Performance Improvements
The last significant group of core improvements to be found in Vista is a collection of several changes Microsoft has made to various subsystems in order to boost overall system performance. Unfortunately, because Vista is still in a beta state where performance optimizations have yet to be turned on, not to mention the lack of diagnostic programs to test these features, we won't be able to bring you any meaningful performance numbers until the release version of Vista ships. However, we can talk some about the most important of these features.
Since XP was launched 5 years ago, broadband internet access has come to be the dominant connection method in much of the world. While XP had some targeted improvements to increase performance on these connections, Microsoft is taking it one step further in Vista with a heavily modified TCP/IP stack. The primary changes will be that the stack is now capable of a greater level of self-optimization by automatically adjusting some settings to maximize performance, and some overhead has been removed to better reach the maximum theoretical performance of high-speed LANs (GigE and higher). The new stack also has support for both IPv4 and IPv6 (instead of requiring 2 separate stacks as is currently the case), but the amount of hardware support to go with this is still fairly low.
The I/O subsystem has also been given a major overhaul, and like the forthcoming changes with DirectX 10, the focus is on better ways to schedule and execute I/O tasks. I/O tasks can now be given a priority level, so that unimportant tasks such as virus-scanners can be given a lower disk priority that will prevent them from being so detrimental to system performance.
The I/O system will now also be able to handle Microsoft's SuperFetch technology, which promises to improve memory usage by creating a third tier of memory pages between those important enough to be in RAM and those relegated to being in a pagefile. The new tier will be a class of pages that are important enough that they need to be accessed often, but are small pages that don't take much time to transfer; these pages can be stored in connected flash-memory devices which offer latencies measured in nanoseconds (a couple orders of magnitude faster than a hard drive page file), and in turn free up the main memory for more important tasks. It's an interesting idea that we hope will give some real benefit in the release version of Vista, and is likely to become more important in the near future as hard drives start to be released with integrated flash memory buffers.
Lastly, the kernel itself has been slightly overhauled, implementing new methods of memory and task management. Microsoft's pitch here is that it will be better optimized for dual-core systems, but since the NT kernel has always had a good level of SMP support for multiple processors, we're a bit skeptical on just what kind of performance improvements can be found here.
The last significant group of core improvements to be found in Vista is a collection of several changes Microsoft has made to various subsystems in order to boost overall system performance. Unfortunately, because Vista is still in a beta state where performance optimizations have yet to be turned on, not to mention the lack of diagnostic programs to test these features, we won't be able to bring you any meaningful performance numbers until the release version of Vista ships. However, we can talk some about the most important of these features.
Since XP was launched 5 years ago, broadband internet access has come to be the dominant connection method in much of the world. While XP had some targeted improvements to increase performance on these connections, Microsoft is taking it one step further in Vista with a heavily modified TCP/IP stack. The primary changes will be that the stack is now capable of a greater level of self-optimization by automatically adjusting some settings to maximize performance, and some overhead has been removed to better reach the maximum theoretical performance of high-speed LANs (GigE and higher). The new stack also has support for both IPv4 and IPv6 (instead of requiring 2 separate stacks as is currently the case), but the amount of hardware support to go with this is still fairly low.
The I/O subsystem has also been given a major overhaul, and like the forthcoming changes with DirectX 10, the focus is on better ways to schedule and execute I/O tasks. I/O tasks can now be given a priority level, so that unimportant tasks such as virus-scanners can be given a lower disk priority that will prevent them from being so detrimental to system performance.
The I/O system will now also be able to handle Microsoft's SuperFetch technology, which promises to improve memory usage by creating a third tier of memory pages between those important enough to be in RAM and those relegated to being in a pagefile. The new tier will be a class of pages that are important enough that they need to be accessed often, but are small pages that don't take much time to transfer; these pages can be stored in connected flash-memory devices which offer latencies measured in nanoseconds (a couple orders of magnitude faster than a hard drive page file), and in turn free up the main memory for more important tasks. It's an interesting idea that we hope will give some real benefit in the release version of Vista, and is likely to become more important in the near future as hard drives start to be released with integrated flash memory buffers.
Lastly, the kernel itself has been slightly overhauled, implementing new methods of memory and task management. Microsoft's pitch here is that it will be better optimized for dual-core systems, but since the NT kernel has always had a good level of SMP support for multiple processors, we're a bit skeptical on just what kind of performance improvements can be found here.
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Squidward - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
Having beta tested Windows XP when it was released, I have to say that so far I'm not very impressed with Vista. Granted there is still quite some time before final release but even with RC1 of XP it was a rock solid stable OS that I used as my full time OS and never had any issues whatsoever (especially security cause no one was writing viruses and malware for it back then). Quite frankly I don't see how the beta 2 I've been looking at and the final polished out the door product is going to happen in 7 months for a Jan. launch. The real problem however lies in the fact that I know I will move up to Vista at some point, but not because it's a better OS than XP but that I'll be hindered by continuing to use an older operating system. I just haven't seen anything in it yet that made me go. "Now that's the kind of feature I've been needing!", and the few features that did make me feel that way were removed to be implemented 'at a later date'. Fancy graphical effects are nice and all, but they don't make an OS. As it stands in the betas the UAC feature is just a complete hinderance that to me seems to punish the end user because of security risks that are out there. The end user shouldn't get a pop up on every single application or item they open to be sure it's 'safe'. There are far better means of controlling permissions within an OS that would have made a lot more sense that what we have now with UAC. That being said, I believe in time and with Microsoft really listening to customer feedback they'll work out a lot of the kinks, but I won't consider purchasing Vista until they do... or force me to upgrade. :)Pirks - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
Besides this thing being early beta, also keep in mind that it's not a cosmetic chaneg akin to upgrade from W2k to XP or from OSX 10.3 to 10.4 - this is a major OS overhaul not too far from migration from 9x to NT, of course early beta of such a grand release will be total crap (at least for many people, but some others seem to enjoy it a lot). So, comparing this early beta release to XP release candidate is indeed pretty stupid. I don't even expect Vista release to be 100% usable out of the box, ESPECIALLY x64 version - Vista 64 will take another year or two to mature, get drivers/apps ready and such. And you should also keep in mind that MS is in a big hurry to avoid Apple to chop its balls off - some more delay and you'll see Apple market share well over 10% which is pretty dangerous to MS if they wanna keep enjoying their desktop x86 OS monopoly status. Hence MS does stuff quickly, cuts off features and will probably release something buggy just to avoid serious threat from Apple. Expect something usable only after SP1 and give it at least a year - in a meantime read some rumours about Leopard and salivate a little - that'll keep you going ;-))Yet another nice point - you think MS will sit still and let Leopard to chew its (MS's) private parts with impunity? I doubt that - MS will very likely release those nice sweet WinFS and other toys there were promising for years and integrate them in the next Vista release (I hope Leopard or whatever Mr. Jobs is up to isn't going to eat that for lunch - 'cause WinFS is the last hope for MS, really - DX10 won't count, too small a market it seems). So, in two years or maybe earlier you'll get those new sexy features you want, I believe... well, Apple could probably beat MS's ass here again, which is even more likely judging how well Apple devs were performing so far, so maybe you won't be interested in Vista at all - OS scene moves very fast - bang bang and u'r dead :) Especially now when Ballmer replaced BG - I'm worried, I don't quite trust Ballmer and Ozzie and others - ol' Bill was da man, not sure Vista survives w/o him when his archrival Jobs is only started to accelerate before real takeoff (Leopard?), but we'll see, we'll see...
Oh, interesting, tell stupid us what is this "far better means of controlling permissions within an OS" instead of annoying ugly UAC, this must be something revolutionary and ingenious - maybe MS will pay you big bucks for that, who knows ;-))
ChronoReverse - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
You tested RC1 of XP. Release Candidate 1.This is BETA 2 of Vista. Maybe when they release RC1 of Vista you can compare again.
Frallan - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
Well i found 1 thing to be more interesting then the rest: Gaming Perfomance!!That means that at least til the games I want to play are DX10 combined with the fact that DX10 games get better results im going to stax with my XP.
Sorry M$
/F
Googer - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
There are so many versions and the feature sets will confuse most of us.Here is a screen shot from Paul Thurott's Win Super Site.
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/Googer/Windows_Vista_...">Windows Vista Versions.
Ryan Smith - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
Keep in mind that that's an old chart. Small Business Edition no longer exists, and Professional is now Business Edition.Googer - Saturday, June 17, 2006 - link
Thanks forthe update. Here is the now silghtly out of date chart but still has some usefull information.http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/winvista_edit...">http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/winvista_edit...
slashbinslashbash - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
Page 8, "regulated" should be "relegated"Also in the same sentence, "Superfetc.h" (which might not be a typo)
A 14-page article with 2 minor problems.... The quality ratio here at AT just kills DailyTech.... please impose AT quality control on DailyTech!
JarredWalton - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
Fixed - DT runs a lot of short, quick articles, and unfortunately that means they get more typos and errors. Anyway, since they are a separate entity, there's not much we can do. Feel free to post and tell them, though, but remember they're looking at probably 10X as many press releases as we do. LOLDerekWilson - Friday, June 16, 2006 - link
1) vista is perfectly capable of being a stable light weight desktop system (with some quirks) at the beta 2 stage ... but try to do anything fast or power hungry and you'd be better off sticking with xp until vista is released. right now, at beta 2, vista is a neat toy. don't try to use it for everything.2) after all the spit an polish dries, i will still prefer os x to vista
3) final verdict? same as it ever was -- i'll be running vista for games and linux for programming. and since i've recently been bitten by the switch bug, os x for everything else.