XP or Vista for an older computer

[Mike64]

Every single vista machine I've ever used has been slow. Click on something, and have to wait, and wait, and wait, go for coffee, oh, it just came up 5 times.

When was the last time you used Vista? I'm using 64-bit Vista right now (on a lowly C2D E7300 PC w/only 4GB RAM and a 4-year-old Kingston V+100 SSD, no less) and as far as compute-heavy tasks are concerned, to say it's no speed demon would be an understatement, but in general it's nowhere near as slow as you suggest. And I even use Aero...

 

[Red Squirrel]

When was the last time you used Vista? I'm using 64-bit Vista right now (on a lowly C2D E7300 PC w/only 4GB RAM and a 4-year-old Kingston V+100 SSD, no less) and as far as compute-heavy tasks are concerned, to say it's no speed demon would be an understatement, but in general it's nowhere near as slow as you suggest. And I even use Aero...

Well a SSD will probably help. I think the slowness in Vista was it's constant disk access. 4GB of ram is probably bare minimum for it to work not bad, but most of the machines I've seen had less than that. OP said older machine so I was thinking something along the lines of like a single or dual core with 1GB of ram and slow 5400rpm hard drive. I recently used it on similar machine (I don't recall the actual specs, but it was a machine that came with Vista and back in the day they were way under powered). I found that everything I did was just so slow. I found it was a game of constantly having to wait. Even opening the start menu took a long time. It's seconds instead of instant, but that feels very slow when your mind is 20 steps ahead of what the computer is at. It's not to say that it was probably faster when it was a completely fresh install, but a typical machine that's been "broken in" will be slow compared to any other OS. You can't just base speed on when it's a clean install, of course it's going to be decently fast. Install A/V, drivers, misc stuff that may need to run in background, and then try to perform an actual task on the computer, perhaps even try to multi task such as browsing the internet while rendering a video and it wont be so quick anymore.

 

[mikeymikec]

Well a SSD will probably help. I think the slowness in Vista was it's constant disk access. 4GB of ram is probably bare minimum for it to work not bad, but most of the machines I've seen had less than that. OP said older machine so I was thinking something along the lines of like a single or dual core with 1GB of ram and slow 5400rpm hard drive. I recently used it on similar machine (I don't recall the actual specs, but it was a machine that came with Vista and back in the day they were way under powered). I found that everything I did was just so slow. I found it was a game of constantly having to wait. Even opening the start menu took a long time. It's seconds instead of instant, but that feels very slow when your mind is 20 steps ahead of what the computer is at. It's not to say that it was probably faster when it was a completely fresh install, but a typical machine that's been "broken in" will be slow compared to any other OS. You can't just base speed on when it's a clean install, of course it's going to be decently fast. Install A/V, drivers, misc stuff that may need to run in background, and then try to perform an actual task on the computer, perhaps even try to multi task such as browsing the internet while rendering a video and it wont be so quick anymore.

Which is why I suggested making regular use of sleep/hibernate mode; after a cold boot, Vista takes a while to settle down. After it has settled down however, it's as quick as Win7.

My parents' machine is running Vista 64 with an Athlon 64 X2, 4GB RAM and an 80GB HDD. It runs as quick as it would with any modern OS. My wife's machine is also running Vista 64 (she doesn't like how 7 looks in places and I had spare Vista licences) on a Pentium G620 with 4GB and a 500GB HDD, again it runs perfectly fine.

One thing to note about Vista is that it has the problem of using lots of RAM during a Windows Update check that I mentioned here:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2421895

That problem has been fixed on Win7, however Vista's memory WU RAM usage during a check is about 600-700MB so the machine should have more than 2GB RAM in order to handle it without going all slo-mo.

 

[Guest essential]

Just to say that XP is still holding its own since 2003. I was wiped out for a time or two, over the years, but with the 'rapid recovery disks' (is that the right name?), I was back up and running in less than an hour. Win XP, for life.

Bought a Chromebook earlier this year, just to play with. No comparison of course.

 

[Z15CAM]

If you are debating choosing between XP and Vista, I would choose Win7.

Not saying I didn't like XP as I would choose it over Vista.

It's like comparing WinSE to Millennium, where I skipped Millennium and loaded XP

Pending Hardware of course.

 

[Mem]

If you are debating choosing between XP and Vista, I would choose Win7.

Not saying I didn't like XP as I would choose it over Vista.

It's like comparing WinSE to Millennium, where I skipped Millennium and loaded XP

Pending Hardware of course.

Now this is pure FUD, Vista is nowhere near the level of WinME, remember Win7 is based on Vista so your analogy says a lot about Win7.
XP is a dead OS, no support and full of security holes so can some people wake up and do some research .

He only has two choices if you read his first post ie XP and Vista, Vista no brainer for obvious reasons.
The only other choice is what we have already stated ie Linux, which is free and plenty of distros to choose from.

 

[MongGrel]

Win XP, for life.

If you are debating choosing between XP and Vista, I would choose Win7.

Not saying I didn't like XP as I would choose it over Vista.

It's like comparing WinSE to Millennium, where I skipped Millennium and loaded XP

Pending Hardware of course.

 

[Z15CAM]

Millennium was MS's attempt to build in a BackUp System for Win98 that did nothing but eat up space. XP was the Ultimate 98 OS.

Granted Vista was a bases for Win7.

Now MS is attacking Wn7 with WinX. I'm gong to wait before I consider loading WinX for my main OS - Not saying I'm going to experiment with it before I decide.

Win8 may be friendly OS for a Tabloid but I run a DeskTop.

You have posted 23,008 threads of useless Troll Info.

My favorite MS OS's were MS DOS 6.1, Win 3.11, Win 95B. WinSE, WinXP and Win7 - What's WinX?

Does mean I can't load Linux or BSD.

CHIRP!

 

[Mike64]

OP said older machine so I was thinking something along the lines of like a single or dual core with 1GB of ram and slow 5400rpm hard drive.

At this point, I think that would be a really old machine. Mine was "yesterday's news" even when I bought it -- I can't even remember exactly when, but I think the end of 2008 -- and I was disappointed that the motherboard wasn't going to let me upgrade to a quad-core and that it would also only accept 4GB RAM total (damn Dell and their crippled MOBOs), but I needed it quickly and would have to have waited longer for the quad-core machine. Even the SSD dates from 2011 and was slow by then-current standards (but does have what was at the time unusual - firmware-based garbage collection that works without TRIM.)

I certainly wouldn't recommend Vista over a newer Windows version in the abstract, heaven knows, but since the OP's options are Vista and XP, it just seems kind of ridiculous to go with XP...

If you are debating choosing between XP and Vista, I would choose Win7.

In the abstract, so would I. But the OP already owns XP and Vista licenses, but would have to buy Win7.

 

[Z15CAM]

If his Hardware can run Vista - Why not load Win7?

32-Bit for 3 or 4 GB of DDR1 Ram 2 core CPU or say 6 GB of DDR2-3 64-Bit 4 core cpu - We don't know what he has for hardware.

 

[Mem]

If his Hardware can run Vista - Why not load Win7?

He did say why in his first post,

I have an older computer I am going to be giving to a friend and I have a license for XP and one for Vista. Trying to decide which I should put on it.
I know XP is not supported anymore and Vista had a bad reputation, but I heard that with service packs it got respectable, but I never saw that myself.

Can't spring for 7, 8 or 10.

 

[ninaholic37]

If his Hardware can run Vista - Why not load Win7?

Your thread here and here isn't very encouraging either. I'm surprised you're even recommending 7 considering all those updates you're against in it already.

 

[Z15CAM]

To me there's no difference between Vista and 7 other then 7 FIX's Vista's Gody GUI and Dead End links. It's the same OS just like Win98 to XP.

The OP of this thread has to know what hardware he is dealing with and mate it with a MS OS of choosing.

PS: Win 95A is capable of encoding MP3 & MP4 - It's all about Copy-Write and your Privacy over mPeg2, FLV, MKV let alone AVI.

WinXP is a Super Win98 MS OS.

If you can't download the media; how about SCREEN CAPTURE where I can't go ;o)

 

[Mike64]

If his Hardware can run Vista - Why not load Win7?

As I mentioned in the post you replied to, he already owns XP and Vista, but does not own Win7.

 

[VirtualLarry]

It's the same OS just like Win98 to XP.
WinXP is a Super Win98 MS OS.

Sigh. I don't think that you could be more mis-informed. While their UI is similar, in terms of drivers and kernel architecture, they are quite different "under the hood".

 

[Z15CAM]

Sigh. I don't think that you could be more mis-informed. While their UI is similar, in terms of drivers and kernel architecture, they are quite different "under the hood".

Not arguing that Larry - The Kernel is different but to OS Lay out from 98 to XP isn't much different other then XP offered 64-Bit (Providing Hardware) NTFS, extended User accounts with a Crappy BackUp System.