New Job, Old Operating System

You really don't know how good something is until you don't have it any longer. This is a statement that is very much the truth. I started a new graduate assistant position this week at Illinois State University. I will be doing a variety of tasks in this position and some of them involve work on the computer.

The operating system on the computer I will be working on? You guessed it - Windows 7.

The last time I used Windows full time XP was still still the latest stable Windows release (cause lets be honest, I don't consider Vista a stable release). Kubuntu 7.04 was the first Linux LiveCD I ever burned and I haven't looked back since. Its amazing all the little things you miss when you don't have them any longer.

I was working in two applications at once, so instinctively I went to move the second application to a different workspace...

Only to realize I couldn't. 

I went to find a copy and paste manager, there wasn't one installed. So naturally I sought out the package manager to install one...

Wait, there isn't a package manager?

Comon - even the smart phones most people carry around have a "App Store" which is really just a front end for package management! Sure, I could just search for whatever application I wanted on Google - but installing applications that have access to system data from random internet sources just doesn't seem terribly safe.

The biggest annoyance I ran into (and someone please let me know if I can make Windows 7 do this)? alt+left click to move a window. I didn't realize how often I used that when pushing applications around on my screen. It just feels terribly inefficient to have to move the mouse all the way to the top of an application to relocate it on the screen.

It's really funny the things you don't realize you have gotten used to having. Needless to say the 20 hours a week I will be working on campus for this next year will be a trail in patience with technology for sure.

~Jeff Hoogland

Nokia kicks FOSS to the Curb

If you have been by my blog here before then you might know I really like my Nokia N900. It is one of the most flexible, powerful, open source friendly devices on the market. I bought mine and carry it with pride everyday (because I am an FOSS advocate). When Nokia announced they where merging Maemo into the MeeGo project I openly voiced my support. With a corporate backer like Nokia, Meego was sure to quickly become a forerunner in mobile technology.

Today Nokia revoked that backing.

In one swift move Nokia brought Meego from a potential revolutionary piece of technology to being simply the red headed step child of mobile operating systems. To quote Nokia:

"MeeGo will place increased emphasis on longer-term market exploration of next-generation devices."

I believe this is a kindly worded death sentence for the platform - not many developers are interested in writing software for a "longer-term market exploration" operating system. Long term means less profits, less profits means less applications, less applications means less users... It is a vicious path they have started down. One that eventually leads to the discontinuation of a short lived operating system.

What is the cause of this back seating of Meego? Nokia announced today that they struck a deal with Microsoft that will make Windows Mobile 7 the operating system on a majority of their handsets in the future. It seems some of the doubts I had when Stephen Elop, a former Microsoft employee, took over Nokia where correct. Windows Mobile 7 on Nokia devices means they will be just as restrictive as other propitiatory devices such as Apple's iPhone and RIM's Blackberry. Restricted technologies are not the way of the future and Android's explosive growth is proof of this.

I am not just blowing smoke here, lots of people are upset by this. Including many Nokia employees. In fact Geek.com estimates that close to 1,000 Nokia employees staged a walkout today, opting to use their flex-pay days to take the day off work. Consumers also appear to be taking note of this exchange as well and are responding in a similar manner. Nokia's stock dumped nearly twelve percentage points today:


Speak with your wallet folks, the N900 will be my last Nokia product unless the company does (another) serious 180 some time soon.

The biggest joke at the end of all this? We don't even have a set release date for Nokia Win7 devices (and if Nokia's stock continues to dump at this rate we may never see one). Odds are we will not see them till next year, if not later. Remember Meego handsets where first predicted to release Q4 of 2010, which turned into Q1 of 2011, which has now turned into "some time this year".

What is your take on all of this, is Nokia shooting themselves in the foot with this union or could is possibly yield something good?

~Jeff Hoogland

Does Windows 7 Aero Slow Down Your 3D?

Early last week I made a post that detailed some benchmarks with Linux desktop effects being on and Linux desktop effects being off. In the case of Compiz I found that slowed 3D performance of the system on average by over 10%. Several of you dropped comments wondering if a similar performance decrease was present when utilizing Window 7's Aero feature while gaming - today I am going to set that wonder to rest.

The Test:
I am going to use Unigine Benchmarks on Winodws 7 Ultimate 64bit. This was a fresh install of Windows that had only the security updates applied to it. No anti-virus was running (or even installed on) the system. I used the latest nVidia driver for Windows (260.xx). The tests where all performed using the OpenGL rendering of the benchmarks.

The Hardware:
I'm using my same gaming rig that I've used for all my other benchmarks: Processor - Intel p9700 2.8ghz Dual Core, RAM - 4gigs of DDR3 1066, Video Card: nVidia 260m with 1gig DDR3 dedicated memory.

The Results:
I was decently surprised at the results, in fact I ran each test several times to ensure their consistency.

Heaven Benchmark -

• Aero Off - 23.7fps, 598 Score
• Aerp On - 23.7fps, 598 Score

Tropics Benchmark -

• Aero Off - 31fps, 782 Score
• Aero On - 31.1fps, 782 Score

Sanctuary Benchmark -

• Aero Off - 36.8fps, 1562 Score
• Aero On - 36.7fps, 1558 Score

As you can see Aero makes virtually no difference in OpenGL performance. Perhaps this might change if the benchmarks are rendered in DirectX (A benchmark for another day methinks)?

Oh and one other note, it appears Windows still benchmarks slower than almost every Linux distro I've tried.

~Jeff Hoogland

Linux Out Performs Windows in OpenGL

Late last year I did a posting detailing how Windows 7 crushed Ubuntu 9.10 in the area of 3D performance. Nine months later I am happy to say:

Linux out performs Windows 7 in OpenGL benchmarks!

Using the Unigine benchmarks Windows 7 on my system obtains the following average frames per second:

Tropics - 30.5 FPS
Sanctuary - 35.2 FPS

Of all the Linux distros I recently tested, Chakra Linux performs the best in these benchmarks with the following average frames per second:

Tropics - 38.0 FPS
Sanctuary - 38.3 FPS

Whew! Chakra's scores are just higher than Windows 7s' scores and they are leaps and bounds above the level Ubuntu 9.10 performed at on my same hardware. I am always pleasantly surprised at the rapid development of technology in the world of Linux and these improved scores are evidence of just how quickly this world moves.

~Jeff Hoogland

Please note while these benchmark scores presented are accurate to the best of my abilities, they only represent my personal hardware and software configurations. Your results on your own system(s) may vary (and if they do, please share them!).

Windows vs Ubuntu Release Cycle

I started writing this article but then felt it's point could be better represented in comic form (click to enlarge):


While it does not address how all Linux distributions release, I think you may get my point. Most people fall into one of the following for their operating system upgrades:

• Upgrade to New Release Every 6 monthsish (Fedora isn't always on time)
• Upgrade to a new LTS every two years
• Upgrade to a new Windows version... Well, whenever the next one comes out!
• Upgrade Windows? Pff, XP is support till 2020!
• Upgrade your operating system? I use a rolling release distro!
  

What is your preferred release cycle for a operating system?

~Jeff Hoogland

T91MT vs T101MT - Hands on Review

Earlier this month I talked about why I feel Asus's T91MT is a better computer than Apple's iPad. What I failed to mention in that posting is that in addition to the T91MT Asus also has a T101MT netbook/tablet hybrid. If you are in the market for a tiny tablet computer you might be like I was, torn between which of these two netbooks to buy - they are fairly close in price! After having owned both a T91MT and the T101MT I have put together the following compare and contrast of the two tablets that will hopefully help you decided which of the two to purchase.
Size and Weight -
Lets start with the obvious - how big these devices are. The average consumer will first notice that the T91MT is an 8.9" tablet that weights in at 2.1 pounds while the T101MT is 10.1" that weights in at 2.86 pounds. Which of these is better? Its a personal choice really.

Keyboard -
The T91MT has a flat key board while the T101MT has a chiclet keyboard (some space inbetween the keys). Coming from my old EEE 900A model/normal laptop the chiclet keyboard took some getting used to, but after a few days I was typing away on it with no issues. The image below is the T91MT keyboard on the left and the T101MT keyboard on the right:


Track Pad -
The track back on both the devices is essentially the same. Same look and feel, same silver mouse button. Neither supports multi-touch on the track pad and both support scrolling on the right side.

Screen Resolution/Design/Finish -
Both the netbooks contain the fairly standard 1024x600 resolution netbook panel. Both panels fully support multi-touch. For some reason though the touch layer is much more noticeable on the T101MT than it is on the T91MT. If you look at the screen from the wrong angle the contents appear blurry almost. Another thing you will notice right away between the two laptops is that the T91MT has a shiny finish on the back of it's screen - meaning it is a giant finger print magnet. The T101MT has a matted finish that tends to stay much cleaner.

Lastly the hinge on the T101MT is much smoother than the one on the T91MT. When closing the T101MT (or putting it in tablet mode) it has rubber stoppers that are designed to slip into slits cut into the screen so the keyboard part does not rotate out form under the screen while you are moving the device around. This was a much needed design additive as it always annoyed me that the T91MT screen does not sit straight on when the device is closed.

Processor -
The processors in these two devices are very, very different. The T91MT uses a Z series 520 chip that is clocked at 1.33ghz, while the T101MT sports an N series 450 chip that runs at 1.66ghz. Both chips have hyper-threading technology and of the two only the Z520 supports virtulization (just in case you wanted to run a virtual machine on your netbook). The extra speed of the N450 is decent noticeable. It is much "snappier" when multi-tasking than it's Z520 cousin.

RAM -
Both tablets come with 1gig of DDR2 memory and are upgradable to 2gigs. The only thing worth noting here is that the T91MT has a 1gig stick that you have to replace with a single 2gig stick in order to upgrade it's memory. The T101MT on the other hand has it's default 1gig of memory soldiered to it's mother board - meaning in order to upgrade it's memory you need to purchase a 1gig stick.

Hard Drive -
The T91MT comes stock with a 32gig SSD while the T101MT comes with a 160gig 5400rpm standard laptop drive. The T91MT hard drive uses a PCI mini port to connect - meaning if you want to change the drive in it you are somewhat limited on selection. The T101MT on the other hand uses your standard 2.5" sata hard drive connector so you can drop any mobile drive in it (personally I ordered an SSD with my T101MT, I feel a normal hard drive is just a bad idea in a netbook).

Webcam -
Both the netbooks come with very sad .3 mega-pixel cameras. Good enough to make a video call over Skype, but not a quality image by any means.

Graphics Card -
The T91MT comes with the Intel GMA500 graphics card while the T101MT has the more standard Intel GMA3150 graphics controller. An important thing to note here is that while the GMA500 is a physically faster graphics card, the drivers for it are decently horrid on all platforms (although they are the best under Windows 7). The GMA500 should do 720p video playback however do not expect it to be 100% smooth if this is what you want to play on the device. The driver issue with the GMA500 is largely due to the fact that Intel doesn't actually make the GMA500 chip, they just stamp their name on it.

Operating System -
The T91MT ships by default with Windows 7 Home Premium while the T101MT ships with Windows 7 Starter. Not a big deal right? Actually it is. Windows 7 Starter does not support multi-touch functionality regardless of your hardware. Meaning if you want multi-touch on the T101MT you will need to upgrade/change the Windows version installed on it. Both of the netbooks run Ubuntu quite well with a small bit of hacking (and have multi-touch with kernel > 2.6.33). If you are going to keep Windows 7 on the tablet however, do yourself a favor and make sure to upgrade the RAM to 2gigs.

Bluetooth -
The T91MT has a built in bluetooth controller while the T101MT does not. So if you are needing bluetooth on the larger tablet be sure to pickup a USB bluetooth adapter.

Battery -
The T91MT claims "up to 5 hours" and the T101MT claims "up to 6.5 hours". Off a full charge while streaming audio over the speakers from Pandora the T91MT gets just over three hours and the T101MT gets just under four hours. The T101MT has has a removable battery while the T91MT does not, personally I really like having a removable battery so I can carry a spare.

Follow Up -
I ended up keeping the T101MT and selling the T91MT to a friend. The two main deciding factors for me in this decision was the battery life and graphics card (the GMA500 is a giant pain under Linux). Which of these two tablet is right for you? How would I know! Hopefully if you have been trying to decide between the two of them this article helped you decide on one or the other.

~Jeff Hoogland

Starcraft 2 and a bit of Wine - Linux Performance

EDIT: If you stumbled upon this page looking for a HOWTO for getting Starcraft 2 working under Wine check here.

I mentioned earlier this month that I was enjoying the Starcraft 2 beta on Ubuntu 10.04 thanks to Wine software. In my previous posting I had simply stated that SC2 was "playable" under Wine. I have a fairly powerful gaming laptop that sports an nVidia 260m GTX and a 1680x1050 resolution panel. SC2 defaulted itself under Wine to "ultra" settings on my system - after playing one game at these settings (well it was really more like playing a slide-show). I promptly lowered the details and textures to low (while leaving the resolution the same).

With these settings I average around 40 FPS at the main menu and in game. At the high end I see just over 50 FPS while playing and at the low end it bottoms out around 20 FPS in combat. (For those wondering how I obtained these numbers press control+alt+f to put an FPS counter in the upper left hand corner of the screen while in SC2). These numbers come from the latest SC2 patch as of today (05/25/10).

Now for a bit of an ironic story regarding SC2. Late last night I dual booted my system with Windows 7 Ultimate again due to the need for an embedded youtube video to work in an Office 2007 power point presentation (it failed to work under Crossover and youtube plays poorly in VMs, thus native install was my only option left). Back on topic - since I had Windows installed anyways I figured I would copy over my SC2 files (god bless Blizzard and their portable installs) and see how comparable the performance was on the native operating system.

Needless to say it performs better, in fact the FPS I see under low settings on Wine is about equal to the same FPS I was seeing under high settings on Windows. That is about where the things that worked better under Windows ended for SC2 on my computer.

I would like to prefix my following statement with the fact that my network drivers are installed, working, and I had used several other applications online just fine.

When I joined my first SC2 game on Windows I had just selected my workers to start mining when the lag started, around two minutes later I was dropped from the game and it counted as a loss in my ladder league. I figured it was just something funky with my internet line, even though I had not had any issues in SC2 under Wine in the last three weeks, as such I promptly selected "find match" to start another game. Two minutes later I had "lost" another ladder game due to "connection" issues.

Fan-flipping-tastic.

Just out of curiosity I decided to boot in Linux to see if the issue existed there as well (I'm hoping the irony of rebooting into Linux to play a game isn't lost on anyone). Needless to say the problem was not present there, after sweeping two ladder games without any connection issues on Ubuntu I can indeed confirm that it was a "connection" issue with the SC2 was only happening under Windows.

Yes: I know this game is still in beta.
Yes: I know odds are this issue is limited to my system.

Is it still annoying? Yep. It is ridiculously ironic? You bet.

Anyone else have fun story they would like to share about an application working better under Wine than it does on Windows itself?

~Jeff Hoogland

Some WINE with your Starcraft 2?

EDIT: If you stumbled upon this page looking for a HOWTO for getting Starcraft 2 working under Wine check here.

It finally happened. I have a Starcraft2 closed beta key! What feels like decades ago now I had applied for a Starcraft2 beta key on Battle.net and had all but given up hope after many months of waiting when a friend was kind enough to give me one of his invite passes. I entered the key into my account and was thoroughly excited when I saw the beta appear in my downloads. I was clicking through the website as quick as I could so I could get the game downloading, when reality came crashing down on top of me as I hit the downloads page and was asked to choose between a Windows and an OSX client.

What is a Linux user to do? With the recent release of Ubuntu 10.04 I had removed Windows 7 from my hardrive as it had not been booted into in over a month and was simply taking up storage space. My first thought was to simply reinstall Windows 7, giving it just enough space to boot and install Starcraft. Then I thought about the fact that I almost never reboot my system and that having to restart just to play Starcraft would be a real kill joy (and a time waster).

I run all of my source engine games on Linux via CXGames however upon looking at their entry for Starcraft II I had little faith that it would work under Crossover. Not quite ready to give up hope yet I headed over to the WINE AppDB entry for SC2, lo-and-behold it had a gold rating! Browsing through the page you will find a wonderful HOWTO for recompiling WINE from git with a custom patch for SC2. Always one to jump in with both feet first I promptly uninstalled my current WINE version from my system and began downloading/compiling a patch version of 1.1.43 Twenty minutes later (I have a fairly good processor) I had the patched version of WINE built and installed. I then proceeded to download the beta client and get it installing under WINE (I also followed the directions here that contains some extra tweaks for running the beta under WINE, it also installs SC2 to it's own WINE prefix).

I have been happily playing Starcraft 2 under Ubuntu 10.04 for the last three days now. All I have to say is that it is a true testament to how much progress the WINE project has made in recent years when it can be counted upon to run a new title that hasn't even been fully released yet! Performance under WINE is not perfect, but on lower settings it is more than playable (which is what really counts). There seems to be a processor bottle neck on higher detail settings (also present in L4D2 under WINE actually) that hinders performance.
~Jeff Hoogland

The Year of the Tablet Computer

There is no denying the fact that we have become a touch-centric society in regards to our technology. Thanks to the "iPhone standard" every new handheld device better sport at least some form of touch screen if it expects to compete with the competition. Where is our technology headed though? With the idea of "bigger is better" in mind: if a 3.5~ inch touch screen is good a larger screen must better right?

Apple announced their "iPad" earlier this year.

With a revolutionary device such as the iPhone already under their belt, can Apple hope to dominate the tablet computer market in the same way that they have crushed the smart phone market in recent years? Initial signs point to no. Sure, there is going to be that collective of die hard Mac users that flock to the latest shiny product Apple releases and buy the iPad the day it releases, however consider the following about the iPad:

• Like iAnything, the iPad is going to have a locked amount of internal storage
• It lacks USB ports, meaning you can't really connect anything useful to it
• It lacks flash support. Meaning a large portion of the web will not function on it
• I could go on...

With the iPad apparently set to fail to satisfy our touch-technology needs from the start: Where is one to turn when looking for a tablet computer in 2010? There is of course long term contender in the tablet PC market the touch screen laptop. At this point such devices, while functional, are far from being anything "special" or "revolutionary".

Slightly more recent is the hybrid of last year's craze the netbook and what is bound to be a theme for this year the tablet computer found in Asus's EEE T91.

Next: Enter the latest addition to the touchscreen devices set to da-beau in 2010: MeeGo. In a joint effort between the Intel and Nokia companies. MeeGo, a Linux based operating system, is going to be targeted at both ARM and x86 based devices (despite the former of the two not being made by Intel). While MeeGo is still in the very preliminary stages of development, other Linux-based touchscreen-orientated operating systems, such as Android and Maemo, have shown us that the Linux platform is more than capable of functioning on such devices in an elegant manner. With backing from such large companies MeeGo is going to be hard-pressed to not get at least some publicity.

Speaking of Android - the Notion Ink ADAM contains some of the most impressive tablet computer specs we have seen thus far. If the initial announcements are held true over the course of development, then this little tablet computer might just be that "revolutionary" tablet the world is looking for. The first set of tech specs boast:

• HDMI Output
• 3 USB Ports
• 16 hours video playback
• Adobe Flash (thank god)
• Camera
• And More

While it isn't official which operating system will be shipping with the device when it finally goes to market - there is a tech demo video of the device, found here, running what is said to be "a wrapper around Android". Other mentioned operating systems that might be possible to run on the device include Google's Chrome OS and Ubuntu ARM.

Finally I would like to mention the product I think should end up being the clear winner in the "tablet-orientated" marketplace in 2010:

Lenovo's U1 Ideapad

Now with the hype have I just given the ADAM you might be thinking "What makes the U1 so special/interesting/unique?" Simple:

The U1 is two computers in one.

In addition to being a fully functional 11.6 inch touchscreen laptop sporting an Intel Core 2 processor, two gigs of RAM, and a 128gig SDD the U1's touchscreen is detachable. When detached from the computer the tablet-screen contains it's own 1ghz snapdragon ARM processor, RAM, and 16gig SSD. When in "laptop" mode the system by default runs Windows 7 and when the screen is detached the tablet-screen runs Lenovo's Skylight Linux. Both computers contain their own batteries (which are each rated at five hours duration), and each of the computers are fully functional without the other (if you hook the laptop base up to an external monitor of course, because naturally while tablet-screen is detached the laptop is missing it's screen).

Needless to say there is not going to be any lack of tablet computers on the market in 2010. Another point I feel worth noting is that a majority of the devices listed here are running various forms of Linux (Just like many of the smart phones being released recently). So while 2010 might not end up being the year of "desktop" Linux, with the flood of penguin-powered touch screen devices it may still be the year Linux makes it's way into countless homes.

I have just highlighted some of the top competitors for upcoming tablet computers I have come across/researched thus far. Know of any other upcoming tablet computer releases (or perhaps one that is already released)? Drop a comment to let me know about it.

~Jeff Hoogland

Always the Wrong Windows Version...

My younger brother was reformatting his laptop to Windows 7 at my house this past weekend and I lent him my netbook to download drivers with while it formatted. When he visited Gateway's site he was greeted by this message:

In case it is difficult to read the message says "We are unable to detect if this file supports the version of Windows on the computer in front of you right now, be sure to double-check that this file matches the computers version of Windows before continuing." Needless to say I was highly amused. It is not difficult for a website to detect a client's operating system/browser in this day and age. You'd think a large company like Gateway would account for all of them when writing messages like this one...

~Jeff Hoogland

OpenGL vs DirectX - Benchmark Comparison

I've done a few benchmarks to date and today I am going to add another interesting set of numbers to the list. Unigine is a cross-platform real-time 3D engine, I stumbled across awhile back on some message boards I am a part of. Since it is cross platform it offers the benchmark rendering in both OpenGL and DirectX APIs, as such I was curious as to which of the interfaces that are commonly used for 3D development offered better performance.

The Tests: Unigine offers two free benchmarks - Tropics and Sanctuary. I ran both demos using OpenGL, DirectX 9.1, and DirectX 10.0 under the 1680x1050 resolution.

The Hardware: While my hardware is not fastest in the world it is (as of posting this) relatively new and decently quick. Processor - Intel p9700 2.8ghz Dual Core, RAM - 4gigs of DDR3, Video Card: nVidia 260m with 1gig DDR3 dedicated memory (Running the latest stable nVidia driver 195.62).

The Software: Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit & Unigine Benchmarks

The Results:

Tropics -

• OpenGL - 31.8 fps
• DirectX 9.1 - 34.9 fps
• DirectX 10.0 - 35.8 fps

Sanctuary -

• OpenGL - 36.0 fps
• DirectX 9.1 - 39.7 fps
• DirectX 10.0 - 42.6 fps

Wrapping Up:
Clearly DirectX 10 appears to be the optimum choice performance wise. In the case of the tropics benchmark it scored about 12% higher and for Sanctuary it scored around 16% higher. Worth noting is that while running the benchmarks there really isn't truly much detail difference between the rendering in the three different selections (meaning most people would not be able to tell the difference between which of the three was is use). Also I'd like to mention for any who may not know that OpenGL as the name implies is free open source software and runs fully cross-platform (where is DirectX is locked to the MS Windows and XBox) - so if you want to develop for a wider range the slightly slower OpenGL may be the best choice of the three to use.

~Jeff Hoogland
Please note while these benchmark scores presented are accurate to the best of my abilities, they only represent my personal hardware and software configurations. Your results on your own system(s) may vary (and if they do, please share them!).

Wine, CXGames, and Windows 7 Performance Comparison

I blog more than a little about Wine software. In the past I have run benchmarks between the most current pieces of Wine technology out there and how they compare with each other. However one important question many gamers have when looking to game on Linux is not so much how do the different Wine technologies compare with each other so much as how do they perform compared with the program(s) running natively on Windows? Since I finally installed Windows 7 I figured I would take a look into just how well my favorite non-emulators stack up against the native platform for a few 3D applications.

The Tests: I ran both a synthetic benchmark (3D Mark 2001se) as well as some actual game applications (TF2, L4D, & L4D2). Each test was run several times under Wine/CXGames/Windows to ensure that the scores are as accurate as possible.

The Hardware: While my hardware is not fastest in the world it is (as of posting this) relatively new and decently quick. Processor - Intel p9700 2.8ghz Dual Core, RAM - 4gigs of DDR3, Video Card: nVidia 260m with 1gig DDR3 dedicated memory.

Operating Systems and Drivers: Ubuntu 9.10, running the nVidia 190.53 driver & Windows 7, running the nVidia 195.62 driver

The Wine Software: Wine version 1.1.35 (with extra fonts and the d3dx9 packages installed via Winetricks) and CXGames 8.1.4 - both of these are the latest versions as of my posting this.

The Results:

3D Mark 2001 SE

• Resolution: 1680x1050
• - Wine Scored: 18497
• - CXGames Scored: 18538
• - Windows 7 Scored: 31573
• Resolution: 1024x768
• - Wine Scored: 22141
• - CXGames Scored: 23265
• - Windows 7 Scored: 35508

Team Fortress 2

• Resolution: 1680x1050
• - Wine: 65.11 fps
• - CXGames: 61.78 fps
• - Windows 7: 87.13 fps
• Resolution: 1024x768
• - Wine: 81.82 fps
• - CXGames: 70.68 fps
• - Windows 7: 101.88 fps

Left 4 Dead

• Resolution: 1680x1050
• - Wine: 13.76 fps
• - CXGames: 27.36 fps
• - Windows 7: 63.48 fps
• Resolution: 1024x768
• - Wine: 19.93 fps
• - CXGames: 35.38 fps
• - Windows 7: 65.65 fps

Left 4 Dead 2

• Resolution: 1680x1050
• - Wine: n/a
• - CXGames: 38.45 fps
• - Windows 7: 72.04 fps
• Resolution: 1024x768
• - Wine: n/a
• - CXGames: 56.46 fps
• - Windows 7: 111.68 fps

Things Worth Noting: Obviously all the applications run faster natively under Windows than they do under Wine technology (I hope no one is surprised by this). Secondly I'd like to point out the FPS averages for Wine 1.1.35 and CXGames 8.1.4 have improved from older versions. Lastly I feel I should mention the n/a score Wine has on Left 4 Dead 2 - this is because try as I might no matter what hacks/cracks I throw at Wine I can still not get Left 4 Dead 2 to play for me under Wine.

Wrapping Up: Obviously if you are extremely worried about getting every last FPS out of your video games you should stick with Windows - however depending on your hardware and what games you are playing Linux may very well be capable of playing them at a satisfactory level (remember the human eye can only see 60 fps, so anything higher is overkill). Also remember that with almost every new release Wine continues to further advance it's performance so be sure to check back for new benchmarks/scores as new versions are released.

Happy New Year to everyone and keep on fragging!

~Jeff Hoogland
Please note while these benchmark scores presented are accurate to the best of my abilities, they only represent my personal hardware and software configurations. Your results on your own system(s) may vary (and if they do, please share them!).

Windows 7 vs Ubuntu 9.10 - 3D Benchmarks

In the past I've done benchmarks regarding Wine software, today I am going to do something a bit different. Unigine is a cross-platform real-time 3D engine, I stumbled across awhile back on some message boards I am a part of. Since it runs natively cross-platform I have been curious to see exactly how drastic the performance difference of the engine is between the Windows and Linux platforms. Since I recently installed Windows 7 I decided to sit down and put the software through its paces.

The Tests: Unigine offers two free benchmarks - Tropics and Sanctuary. I ran both demos using OpenGL (because OpenGL runs on both platforms natively and DirectX does not).

The Hardware: While my hardware is not fastest in the world it is (as of posting this) relatively new and decently quick. Processor - Intel p9700 2.8ghz Dual Core, RAM - 4gigs of DDR3, Video Card: nVidia 260m with 1gig DDR3 dedicated memory (Running the latest stable nVidia driver on both Linux (190.42) and Windows (195.62)).

The Software: Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit, Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic) 64bit, & Unigine Benchmarks

The Results:

Tropics -

• Windows
• - 1680x1050: 30.5 fps
• - 1024x768: 44.8 fps
• - 640x480: 59.8 fps
• Ubuntu
  
• - 1680x1050: 14.9 fps
• - 1024x768: 23.6 fps
• - 640x480: 30.9 fps

Sanctuary -

• Windows
• - 1680x1050: 35.2 fps
• - 1024x768: 61.9 fps
• - 640x480: 99.9 fps
• Ubuntu
  
• - 1680x1050: 17.3 fps
• - 1024x768: 27.9 fps
• - 640x480: 48.9 fps

Wrapping Up: The numbers speak for themselves. In the realm of 3D graphics it is clear that Ubuntu still has a long way to go if it ever wants to meet (or possibly beat) the performance Windows has. In all of the above tests Ubuntu scored between 48% and 55% lower frame rate than the same benchmark on Windows.

Cheers,

~Jeff Hoogland
Please note while these benchmark scores presented are accurate to the best of my abilities, they only represent my personal hardware and software configurations. Your results on your own system(s) may vary (and if they do, please share them!).

Hands on with Windows 7 - An Ubuntu User's Perspective

Microsoft released Windows 7 out into the wild for all of the personal computing world to experience some two months ago and now it is nigh impossible to walk into a computer store (excluding the Apple store obviously) with out being bombarded by ads for it. (There are also the rather strange Windows 7 ads, such as the "Windows 7 Whopper" in Japan or the recently reviled Family Guy Windows 7 Ads that got axed before being released). At any rate there is no doubting that this latest addition to the Windows line is going to quickly become a major player in the tech field.

In fact it already makes up for some 20% of gamers that use the Steam platform as of November 2009

At any rate I try to make it a point to play with any bit of new technology I can get my hands on so I figured Windows 7 should be no exception to this rule. I previously only had Ubuntu 9.04 installed on my laptop and I'd been meaning to upgrade it to the latest version for some time now, so I took the opportunity to set up a dual boot with Windows 7 Ultimate while I was at it.

Installation:

The first thing I'd like to say about installation is that Windows 7 lost one of the features I really liked about Vista - that is there was only one install DVD and what type of install you obtained (home, business, ultimate, ect.) was determined by the activation key you entered. With Windows 7 they are back to a separate disc for each version, its not a big thing really but I thought it was worth mentioning. The actual installation process looks and feels a lot like of the Vista installation process (except it now has Windows 7 branding of course). It also takes the same God-awful amount of time to fully expand/install all the files it needs to get running from the disc. Around forty minutes and three restarts later I had my Windows 7 install up and running.

Setup:

The first thing that pleasantly surprised me was the fact that I had a working wireless card from the clean install with my Intel wifi card. I was quickly able to hop onto my wireless network and grab the couple of updates that have been released for 7 in the past couple of months. As anyone who has installed Windows before knows the next stop on my setup route was downloading drivers. I went and obtained the most important one first - my video drivers (which apparently are a 140meg download for Windows? Guess I've gotten spoiled with them only being 22megs on Ubuntu). At any rate a few clicks around on my laptop's manufacture's website, a couple of downloads, and then a restart later (phew!) my system was all ready to be used!

Well not really. I now finally had the operating system installed, still need to get it loaded up with applications for it to be truly useful to me. Twenty minutes or so and another restart (thats five now) later I had AVG, OOO, Chrome, and Steam (among other things) all set to go and I was ready to use my shiny new operating system.

Usage:

The first thing I noticed once I got my graphics drivers all setup is that Windows 7 truly is shiny. The aero effects present give the operating system a good feel and they ran quite smoothly on my modern hardware (while they do not quite compare just yet to Compiz it is a step in the right direction, to the average user eye candy is always a winner). The main thing users will notice right away about Windows 7 is the new task bar. It really is a great improvement, the way it allows the "pinning" of commonly used applications is wonderus along with how it sorts applications with multiple windows that are loaded.

My applications all loaded up with out much issue (had some trouble with a few of my Steam games at first - but that is really more of a Valve issue than a Windows 7 one). I was now all setup to do my web surfing and gaming under Windows 7 :)

Final Thoughts/Ubuntu Comparisons:

The main draw back/time consumer in setting up Windows verses Ubuntu has not changed any with the release of Windows 7. Drivers are still a must for pretty much any hardware you want to use and to make the operating system useful in the slightlest you need to install additional applications. Resource consumption wise 7 is still a hog by comparison at any given point I seem to be using around 1.3gigs of RAM at the very least and the base install plus my applications (not counting games) took up just over eighteen gigs of space (where is Ubuntu with the same applications runs around two and a half gigs)

All in all while Windows 7 did not "simplify my PC" any - it is a decently solid operating system. Will I be using it as my primary operating system anytime soon? Probably not, but I do plan to keep an installation on my system so I can both stay familiar with the GUI and for the occasional game I want to play that I cannot get working under Wine technology.

Regards,

~Jeff Hoogland

Comments on Windows 7

Oh Microsoft... Odds are many of you know how I feel about Windows and this company in general – I stay away from it. How ever in light of Windows 7 being released I figured I would take a quick moment to stop and look back at the platform I used once upon a time before I was enlightened to the choices in the world of operating systems. As with my look into OSX/Mac I plan to try and be fair in my little review of sorts here but, as always if you feel I give some miss-interpreted information feel free to call me out on it.

The first thing I would like to point out there really isn't much truly “new” in Windows 7. In fact when I asked my older brother, who makes his living in the computer field, to highlight what makes Windows 7 so great he said something along the lines of: Its faster, more secure, and a lot less buggy than past Windows versions. Oh ok, so basically it is what an operating system is SUPPOSE to be. Leave it to Microsoft to get it's clients excited about new “features” it should have had from the start. That being said Windows 7 could quite possibly be the best Windows based operating system ever released. Microsoft has really worked hard to bug test it, Windows 7 is I believe the world's largest open beta for a piece of software ever, and get it working as it should so it will be ready to be installed onto production machines the day it is released. In short Windows 7 is gearing up to be what Vista should have been from the get go.

In conclusion, I'd like to say that if you feel that you must use the Windows platform for what ever reason – be it a hardcore gamer or for that one piece of proprietary software you cannot live with out – then it appears Windows 7 will soon be the best choice out there for doing so. And hey – the starting price for “home basic” is only 200$ (We all have that laying around right? The depressing part is this is down 60$ from the initial Vista home basic cost) and always remember – Ubuntu is free.

~Jeff Hoogland