Windows 8 Versus Windows 7: Game Performance, Benchmarked

[damianrobertjones]

[citation][nom]lradunovic77[/nom]The only way to use Windows 8 is to uninstall all Metro Apps and use Start8 from StarDock otherwise unusable operating system.[/citation]

? Yet people are using it! Are you mentally challenged as I'm pretty sure that you're not but your post really doesn't do you any favours. Come on now, even a 3 year old can use Windows 8

 

[Cryio]

[citation][nom]damianrobertjones[/nom]This is simply not true. Add a shortcut to the task bar.Windows 7... click Start, Programs, folder, applicationWindows 8... Click start, type the name, click orWindows 8... Find the application, click.I'm constantly amazed by the negativity in this place[/citation]

Actually, it more like:
Windows 7: Press Windows key, Type name, Press Enter
Windows 8: Press Windows key, Type name, Press Enter.

Result? Both as fast.

 

[Guest]

i know it wasn't supposed to outpreform 7 by a wide margin but-

you used an i7 extreme edition. at that point, how much fast 8 is over 7 doesn't really matter because the i7e's speed is in a league of it's own.

you didn't use FX processors.they will scale better in a comparison, and the better scheduling engine will give fx about a %15 boost, which i believe puts the 8350 on par with the i5.

 

[mayankleoboy1]

Can you repeat these steps, but using an iGPU instead of a discrete GPU ? Win8 team have done some optimisations and the best way to test it is by using iGPU. dGPU are ridiculously fast anyway.

 

[demonhorde665]

Is it just my paranoid imagination , or does it seem like the last several tom's articles about win 8 were trying to convince us gamers to switch to it from win 7 ?


I'm still not buying this OS , sorry tom's nice try though. and while i do play games my decision has nothing to do with gaming well ok it does a little. I'm also in school for game art design , and the last thing i need is their new a-- ugly UI slowing my productivity down as i learn it. so its as much a work concern as it is a gaming concern here ... not to forget the UI is fugly ... no thanks MS.

 

[dingo07]

If it ain't broke, Don't fix it!!!

I'll stick with Windows 7 until my games and progs no longer run at the speed I'm used to, OR the Next version of windows proves at least 30% increase in speed.

 

[jeffredo]

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Win 8 has no compelling reason for me to switch from Win 7. It performs very well and is rock solid stable. A slightly faster boot time isn't worth the bother or cost (I've got an SSD anyway - I'm pretty satisfied with boot times and system "snappiness").

 

[shin0bi272]

Im wondering if this is microsoft's way of trying to push everyone onto their surface interface. Trying to say that the desktop is falling out of favor and will soon (maybe in the next 10 years) be about as commonplace as a corded telephone. I'll personally still have my desktops but all the kids comin up will more than likely be using their 7-10" tablets instead... Remember there are kids in highschool now who dont know why we killed bin laden...

win8 could be microsoft's first attempt at a unified interface for smartphones, tablets, and desktop/laptops... Which if done right could be cool when 3d projection screens become the norm... all futuristic and scifi like mass effect. But till then Im good on win7.

 

[buzznut]

Well, I think this is quite promising, considering most drivers right now will be optimized for WIN7. I'd expect in a few short months that WIN 8 will be able to surpass WIN7 performance. M$ is not known for supporting older operating systems simply due to user preference. Eventually they will try to force everyone to convert.

I am hoping that WIN 9 comes out by then.. I don't care about a few frames per second, I will keep my WIN7 as long as possible. I do think that I may run a dual boot, there are some features about 8 that I like despite the crappy interface.

 

[jerm1027]

Should have been testing CPU's. We know Windows 7 suffers a thread scheduling issue on AMD CPU's, which can take a 10-20% performance hit and MS never released a proper patch. Apparently Windows 8 fixes it. Would like to see that.

 

[dragonsqrrl]

[citation][nom]jerm1027[/nom]Should have been testing CPU's. We know Windows 7 suffers a thread scheduling issue on AMD CPU's, which can take a 10-20% performance hit and MS never released a proper patch. Apparently Windows 8 fixes it. Would like to see that.[/citation]
AMD representatives have said there will be no performance boost from Windows 8 compared to the most recent patches for Windows 7.

 

[hixbot]

[citation][nom]gnodeb[/nom]Vista is better then win7. [/citation]
Not a soul in this world has ever uttered those words, so what's your point?

 

[southernshark]

I was going to DL W8 today, but it won't sell it to me because I am in Guatemala. Yes I could use a VPN, but to be honest I feel like if a store won't sell me something, then I won't buy it.

 

[falchard]

I would have rather seen Bulldozer/Piledriver cpus used in testing as there stood little reason that a core i7 would see a bump, while there was a reason why newer AMD cpus would see a bump.

 

[jerm1027]

AMD representatives have said there will be no performance boost from Windows 8 compared to the most recent patches for Windows 7.

I've never heard such a thing. And this article states otherwise:

It's important to note that the hotfixes for Windows 7 aren't ideal either. They simply force threads to be scheduled on empty modules first rather than idle cores on occupied modules. To properly utilize Bulldozer's architecture we'd need a scheduler that schedules both based on available cores/modules but biases its scheduling depending on data dependency between threads.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5448/the-bulldozer-scheduling-patch-tested/4

Also

The silver lining is that Microsoft tells us Windows 7, even patched, is not indicative of how Windows 8 will behave. In our own exploration of performance in the developer build, FX did, in fact, yield better numbers.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/windows-7-hotfix-bulldozer-performance,3119-8.html

 

[dragonsqrrl]

[citation][nom]jerm1027[/nom]I've never heard such a thing. And this article states otherwise:http://www.anandtech.com/show/5448 [...] h-tested/4Alsohttp://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 119-8.html[/citation]
Wow, those articles are... from right around the time the patches were announced. I think that information may be a bit dated.
[citation][nom]cangelini[/nom]Nope. Even AMD's own guys are saying don't expect any improvement from Windows 8 versus a properly-patched Windows 7 machine (which mine is).[/citation]
Apparently Chris was recently in contact with AMD representatives who told him this.

 

[jerm1027]

Wow, those articles are... from right around the time the patches were announced. I think that information may be a bit dated.

Well, unless Microsoft released another patch completely under the radar, it is the most up to date info. I just did a Google search "AMD FX Windows 7 patch" from the past 6 months and found nothing.

 

[billgatez]

The slight improvement is not worth the pain of using a crappy UI. I'am also courous to see how much adoption DX 11.1 gets

 

[ojas]

Um, didn't tom's repeatedly state that even AMD wasn't expecting any improvements beyond the Win 7 hotfixes?

 

[f-14]

no voice command and doesn't work like the ironman OS nor the Halo OS

 

[monu_08]

i think win 8 needs to be more upgrading to compete with win 7 still 7 is great one ms should spend some action in 8 for making it perfect just like 7 does

 

[Guest]

Isn't it cheaper to upgrade to Win8 right now ($40 download) than to Win7 from an older Windows platform like XP or Vista? That's one benefit I guess.

 

[atikkur]

upgrade win8 or buy ssd? i think ssd first..

 

[christophermarti]

Now that'a good config to compare those systems ... , wouldn't be it more representative if it was like: i5 2500?

 

[Guest]

I wasn't really a fan of Windows 8 ( I hated the "Metro"-Interface before even using it) but since we get a free copy of Windows 8 from our University, I figured I'd try it on my Laptopt.

The new interface is a bit confusing at first, but 3 hours into it you are already acustomed to it and it works really fast! Think of the Metro-Interface as more of a Shortcut Screen accessable anytime, this way it's really awesome. When you are using the same apps as in Windows 7, you will stay at the desktop 100% of the time, except for when you launch an application (ie Metro = Shortcut). Just hitting Start and typing searches for an app you want to start (just like in Windows 7), so this behaivour is EXACTLY the same.

Performance is (as the article states) on par with Windows 7, but there is one example (at least for me) where it exceeds: Guild Wars 2 was unplayable on my Laptop with Windows 7. Everytime the game has to load data from the disk (so very often) FPS would drop from about 30 to 5, making things unplayable. In Windows 8, FPS are constant at 30, no drops. Finally playable.
So while Windows 8 doesn't increase FPS, it helps playability in some cases and it's as easy to use as Windows 7, if you take the time (rougly 3 hours for me) to get to know it.

Long story short: Try it, before you complain. I was changed from "Windows 8 is not worth my while" to "Windows 8 is awesome!" in about 1 day of use, so give it a chance!