Microsoft says it has tweaked its Windows Experience Index (WEI) for Windows 7 to take into account new PC hardware configurations. Introduced with Windows Vista, Microsoft’s PC rating system is compiled by measuring the relative capabilities and configuration of each machine’s components.
The goal of WEI is to help consumers buy hardware, programs and software matched to their computer’s score. The WEI does not measure the interactions of components under a software load, but rather characteristics of the hardware, noted Microsoft Senior Vice President Steven Sinofsky.
“As such it does not — nor cannot — measure how a system will perform under your own usage scenarios,” Sinofsky said. “Thus the WEI does not measure performance of a system, but merely the relative hardware capabilities when running Windows 7.”
WEI Scoring
For Vista and Windows 7, the five areas scored include processor, memory, general desktop graphics, gaming graphics, and primary hard disk.
“The overall Windows Experience Index is defined to be the lowest of the five top-level WEI subscores, where each subscore is computed using a set of rules and a suite of system assessment tests,” said Michael Fortin, an engineer in Microsoft’s Windows Core Operating Systems Division.
PC buyers will be able to follow some general guidelines to understand the experiences that a PC with a given score range can be expected to deliver. “These Vista-era general guidelines for systems in the 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0 and 5.0 ranges still apply to Windows 7,” Fortin said.
Though the scoring areas for Windows 7 are the same as Vista, the actual rules for scoring devices have changed “to reflect experience and feedback comparing closely rated devices with differing quality,” Fortin explained. This makes the WEI more indicative of actual use, he said.
New Levels
Moreover, scoring levels 6.0 and 7.0 have been added to Windows 7 –…