Question Windows 10 has degraded my Subnautica experience. Is it OK to stay on Windows 7?

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Dave Thompson

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Jun 11, 2014
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First of all, I love you guys for being here helping out those who are struggling: it's seriously appreciated. I have come to you as a last resort as I am out of ideas.

Much of my hardware is very old, I know this, but I can't upgrade until autumn. I have been on Win7 for so long, and when I heard only 4% of Steam gamers were on Win 7, I got an extra SSD and went for it.

My game is Subnautica at the moment, it is superb, but after going through the quite-frankly tedious process of "tweaking" Win 10, I was left with a poor performance of the game, and it's certainly not my imagination that Windows 7 runs the game significantly smoother... I was not expecting that. Batman Arkham Night on the other hand, seemed to run better, although I don't have much evidence for that nor experimented much. Bios is up-to-date, and I have tried all AMD drivers that were available.

Here are my specs, and yes I know I am lucky I don't have more problems.

Win 10 v 21H2
GA H81M DS2V Gigabyte
R9 280x
i7 4790
Corsair TX650M
12 Gig ram
WD Blue SSD

Why is Windows 10, after following all the "tweaking guides", interfering with the graphics card? What is causing the lumpiness and stuttering?
Should I just keep gaming on Win 7 until I upgrade late in the year, or can I get Win 10 to play nice? I keep wondering how many processes I could try disabling.

Thank you so much if you have any explanations for me.
 
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On my very recently retired system (2 months ago), i7-4790k, 32GB RAM, RX580 GPU....there were NO performance issues with Win 10 vs any previous windows version.

You need to be really really careful with these so-called 'tweak' sites and steps.
Often, they are badly wrong and can reduce performance.

Your problems likely lie elsewhere, other than just "Win 10".
 
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I agree with USARet, Win 10 is highly unlikely to be the problem. Also, tweak/driver optimising sites actually on the contrary are likely to polute your system with adware/bloatware/spyware/gunkware, so I would NEVER use any of that as it could be running in the background counterproductively.
Anyway, according to UserBenchMark your system is running as expected for the age and spec of your components. Its a good comparison for same spec kit across the user community and your kit is aging well.
So, maybe look at other stuff like gpu and cpu temps under load...is the box getting too hot, is there dust in the heatsinks, filter etc that create heat buildup over long gaming sessions ?
Are you trying to game at a resolution and settings too high for your R9 280X
 
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Thanks guys for replying,

The "tweaking" was just disabling this and that including disabling the HPET in boot-time comand. General optimisation.

All that is changing here is the OS. I have read that Windows 10 leads to better framerate on modern hardware, where as those who have old hardware will have the opposite result. My mobo and graphics are well outdated now.

I had a headache installing Win 10 to two drives, and ended up with non-bootable drives at one point forcing me to reinstall, so I think I am done with it now. I will use Win 10 for everyday stuff, and Win 7 for gaming and try to limit my internet use.

If windows 10 uses more resources than 7, then that would be a plausible explanation. As I use a gamepad, I notice dropped frames more than somone who plays with a mouse. I don't like Win 10 much it has to be said. Bit of an anti-climax really.
 
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W10 uses a bit more system RAM due to it's tons of telemetry features, but once you turn them off, it should be no worse than W7. In general, if you know how to set it up, W10 as mentioned shouldn't be the problem, unless it wasn't installed properly, like an upgrade vs clean install.

I use O&O ShutUp10 to automatically disable W10 telemetry with a click. The beauty of it is, you can just as easily re-enable it if you want.
 
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Frag Maniac said:
W10 uses a bit more system RAM due to it's tons of telemetry features, but once you turn them off, it should be no worse than W7. In general, if you know how to set it up, W10 as mentioned shouldn't be the problem, unless it wasn't installed properly, like an upgrade vs clean install.

I use O&O ShutUp10 to automatically disable W10 telemetry with a click. The beauty of it is, you can just as easily re-enable it if you want.
Click to expand...


Thanks for that. I will try that program. I am focussing on one game, so it could be the game rather than Win10. Subnautica developers have had a beta version for the last two years with significant improvements at the expense of more bugs, so do you think it's possible that the game (stable version) doesn't run as well in W10 because it wasn't made for it? The Experimental version (which is always being worked on) runs well, but I didn't want to be forced to play it.

Win10 did come with a lot of baggage which was disappointing, and I hated that windows update was harder to have control over. Still learning about it anyway.

I will do more experimenting, but I need a break from it after the installing hassle I had. (The boot-time windows repair was utterly useless. I wonder if that has worked for anyone.)

Cheers.
 
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Frag Maniac said:
It's possible it's that one game not working well with W10. Have you tried playing it in W7 compatibility mode on W10?
Click to expand...

Yes, someone suggested that to me and I gave it a go a few days ago. I think that's for applications that don't start up. I think it's because I am comparing directly, so less ram available = slower performance. I will try what you suggested regarding telemetry processes and I'll let you know.

UPDATE: OMO-Shutup10 made no difference, even applying recommended + somewhat. I am downloading some of my other games and I'll see if this performance difference is isolated to just Subnautica.
 
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Dave Thompson said:
Yes, someone suggested that to me and I gave it a go a few days ago. I think that's for applications that don't start up. I think it's because I am comparing directly, so less ram available = slower performance. I will try what you suggested regarding telemetry processes and I'll let you know.

UPDATE: OMO-Shutup10 made no difference, even applying recommended + somewhat. I am downloading some of my other games and I'll see if this performance difference is isolated to just Subnautica.
Click to expand...
No, W7 compatibility mode is not just for apps that don't start up, it's often used, and has been known to work for, many games.

One thing you did not verify is whether you did an upgrade to W10, or a clean install, makes a big difference.
 
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Frag Maniac said:
No, W7 compatibility mode is not just for apps that don't start up, it's often used, and has been known to work for, many games.

One thing you did not verify is whether you did an upgrade to W10, or a clean install, makes a big difference.
Click to expand...

It was a fresh install, and I bought an extra SSD so I could have both gaming (WD) and general-use (V-series) on SSDs. I made use of my Sata 2 port for the HDD. as there are only two Sata 3s. A very different version of Acronis that came with the WD Blue SSD (that I bought a few years ago) tripped me up with it's unconventional UI causing me non-boots, which just added to the frustration and regret for bothering to switch OS (Windows 7 was fine!).

Now that I am on top of the Acronis software, I can simply restore either OS on the gaming SSD- so all that changes is 7 to 10. On W10 the extra stuttering shows as erratic movement, like the stuttering is being smoothed over - it's something I didn't really experience on Win 7.

I am happy to make a recording from my camcorder of both, side-by-side, and upload to YT if you're interested. I am using the same save file and moving along the same path so I can notice the difference, and I notice it everytime, and it's a bit rough, although certainly still playable.

It would be a shame not to use W10 for gaming, and I quite like the added volume bar that appears in game. Not sure if that overlay is Windows or Steam. (No need to answer that, will find out now).
Could my mobo or value-ram be causing the issue? My mobo software is all dated back to 2015!

Thank you.
 
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Frag Maniac said:
Have you tried disabling the Steam overlay, and also Game Bar in W10?

Also, if you have any overlays you're unaware what software they belong to, try disabling startups one at a time to see if it's 3rd party software that might be conflicting.
Click to expand...


Yes, I disabled Steam overlay last night, and disabled game bar days ago.

There are only a handful of programs starting up, but what is missing in my Win7 is "Security health systray". I have been wondering about Windows defender and have switched off anti virus but made no difference. Firewall is on.

I still have this volume bar appearing (which I actually like) so could that be complicating things? Apparently it's linked to browsers which was strange.

Please don't hurry in answering me, as this is low priority for me right now, but I would still love to know how to get W10 performing same as W7.

Cheers
 
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Frag Maniac said:
I meant in W10, not W7.
Click to expand...

Yes, I was inferring that W10 had this program running which may be a problem. It is not in my list of startups on W7, and apart from that, the same programs are running on both. Are there some W7 extended support updates available? To keep me safe while running W7 for Steam and a browser?

I have spent a lot of time going through forums for answers, but it continues to baffle. Perhaps the addition of DX12 is interfering. I really should not be speculating with my little knowledge!

I am happy to try any experiments you might think will reveal the answer.
Also happy to make a video in a couple of days or so.
Thanks

P.S, CCleaner is claiming I have many outdated drivers, and W update has some optional downloads. I don't like installing multiple drivers I'm not sure about.
 
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Dave Thompson said:
Are there some W7 extended support updates available? To keep me safe while running W7 for Steam and a browser?
Click to expand...
It's called W7 ESU (Extended Security Updates), but it's intended for IT Professionals, and you have to buy it. Whether it requires any proof of being an IT pro, similar to tradesman submitting their company info to get access to wholesale products, I don't know. W7 ESU is only going to run 3 years though, so there's only going to be slightly more than 10 months more support on it.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/tr...s-faq/windows-7-extended-security-updates-faq
 
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A bit of performance problem i had with windows 10 is that will automatically install a Gpu driver (old one) and when you install a new one over the old one you have performance issues. Download in advance the amd driver, download ddu, remove internet cable/conection, use ddu to remove the video driver restart and install the new one, restart and after that conect it to internet.
 
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Dragos Manea said:
A bit of performance problem i had with windows 10 is that will automatically install a Gpu driver (old one) and when you install a new one over the old one you have performance issues. Download in advance the amd driver, download ddu, remove internet cable/conection, use ddu to remove the video driver restart and install the new one, restart and after that conect it to internet.
Click to expand...

Sorry for the delay.

I just wanted to thank you guys for responding. I did wonder if the auto display driver update from windows update was messing things up, but it wasn't.

I will call it a day on this, mainly because Win 7 for gaming will be OK until winter, and then I will get a new mobo, ram, CPU and GPU, and by then I'll be over the game Subnautica and the issue might be gone (Haven't tried Below Zero yet.)

If I decide to reinstall Win 10, what do I really need to disable/uninstall to clear out the junk and make it optimized for gaming?

Cheers.
 
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