Why Magento 1.8 better than older version?

Question

I have one question related to Magento new version its good for security point of view and other point which is mentioned there release note but there is no much enhacement related to front end performance.

Currently i have Magento 1.4.2 on my ongoing project for which client complain me performance are slow for end user prespective, to overcome this issue i tried to test Magento 1.8 performance for similar test cases but i don't even find any performance boosting result like in category page i get same loaing time in both Magento 1.4 and Magento 1.8 and also when i import 10,000 product and then check performance for loading time but there is no effect.

can any one highlight Why Magento 1.8 is better than Magento 1.4 it obviously newer version is better than old but i want to convience my client with some convincible point.

Thank You

Answer 1

Surely the release notes should speak for themselves, there have been a whole bunch of security, performance and functionality improvements released over time and there is no one single answer that is suitable for this question.

Release Notes

Magento Community Edition (CE) Release Notes (1.8 and later)

There have been many releases which have a high severity which also state why, such as:

Magento recently issued a patch to resolve a remote code execution vulnerability that enabled an attacker to delete files and directories on the Magento installation. This vulnerability was discovered through our quarterly penetration testing process and has not been reported by merchants. The patch is avaliable on the magentocommerce.com/download in the Magento Community Edition Patches section. Magento takes security very seriously and will continue to focus on identifying potential issues and hardening our defenses.

(This patch is included in the latest release):

This issue was fixed in Magento Community Edition 1.8.0.0; no patch is necessary for versions 1.8.0.0 and later. Patches are available for Magento Community Edition 1.4.0.0 through 1.7.0.2. We encourage all affected merchants to apply the patch in their next regularly scheduled maintenance cycle.

The list can go on and on.