How much better is XP over Vista for gaming?

I am currently using Vista Home Premium on my main notebook (Dell XPS M1710) and I am wondering if I should wipe the HD and install XP Pro instead to improve gaming performance. I mainly play:

Command and Conquer 3
World of Warcraft
Far Cry

I am also looking foreword to Crysis and Far Cry 2 when they come out.

Would I experience a major increase in frame rates/quality by going back to XP or should I just stick it out with Vista?

 

You probably wouldn't see a major increase, no, though you would see some increase. I don't think it's probably worth a clean install, unless there are other things about Vista you don't like.

 

I would just keep using Vista imo since the 7950GTX is a very powerful card and it should have no problems running games in Vista. If you install XP and you'll probably get around 5-10% performance increase (ie. not much fps increase) but why waste money and time when you only get so little in return?

 

Not much, you might have 70FPS XP while 60 on Vista, no big deal

And with the time, Vista gets less perf decreasements, FC2 and Crysis will work as good on vista...

 

Pretty much every article I've seen comparing the two OSes for gaming show a less than 10% difference, which is entirely undetectable without benchmarking. Just stick with whichever OS you prefer in general.

I remember several years back when XP was relatively new, seeing people who would adamantly stick to Windows 98 because benchmarks would show that to be slightly faster. Same thing's happening now, and just as before the differences are fairly small.

 

what everybody else said.

 

You get Vista pretty much to play the Vista only games like Halo 2. Stardock Suite makes my Windows XP look a lot whole better than my Vista Ultimate.

 

***Will someone who uses Vista and has my same specs plz provide a comparison for the OP?***

Source Video Stress Test I did with settings shown (16x Aniso!):
http://img222.imageshack.us/img222/3508/16344tv1.jpg
T7300, 2GB, 8600M GT, XP Pro SP2, 163.44's.

 

YES... ppl have to stop thinking VIsta is a hellspawn of an OS. If you have 2gb and a newer Gfx card, 8600/7950 your FINE. can we stop thinking vista will KILL your gaming career. it wont. however, if your buying a system with 1gb RAM and like an 8400, and CPU less than the T73... you may see a bigger difference, altho i doubt you'd buy that anyway as a gamer. im a gamer whose been playing on XP pro. i consciously bought my lappy with Vista ult. and am not regretting it one bit.

 

^^ my sentiments exactly

 

lol, well put

 

You guys have eased my mind as far as this is concerned. Getting closer to pulling the trigger on a 900C purchase every day.

Thanks

 

Thanks for all the help. My laptop came preloaded with Vista but I still have my old XP Pro full install laying around and I was not sure if it was worth the hassle to start over. To be honest, I really like the new GUI in Vista and the fact that although it still locks up in the same places as XP, the result has not once been a full system lockup.

Thanks again. I think I'll stick with Vista.

 

lol everyone says vista, yet there are 12 XP votes

 

haha, you can actually see who voted what if you click into the number of votes on top... For some reason people who voted for XP never posted...

 

That's no big deal those 10fps looking at it that way but f.e. 30fps XP and 20fps vista then those 10fps are a very big deal.

I use XP for gaming, i havent tested games when looking at gaming performance but overal performance is much better. XP works faster then Vista. From booting till opening windows, XP is superiour. I still have fista on a bootpartition though, for DX10 games and my GPU installed with a newer driver for playing those games and using HDMI.

Every time i boot to Vista instead of XP it's like taking 3 times more. bah vista.

 

If your hardware meets Vista Premium requirements, I vote save yourself the bother.

Surely newer games are going to be optimised for Vista, XP Game compatability will only get worse.

 

I actually found that I had more FPS in the Valve Stress Test in Vista than in XP. Of course, I was using way newer drivers. The only reason I switched back is because of all the BSODs (I had about 6 a day) and the fact that the graphics card would suck down the power because it would be in 3D mode in the desktop.

 

If you like vista then definitely stick with it.

 

I ran my laptop with XP for the first year I had it, switched to Vista Home Premium about 2 months ago and after working out some driver issues and doing a bit of minor tweaking, I can't tell a bit of difference in my gaming performance over XP. It runs my games at least as well, and while my machine is no slouch, it's not a powerhouse either.

I mostly play Medieval 2 and some SWAT. Medieval 2 is pretty demanding on higher settings, at least on my machine, and even there I don't notice a difference. After a week or so of getting used to using it, I love Vista and won't ever go back to XP.

-Wintery

 

i would also think that worse game performance on vista is only limited to older games.

 

the difference is minimal. its not as big as 70fps in xp and 60fps in vista. its 1-2fps max, if that anymore.

 

That depends on the game, and your setup, and whether you tweak Vista or not. Going from a decent XP gaming machine (x1600, CD 2GHZ, 1GB RAM) and simply installing Vista can easily bring you down 10 fps or more. That being said, with the proper setup and tweaking, Vista will certainly perform nearly as well (if not as well as) XP for most games.

 

What do you mean by this? Most up to date drivers or is there more tweaking to be done to Vista?

 

Things like turning off superfetch can help alot.

 

I think that is true for the most part. For instance, running NWN is dog slow on vista. I had a Sony SZ450NC with vista and it crawled with NWN. Changed to XP and it runs very well. The sony also only has a 7400 go which got along with XP better than vista even with the fancy effects turned off. On a more powerful graphics card, 7900 or 8600 with newer games (last year or so) I'd predict no significant difference. Hard to say on the older mid range (7600, x1600) cards.

 

actually, and im not 100% on this, so dont like destroy me, but if you keep playing the game you like a lot, it actually helps to leave it on. I have noticed Superfetch at work actually. Wen i first started up my system, it was a lil sluggish, but things that i use often, got MUCH faster. IE, windows media, my antivirus, CS:S!!, and even windows dreamscene all load quicker and seem to put less stress on the system. I "!!"'ed CS:S cuz it loads much quicker, and i believe it has to do with superfetch knowing its gonna open the game eventually. Read up on wat it does, its not bad. So at first, it may eat up sys. mem, but its cuz its using that memory for something it knows u didnt open, but u will....

also, yea, i stated this before, but it came up in the 2 pages in between, yes, Vista will have a bigger effect on less advanced systems. THis is mostly cuz Vista caters to the new technology and wats coming out in the future.

 

XP > Vista by far. Games in Vista STILL run horribly on my go 7900 gs. Only solution is to go back to XP where my games run top notch. I've had it up to here with vista, it's a hopeless cause since no one can help me with my issue.

 

what have you done to try fix it? because you are certinally in the minority.

the latest drivers fixed it with me.

 

I've seen benchmarks comparing gaming on XP, Vista, and linux under WINE and vista performed the worst. Right now the driver support isn't there and theres not much you can do about it.

 

by FARR? im curious to know by how much, maybe some benches? yea, there have been many new drivers to come out. And like i said... the 7900gs is new... but vista will have a less of effect the newer it gets, such as cards 7950/8600 and better. In fact, by christmas time, im betting games will end up running BETTER on vista, due to DX10 written games, on newer cards.

 

@band aid - thats was a couple of months ago. i can assure you i am getting a fps hit of maybe 3 - 4, thats it.

 

so even though vista was using 1GB of my memory w/no apps running and xp uses about 300MB the gaming performance should be the same.

 

I seriously doubt your OS was using 1GB of memory with no other applications running. If that's the case, then you have something wrong with your computer, possibly a virus.

 

yes, vista manages your memory much better than xp. what is the point of having 2gb and only using 10% of it.

vista will allocate the memory to the applications that need it, so when you fire up that game, it will receive the most memory.