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The right time to assess Windows Vista’s performance

Measuring the performance of an operating system is a tricky thing.  At the same time, it's the right and necessary thing to do, because performance is one of many criteria important to customers.  Part of the trick of measuring performance is to time testing execution with the product cycle such that the results are as meaningful as possible for customers; this helps them make a better decision by making use of the full array of available information.  As one example, about a year ago we commissioned a firm called Principled Technologies to conduct a study comparing Windows XP SP2 to Windows Vista RTM.  That study found the performance measures of the two operating systems were within the same range for many tasks that home and business users frequently perform under real-world conditions.

My point is that we waited to conduct these benchmarking tests until Windows Vista had reached the RTM milestone in the product cycle, as this allowed us to provide our customers the most meaningful data available at the time -- the data most likely to directly affect their decision to upgrade to Windows Vista.  We do a whole range of performance tests at every stage of the OS development process, but, as a general rule, we avoid sharing benchmark tests of software that hasn't gone RTM (i.e., final code).  This explains why we have not to date published any findings of benchmark tests (nor commissioned anyone to do so) on performance improvements brought about by Windows Vista SP1.  Publishing benchmarks of the performance of Windows Vista SP1 now wouldn't be a worthwhile exercise for our customers, as the code is still in development and, to the degree that benchmarking tests are involved, remains a moving target.

Aside from that point, let me also emphasize that there are a variety of ways to benchmark the performance of a PC.  Different techniques can yield different results.  Some benchmark techniques simply test PC hardware performance by running a series of tasks at superhuman speed.  Such tests tend to exaggerate small differences between test platforms and consequently are used less frequently nowadays, replaced in favor of benchmarks running tasks at human speeds with realistic waits and data entry.  Benchmarks that run at superhuman speeds often deliver results that don't tell the whole story.  In fact, we made deliberate choices during the development of Windows Vista to focus on real-world scenarios affecting user experience, rather than focusing on improvement of microsecond operations imperceptible to the user.  In addition, in Windows many operations can require additional processing time for work that is done for reasons that benefit the customer; these can include security, reliability or application compatibility checks conducted when a program launches.  These operations may add microseconds to an individual application's launch that under real usage isn't perceivable to the human eye.  When thousands such operations are strung together through automation, those few microseconds can have a cumulative effect on the benchmark result, causing performance to appear much better or worse than expected.

I've included below a video we captured depicting a "benchmark test" running a window-open, window-close routine at accelerated speed.  You can see that it isn't representative of real-world user behavior and hence isn't an accurate gauge of the actual end-user experience.  Further, tests like these only measure a very small set of Windows capabilities and so aren't representative of the user's overall day-to-day experience of working with Windows and running applications.

Video: Windows Vista benchmark testing

Methods like those of Principled Technologies that actually approximate the experience of using the PC, taking an OS through the paces of completing actual tasks at the approximate pace a user might click through them, tend to provide results far more useful to our customers.  The typical Windows customer generally wants to know how his/her actual computing experience will change (read: improve) with an upgrade.  The Principled Technologies tests do that.

For what it's worth, I can personally attest that I prefer to get my work done on Windows Vista SP1 RC bits.  I run Windows Vista RTM on two production machines and SP1 RC bits on two others; in fact, I'm writing this post on a machine with SP1 RC bits installed.  As a part of our internal SP1 testing program, I know that we continue to develop and improve SP1 every day, in large part based on feedback and bug submissions from external an internal Beta-test program members.  IMO, the perceived gains in performance between SP1 Beta and SP1 RC code are significant.  As I said at the beginning, though, performance is only part of the story -- don't forget that SP1 also brings support for new types of hardware and several emerging standards, and further eases an IT administrator's deployment and management efforts.

But don't take my word alone for it.  We'll broaden the testing pool of SP1 RC bits soon (very soon), so when I post that notice here on the blog, you'll be able to put Windows Vista SP1 RC through its paces yourself.  I think you'll find the experience worthwhile and satisfying.

Firefox 2.0.0.11 Out - No Security Fixes

ColdFusion Positions In CA And FL

• eBay (San Jose, CA) is looking for a ColdFusion developer. Requirements include at least 2-3 years of experience with ColdFusion, at least 2-3 years of SQL experience (Oracle, MySQL), and familiarity with frameworks and related technologies (Model-Glue, Fusebox, ColdBox). Flex experience is a big plus. Details posted online.
• Duty Free Americas (Hollywood, FL) is looking for a mid-senior level web developer. Requirements include at least 2 years ColdFusion experience, as well as experience using ColdFusion Components, and SQL Server T-SQL. Experience with Flash CS3, Flex, ActionScript is preferred. Contact DFAJobs@DutyFreeAmericas.com.

Desktops: Penryn PC Takes Power Prize

The first desktop we’ve tested with Intel’s new Penryn CPU tops our chart.

Ask Our Experts: Connect USB External Drives Wirelessly?

Can external hard drives become network-attached storage over Wi-Fi?

ProcessLibrary Upgrade Makes Troubleshooting Easier

The Wisdom of Chuck

The First Year of IE7

It’s been a little over a year since we released IE7 on Windows XP and for Windows Vista, so I thought it would be worthwhile to talk about where we are after the year.

According to internal Microsoft research based on data from Visual Sciences Corporation, there are over 300 million users are experiencing the web with IE7. This makes IE7 the second most popular browser after IE6. IE7 is already #1 in the US and UK, and we expect IE7 to surpass IE6 worldwide shortly.

Perhaps more important than the overall numbers is the positive impact IE7 has made for our users. As you know, we focused a lot on improving security in IE7. We believe IE 7 is the safest Microsoft browser released to date. According to a vulnerability report published today, IE7 has fewer vulnerabilities than previous versions of IE over the same time period. What’s more, the report showed that IE7 had both fewer fixed and unfixed vulnerabilities in the first year than the other browsers we compared.

In addition to having fewer vulnerabilities, as we previously mentioned, IE 7’s Phishing Filter stops more than 900,000 phishing attempts per week, stopping crimes-in-progress before users give up their personal information. On top of that, more sites are adopting Extended Validation Certificates as a way to help protect their users from fraud, and people are noticing. A recent USA Today article noted that “for the ultimate peace of mind, look for the address bar to turn green in IE7” in the context of securely connecting with your broker.

Finally, we’ve seen a decrease of 10-20% in the support call volume for IE compared with a year ago, before the release of IE7. This is typically a sign that the product is more stable and has fewer issues than the previous release.

While we’re happy with how well IE7 is doing, as always, we continue to listen to our customers and find ways to further improve Internet Explorer. Look for more news on this front in the coming weeks.

Tony Chor
Group Program Manager

A Speedy Tablet and a Bargain Laptop Debut

The low-cost T-6815 and the convertible E-295C, formerly under the Gateway brand and now sold by MPC, enter our all-purpose laptops chart.

A $30 Inkjet Competes With Printers Thrice Its Price

Lexmark’s extremely budget-priced Z1300 inkjet printer claims the ninth spot on our latest chart.

Sony LocationFree Tops Slingbox Solo

Sony’s LF-V30 LocationFree delivers sharp video and audio, while the Slingbox Solo supports multiple devices.

BlogCFC Export/Import Code

RIAForge Schedular Mystery Solved (Mostly)

Top 10 Inkjet Printers

These are the top Inkjet Printers today, but ratings and rankings can change quickly due to pricing and technology changes, so check back frequently for the latest info.

McAfee Internet Security Suite

McAfee’s Internet Security Suite has ample features, including a backup program and antispam plug-ins for Windows Mail and Thunderbird; but threat detection could be better.

Symantec Norton Internet Security 2008

Symantec’s Norton Internet Security 2008 suite offers solid security protection and features, including the best behavior-based defense against unknown threats.

CA Internet Security Suite Plus 2008

CA’s easy-to-use security suite lacks sufficient protection to stop many of today’s threats. Don’t rely on it.

BitDefender Internet Security 2008

BitDefender was an excellent performer among security suites, but it’s best for experts who don’t need guidance regarding security extras and pop-up alerts and who don’t mind therough interface.

Avira Premium Security Suite

Avira’s great threat detection is offset by a dearth of various features typical of a security suite.

Kaspersky Internet Security 7.0

Kaspersky’s top-tier Internet security suite scans slowly, but otherwise it performs well. It responds quickly to new outbreaks and has a nice design.

Trend Micro Internet Security 2008

The Trend Micro security suite combines a good feature set and solid malware disinfection, but those benefits are offset by below-average detection as well as interface and installation bugs.

Checkpoint ZoneAlarm Internet SecuritySuite 7.1

Checkpoint offers a full-featured firewall, but the rest of the suite is flawed.

Tools for Detecting Memory Leaks

Hi everyone,

As many web devs know, it’s relatively easy to build a site which results in memory leaks when viewed in Internet Explorer. IE team members have written MSDN articles on leak patterns, and other sites have posted articles with varying tone, depending on the author’s frustration with the problem.

These memory leaks often occur as a result of circular references between Jscript objects and objects within IE’s DOM (document object model). Since the Jscript engine and IE have independent memory management schemes, each side can’t see the entire cycle of these circular references.

Internet Explorer 7 improved the situation by releasing all references to Jscript objects attached to the DOM tree when IE navigates away from that page. This allows the Jscript engine to then garbage collect those Jscript objects and recover that memory. We’ve also made the same changes in IE6 on Windows XP SP2 (shipped originally with the June Update). However, as some web developers have pointed out, those changes don’t solve the problem entirely. IE still leaves behind anything not attached to the tree when we tear down the markup. In addition, sites that users keep open for extended periods of time, such as Web-based mail, can still cause IE’s memory usage to continually grow if the site doesn’t take care to avoid the leak patterns.

So no, it’s not perfect, but we’re also continuing to invest in improvements for future versions of IE.

In the meantime, tools and best practices can help web developers find and remove leaks today.

Drip and sIEve (joint SourceFourge site) are two such tools. Many of you may already be familiar with them, but a little extra visibility never hurts. Both applications host Trident – IE’s rendering engine – and add detection of memory leak patterns. They let you track memory and DOM usage while using a site and then detect any leaks when you navigate away from that page. Drip is an open source project under the BSD license. Based on Drip, sIEve improves the usability in a few ways including non-modal dialogs and a real-time graph of DOM usage instead of memory usage. If you have questions/comments about the tools themselves, try the documentation, forum, or mailing list. And if you’re interested in taking a more active role in the project, contact Matthias Miller through the forum or mailing list.

Those tools will you help find the leaks, and here are a few articles that provide more information about removing them, or better yet, avoiding them in the first place:

• “Understanding and Solving Internet Explorer Leak Patterns”
• “Fixing Leaks”
• “Memory Leakage in Internet Explorer – revisited”

Thanks!

John Hrvatin
Program Manager
Internet Explorer

Customizing the Wordpress Text Editor with Quicktags

The Wordpress text editor comes with a set of buttons that allows you to easily format your post by quickly inserting things like:

• links
• images
• html list

Though very useful, I found that I needed a few more buttons … and so I figured out how to do it.

I just released a new video tutorial on how to edit the Wordpress text editor:

The Video: Customizing the Wordpress Text Editor

I hope you find it useful!

Thanks,

Stefan Mischook

www.killersites.com
www.killerphp.com

And then there was one…

Resolutions 2007-11-27

ColdFusion 8 and Ajax-Based Login

The Globalization of Cyber Crime

Today we released our third annual Virtual Criminology Report, which has become an internationally respected benchmark for what’s happening in the world of cybercrime. In addition to working with our team of experts at Avert Labs, for this year’s report we consulted with more than a dozen specialists from around the world at top institutions such as NATO, the FBI, Oxford University, Purdue University and the London School of Economics. We wanted to know their thoughts on where cybercrime is today, what the global trends are, and where this malicious industry is headed.

What did we find? The report is available for free by clicking here and I encourage everyone reading this blog post to download a copy. The unanimous verdict of the experts is a disturbing one. Without question, cybercrime has evolved significantly, and national governments are now being targeted. We’ve seen a considerable amount of emerging threats from increasingly sophisticated groups attacking organizations around the world. Case in point: Earlier this week it was reported that cyber attacks against U.S. federal agencies rose 152 percent from fiscal year 2006 to 2007. Everyone is now at risk, and as reported attacks spiral upward, consumers around the world are losing confidence in the safety of the Internet.

I sincerely hope you get a chance to read this important report. And if you have any thoughts on it, please post a comment here. I can’t promise a personal reply, but I would certainly appreciate the feedback. The bad guys are attacking from every angle, and we must work together to stop them—but stop them we will.

Until next time,
Dave

Excellent Ajaxian Post on CFGRID

Ask a Jedi: When does a session start?