Section 1.4. Windows System Performance Rating

1.4. Windows System Performance Rating

Windows Vista includes a performance rating system, which may puzzle you at first. After all, your hardware can clearly support Windows Vista if you're able to run the tool, so what is its purpose?

In fact, it's not designed to tell you how well your PC runs Vista, but rather how well it can run other software. The idea is that software makers will assign their software a certain level, and you'll buy only the software that the performance rating system says you can run. The higher the number is, the better the performance.

In theory, that's fine. But it's not clear how well it will work in practice, because software makers, including Microsoft, have yet to rate their software according to this system. And it's also quite mysterious how the performance rating system calculates its ratings. As you can see in Figure 1-6, the individual components of this PC rate relatively high, from a 5 (the top rating) to a 3.7. So why is the overall system rating a 3.7? Windows Vista automatically takes the lowest component rating and uses that as the overall system rating.

Figure 1-6. Performance rating

Useful or not, you might want to see how Windows Vista rates your hardware. Choose Control Panel System and Maintenance Performance Information and Tools.