Windows Vista System Requirements

7 Sep, 2005 at 2:16pm ET Article published in Tech

A Tech Strategist within Microsoft, Nigel Page, has gone on record to discuss the hardware requirements for Windows Vista, due out next Christmas.

View: Vista Is A Hardware Beast

RAM: 2GB is the ideal configuration for 64-bit Vista, we’re told. Vista 32-bit will work ideally at 1GB, and minimum 512. However, since 64-bit is handling data chunks that are double the size, you’ll need double the memory, hence the 2GB. Nigel mentions DDR3 – which is a little odd, since the roadmap for DDR3, on Intel gear at least, doesn’t really kick in until 2007.

HDD: SATA is definitely the way forward for Vista, due, Microsoft tells us, to Native Command Queueing. NCQ allows for out of order completions – that is, if Vista needs tasks 1,2,3,4 and 5 done, it can do them in the order 2,5,3,4,1 if that’s a more efficient route for the hard drive head to take over the disk. This leads to far faster completion times.

Submitted by: Enverex

“Let me just say firstly…. hahahahahahahahhaha”.

Source: Bit-Tech

Comments

7 Sep 2005 ~ 2:30pm Enverex Heh, I was going to submit this for people to review if they wanted the link for a news article but didn't know who to send it to. Seems like it worked anyway
7 Sep 2005 ~ 3:58pm Trogan I'm gonna ask something that i've wanted to ask for a while, so here goes!

What is SATA? I keep reading and seeing the name SATA but have no idea what it is/does.

And, What is Raid? I keep reading about Raid 0, 1, 2 in various threads but don't know what people are talking about.

Any explaination would be great, thanks
7 Sep 2005 ~ 3:59pm Garg I'm glad I haven't been upgrading my system for awhile . I'll just do it all when Vista comes out. Nothing like staying 3 years behind the curve
7 Sep 2005 ~ 4:24pm Enverex

Trogan_1000 wrote:

I'm gonna ask something that i've wanted to ask for a while, so here goes!

What is SATA? I keep reading and seeing the name SATA but have no idea what it is/does.

And, What is Raid? I keep reading about Raid 0, 1, 2 in various threads but don't know what people are talking about.

Any explaination would be great, thanks

SATA is just a new drive conectivity method, a new style of connecting drives rather than the old PATA method you're using now with the bulky cables and slower interface.

RAID controlers let you do different things with disks. Either attach them and make the OS think you have one giant drive, or set them up so they both deal with the data at once (part each) making it faster or mirroring when data is copied to multiple drives for backup purposes etc. Then you have other modes as well as being able to mix modes (like stiping and mirroring at once). Brief but it's the basics.
7 Sep 2005 ~ 4:34pm Trogan So, thats what SATA is. I guess I have PATA and i've never heard of PATA

Raid sounds a bit complicated....

Thanks Enverex
7 Sep 2005 ~ 5:01pm Enverex

Trogan_1000 wrote:

So, thats what SATA is. I guess I have PATA and i've never heard of PATA

Raid sounds a bit complicated....

Thanks Enverex

It never really got called PATA before SATA came along. It is now simply so it has a name to reference it by (it's also correct as SATA is Serial ATA, PATA is Parallel ATA).
7 Sep 2005 ~ 5:33pm Trogan Thanks for the info
7 Sep 2005 ~ 5:47pm primesuspect

some dude wrote:

However, since 64-bit is handling data chunks that are double the size, you'll need double the memory, hence the 2GB

This is a ridiculous statement. Pseudo-tech babble.
7 Sep 2005 ~ 5:55pm BuddyJ Vistards strike again!
7 Sep 2005 ~ 8:43pm FormFactor

Display: Prepare to feel the red mist of rage - no current TFT monitor out there is going to support high definition playback in Vista. You may already have heard rumblings about this, but here it is. To play HD-DVD or Blu-Ray content you need a HDCP compatible monitor. Why? Because these formats use HDCP to encrypt a video signal as it travels along a digital connection to an output device, to prevent people copying it. If you have just standard DVI or even an analogue output, you're going to see HD scaled down to a far-less-than-HD resolution for viewing - which sucks.

Wow that totally sux... WTF is HDCP anyways? Does it provide for resolutions higher than 1080P? Can you even buy a HDCP display yet?

Otherwise, an OS that pushes your hardware to the max with a graphics card intensive 3D GUI sounds sweet. It will be strange to say "WOW Windows Vista looks awesome on my new ATI Radeon Z9,000,000ZT!"
7 Sep 2005 ~ 10:24pm djstubbs I guess this makes me happier I got my new memory?
7 Sep 2005 ~ 10:30pm RWB

FormFactor wrote:

Wow that totally sux... WTF is HDCP anyways? Does it provide for resolutions higher than 1080P? Can you even buy a HDCP display yet?

Otherwise, an OS that pushes your hardware to the max with a graphics card intensive 3D GUI sounds sweet. It will be strange to say "WOW Windows Vista looks awesome on my new ATI Radeon Z9,000,000ZT!"

In your own quote...

Why? Because these formats use HDCP to encrypt a video signal as it travels along a digital connection to an output device, to prevent people copying it. If you have just standard DVI or even an analogue output, you're going to see HD scaled down to a far-less-than-HD resolution for viewing - which sucks.

It's just got a built in encoder/decoder that prevents us from doing things they don't like. It's bullsnit.
7 Sep 2005 ~ 10:44pm lemonlime So let me get this straight.. Vista offers nothing new that I want or need, and will dog my system twice as hard as XP.. So basically instead of disabling and removing 75% of Windows XP, I'll be disabling and removing 95% of Vista.. I'm going to downgrade to 512mb of ram, disable ncq on my drives, and rip the gddr3 off my video card just to spite these requirements
7 Sep 2005 ~ 10:50pm RWB It'd be pretty funny if this one flopped

But it won't, it'll be like XP. Sucked at first, take me 2 years to work up the nerve of buying it and then fall in love with it. Though I still like Windows 2000 a bit more, the compadibility thing drives me nuts though.
7 Sep 2005 ~ 10:53pm profdlp Either MS is in collusion with the OEM's to boost HW sales, or the OEM's are going to be howling about how expensive their new systems will have to be.

Or maybe this will drive the price of RAM and HD's down substantially.

/me can dream...
7 Sep 2005 ~ 11:14pm mmonnin Well it looks like they are taking the burdon of some of the graphics intensize stuff off of the CPU and onto the GPU where it belongs. The GPU should be able to do it more effieciently as well.
7 Sep 2005 ~ 11:14pm primesuspect Or this is a bunch of media BS.....
7 Sep 2005 ~ 11:17pm airbornflght no, no, no...I cant believe windows is actually doing this. 2 gb of ram!!! what the hell are they thinking? What kind of processor am i going to need, an amd 6900+???? yeah right.

I think ms is gonna regret this one. the prices of a computer will go up so much..If I have 2 gb of ram, I wanna use that for games and encoding. not renderign a ficking desktop.
7 Sep 2005 ~ 11:22pm primesuspect I would bet money. I swear to you, 2gb will NOT be a requirement for Vista. This is a bunch of crap. I am going to guess and say 512mb will be minimum and 1gb will be recommended for optimal experience.
7 Sep 2005 ~ 11:50pm Garg

airbornflght wrote:

no, no, no...I cant believe windows is actually doing this. 2 gb of ram!!! what the hell are they thinking? What kind of processor am i going to need, an amd 6900+???? yeah right.

I think ms is gonna regret this one. the prices of a computer will go up so much..If I have 2 gb of ram, I wanna use that for games and encoding. not renderign a ficking desktop.

I just about spewed water all over my monitor
8 Sep 2005 ~ 1:55am Thrax

primesuspect wrote:

I would bet money. I swear to you, 2gb will NOT be a requirement for Vista. This is a bunch of crap. I am going to guess and say 512mb will be minimum and 1gb will be recommended for optimal experience.

Just like it should be now. GASP.
8 Sep 2005 ~ 2:00am primesuspect Windows XP runs fine with 256mb, and I see plenty of customer computers that run XP with 128mb of ram. I didn't mean "runs well" - i meant minimum.
8 Sep 2005 ~ 2:06am Thrax Let's face it..

Minimum requirement in this day and age means, "Turns on, takes 45 minutes to boot, crashes a few applications, thrashes your hard disk so badly your modem dials 911 for assault, and then gives virtual memory errors after 45 minutes of use."

Windows XP with 256mb of RAM is still quite sluggish when compared to a PC with 512MB of RAM. The minimum requirement should equate to the OS and applications running well, not simply "Turning on.. Eventually.. If you give it enough time."

I hope the 512/1GB recommendation is a departure from today's minimum requirement paradigm, because it's about time people have computers that are a bit faster than a donkey eating a camel in molasses.
8 Sep 2005 ~ 2:13am primesuspect I totally disagree with you on 256 being quite sluggish. For the corporate desktop (read: where microsoft makes actual money), 256 will run winXP + MS office quite handily.
8 Sep 2005 ~ 3:06am Enverex XP used most of my 512MB so I would hate to run it with 256MB and would have to agree that it would be sluggish.

Prime: If you read what they wrote, 2GB was the recommended RAM, 512MB was the minimum.
8 Sep 2005 ~ 12:39pm primesuspect You're a home user and you do more than two tasks day in and day out.

I'm talking about the millions of corporate desktops (again, I hate to say it, but MS doesn't make billions of dollars off of us, and others who buy OEM or Retail) - the systems run an OS, and maybe client software for a CRM, and maybe office or even just outlook. 256 works great for this. no sluggishness.
8 Sep 2005 ~ 1:07pm BuddyJ

Gargoyle wrote:

I just about spewed water all over my monitor

Woulda been funnier if it was Coke.
8 Sep 2005 ~ 1:13pm Garg

Buddy Jesus wrote:

Woulda been funnier if it was Coke.

I'm not sure if it could have handled a second dousing. That poor thing's been through hell already
9 Sep 2005 ~ 6:49am Tex I have run a half dozen versions of Longhorn (Vista) and they all ran fine on 1gb.

Tex
9 Sep 2005 ~ 11:37am Spinner

Tex wrote:

I have run a half dozen versions of Longhorn (Vista) and they all ran fine on 1gb.

Tex

Indeed, Beta 1 runs great on my XP 2000+ system with 1GIG.
9 Sep 2005 ~ 11:43am Tex If its coming out anytime soon they will make sure it runs on the majority of computers in use. Even if they have to really work to optimize it or cut features.

Which means 512mb of ram will be minimum and 1gb recomended. They want to launch this OS and have a 2 million sales in the first 48hours.

That dog won't hunt with a 2gb minimum requirement. If your box runs XP good now and has at least 512mb of ram I bet it runs Vista also. 1gb may be the "sweet spot" for 32bit versions of Vista just like I think 512mb is the current sweet spot for running XP. XP will run on less but is much happier with 512mb.

Tex
7 Jan 2006 ~ 9:25am fishlips I have Itell 865 chipset ,,1gig memory will Vista work on that ?
7 Jan 2006 ~ 2:16pm danball1976

primesuspect wrote:

Windows XP runs fine with 256mb, and I see plenty of customer computers that run XP with 128mb of ram. I didn't mean "runs well" - i meant minimum.

I even managed to install Windows XP on a computer with 64MB of RAM with no problem. It took 2 hours to install, and 5 minutes to boot up, but it worked.
8 Jan 2006 ~ 9:38am lemonlime

fishlips (Guest) wrote:

I have Itell 865 chipset ,,1gig memory will Vista work on that ?

I'm pretty sure it will work just fine. Those initial requirements were likely inflated pretty heavily to spark some hardware sales.
8 Jan 2006 ~ 3:20pm sectorz715 i have used XP on a PC with PC100 SDRAM with a PIII w/ Office, took forever but it worked
8 Jan 2006 ~ 5:57pm tmh88 I havent had a chance to try out longhorn yet....Mainly because I'm too lazy to save all of the important files to my 2nd hard drive, format and install longhorn, and then transfer the files back over. I'll just wait until I have a horrible virus or something to try out longhorn.