Why I like Windows

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: edhackett

They compared it to equal hardware, IBM and the like servers.


But were the CPU's the same model number? was the chipset the same? These are important distinctions.

Quote:
They weren't running windows as a virtual OS on the Mac, they were booting in Windows.


So they were using BootCamp?

Quote:
The hardware may indeed be the same but the implementation varies.


Not really. Normally what people think is the same isn't. You have to match the chipset, memory clock....etc. There a pile of nuances that need to align for the comparison to be truly equal.

Quote:
I see that even with standard wintel machines here in the lab. I have one instrument that would crash the software with a main bus overload when run on Compaq or HP machines. It's been rock steady for 7 years on a Dell. The company explained that Dell held the timing on the bus to tighter tolerances. Ed


Sounds more like a BIOS bug on the HP/Compaq boxes (they are the same company). I've run into a similar issue with Lenovo, where they eventually fixed it with a BIOS upgrade.

 

[edhackett]

Yes, running BootCamp. I don't know the specifics of the various computers. An RFP was issued for computers meeting X specifications to be submitted for evaluation.

It could have been the bios. The Compaq would crash several times a day. The HP once a day, and would occasionally make it through a day. I haven't discounted the software itself as being specifically sensitive to timing(maybe not written as well as it could be).

Ed

 

[Garak]

Originally Posted By: uc50ic4more
I use Arch on my personal system.

I've set Ubuntu up for plenty of uninitiated people, and they've been happy with it. I like to think I'm pretty competent with software (I've provided tech support in Linux for Windows techs who were out of their depth

), but that doesn't mean I want to try Arch or anything similarly difficult just for the fun of it, either. I've only had to compile from source once, and it's something I'll avoid unless I have to. For my minimalist application (to run some legacy hardware), I run FreeDOS on a PIII. That's pretty quick, too.

Originally Posted By: Mystic
Let me correct you here. I was almost talked into switching to Linux right here at this website. And somebody here, I can't remember who, told me that I should write my own drivers for my printers and scanner. So when you say that nobody is going to suggest you writer your own driver, it happened right here at this website.

I'll take your word for it. That's the beauty and curse of Linux - choice. You can have something like Ubuntu that will work with most hardware at least as well as Windows will (better with my HP printer and NIC card, both of which want drivers in Windows), not to mention speed and safety. Then, as uc50ic4more and I mentioned above, there are distributions that are not for the faint of heart.

Heck, there are more forks of Ubuntu out there right now than there are different versions of Windows commercially available, let alone all the other Linux distributions out there. It can be text based or GUI; for a server or a desktop or a mobile device. Some aren't even designed to be actually installed in the first place.

So yes, someone could tell you that you need to write your own drivers. With certain distros, that would certainly be the case. If I told you to install Knoppix, SELinux, NST, or even Arch on your home based system, that would be some pretty disingenuous advice on my part.

However, that doesn't mean that Linux is a bad idea. If someone recommended that a person who lives paycheque to paycheque and has eight kids buy a brand new Vette as his primary vehicle, that's bad advice. That doesn't mean he should strike all Chevrolets off his list of potential vehicles.

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: JHZR2
Originally Posted By: edhackett
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL


I'd be interesting in seeing these performance figures. Please share them if you don't mind.


I can't provide numbers or specifics, but can confirm what gr8gatzby has observed. I have a colleague here at work that does modeling. They run the model on a Mac Pro tower running windows. It is faster and more stable than any of the high end wintel computers that were tried.

Ed


I agree and it is more than just hardware. My mac runs the atomic theory models and data fits far faster than my colleague's dell. Mine is a C2D, he has an i7. I wouldnt believe it unless I saw it. We ran multiple tests with our stuff. i am running on OSX, while he on W7.


It isn't the hardware at all.

You aren't running this software in a Windows 7 VM on top of OSX, which is what we are discussing with respect to performance benchmarks.

Using OSX is no different than using xBSD, Linux....etc for virtualization. Which is ultimately what is normally running on the server hardware that what is used in the MacPro compares to.

There are many pieces of software that work a LOT better on a *nix OS than on Windows. That doesn't mean the hardware in whatever box is running OSX is somehow magically better. It isn't. A XEON of a given model number is a XEON of a given model #.

A more telling demonstration of this for you and your example would be for you to use BootCamp and boot into a Windows 7 environment and run the test there.

I have done it three ways. Osx, w7 in parallels, and w7 booted direct.

Yep, running in osx is best, but all variants are faster, believe it or not.

I chalked the w7 vs w7 to mine being a clean install and his being a dell...

Sure, a Xeon is a Xeon. I don't necessarily buy that all the capacitors and other components are exactly the same grade, just judging by my firsthand MTBF.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: JHZR2

I have done it three ways. Osx, w7 in parallels, and w7 booted direct.

Yep, running in osx is best, but all variants are faster, believe it or not.

I chalked the w7 vs w7 to mine being a clean install and his being a dell...

Sure, a Xeon is a Xeon. I don't necessarily buy that all the capacitors and other components are exactly the same grade, just judging by my firsthand MTBF.


The other possibility is that your C2D (remember, these are all evolutions of the Pentium-3, Pentium-M...etc) is clocked higher than his i7 by enough of a margin that it makes up for the difference.

Check out this chart:

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/laptop.html

You'll see that for example, the Core2Duo E8435 is faster than the i7 L640

 

[NJC]

Originally Posted By: grndslm
Just don't act like Windows actually offers anything more than games...

http://www.ubuntu.com/ubuntu

A few reasons:

- Picasa (running under Wine in Linux is [censored])
- Camera software is smooth and seamless in XP
- Irfanview in XP
- Windows Explorer is 10x faster than Nautilus. I'd like to see what computer could run Nautilus quickly. I'm starting to despise how slow and laggy it is (yes I know how to turn off thumbnail viewing).
- Bittorrent. I have the same port forwarding in Linux, yet I'm able to achieve faster downloads.

I'm not a MS shill, and have used Ubuntu since 6.06. But there's a very solid reason Linux has a a>.

 

[Brandon Gatz]

Interesting copy benchmark:

File transfer:

3.72gb
ThinkPad: 18 minutes
Macbook: 4 minutes

6.11gb file:
ThinkPad: 22 minutes
Macbook: 5 minutes


ThinkPad T61/2.1 Core Duo/3GB/Win7 SP1

MacBook 2.0 Core Duo/2Gb/10.6.3

The mac is 7 years old.

 

[Rand]

Originally Posted By: gr8gatzby
Interesting copy benchmark:

File transfer:

3.72gb
ThinkPad: 18 minutes
Macbook: 4 minutes

6.11gb file:
ThinkPad: 22 minutes
Macbook: 5 minutes


ThinkPad T61/2.1 Core Duo/3GB/Win7 SP1

MacBook 2.0 Core Duo/2Gb/10.6.3

The mac is 7 years old.


not sure what you are trying to say there..... about 4 different wireless options on those..

My t520 with the good wireless option connects and transfers much faster than the t400 I had with the base cheapo wireless.


hardware is hardware.

 

[Brandon Gatz]

Originally Posted By: Rand
Originally Posted By: gr8gatzby
Interesting copy benchmark:

File transfer:

3.72gb
ThinkPad: 18 minutes
Macbook: 4 minutes

6.11gb file:
ThinkPad: 22 minutes
Macbook: 5 minutes


ThinkPad T61/2.1 Core Duo/3GB/Win7 SP1

MacBook 2.0 Core Duo/2Gb/10.6.3

The mac is 7 years old.


not sure what you are trying to say there..... about 4 different wireless options on those..

My t520 with the good wireless option connects and transfers much faster than the t400 I had with the base cheapo wireless.


hardware is hardware.



This was a simple file transfer from an 8GB Kingston flash drive, 802.11(x) was not involved. The hardware on the Wintel was C2D with 3GB RAM, the Mac is Core Duo with 2GB RAM. OSX ftw.

 

[SwampSurvivor]

Originally Posted By: gr8gatzby
Originally Posted By: Rand
Originally Posted By: gr8gatzby
Interesting copy benchmark:

File transfer:

3.72gb
ThinkPad: 18 minutes
Macbook: 4 minutes

6.11gb file:
ThinkPad: 22 minutes
Macbook: 5 minutes


ThinkPad T61/2.1 Core Duo/3GB/Win7 SP1

MacBook 2.0 Core Duo/2Gb/10.6.3

The mac is 7 years old.


not sure what you are trying to say there..... about 4 different wireless options on those..

My t520 with the good wireless option connects and transfers much faster than the t400 I had with the base cheapo wireless.


hardware is hardware.



This was a simple file transfer from an 8GB Kingston flash drive, 802.11(x) was not involved. The hardware on the Wintel was C2D with 3GB RAM, the Mac is Core Duo with 2GB RAM. OSX ftw.


I find it quite humorous .. you DO realize that the apple computers use Intel now, right?

So the macbook has a faster USB bus on it. Wow! I'm glad to know that if I overpay for a shiny piece of hardware it has fast usb transfer speeds.

In fact, I'm going to drop $1500 on a Macbook tonight because of that ...

 

[Brandon Gatz]

1) Judging by hardware alone, this Macbook is technically slower in every metric than the ThinkPad against which it is being measured for this simple file transfer. So we can only assume that the operating system is the progenitor of this vast difference in speed.

2) A new Macbook can be had for $999. The 7 year old mac used in this test was purchased for $125 last week.

3)
Quote:
I find it quite humorous .. you DO realize that the apple computers use Intel now, right?
Strange thing to say, as I listed the Intel hardware in both previous posts.

4)
Quote:
So the macbook has a faster USB bus on it.
Incorrect. They both have USB 2.0

 

[Brandon Gatz]

Hey if y'all are ever in Charlotte, NC, stop by my shop( Dogma Computers). We can run these side by side mac and pc tests together.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

Originally Posted By: gr8gatzby
Originally Posted By: Rand
Originally Posted By: gr8gatzby
Interesting copy benchmark:

File transfer:

3.72gb
ThinkPad: 18 minutes
Macbook: 4 minutes

6.11gb file:
ThinkPad: 22 minutes
Macbook: 5 minutes


ThinkPad T61/2.1 Core Duo/3GB/Win7 SP1

MacBook 2.0 Core Duo/2Gb/10.6.3

The mac is 7 years old.


not sure what you are trying to say there..... about 4 different wireless options on those..

My t520 with the good wireless option connects and transfers much faster than the t400 I had with the base cheapo wireless.


hardware is hardware.



This was a simple file transfer from an 8GB Kingston flash drive, 802.11(x) was not involved. The hardware on the Wintel was C2D with 3GB RAM, the Mac is Core Duo with 2GB RAM. OSX ftw.


Was the USB drive formatted NTFS or FAT32? a 6.11 GB will not fit on an 8GB stick if formatted FAT32, 4GB is the max file size for such file system. Many USB sticks come that way as it will work on any system w/o the end-user worrying about file systems. The USB stick must be reformatted NTFS for a file that large to fit on there.

 

[Brandon Gatz]

Originally Posted By: ToyotaNSaturn
Originally Posted By: gr8gatzby
Originally Posted By: Rand
Originally Posted By: gr8gatzby
Interesting copy benchmark:

File transfer:

3.72gb
ThinkPad: 18 minutes
Macbook: 4 minutes

6.11gb file:
ThinkPad: 22 minutes
Macbook: 5 minutes


ThinkPad T61/2.1 Core Duo/3GB/Win7 SP1

MacBook 2.0 Core Duo/2Gb/10.6.3

The mac is 7 years old.


not sure what you are trying to say there..... about 4 different wireless options on those..

My t520 with the good wireless option connects and transfers much faster than the t400 I had with the base cheapo wireless.


hardware is hardware.



This was a simple file transfer from an 8GB Kingston flash drive, 802.11(x) was not involved. The hardware on the Wintel was C2D with 3GB RAM, the Mac is Core Duo with 2GB RAM. OSX ftw.


Was the USB drive formatted NTFS or FAT32? a 6.11 GB will not fit on an 8GB stick if formatted FAT32, 4GB is the max file size for such file system. Many USB sticks come that way as it will work on any system w/o the end-user worrying about file systems. The USB stick must be reformatted NTFS for a file that large to fit on there.


exFAT

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

Got it.

Have you seen this tweak?

http://waystoworld.com/review/2013/01/co...fs-file-system/

 

[simple_gifts]

Quote:

I find it quite humorous .. you DO realize that the apple computers use Intel now, right?

So the macbook has a faster USB bus on it. Wow! I'm glad to know that if I overpay for a shiny piece of hardware it has fast usb transfer speeds.


If you're suggesting hardware produces the same performance regardless of the OS, you are underestimating the importance of the OS.

Poorly written code, apparently epidemic in Windows, relegates most of our Dell servers to single task deployments, while our Dell boxes running Redhat carry almost unheard of workloads.

Our "golden rule" for deploying software is "We only deploy Windows if we have to" This is born out of years of real world enterprise experience.

Maybe windows should stop playing an AVI file when the user needs to copy files..... JMO

 

[Mystic]

I think it has been a while since Microsoft software was so poorly written. We have come a long ways since Windows XP. Windows 7, most people agree, runs pretty dang good.

Everybody says (all the people who know everything) run VLC open source software rather than just what Microsoft offers. Well, every time I open VLC player it seems to need an update, and sometimes it does not run very well.

Don't forget that I have a considerable amount of experience running Apple Computers. I have used Apple Computers since 1996. Apparently Apple does not always write the best software because sometimes the updates for an Apple OS are almost larger than the original OS itself. Hundreds and hundreds of megabits worth of updates to solve all kinds of issues, including security issues.

When it comes to security today few people realize that most of the security issues have nothing to do with Microsoft. Number one security issue today is usually Java. Remember when Java first came out and everybody was saying what awesome technology it was?

Number two and number three security issues today are usually Adobe Software Flash and Reader. Security holes in third party software now account for usually somewhere in the neighborhood of some 70% of security problems. It has been a long time since Microsoft software was the big security problem.

Where I work there are Unix and Windows servers and the Windows servers work just fine. In fact Windows servers have been replacing Unix servers. No Linux servers and no Redhat-sorry.

 

[Mystic]

Just now opened up VLC (open source software) Player and sure enough a new version was available. It slowed my computer down downloading the new version. Microsoft Windows updates download and install so much better. And sometimes this VLC Player really does not run very well.

 

[uc50ic4more]

Originally Posted By: Mystic
No Linux servers and no Redhat-sorry.


Red Hat is a Linux distribution.

Originally Posted By: Mystic
Just now opened up VLC (open source software) Player and sure enough a new version was available. It slowed my computer down downloading the new version. Microsoft Windows updates download and install so much better. And sometimes this VLC Player really does not run very well.


I think that any software, while downloading and updating itself, will slow your system down.

One of the reasons (actually, Mystic, the *only* reason) that a lot of people recommend VLC is that is comes bundled with, and therefore ready to play, pretty much any and every format of media under the sun. Windows Media Player, in very stark contrast, plays very few formats unless and until you install additional codecs. This usually means you have to go to a web site, download a codec's installation file and run the setup. The CCCP codec pack is very popular as it contains most of the codecs you'd ever need, but VLC makes it awfully handy as it plays this stuff right out of the box. It also runs on Mac and Linux; even the BSD family of OS's! So it's advantage is NOT performance or even resource usage, but ease of use due to it's bundled codecs. In the few Windows machines I have had to suffer using, VLC used more RAM and never performed as well as Windows Media Player; *presuming* Windows Media Player could play any given media file at all.

 

[Mystic]

The ONLY reason I keep using VLC is because it can run so many different file formats. Otherwise it really does not run all that well and is by no means as smooth as Microsoft software normally is. The programmers at Microsoft seem to me to be about as good as any other programmers.

And thankfully a Windows computer usually is able to operate my photo printers and scanners.

The never ending illogical hatred of Microsoft, Windows and Bill Gates gets very old. I am too mature to get into that kind of nonsense. Microsoft and Apple are just corporations. And Apple has its own issues. Linux computers are okay as servers. A Windows desktop is just fine in my book. And Apple Computers are fine also as desktop computers except sometimes the hardware support is not as good as I would like to see. And Apple Computers are expensive.