Vista 64 vs XP 32: HD 4870 X2 Runs better under Vista!

[jmke]

Performance Scaling XP to Vista

On average with the Geforce GTX 280 you lose -1.6% by switching to Vista 64-bit, so in short: same performance and no loss!

The Radeon HD 4870 X2 does even better, if we leave out the numbers of Stalker and Tomb Raider (as Crossfire failed to run properly under XP) we see a +5.8% boost in average FPS going from XP to Vista. If we add the two game titles and let them enjoy CF-scaling the number jumps up to +27.7%!

also

Anti Aliasing Performance Scaling

We put all our results together for all games tested under both operating systems we can extract the following findings:

# Going from 0xAA to 4xAA

- Geforce GTX 280 under XP: -19.1%
- Radeon HD 4870 X2 under XP: -23.1%

- Geforce GTX 280 under Vista: -21%
- Radeon HD 4870 X2 under Vista: -10.6%

For both cards under XP the drop is pretty much on par; under Vista the HD 4870 X2 shows a remarkable difference, as performance only drops by ~10% on average!

# Going from 0xAA to 8xAA

- Geforce GTX 280 under XP: -26%
- Radeon HD 4870 X2 under XP: -25.8%

- Geforce GTX 280 under Vista: -28.7%
- Radeon HD 4870 X2 under Vista: -15.4%

When going from 0xAA to 8xAA the HD 4870 X2 is now better in both XP and Vista, under Vista the performance drop is still quite small, only ~15%! The GTX 280 drops by nearly double.

Source, with detail charts of all games tested

[spicypixel]

Wow, thats good news, though it makes me sad that nvidia isnt playing ball.

[eric66]

amd must really work on drivers such power is wasted cause of them

[Sly Fox]

Good, about time programmers start paying attention to Vista and making sure it's up to par.

Having been using Vista 64 bit since it first launched, believe me, I know quite a bit about bad driver/software support for Vista... Luckily devs are finally starting to realize that just like 2000 -> XP, progression is inevitable.

OT: By the end of this topic I predict it will be nothing more than ignorant people who have used Vista a few times just bashing it nonstop and complaining.

[Coldon]

funny how all the people that predicted that the poor performance was due to bad drivers turned out to be right. if anything my vista is more responsive than my xp in starting up apps and getting work done. Once i made the move i cant ever see myself going back to XP

[Bobsama]

Vista64 is a great OS. I've had the pleasure of using it for now 9 months. 64-bit is great on it--I run into only a few problems, but those are solved with Virtual PC 2007 or VMWare. Windows More Errors on the other hand, that was quite a pain. I ran it for about 3 months on a K6-2 550MHz before that machine was replaced by a Celery2GHz with WinXP.

[MGreg]

Vista x64 works great for me, only issues I have are due to software with drivers not supporting vista.

[Tonucci]

Nice to see vista doing well in games... since i wont be able to run away from it forever Its not bad at all imo...after I remove/configure tons of useless stuff. No ground breaking features or anything, but at least it has dx10 and decent 64bits support.

[ahmad]

Hey thats awesome. Only 15% drop for 0-8xAA.. WOW. I guess probably more CPU bottleneck at 0xAA.

[tjelaw]

I switched from WinXP to Vista 64bit ultimate just yesterday, I waited so long because I was sceptic about driver support, especially for my X-Fi.

Gaming performance is important to me, so this is good news. I'm starting to get used to vista and starting to like it more and more. Just mem usage seems so high compared to XP...

Only 2 things that really annoys me:
- cant properly tweak usb mouse polling rate (without having test-mode watermarks on desktop)
- warning every time you open an installer file. (not UAC)

[Sly Fox]

Of course it's the most "bloated," it's the newest.

XP was more "bloated" than 2000 as well, yet I don't see you history-rewriters complaining about that. Don't even get me started on Windows ME...

If you guys want to ignore the fact that in the past the same crap happens with every new OS (waah, it's bulky. waaaah, it crashes. waaaaah, it underperforms) that's fine, but don't drag your dribble into EVERY topic with Vista in the title. Nobody wants to hear it.

[Gamekiller]

Of course it's the most "bloated," it's the newest.

XP was more "bloated" than 2000 as well, yet I don't see you history-rewriters complaining about that. Don't even get me started on Windows ME...

If you guys want to ignore the fact that in the past the same crap happens with every new OS (waah, it's bulky. waaaah, it crashes. waaaaah, it underperforms) that's fine, but don't drag your dribble into EVERY topic with Vista in the title. Nobody wants to hear it.

I agree 100%, Sly Fox!

[JargonGR]

Just the good news I like to hear right after I bought a 4870X2 for my Vista Ultimate 64bit machine. Oh no! All my machines are Vista, four PCs at home and many more in the office.

[Eastcoasthandle]

It's amazing how people deny the fact that ATI drivers for the 4870 X2 are shown to be better in Vista then Nvidia by going on a "I love Vista" routine. Could this be some sort of defense mechanism...

[zanzabar]

i dont know i think it has more to with 3dmark and crysis for NV people instead of IQ for IQ FPS in real games. but this lets them come over without saying that they were wrong

[milkmandan]

Of course it's the most "bloated," it's the newest.

XP was more "bloated" than 2000 as well, yet I don't see you history-rewriters complaining about that. Don't even get me started on Windows ME...

If you guys want to ignore the fact that in the past the same crap happens with every new OS (waah, it's bulky. waaaah, it crashes. waaaaah, it underperforms) that's fine, but don't drag your dribble into EVERY topic with Vista in the title. Nobody wants to hear it.

I agree 100000%
It's about time someone said this.

[Eastcoasthandle]

i dont know i think it has more to with 3dmark and crysis for NV people instead of IQ for IQ FPS in real games. but this lets them come over without saying that they were wrong

Interesting hypothesis.

In any case, I had no idea of the gap when using 8x AA in vista:

# Going from 0xAA to 8xAA

- Geforce GTX 280 under XP: -26%
- Radeon HD 4870 X2 under XP: -25.8%

- Geforce GTX 280 under Vista: -28.7%
- Radeon HD 4870 X2 under Vista: -15.4%

Under XP the difference is minuscule but under vista there is a large gap.

[jaredpace]

are there 4870x2 drivers for windows mohave experiment?

[RPGWiZaRD]

I wish same applied for nV cards. Still if you check the FPS numbers only then Vista numbers aren't that amazing. It may be a lower AA perf drop but it's still most of the time lower fps in Vista to begin with. :p

[STEvil]

Need some XP-64 vs Vista64 numbers.

[Clint]

Need some XP-64 vs Vista64 numbers.

Very true, we need valid comparisons between the x64 versions.

Bordering OT:
The reason why we see better performance on Vista x64 is simply the fact is that there is where the focus lies for the driver development, simple as that.

Vista WILL have better performance in future compared to XP, but that is only due to the shifted focus on driver development. Vista is dragging along that driver polling DRM related crap that effectively will hinder it from perform as good as XP, period and end of story. (and no matter how quick you think the "swishy-swooshy" windows opens in Vista)

Taken the same attention is given to both OS'es when developing drivers and such XP is allways going to be faster, due to the simple fact is has not as much load to carry (driver polling) that is built in in Vista.

Btw, Vista is not a "new" OS, it shares the same old NT base as XP...essentially 95% the same as XP (even Win2000). But as I said, has the (very heavy) driver polling load to carry. It all boils down to simple logic folks,
read up on the matter.

[@@@@]

unfortunately I have to agree with you there, yes Vista takes more resources due to the overhead of DRM I hope there is a software that strip the DRM from windows Vista maybe soon with litePC? , Windows lite?, Vista lite? but if I am not mistaken it is embedded in the kernel?

on the other hand Vista 64 bit is improving but still has some crash with it could be form driver or from vista

haven't tried Vista 32bit though

[safan80]

I like my 4870x2 way better than my GTX280. the sad thing I can't get both of my 4870x2s working on my DFI even with the latest bios 8/29.

edit: the image quality is much better on my 4870x2 compared to my gtx 280.

[Miss Banana]

Really safan?
What is the differencde exactly?

[iddqd]

[QUOTE=Sly Fox;3267973Windows ME...[/QUOTE]
Windows ME is dead, long live Windows MEII