Vista gets crammed onto a PS3. It's as bad as you think.
By Donald Melanson 
posted August 5th 2008 12:13PM
posted August 5th 2008 12:13PM
We can't in good conscience recommend trying this one at home for sake of your own sanity, but one enterprising PS3 enthusiast has thankfully gone the extra mile and installed Windows Vista on the console so you don't have to. As you might have guessed, however, it's not a pretty sight, with the OS running under emulation and requiring nearly 25 minutes to fully boot up. You can also add an extra five minutes and thirty seconds on top of that to load the start menu, and about twelve minutes to load up that most demanding of applications: Notepad. Head on past the break to see it for yourself, and hit up the link below for the installation instructions... if you dare.
[Thanks, Death_Coil]
[Thanks, Death_Coil]
@Lorre
You cannot simply recompile an operating system and expect it to run on another architecture. Certain aspects may very well be written in native x86 assembly. Vista/XP 64bit are most certainly not just recompiled with some magic x86-64 flag.
(As this broken comment system won't come through with an e-mail for my reply, I'll just post again)
@Zak:
3 things "wrong with me":
1) that posting was meant to be a reply to the troll known as "Ocean 10 (im not 'clak')". Chalk the misplaced remark up to a shoddy commenting system.
2) Step off, fanboy. PS3 wasn't designed to run Vista... I'm surprised it even runs this fast, given the nature of the hack.
3) Engadget is biased, "dipstick". In fact, most tech blogs readily bash anything to do with MS, yet laud the next minor OSX update as the second coming of Jesus. Read a few of their posts before sounding like a moron...
1. Fair enough, comments always get messed up here.
2. How am I a fanboy again? Vista runs *horribly* on the PS3. That's a simple fact. There are no excuses you can make for it.
3. I read all of Engadget's articles. I fail to see how this one makes them biased against Vista or towards Apple which isn't even mentioned - at all - in the article. Engadget says Vista is slow on a PS3... if I were to guess, I would say that it's because Vista IS slow on a PS3. Are you calling Engadget biased because they're reporting the truth?
And note that Engadget is not saying anything bad about MS in the article either. They're just saying Vista is horrible on the PS3. That's because it IS. Not because Engadget is biased. All it takes is some common sense to figure this one out.
@Zak:
I sometimes wish there was an 8th circle of hell, reserved especially for people like you.
Chris: Insulting me doesn't make you look any smarter. Come up with some reasons why you disagree with me and we'll be getting somewhere. Until then, you're just a troll.
Oh, and by "people like me", I can only assume you mean people who point out the obvious truth. I know, the truth hurts.
Use the "light version for Christ's sake.
Will Smith could have summed up this project in a sentence.
"I am so not gonna get me one of those."
This video was a great lesson in the futility of trying just about anything for the hell of it.
i'm pretty sure will smith said
"I have GOT to get me one of those"
after driving the caddy CTS during the movie bad boys
=]
They should run Linux in VMWare in the Windows.
Yes... but will it run OS2?
Or a better question: Will it blend?
Your mom blends.
maybe if they ran windows 3.1 in Qemu on the PS3 it would go at a half decent speed...
hmmm...mental note to self...
Hamidxa, I believe you were tasked with the quality of your opinion based upon a stated fact that it takes Vista 25 minutes to load onto a PSP. Since we only have speculation about how other OS will run on this archetectuer, I say the point is moot. I don't believe we need to chastise the education system in this country to further our point. Furthermore, I've heard nothing but bad about Vista since it came out. I worked as a contractor running batch security tests for said OS and actually walked away due to the ineptitude of the entire testing process. I would like to posit another accounting and business rule. "If you release a poorly designed product, nobody will use it. Regardless of how much you force people to use it, you will eventually lose." I have yet to see a working copy of Vista on anyone's home PC.
Really? You haven't seen a working copy at anyones home yet? And I thought I didn't go out much.... (jk) Mine works just fine and fast and I am using a system I built for myself mid last year.
Good lord, you have the syntax of a child that is equal parts pretentious fuck and uneducated moron. Please make it stop.
Damn you Engadget comment system... Damn you....
...clak?
@eggsmatter
At first I was almost believing your little tale. Then I stumbled upon your last sentence and realized you were a complete idiot and/or liar. (or perhaps you just know no one that would invite you into their home.. if so that makes me happy)
Yah, I'm a complete idiot. So quick to flame. It is true. Here in the gret NW nobody uses vista. Sorry, 99% of my computing is done at work so . . . I need a reliable OS free from security failures etc. Most businesses are a bit gunshy when it comes to implementing a poorly tested release. We are seeing a lot of this across the boards (symantec, anyone?) Corporations that can, rely on their initial consumer base to actually do the hard testing and then patch and plug where they can. What do I rely on? Anything built by SUN microsystems and good old Unix system 5. Something I really wouldn't want to run on a playstation for the most part. So uhhh flame on buddy. Apparently some people here have too empty of lives and too much time on their hands to really be constructive. Are you like that guy in South Park who would beat everybody at World of Warcraft 'cuz he had no life?
'I'm accepting donations for a new camera.'
Jesus what a douche.
Will it run Windows Mojave?
There are 3 reasons for the slow operation of Vista.
1) The architecture is Primarily RISC and trying to emulate x86 on RISC is going to have a serious performance penalty.
2) Only one of the 8 cores (the mother core) is available for processing, the SPE's are out of the picture due to the hypervisor.
3) Very low memory for Vista's requirements which causes excessive Disk swap and hence slower response times.
So the following statements may be considered true:
1) the X86 version of OSX will be subject to the same problems as Vista.
2) the RISC version of OSX might be modifiable to have it run natively and hence perform almost as good as ubuntu linux for PS3.
3) the X86 version of linux will be subject to the same problems as Vista.
4) even though there is a RISC versin of WIN-NT, it will never install due to outdated architecture and lack of device drivers. If I had to leave a chance of success, it would be .00001% of a chance.
5) The best way to squeeze performance out of the PS3 would be to somehow get a leaked version of the source-code for the PS3 OS, which is heavily linux dependent. Then someone would have to remove the restrictions in it that keep users from installing programs of their choice etc.
Grammar Corrected:
He should have put Apple's OS X on it, because then he would be happy. OS X is heaven; Vista belongs in the bin. Nobody uses Vista.
Facts Corrected:
He should have put Apple's OS X on it, even though it would be nearly as slow as Vista. OS X is heaven; Vista belongs in the bin. Some people use Vista (and I'm not sure why,) but what OS they use is their business.
Damnit, replies never work. This one was meant for clak.
On that matter, why don't we ever hear anything from Ryan Block and the gang about why commenting here sucks and if they can do anything about it?
What would You change About the Engadget Comment system?
5433 comments
Shame Vista is being forced upon on many computers, most of the drivers for many manufacturers made their dirvers Vista Compatible only..
My friend uses Linux or XP on his PS3, but on a separate hard drive, I think XP runs pretty smooth, just that its not made for a PS3..
good job anyhow, quite the challenge, I'm impressed you took the time to do it despite how much I dislike Vista's performance.
Cheers,
Nick
look at all that "unbelievably fast cpu" and "untapped power". cant even run vista. piece of crap has 256 ram and a 4 generation old graphics card. sony = fail.
Cell is based off of Power PC you moron. Its architecture is completely different than what Windows runs on. Thats why people were so excited when Apple switched to Intel over IBM. It meant people could dual boot natively and cut out emulation all together.
Considering your on a tech blog I'd think you'd know a little more... Start reading the site instead of just looking at the perty pictures, k?
Microsoft and Blue-ray, one step closer...
You see a room full of older men, some wearing a shirt with an Apple, some with a funky wavy square, and some with a penguin. Many are crying, and most have a substance known as "bullshit" spewing from their mouths. On the door to this room hangs a sign that displays in a bold courier typeface: "Who Cares?"
Oh yeah? Well Sega does what Nintendon't. Does YOUR game system have 16-bit blast processing?
Anyone think someone might make a distribution of Linux that uses Cell to its limits or would that be impossible due to Sony? I know Sony limited RSX on Linux but I've never heard about Cell being limited. It sounds like no linux distro is optimized for Cell.
Anyone think its at all likely that someone will do the PS3 right? An install disk could be packaged with the PS3.
So it doesn't only suck at web browsing, it sucks at running windows or doing ANYTHING productive. (no, music, pictures and games don't count)
"Nobody uses Vista"? What? My Vista machine begs to differ. As do a whole lot of others.
well I am impressed by them getting vista to run on 256mb ram...
What a useless piece of news.
Please install Vista and try then, not use Vista on an emulator. That's not the same thing and at least I got the feeling when I read the title that they had installed Vista, not Vista over Linux emulator.
Are ALL of you people kidding me?
Have most of you been asleep as far as tech news is concerned?
Cell Processors are finding their way into computers now.
So the OS makers are going to have to step up in some way.
You are all also losing site of what a processor is. You read too many opinionated advertising crap and you now are biased yourselves.
The entire function of a processor is to CRUSH math calculations and instructions.
OS's and software are means to an end. Someone WILL make a Cell based OS.
On top of that, we exploited and made cheat devices for the PS2.
I am already hard at work on the PS3 and I have already made a memory and iOP interface on my PS3.
Give us time, we will bust this thing WIDE open.