# General Business Category > Technology Forum >  Windows 7

## twinscythe12332

Windows 7 is on a lot of people's minds.

will it be the next big thing for microsoft, or is it going to be another version of "the V word". 

one thing is for sure, it definitely looks like the very graphical user interfaces are here to stay:


with the reviews on the current public beta looking pretty good and microsoft's design strategy getting turned on its head, windows 7, at the very least, is looking to be a major improvement on vista.

a few extra links I found:
windows chief opens up on '7'

 Windows 7 build 6956 performance test

number of benchmarks in different progs amongst vista, 7 and XP SP3

so what is your take on Windows 7?

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## Dave A

Love the Mac advert  :Rofl:

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## 3x-a-d3-u5

> Love the Mac advert


There are soo many GREAT Mac ads on youtube. If you've got he bandwidth I sugget you take a look. The only problem is after a while you'll want a mac  :Wink:

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## twinscythe12332

> There are soo many GREAT Mac ads on youtube. If you've got he bandwidth I sugget you take a look. The only problem is after a while you'll want a mac


nah, never had that problem. I hear the cure is to buy more apple stuff, and when asked why it's better than a PC, explain how "it just feels better"

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## 3x-a-d3-u5

> nah, never had that problem. I hear the cure is to buy more apple stuff, and when asked why it's better than a PC, explain how "it just feels better"


Funnily I don't own any apple stuff, I just start playing a game on my window machine and realise how awful it must be for non-windows machines to play those great games  :Wink:  (I would list them but there are just so many, but the obvious C.O.D. 4, CSS, CS 1.6, Warcraft, Warhammer etc.)

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## 3x-a-d3-u5

If you have the bandwidth (and the patience) you can try out the new windows from a beta download here:http://www.microsoft.com/windows/win...-download.aspx

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## twinscythe12332

> Funnily I don't own any apple stuff, I just start playing a game on my window machine and realise how awful it must be for non-windows machines to play those great games  (I would list them but there are just so many, but the obvious C.O.D. 4, CSS, CS 1.6, Warcraft, Warhammer etc.)


hahaha, funnily enough I've been reading up that the mac is starting to support gaming. take a look on amazon.com or the likes and just type in "mac" plus any one of those titles. I'm sure you'll don the tin foil hat and say the end is nigh just like I did  :Big Grin: 




> If you have the bandwidth (and the patience) you can try out the new windows from a beta download here:http://www.microsoft.com/windows/win...-download.aspx


those testing it seem to be enjoying themselves. I haven't read a bad review on it yet. but then again, they are comparing it to vista (whichever version), which already has had its name dragged through the mud.

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## 3x-a-d3-u5

I eat my hat! Mac/apple supporting mainstream games! The end of the world as we know it is certainly nigh!

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## twinscythe12332

Microsoft extends Windows 7 beta download deadline

well, it appears Microsoft has been really into pushing deadlines later and later.

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## Dave A

They probably have a rough number in mind as to how many Beta downloads they want out there. Remember, it's not about previews to amp it up - it's about guinea pigs to test the software  :Stick Out Tongue:

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## twinscythe12332

> They probably have a rough number in mind as to how many Beta downloads they want out there. Remember, it's not about previews to amp it up - it's about guinea pigs to test the software


too true, especially in the realm of OS creation. there is just too much that can go wrong

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## twinscythe12332

No More beta well there we go, as was announced at PDC, microsoft isn't going to be doing a beta 2, just got the release candidate to look forward to.

all in all, by the reviews I've read, it sounds like they wouldn't have needed much of a beta 2. it should just be a few tweaks to get going. 

I'm excited to see what windows 7 will look like eventually, but still going to wait the 6 or so months after release before I put full trust (and a bit of cash into a new PC) in Microsoft's delivery.

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## Dave A

A new PC too?  :EEK!:

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## twinscythe12332

hahaha. I'd rather get a new PC with a new OS than get a new OS for an old PC. then you don't have old component issues and all that. why be bleeding edge on one section and not another?

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## Loman

Vista was pretty good in beta too, I'm told.

But lets hope they learnt from the whole vista screwup.
Can't wait to try it out. What an excellent reason to upgrade a pc.

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## Dave A

Didn't Vista have that "hack it if you can" contest in Beta?

I think that went a long way to the beta good rep.

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## twinscythe12332

yeah, of course people could just be projecting their hopes. "please be better than vista, please be better than vista, please be better than vista..." oh wait, that might be microsoft.

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## garthu

:Big Grin:  NICE!

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## Loman

Definitely

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## twinscythe12332

uh oh, looks like there's trouble in paradise. 

I honestly will have to agree with the microsoft side though. if that can be considered a vulnerability, we should disable browsers and email, after all, isn't that where most of the attacks come from?

here's a more recent link to follow up on as well:
read here.

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## Dave A

MS should run a poll as to whether you want the "did you initiate this" nag on or off by default. And the switch between those options definitely should not be hidden!

Personally, give me the nag. As said in the article, *irritating but safe*.

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## twinscythe12332

read here

some interesting information. it looks like people on windows XP will be able to upgrade to windows 7 (thus doing a vista skip entirely), albeit with a fresh install. whether you'd want to do that, is another story. I still think windows 7 is going to have some size issues, and it's still going to use up a fair chunk of resources. however, machines running vista currently (and are truly vista capable), should have no problems with windows 7.

personally, I'll probably gun straight for the 64 bit version. there are a number of new software packages that utilise 64 bit now, a major increase from when dual and quad cores first came out.

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Dave A (18-Feb-09)

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## Dave A

So computers bought after 1 July 2009 with Vista loaded will be entitled to a free upgrade to Windows 7.

That's a fairly good incentive to hold back on buying that next PC until then  :Stick Out Tongue:

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## Chrisjan B

I downloaded the Windows 7 beta and installed it on a PC with the following specs:

Pentium 4 2.8 GHz processor
1GB DDR 400 memory
128 MB Nvidia 6200 graphics card
80 GB 7200 rpm IDE hard drive

I t uses MUCH less resources than Wondows Vista - freshly booted and with Avast Antivirus running it uses about 328 mb of memory which is about the same as Windows XP.

It also run the Aero interface and the speed and responsiveness of the PC seems to be the same as we get used to in Windows XP.

It does have it issues - Trend Micro PCcillin is not compatible, the Windows Experience Index does not work properly (exited without finishing) on the network only one of several shares is seen etc.

Overall it seems that it may be worth the wait, and a new PC not necessarily needed for acceptable performance.

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Dave A (18-Feb-09), Graeme (18-Feb-09)

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## twinscythe12332

> I downloaded the Windows 7 beta and installed it on a PC with the following specs:
> 
> Pentium 4 2.8 GHz processor
> 1GB DDR 400 memory
> 128 MB Nvidia 6200 graphics card
> 80 GB 7200 rpm IDE hard drive
> 
> I t uses MUCH less resources than Wondows Vista - freshly booted and with Avast Antivirus running it uses about 328 mb of memory which is about the same as Windows XP.
> 
> ...


very similar to a test rig I had when first using vista. 6200 was a 256MB ddr2 and hard drive was a 40 gig. The real thing with vista is it tends to optimize to your PC's resources. admittedly hogging more than it should, but still. It tended towards approx 34% - 40% of the system's memory on idle. 

let's not forget that that is the beta. I like the reports coming out about it, but it also has the chance of going a bit haywire towards the end. let's hope Microsoft keeps to their current adopted strategy of not releasing a module unless it is complete, and doesn't make the boot progs look a few pages long. 

the big test is going to be RC1. if they can keep winning votes with that, Microsoft is going strong.

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Dave A (19-Feb-09)

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## twinscythe12332

Enterprise features

apologies for the double post.

looks like windows 7 enterprise isn't going to be too amazing, but may have some interesting features geared towards telecommuting. connecting to office networks without a VPN, BranchCache for speeding up remote file access and the likes, BitlockertoGo for when your son really wants those new songs on your work 500gig, and appLocker (which looks kinda interesting) for restricting application installation and access.

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## Dave A

> apologies for the double post.


No need to apologise. Thanks for keeping us informed  :Thumbup:

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## twinscythe12332

Microsft said to ship windows 7 in september

yeah, I'm not going to believe this till an MS OFFICIAL says it's happening. the guy may have a clue, but then again, microsoft may hit a giant block and leave him looking like a fool.

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## Dave A

In the meantime he gets a whole pile of links and hits for breaking the rumour  :Wink:

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## twinscythe12332

very true. after all, a bit of bull here isn't going to really attract too much attention down the line while he's wrong.

for those of you on windows 7 beta, read here for a brief overview of some of the changes that will be hitting RC that you might care for. for everyone else, take a sneak peak at what to expect once you upgrade  :Wink:

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## twinscythe12332

windows 7 starter edition. Thought you guys might want to know about it. it sounds awesome for netbooks, no doubt bringing down the price but still keeping decent functionality.

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## twinscythe12332

A bit of an old thread, but since Windows 7 was released on the 22nd of october last year (the guy was wrong, but I guess not too far out. lol), I guess now would be a good time to get this thread up and running again with your views of windows 7, as well as any good/bad stories. 

Starting off the discussion, I installed a copy of 7 professional yesterday. I used Vista before, and it worked beautifully for me. Doing a clean install (a few of the upgrade nightmare stories made me decide on this) didn't feel any different than when I did the vista install. the only real difference you see is that the background picture is different. Everything installs, you enter your key and continue through. 

in terms of the user interface, the main noticeable difference you will see over and over again is the task bar. Instead of the usual icon and text, win7 sticks to larger icons. hovering over these icons will bring up a mini display of whatever you're hovering over. Hovering over the mini screen will hide everything else and show you just what you're hovering over. While the fresh UI will keep XP users in awe, most that chose to use vista will feel very comfortable while using it (unless of course you hated vista's UI).

The large majority of the tweaks and upgrades are in the back-end. from personal experience, vista took up approx 35-38% of my memory on start up. windows 7 currently takes between 21 and 25%. the start up and shut down is extremely quick (and I have an abnormally long boot sequence). Opening applications is equally fast, and gaming hasn't suffered through this upgrade.

I choose the word upgrade, because that is what it is. the version number for vista is 6.0.
the version number for win7 is 6.1.
It is better than vista, but not completely different (like vista was to XP).
And, naturally, it is better lol.

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## tec0

I got my windows 7 starter with my new notebook. It is really robust and can be stable. Yes some of the older software will not touch it with a ten foot pole but it doesnât eat your computer alive. Your computer does feel faster and more responsive then with Vista and basically runs a good GUI âit looks niceâ

So yes in all it looks the business and it works well. However, you can still streamline it and Skype has real compatibility problems "you get an annoying error of your explorer not being able to handle something." 

Other than that, it runs well and it works... It doesnât need a big CPU and a billion GB of ram and more importantly if you disable the updates it doesnât cry, scream and give you âyou are at riskâ death notes... However it gets cranky with you when you open a few programs at the same time. 

Still multitasking is a windows XP Pro thing but again how many big applications can you run on a simple CPU and not much RAM? Maybe it is to stop memory faults and that common phenomena known as blue-screen-of-death that is synonymous with XP before SP 1 and not to mention VISTA âand yes VISTA is crash happy!â 

So overall if you go for windows 7 and you want the basics then YES windows 7 starter is limited like a serial killer in a straitjacket that is locked up in a padded room. But it still has a mean look about it. I honestly think its SP1 will allow for a bit more freedom but let us see.   :Yes:

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## AndyD

I'm running win7 on only one of my computers. To me win 7 is what Vista should have been. It's more stable, and less resource intensive than Vista and it's okay if Micros0ft operating systems are your thing. I haven't been motivated to upgrade my XP Pro pc's and I certainly won't be uninstalling OpenSuse to make way for Win7 anytime soon.

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## twinscythe12332

> I got my windows 7 starter with my new notebook. It is really robust and can be stable. Yes some of the older software will not touch it with a ten foot pole but it doesnât eat your computer alive. Your computer does feel faster and more responsive then with Vista and basically runs a good GUI âit looks niceâ
> 
> So yes in all it looks the business and it works well. However, you can still streamline it and Skype has real compatibility problems "you get an annoying error of your explorer not being able to handle something." 
> 
> Other than that, it runs well and it works... It doesnât need a big CPU and a billion GB of ram and more importantly if you disable the updates it doesnât cry, scream and give you âyou are at riskâ death notes... However it gets cranky with you when you open a few programs at the same time. 
> 
> Still multitasking is a windows XP Pro thing but again how many big applications can you run on a simple CPU and not much RAM? Maybe it is to stop memory faults and that common phenomena known as blue-screen-of-death that is synonymous with XP before SP 1 and not to mention VISTA âand yes VISTA is crash happy!â 
> 
> So overall if you go for windows 7 and you want the basics then YES windows 7 starter is limited like a serial killer in a straitjacket that is locked up in a padded room. But it still has a mean look about it. I honestly think its SP1 will allow for a bit more freedom but let us see.


yep, starter is limited to 3 concurrent programs if I remember correctly.

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