XP or Not XP -- That Is the Question

Or to put it another way... should I upgrade to Windows Vista or stay with Windows XP? A lot of people still aren't convinced that upgrading to the newest Windows operating system is the best route. In fact, a recent study by Forrester Research indicates that 84% of North American and European companies are currently using Windows XP. Additionally, some users who have upgraded to Vista are reinstalling Windows XP on their systems. They cite software and hardware compatibility issues and increased memory requirements (ideally, you should have at least 1GB RAM and more is better) as just a couple of (expensive) reasons why upgrading may not be a good idea. On the other hand, Windows Vista has a cool new interface, increased security, and improved search functions, just to name a few of the new features and benefits this OS provides. And let's not forget that at some point, Microsoft will stop supporting Windows XP. So, what to do? Many companies and individuals have adopted a wait and see attitude and have been planning to reevaluate their options after the first Vista service pack is released.

Well, that time is almost here. And the preliminary results aren't looking good for Vista. Microsoft expects to release Service Pack 1 for Vista and Service Pack 3 for Windows XP in early to mid-2008. According to testers at Devil Mountain Software who are working with early versions of these releases, XP SP3 is outperforming Vista XP1 on everyday computing tasks. Benchmark comparisons show that the current version, Windows XP SP2, already handles typical tasks 50 to 100 percent faster than Vista. After applying the service packs, Windows XP SP3 actually improved its speed by 10 percent! TechNewsWorld provides additional details on their blog, and the blog by Devil Mountain Software researchers - exo.blog - includes graphs and comparison charts, just to make the differences even more obvious.

It should be noted that these are preliminary test results. Hopefully, Microsoft will continue tweaking and refining the Vista service pack to provide better final results. However, it doesn't look like improved speed and efficiency is the main objective of this service pack and users who were hoping for increased performance results may be sorely disappointed.

Discussion Questions for Students
1. Have you upgraded to Vista yet, or purchased a new computer with Vista already installed? If so, what version of Vista are you using and what are your impressions of this new operating system so far?
2. What are benchmark comparisons? (Note: This may be a good hands-on exercise for students -- Ask them to search for some benchmark tests online or to create their own. Select several that would be appropriate to test, divide the students into groups, and ask them to run the tests on computers with different operating systems. If no one has access to a machine running Vista, try running the tests on an older version of Windows, such as Windows 2000 or 98. Have the students present their findings and discuss and compare their results.)
3. Findings seem to indicate that Vista's architecture, not bugs, are behind the lower performance results. Would you be willing to use a slower computer if it was more stable (i.e. less crashes or freezes) than a faster computer? When does slow become too slow?
4. How do you feel about releasing preliminary reports such as this, knowing that the final version of a product may change considerably? Is it fair to the consumer or the manufacturer? Will you take the time to find out what the final version can do or will you have already made up your mind based on early information?