Test System Setup

Processor(s): Intel Q9450 quad-core @ 3.2GHz

Motherboard(s): MSI X48 Platinum (Supplied by MSI)

Memory: 2 x 2GB Patriot DDR3 1600MHz

Hard Disk(s): 2 x Western Digital 300GB VelociRaptor in RAID 0 (Supplied by Western Digital)

Graphics Card: MSI HD Radeon 3870 X2 OC (Supplied by MSI)

Operating System: Windows Vista SP1 64-bit and Windows Vista SP2 RC 64-bit

Drivers: Latest Windows Updates and ATI Catalyst 9.1

After getting a fresh copy of Windows Vista SP2 RC installed on a clean partition of our speedy 300GB RAID 0 VelociRaptor setup, we were ready to begin testing.

As a quick note, there was nothing new or special with the SP2 install. It also took roughly the same amount of time to install the OS as SP1. When Microsoft eventually releases Vista SP2 to the world, you will be able to download a smaller standalone update installer to update SP1 to SP2, but that's not out yet.

We would have liked to be using the latest graphics card (4870 X2), but we were unable to get one from AMD, so we had to stick with the capable Radeon HD 3870X2 OC from MSI.

3DMark Vantage

Version and / or Patch Used: 1.01

Developer Homepage: http://www.futuremark.com

Product Homepage: http://www.futuremark.com/products/3dmarkvantage/

Buy It Here

3DMark Vantage is the new industry standard PC gaming performance benchmark from Futuremark, newly designed for Windows Vista and DirectX10. It includes two new graphics tests, two new CPU tests, several new feature tests, and support for the latest hardware.

3DMark Vantage is based on a completely new rendering engine, developed specifically to take full advantage of DirectX10, the new graphics API from Microsoft.

As you can see from our first test, there is little difference between SP1 and SP2 - however, SP2 does take the lead by a very small margin here. It is only in GPU score that it is a little behind, but not by much at all.