Vista vs. Windows XP: Head to Head Benchmarks

The January 30 release of Windows Vista is bearing down on us, and PC World has graciously posted the results from a series of tests measuring Vista's performance in the real world, specifically in comparison to Windows XP, which you're probably using right now.

The results are actually pretty encouraging. Here's a rundown of what you should expect if you're planning on running Vista on hardware you already own by upgrading.

• In most cases, Vista is slower than XP, but not terribly. Photoshop tests showed a drop in performance of 7 or 8 percent on dual-core PCs and 13 to 23 percent on single-core machines.
• Gaming is about the same, with Vista dropping frame rates from 5 to 25 percent, depending on the machine (and with no regard for CPU type).
• In multitasking tests (where the tester ran multiple tasks simultaneously), results were mixed: Single-core machines were marginally slower with Vista (6 to 10 percent), while dual-core machines were significantly faster with Vista (up to 31 percent). This is likely due to Vista's programming to better handle multicore CPUs, and since most of us have more than one application open at all times, that's a critical benchmark.

Some lessons from the story: Memory is critical, with 2GB being the sweet spot for Vista. 64-bit CPUs were slower than 32-bit CPUs, as well, but, as noted above, dual-core makes a big difference.

This is just a first volley of Vista benchmarks, of course. I'll be running my own tests as well as linking to other studies as Vista machines begin to hit the market.