| Author |
Gaming under Vista: My views. |
Lyedtau
Admiral
Joined: January 18, 2007
Posts: 147
From: Dev land
|  Posted: 2007-03-06 07:43
I’ve been using Vista for the past two weeks, testing games under DX10, and seeing if Vista is ready for gaming. I had to write an article for a website I frequent, for obvious reasons I’ve changed, well, pretty much everything (not just for identity reasons). Thought some of you might be interested.
The system I used was pretty high-end, but I turned all the options up to high where I could, and smacked the resolution way up so I could make use of the PCI-Express card to its fullest.
I’ll start with an argument that’s been plaguing the forums of this site I frequent:
Should you have 1GB or 2GB installed on Vista if you plan to use it for gaming?
People have been posting results on systems, and are obviously not well versed in computing. This is obvious when they open the task manager directly after booting into Vista, and stating it uses 600MB of memory without knowing how anything works. Most non-tech savvy people would take one look at this, and not see anything. In XP, the boot footprint is about 300MB, meaning on a 1GB system, you’ll have 700MB of memory to play with directly off the block. This means you can instantly go into any game you want, with hardly any loading, as long as it uses less than 700MB (which many, many games use nowadays (Oblivion, F.E.A.R, Supreme Commander – to name a few)).
So, if Vista’s using 600MB of memory on boot, that means you have roughly half as much of the memory to play with as XP. A lot of people who think they know a lot about computers take this as if it’s blasphemy against Bill Gates himself, when in actual fact, it’s just Vista being extremely clever. Vista uses a technology using SuperFetch. This “appears” to pre-load all your most used programs directly into memory the moment you start Vista. When in actual fact, it assigns memory for the most used programs, without actually loading them. So, if you want to load up Steam, it’ll load up instantly, because it’s been assigned memory, and Vista knows it’s got enough space to load it without swapping anything to the hard drive. So Vista isn’t really using 600MB of memory, but it does use a large amount of memory for the key executables (footprint).
So, do you need 2GB of memory to run Vista, and game? No (although I prefer it).
Next up, how does the beasty handle?
What I saw on my tests was very surprising. I thought that XP would draw a very clear line over Vista, and beat it in all tests. Not just because it uses less memory (see above), but because of the driver support.
System:
AMD FX-60
Sapphire X1900 XTX
1GB OCZ PC3200
Creative X-Fi
There were 4 games I tested, but I’ll only be displaying 2 here:
Supreme Commander
Half Life 2: Lost Coast
First up, SupCom. For those of you not in the know, this is the successor to Total Annihilation, which was published ten years ago, and was one of the best selling RTS games of all time (even today, it sells copies daily). You typically have 64000 square kilometre (scaled) maps, with thousands of units and buildings on screen. This is one of the few games that makes use of the bandwidth available to PCI-Express graphics cards, and is a real toughie to run at maximum resolution, and settings, with dual monitors.
I won’t bother inserting any nice graphs or anything, and I’ll just post the hard evidence.
(FPS refers to the term Frames Per Second, and is basically an industry measuring tool to measure how fast games run)
XP:
MinFPS: 16
AvgFPS: 27
MaxFPS: 34
Vista:
MinFPS: 15
AvgFPS: 31
MaxFPS: 36
This is not so surprising, to be quite honest, as SupCom was designed to be one of the first games 100% compatible with Vista. Although Vista has a lower minimum FPS, it ran consistently smoother throughout, whereas XP didn’t. One thing I will say is that it took XP longer to reach the minimum fps, because Vista had less memory to play with, although when this did happen, Vista managed to pull the FPS back up within seconds.
Second up, HL2: LC. This is a free tech demo available on Steam for those of you who have purchased HL2. It was a tech demo demonstrating Valve’s implementation of HDR (the process of making light appear realistic in games by making an area appear lighter or darker depending on the amount of light available to the player’s in-game eyes), which was widely accepted as awesome. LC also had textures 4x the size of the normal games textures, meaning everything is insanely high-detailed, and is the benchmark for the continual development of Valve’s Source engine.
XP:
MinFPS: 43
AvgFPS: 70
MaxFPS: 94
Vista:
MinFPS: 32
AvgFPS: 51
MaxFPS: 92
At the time of writing this, I had actually completely forgotten that ATI hadn’t implemented HDR support in their drivers 100% for Vista yet. Under XP, trying to use HDR, without HDR support, will force the game to crash to desktop (all Nvidia cards currently experience this with anti-ailising on, as they have no HDR support with AA (bar the 8x range)). I tried again without HDR (didn’t run a rolling demo though to see the stats), and it was a lot smoother than XP without HDR. Under XP I experience periodic pauses, probably some disk swapping. However, under Vista I experienced none of this, and it felt a lot smoother than when playing it on XP.
So, is Vista a viable gaming platform? Yes. However, it’s far from completely stable just yet, and Microsoft are doing a good job of patching the small bugs (there are no gaping security holes just yet (good thing!)). You will need a minimum of 1GB of memory AT LEAST if you plan to game in Vista, and I recommend 1.5GB of 2GB of high speed memory if you plan to game at high resolutions.
Another thing I’ll mention is the fact that Nvidia are currently not doing so well in Vista with their driver support. If you have an ATI X1x card, 1GB or more of memory and are thinking of upgrading to Vista, there’s no reason you shouldn’t.
Also, I have every service I don't use in XP stopped or disabled, meaning the boot footprint is significantly lower on my machine. I haven't tinkered with Vista yet, so this is without optimisation.
Best thing is, DarkSpace works faster under Vista too!
[ This Message was edited by: Lyedtau on 2007-03-06 10:24 ]
_________________
 rn
Made by Doran
|
Mersenne Twister
Fleet Admiral
Joined: May 11, 2003
Posts: 1161
From: Sector C Test Labs and Contol Facilities
| Posted: 2007-03-06 09:22
one of these days publishers will start putting out linux versions of [latest game with omgasm graphics]. probably not mac versions though... last game i ever played on a mac was either warcraft2 or myst..
_________________
I wouldn't screw with it if I were you. The doctor already holds you in poor favor. Messing with this might really fry his shorts.
|
Leonide
Grand Admiral
Templar Knights
Joined: October 01, 2005
Posts: 1553
From: Newport News, Virginia
| Posted: 2007-03-06 10:03
now i guess i should just wait for Nvidia to publish Vista drivers.
_________________
captain of the ICC Assault Cruiser C.S.S. Sledgehammer
|
Lyedtau
Admiral
Joined: January 18, 2007
Posts: 147
From: Dev land
| Posted: 2007-03-06 10:24
Quote:
|
On 2007-03-06 09:22, Mersenne Twister wrote:
one of these days publishers will start putting out linux versions of [latest game with omgasm graphics]. probably not mac versions though... last game i ever played on a mac was either warcraft2 or myst..
|
|
Mac's run on a modifed Linux OS. Not to mention that because they decided to use Intel processors, they can now dual-boot XP.
_________________
rn
Made by Doran
|
Scotty
Grand Admiral
Joined: May 26, 2004
Posts: 813
| Posted: 2007-03-06 10:27
There are numerous other issues with Vista.
Part of the reason is that MS released a Beta version to the industry long before they released. This is done so the industry can develop their software to run und the new OS. Unfortunatley, Vista went retail and MS didnt let the industry know about the changes they made. The result is that a lot of things will not run on Vista at the present time.
I have to deal with this daily as I install WLANs here for the Telecom. This is not a problem really, as setting it up it is just about the same as in XP. The issues start when trying to run other programs used for setting up telephone systems or the mail client even. They plain dont run on Vista.
My personal advice is to wait a few months or if you want to buy a new system, try and get wone with XP and upgrade rights in the future.
Just my 2 cents.
Scotty
_________________
|
Lyedtau
Admiral
Joined: January 18, 2007
Posts: 147
From: Dev land
| Posted: 2007-03-06 11:38
Quote:
|
On 2007-03-06 10:27, Scotty wrote:
There are numerous other issues with Vista.
Part of the reason is that MS released a Beta version to the industry long before they released. This is done so the industry can develop their software to run und the new OS. Unfortunatley, Vista went retail and MS didnt let the industry know about the changes they made. The result is that a lot of things will not run on Vista at the present time.
I have to deal with this daily as I install WLANs here for the Telecom. This is not a problem really, as setting it up it is just about the same as in XP. The issues start when trying to run other programs used for setting up telephone systems or the mail client even. They plain dont run on Vista.
My personal advice is to wait a few months or if you want to buy a new system, try and get wone with XP and upgrade rights in the future.
Just my 2 cents.
Scotty
|
|
Yeah, I heard quite a few people were annoyed at that. Vista certainly had a smooth launch though, and it's far more stable than XP was at release.
_________________
rn
Made by Doran
|
.MeLLyMoo.
Cadet
Joined: July 03, 2005
Posts: 90
From: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
| Posted: 2007-03-06 13:40
Quote:
|
On 2007-03-06 10:27, Scotty wrote:
There are numerous other issues with Vista.
Part of the reason is that MS released a Beta version to the industry long before they released. This is done so the industry can develop their software to run und the new OS. Unfortunatley, Vista went retail and MS didnt let the industry know about the changes they made. The result is that a lot of things will not run on Vista at the present time.
I have to deal with this daily as I install WLANs here for the Telecom. This is not a problem really, as setting it up it is just about the same as in XP. The issues start when trying to run other programs used for setting up telephone systems or the mail client even. They plain dont run on Vista.
My personal advice is to wait a few months or if you want to buy a new system, try and get wone with XP and upgrade rights in the future.
Just my 2 cents.
Scotty
|
|
OMG!! SCOTTY! I <33 YOU!!!
/Chucks flowers and clothes at you while waving around a massive banner
_________________
|
Coeus
Grand Admiral
Sundered Weimeriners
Joined: March 22, 2006
Posts: 2815
From: Philly
| Posted: 2007-03-06 16:12
*pokes melly with a partially eaten cheese wheel*
_________________
Do I really look like a guy with a plan?
'I'm gonna go crazy, and I'm taking you with me!'
ICC Security Council Chief Enforcer
|
doda *EP5 no longer exception...*
Grand Admiral
Joined: December 11, 2005
Posts: 1012
From: happy land
| Posted: 2007-03-07 00:46
Quote:
| Yeah, I heard quite a few people were annoyed at that. Vista certainly had a smooth launch though, and it's far more stable than XP was at release. |
|
Thats why you buy stuff a while after release  . Let others get frustrated with the bugs so you can enjoy a smove running system.
_________________
Please resize your Admin - signature
VCA since June 5th 06
|
.MeLLyMoo.
Cadet
Joined: July 03, 2005
Posts: 90
From: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
| Posted: 2007-03-07 13:45
Quote:
|
On 2007-03-06 16:12, Coeus - Got LG? wrote:
*pokes melly with a partially eaten cheese wheel*
|
|
Owww that tickles!
_________________
|
ScottyderEchte
Fleet Admiral
Pitch Black
Joined: February 15, 2002
Posts: 657
From: Nuernberg, Germany
| Posted: 2007-03-08 14:16
/me tickels Melly till she faints
_________________
|
Reeves-81
Grand Admiral
Pitch Black
Joined: January 24, 2006
Posts: 141
From: Canada
| Posted: 2007-03-08 16:33
"I’ve been using Vista for the past two weeks, testing games under DX10"
x1950xtx or whatever it was you said doesn't support DX10 , theres only 1 card on the market that handles dx10 right now
"gfx8800".
Ive been using vista for about 6 months now "various betas and Vista Ultimate retail now" Its pretty..... so long as you turn off the DEP that thing drives me nuts.
You can obviously still use it with dx9 cards but you won't recive all of the benefits of dx10 mate. 
On something else completely how much have you been able to oc that FX-60 core, I have an AM2 socket and wanted to drop an FX-62 into it but Im not sure, My last cpu was a Athlon 3800+ AM2 But I oc'ed it up to 2.8GHz "appx 4350+ qs" .
_________________
Smacktacular, \"with my legs in a case\"
\"Peace is that brief glorious moment in history when everybody stands around reloading.\"
--Thomas Jefferson
|
Reeves-81
Grand Admiral
Pitch Black
Joined: January 24, 2006
Posts: 141
From: Canada
| Posted: 2007-03-08 16:42
Quote:
|
On 2007-03-06 10:27, Scotty wrote:
There are numerous other issues with Vista.
Part of the reason is that MS released a Beta version to the industry long before they released. This is done so the industry can develop their software to run und the new OS. Unfortunatley, Vista went retail and MS didnt let the industry know about the changes they made. The result is that a lot of things will not run on Vista at the present time.
I have to deal with this daily as I install WLANs here for the Telecom. This is not a problem really, as setting it up it is just about the same as in XP. The issues start when trying to run other programs used for setting up telephone systems or the mail client even. They plain dont run on Vista.
My personal advice is to wait a few months or if you want to buy a new system, try and get wone with XP and upgrade rights in the future.
Just my 2 cents.
Scotty
|
|
well put, thats what ive been telling people, I have vista ultimate x64, but I dont use it I'm still using my XP MCE 2005. due to incompatibilities with my favorite software, even this game had issues connecting to the chat server using vista. but once in game it was ok.
_________________
Smacktacular, \"with my legs in a case\"
\"Peace is that brief glorious moment in history when everybody stands around reloading.\"
--Thomas Jefferson
|
Lyedtau
Admiral
Joined: January 18, 2007
Posts: 147
From: Dev land
| Posted: 2007-03-08 18:59
Quote:
|
On 2007-03-08 16:33, Hunter-S-T™<1RA> wrote:
"I’ve been using Vista for the past two weeks, testing games under DX10"
x1950xtx or whatever it was you said doesn't support DX10 , theres only 1 card on the market that handles dx10 right now
"gfx8800".
|
|
It still uses DX10, although it emulates DX9 using a "Light" emulation layer (DX9L).
For instance.
Game A, needs DX9 to run. Vista loads DX10, and it's DX9L emulation layed to handle all the DX9 calls to the card.
Game B, needs DX10 to run some effects. Vista loads DX10, and loads DX9L emulaton because that's all your card supports. It translates the DX10 calls into DX9L, then calls the card. Some effects can't be "translated", and this is why some DX9 games won't display effects on older cards (because they can't translate effects to older DX versions).
Like I said, DX10 has an embeded DX9L emulation layer, and is supposed to be more optimised than XP's DX9.
Quote:
|
Ive been using vista for about 6 months now "various betas and Vista Ultimate retail now" Its pretty..... so long as you turn off the DEP that thing drives me nuts.
You can obviously still use it with dx9 cards but you won't recive all of the benefits of dx10 mate.
On something else completely how much have you been able to oc that FX-60 core, I have an AM2 socket and wanted to drop an FX-62 into it but Im not sure, My last cpu was a Athlon 3800+ AM2 But I oc'ed it up to 2.8GHz "appx 4350+ qs" .
|
|
I don't overclock it. I don't need too, everygame I run runs at well over 100 fps, and all software I use loads up instantly. What's the point in overclocking it when I don't need too?
I've also been using Vista on and off since beta 1, but I've been using the retail version for the past two weeks.
DEP is one pain in the rear though.
[ This Message was edited by: Lyedtau on 2007-03-08 18:59 ]
_________________
rn
Made by Doran
|
Sir Night Runner
Fleet Admiral
Sanity Assassins
Joined: June 22, 2005
Posts: 87
| Posted: 2007-03-09 09:40
Poo on Vista. Poo all over it. Eat magnets, then poo in a computer with vista.
Shmista Vista Bullshista whatever.
_________________
|
English
Deutsch
Nederlands
)
