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Windows 7: Tested in depth

By Seth Rosenblatt on 03 August 2009, 5:40pm

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Performance

Windows 7 feels faster than Windows XP and Vista, but it turns out that's not always the case -- sometimes, it's the slowest of the three operating systems. We tested four 32-bit Windows operating systems: Windows 7 RTM build 7600, Windows 7 Release Candidate build 7100, Windows Vista with Service Pack 2 and Windows XP SP3, all on an Inspiron Desktop 530 mini-tower running an Intel Core 2 Duo Processor E4500 at 2.20GHz, with a 128MB Nvidia 8300 GS graphics card, 4GB of RAM and two 320GB SATA 7,200rpm hard drives.

Microsoft Office Performance (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Windows 7 RTM Build 7600 (32-bit)

684

Windows 7 RC Build 7100 (32-bit)

752

Windows Vista SP2 (32-bit)

673

Windows XP SP3 (32-bit)

483

iTunes encoding (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Windows 7 RTM Build 7600 (32-bit)

187

Windows 7 RC Build 7100 (32-bit)

188

Windows Vista SP2 (32-bit)

189

Windows XP SP3 (32-bit)

187

Boot time (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Windows 7 RTM Build 7600 (32-bit)

41.25

Windows 7 RC Build 7100 (32-bit)

44.81

Windows Vista SP2 (32-bit)

40.16

Windows XP SP3 (32-bit)

40.03

Shutdown time (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Windows 7 RTM Build 7600 (32-bit)

5.1

Windows 7 RC Build 7100 (32-bit)

6.2

Windows Vista SP2 (32-bit)

5.69

Windows XP SP3 (32-bit)

29.9

Cinebench
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

Windows 7 RTM Build 7600 (32-bit)

4,213

Windows 7 RC Build 7100 (32-bit)

4,184

Windows Vista SP2 (32-bit)

4,174

Windows XP SP3 (32-bit)

4,217

As you can see in the chart, we found that Windows 7 RTM was the fastest to shutdown, and was tied with XP for iTunes encoding. It was slower than XP and Vista, however, for both booting up cold by a little more than 1 second, and slower than either of its predecessors in its Microsoft Office performance. After having used Windows 7 beta, RC and now the RTM for more than six months combined, it still feels faster for us when launching programs, opening the control panel and dragging icons, files and folders around than XP. That's not to denigrate the value of the benchmarks, but keep in mind that the perception and reality might differ based on hardware and usage.

Support

When you try to use a file already in use, Windows 7 goes beyond Vista and XP by telling you not just that it's being used, but where it's being used so you can manage the situation faster. Other than that, Windows 7 offers on-board operating system support nearly identical to Windows Vista. Screen darkening, one-click action hand-holding and a useful question-mark icon on all Explorer windows maintain Vista's improved help features, compared with Windows XP.

Conclusion

Windows 7 looks like the operating system that both Microsoft and its consumers have been waiting for. By fixing most of the perceived and real problems in Vista, Microsoft has laid the groundwork for the future of where Windows will go. Windows 7 presents a stable platform that can compete comfortably with OS X, while reassuring the world that Microsoft can still turn out a strong, useful operating system.