The core need for Vista to run smoother is a PCI-x based video card 128
MB minimum. Then comes the Processor 2.0ghz minimum in from the
Centrino, Turion, Duo Core, P4, and Athlon lines. Be advised in Laptops
9 cell Li batteries get expended faster In Vista than XP, but Vista has
a easy adjustment power feature. Finally the minimum RAM is PC 4200,
but that hurts; Hope you have at least 1GB of DDR 2 with any of the
aforementioned processors but best results with a ATI or NVIDIA PCI-X
Video card.
Check the ratings of the machines that people are complaining about are
they above two maybe at 3. I had tested 8 different environments and my
best experience was with my Gateway that had a AMD turion, with 2 GB
DDR2, and ATI x1300. My rating was 5 and of course I had upgraded my HD
to a 120 GB 7200 rpm unit prior to install of Ultimate. I ran the Side
Bar, had the full time slideshow and would run my lan scans and other
apps with no issue. The laptop investment was over 1500 but I was
running factory XP, so when it came time to go to Vista I felt I had
more power than a lot of the Desktops I tested.
AGP video cards will run Vista but not very well. DDR2 can boost a
little performance with an older box, but may as well put together a
nicer more modern PC.
Did I mention that if you are strapped for memory you can plug in a USB
drive and use it speed up your VISTA system by having temp system files
run there? This helps all of our 512Mb users out there.
Have a good day
Timo Vasquez- D.S.S. Team Member
Michigan State University
Administrative Information Services
[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
517-353-4420 ext 249
________________________________
From: MSU Network Administrators Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Scott Cassaday
Sent: Friday, September 21, 2007 1:06 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [MSUNAG] Windows Vista Aero transparency CPU costs
We have been testing vista at IMC since may. The whole aero shell also
takes up much more ram than you would expect. All of the "pretty"
textures and such are all done in a pretty high resolution and depending
on your settings are even presented in "HD". Most of these graphics are
stored in the system cache until use. Right now after a cold boot and
with only windows mail open I only have 45% of my ram available... out
of 2 gigs. And the ram hog is, you guessed it dwm.exe, sidebar.exe and
explorer.exe.
Long and short of it, vista is a pretty looking ram hog.
Although, to be fair, I do like the OS. Other than its ram usage I cant
say as though I have seen many other problems.
The networking setup was a pain though...
Scott Cassaday
Network Administrator
Instructional Media Center
Michigan State University
517-432-8193
[log in to unmask]
----- Original Message -----
From: Richard Wiggins <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Friday, September 21, 2007 11:16 AM
Subject: [MSUNAG] Windows Vista Aero transparency CPU costs
I upgraded to Windows Vista a couple months ago because I needed
to experience it in order to write about it and understand what
customers are going through.
My Thinkpad Z61t has been sluggish compared to running XP,
something documented in the trade press. This morning I was looking at
Task Manager to see what proceses were eating up CPU. A module called
dwm.exe was consistently taking up 12% or so of CPU.
Turns out this is the Desktop Window Manager, which handles the
transparency effects and other new features such as seeing a preview of
a window by mousing over its place on the Taskbar.
I disabled the transparency effect and dwm.exe fell to using
about 5-6% of CPU.
As it happens, I can't stand the transparency effect. It makes
it harder to discern the top edge of the current window and it costs a
lot of CPU. Others using or deploying Vista may want to try turning it
off.
/rich
