XP or Vista for ARMA 2?

[fish44 0]

I noticed on the OFPmark thread, that some Arma 2 users with XP appear to get significantly better performance than Vista. Havent trawlled through the full thread, so my observation is hardly a statistical anslysis.

Be interested in comments on this.

Update

I have put in an older HD with Xp on it and popped Arma2 on. And re ran the ofpmark test here. Everything the same except OS.

2180 Vista ultimate 32 sp1 2180

2670 XP pro 32 sp3

thats 22% improvement, just from OS.

Both are 1.02, with video memory set to very high.all others normal, 1680x1050.

Did some tweaking in Vista.

got scores 2400,2600,2595,2460,

Tweaks

1. changed process priority to high (has to be done manually each time game is started).

2. switched off themes.

3. changed program compatibility for arma.exe to xp sp2.

Additional tests in xp

2700,2640,2670,2950

Edited July 6, 2009 by Fish44

[Gonzo89 10]

I've found that Windows 7 x64 has given me far greater performance than Vista, and it appears that is the case for XP as well. On the Arma 2 Mark on Vista I got an average of 22fps, but on W7 I was at 28fps on the same settings.

[GLeek 10]

I've found that Windows 7 x64 has given me far greater performance than Vista, and it appears that is the case for XP as well. On the Arma 2 Mark on Vista I got an average of 22fps, but on W7 I was at 28fps on the same settings.

and Vista with High priority arma.exe processus ?

[hoak 0]

I don't understand why people are so quick to jump to and recommend the 64-bit versions of Microsoft's Operating Systems for 32-Bit games, and ArmA II is a 32-Bit game...

Running a 32-Bit Game on a 64-Bit Microsoft OS means you'll be running through a 'thunking' layer of 32-to-64-bit interpolation libraries. A quick Google search about how this works will return a lot of unimpressive results and issues with regard to performance...

The end result of this is that the OS needs to run nearly twice as many processes and services as a 32-Bit version of the OS, in many cases completely obviating any advantage of the larger memory access 64-bit memory managers offer, and slowing down game performance regardless due to the interpolation/thunking translation.

Almost every benchmark shows 32-Bit games performing more poorly under the 64-bit Microsoft OS, compared to the 32-Bit alternative, on systems less then 4Gb of RAM the performance difference is dramatic. Granted there were driver issues with Vista that complicated this matter, but Windows 7 is past that...

:butbut:

Edited July 6, 2009 by Hoak

[1longtime 10]

I don't understand why people are so quick to jump to and recommend the 64-bit versions of Microsoft's Operating Systems for 32-Bit games, and ArmA II is a 32-Bit game...

Running a 32-Bit Game on a 64-Bit Microsoft OS means you'll be running through a 'thunking' layer of 32-to-64-bit interpolation libraries. A quick Google search about how this works will return a lot of unimpressive results and issues with regard to performance...

The end result of this is that the OS needs to run nearly twice as many processes and services as a 32-Bit version of the OS, in many cases completely obviating any advantage of the larger memory access 64-bit memory managers offer, and slowing down game performance regardless due to the interpolation/thunking translation.

Almost every benchmark shows 32-Bit games performing more poorly under the 64-bit Microsoft OS, compared to the 32-Bit alternative, on systems less then 4Gb of RAM the performance difference is dramatic. Granted there were driver issues with Vista that complicated this matter, but Windows 7 is past that...

:butbut:

This post is old, but I think there's an important reason that's being missed here...

Anyone who has high-end dual video cards eating up 2GB of their 4GB of addressable memory would disagree that 64bit is so bad. Do the math:

4GB

-2GB of video RAM addressing

-.5GB of random Vista/Win7 junk (this can be much worse, actually...)

------

1.5GB RAM <---- this is what you are left with for ALL your apps (if you're lucky)

I've read several articles that state there is often only a negligible loss in performance using a 32bit app on a 64bit OS, and on some cases no difference in performance. Some apps benchmark less than 2% performance hit. Others may be worse, I won't argue that point. I believe the performance impact is almost nil in my personal experiences, regardless of articles or benchmarks.

The real question... is it worse than having to write to a pagefile because you're out of RAM? 4GB sounds huge... until you realize it's all gone.

[Monkwarrior 0]

I would choose XP over Vista any time.

More games will run on XP then Vista (if you have a widespread of games obviously).

Monk.

[frag85 10]

this is how i would rate Windows OS's if Game Performance is your #1 priority:

XP > 7 > Vista

vista is just horrible. everyone having problems around me is using vista. and windows 7 overall feels faster than XP. either that or hardware has caught up with what the bleeding edge of OS's needs.

[hamis 0]

Anyone who has high-end dual video cards eating up 2GB of their 4GB of addressable memory would disagree that 64bit is so bad. Do the math:

Well,i have xp pro 32 and 4870x2.Free memory is about 2.5gb.

[-RIP- Luhgnut 10]

this is how i would rate Windows OS's if Game Performance is your #1 priority:

XP > 7 > Vista

vista is just horrible. everyone having problems around me is using vista. and windows 7 overall feels faster than XP. either that or hardware has caught up with what the bleeding edge of OS's needs.

I agree with this ranking. Most people get really excited of the boosts coming from Vista to Win-7 but I dual boot into XP only for Arma2. XP-32 Bit much faster than others for older machines. Newer machines seem to like Win-7 better though.

[kklownboy 43]

I would choose XP over Vista any time.

More games will run on XP then Vista (if you have a widespread of games obviously).

Monk.

I have never found a game not to run on vista 64.... ever. I haven't used xp32 for almost a year...since i have had v64 and win7rc,but i have been using xp64 for the last month or so with arma... its good but i like using all my gpus in quadfire and you cant do that with xp32 or xp64. Vista is much better than XP imo, but its a stupid learning curve if your used to "classic" XP setup. The big reason for xp being any better at all is the ability to turn off Vsync for ATI cards, and even nvda cards a while back. But its all for not now that you can get win7 which is better than them all except for the vsync issue on Ati. And win7 has a cool emulator/vitual machine for the xp.

[-RIP- Luhgnut 10]

I have never found a game not to run on vista 64.... ever. I haven't used xp32 for almost a year...since i have had v64 and win7rc,but i have been using xp64 for the last month or so with arma... its good but i like using all my gpus in quadfire and you cant do that with xp32 or xp64. Vista is much better than XP imo, but its a stupid learning curve if your used to "classic" XP setup. The big reason for xp being any better at all is the ability to turn off Vsync for ATI cards, and even nvda cards a while back. But its all for not now that you can get win7 which is better than them all except for the vsync issue on Ati. And win7 has a cool emulator/vitual machine for the xp.

The biggest problem with Vista is the extreme overhead that's needed to make it operational. It's "footprint" is larger which takes up needed CPU clocks as well as RAM. It it's more forgiving with drivers but it just eats up so much system resources that there's less there for what you really want to do, like play arma and watch the pron. :eek: