran Vista x64 for over a year, played copious amounts of games on it, and never remember it running like a slug. Just my experience.
I was thinking about hardware more in line for XP. I run Vista32 on a pretty powerful laptop and Vista64 on a very powerful desktop and they run fine. But when it was released, we got some laptops at work and it runs horrible on them, though XP runs just fine.

[Ualaa]

Windows 7 is a better operating system then Vista, for low end systems.
I'm not claiming either is as good as XP for low end systems.

[BobGnarly]

2x nVidia Geforce 8800GTS (684Mb video ram) in SLi mode

2 X 684 is about 1.5 G ..... what else do you expect?'



have found somewhere on the net that windows and/or the bios will assign a big chunk of your main ram to cover as interface between the video ram and the rest of the computer.

This is correct.

It is correct for 32-bit OSs, it is NOT correct for 64-bit OSs (or at least it doesn't have to be).

The problem is that, in a 32-bit OS, it can only address 4G of memory (2^32) total. That means for things like video cards, the MMIO for these devices must lie withing that 4G range. Since you have 4G of RAM, there is nowhere left for the MMIO to exist except over the top of your RAM, meaning you lose the memory.

On a a 64-bit OS, it can map the video card memory above your RAM address range - it will not conflict with your RAM.

Short story: if you are running a 64-bit OS, you shouldn't have any peripheral I/O memory subtracted from your usable RAM total. If you do, something is misconfigured (probably your m/b).

[Tasty]

This is all very off topic, who cares about WoW. The point is Windows 7 Media Center KICKS ASS

:P

[Fizzler]

This is all very off topic, who cares about WoW. The point is Windows 7 Media Center KICKS ASS

:P

-Start Hijack-

Heck yeah it does. Combine with Media Center Browser and MediaCenterMaster for tagging it is outstanding. I have ripped almost 4TB of movies and TV series (yes all mine) to my media vault. I had to buy 4 copies of Pixar Cars in the last year alone the 4 yr old always manages to get a hold of the DvD. Not a problem anymore.

My wife likes streaming netflix (quality ugh) they just added support for it last week so all is good now.

-end Hijack-

After Vista I have nothing but good things to say about Win7. Performance wise as it relates to WoW the FPS is about the same for me.

[Los]

Yeah, that's something to remember. Windows 7 has lower recommended requirements than Vista, but it's still more similar to Vista than XP. Its system requirements are higher than XP, particularly where RAM is concerned. "Faster than Vista" is like being faster than a slug... it doesn't mean you're fast.

Ofc w7 has different requirements then windows xp, the latter is like what, 9 years old?

[Oswyn]

One of my raptor drives tanked, so I took this opportunity to do a clean install of Win7. Installed video drivers and found that I couldn't get anything above 40fps in Stormwind (settings maxed out). I should be seeing well above 130fps. After some tinkering I found that the shadow quality setting was the culprit. If I move the slider more than halfway, the fps just sinks. So I'm assuming this is a driver issue. I'm using 4870 X2.

[mebben]

Windows 7 is the best thing that happened since Win 3.11

[jstanthr]

i noticed a substantial increase in speed and performance with windows 7 over vista and xp even. after i made a few changes, the first thing you should do is turn all the aero stuff off!!! go to personalize, then advanced and uncheck everything, that gave me around 1500 more on my 3dvantage score and bumped my fps up quite a bit with 5 clients running. and also turning off the before mentioned indexing and stuff. i use a program taht was linked in the forums some time ago for setting up symlinks within the right click context menu, it works flawlessly witn win7. i am extremely pleased with what ms has done, seems they have gotten it right this time, lets just hope they don't mess it up with a service pack or update. and the performance with multi-gpu's in sli and not, is astonishingly better as well, running a monitor per gpu, non sli is ridiculously fast now, nomore cross rendering, it works as intended now, at least on my setup.

[Multibocks]

what is crossrendering? Do ATI cards have it as well?

[Ualaa]

With InnerSpace, I don't need to use Symbolic Links or Junction Points, as the config file is virtualized for each toon. Different settings per account, is about the only boost from linking to the same folder. Referencing a file several times isn't any faster then just using that file each time. The program worked great for me too; it's found here: http://schinagl.priv.at/nt/hardlinkshellext/hardlinkshellext.html

I've got a Sapphire 4870 X2, and run each of the wow's with shadows all the way down. Aside from the event where you needed to catch the torches, by standing in the shadow of them... shadows don't do much in wow, aside from kill frames per second. Pretty much, slaves have every setting down. And the master toon has maxed view distance and spell effects.

[Lost Ninja]

Windows 7 is the best thing that happened since Win 3.11

Win 98 OSr2 was far superior to 3.11... hell DOS 6.22 was superior to 3.11.

[Aragent]

As stated befor in many of the Windows 7 Posts,

You will find very little performance increase from Vista Unless you turn a ton of Services off.

Windows 7 Is a good program, theres is little actual performance increase from Vista to windows 7 however there is a Perceived Increase in performance. this is caused by how windows 7 handles Hard drive access and Video, where as the actual performance is not increased much it does created a smoother and less choppy experience giving a cleaner and smoother experience.

Windows 7 also handles SDD's better and duo video cards.
SO I would recommend going with a windows 7 64