Vista performance issue

[Stefan H.]

Hi,

I have just installed Windows Vista Business Edition and have noticed
some performance issues in comparison with Windows XP, where
everything works fine. CPU usage reaches 100% percent even if there is
almost no activity. When I start an application CPU usage of that
process is always 100%. When I scroll up and down in Notepad for
example CPU usage is at least 40% (only Notepad) and some applications
like Terratec Home Cinema (for watching tv) are unusable. I have
disabled everything for testing (all visual effects/Aero, ReadyBoost,
SuperFetch, Windows Defender, DEP and so on) but the problem persists.
Process Explorer shows that most activity is taking place in kernel
mode (at least 2/3 of CPU usage). But CPU usage of interrupts and DPC
is <4%. I have the following system:

Mainboard: Kudoz 7 (VIA ST266A chipset)
CPU: Athlon XP 1,4 GHZ
Graphics: ATI Radeon 9600 PCI (only AGP 4X)
Memory: 1 GB RAM

Windows Performance Index:

CPU: 2,7
Memory: 3,7
Graphics (Aero): 2,9
Graphics (Games): 3,4
Harddisk: 5,1

I know that my PC is not the best one. But even large Java Swing
applications under Windows XP (like Netbeans IDE) where faster then
Notepad is in Windows Vista. I think something is wrong in kernel
mode. Is there any (new security) feature I can disable to increase
performance ?

Thanks
Stefan

 

[Milhouse Van Houten]

With Task Manager or Process Explorer, shouldn't you be able to narrow down
the culprit to a particular task? I'm not quite sure what the kernel mode
reference means, but it would be more helpful if you broke CPU usage by
task.

 

[Dana Cline - MVP]

Given that this is basically inadequate hardware to begin with, I wouldn't
expect too much. Have you turned off the Sidebar, and the Windows Search
service? Which antivirus are you running?

Dana Cline - MCE MVP