Author: Matt Taylor
Date: 11:58:34 01/31/03
Go up one level in this thread
On January 31, 2003 at 11:48:45, David Rasmussen wrote: >On January 31, 2003 at 02:53:19, Matt Taylor wrote: > >> >>Supposedly Windows XP has increased performance due to a 10% lower system call >>latency. It also comes with more bugs. Many more bugs. >> > >I've heard that myth many times. I've never experienced it myself, though. Most >often when people complain, it's when they're trying to use an old driver or old >program that is badly programmed, and therefore doesn't work on XP. This is a >good thing, IMO. What bugs have you experienced? I don't mean the kernel. The kernel is roughly the same. There is an old bug that dates back to NT4 days (or possibly prior) where Windows Explorer will lock a file for no apparent reason and will not unlock it even across reboots. The only solution I have found is to terminate explorer and use a command prompt to move/delete the file. The bug is old, but I ran Windows 2000 for over a year without experiencing the bug at all. I see it multiple times per month with XP. There are also a fair number of graphical bugs, and the ZIP support in Windows Explorer is awful. (I am glad I am accustomed to using InfoZIP on Windows.) Personally, regarding the system call claim, I don't think that's really an issue. Over a spanse of 2-3 minutes I observed roughly 400,000 system calls starting from boot time. After boot time, the rate slows -dramatically-, but I do not have any figures to substantiate that. Drivers...heh. I do blame nVidia and Creative Labs for their own bugs. There is no excuse for crashing in 2D mode. Creative Labs Audigy drivers are so buggy that I crash hourly when using DirectSound. >>My personal preference would be Windows 2000, but XP has the compelling Remote >>Desktop and IEEE over 1394 features. >> > >Windows 2000 is nice too. > >/David Depends on your needs. I find Remote Desktop to be extremely useful for what I do. If not for Remote Desktop, I'd definitely be using Windows 2000. (I can't get IEEE over 1394 to work.) For a computer that does nothing but compute Chess, Windows 2000 is probably quite attractive since it does less behind your back. -Matt
This page took 0 seconds to execute
Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700
Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.