Vista's slowness cost users $81 bilion

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: BubbaBooBoo
Well, my IQ may not be 138, more like 38, but ive been using memory moniters since Win98se. Ive always found exactly the same thing. Reboot cleans everthing up nice and the PC (execpt my current one) runs faster. Even timed it on sereval ocasions. Noticable diference.

You are not understand how Vista works. Quite simply put, it will take your free RAM(that your currently running programs aren't using) and load data into it in order to speed up access time if/when you do access that data since reading from RAM is a LOT faster then reading from your HDD. When a program requests more RAM from the OS the OS will delete some of that cached data to provide space for the running application.

Ideally you want your OS to be utilizing all available RAM otherwise what's the point of having it?

 

[lxskllr]

Originally posted by: Crusty

You are not understand how Vista works. Quite simply put, it will take your free RAM(that your currently running programs aren't using) and load data into it in order to speed up access time if/when you do access that data since reading from RAM is a LOT faster then reading from your HDD. When a program requests more RAM from the OS the OS will delete some of that cached data to provide space for the running application.

Ideally you want your OS to be utilizing all available RAM otherwise what's the point of having it?

I currently have 33mb free of 8gb. Should I dump my ram? :^D

 

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: lxskllr

Originally posted by: Crusty

You are not understand how Vista works. Quite simply put, it will take your free RAM(that your currently running programs aren't using) and load data into it in order to speed up access time if/when you do access that data since reading from RAM is a LOT faster then reading from your HDD. When a program requests more RAM from the OS the OS will delete some of that cached data to provide space for the running application.

Ideally you want your OS to be utilizing all available RAM otherwise what's the point of having it?

I currently have 33mb free of 8gb. Should I dump my ram? :^D

I'm in the same boat as you, I only go over 50% utilization when I'm gaming on my rig with 8GB but Vista always shows <100mb 'free'

 

[Nothinman]

Well, my IQ may not be 138, more like 38, but ive been using memory moniters since Win98se. Ive always found exactly the same thing. Reboot cleans everthing up nice and the PC (execpt my current one) runs faster. Even timed it on sereval ocasions. Noticable diference.

Win98 was a completely different beast and did indeed have to be restarted periodically but anything based on NT has never had that problem. There are a lot of variables to virtual memory management and it's not something that can ever be 100% correct for everyone's workload, sadly MS doesn't give you any knobs to tune it if it's not right for you.

I bet that if you look at taskmgr before you reboot next time you'll see that Cached memory is where most of it is allocated which is essentially free. As soon as a process requests memory cached memory will be given up and handed to it with no delay. Keeping the appropriate data in memory is something that SuperFetch is supposed to help with by preloading things that you regularly use.

 

[jtvang125]

Just another stupid reason to blame lost productivity on something when you should be blaming the employees. Like how employees taking 15 minutes at the water cooler or getting coffee multiple times a day. How about all the employees updating their myspace page and replying to their personal emails. The time productivity lost on boot times with Vista is just a fraction of the time being wasted by employees doing all these other things.

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: BubbaBooBoo

Originally posted by: bsobel

For a good laugh go to the second part of the article where he defends his math.

Im no math whiz but where is the math wrong? Looks rite to me, but maybe im missing something.

I can re-write the math and make it 200 billion or 20 million. How can you compare my numbers vs his?

 

[BubbaBooBoo]

Originally posted by: Crusty
Quite simply put, it will take your free RAM(that your currently running programs aren't using) and load data into it in order to speed up access time if/when you do access that data since reading from RAM is a LOT faster then reading from your HDD. When a program requests more RAM from the OS the OS will delete some of that cached data to provide space for the running application.

I know thats the way its suposed to work but ive yet to find it working that way on any system ive had, 98se, XP home, XP pro, Vista 32 and 64. Ive done that test many tiems. Ill launhc photoshop CS4, MS Office, and OpenOffice. Now shut down. Now launch again. Now shut down. By now the RAM utilesation will be 50%. On my C2Q and down by now the Pc woudl start slowing down noticabely.

Originally posted by: Nothinman
I bet that if you look at taskmgr before you reboot next time you'll see that Cached memory is where most of it is allocated which is essentially free. As soon as a process requests memory cached memory will be given up and handed to it with no delay. Keeping the appropriate data in memory is something that SuperFetch is supposed to help with by preloading things that you regularly use.

Nope. cashed memory on my old C2Q never usualy went above 1 GB out of 3 GB. The point remains that the computer did slow down a lot once there was litle free memory left as shown on the RAM utelities.

Originally posted by: bsobel
I can re-write the math and make it 200 billion or 20 million. How can you compare my numbers vs his?

Maybe because his numbres make sense and hes shown it step by step to why hes arrived at them all. What numbers are you using?

 

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: BubbaBooBoo

Originally posted by: Crusty
Quite simply put, it will take your free RAM(that your currently running programs aren't using) and load data into it in order to speed up access time if/when you do access that data since reading from RAM is a LOT faster then reading from your HDD. When a program requests more RAM from the OS the OS will delete some of that cached data to provide space for the running application.

I know thats the way its suposed to work but ive yet to find it working that way on any system ive had, 98se, XP home, XP pro, Vista 32 and 64. Ive done that test many tiems. Ill launhc photoshop CS4, MS Office, and OpenOffice. Now shut down. Now launch again. Now shut down. By now the RAM utilesation will be 50%. On my C2Q and down by now the Pc woudl start slowing down noticabely.

Originally posted by: Nothinman
I bet that if you look at taskmgr before you reboot next time you'll see that Cached memory is where most of it is allocated which is essentially free. As soon as a process requests memory cached memory will be given up and handed to it with no delay. Keeping the appropriate data in memory is something that SuperFetch is supposed to help with by preloading things that you regularly use.

Nope. cashed memory on my old C2Q never usualy went above 1 GB out of 3 GB. The point remains that the computer did slow down a lot once there was litle free memory left as shown on the RAM utelities.

Originally posted by: bsobel
I can re-write the math and make it 200 billion or 20 million. How can you compare my numbers vs his?

Maybe because his numbres make sense and hes shown it step by step to why hes arrived at them all. What numbers are you using?

Once again, you don't understand what's going on. This is a NEW feature in Vista called superfetch. Windows actively monitors what applications and when you run them on your computer and will preload application data into memory for when you do want to use said programs.

If I reboot my computer to my desktop and let it sit, eventually Windows will load up data into all 8GB of my ram and my computer still runs at 100% speed.

 

[bsobel]

Maybe because his numbres make sense and hes shown it step by step to why hes arrived at them all. What numbers are you using?

The make sense do they? Hmm, lets start with the 480 million copies of Vista he claims. A year ago the MS number was 140 million. They did not sell 340 million copies last year.

Lets then take the install claim. The VAST majority of Vista users got their copy with a new system, they did not run install.

Lets take install. The average Vista install does not take 4 hours to complete.

Oh yea, remember he claimed it took 15-30 minutes to BOOT a Vista machine?

You really believe his number are valid and he's not a complete nutjob?

 

[bsobel]

If I reboot my computer to my desktop and let it sit, eventually Windows will load up data into all 8GB of my ram and my computer still runs at 100% speed.

Which of course means your system is actually slower right after a reboot, not faster.

 

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: bsobel

If I reboot my computer to my desktop and let it sit, eventually Windows will load up data into all 8GB of my ram and my computer still runs at 100% speed.

Which of course means your system is actually slower right after a reboot, not faster.

Right, and as I start to use programs the disk I/O from superfetch slows down. I can attest that it definitely doesn't run 100% when superfetch is loading the data, I would put it somewhere at 85-90% by feel.

Not like it really matters considering I only reboot once or twice a month, and that usually happens overnight after updates are done so by the time I'm awake superfetch has already loaded everything it needs anyways.

 

[Cogman]

Originally posted by: BubbaBooBoo

Originally posted by: bsobel

For a good laugh go to the second part of the article where he defends his math.

Im no math whiz but where is the math wrong? Looks rite to me, but maybe im missing something.

Originally posted by: postmortemIA
People learned to not use Vista.

I was working on my buddy's PC over the weekend, he reinstalled Vista this week and it takes about 3 minutes to shutdown. He has a typical laptop with 5400rpm drive.

Looks like it works well on my PC only because I have two raptors in a RAID

Ya, Vista is grate if you have a lot of horsepower. I can tell the diff between my old C2Q and now with my i7 hugetime. I know lots of guys who run it on weak computers and just hate it.

Originally posted by: Nothinman

Then either your memory utility is wrong or you're reading it's output incorrectly.

All CPU Meter V 1.0 By Addgadget.com. And I know Im no Einstine but you figure you should gimme some credit for reading a bar chart. That RAM utalizetion goes up and up and up with every app I launch and even if ive shut down every app it stays high until reboot.

How about you count the number of times he says "Now, lets assume" That alone should be setting off red flags like crazy. Not to mention the fact that from several sources he gets around 60-70 seconds for boot up, and yet he settles on 180 (Double the time) because some dude said that vista took im 3000 seconds to boot up.

Then, how about the fact that he takes the number of computer connected to the internet, ASSUMES that they are ALL vista, and then assumes that there are many more vista machines not connected to the internet....

On top of all that, he pulls the $7.50 from nowhere. Think of it this way, he is claiming that because vista takes 2 mins to boot up, it costs 81billion dollars globally (and he doesn't even mention how he converts those 2 mins into daily bootup times). Heck, If we say that on average everyone is late to work by 2 mins, what does that say about the loss of profits globally due to the fact that people are late to work?

And now lets not forget the all important fact. How much time does it take a NON vista machine to boot up? Guess what, in almost every case it isn't going to be faster then the vista boot-up times. XP boots slower then vista in many cases.

As for the ram utilization, you're right, you are no Einstein. Go read up about Superfetch before you complain that your operating system isn't loading every program from the hard disk. (Oh noes, my ram isn't sitting around empty and worthless!!!)

 

[TheStu]

I have noticed that Vista takes longer to shut down than say 7 or XP do, BUT... boot times are about the same, maybe a little longer.

This would matter to me here at work since I have to restart the laptop I work with generally 1 to 3 times a day. But, that is the fault of the really horrendous AT&T 3G PCMCIA card and Cisco VPN that I have to connect with to actually do my job (its all web based). Every now and again, the AT&T Connect software forgets that the 3G card is there and the only cure is a hard boot.

With regards to Vista RAM utilization, I almost wish that they had done a PR thing similar to what SP1 did with 32 bit users (32bit Vista can only use 3.5GB or whatever, but if you have 8GB physical then it will actually say that you have 8 GB instead of 3.5GB) So, in that same vein, don't show that 90% of the RAM is being 'used' but instead the actual.. 30% or whatever, then if you go deeper you will see that 50% is being used by things like SuperFetch.

All I can say is that Vista was snappy enough on my Athlon64 with 1.5GB RAM, and since building my newer system (sig) I have really only been using 7 for my Windows-ing.

 

[BubbaBooBoo]

Originally posted by: bsobel
The make sense do they? Hmm, lets start with the 480 million copies of Vista he claims. A year ago the MS number was 140 million. They did not sell 340 million copies last year.

Lets then take the install claim. The VAST majority of Vista users got their copy with a new system, they did not run install.

Lets take install. The average Vista install does not take 4 hours to complete.

Oh yea, remember he claimed it took 15-30 minutes to BOOT a Vista machine?

Compeltely wrong. He backed up his figres with Marketshare and other linkd data. He said that hes alowing for four hours to instal Vista plus all his other software and thats fast if he can do it in that time. It was the lawyer who said 15-30 minutes.

Originally posted by: Cogman
Then, how about the fact that he takes the number of computer connected to the internet, ASSUMES that they are ALL vista, and then assumes that there are many more vista machines not connected to the internet....

On top of all that, he pulls the $7.50 from nowhere. Think of it this way, he is claiming that because vista takes 2 mins to boot up, it costs 81billion dollars globally (and he doesn't even mention how he converts those 2 mins into daily bootup times).

Completely wrong too, Einstine. That asumption that they are all Vista is not in the article. And the daily bootup times alow for a singel startup a day. Thats what I do to my PC. The $7.50/hour is a reasonble assumtpion too considering the worlds salaires.

Do you people just read what you want to read into an articel or actualy pay atention?

 

[bsobel]

Completely wrong too, Einstine

Well the simple fact that you resorted to name calling pretty much somes up the fact that you are a troll. You can't even accept the first number as wrong (number of Vista installs which he based on WORLDWIDE INTERNET USERS [which btw, includes cell phone users with internet access]). Second, how many of those people actually installed Vista vs getting it already installed?

Bill

 

[Cogman]

Originally posted by: BubbaBooBoo

Originally posted by: Cogman
Then, how about the fact that he takes the number of computer connected to the internet, ASSUMES that they are ALL vista, and then assumes that there are many more vista machines not connected to the internet....

On top of all that, he pulls the $7.50 from nowhere. Think of it this way, he is claiming that because vista takes 2 mins to boot up, it costs 81billion dollars globally (and he doesn't even mention how he converts those 2 mins into daily bootup times).

Completely wrong too, Einstine. That asumption that they are all Vista is not in the article. And the daily bootup times alow for a singel startup a day. Thats what I do to my PC. The $7.50/hour is a reasonble assumtpion too considering the worlds salaires.

Do you people just read what you want to read into an articel or actualy pay atention?

Woops, you are right. The assumption was that because Vista has 29% of the market share, that must be the percentage of vista machines on the internet (and as bsobel points out, that's completely wrong as there are many types of machines besides i386 based architectures)

However, the rest of my arguments are sound. There is a substantial amount of "Hey, this sounds like a good number." arguments. The whole fact that he put so much weight on a machine that he even says is not common place (3000 seconds to boot, seriously?) really casts a whole lot of doubt. He was looking for a big number.

The argument that I still like the best, though, is what OS doesn't take over a minute to boot? You can't claim a loss of money from a product if every other product is causing the same loss.

 

[TheStu]

Originally posted by: Cogman

Originally posted by: BubbaBooBoo

Originally posted by: Cogman
Then, how about the fact that he takes the number of computer connected to the internet, ASSUMES that they are ALL vista, and then assumes that there are many more vista machines not connected to the internet....

On top of all that, he pulls the $7.50 from nowhere. Think of it this way, he is claiming that because vista takes 2 mins to boot up, it costs 81billion dollars globally (and he doesn't even mention how he converts those 2 mins into daily bootup times).

Completely wrong too, Einstine. That asumption that they are all Vista is not in the article. And the daily bootup times alow for a singel startup a day. Thats what I do to my PC. The $7.50/hour is a reasonble assumtpion too considering the worlds salaires.

Do you people just read what you want to read into an articel or actualy pay atention?

Woops, you are right. The assumption was that because Vista has 29% of the market share, that must be the percentage of vista machines on the internet (and as bsobel points out, that's completely wrong as there are many types of machines besides i386 based architectures)

However, the rest of my arguments are sound. There is a substantial amount of "Hey, this sounds like a good number." arguments. The whole fact that he put so much weight on a machine that he even says is not common place (3000 seconds to boot, seriously?) really casts a whole lot of doubt. He was looking for a big number.

The argument that I still like the best, though, is what OS doesn't take over a minute to boot? You can't claim a loss of money from a product if every other product is causing the same loss.

My MacBook used to boot in about 45 seconds (now it is closer to 1.5 minutes, not sure why). My friend's new Unibody boots in 30 seconds or less.

I have no idea how fast my desktop could boot since I dualboot Vista and 7 (slow down there for choosing OS), and every time I boot it has to run chkdsk on a drive (same one every time, works fine in OS X, doesn't in Windows, formatted NTFS.. no idea why it doesn't work in Windows) and I cannot skip it since my USB keyboard isn't recognized at that stage of the boot process.

 

[BubbaBooBoo]

Originally posted by: bsobel

Completely wrong too, Einstine

Well the simple fact that you resorted to name calling pretty much somes up the fact that you are a troll. You can't even accept the first number as wrong (number of Vista installs which he based on WORLDWIDE INTERNET USERS [which btw, includes cell phone users with internet access]). Second, how many of those people actually installed Vista vs getting it already installed?

Bill

bsobel, that prety well proves it. You cant read. Either that or you have no short term memory. Cogman started by ofending me:

"you're right, you are no Einstein."

wich was his way of turning around my previous statement into a derogatery term.

So watch who your calling a troll, man.

Besides, your realy sounding wacked. I went thru that internet source site and didnt see anything at all about cell phones.

Originally posted by: Cogman
The whole fact that he put so much weight on a machine that he even says is not common place (3000 seconds to boot, seriously?) really casts a whole lot of doubt.

Again you guys dont seem to be reading what i am. Maybe there is another page im not seeing. He didnt test a machine at 3000 seconds, in fact that number is nowhere in the artical. He used a 1350 seconds because its based on the lawsuit that some lawyer is sueing Microsoft for.

Again, guys, you seem to be makin up stuff and claiming its in that artical. Thats really weird. Maybe had a couple of beers too many tonite?

 

[Tom]

I'm more interested in how much time is spent installing countless updates..

 

[lxskllr]

The numbers are made up the whole way through. It doesn't take a mathematician to see that it's all BS. Even assuming all his numbers are exactly correct, XP doesn't bootup instantly. You'd have to get the delta of that and Vista to compute the additional cost. The whole argument he makes is specious, and really isn't worthy of debate on any level. I feel dumber just writing this post :^(

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: bsobel
Well the simple fact that you resorted to name calling pretty much somes [sic] up the fact that you are a troll...

Bill

Um...

Isn't calling somebody a troll "name calling"???

You've done it to me numerous times in this forum...

To quote Nothinman, I'm having a hard time following your logic!

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Again, your comparison isn't even close. Even if we give into the fact that Vista is slower and costs you productivity it would be more like you [sic] daydreaming while trying to get work done...

Heh! For the lurkers...

Ever notice how it's the guys with Devil avatars that attack me? SUP with that?

Anyway, Mr. Nothinman sir, please don't accuse me of defaming Vista, now that it's on life-support. I've been defending Vista on Anandtech since the spring of 2007. I was like The Guy From Boston, "You were all thinking it, but I had the balls to say it!"

Vista works just fine, thanks! And, I'm calling bullshit on the OP's article, just like the rest of you...

All I'm saying is, if 100,000 posts say Vista is slow, and 100 say it's fast, who are ppl going to believe - the Vista haters, or the nutsackers?

I'm using Vista right now (sleepless in St. Pete)!

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: Tom
I'm more interested in how much time is spent installing countless updates..

In Vista, simply right-click the update and choose "Hide Update".

Examples:

I don't want IE8 - tried it twice and it sucks!

Windows Live Essentials??? Sounds like patchouli oil to me... hidden!

WU *thinks* I have a Synaptics TouchPad - wrong! It's an ALPS! Hidden...

Er...

If you want to hide security updates, you're on your own!

 

[zerocool84]

Vista starts up in less than 60 seconds for me. I bought 4GB of RAM to speed up my browsing and I would be pissed if my OS didn't take advantage of my RAM. Vista installs infinitely faster than XP ever did and runs faster too.

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: zerocool84
Vista starts up in less than 60 seconds for me.

Yeah, me too! Can't remember which SP took care of that, but it's a non-issue now, IMHO.

Dittos for shutdown. Plus, the apps run a LOT faster these days. Whatever!

I'm running 4GB RAM and 4GB ReadyBoost. Sure, it's takes a while for my ReadyBoost card to fully populate, on boot up, but after that my HD goes dormant (for the most part), so it's worth it to me, e.g. no disk grinding.

None of this causes "lost productivity" for me... Au contraire!

If this article had come out in the winter of 2007, I could understand the angst, but it seems like the author is stuck in a time warp or something.

EDIT: LoL! I was just checking out the author:

Hal Licino on HubPages

Hal has more than three decades of executive experience in media and publishing industries. He managed all aspects of marketing / advertising and editorial / design production for major NYC and LA-based publishing corporations, producing 26 monthly magazine and journal titles for a total of more than 100 million published copies. Hal has pennamed [sic] an international bestselling medical non-fiction book translated into 14 languages. His IT expertise exceeds MCDST. He lives for cats, pasta and motorcycles.

Hahahaha! This guy has gotta be like 60 years old - and probably has a Devil avatar on Anandtech!

OMG!!! It's 3:30 AM here... I'm shutting down for the night.