Under the same configuration, how much performance will Windows 11 improve compared to Windows 10?With this question in mind, the technology media Techspot conducted actual tests on several Intel Core processors. This test is not only to collect some benchmark data, but also to compare it with the 12th generation Alder Laker CPU on the Windows 11 platform.
On the community and social platforms, the answers to the above questions are not the same. Some people claimWindows11 is much faster, while others believe that the opposite is true. In order to clarify the specific situation, Techspot tested the configuration with the flagship Intel Core i9-11900K and the entry-level Core i3-10105F. The latter is an upgraded 10th generation processor with 4 cores and 8 threads. The purpose is to see if there are any performance changes using low-end or high-end hardware.
In addition to the clean installation of Windows 10 and Windows 11 systems, Techspot also tested to upgrade to Windows 11 after clean installation of Windows 10. In the following chart,[Fresh]Represents a clean installation from the system image, and[Updated]It means to upgrade to Windows 11 after installing Windows 10 cleanly.
And the fourth configuration[Fresh] VBS, Which means that the virtualization-based security (VBS) function is enabled in the Windows 11 system. It was first introduced in Windows 10 as an optional security layer for corporate PCs. The role of VBS is to allow Windows 11 to use the hardware virtualization features in modern CPUs to isolate the security areas of memory and host security features, such as Hypervisor-Enforced Code Integrity (HVCI).
VBS and HVCI can prevent hackers from running malicious code with trusted applications and drivers on your system, because it will fail the code integrity check. All of this sounds great on paper, but early tests have shown that it affects performance in some cases, the most obvious of which is gaming.AMDIn some processor usage scenarios, the performance discount is as high as 28%.
Users who use the first-generation Ryzen CPU or the 10th-generation Intel CPU and above will experience this performance regression. For people with newer hardware, the overall performance impact is close to 5%.MicrosoftIt is recommended that OEM manufacturers enable VBS and HVCI by default on new PCs, but they allow these two functions to be disabled by default on gaming PCs.
This test platform includes:
processor:Intel Core i9-11900K and entry-level Core i3-10105F
hard disk:Team Group 8TB MP34Q M.2 NVMeSSD
Motherboard:ASUS ROG Strix Z590-E Gaming WiFi, BIOS version 1007
RAM:Crucial Ballistix DDR4-3200 CL16 kit
Graphics card:MSI RTX 3090 Gaming X Trio
As for the test itself, we are looking at the performance of applications, games, storage and load times. All results are based on the average of 3 runs. In some cases, we shut down the power of the entire system between runs to avoid caching the results. Well, let’s get into the test results.
Cache and memory latency performance
Before we enter the application benchmark test, let’s take a look at the performance of cache and memory latency. In short, we see no change or almost no change in L1, L2, or L3 cache performance of Intel processors. We see the obvious performance difference when looking at DRAM latency.
For 10105F, the installation of Windows 10 and Windows 11 provides the same results, but enabling VBS does produce a 7% performance loss, which can be noticed in memory-sensitive situations, such as games.
For the more powerful 11900K, we see that Windows 10 provides the best results, because upgrading to Windows 11 adds 5% to the delay, although the newly installed Windows 11 only adds 3% to the delay. However, after enabling VBS, we again saw a noteworthy increase, this time an increase of 9% compared to the Windows 10 configuration.
Application benchmark
● Cinebench R23
On Cinebench R23, we found that 11900K produced the best results on Windows 10, although the difference was small, it was about 1% more than the newly installed Windows 11. Enabling VBS has a very small impact on performance, only 2%, and there is a difference between the slowest and fastest configuration, and the same is true for the Core i3 system.
● Blender Open Data
The results of Blender Open Data are very similar to the data of Cinebench. The results of Windows 10 and Windows 11 are basically the same, but enabling VBS will bring a slight performance loss, this time compared to the situation we saw when using Windows 10, it was about 3%.
● 7-Zip
Continuing to look at the results of the 7-Zip file manager, we see that in most cases, the Core i3 processor can provide the same level of performance when using Windows 10 or 11. The Windows 11 configuration with VBS enabled is the only exception. Performance A drop of 3%.
The drop in 11900K was even greater, and we found that Windows 10 provided the best results. After upgrading from Windows 10 installation to Windows 11, performance dropped by 3%, and reinstallation restored some performance. Then, when comparing a fresh Windows 11 installation with VBS enabled, we again saw a 3% performance hit.
● Adobe Photoshop 2021
Tests conducted with Adobe Photoshop 2021 showed that when using the Core i3 processor, the performance of all four test configurations was similar, and enabling VBS resulted in a 3% performance hit.
In other words, when using VBS, we see that the performance of 11900K has dropped more significantly, reaching 7%. However, when the relatively new Windows 10 and 11 are installed, the performance is basically the same.
● Adobe After Effects
In the Adobe After Effects benchmark test, Core i3 and Core i9 components using Windows 10 or 11 both provide the same performance, although this time we saw a significant 10% drop in performance after enabling VBS.
● Adobe Premiere Pro
The last application benchmark is based on Adobe Premiere Pro, and we see almost the same performance using Windows 10 or 11. The only exception is the configuration with VBS enabled, because this reduces performance by 12-13%.
Game benchmark
It’s time for some gaming benchmark tests. Please note that we are not testing dozens of games, but only a few games. In the article, Techspot showed the test results of 4 games.
● 《FI 2021》
Using Core i9-11900K, we saw that a fresh installation of Windows 10 and 11 provided the same performance. Updating the Windows 10 installer to 11 is not that fast, but we are talking about very small differences here.
These differences are slightly increased in the Core i3 section, and Windows 10 does provide the best results, only 3%.
● “Rainbow Six: Siege”
The result of Rainbow Six Siege is interesting because VBS reduced the frame rate by 11-12%, although this rate may be exaggerated due to the extremely high frame rate. In addition to these results, we see that the performance of Windows 10 and Windows 11 using either CPU is the same.
● “Watch Dogs: Legion”
Enabling VBS reduced the performance of Watchdogs: Legion by 8%, which can be seen when looking at the 1% low data. Otherwise, the new Windows 10 and 11 installations provided the same results, and when simply upgrading from 10 to 11, there was a very small performance impact.
● “Cyberpunk 2077”
The last game tested was “Cyberpunk 2077”. Here, we saw that after installing VBS, the performance was affected by ~8%. Otherwise, when comparing Windows 10 and 11, the performance is the same.
Below is the loading time of “Cyberpunk 2077” using TeamGroup 8TB NVMe SSD. Here we see that the difference between various configurations is no more than 1 second, so Windows 11 will not speed up the loading time of today’s games.
Interestingly, compared with Windows 10, Windows 11 also has a slower loading speed, although the difference is not obvious when running at 11900K. The difference with the Core i3 processor is even more significant, because the loading time of Windows 11 has been extended by almost 40%, although this is only a 3 second change. For our configuration, Windows 11 did not improve the boot time.
Storage performance
Before ending the test, let’s take a look at the storage performance of CrystalDiskMark. Regardless of the configuration, the read and write sequence performance is the same, so there is nothing to report here. However, the result of a random queue depth of 32 is interesting.
Compared with Windows 10, the writing performance of Windows 11 has been greatly improved. To be completely honest, Techspot is no longer familiar with SSD testing. Techspot hasn’t run CrystalDiskMark for many years, but I can tell you that after multiple system resets, the results are repeatable. I did fill it completely before starting the test. Brand new solid state drive.
Therefore, I believe that the 20-26% performance improvement of 11900K we see here is accurate, I am just not sure why we are seeing such a large performance improvement. There is even a 10% improvement from Windows 10 to 11 with the Core i3 processor, although the result is much lower overall.
Another noteworthy issue is that VBS weakens storage throughput and reduces read and write performance. On 11900K, we saw a 21% drop in read throughput and 58% drop in write throughput. Or to put it another way, the random write performance of Windows 11 was almost 2.5 times faster after VBS was disabled.
Summarize
In most cases, there is almost no difference between Windows 11 and Windows 10 using Intel’s 10th and 11th generation Core series processors in terms of gaming, application, and storage performance. If you experience significant performance degradation after the upgrade, it is worth checking whether VBS is enabled and doing something as we explained in the introduction.
It is also worth noting that, in order to obtain maximum performance, you’d better start over with a fresh installation of Windows 11. In addition to a small amount of performance loss after the upgrade installation, we also occasionally randomly appear blue screen crashes when loading Windows 11, which has never happened during a new installation.
In short, compared to Windows 10, Windows 11 does not provide real performance advantages. Perhaps the only exception is random read/write storage performance, but we won’t know if this is limited to ours until we conduct further testing. Test the configuration. At this point, we are eager to see the effect of Windows 11 on Intel’s upcoming Alder Lake CPU, as well as our views on Ryzen. Ryzen has recently received a patch to solve L3 cache performance issues.