Vista Question

Hey all,

I recenty purchased a laptop with vista and was wondering what games I can play. Ive just been looking at the Half Life 2 and Source games and to my dismay are all on XP

I haventy got my laptop yet, but when I do, can I change the OS? Can someone direct me to a thread on how to do this?

Or can Vista run XP games aswell?

Thanks,

 

Vista doesn't have a problem running most XP games, however you will need to run some games as a system administrator and with XP SP2 compatibility settings on because of a quirk in the way Vista manages files.

 

Vista should be able to run Half Life 2. Unfortunately there is no simple answer about everything else because Vista is backwards compatible with some XP games and not others. Here is a link to an article discussing this very subject, starting with the verification that HL2 works: "Will Vista Run Your Games"

 

Vista will run games designed for XP, however because Vista is a new OS it is still lagging behind in the performance department. I wouldn't recommend playing any graphics-intensive games on Vista if you have anything less than a GeForce 7950 or in the computer you bought. Unless of course it has an 8000 series card, in which case you may be okay because Vista seems to like the DX10 cards but not the dx 9 cards.


I have tried running games like half life 2 on vista on the computer in my signature, and It really wasnt a pleasant experience. Way too choppy, and really not very good overall performance.

Anyway, before I turn this into a novel, I would reccomend you wipe the system clean and install XP on the system. If you really like Vista, then Dual boot the two, using XP for games. You will probably want to keep away from Vista for gaming for a while.


~poseign

EDIT: The last time i tried to play games on Vista was a while ago, things may have gotten better for Vista in that time.

 

You don't mention how much v-ram your 8600GT has, but i think you should be fine. Maybe you can't use the highest settings for every game, but overall you have good specs for a decent Vista gaming experience.

You can change the OS to XP if you like, although there might be some problems finding certain drivers, i'm sure people from a Dell Vostro thread can help you further with it. Try here:


http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=2404307

 

Cheers for the links and help guys. HL and HL2/Source are all im aiming to play really, but I might want to play others.

Im very intriuged about the dual OS. I've opened another thread in the Dell forum as to how about doing this, maybe they can help aswell!

Cheers guys!