Windows 7: Release Candidate 1 Preview
by Ryan Smith and Gary Key on May 5, 2009 11:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Systems
Power Consumption
We measured "platform" power consumption at the wall outlet using a Watts Up Pro power meter. We do not include the power numbers for a monitor or external speakers; however, we do install a set of headphones in the audio out jack. We also turn on all peripherals in the BIOS along with enabling all power saving features in the BIOS. We measured idle power consumption after 15 minutes of inactivity and the average power consumption while running the Canyon Flight benchmark in 3DMark06. Power management is set to "Balanced" mode and the prefetch folder is cleared for each test.
At idle, Windows XP Pro x64 has the lowest power usage in both single card and dual card operation. Under load, Windows 7 has a very slight advantage compared to the other operating systems. However, there are no real differences overall between Windows 7 and Vista.
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Lexington02 - Wednesday, May 6, 2009 - link
He is not late, he is claiming otherwise to the other people who think that Anandtech is MS loving while this dude is claiming to be Apple loving. I wonder, which is true... Apple lovers or Microsoft lovers...Lexington02 - Wednesday, May 6, 2009 - link
He is not late, he is claiming otherwise to the other people who think that Anandtech is MS loving while this dude is claiming to be Apple loving. I wonder, which is true... Apple lovers or Microsoft lovers...Ryan Smith - Thursday, May 7, 2009 - link
From my perspective, if I'm being accused of being an Apple and a Microsoft fanboy in the same article, then I must be doing something right.;-)I'll note that I have a preference for Mac OS X if given a choice, but I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll talk more about that in next week's Ubuntu article.
strikeback03 - Thursday, May 7, 2009 - link
That was my point - I have long stated that 90% of the articles here that compare something generate comments from both sides claiming bias each way. So the anti-Apple comments were late arriving compared to the anti-MS ones.Are we really going to get a Ubuntu article? Is it now on the transition to 9.04 instead of 8.04?
Ryan Smith - Thursday, May 7, 2009 - link
8.04 (because it's the LTS and most comparable to Windows/Mac OS X as such), to be followed up with 9.04.strikeback03 - Thursday, May 7, 2009 - link
Cool. 9.04 finally resolved some out-of-the-box compatibility problems my desktop has had with each release since I started (6.10)Gary Key - Thursday, May 7, 2009 - link
I am still a big fan of DR-DOS. Does that mean I am anti-MS also? :)MichaelD - Wednesday, May 6, 2009 - link
This is important for me as that's what I use for an AV/AM solution. Overall, it looks very impressive, particularly for a RC; it may just get me away from XP.masterbm - Wednesday, May 6, 2009 - link
I have been using windows 7 on my old amd socket 939 4200 4gb ram 8800gs. I started since build 7000. I started out being guy how felt that I was going to stay on vista for most of my machine I will upgrade to windows when it released. My htpc/file server at this time I plan on leaving it at vista. Due to their is no really good way to convert the .wtv format. This htpc box is automated in since it defrag it self scan it self for virus and spyware. Then It just added auto convert of the show that records. I took while to do that stuff not sure if want do every again.(also note htpc is amd 3800)The other thing I will note is that windows 7 becuase it feels snappier has made use that system more then use tofausto412 - Wednesday, May 6, 2009 - link
They need to make the defrag problem able to do more than one drive at a time...or to schedule them out.