Windows Vista Update: RC1/5728 Preview
by Ryan Smith on October 3, 2006 4:30 AM EST- Posted in
- Systems
Conclusion
While we'll hold back on any final opinions on Vista until we have a shipping version, at this point it's becoming increasingly unlikely we'll see any more significant changes between now and when Vista is finished next month. So what we say now we'll likely be saying again.
At this point most of Vista is perfectly fine. Everything works, all functionality is enabled, and driver support is looking good. If anyone had to pick up Vista and use it today, they would be able to do so once they got over the initial shock of just how different it is compared to XP. For doing so, they would be rewarded with a lot of new functionality that XP can't offer, though other operating systems like Mac OS X have offered many of the features for years now.
As the saying goes, it's the little things that matter. Vista isn't perfect - no operating system is - and while we could pick apart things we still don't like about XP 5 years later, Vista's problems are more pressing. Some of the things that Vista does are flat-out quirky and make little sense, and User Account Controls are still going to come across as combative to enthusiasts and other similar user groups. General users will be fine, but as is often the case general users end up adopting some enthusiast practices, and if that includes disarming parts of UAC, it will significantly undermine the security gains of Vista.
Where performance ends up is also a concern. Our general performance numbers are a mixed bag compared to XP, which turns out is a good thing since it would imply that overall Vista is no slower than XP for performance-critical applications. Memory and disk space usage are up, and that's an inevitability of progress, but most recent machines should be no worse off with Vista than XP as far as general usage goes if our numbers reflect the larger whole. This is something we'll investigate much more in depth once we have the final version of Vista.
Unfortunately, gaming performance is still lagging behind, heavily at times, and this is troubling. Gamers will no doubt stay away from Vista if the final version and final video drivers continue to underperform, but there's also the larger issue of how computers are becoming increasingly reliant on the GPU for general tasks, something Microsoft itself is pushing with the new video threading systems for Vista and forthcoming DirectX 10-class video hardware. A large video performance gap could or could not be a problem for non-gamers moving to Vista, but it's too early to tell.
So where does that leave us then? If Microsoft continues to stay on schedule, they will have a shipping version of Vista ready within a month, though retail consumers will be waiting until 2007 to get their hands on it. Whether it will really be ready to replace XP at that time remains up in the air. Early adopters will likely bite the bullet, but many people will probably prefer waiting for the inevitable Service Pack.
While we'll hold back on any final opinions on Vista until we have a shipping version, at this point it's becoming increasingly unlikely we'll see any more significant changes between now and when Vista is finished next month. So what we say now we'll likely be saying again.
At this point most of Vista is perfectly fine. Everything works, all functionality is enabled, and driver support is looking good. If anyone had to pick up Vista and use it today, they would be able to do so once they got over the initial shock of just how different it is compared to XP. For doing so, they would be rewarded with a lot of new functionality that XP can't offer, though other operating systems like Mac OS X have offered many of the features for years now.
As the saying goes, it's the little things that matter. Vista isn't perfect - no operating system is - and while we could pick apart things we still don't like about XP 5 years later, Vista's problems are more pressing. Some of the things that Vista does are flat-out quirky and make little sense, and User Account Controls are still going to come across as combative to enthusiasts and other similar user groups. General users will be fine, but as is often the case general users end up adopting some enthusiast practices, and if that includes disarming parts of UAC, it will significantly undermine the security gains of Vista.
Where performance ends up is also a concern. Our general performance numbers are a mixed bag compared to XP, which turns out is a good thing since it would imply that overall Vista is no slower than XP for performance-critical applications. Memory and disk space usage are up, and that's an inevitability of progress, but most recent machines should be no worse off with Vista than XP as far as general usage goes if our numbers reflect the larger whole. This is something we'll investigate much more in depth once we have the final version of Vista.
Unfortunately, gaming performance is still lagging behind, heavily at times, and this is troubling. Gamers will no doubt stay away from Vista if the final version and final video drivers continue to underperform, but there's also the larger issue of how computers are becoming increasingly reliant on the GPU for general tasks, something Microsoft itself is pushing with the new video threading systems for Vista and forthcoming DirectX 10-class video hardware. A large video performance gap could or could not be a problem for non-gamers moving to Vista, but it's too early to tell.
So where does that leave us then? If Microsoft continues to stay on schedule, they will have a shipping version of Vista ready within a month, though retail consumers will be waiting until 2007 to get their hands on it. Whether it will really be ready to replace XP at that time remains up in the air. Early adopters will likely bite the bullet, but many people will probably prefer waiting for the inevitable Service Pack.
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Griswold - Friday, October 6, 2006 - link
What a pathetic comment.flexy - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
lol at your reply :)I am NOT going into the age-long debate "Ati has so bad drivers" discussion anymore...we could've had that YEARS ago in Radon 8500 times...now your biased blahblah just hasn't any base and just shows you're a n00b :)
VooDooAddict - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
I wish taht the article expanded more on the issue of lack of Hardware sound processing for older games.imaheadcase - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
Basicly put (someone correct me if im wrong here) MS moved away from all hardware based rendering of sound and put it into the OS. Im guessing its a directx 10 thing is why they did it..but Im sure Creative is pissed.Missing Ghost - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
If creative is pissed than it must be a good thing.michal1980 - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
creative sucking or not. M$ taking away ALL and ANY hardware accelration for games SUCKS.Creatives solution/monoloply is not the best, but given the fact that in general (90%) of the people buying an extra sound card do so for gaming, and creative for better or worse has 100% of the gaming market, locking creative out is a BAD thing.
So we had problems with creative and there drivers and bloat.
Answer me this? what do we have now? A M$ controled SOFTWARE SOUND SOLUTION!!!. EAX is not perfect, but alot of games use it, and when the do, it is GOOD!.
Now were are left with ONBOARD Sound!!!. YAAA thats a step in the right direction? phhhf sorry hardware sound, even creative owns most onboard sound solutions. (Yes there was sound storm, but that was generations ago now).
I'm not a creative fan-boy, I wish there was more then one 'real' sound card for gamers.
BUT I WOULD RATHER HAVE A CREATIVE SOUND CARD DOING EAX, THEN HAVING SOFTWARE SOUND ONLY.
Be a fanboi, Hate Creative. But this is not good for sound. (and yes there are ways around it, be geez, M$ just KILLED creative).
And yes creative knew about it for a long time. However I don't know if they really saw what happened until way too late.
So you Creative Haters, You won, lets all enjoy crappy on-board sound now!. YAAA, on board is soo cool.
squeezee - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
Basically they've changed the whole audio subsystem completely. As part of this change they have also moved DirectSound3D to a pure software implementation with no way for the hardware to directly interact with it. This is particularly effects games which use Directsound and EAX since the EAX effects are performed in hardware.However other APIs can still take advantage of hardware acceleration, such as OpenAL.
flexy - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
well..giggle..the creative programmers get PAID for writing drivers, right ? :)New APIs/implementations need new drivers, maybe even new HW if the old one is not capable. This is NOT necessarely a BAD thing !
Hulk - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
Because right now that seems like the only reason to consider upgrading. And even then we're going to have to wait for the "64 bitness" to show us some goods.Then again I've resisted every MS OS update and when I've finally updated I always wished I'd done it sooner!
Spoelie - Tuesday, October 3, 2006 - link
Vista comes in both 32 bit and 64 bit flavors, you can choose which one you install.I also resisted switching before, but never really regretted it ;). I'm guessing Vista won't get on here before the first service pack - the gaming performance and mem usage is too horrid at the moment. Or maybe that'll get fixed with better drivers / tweak guides.