1GB versus 2GB

As noted earlier, a default Vista Ultimate installation takes up roughly twice the amount of system memory used in a clean Windows XP installation (with the mandatory .NET 2.0 installation), which turns out to be roughly 600 megabytes of memory used on a clean boot. While the 300 MB difference isn’t as noticeable when you have 2 GB at your disposal, it can cause a whole lot of stress for systems with only 1 GB of installed system memory. We repeated all of the tests with one 1 GB memory stick removed from the system.

The framerates weren’t affected in Oblivion, NWN2 and Stalker. Vista was able to maintain the same performance as before, but there was considerably more disk swapping involved. Supreme Commander proved to be a bit more problematic. On smaller maps the performance remained roughly the same, but as soon as we fired up a regular-sized map the framerate plummeted well below 20. Both Windows XP and Vista had the same problem, but it took a higher amount of units to hog up the Windows XP system (after all, it had 300 MB more to work with). F.E.A.R. displayed a similar problem, as 400 MB of free memory was nowhere near enough for it to run at Maximum settings. Windows XP fared better in this test and there was considerably less stuttering during our test, resulting in a significantly higher framerate (only 5 fps lower than the framerate attained with 2 GB of memory).

It’s pretty obvious you’ll need at least 1.5 GB of system memory if you intend to play games under Vista. In fact, you’ll often hear gamers say that 2 GB is a must even when gaming in Windows XP. It should be pointed out that we did not disable any of the Vista services such as SuperFetch, which pre-caches applications even if they are not run, resulting in a higher memory usage. Aero was also running all the time, which didn’t help either.

Conclusion

As with every new Windows version, gamers across the world have to decide when to jump ship (after all, with new DirectX versions Microsoft literally forces us to do it sooner or later). With previous Windows versions it took up to a year before it was actually wise to move completely to the newcomer, as compatibility and stability issues were abundant. Vista is not safe from them either, but it is considerably more stable gaming-wise than Windows XP was at launch. Games also work almost as well and sometimes even better than in the old version.

So, to wrap things up with a metaphor – is Vista gaming ready to set sail? The hull (performance) is watertight and the mast (support) is well fortified. The DX9 sail is lowered and there is some favorable wind blowing. But seeing how Vista is a bigger beast than XP ever was it will take the full help of the DX10 sail to gain enough momentum to surpass its biggest competitor, which is ironically Windows XP.

It is fair to say that ATI's latest drivers for Vista are a very strong set for being so early in the development cycle and we are sure 2007 will see further advancements with performance, especially with the new hardware around the corner.

How does the Nvidia solution compare for gaming in Vista? Be sure to check back soon for Part 2 of our Vista gaming analysis.