Windows 10: Windows 10 vs. Windows 8.1 vs. Windows 7 Performance

I have been using Win 10 Pro for about a week now. Up until yesterday I had horrible boot times. Both from cold and restart. Mine were in excess of 5 minutes either way. After a few updates yesterday that MS pushed my cold boot and restart times had dropped considerably. Both times are now about 30 seconds. I upgraded from Win 7 Pro and never had Win8.

 

Hi there

@pparks1 Just "having a Go".

Actually I LIKE W10 - seems to work for me -- I wasn't madly keen on W8.1 although I could have stuck with it.

I couldn't go back to W7 now either (actually have too much stuff now in Storage spaces -- I like these for robustness and being able to aggregate different size HDD's so I don't have to chuck all my old HDD's away - you don't need mega fast devices for media libraries - just a large amount of space and most multi-media servers etc have problems once your library exceeds capacity of a single volume with the old file systems).

Storage spaces also beat Software Raid -- you don't have to have all volumes same size (capacity) either unlike conventional RAID.

Cheers
jimbo

 

The test shows that Windows 8.1 is still a pretty good OS.
Now that the wait is over, Windows 10 is OK, but it's not that impressive, if you're coming from Windows 8.1.

 

. . .removed it with iObit Uninstaller 5, as of yet it has not returned. . .*Smile

 

Without your spec being posted there is no way to compare your's to mind. My system boots in about 12 seconds (very fast) and comes out of sp in in around five seconds. . .just love the speed (sorry don't use Win 7 some unable to compare. . .*Smile

 

Can't honestly argue with that.

I would rather have the things I like about 10 shoehorned under the hood of 8.1.1 than have a lot of the things I like about 8.1.1 taken away in 10.

For the record, I didn't think much of 8 without a lot of 3rd-party customisation. 8.1 was a big improvement on the original 8, but an 8.1.1 setup, suitably tweaked, is simply a superb OS by any measure. I actually feel a bit sorry for those who chose to bypass it, because they'll likely never know (or understand) what they missed.

I'm starting to like 10 more as I get to know it better, and learn or pick up the hacks and tweaks to make it both less ugly, and to work the way I (and not MS) want it to.


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That would be interesting to look into! I never use XBox or any other gaming system but still understand why MS would see this as something to include. I simply unpinned the tile from the Start box and replaced anything else not wanted with the apps I do run. I probably won't even get to use the uninstaller since I tend to avoid those as a rule anyways.

Gee having come all the way up from MS Dos and 3.1 through the 9X family not getting into ME or 2000 but onto "X P(ee)" and then relief with Vista came before finally a great OS 7 proved itself to be I wouldn't be without 7 for some time to come! No matter how good 10 turns out to be in the long run! W7 is a good and sturdy OS that was needed for 2009's launch! W10 looks like MS got the cross platform stuff worked out finally and of course the number "10" represents completion! *Biggrin

 

I do not measure my boot time, as it is so short so I don't mind it at all. But aprox. after 5-10 seconds (closer to 5) I am on the logon screen, entering PIN and voila. Of course, the processes take some time to load, but in max 5 seconds I am free to work. This is on UEFI MB and SSD.

 

Well that's it! Once you are at the desktop and still seeing the hard drive led if you have one still lit up solid or blinking on and off with more on time you know the startup items not just the system processes are still being loaded into ram! Your startup time will also be effected by how many programs do see their own processes load up at the same time which can slow things down a bit.

 

''Edge/IE? What is all that about? Don't know - don't care.'' You say don't care. but still asked a question in that sentence.

 

I haven't tried windows 8.1 but when I tried windows 10 (I tried both the upgrade, then clean install) it seemed a LOT slower than windows 7 !!

 

It's definitely slower when installing 10 even back when still in Tech Preview form as well as the 8 Customer Preview in comparison to how fast 7 went on! W7 has the record there unless going way back to 3.1 and 9x, ME days! Even 98SE took longer to install as the average time up until 7 was 39min. compared to 7's 20min.!

You would think that since 7 brought in the WinMin kernel that 8, 8.1, and 10 would go on just as fast until you look at what has been added in from the GUI part at least making the newer larger. Virtual desktops and multi-platform options as well as 8 having the Windows To Go option for portable on the flash drive type activity. This is one of the main reasons for seeing the Windows 10 installer as slow as the two previous versions while 7 stood out as just about the fastest.

Never toyed with 1.0 or 2.0 having started off with Dos and 3.1. Dos went right on being the one thing that could still take some time while never as long as Windows simply from the need to swap out floppy disks back in those days! The same for the early Windows.

 

In my experience using Win10 (since 07/29), it feels like a much more modern interface and appears very stable. I also like the fact that I can add apps (albeit kind of limited right now in the MS Store). But very simple things like instantly creating shortcuts (with the tiles) for apps like NetFlix, iHeart Radio, Flixster), or any other number of web apps in Win10.

What I don't particularly like are the privacy settings (or I should say lack of) that default in favor of Microsoft. And although minor on my SSD, the boot time to the desktop clearly takes a little longer in Win10 versus Win7. And there's one program that I cannot use in Win10 (Microsoft Money Sunset) without a lot of fiddling because it's not supported in this new OS.

 

Have you tried using the Compatibility troubleshooter when right clicking on the exe file for the MMSunset? Besides sometimes you can get an older app to run on 10 by using the "run as admin" option also available in the right click to get things going. Ran into a few things that needed it!

The one thing about privacy settings I tend to agree was seen right before finally reaching the desktop the first time during the final stage of the set up where you can opt for either Express settings by default or go in and disable sharing location and other data with MS and 3rd parties. You go back in there later however just as easy to re-enble or disble things found in the "Start>Settings>Privacy-location-camera" settings with the on and off slider tabs now seen you simply click on.

These type settings can easily be disabled but are included for things like beta testing and use in part by developers and others who are sharing data with MS. You might have seen them on the Tech Preview builds as well. The main reason why 8 and newer with 8.1 and now 10 the desktop takes longer to load is from seeing a slightly larger OS due to new features now being seen in addition to being able to "serve two masters" in that you can run 10 on the mobile/tablet platform as well as on the desktop.

That takes up some file space in order to see two entirely different hardware platforms available as well as syncing mobile devices to interact with the desktop while on the go. But can offer quite a bit for those who rely a great deal on their mobile devices for daily life. Even with all that now being seen however I will need a full clean install of 7 on the second case here now seeing both an upgrade to 10 and a clean install in order to really make the timing factor equal since the main machine is loaded up with a good number of startups. The second mini tower with only 4gb of memory makes for an excellent test machine there compared to the 16gb on the main case as well.

 

I see some folks saying that Windows 10 seems "stable" to them.

Honestly, I don't see it myself. For me, I feel like I constantly have to walk on eggshells in Windows 10. It seems like something -- be it the operating system itself, the Start menu, the taskbar, or any number of apps -- is ready to crash.

Now, that may be because I am making an actual effort to use the built-in apps. I have not uninstalled them; I am trying to use them like regular desktop apps and give feedback in the Feedback app.

But the backend for the new app system in Windows 10 seems extremely buggy to me. Even when it doesn't crash, it seems to seize up or freeze. I've had a thousand times the problems with the Start menu in Windows 10 than I ever did in Windows 7 or Windows 8/8.1. And I honestly believe that is because the Start menu in Windows 10 is built on the same universal-app platform that the new apps in Windows 10 are, unlike in the Start menu in Windows 7 and Windows 8 which used the standard Win32 backend.