Is Windows Vista Faster Than XP?

* Basic Windows Vista Performance
How does Windows Vista perform compared to Windows XP? Will applications execute equally quickly, or will they even run slower due to the new features and the AeroGlass interface?
* Windows Vista Performance Enhancements
With SuperFetch and ReadyBoost, Windows Vista introduces two features to make use of today's technology in order to improve the user experience. This means that more application data should be actively cached into all available memory (SuperFetch), whether that is physical RAM or a USB Flash memory device (ReadyBoost). Microsoft's goal was to create balanced performance by removing delays in everyday work.

This article deals with basic application execution under Windows Vista Enterprise, which is representative of the other editions. We put together a high-end test system and performed a comprehensive benchmark session both with Windows XP Professional and with Windows Vista Enterprise to see if there are differences. And indeed, we found that there are some...
Software And Vista

Although the main Windows Vista core has undergone lot of modifications, many of your applications will work with Vista. There is, however, no guarantee. You should definitely try any essential software on Windows before you upgrade.

Process scheduling and thread pooling have been improved in Vista; a deadlock protection mechanism and hardware partitioning for virtualization support were added, together with many more features.

We tried lots of different programs under Windows Vista Enterprise, and came up with a list of software that definitely works.
Games

* Call of Duty 2
* Far Cry
* F.E.A.R.
* Unreal Tournament 2004

Applications

* Adobe Acrobat 8
* Adobe Photoshop CS2
* Autodesk 3DSMax 8.0
* AutoGK 2.4
* Hamachi
* KeePass 1.06
* LAME MP3 Encoder
* MainConcept H.264 Encoder
* Miranda Messager 0.5.1
* Microsoft Office 2003
* Microsoft Office System 2007
* Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.1
* Mozilla Thunderbird 1.5.0.9
* Nokia PC Suite 6.82.22.0
* Ogg Vorbis 1.1.2
* OpenOffice 2.1
* Picasa 2
* Putty
* Skype 2.5.x and 3.0
* SmartFTP 2.0
* Sungard Adaptive Credit Risk Calculation 3.0
* SonyEricsson PC Suite 1.30.82
* SQLyog 5.22
* Symantec AntiVirus 10.2.0.224
* UltraEdit 32 12.10
* WinRAR 3.70
* XviD 1.2.0

Benchmarks

* 3DMark 06
* Cinebench
* PCMark05 Pro
* SiSoft Sandra 2007
* SPECviewperf 9.03



There are some types of software that you should only use if they have been specifically designed for Windows Vista: firewalls, anti-spyware and anti-virus software needs to be Vista-Ready.