XP, Vista or 7.

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Limp Gawd
Joined
Aug 7, 2003
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Well I got a few new riggs for some basic computing needs and low entry gaming but I want to max out the performance. So in terms of the OS should I use xp, vista or 7?

  1. Sony Optiarc CD/DVD Burner Black SATA Model AD-7260S-0B - OEM
  2. AMD Athlon II X3 445 Rana 3.1GHz Socket AM3 95W Triple-Core Desktop Processor ADX445WFGMBOX
  3. G.SKILL Value 4GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model F3-10666CL9S-4GBNT
  4. GIGABYTE GA-M68MT-S2P AM3 NVIDIA GeForce 7025/nForce 630a chipset Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
  5. Seagate Barracuda ST500DM002 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard

As you can tell it's nothing mind blowing, grandfathering down some video cards from some other pcs. My 1st inclination is to go with Windows XP 64bit, though I am having trouble getting SSFIV:AE running on it.
 
With Windows 7 couldn't you just disable some of the graphical bells and whistles and get the same performance as XP with the added security of 7?
 
i have actually found 7 to run better on machines with lower end hardware than xp as long as they have over 2 gig of ram both vista and 7 are pretty good. Plus that computer you posted is too modern to have xp on it you will have a much better time with 7 the only issue is the video card you really need a discrete card you can not get away with onboard if you want to play anything more than angry birds...
 
Definitely run Windows 7 over Vista. Vista is too demanding of video and memory resources compared to 7.

Just get a decent video card and you shouldn't have any problems with the build running Windows 7.
 
I'm not planning on using the on board video. I have a 5450 and 4300 I'm gonna grandfather down to them. I do plan on upgrading the video cards later but it's not really top priority.. And as you can see both systems have 4 gigs of ram.
 
Lunas said:
i have actually found 7 to run better on machines with lower end hardware than xp as long as they have over 2 gig of ram both vista and 7 are pretty good.
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I've noticed the same thing, 2GB of RAM is the sweet spot for both 7 and Vista but particularly 7. With 4GB of RAM 7 will run just fine on this machine, there's just no point in using XP or even Vista at this point. Heck if you're inclinded I'd see how well the Windows 8 Preview runs on the machine. I've tried it on two machines and on my desktop it runs well enough for the machine be perfectly stable and useful but YMMV.
 
Yeah, I would not recommend using XP x64 as an everyday OS unless you were doing something specific that you knew you needed it for. Vista x64 and 7 x64 have much better application compatibility. XP x64 was basically an experiment anyways.
 
^^^ Yeah from what I've read it's been referred to as "XP32 with some tacked on 64bit stuff" but nothing really done properly.

Vista is not a bad OS; it'll never escape the pre-SP1 hatred that people have for it (and the mentality from all the Switch ads), but post-SP1, Vista was a very good OS. The only problem with it now is that 7 runs better on lesser hardware.
If I didn't have access to 7 I'd be more than happy using Vista still.
 
zero2dash said:
^^^ Yeah from what I've read it's been referred to as "XP32 with some tacked on 64bit stuff" but nothing really done properly.

Vista is not a bad OS; it'll never escape the pre-SP1 hatred that people have for it (and the mentality from all the Switch ads), but post-SP1, Vista was a very good OS. The only problem with it now is that 7 runs better on lesser hardware.
If I didn't have access to 7 I'd be more than happy using Vista still.
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Yea. I use Vista every day, and have no issues whatsoever. But there's no denying 7's better.
 
Xp x64 is way better than vista, which is a pain in the ass.
 
[F8];1037788109 said:
With Windows 7 couldn't you just disable some of the graphical bells and whistles and get the same performance as XP with the added security of 7?
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The biggest barrier to installing a post-XP flavor of Windows (especially Windows 7) on an older computer that runs XP is one of two issues - lack of a DVD drive (which both Vista and 7 require) and, unsurprisingly, *hard drive space* - this is of particular issue in laptops.

On desktops, as long as the computer in question has SATA ports (of any sort) available, this is the easiest to solve.

On portables, the DVD drive issue moves to USB ports (replacing the DVD drive as the source); however, making sure you can find a hard drive large enough that will fit your legacy laptop can be a pain.

Most of the *graphical bells and whistles* are not performance-detractors in Windows 7 (as they were in Windows Vista) largely due to improvements at both ends (both the underlying code in 7 compared to Vista, and driver improvement over the same period; the drivers themselves are largely unchanged between Vista and 7 in terms of general structure) - still, you will want as recent a GPU in even a legacy PC as it can swallow and your budget can stand. (AMD's old X1K series, and especially in AGP, are nice safe legacy-PC bets, as even Vista and 7 support them via included drivers - Aero and all.)
 
PGHammer said:
The biggest barrier to installing a post-XP flavor of Windows (especially Windows 7) on an older computer that runs XP is one of two issues - lack of a DVD drive (which both Vista and 7 require) and, unsurprisingly, *hard drive space* - this is of particular issue in laptops.

On desktops, as long as the computer in question has SATA ports (of any sort) available, this is the easiest to solve.

On portables, the DVD drive issue moves to USB ports (replacing the DVD drive as the source); however, making sure you can find a hard drive large enough that will fit your legacy laptop can be a pain.

Most of the *graphical bells and whistles* are not performance-detractors in Windows 7 (as they were in Windows Vista) largely due to improvements at both ends (both the underlying code in 7 compared to Vista, and driver improvement over the same period; the drivers themselves are largely unchanged between Vista and 7 in terms of general structure) - still, you will want as recent a GPU in even a legacy PC as it can swallow and your budget can stand. (AMD's old X1K series, and especially in AGP, are nice safe legacy-PC bets, as even Vista and 7 support them via included drivers - Aero and all.)
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neither vista nor 7 REQUIRE a dvd drive they can both be installed via usb...
 
IIRC at least for vista it is possible to request a CD set. Dunno about win7.
 
SuperSubZero said:
I haven't used XP64 since late 2007. Are common hardware makers (ie. nVidia, ATI, Realtek) still updating their drivers for it?
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Most vendors wont stop making drivers for an OS until the company drops support (microsoft doesnt drop full XP support until 2014 for larger corporations). So nVidia, AMD and the like will still produce drivers until M$ drops support.

If I had to chose from Vista x64 and XP x64, I would chose Vista, the drive support for x64 was phenominal compared to XP's. However, x86 I would go XP anyday! But if the choice is between XP and 7, I choose 7 hands down for both x86 and x64. And as long as your running 4GB ram (which is my personal minimum recommendation for systems now), than windows 7 will do just fine. And as stated earlier, you can kill some processor draining apps in Windows 7 to increase performance.
 
zero2dash said:
^^^ Yeah from what I've read it's been referred to as "XP32 with some tacked on 64bit stuff" but nothing really done properly.
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More like "cut down workstation version of Server 2003" as XP Pro x64 shares a lot more in common with that than its 32-bit cousins.

Anyhow, OP should get Windows 7. End of story. Vista is fine if you've already purchased a copy but for performance Windows 7 is just...better.

Please don't even consider XP as an option. Christ, it's just 29 days shy of being ten years old. That would be like installing DOS 5.0 on a Pentium 4 machine. And even though I thought it was a great OS IME, I would pass on XP x64. It was more of a proof-of-concept OS than a usable OS. You will have compatibility problems with many games and programs, and since it shares the same code base and version number as Server 2003 some programs will demand that you purchase the server version of their software (a lot of AV software comes to mind).
 
Lunas said:
neither vista nor 7 REQUIRE a dvd drive they can both be installed via usb...
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Which I addressed in the same post (in fact, further up from your quote). However, that's likely NOT something a n00b is going to think of right off.
 
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