W7, the Windows 7 Thread

[ph0bYx]

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http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/08/windows7-seven-reasons/

Landing in stores October, Windows 7 is sparking a surprisingly heated debate (in our forums, at least) on whether or not upgrading from XP is a good idea. If you’re in the “nay” camp, we’re going to lay out seven reasons why you should consider switching your stance to “yay.”

When scanning our list, we politely encourage you to ask yourself, “Do I really want to continue using an eight-year-old operating system?” Followed by “Don’t I deserve better?” Because no matter how comfortable you are with XP, you do deserve an OS that’s both newer and better, and Windows 7 will deliver. Not convinced? Then read on.

You Asked for This
Remember Vista? We know most of you don’t want to, and that’s because the OS fell short of many consumers’ expectations. As a result, many — especially power users — elected to skip Vista entirely, and have continued running Windows XP. Hence Microsoft’s attempt at a redo with Windows 7. This time around, the software giant made an effort to crowdsource feedback from Microsoft enthusiasts by distributing a free beta version of Windows 7 in January.

You complained, you demanded, and in response Microsoft slapped something together to ship October 22. The result? The overall presentation of Windows 7 is familiar enough to welcome XP users, but fundamentally it’s different enough to make you change the way you think of Microsoft. (I can vouch for that, being a long-time Mac user and ex-Windows fan).

Upgrading Won’t Screw You Over
Microsoft has its loyal fans in mind, including those clinging for dear life to XP. The tech giant promises that Windows 7 has been coded to support almost every piece of software that runs on your XP system. If, in the rare case one of your XP programs doesn’t work on Windows 7, you can still run it in a virtual environment called XP Mode. What’s especially cool about this mode is you won’t have to toggle between an XP emulator and Windows 7. The apps running in XP Mode appear like ordinary windows that are part of Windows 7.

Also, the Windows 7 upgrade chart may appear intimidating and confusing, but prior to release Microsoft plans to release a compatibility checker that will automatically scan your system to tell you which version of Windows 7 is for you.

Automatically Installed Device Drivers
This is only a minor improvement, but it addresses a major pain in the ass in earlier versions of Windows. Who has time to scour the internet for a device driver to work with hardware such as a video card or an external hard drive? Life is too short for that garbage work, and fortunately Windows 7 does this chore for you. Plug in a new piece of hardware, and the OS will find and install the driver for you. XP has this feature, sort of, but it works better in Vista and much better in Windows 7. No more of those annoying yellow question marks. Good riddance.

Piracy
Yarr! We know there are plenty of you out there downloading pirated digital booty, especially in Windows land. But it’s never been convenient to be a pirate compared with being a paying customer. For example, if you’re a legitimate buyer purchasing movies off iTunes, you can easily stream your media to your legitimately purchased Apple TV. If you’re a pirate, you’d have to go through roundabout programs and hardware to re-create the experience.

Windows 7 is an OS practically made for pirates. Want to display your movies, photos or music on your TV? Bam! Windows Media Player will do that out of the box if you have a Wi-Fi enabled TV, or an Xbox. No extra programs to install: Windows Media Player seamlessly communicates with your Wi-Fi device to display your illegal content in all its glory on your fancy HD TV.

And sharing media is easy, too. Want to download all of your brother’s music? Bam! HomeGroup, an easy networking feature included in Windows 7, will make that super easy between computers running the OS. Immediately upon plugging in to your network with Ethernet or Wi-Fi, HomeGroup will ask if you wish to join the group on the network, allowing you to set up easy file sharing in minutes.


A Better Interface
The new Aero features, which we covered in our Windows 7 first look, will change the way you interact with your computer. Aero Peek will prove the most useful: The feature displays outlines of all your open windows behind your active window. Each outlined box contains a thumbnail previewing its corresponding window to help you choose.

Gizmodo’s Matt Buchanan, who has been using AeroPeek for six months, provides an excellent perspective on Aero: “It breaks the instinct to maximize windows as you’re using them; instead, you simply let windows hang out, since it’s much easier to juggle them.” Makes sense, doesn’t it, for a generation of multitaskers? Aren’t you tired of Alt-Tabbing over and over and over?

Another feature, Aero Snap, makes it easier to resize and tile windows to fit the available space. (Read more about Aero Snap and Aero Peek.)

Words aren’t enough. You really have to try the OS to understand why these UI enhancements are a big deal. We get the idea that the people dismissing Windows 7 haven’t yet tinkered with it, and we highly encourage you to download the release candidate and give it a test drive. But do it now: The download is only available until August 20.

More Advanced Hardware Support
Technology evolves faster than living organisms, and Windows 7 is also designed to work well with upcoming hardware. Touchscreens are getting more popular in the mainstream (thanks largely to the iPhone), and sure enough Windows 7 includes multitouch support. (Check out a video demoing how it works.) If 2010 is indeed the year of the tablet, as we predict, then Windows 7 just might be the winning OS in that new landscape.

If you’re not interested in touchscreens, think multiple processor cores. At some point when multicore computers are more widely available, affordable and energy efficient, an eight-year-old OS like Windows XP isn’t going to know what to do with all that extra processing power. Microsoft has already hinted that Windows 7 will scale to 256 processors. That’s more than enough, but you get the picture: This is a new operating system designed for newer systems. You’re going to need to upgrade eventually, so why not do it now, so you can get a good feel for the OS, rather than later?

The 64-bit version of Windows 7 can handle bigger system memory, too, scaling up to 192 GB of RAM, compared to the 4-GB limit for the 32-bit versions of Windows XP and Windows 7, and 128 GB for the less common 64-bit edition of Windows XP.

Oh, yeah, speaking of new devices — Windows 7 is tweaked to better suit those trendy netbooks, too. These puny devices are low-powered and thus limited in performance, and Windows 7 will run better on them thanks to its improved memory management. For example, Windows XP allocated video memory for unseen windows, but Windows 7 does not. It uses video memory only for visible windows. That equates to a more responsive netbook with longer battery life.

It Looks Sexier
A superficial reason, we know, but we’ve become so intimate with our gadgets that their looks are important, too. Windows 7 will make your new PC look new, unlike the boring-as-vanilla UI of Windows XP. Extra detail, polish, gradients and a UI that will clear your desktop of clutter should all make Windows 7 a more attractive choice.

[f4Gg0t_43]

*cough*

[ph0bYx]

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http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/08/7-reasons-to-avoid-windows-7/

Windows 7, which hits stores in October, is shaping up to be the best version of Microsoft’s widely used operating system yet.

But nothing’s perfect. Windows 7, like any product, has flaws — some of them big ones. Wired.com on Tuesday laid out a list of good reasons to upgrade to Windows 7, including an enhanced user interface, improved compatibility with newer hardware and a seamless entertainment experience. (For even more background, see our first look at Windows 7.)

Now let’s look at the other side of the story: The reasons you might consider skipping this upgrade altogether.

Upgrading From Windows XP Requires a Clean Install
If you’re a Windows XP user, upgrading isn’t as easy as inserting a disc and running the installation. Instead, you must back up your applications and files, wipe your hard drive and perform a clean install of Windows 7. After getting Windows 7 up and running, you must either manually reinstall your software and repurpose your file library or trust Microsoft’s Easy File Transfer to migrate your files for you.

We don’t see this as much of a headache, because data backups should be performed regardless of whether you’re switching to a new OS. Plus, a fresh install is preferable to ensure clean performance. But we understand why this would bug many XP users. For one, it’s time-consuming. For another, many are sensitive about their data, and they don’t trust Microsoft. (We don’t blame them.) Third, if XP is working fine for you, why fix something that isn’t broken?

Vista users, on the other hand, can upgrade to Windows 7 without a clean install. They might as well climb out of that train wreck, since it’s easy.

The Upgrade Is Expensive
Windows 7 isn’t cheap. Pricing varies based on the version you choose, but you’ll be paying at least $120 to upgrade from XP or Vista. And if you don’t already own a copy of a Windows OS, you must pay the full price of at least $200 for Windows 7.

In the software market, $120 isn’t ridiculous for an upgrade. Apple’s Mac OS X Leopard costs $130, for instance. However, Apple plans to sell its next OS, Mac OS X Snow Leopard, for $30 to current Leopard users. This Apple power move alone makes Windows 7’s pricing look pretty steep.

It’ll Cost You Time, Too
The customers most likely to opt against upgrading to Windows 7 because of money are businesses. Joe Ansel, owner of a company that plans development of science centers, wrote in an e-mail to Wired.com stating his reasons for not upgrading to Windows 7: “Upgrades cost us time and money as we find ourselves playing with our computers to make them do the things they used to do seamlessly — while the phone never stops ringing and you’re getting 60 e-mails a day. Make no mistake, as a business owner, the cost of the upgrade itself is nothing compared to the lost wages trying to get the new OS to do what the old one did.”

Ansel added that companies running obscure software will also feel disinclined to switch. Microsoft promises Windows 7 will support almost every piece of software compatible with XP, and in the few cases it doesn’t, there’s an XP virtualization mode ensuring backward compatibility. Still, companies invest thousands of dollars to create a stable IT environment, and it’s understandable why they wouldn’t wish to upset their non-Apple cart.

It’s Still Windows
Despite delivering an intuitive, modern interface in Windows 7, this OS is still Windows. In our first look at Windows 7, we complained about the OS’s inability to recognize an Adobe AIR file followed by its failure to search for software to run the file.

Also, Windows 7 doesn’t immediately know what to do with some pretty obvious tasks. When you insert a thumb drive, for example, you must tell Windows 7 what to do with it (i.e. open the folder and view the files) and customize a setting to get the OS to automatically behave that way. In short, when getting started you’ll have to do a lot of tweaking and customizing to get moving smoothly. That’s unfortunately an experience all Windows users are accustomed to — things don’t “just work.”

Security Isn’t Automatically Better
Computerworld’s Steven Vaughan-Nichols stands firm that Windows 7 won’t change anything from a security perspective: “Windows 7 still has all the security of a drunken teenager in a sports car,” he wrote. “Millions of lazy Windows users are the reason why the internet is a mess. If you already do all the right things to keep XP running safely, you’re not going to get any safer by buying Windows 7.”

Good point. Because Windows 7 is still Windows, you’re again the primary target of attack for hackers and virus coders. Therefore, it’s up to you to protect yourself with anti-virus software and running update patches to keep the OS as secure as possible. (Compare this experience to Mac OS X Leopard, for which many don’t even run anti-virus software, because it’s more secure out-of-the-box compared to Windows.) Though Windows 7 does deliver some security enhancements, such as data encryption for thumb drives, and a feature for IT administrators to control which applications can run on a corporate network, these are not general security improvements that change much for the overall user experience.

Built-In Support for Egregious Hardware-Based DRM
Paranoid XP users won’t wish to upgrade to Windows 7 for the same reason they didn’t switch to Vista: Like Vista, Windows 7 includes support for digital rights management technologies that could potentially regulate how you use your media. Though some alarmists have called Microsoft’s DRM “draconian,” the implemented DRM hasn’t proved to bear significant consequences yet.

Ars Technica provides a thorough explanation of the DRM in question. In short, the technologies called Protected Video Path (PVP) and Protected User Mode Audio (PUMA) provide secure playback of video and audio media, respectively. “Little or no media actually demands the use of the protected paths, so on most users’ systems, Windows never invokes them,” wrote Ars Technica’s Peter Bright. “Play back unprotected media on a Vista machine, and the DRM subsystems simply don’t get used.”

Still, there are going to be people cringing in fear that one day PUMA and PVP will screw them over. And for that reason they’ll be sticking with XP — or a totally open OS like Linux.

Snow Leopard Is Almost Here
Apple’s next-generation Snow Leopard is arriving September — a month before Windows 7. Apple is promising its OS will deliver on many of the improvements Microsoft highlights in Windows 7 — 64-bit addressing, improved efficiency with task management on multiple processors, and others. It’s undetermined which OS is better, but from my own perspective as a long-time Mac user, I will say I already prefer the current Mac OS X Leopard to Windows 7. If you’re looking (or willing) to switch to a radically different OS, then OS X Snow Leopard is an option to consider before committing to Windows 7.

Conclusion
Do the cons outweigh the pros? That probably depends on how committed you already are to Windows. If you’re currently using Windows Vista, the upgrade to Windows 7 is a no-brainer. Most of those currently using Windows XP should also upgrade, to take advantage of Windows 7’s usability, enhanced device support, and other features. But if you’re currently using a Linux distribution or a version of Mac OS X, Windows 7 isn’t going to offer much to get you to switch.

[ebrizzlez]

Windows is making an attempt to become better, so we need to give windows a round of applauds.

An operating system is only as stable as the user makes it. Windows is very buggy indeed, but most of the problems caused by windows is more towards the users side, then the actual operating system fault. Many services could've been improved on and made more secure, but I think windows is realizing this and Windows 7 hopefully will improve all of this.

Thanks for keeping the updates ph0. ;]

[leetnigga]

An operating system is only as stable as the user makes it. Windows is very buggy indeed, but most of the problems caused by windows is more towards the users side, then the actual operating system fault.

Isn't it just a fact how stable an operating system is? It's not subjective. Maybe one user will notice it less or be able to work around it easier but that doesn't change how stable it is.

Knowing how to avoid or live with things is good, but it doesn't improve the quality of the operating system.

[DNR]

It is subjective, I find most problems with new installs of OS were on old hardware. People really should not upgrade their OS from XP to 7, the hardware is just too outdated. People that I found trying to upgrade their OS - without upgrading their hardware - admitted they were trying to do this on the 'cheap'. When microsoft tests their product they have to do it around the machines available for sale, not every combination of old hardware that people are nursing along. I see it as trying to put a new ECM in an old car to make it go faster - while the ECM will tell the engine to go faster, the engine just doesn't have it.

I have been using MS products since MSDos 3x, I setup other customers PCs and networks, I worked in a college computer lab - so I had to install, and setup hundreds of boxes with MS. My experience is not just 2 or 3 computers I owned, but hundreds of other boxes I had to setup and run Windows on. My OS experience also includes Solaris, Novell, and AS400. With all the positive experience I have with MS, I have to question people that complain, and yet they only tried it once or twice on one or two computers. My hands-on experience with over a hundred different machines is just undeniable proof that MS works.

I have been using Vista on my laptop for a few months and no problems. The problems I did expect - some old software might not run perfectly - those had to be upgraded -and its not a work-around, its called an upgrade because its was time. There are people here that stated they have used XP with only one or two BSOD the entire time they owned it. I have 3 machines here that I can boot right up, one has Win98, two has XP, plus I have removable HDDs that have Win98 or XP on it, all will work and run with no issues. All of these machines proved reliable and some machines are 20 years old! Why? The OS works because they are matched to the old hardware. I would NEVER consider upgrading an old machine's OS to a new OS, to complain to MS about why I can't get Vista to work on a machine I brought 10 years ago is just stupid.
I sense some people just complain, to complain about some old slight they got a long time ago by MS. Its time for them to get over it.

DNR

[Lundis]

The thing is, this time vista users can upgrade to 7 and actually get better performance. However, as DNR says, there's no point in installing 7 on old "xp"-hardware, but I must say that I'm surprised at how well it runs on my old 1.6ghz comp ^^

[Alien1]

The comment of not running it on an older XP machine is No name calling please, Windows 7 will install on older XP machines that meet some of the basic requirements, like at least 1 gig RAM. I have it installed as a dual boot on an old 2.4 P4 with 1 gig mem and all is smooth. I tried putting Vista on and it just sat there looking at me stupidly. MS thought it thru this time, they WANT users who are running XP to be able to upgrade, since this will make them money, by the way they make more $$$$ when a user upgrades from XP then they would if you bought a new PC or upgraded for FREE from buggy VISTA.

In all honesty I believe any vendor should upgrade drivers from an XP machine since XP is still supported by M$, but they get greedy also trying to make users buy new hardware. OH by the way M$ detected allot of my older stuff from the WU site and installed proper drivers, so M$ is learning to please the masses.

I still love my Linux boxes, but Win7 to me isstable and fun to play around with.

Anyhow these are just my 2 cents, please no one be offended by them. I made sure of that ph0bYx

[nightkid]

my stats----
gigabyte motherboard
4gig ddr2
250gb hdd
1 gig nvidia graphix card
amd 2.6 duo core processor

i been using windows 7 for a bit on my main box and i like the look of it, if you have the power to run the eye candy it's a nice change but not a must. i installed the classic doom collection & WOW both run very smooth.
i havent had any bad experiences with window 7 yet has alot of codec video drivers except divx. and one thing i dont like is when you defrag it doesnt show u a visual layout of your HDD but you can download a diff. defrag tool to fix that. windows 7 uses a less resources than xp from the cpu but the ram usage is about the same. make sure your hardwire is compatiable, i had a cam that was a little outdated and wasnt able to use it...but i got a 120 dollar cam for 30 bones but thats another story.

[Alien1]

Some hardware can be run in compatibility mode say for XP or Vista and thats how I got my old Logitec cam to work in Windows 7.

[bozotheclown138]

i ran 7 on my old windows xp with 512mb of ram lol

[nightkid]

how bad was the lag/response rate?

[bozotheclown138]

i would have to say it was ok as long as nothing ran on the computer haha so it is not recommended