You got love it. Rumors are already surfacing that XP SP3 is twice as fast as Vista SP1. Naturally no data is brought forth to substantiate these finding, but it does make for good reading. So with this in mind, I decided to run some unscientific tests on my test computer that currently dual boots Vista with the SP1 beta and XP with the SP3 beta. The nice thing about this type of setup is that both systems use the same computer with the same specifications.

Before I begin posting the results, I just want to say that I would suspect that XP is going to be quicker. Why? Those pretty graphics and sidebar take some time to load. Whereas XP is void of this eye candy. So I sat down with my stop watch in hand to take a look-see which is faster. Another side note. These are beta releases only and performance for both may improve when the final releases are released.

Well I did these tests 3 times just to confirm my findings. I timed boot up for each from the dual boot menu, opening MS Word, Firefox and Internet Explorer in both operating systems. I won’t bore you with the times, but not surprising Windows XP is a whopping 50% faster + in all of the above. On second thought, maybe it is surprising. Until one actually times the events, I really hadn’t perceived that much of a difference after installing SP1.

One note. Vista with SP1 is definitely faster than without SP1. It was really poky before the update.

Maybe I should includes the times for my system:

Vista boot 1min. 21 sec., Word 2007 13 sec., Firefox 15 sec., and I.E. 9 sec.

XP boot 50 sec. , Word 2003 6 sec., Firefox 10 sec., and I.E. 6 sec.

Another thing I noticed. On both Vista and XP I have AVG Free Edition running which needed updating. On XP it connected immediately to the download server and updated quickly. On Vista it took about 20 seconds [I didn’t actually time it], before a connection with the server was made. In all fairness this could of been the AVG server itself and does not truly reflect anything.

Again, this was totally none scientific and only with one computer system. Before coming to any solid conclusions, I’d like to get some other opinions. We may have to wait until both beta’s are released to the public for testing.

Comments welcome.

Tags: vista, xp, windows, service packs, beta, testing