March 3rd, 2008
Vista SP1 - Benchmarking round-up
Given that I’ve made numerous posts relating to benchmarking Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) on this blog over the past few weeks I thought that many readers would appreciate a single post that pulled together all the individual posts and which drew together the thoughts, findings and conclusions from the individual posts.
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Vista SP1 Performance
I first got my hands on the Vista SP1 bits back on the 7th of February (install gallery here). I received from Microsoft two discs, one containing the Vista SP1 upgrade pack for Vista 32-bit and Vista 64-bit, and a disc containing an updated Vista installation image which included SP1 (32-bit only).
I started off by installing SP1 onto one of my test systems, and very soon felt that SP1 was indeed a worthwhile install.
Here’s what I had to say on Day 1:
“I’m not ready to publish any benchmark test results yet, but on first blush SP1 feels snappier than Vista RTM. Manipulating files certainly feels a lot better and many of those awful (and workflow disrupting) lags are gone.”
That same day I carried out some preliminary benchmarking, comparing Vista RTM to Vista SP1. These test showed that Vista SP1 did, as Microsoft promised it would, improve file copy performance, as well as improving the way that Vista handled compressed files. However, synthetic benchmark results (using PassMark PerformanceTest 6.1 and PCMark Vantage) showed a drop in performance.
By the 8th of February I’d carried out a number of system upgrades, including that of my main workstation, which was the first 64-bit SP1 upgrade I’d carried out. I still didn’t have any robust benchmark results but I did post my thoughts so far:
- Overall, the system feels quicker. There’s a snappy feeling to carrying out tasks (although this system was no slouch under Vista RTM!).
- Navigating network shares is a lot faster.
- Remote Desktop Connection is a lot better - I can connect to remote machines faster and the experience is noticeably better.
- There has been no change to the Windows Experience Index scale - 5.9 is still the top ceiling of the scale.
- Recovering from sleep is faster and the system is up and ready to use quicker.
By the 14th of February I’d completed an in-depth file-copy/compress/decompress/network transfer benchmark comparing Vista RTM with Vista SP1. These benchmark results showed impressive performance gains for SP1 over a Vista install which didn’t have SP1 installed.
“Credit where it’s due, Microsoft does seem to have eliminated a considerable number of Vista bottlenecks in SP1. Two words sum up how I feel - I’m impressed.”
Adrian is a technology journalist and author who has devoted over a decade to helping users get the most from technology. He also runs a popular blog called The PC Doctor. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations
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