Windows 7 Retail -- EARLY REVIEW

[perez007usa]

You pretty much nailed what Windows 7 is on the head, it is a "new" OS for "new" hardware.

Yes... but even on new hardware, Windows XP outperforms Windows 7. That series of benchmark scores that I listed in my OP (which were originally posted by CNET) were taken on a brand new machine... not an older one. And the scores for WinXP were consistently better than the scores for Vista and Win7.

  You are so right Tess, I have friends who have Win7, and swear by it. Time, will tell them soon that its not a good system. Funny thing too, they come to me for answers about their systems. I guess with the money they spent on this OS crap, they want to make sure it  works right. I told them from the beginning about it, in one ear, out the other. Now they are paying the price.

[mhurley1]

Well, I decided to go with the win 7 oem 64bit pro. Your right, that was the frigging slowest install I have ever experienced and I've done many. But, I was able to install it and it did give me choices for partitioning before installation. All though I allready had the win 7 ultimate rc on my new sata drive by itself and a second drive with xp pro in raid. The new win 7 went right over the old rc. Then I started experienceing your other problem, my athalon dual core didn't seem to want to run right, I lost speed and experienced glitchs. I went to amd and downloaded the optimizer for my processor and man what a difference!!!!!!! I have a 4600+ dual core running 8 gig of ram and a GTX 260 -896mb card. Startup is a little slow but after it get's going it is really fast. All my games are running super so far,with the exception of Underworld which has crashed 2 times but not lately. Everything else seems to be really good. I bought Modern warefare 2 and took it for an internet test run last night. My machine held up great and I was able to hang in there with the pro's. On the desk top it is sailing along, but I have started tweaking the os, the first thing to go is the Aero. I got to say so far I am pleased but it doe's take some figureing out. At least I to have XP pro as a backup on my second drive. I guess time will tell, and yes it definatly was designed to run with certain hardware.

[Tessera]

And I have another complaint...


Internet Explorer 8 is HORRIBLE. What a dysfunctional pile of shit. I just got rid of it.

The latest version of Firefox (version 3.5) is working out much better for Windows 7.
I used to hate Firefox, but their latest version is laid out a lot better than their older
versions were. Multimedia performance has increased, thanks to their new "open
video and audio" feature... whatever the hell that means. It just seems to run a
bit faster than it used to. So for the time being, I'll be using Firefox 3.5 as my
web browser of choice in Windows 7.

[tepesimpaled]

Internet Explorer is HORRIBLE. 

I learned to love Firefox because I had too.  When using Linux is was Mozilla and Konqueror and Mozilla was the better of the two by far.

[Zenoseiya]

As usual, Microsoft delivers a subpar product. Good thing I still use XP.

My question is this: how is the worst operating system in the world the best selling one?

[perez007usa]

I believe of all the kick backs they get, and all the companies that make puters.

[Tessera]

My question is this: how is the worst operating system in the world the best selling one?

Because Microsoft uses leverage to shut out their competition.

That's why they've been hauled into court dozens of times by
their competitors: unfair business practices.

[Tessera]

The following readout should help everyone to understand why Windows 7 sucks for gaming:




What you are seeing is the amount of system memory and CPU cycles that Windows 7 x64 Ultimate is using... when it is just IDLING.

Not when running a program... not when doing some sort of maintenance chore... but simply IDLING and doing nothing.

Now, I know that the first thing a lot of Win7 fanboys will tell me is to start killing background services and so forth, to free up system memory and CPU time. Well, guess what..? I'm way ahead of ya's. I already did all of that, prior to taking that screenshot. I killed the stupid Aero desktop effects, I turned off any and all unnecessary services (using msconfig), I shut down every frivolous bell and whistle that Win7 would allow me to turn off.

And my choice of words in the previous sentence is quite appropriate. I said "allow me to turn off" for a reason. Microsoft is once again guilty of the same "every one of our customers is a dummy" mentality that screwed them up the ass with Vista. Many of the various services and background programs that Win7 insists on loading at every boot-up are difficult (if not impossible) to shut down. Many of them are not even listed in the Services applet of the Administrator controls. Basically, Bill Gates has assumed that all of us are idiots and that he knows what is best for us... regardless of the end-user's level of expertise.

What does this mean to gamers..? Well it's simple, really: it means that Win7 is unnecessarily sucking up a crapload of your computer's overall capabilities. In fact, I would estimate that if you wanted Windows 7 to run games as fast and efficiently as Windows XP does, then you would need to invest in something like $1000 more hardware than a WinXP system would require... just to produce the same performance. In short, you would need to resort to some rather expensive brute force, in order to overcompensate for the gross inefficiencies of Windows 7.

Total garbage... just like Vista. As I have said many times: the operating system is supposed to be the stage... not the whole show. But good luck impressing that fact upon the egomaniacs at MicroSlop.  



SYSTEM SPECS FOR ABOVE SCREENSHOT:

4 GB High-Speed DDR RAM (Patriot "enthusiast" memory)
AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 "Toledo" Dual-Core CPU
ASUS A8N32-SLI Deluxe motherboard
nVidia GTX285 OCX video card, manufactured by BFG Tech
1920x1080 HD widescreen desktop resolution

[anariel]

My question is this: how is the worst operating system in the world the best selling one?

Because Microsoft uses leverage to shut out their competition.

That's why they've been hauled into court dozens of times by
their competitors: unfair business practices.

In essence: actually there are three operating systems out there: Windows, Mac and Linux. Linux is presented as some sort of cultist elite way of using a computer, and Mac is disregarded as a media suit first and a subpar game platform.
The reason behind windoze is the top selling? In short: every game developed today with a commercial target is developed fow windows or consoles. Mac users sometimes get conversions. Linux users have to fight their way through a lot of forums, several threads, and they will probably end without being able to run the game in their windows emulator (a work in progress... much more efficient than the original windows...).
Add to that the fact that 90% of the new computers come with Windows installed by default, and the components drivers being made only for the latest windows version... and you have a great part of the picture in your hand.

The problem is, Microsoft and a lot of hardware companies have allied themselves in order to get more profits (no one there has a photo of the CEO's of those companies dressed as Ferengi? XD), which means the worstperfomance the SO does, the better for the hardware companies, because you have to spend more to get the same.

Edit: Regarding the RAM comsumption, I yesterday asked a friend and he told me that win7 reserves a certain % of your total RAM for faster applications execution. When I asked for clarification, he told me that launching, for example, word won't increase the RAM from that 1.15GB. I don't know if it's true, but that's what I've been told.
Also, that the last MacOs (version 10) has been made directly from a Debian linux (the previous MacOs versions seems to have been based, however, when they needed to integrate Intel processors, they had to re-evaluate).
I also have been told that, if I want to use fully a dual or quad core CPU, my only options are Vista, seven or Linux... Quite depressing

[Tessera]

Regarding the RAM comsumption, I yesterday asked a friend and he told me that win7 reserves a certain % of your total RAM for faster applications execution. When I asked for clarification, he told me that launching, for example, word won't increase the RAM from that 1.15GB. I don't know if it's true, but that's what I've been told.

What he told you is correct. But it does not explain why Windows 7 x64 is using as much as 30% of my CPU when it is just IDLING. In comparison, the most I ever saw Win XP x64 using when it idled was perhaps 12% at most.

Here's another look:



Those are my CPU's idling temperatures, showing both cores running at around 40 degrees Celsius. Readings taken using CPUID Hardware Monitor.

I don't have a screenshot handy at the moment, but trust me when I tell you that those temperatures are several degrees hotter than what I normally see in Windows XP x64. Same exact CPU... same aftermarket Zalman "Fatal1ty" CPU cooler... same Arctic Silver thermal paste... same everything. The only difference is the operating system. And when I am running Windows 7 x64 "Ultimate," my system runs hotter, uses more RAM and more CPU cycles when it is supposedly doing NOTHING AT ALL. Just sitting there -- idling, with no programs running -- the system is burning up a ton of resources just for Windows 7.

This is unacceptable for -any- operating system. An operating system is supposed to be a platform, upon which you run your various programs. An operating system is not supposed to be a bloated resource hog, which sucks away as much as 40% of your computer's power when it is doing nothing except idling. This tells us that Windows 7 is poorly coded, so far as resource management is concerned. It also tells us that Windows 7 is constantly doing a shitload of unnecessary stuff that we can't see. All of those wasted CPU cycles must be doing SOMETHING... but I have no idea what. I've searched through the running processes... I've explored the various start-up options in msconfig... but so far as I can tell, it is simply the Windows OS kernel itself which is sucking away so much of my system's power. Far more than any previous version of Windows that I have ever used.

Oh... and before anyone suggests that it may be a virus of some kind which is sucking up my CPU..? Forget it -- no chance. My system is regularly scanned by BitDefender Internet Security 2010. No viruses at all. As a matter of fact, at first I suspected that it might be BitDefender itself which was sucking up all of those CPU cycles... but when I temporarily uninstalled BitDefender, the problem remained. So that's not the culprit.

The bottom line is that Windows 7 is a terrible choice for people who play high-end games on their PC, just as Windows Vista was. Windows XP (32 bit or 64 bit) is still a far better choice for gamers, all things considered. And it doesn't matter how powerful your rig happens to be. No matter how good your hardware is, it will always run faster and waste less resources on Windows XP versus Windows 7... period.

So for all of the Win7 fanboys out there who think that their bitchin' quad-core rigs are immune from these issues... guess again, kids. Because an unnecessarily large percentage of your system's power is being wasted by Windows 7. This will -always- be true, regardless of what hardware you have. An inefficient OS is a wasteful OS.

[Claenteh1st]

I also have been told that, if I want to use fully a dual or quad core CPU, my only options are Vista, seven or Linux... Quite depressing

Solution: Get Linux on a virtual machine for now, and then when you feel that you've learned enough to depend entirely on it, go Linux all the way. I know I intend to when I finish my UNIX courses so I'm not diving headfirst into a rock pile. I am aware of a Linux kernel that plays current gen games, although the compatibility hasn't completely been worked out. However, it runs about 100% more efficiently than XP does concerning gaming, without the limitations of DX9... or so I've heard. I fully intend to acquire this kernel and see if I can help clean it up to snuff when the time comes.

This be Claen'tor, signing off.

[Tessera]

If there was a better Windows emulator for Linux (for gaming), then I would happily
switch over to Ubuntu 100% of the time and piss all over Bill Gates' grave.

I keep hopin'.

[anariel]

Maybe the system is in "hot standby"? So, it reserves RAM for fast-use, and CPU too? I think it would be a waste of electricity, though... not to mention the wear and tear to the components for being all the time "in use".
Just supposing, though :S

Claen'tor, if you know that, say the name XD. The only thing holding me in windows atm is only the games...

[Tessera]

Well no... what is actually going on is that Windows 7 does the same thing that Windows Vista did: it pre-loads a ton of garbage into your system RAM at boot-up, as a part of its "SuperFetch" function.

SuperFetch claims to speed up your computer. What it also does is thrash your hard drive at the same time, as it constantly loads and re-loads data that it thinks you might need to be pre-loaded. SuperFetch also promises to "instantly" free up any and all system RAM that a launched program (such as one of your games) asks for. Of course, in some cases this involves swapping things around right in the middle of your game... leading to occasional stuttering and other performance issues.

I remember when Koroush Ghazi... the PC guru over at TweakGuides.com... did his best to convince everyone that Windows Vista was nowhere near as bad as we all KNEW that it was. And I am sure that he will have equally misguided things to say about Windows 7, too. This is to be expected, because Koroush is convinced that anyone who disagrees with him must be ignorant of the facts. His overall attitude seems to be "Don't believe your lying eyes -- WinXP is not faster," basically. But the fact remains that no matter which computer you test it on... and no matter how powerful your hardware is... when it comes to gaming performance, Windows XP beats the performance benchmarks of Windows Vista/Win7 every single time... NO MATTER WHAT. And whenever someone brings up those types of benchmarks over on Koroush's own forums, he deftly side-steps those disturbing facts and figures with one fanboy-ish, "Just trust me because I know better than you" style denial after another.

He is simply wrong. I respect most of his "Tweak Guides" and his overall level of technical ability, but he is unfortunately another one of those industry boot lickers... who believes that everything newer is automatically "better." And he will go on at great lengths to rationalize his opinions... all the while conveniently ignoring the actual benchmark data. The guy must have a file cabinet full of condescending rationalizations and pitiful denials.

"Progress" should equal -more- speed and -better- performance... not worse speed and glitchy performance. Consumers have every right to expect that the newer operating systems will work BETTER than the older ones did... not the same, or worse. And yet with each successive version of Windows... starting with Windows XP... our computers have become increasingly SLOWER and MORE ANNOYING. Oh sure... we've compensated for this by upgrading our hardware to newer and faster components. But my point is that NO MATTER WHAT kind of hardware you own, your system will run faster under Windows XP than it will under Windows 7.

There are a few things that I have done to speed up my Win7 system, however. For one thing, I completely deactivated User Account Control (UAC) from my system. In return, I gained an appreciable performance increase... not to mention a LOT less annoyance from constant "Do you really want to do this?" pop-ups, asking me to confirm my changes every single time I farted or belched. I have also removed just about every single folder from the Windows indexing service. I may even shut off indexing altogether... but for now, I have severely restricted it to ONLY indexing an extremely limited number of locations. And then there's the constant tendency of Windows 7 to create system restore points, every single time I install a new piece of software. Well, I totally shut that crappola off, too. I'll take my chances and do without all of the delays and hard drive hogging that system restore was responsible for, thanks.

So to speed up Windows 7, I have essentially deactivated most of its built-in "system security" features. What can I say... I like to live on the edge. I also like to get my money's worth out of my system hardware -- without Windows 7 hogging up 40 percent of it for a bunch of frivolous bells and whistles.

[anariel]

What can I say... I like to live on the edge.

We know, you bought an SO you knew was the crappiest in history xD.

I supose the main problem with Vista is you can't deactivate or manually program all that crap... well... the moment a windows emulator just for games comes for linux, bye bye, Mr Gates.

[Boris187]

Oddly I have found Windows 7 to be far faster than XP or Vista, however this was not initially the case, when I first installed Win 7 Pro 64bit it ran like crap, however after updating my Bios to the most up to date version and then reformatting back to Win 7 it ran like a champ, bios was the only change, every driver used was the exact same version.  I tested all of this with benchmarks comparing Win XP Pro SP3, Vista Ult 64 and 7 Pro 64 and in every benchmark Win 7 Pro 64 beat out the others.  This is also not with a brand new PC, it is one that I have been upgrading slowly over the past 3+ years using a Asus P5B mobo, Intel Q6600 2.4ghz OC'd to 3ghz, ATI Radeon HD4870 512mb, Asus Xonar DX and 4gigs of Corsair Dominator DDR2 ram.  The benchmarks I tested it on were SiSoft Sandra, 3D Mark 05 and 3D Mark Vantage(only on Vista and Win 7 due to no Dx10 in XP) the biggest increase was actually in 3D Mark 05 where I saw over a 1000 point increase in my score over XP....

I would like you to keep something in mind, I used Windows XP Pro when it first came out and let me tell you, it was a challenge just to keep it installed it was SO bad, it was not until they came out with SP2 that it was even somewhat stable, so for all those who love to talk about how great XP is.....maybe it is NOW, but it wasn't always that way, it took a couple of years for it to get to the state that it is in today.  So to compare something that has been around as long as XP has with as many patches as it has seen and NEEDED for it to work worth a damn to something that has only been out for a couple of months, it's almost not even fair to do, but I can guarantee you one thing, if you looked at XP vs Win 7 along their lifespans timelines, Win 7 as new as it is puts XP to shame.  I just think of how often even with SP2 and SP3 in XP I used to get BSOD compared to the 1 that I have got with Win 7 in the 3 months that I have been using it...I couldn't go a day w/o at least 1 BSOD with XP.

I would highly suggest you try updating your Bios and give Win 7 another go Tessera because there is definately something wrong looking at your screenshot of your task manager, right now looking at mine with Firefox open in 7 tabs, Aero fully enabled, Windows auto update enabled, Microsoft Security Essentials running, Ad-Aware running, Thunderbird open and Ventrilo running I am only using 1% CPU and 1.32 GB Ram, so you definately have something funky going on and it reminds me very much of what I initially ran into on my first install of Win 7 before updating my bios and reformatting again since it ran even worse after the bios update, but after the bios update and reformatting/reinstalling Win 7 it ran better than it ever had.

[Tessera]

I tested all of this with benchmarks comparing Win XP Pro SP3, Vista Ult 64 and 7 Pro 64 and in every benchmark Win 7 Pro 64 beat out the others.

You are the only person on the planet earth who has claimed to have faster gaming performance benchmarks under Win7 as compared to WinXP.

That's rather extraordinary.

Because every other reputable benchmark test has consistently demonstrated that WinXP x64 boots up faster, runs games faster and uses less system resources when idling than either Vista or Win7.

How do you account for your highly unusual results..? Because even the rabid Win7 fanboys over at Tom's Hardware couldn't get Win7 to run faster than WinXP x64. And lord knows, they tried.

I suggest running your tests again, using ACTUAL GAMES this time... and measuring their load times, framerates, hard drive thrashing during gameplay, save and load times, memory usage, and so on.

Incidentally, a BIOS upgrade is only important if your BIOS was buggy or inefficient in the first place. The operating system shouldn't make any difference, nor should anyone feel the need to update their BIOS if everything in their machine is working properly. Either the motherboard BIOS works properly, or it doesn't. Hence, you should have seen a performance benefit under ALL operating systems after upgrading... WinXP included. I have never seen such a thing as a "Windows 7 optimized BIOS," so whilst your advice is well-intentioned, it is not the magic bullet here. It is far more likely that the built-in motherboard drivers in Windows 7 were incompatible with your previous BIOS version and after you upgraded, Windows 7 stopped malfunctioning (or it malfunctioned less). So what we're really saying here is that Windows 7 has shitty built-in system drivers as compared to WinXP.  

[Boris187]

Well I was not using XP 64bit, only 32bit so maybe that has a lot to do with it as well, and actually I am using the Windows 7 built in motherboard chipset drivers since the readme file that came with the chipset drivers i downloaded from Asus said they did not need to be installed under Windows 7.  Odd maybe performance wise, but I had never had anything but problems with XP from the day I started using it, granted they did get better with the service packs but it was always a troubled OS for me, better than 98se, sure....but certainly not better than Vista Ult 64 or 7 Pro 64 in regards to performance or stability, could that come from just switching from a 32 bit OS to a 64 bit OS?  Oh and I know a lot of people don't update their bios very often if at all, but in my experience I have yet to have a negative effect from doing so, granted I don't update it nearly as often as I update say my GFX drivers, but I do try and update it at least once per year.