Windows System Assessment Tool (WinSAT)
Posted by decipherinfosys on February 4, 2007
Microsoft has introduced an interesting new tool with the release of Windows Vista – the Windows System Assessment Tool, or WinSAT. This tool rates a computer on a scale of 1 thru 5, with 5 being the highest (or best) possible score. Some of the components WinSAT analyzes include a system’s processor, memory, hard disks, and graphics capabilities. It then uses an algorithm to calculate what is called a system’s ‘Windows System Performance Rating’. This is not merely an average of the performance of the various components. The algorithm provides a much more accurate picture of a system’s performance capabilities than other tools like PerfMon, for example, which is average-based.
To better understand this rating system, consider the following scenario: You have a desktop PC with 4 Gig of memory, but a terribly inferior graphics card. A normal averaging rating system would rank the memory of the machine at a 5, and the graphics card would receive a 1, which would average out to be a 3. Now, we all know that an operating system like Vista is much more dependent on excellent graphics capabilities than the excessive 4 Gig of memory, so in reality this machine will have terrible performance. In this example, the average rating of 3 is misleading, and not at all indicative as to how the system will actually perform.
So how do you run WinSAT? Go to Control Panel -> System and Maintenance -> Performance Information and Tools. The process will take a few minutes, and once completed the results will be displayed as shown in the screen-shot below:
From here you can view and print the details of the report, or learn more about the scores by clicking on the “What do these numbers mean?” link.
In case you’re wondering about the low score of “1″ in the screen-shot, the machine was a VMWare virtual machine with 748MB of memory.
