Testing Valve Games on Vista Beta

This space is for people (the user community) testing the compatibility and/or the performance of current Valve games as well as the Steam platform, on the next generation Windows.

Purpose

The idea is to help Valve optimize their games for the next consumer platform by giving them performance samples similar to what they gathered with their stress tests.

Current Vista

Beta 2 Build 5384.4 (public beta)

Note:This beta requires a CD key. You can get one for free, or order the OS on DVD, here.

• English - 32-Bit (x86)

http://download.windowsvista.com/preview/beta2/en/x86/download.htm

• English - 64-Bit (x64)

http://download.windowsvista.com/preview/beta2/en/x64/download.htm

• German - 32-Bit (x86)

http://download.windowsvista.com/preview/beta2/de/x86/download.htm

• German - 64-Bit (x64)

http://download.windowsvista.com/preview/beta2/de/x64/download.htm

• Japanese - 64-Bit (x86)

http://download.windowsvista.com/preview/beta2/jp/x86/download.htm

• Japanese - 64-Bit (x64)

http://download.windowsvista.com/preview/beta2/jp/x64/download.htm

Steam Forums Vista Discussion

Steam Forums Vista Discussion

Drivers downloads

These are the latest drivers, but might be for an older Vista build. For each of the following set of drivers, please read the readme for the list of supported devices.

ATi Catalyst Video Drivers Catalyst Beta Driver for Windows Vista Beta 2 The OOB drivers for 5308 are the same as the drivers from ATI's website. Nvidia nForce System Drivers Nvidia nForce Beta2 x86 Drivers Nvidia Forceware Video Drivers Windows Vista x86 February CTP 32 bit Windows Vista x86 February CTP 64 bit Creative Sound Cards Creative Vista Drivers Availibility Chart

Results

Windows Vista Build 5308 Suede Game: Counter-Strike: Source OS: Windows Vista Home Premium (6.0, Build 5308, x86) DX: Version 9L CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3200+ 2.21GHz (Overclocked from 2.01GHz) Video: NVIDIA Geforce 6600GT (Driver Version: 6.14.10.8682) Memory: 1GB PC3200 DDR So-Dimm Video Settings Shader Detail: High Model Detail: High Shadow Detail: High Texture Detail: High Filtering: Antistropic 16X Water: Reflect All AA: None VSync: Off HDR: Full (Where available) Average FPS 60.22 FPS (1024x768) nba1341 Game: Counter-Strike: Source OS: Windows Vista Home Basic (6.0, Build 5308, x86) DX: Version 9L CPU: iP4 3.06 GHz 533 MHz FSB Video: NVIDIA Geforce FX Go5600 (Driver Version: 6.8.0.0) Memory: 1.25GB PC2700 DDR So-Dimm Video Settings Shader Detail: High Model Detail: High Shadow Detail: High Texture Detail: High Filtering: Triliniear Water: Simple Reflections AA: none VSync: off Average FPS 57.43 FPS (800x600) 39.58 FPS (1024x768) DogGunn Game: Counter-Strike: Source OS: Windows Vista Ultimate Edition (6.0, Build 5308, x86) DX: Version 9L CPU: AMD Athlon64 X2 3200+ Video: ATi Radeon 9800 Pro (Driver Version: 5308 Vista Beta) Memory: 1GB PC3200 Video Settings Shader Detail: High Model Detail: High Shadow Detail: High Texture Detail: High Filtering: Antistropic 4X Water: Reflect All AA: 2x VSync: Off HDR: Full (Where available) Average FPS 20 FPS (1024x786) TecShdw Game: Half-Life 2: Lost Coast, Day of Defeat: Source, and Counter-Strike: Source OS: Windows Vista Ultimate Edition (6.0, Build 5342, x86) DX: Version 9L CPU: Pentium 4 Prescott 3.0EGHz 1MB L2 (254*15FSB 3.81GHz) Video: GeForce 6800GT 256MB AGP (Drivers from Nvidia's site) Memory: 2GB PC3200 DDR 2.5-3-3-7 Video Settings All settings on high as detected by HL2 (same as in XP) HDR: Full (Where available) Average FPS (1680*1024) Comments Everything looks great Must turn off Desktop Composition via ctrl-shift-F9 (will make play perfect)

Windows Vista Build 5342 Ry Jones Game: Day of Defeat: Source OS: Windows Vista Ultimate Edition (6.0, Build 5342, x64) DX: Version 9L CPU: AMD Athlon64 3200 Video: ATi Radeon X300 Memory: 1GB Video Settings Defaults (1600x1200) Performance A-OK LOKI415 Game: Half-Life 2 and Garry's Mod 9 OS: Windows Vista Ultimate Edition (6.0, Build 5342, x86) DX: Version 9L CPU: PENTIUM D 820 3.2GHZ Per core (Dual Core) Video: ATi Radeon X1300 512MB (Driver Version: 5308 Vista Beta) Memory: 1GB PC4800 DDR 2 Video Settings Shader Detail: High Model Detail: High Shadow Detail: High Texture Detail: High Filtering: Antistropic 16X Water: Reflect All AA: 4x VSync: on (75hz) HDR: Full Average FPS 34 FPS (1280x1024) bugs In windowed mode screen doesn't fit window and offsets mouse Jumpy with desktop composition enabled Priyajeet Game: Half-Life 2: Lost Coast OS: Windows Vista Ultimate Edition (6.0, Build 5342, x86) DX: Version 9L CPU: AMD Athlon64 X2 4400+ 2.2GHz (Dual Core) Video: ATi Radeon X1900 XTX (Driver Version: 5308 Vista Beta) Memory: 2GB PC3200 DDR 2-2-2 Video Settings Shader Detail: High Model Detail: High Shadow Detail: High Texture Detail: High Filtering: Antistropic 16X Water: Reflect All AA: 6x VSync: Off HDR: Full (Where available) Average FPS 45.74 FPS (1280x1024) Comments Very minor texture corruption at places Pink textures still a problem

Windows Vista Build 5384

Zips

• Game: Counter-Strike: Source & Half-Life 2
• OS: Windows Vista Ultimate (Beta 2, Build 5384, x86)
• DX: Version 10
• CPU: AMD AthlonXP 2500+ 1.83GHz
• Video: NVIDIA Geforce 6800GT (Driver Version: 87.98)
• Memory: 1GB PC2700

Video Settings

• Shader Detail: High
• Model Detail: High
• Shadow Detail: High
• Texture Detail: High
• Filtering: Antistropic 8X
• Water: Reflect All
• AA: 2x
• VSync: Off
• HDR: Full (Where available)

Average FPS

• 45.33 FPS (1280x1024) On CS: Source Stress Test
• Couldn't measure accurately in Half-Life 2 due to random glitches.

Comments

• CS: Source - Stress test ran without issue. In-game it ran ok with minor hitching here and there (only 15 mins of gameplay though).
• HL2 issues - After a period of about 20 minutes of playing, the game completely froze for over 30 seconds and when control returned to me all sounds have disappeared. The only way to fix this was to restart the game.
• Textures and world geometry completely disappared. Antlions would only appear as shadows on the ground as well.
• The game ultimately hardlocked my computer multiple times prompting me to use the reset button on my machine each time. Vista is using an early version of DirectX 10, and there seems to be a number of issues for games using DirectX 9 (and possibly earlier).

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Required

• Adding publisher details to steam client/game executables. Will help in publisher verification at Vista security checks.
• Using CTRL-SHIFT-F9 to turn off Desktop Composition will be extremely helpful.

Links

• Windows Vista
• MSDN Half-Life Coding4fun
• WGF aka DirectX 10

Screenshots

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Videos

HL2 in a Window This video was made by Suede. Settings can be found further up the page.