Windows 7 Rates my computer a 6?

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Gutspiller

Gawd
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Oct 19, 2005
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It says my lowest item in my computer is my "graphics" and "gaming graphics". Which makes my computer a 6, but my cpu and memory are rated as a 7.4 and primary disk is rated a 7.1.

My graphics card is a 9800GX2. Does anybody know if my 6 rating has anything to do with Windows 7 not using both of the GPUs in my card, or does it simply have a database of what my card is and it rates it on that?

Either way, I would have thought a 9800GX2 would have rated higher. I guess I'm assuming that the nicest gaming rig would score a 9 or 10 across the board, but perhaps that's not the case either. If it is though, than my system is pretty crappy, even considering I have a Q9450 OCed @ 3.2Ghz , SSD, and 8GB of memory with my 9800GX2.

In rating terms, isn't 8.0 considered average? So I have a below average computer or graphics card? hmm.

Can others that have Vista or Win7 throw out some of their system rating numbers so I can get a feel.

From this it seems Windows is telling me my graphics card is pretty crappy from the sound of it.

I know I shouldn't be using this number as the end all for measuring performance, but it's sorta got me a little curious too. Thanks for any numbers you can throw my way.
 
there are multiple recent threads on this topic right here in this forum. check them out, 6 is not a bad score. the highest you can get is a 7.9.
Posted via [H] Mobile Device
 
It doesn't consider SLI when doing ratings (as far as I know). If you completely disable one of your GPU's in device manager (not recommended unless you 100% know what your primary GPU is in there) and re-scan, it will be the same score. Anyways, 7.9 is the highest you can have now, so 8.0 is not "average". I think "average" would be anywhere from 3-5 on WPI and 6-7.9 being for higher end systems. Plus the numbers are not necessarily meant for benchmarks, they are more meant for comparing system to each other and to use as an easier way to identify system requirements.

I like the WEI system and think it's beneficial and could be pretty useful if companies would adopt it.
 
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I'll be blunt and to the point:

The WinSAT score is absolutely meaningless in the big picture and should be avoided as a form of comparison or "system performance" to the greatest extent possible.

Simple.
 
Useless. . .

It's a number on your screen. Does it affect how you use your PC in anyway shape or form?
 
Yes, that is how the score is determined: by the lowest sub-score.

And it's a pretty lame scale anyways. Don't sweat it.
 
I'll believe this is useless on the day someone shows me two systems that perform significantly differently yet rate similarly (minus SLI/Xfire systems). Until that day (which will never come) I will still consider this a way to compare system performance without having to wade through a bunch of numbers that some casual users don't want/care about seeing.
 
Joe Average said:
I'll be blunt and to the point:

The WinSAT score is absolutely meaningless in the big picture and should be avoided as a form of comparison or "system performance" to the greatest extent possible.

Simple.
Click to expand...

That about sums it up
 
bigdogchris said:
I'll believe this is useless on the day someone shows me two systems that perform significantly differently yet rate similarly (minus SLI/Xfire systems). Until that day (which will never come) I will still consider this a way to compare system performance without having to wade through a bunch of numbers that some casual users don't want/care about seeing.
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Totally agree. Also, wouldn't it be great if all they had to print on the bottom of a game box is "requires a Windows Rating of 5.0+ for best operation" or something similar? It would be much better than a bunch of vague hardware specs that the average person has no clue about.
 
Reus said:
Totally agree. Also, wouldn't it be great if all they had to print on the bottom of a game box is "requires a Windows Rating of 5.0+ for best operation" or something similar? It would be much better than a bunch of vague hardware specs that the average person has no clue about.
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Microsoft does this for some of their own applications but I was a little surprised to see Microsoft Game Studios published software on the shelf does not have these numbers. Maybe we'll start seeing them when 7 releases. I also think it's a good idea for people to get an idea of "what can I upgrade next" in case your not tech savvy.
 
A vanilla GTX 285 only gives a 6.6 just for comparison.. I do know it's possible to max out a few of the categories to 7.9, but I'm not sure I've seen anyone max out the graphics rating yet.
 
616 said:
A vanilla GTX 285 only gives a 6.6 just for comparison.. I do know it's possible to max out a few of the categories to 7.9, but I'm not sure I've seen anyone max out the graphics rating yet.
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My 4870 gives me a 6.8, therefore 4870 > GTX 285.
 
lathode said:
My 4870 gives me a 6.8, therefore 4870 > GTX 285.
Click to expand...

That's probably not quite right, but until there is a greater array of benchmarks that accurately depict real-world usage, you can only use these numbers as a ballpark figure. FWIW, the 4870 and the GTX285 are in the same league, and that's what these scores demonstrate, so there's no point reading deeper into it.
 
This is what I get with the sig rig:

System.jpg


3x SLI GTX 280's show up as 6.5 so yeah this index isn't very meaningful at all as a single 4870 shows up with a 6.8.
 
bigdogchris said:
I'll believe this is useless on the day someone shows me two systems that perform significantly differently yet rate similarly (minus SLI/Xfire systems). Until that day (which will never come) I will still consider this a way to compare system performance without having to wade through a bunch of numbers that some casual users don't want/care about seeing.
Click to expand...

Easy as pie to do.

System A: 512MB RAM, i7 CPU
System B: 8GB RAM, Pentium 4


All the rating does is take the lowest common denominator. Those systems *Will* run different and *Will* have similar ratings.
 
TechieSooner said:
Easy as pie to do.

System A: 512MB RAM, i7 CPU
System B: 8GB RAM, Pentium 4


All the rating does is take the lowest common denominator. Those systems *Will* run different and *Will* have similar ratings.
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Precisely, the point of the index is to a general idea about five areas of performance, with "the" score being the lowest of the five. The five individual scores are actully useful. As in your example above, the lowest scores should have been memory and CPU respectively. The individual scores should tell you where you have bottlenecks.
 
The idea behind the score is valid. It is for helping people that do not really know what is in their system, choose software (mostly games) that will actually run acceptably on their system. Not all pubs bother with putting the number on the box right now so it's usefulness is debatable.

The scoring system obviously fails for multi gpu users. However, the majority of dual, tri, and quad gpu users typically know what is in their system and what sort of performance to expect from it..
 
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heatlesssun said:
Precisely, the point of the index is to a general idea about five areas of performance, with "the" score being the lowest of the five. The five individual scores are actully useful. As in your example above, the lowest scores should have been memory and CPU respectively. The individual scores should tell you where you have bottlenecks.
Click to expand...

I question the whole system in general though.

[H] USERS: Already know what the heck they've got and what the heck they need. It's not needed.

COMMON USERS: Wouldn't know what any of it is anyway. More than likely they'd go to someone for help, which in turn asks them their specs anyway. It's not needed.


I think the whole thing is pointless IMO.
 
lathode said:
My 4870 gives me a 6.8, therefore 4870 > GTX 285.
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Because the test is based on synthetic benchmarks that is completely believable. ATI cards do seem to get better synthetic scores than Nvidia.
heatlesssun said:
3x SLI GTX 280's show up as 6.5 so yeah this index isn't very meaningful at all as a single 4870 shows up with a 6.8.
Click to expand...
It's already been pointed out that WEI does not take into effect SLI so those other 2 cards are being ignored.

TechieSooner said:
Easy as pie to do.

System A: 512MB RAM, i7 CPU
System B: 8GB RAM, Pentium 4


All the rating does is take the lowest common denominator. Those systems *Will* run different and *Will* have similar ratings.
Click to expand...
Nice try but there is more numbers to look at than just the overall. If you have one that is a 2.0 rating and everything else a 6.0 rating, you've got to consider that. Anyways, I never specified the overall rating. I was referring to actual component ratings.

But regardless of how hard someone tries to make me change my mind, which won't happen, I think the idea is a good one. I think trying to make system requirements easier to understand for people is a good thing and trying out methods like this is the first step. I'm going to chose to not live in the stone age and will support new designs that try to solve problems, like what WEI is doing.
 
the cpu, ram, and hard disk tests are actually pretty good.

the graphics ones, not so much. they only test one aspect of what a graphics card can do. so it doesnt give you a whole picture.
 
My ram scores 7.9 ... heh. But my 4.0GHZ overclocked i7 only 7.6? Bleh. I Lol at WEI.
 
Windows 7 sucks. My main system is down (bad mobo) so I'm using this old system, Athlon XP 3200+, 512mb RAM and 9800 Pro. I'm only getting a 2.9 w/Aero. I'm hitting 100% load with IE and a Hulu video playing.
 
lathode said:
Windows 7 sucks. My main system is down (bad mobo) so I'm using this old system, Athlon XP 3200+, 512mb RAM and 9800 Pro. I'm only getting a 2.9 w/Aero. I'm hitting 100% load with IE and a Hulu video playing.
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No, it doesn't suck. That computer doesn't meet the minimum system requirements. In this case you only have half as much ram as is required.
 
Archer75 said:
No, it doesn't suck. That computer doesn't meet the minimum system requirements. In this case you only have half as much ram as is required.
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I was joking, guess I shoulda put a smiley in there. It's running pretty good on a 5-6 year old system. 512mb is minimum required, 1GB minimum recommended.
 
lathode said:
Windows 7 sucks. My main system is down (bad mobo) so I'm using this old system, Athlon XP 3200+, 512mb RAM and 9800 Pro. I'm only getting a 2.9 w/Aero. I'm hitting 100% load with IE and a Hulu video playing.
Click to expand...


If you bump to 2gigs it will actually run quite well on that system. My wife's pc is almost identical except that she has more ram.
 
lathode said:
Windows 7 sucks. My main system is down (bad mobo) so I'm using this old system, Athlon XP 3200+, 512mb RAM and 9800 Pro. I'm only getting a 2.9 w/Aero. I'm hitting 100% load with IE and a Hulu video playing.
Click to expand...


If you bump to 2gigs it will actually run quite well on that system. My wife's pc running Win 7 RC is almost identical, except that she has more ram.
 
Archer75 said:
Nope. 1gb is required. Not recommended.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/download.aspx
http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=2643
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These are the Microsoft minimum hardware recommendations for systems that will be running the RC. These recommendations are specific to this release and are subject to change.

Windows 7 RC system requirements:

1 GHz or faster 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor

1 GB RAM (32-bit) / 2 GB RAM (64-bit)

16 GB available disk space (32-bit) / 20 GB (64-bit)

DirectX 9 graphics processor with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver

Either way, I figure it would not have let me install it in the first place if 1GB was required. Ofcourse running Seven on only 512MB of RAM would lead to a bad experience using the OS and MS wouldn't want anyone doing it, especially since RAM is so cheap. They could have easily blocked it from installing on this system though if they wanted to.
 
lathode said:
These are the Microsoft minimum hardware recommendations for systems that will be running the RC. These recommendations are specific to this release and are subject to change.

Windows 7 RC system requirements:

1 GHz or faster 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor

1 GB RAM (32-bit) / 2 GB RAM (64-bit)

16 GB available disk space (32-bit) / 20 GB (64-bit)

DirectX 9 graphics processor with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver

Either way, I figure it would not have let me install it in the first place if 1GB was required. Ofcourse running Seven on only 512MB of RAM would lead to a bad experience using the OS and MS wouldn't want anyone doing it, especially since RAM is so cheap. They could have easily blocked it from installing on this system though if they wanted to.
Click to expand...

Please note it says requirements. Not recommendations.

No, Microsoft does not block installations of any windows OS on hardware that does not meet the system requirements. They never have.
 
Archer75 said:
Please note it says requirements. Not recommendations.

No, Microsoft does not block installations of any windows OS on hardware that does not meet the system requirements. They never have.
Click to expand...

Please note it says recommendations before it says requirements. Why are there articles on the interwebs with people using a crack to get Vista to install on 256mb of RAM? Stating if they run the installation without the crack they get a message stating that Vista needs atleast 512MB of RAM (ofcourse it runs pretty bad on 256mb, but they were able to install it with the patch)? I'm not trying to argue here, it was simply a joke, but Seven is running pretty much fine with 512mb, and 256mb free after the desktop and everything loads. So if it REQUIRED 1GB then it shouldn't be running at all.
 
lathode said:
Please note it says recommendations before it says requirements. Why are there articles on the interwebs with people using a crack to get Vista to install on 256mb of RAM? Stating if they run the installation without the crack they get a message stating that Vista needs atleast 512MB of RAM (ofcourse it runs pretty bad on 256mb, but they were able to install it with the patch)? I'm not trying to argue here, it was simply a joke, but Seven is running pretty much fine with 512mb, and 256mb free after the desktop and everything loads. So if it REQUIRED 1GB then it shouldn't be running at all.
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recommendations is stated on a zdnet article. Not on microsofts. On the actual specs themselves it says requirements.

I am aware of no crack to install vista on 256mb of ram. Nor do I know why you'd want to. XP is painful on 256mb.
Microsoft says 1gb is required. They are covering their ass and ensuring that it is sold on computers with a minimum of 1gb of ram. Below that they believe it negatively affects performance.
If you feel their own requirements are in error then take it up with them.
 
Archer75 said:
recommendations is stated on a zdnet article. Not on microsofts. On the actual specs themselves it says requirements.

I am aware of no crack to install vista on 256mb of ram. Nor do I know why you'd want to. XP is painful on 256mb.
Microsoft says 1gb is required. They are covering their ass and ensuring that it is sold on computers with a minimum of 1gb of ram. Below that they believe it negatively affects performance.
If you feel their own requirements are in error then take it up with them.
Click to expand...


I got the quote from this page: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/faq.aspx

What you just said is basically agreeing with me, if MS believes below 1GB of RAM negatively affects performance then they would want systems to have at least 1GB. Which is a recommendation. But they tell the public/OEM's required so it wouldn't happen. It's NOT actually required, but a recommendation. I would not be typing this post right now if it was REQUIRED because my system would not be working. I guess we can agree to disagree.
 
lathode said:
I got the quote from this page: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/faq.aspx

What you just said is basically agreeing with me, if MS believes below 1GB of RAM negatively affects performance then they would want systems to have at least 1GB. Which is a recommendation. But they tell the public/OEM's required so it wouldn't happen. It's NOT actually required, but a recommendation. I would not be typing this post right now if it was REQUIRED because my system would not be working. I guess we can agree to disagree.
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Microsoft says required. But that doesn't mean you can't run below required specs. You can debate it all you want. But the makers of the OS state the required specs so there it is.

I'm not saying you can't run it on 512mb of ram. But it's a fact that it's below the required specs as posted by microsoft.
 
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