Is windows 11 really bloated?

[Bubble99]

Is windows 11 really bloated?

I'm checking on HP laptop rebooted and shows 6 GB of RAM in use? Yes the laptop rebooted!! It showing 6 GB of RAM in use and no apps running.

The laptop has 16 GB of RAM.

 

[Shirasaki]

Yes windows 11 is very bloated. My old Dell laptop running windows 10 with 16GB of ram would only have a start RAM of about 8GB or less, and that’s with lots of programs starting up at reboot. A raw windows 10 would only take up 3GB of ram after startup.

 

[AustinIllini]

Windows as a platform is incredibly bloated. Case in point, install any linux distribution on the same hardware and immediately the performance doubles minimum.

I'm a huge believer in Fedora as a platform.

Is windows 11 really bloated?

I'm checking on HP laptop rebooted and shows 6 GB of RAM in use? Yes the laptop rebooted!! It showing 6 GB of RAM in use and no apps running.

The laptop has 16 GB of RAM.

This is pretty crazy, especially because Windows doesn't use RAM the same way Macs do.

 

[Basic75]

Windows as a platform is incredibly bloated. Case in point, install any linux distribution on the same hardware and immediately the performance doubles minimum.

Double? It's surely faster, as Linux is faster than macOS on the same hardware.

This is pretty crazy, especially because Windows doesn't use RAM the same way Macs do.

Windows has a buffer cache, it can mmap files, and it has demand-paged executables. It can page and swap to disk. Where is it so different?

 

[maflynn]

Here's a Dave2D video, where he compares the performance of the Legion Go S. Two identical handheld devices, one running windows, the other steamOS. In case people are unaware, SteamOS is a Linux OS, that is able to play windows games by emulation.

You'd expect that windows version executing these games natively would have the edge performance wise, but not so.

Here's his review of a laptop, where Intel's newer processor is really good on paper but when paired with windows, the user experience is rather poor given MS doing stuff we don't want

 

[boswald]

Windows as a platform is incredibly bloated. Case in point, install any linux distribution on the same hardware and immediately the performance doubles minimum.

I'm a huge believer in Fedora as a platform.


This is pretty crazy, especially because Windows doesn't use RAM the same way Macs do.

I use Fedora too and love it.

 

[NixUser]

Here's his review of a laptop, where Intel's newer processor is really good on paper but when paired with windows, the user experience is rather poor given MS doing stuff we don't want

I have a Lenovo i7 flip, nice sleek PC - with Win10 it was always feeling a bit sluggush.
I then installed Debain xfce4 over the top and it simply flew.
And became a useful laptop again too, which was nice.

 

[maflynn]

I have a Lenovo i7 flip, nice sleek PC - with Win10 it was always feeling a bit sluggush.
I then installed Debain xfce4 over the top and it simply flew.
And became a useful laptop again too, which was nice.

My desktop 3700x cpu 7800xt gpu feels a lot more perky running CachyOS. The cpu is a little long in the tooth by today's standards but the 7800xt is still pretty good

Gaming on CachyOS is giving me near windows 11 FPS performance which is surprising since they're running through proton

 

[Bubble99]

Yes windows 11 is very bloated. My old Dell laptop running windows 10 with 16GB of ram would only have a start RAM of about 8GB or less, and that’s with lots of programs starting up at reboot. A raw windows 10 would only take up 3GB of ram after startup.

That is really interesting because Microsoft Minimum RAM requirements is 4 GB for windows 11.

So I’m not sure why that not the case.

 

[maflynn]

That is really interesting because Microsoft Minimum RAM requirements is 4 GB for windows 11.

Interesting video

 

[it wasnt me]

I'm a huge believer in Fedora as a platform.

As someone who found Fedora far too bloated over ten years ago, I find this assessment somewhat amusing in the context of whether Windows 11 is too bloated.

The Linux kernel itself is already pretty chunky (at least compared to the kernels of other contemporary systems like Haiku and OpenBSD), even when you take various optimisation mods into account (such as the CachyOS kernel, which I recently looked at with Gentoo — fortunately, it's not tied to the distribution); in my opinion, Fedora piles quite a bit more on top of that.

 

[Bubble99]

Windows has a buffer cache, it can mmap files, and it has demand-paged executables. It can page and swap to disk. Where is it so different?

What is being cached to RAM on system that was rebooted? Is the OS loading apps to RAM thinking you may use it?

Is it normal for people system to show 40% used RAM.

 

[Basic75]

What is being cached to RAM on system that was rebooted? Is the OS loading apps to RAM thinking you may use it?

Are you trying to say that macOS loads applications into RAM after booting before you open them so that they launch faster?

 

[popup]

Is windows 11 really bloated?
...

Ooooh, yeaaaah.
Linux not only uses much more less RAM, but also the CPU is much more cooler. In a mini PC with Ryzen 5800H and 16GB RAM I got 20°C less with Debian 13 , KDE 6. With Windows 11 it hit the 90 + °C and 80+ °C at standby. With Debian it run at 60+ °C.

 

[Bubble99]

Are you trying to say that macOS loads applications into RAM after booting before you open them so that they launch faster?

That is what some one said that windows and Mac OS loads apps into RAM to speed it up. So if brave is your default browser than windows loads brave into RAM to speed it up when you click on brave to open.

I don’t think Linux does this.

 

[it wasnt me]

Linux not only uses much more less RAM

Wait until you start a GUI.

 

[Calaveras]

Is windows 11 really bloated?

I'm checking on HP laptop rebooted and shows 6 GB of RAM in use? Yes the laptop rebooted!! It showing 6 GB of RAM in use and no apps running.

The laptop has 16 GB of RAM.

It's hard to base that assessment off a laptop loaded with a manufacturer image. Such as a Dell with a Dell version of Windows which has all kinds of extra bloatware loaded in it.
I had a Lenovo a few years back for work that had all kinds of extra stuff running.
I spent a few days researching which were necessary and which were just crowding my resources.
There were 3 apps for wifi besides the normal Windows Wifi. Apps for ordering supplies and accessories. A bunch of things which basically replicated Windows functions but with Lenovo branding. And of course the worst was McAfee.
I was able to get it down to half as many running processes and more than half as much memory utilization.
More relevantly I wish it was easier to do the same to MacOS. There are a few Apple things and a lot of Adobe things I'd rather not have running all the time. Especially since Adobe nuked it's cloud storage feature. Why do I still have Adobe Content Sync?

 

[Shirasaki]

That is really interesting because Microsoft Minimum RAM requirements is 4 GB for windows 11.

So I’m not sure why that not the case.

Minimum is almost always what OS manufacturer wants for a certain level of experience, namely not some super crappy ones. It does not take into account extra programs users may load. My Windows 10 used to have startup ram usage of 8GB, and hover around 12-15GB while I’m using it. Granted I do load a lot of programs in the background but you get the idea.

 

[pshufd]

macOS and Windows have stuff running that uses RAM and CPU resources. Sometimes a lot of them. For Sequoia, it was a problem so I turned off everything I didn't need.

I did that once for Windows on my Lenovo Yoga though the stuff I got rid of didn't seem to have much of a performance impact. Though I just found that Copilot came back and uninstalled it again.

My 2020 Windows 11 desktop and my Lunar Lake laptop run fine. But the desktop has 128 GB of RAM and the Lunar Lake has 32 GB. If you get at least 32 GB, you probably won't have issues from bloat.

 

[winxmac]

Windows 8.x is more bloated than Windows 7 but is less bloated when compared to Windows 10 and Windows 11.

I still wish that Microsoft revive the Windows 7 look, or revive Windows 7 itself then upgrade everything under the hood and just add the option to switch between the Windows 7 [and older Task Manager] and the Windows 8.x and newer Task Manager as well as the file transfer progress window introduced in Windows 8.x

With the changes Apple introduced in Big Sur and later releases, they seem to follow in the footsteps of Windows 8.x which is making things bigger and waste space, they could be releasing a touch friendly macOS version in the future, or just merge iPadOS and macOS.

 

[Steve Adams]

Here is my take on computing after having long mental sessions with all OS'es. 99.9% of the windows rage is clickbait on Youtube, tech sites etc. I am guilty of it too. Had an issue with my M365 yearly payment going through with something borked on MS side. Went to a different pc and it worked. Other than that it's on the hardware side I am having issues with.

As for MacOS and Linux, I have tried both multiple times and keep coming back to windows. I have the Badgering of ads turned off, I have co-pilot turned off in all applications and I have telemetry set to NO. I am moving forward with windows and android as my systems of choice and just need to find the proper replacement for my laptop. That's what I find hard. I want a 14 inch laptop with great build quality because I am travelling with it, an sd card reader, ability to edit 3 streams of 4k video with mild color grades and effects, and touchscreen. Unicorn system. At least 32gb of ram, preferred 64gb like I have now, and upgradable storage.

So, for now I am stuck with my current dell which has all of that but not the 3 4k feed editing (I do have a built workstation that will rip through that no problem), but would like to be able to on the road.

 

[pshufd]

Here is my take on computing after having long mental sessions with all OS'es. 99.9% of the windows rage is clickbait on Youtube, tech sites etc. I am guilty of it too. Had an issue with my M365 yearly payment going through with something borked on MS side. Went to a different pc and it worked. Other than that it's on the hardware side I am having issues with.

As for MacOS and Linux, I have tried both multiple times and keep coming back to windows. I have the Badgering of ads turned off, I have co-pilot turned off in all applications and I have telemetry set to NO. I am moving forward with windows and android as my systems of choice and just need to find the proper replacement for my laptop. That's what I find hard. I want a 14 inch laptop with great build quality because I am travelling with it, an sd card reader, ability to edit 3 streams of 4k video with mild color grades and effects, and touchscreen. Unicorn system. At least 32gb of ram, preferred 64gb like I have now, and upgradable storage.

So, for now I am stuck with my current dell which has all of that but not the 3 4k feed editing (I do have a built workstation that will rip through that no problem), but would like to be able to on the road.

I haven't had any problems with Windows 11 that I couldn't solve but maybe that's due to my hardware.

If I had your requirements, I'd get one of the Panther Lake 2.2 pounds and under 14 inch laptops and combine it with an M5 Pro MacBook Pro 14. Total weight under six pounds which is in the ballpark of gaming laptops that have high-performance CPUs, GPUs and heavy-duty cooling.

 

[Steve Adams]

Won't be going with a macbook. I have used a couple this weekend and while the hardware is NICE, the software I cannot gel with at all. My son uses mac for his work, but I cannot. ha ha. I like the galaxy book 6 lineup, but have to goto a 16 inch model to get what I want, and they are only being offered with 16gb of ram.

 

[Bubble99]

Well that is interesting on a work laptop running Windows 11 pro it has 16 GB of RAM and 4 GB is in use on start up with no apps running.

But other laptop running Windows 11 pro it has 16 GB of RAM and 6 GB is in use on start up.

 

[pshufd]

Well that is interesting on a work laptop running Windows 11 pro it has 16 GB of RAM and 4 GB is in use on start up with no apps running.

But other laptop running Windows 11 pro it has 16 GB of RAM and 6 GB is in use on start up.

macOS usually uses 5.5 - 6.0 GB with nothing running for me but I think that the amount of RAM in your system is a factor in how much the OS uses up. I think that 32 GB is the sweet spot of not having to worry about the OS size and it's growing and shrinking to deal with application software demands.