About 30fps faster in Q3, and a little faster in other games. Plus, some games just work better in XP the first time around without fiddling.
 
WinXP Pro
P3 933@1085, 1.75v (155x7, runs at 29*C at idle, and 41*C while gaming)
Vantec CCK-7035D HSF
ASUS CUSL2 i815
512MB Crucial CAS2 PC133 RAM
WD 40GB ATA-100 HD
Samsung 5x DVD/32x CD Drive
Hercules Geforce 2 Pro, 64MB (Detonator 23.11)
Creative Audigy Platinum with Audigy Drive
Intel Pro/100 Mgmt Adapter
Radius 19" Monitor (Trinitron AG CRT)
MS Natural Keyboard Pro
MS Intellimouse Explorer
SanDisk USB Compact Flash Reader
Logitech Wingman Cordless Rumblepad (USB)

impressive, wish I could get that

Same performance for me....but I can't due much testing due to the "infinite loop". Haven't tried the VIA register patch yet.

the multiplayergames crash in need for speed 5 for me other than that everything runs great. o except southpark that doesn't run on xp so i deleted it.(game sucked anyway)
 
I have not run win2k on my i840 dually, only xp but i can tell you that xp was faster than 2k with my single pIII 500 on a 440bx.
all the parts are the same since then excep motherboard cpu's and ram.

I find XP alot faster than w2k, w2k crawled like an injured dog when i instal it but XP managed to beat my previous instalation of winme(especialy in opengl)

I don't know why people always comment on 2k being slower than XP. Do you guys not set up things right or something? Benchmarks and the "feel" between 2k/xp has always been the same with XP coming out under 2k as being slower in the "feel" category. I'm a very objective person and have been doing this stuff since the C64 days so I'm pretty confident in my ability to analyze OS differences. Therefore I believe that my judgement is correct.

Standard Windows XP configuration hurts responsiveness and it shows.
 
MenuShowDelay has an excessive string value of 400 in:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop
 
The system reserves 20% Internet bandwidth. Read "WinXP steals your bandwidth" by John Lettice, posted: 29/11/2001:
 
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/23090.html
 
For OS speed testing, check "TR's Windows performance comparison"
by Geoff "Dissonance" Gasior":
 
http://www.tech-report.com/reviews/2001q4/os/index.x?pg=1

Well, I know that *I* can setup systems properly, and *I* can tell you that XP has "felt" (launched applications, moved through multiple tasks, etc) faster. Also, its standby support is GREATLY improved over Win2K's, and the PC doesn't appear sluggish anymore for the first 5 or 10 min afterward. It doesn't seem to be as affected by multiple standby sessions either as Win2K was. I am a diehard fan of Win2K, but if you have excessive amounts of RAM (384+) and a 500MHz+ processor to throw at it, then it won't disappoint you. Hell, my celeron 300a@450 screams with WinXP, and I wound up bumping the RAM to 640MB and disabling the pagefile to see what would happen. Well, it got faster. It picked up another 5fps in Q3 (with a 450MHz system and a GeForce SDR, it's not the best for Quake but I do get over 65fps in demo four.dm_66 in v1.30 after I tweak the settings) and it launches and shuts down VERY smoothly. So, in short, I like it and it runs quite well. The way it handles applications can make people "think" that it is more responsive, and some people may confuse the responsivness with boot-time since it does boot and shut down a lot faster. But, I can tell you that *I* feel it is faster than Win2K on fast machines, and *I* am objective as well.
 

Running W2k Pro and XP Pro on dual p3 1ghz system with 768 MB ram and GeForce2 GTS. I have sp2 installed on W2k and 23.11 detonator on both os's along with the same Via agp driver. I've tried Quake 3 Arena with the latest patch and settings maxed, and my framerates on both os's are about the same.
 
K

2 objective opinions....2 right answers.

 
Yeah, I know. I just wanted to show that it wasn't only the newbies that thought WinXP was kicka$$ on workstations. But you really do need to have a lot of RAM to see it, otherwise it's just a pig. My gaming has been smoother, and apps that were flaky in NT, and got stable in 2K, seem to run quite smoothly in XP so far (mostly CAD utils, and some games). My fav OS is still Win2K server, and I am waiting to see what .Net brings...

WinXP's speed, apparent and real, is grossly affected by the device complement it is supporting. Bad device drivers = bad performance. Good device drivers = good performance. Win2K didn't seem to be adversely effected as easily when there was iffy driver support. Just one other ingredient to toss into the gumbo. WinXP is definitely faster on my three personal machines than was Win2K. It is definitely slower on my spouse's desktop, but faster on her notebook.
 
- Collin