Windows Vista SP1 restores faith
Monday, March 10, 2008 by Draginol | Discussion: Windows Vista
Windows Vista Service Pack 1 is the first major update to Microsoft's controversial follow-up to Windows XP. I say controversial because Windows Vista got off to a bit of a rough start mostly in the area of driver support, the new User Access Control and just a number of polish issues that gave early adopters a bit of a sour taste.
We've been given a copy of the final release of Service Pack 1 and we're pleased to say it's a big step forward for Windows Vista users. Having previously been using the betas and most recently RC1, I had been disappointed with the general slowness and klunkiness of Windows Vista.
For most new users to Windows Vista, the first thing they would tend to notice is how much slower Windows Vista was versus Windows XP. With Service Pack 1, Windows Vista is very snappy. The overall experience is just much better. Here are the big improvements based on our testing:
- Superfetch is super. The most significant improvement we noticed in SP1 over Vista (including the RC's) is that superfetch is much better. Superfetch looks at what programs you tend to use and so when you boot up, it will tend to load pieces of these into memory. Now, users who get really uptight about the amount of memory used by the system on bootup will still have a cow. But the reality is that now when you load up the programs you usually run, it's lightning fast. If you've ever right-clicked on the desktop in Windows XP to create a folder and found it obnoxious how long it takes to bring up a pop up menu, you'll like SP1.
- File Management much snappier. In Windows Vista, moving files around was obnoxious. You'd get a dialog that would start to estimate the amount of time it would take to copy the files. If I'm moving 10 gigs around, sure, that might make sense. But even on relatively small file operations, I'd get this dialog. Now, moving things around in Windows is as fast or faster than it was on Windows XP. It's very snappy. One other plus, the zip handling is much faster.
- Using it with a laptop is nicer. One thing we noticed immediately over plain Vista was coming out of sleep was much much faster. This is particularly true if you have USB devices hooked up. It was very noticeable.
- General performance is better. Is it better than Windows XP? Most people will say no but it depends on what matters to you. Windows XP benchmarks better but in terms of actual responsiveness, Windows Vista is feeling faster on the same hardware for me. That is, loading up programs I commonly use, switching between programs, etc. I am inclined to agree with those who say that Vista will perform more slowly in benchmarking but Vista is a lot more intelligent in its memory management in SP1 than XP and vastly better than Vista plain.
There are numerous other updates to Windows Vista SP1 but in terms of what we think most users will notice, these are the big ones.
Reply #22 Tuesday, March 11, 2008 11:26 AM
Reply #23 Tuesday, March 11, 2008 11:23 AM
Reply #24 Tuesday, March 11, 2008 12:32 PM
No problems at all for me with nvidia drivers and vista. Zero. I've put Vista SP1 on 3 machines running vista. 2 of them were x64 and those drivers have not been updated in several months.
Reply #25 Wednesday, March 12, 2008 4:33 PM
Reply #26 Wednesday, March 12, 2008 5:49 PM
It's an 8600GT, and yes you are correct with the comment about the 6/7 series. I had nothing but grief with those. I've not tried ATI on Vista, but ATI gave me a real bad taste in the mouth once on XP, thus my devotion to Nvidia cards.
Reply #27 Wednesday, March 12, 2008 5:56 PM
I had a 7900GTO and waited for nvidia for 6 months, for instance in source games if I enabled 2xaa i would literally lose 100fps on the stress test. I haven't had an nvidia card since.
Reply #28 Wednesday, March 12, 2008 7:17 PM
More than! Any of my projects exported as a standalone gadgets don't work too... However they work as a widgets! And I can finally edit the scripts on Vista SP1. So I must say that nearly 95% of DesktopX functions are already working on Vista.
Let's wait a bit until Stardock will show us the release of Object Desktop 2008 (~ 31 March). Hope this will be a perfect product as always.
Reply #29 Wednesday, March 12, 2008 8:15 PM
Im on x64 using the x86 sidebar (dx gadgets dont work at all on the x64 sidebar) and I just tested out the Sirus gadgets and they work fine....
Reply #30 Wednesday, March 12, 2008 8:15 PM
Reply #31 Wednesday, March 12, 2008 8:16 PM
Reply #32 Thursday, March 13, 2008 1:35 AM
Generally I don't run betas and have not tried SP1, waiting for that through WU
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Reply #33 Thursday, March 13, 2008 1:37 AM
Reply #34 Thursday, March 13, 2008 7:22 AM
Reply #35 Thursday, March 13, 2008 10:08 AM
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Reply #36 Friday, March 14, 2008 8:29 AM
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Reply #37 Friday, March 14, 2008 10:00 AM
I'm not sure if it's Nvidia to blame. I have an Nvidia on my desktop as well, so I will install it on there and see how it goes.
Reply #38 Saturday, March 15, 2008 7:23 PM
Norton is the worse program to put on a PC...
And the first thing I uninstall when fixing customers computers...
Reply #39 Tuesday, March 18, 2008 4:08 PM
Reply #40 Tuesday, March 18, 2008 4:14 PM
Norton is the worse program to put on a PC...And the first thing I uninstall when fixing customers computers...
Gah no joke, insidious beast. Have to use a special remover tool to get rid of it, because if you try to uninstall the components in the wrong order, you are *screwed.*
Bebi Bulma shakes fist at stupid manufacturers for pre-loading this crap onto machines
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Reply #21 Tuesday, March 11, 2008 11:25 AM