Windows 11 Upgrade?

[RasmusP]

I also upgraded to Win11 last weekend. I decided to go with a new install and then move all the needed apps and settings there which took quite a while, but the benefit is a clean system to start with. Seems to be quite OK, I guess they ironed most of the bad stuff after a year and some. The only thing I'm actually missing is the ability to move a single taskbar on a secondary monitor. It's either show it on the main display or show on all displays, but the latter option doesn't how tray icons on a secondary screen. Why they had to remove this functionality is beyond me, I hope they're gonna bring it back some time soon, I really need it

You could check out "Explorer Patcher".
I don't know if it enables what you need, but I needed to have the taskbar at the top of the screen for my Surface Pro 8, which ships with Win 11 and it's another feature not available in Win 11 anymore.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

many years of Vista, many more of win7
View attachment 645409

I see order by arrow next to Name header, which might explain your issue, at least on this screenshot.
Anyway, this is what I have on Win11.

 

[RCHeliguy]

Wow! This thread has disintegrated.

Other than the cartoony look to Windows 11, I don't have much that I would complain about.

 

[jgf]

Wow! This thread has disintegrated.

Other than the cartoony look to Windows 11, I don't have much that I would complain about.

Lol. Threads, like conversations, meander.
I never liked the Aero or modern looks, with the rounded buttons, made the desktop look like a toy. I still use the Classic mod for that XP look.

As for Win11,

https://www.extremetech.com/computing/342941-windows-11-collects-an-awful-lot-of-telemetry-about-your-pc

 

[Deleted member 197115]

Wow! This thread has disintegrated.

Degenerated, for sure.

 

[demetri]

You could check out "Explorer Patcher".
I don't know if it enables what you need, but I needed to have the taskbar at the top of the screen for my Surface Pro 8, which ships with Win 11 and it's another feature not available in Win 11 anymore.

In fact, I did. But it's not ideal either. E.g. right-click menu from one of the system tray icons would pop up on the main screen and there were some other minor graphical glitches I noticed during a couple of hours I was checking it out. For now, I decided to just switch my main monitor to the center screen when I need to run a game on it, which doesn't happen too often

 

[RasmusP]

In fact, I did. But it's not ideal either. E.g. right-click menu from one of the system tray icons would pop up on the main screen and there were some other minor graphical glitches I noticed during a couple of hours I was checking it out. For now, I decided to just switch my main monitor to the center screen when I need to run a game on it, which doesn't happen too often

Meh, that doesn't sound great, yeah...

 

[Spinelli]

According to the Bios help text, turning off the ecores allows it to run a higher cpu clock. I think that's related to the shared cache memory.

The 13900 has a level 2 cache over twice as large as the 12900 and a slightly larger l3 cache. The result is that it is less dependent on the MB DRAM speed.

Yup, turning off the e-cores gives some advantages. First off, it lowers temps. Second, usually allows higher frequency at the same voltage. These two points mean possibly a 200 Mhz or so higher overclock. Thirdly, it frees up more L3 cache giving the 13900K 36 MB instead of 30 and the 12900K 30 MB instead of 24 - it's nothing compared to AMD 3D chips but it's still nice to have that extra bit as games clearly take advantage of it as AMD 3D CPU benchmarks show. Lastly, it allows a much higher ring (AKA cache, uncore) clock - usually around 4.9-5.0 GHz on the 12900K and possibly more on the 13900K (5.1-5.2 GHz?). It may also free up more L2 cache but I'm not 100% sure.

There's a fair bit of performance headroom potentially available when you combine a higher CPU P-core overclock + more P-core cache + a higher cache/ring/uncore overclock.

Then there are very interesting reports like this mentioning leaving e-cores enabled but disabling hyperthreading for all cores:

Out of the games with performance penalty I have Metro Exodus so I've done some testing. This is on 13900K 5.9 core 5.2 cache 4.5 ecore 4x8 ddr4-4100 cl14 timings tuned.

(8 threads) 8P/0E/HT0 - 165.26
(16 threads) 8P/0E/HT1 - 160.31
(16 threads) 8P/8E/HT0 - 157.58
(24 threads) 8P/8E/HT1 - 148.42
(32 threads) 8P/16E/HT1 - 139.06

So the penalty is not from E-cores, it is from the number of threads. At 16 threads the penalty for running 8+8 instead of 8c/16t is just 1.5% and disabling hyperthreading increases overclocking potential by 200MHz at the same voltage, so performance will equalize.

This is quite in line with some other tinkering I've been doing since getting the CPU, this kind of situation happens from time to time, that's why the maximum number of threads you want to have in gaming setup is 16, going above causes issues that are not so easy to detect, because it is not necessarily games just refusing to launch or crashing (this does happen at 32 or more threads in some games though), but underperforming in either framerate or frametime consistency, and you have no way of knowing until you test it for each game.

I've also found some single threaded games like CSGO or Witcher1 that get 10% boost from E-cores even though they obviously sit idle, so either the CPU can access E-core resources somehow or it doesn't always function properly with E-cores off, so disabling all of them is not a good idea.

So overall 8P/8E/HT0 seems a way to go for gaming. 16 threads do not have any compatibility issues or meaningful performance penalty, you need E-cores for games that get a boost from them and disabling HT increases overclocking potential by 200 MHz at the same voltage.

I haven't cared enough to test this but this is a really cool & interesting idea.

In the end, either of the 3 methods aren't going to give any major differences in the majority of games but there can be decent game-specific differences, plus it's fun & interesting for those of us who like tinkering & testing even if most of the differences may only be "on paper" rather than humanly perceptible.

 

[BrunoBæ]

Reading this I become more more convinced to stay with my old Win7 and my just as old Xeon x5670 as long as I can. Hehe Im ofcourse running without the hyperthread joke.

CatsAreTheWorstDogs: My main consern is that if I wanna try VR in this lifetime then I have to upd to a newer OS - and then have to fight all the MS telemetry bullocs.

 

[Durge Driven]

When any company has no competition they have no incentive to improve their product or lower their prices.

I'm not saying ten different OS per se, but ten different developers producing OS to a common standard. Where would the automotive industry be if one company had locked down all the patents and became the only manufacturer? So we have numerous auto manufacturers but all use the same fuel, oil, tires, spark plugs, etc., and run on the same roads. Where would the VCR market have gone if Sony had not licensed the technology to other manufacturers, so we had numerous different VCRs but all recorded from the same sources, played on the same TVs. and used the same tapes. We should have MS Windows or HP Windows or IBM Windows or Joe's Windows, with such competition we would get better products and lower prices.

Lower prices lol you can buy W10 /W11 for peanuts online.
I never argued on principle or best practices.
I was asking what use would 3 or 4 OS to run same gaming PC
Would developers support them all and for what reason ?
If games supported different OS where would it end, I would need 4 PC or
have to re-install OS to run another game.
Sorry can't see the upside.

 

[RCHeliguy]

When I upgraded my gaming computer from Windows 8 to Windows 8.5(?) to Windows 10 and now to Windows 11, all the upgrades were free. Along the way they included WMR and other tidbits that they created and even if I only used that briefly, it didn't cost me anything.

MS never made a dime on those upgrades or continuing to keep all those OS's patched for security issues and new features. We can complain about the inconvenience of getting patches sent to us and installing them, but damn MS for trying to keep our systems secure from viruses and being hacked and fixing bugs long after the first sale was made. They have a lot of nerve keeping all those developers employed writing those updates for us and designing and building new features for us.

 

[BrunoBæ]

MS never made a dime on those upgrades or continuing to keep all those OS's patched for security issues and new features. We can complain about the inconvenience of getting patches sent to us and installing them, but damn MS for trying to keep our systems secure from viruses and being hacked and fixing bugs long after the first sale was made.

Yeah you are right that all these free updates is only a great MS service forced on us to make our computers safe. Nobody does thank MS for this altruistic and free service - right?

 

[demetri]

Reading this I become more more convinced to stay with my old Win7 and my just as old Xeon x5670 as long as I can. Hehe Im ofcourse running without the hyperthread joke.

CatsAreTheWorstDogs: My main consern is that if I wanna try VR in this lifetime then I have to upd to a newer OS - and then have to fight all the MS telemetry bullocs.

You would have to update the hardware first. That old Xeon with DDR3 and PCI-E 2.0 isn't gonna be OK for VR anyway

 

[RCHeliguy]

You would have to update the hardware first. That old Xeon with DDR3 and PCI-E 2.0 isn't gonna be OK for VR anyway

Not if you really believe Bill Gates once said, "640K software is all the memory anybody would ever need on a computer."

BTW Bill Gates denies ever saying that in the interview below.

QUESTION: "I read in a newspaper that in l981 you said '640K of memory should be enough for anybody.' What did you mean when you said this?"

ANSWER: "I've said some stupid things and some wrong things, but not that. No one involved in computers would ever say that a certain amount of memory is enough for all time."

 

[BrunoBæ]

You would have to update the hardware first. That old Xeon with DDR3 and PCI-E 2.0 isn't gonna be OK for VR anyway

Yeah thanks - but I know I know
Actually its not the money but the fact that for the sim I prefer at the moment (AMS2) then everything is running more than ok.
Probably helped by my small 1680x1050 monitor.
Because until I decide to invest in a VR kit then I have no urge to upgrade my system.

 

[Neilski]

Then there are very interesting reports like this mentioning leaving e-cores enabled but disabling hyperthreading for all cores:

Disabling e-cores and/or HT certainly seems to have some useful impacts on certain workloads. (The impact on Metro Exodus being as high as that does make me wonder if it has some pathological/buggy handling of threads.)

I'd be far more inclined to consider taking advantage of those tweaks though if they could be turned on and off without fuss in a running system - and if I've understood the recent posts correctly, that's not possible. I hate rebooting too much to be willing to change BIOS settings more than very occasionally (like a few times a year! ).

 

[jgf]

Lower prices lol you can buy W10 /W11 for peanuts online.
I never argued on principle or best practices.
I was asking what use would 3 or 4 OS to run same gaming PC
Would developers support them all and for what reason ?
If games supported different OS where would it end, I would need 4 PC or
have to re-install OS to run another game.
Sorry can't see the upside.

Remember when many games did come with different versions - DOS, windows, Mac - on one disc? (I still have my original ICR2 on such a disk.)

And note I did not say having three or four OS, I said have several companies making the same OS. With competition comes the incentive to make a better product, and to make what the customer wants. With no competition there's no incentive to listen to the customer, the product is dumped with a "take it or leave it" attitude at whatever price (have you ever seen MS have a sale on any version of windows? the only way to get a markdown on any MS product is to buy a used copy).

And "peanuts" is relative. You can buy a new LearJet for $6.7mil ($43k/month), for many people that's peanuts.

 

[Novopaine]

And note I did not say having three or four OS, I said have several companies making the same OS.

You more or less just described Linux. It's getting better all the time, especially with companies like Valve helping to accelerate the potential. Unfortunately there's a long, long road ahead still.

 

[jgf]

You more or less just described Linux. It's getting better all the time, especially with companies like Valve helping to accelerate the potential. Unfortunately there's a long, long road ahead still.

If they can ever develop Linux to natively run windows software they will have a world beater. Until then it's too much of a technophiles' toy (at my age I want to use, not tweak).

Though Valve (Steam) is a dealbreaker for me.

 

[RCHeliguy]

Valve steam is a deal-breaker?

Linux is too much to learn?

MS's new stuff won't cut it?

So that leaves obsolete OS's or Apple?

Apple is working on a new headset....

Or maybe Playstation VR