Mandelbrot Explorer Benchmark Test

[SoFChef]

I am interested in finding out WHY there is this delta between the two OSs.
I dual boot XP Professional and Vista Ultimate on my laptop.
I ran the benchmark in this Mandelbrot Explorer program:

http://hp.vector.co.jp/authors...26611/index_win_e.html

These are my results:

Vista's Execution time: 71.074 sec.
XP's Execution time: 39.969 sec.


I've had similar results on quad-core boxes.

Vista on my Q6600@2.4GHz: 32 sec.
XP on my friends Q6700@2.9GHz: 8 sec.


I can't understand what makes the difference.
I would like to understand, if someone has a legitimate idea.

BTW, PLEASE! keep your Vista bashing to yourself and on /.

Thanks in advance.

 

[flexy]

25.8 here, thats under Vista64, 4GB and Q6600 at 3537Mhz

 

[flexy]

i THINK i know what the problem is, although your point is a valid one and would deserve deeper investigation:

I think for a pure calculation BM this tool is worthless - the reason is the constant "real time" up-date of the GUI (the slider and the window). For me its a fact that Vista GUI (DWM) is more sluggish than it was under XP, its also far more complex.

To have a valid benchmark using FPU calculation the program should NOT use the GUI/Slider update but focus *solely* on pure FPU calculation.

See...the hardware is the same (as you say)..so it's the update of the Gui/Windows functions which actually slows everthing down. Not really an indication whether it actually "calculates" faster under whatever OS....rather an indication that

a) Vista Windows Manager is sluggish
or
b) Programmer used inefficient/wrong code not optimized for Vista