Windows 7 gets down to business
With Windows 7, Microsoft is trying not to make the same mistakes it did with Windows Vista. That much is clear.
One of the biggest things Microsoft is trying to do different this time is be a more dependable software vendor. The company knows it lost some credibility with businesses by changing its Vista plans midstream and also having several delays.
Windows 7 bears a resemblance to Vista.
(Credit: ZDNet UK)"We know the stop and start nature of Vista created big challenges for our customers and partners," Microsoft senior director Gavriella Schuster said in an interview this week.
Microsoft is aiming to get Windows 7, currently in beta, ready to go in time to be included on PCs sold during the 2009 holiday shopping season.
Although Microsoft has been criticized by some enthusiasts worried that their voices weren't being heard early enough to affect the design of Windows 7, Schuster notes that businesses have had an early say in Windows 7, through efforts such as a desktop advisory council.
"We brought them in periodically at each development milestone including the planning phase," Schuster said.
As an example of the kinds of changes Microsoft made in response to the business feedback, Schuster points to the way Microsoft handled DVD playback.
With Vista, Microsoft offered the DVD decoding software only in its consumer and Ultimate versions. When some businesses complained that they needed DVD-playing abilities too, Microsoft added that feature to the business versions. However, some businesses said they actually didn't want workers to be able to play DVD movies on their machines. So in the end, Schuster said, the feature will be there in all the business versions, but companies will be able to elect whether it is on or not based on the image they select.
Another change came when the company showed customers its BitLocker-to-go feature, which brings the file encryption to portable devices like USB flash drivers. Businesses like the feature, Schuster said, but were concerned that the encryption would prevent the devices from being used later with Windows XP and Vista machines. As a result, Schuster said, Microsoft decided to engineer some measure of support in earlier operating systems for BitLocker-to-go. Now, when protected devices are inserted in an XP or Vista machine, users can enter their credentials and then use the device in a read-only manner.
In addition to listening to business customers, Microsoft is also watching how they work. The company says many of the changes that it decided to make in Windows 7 were based on the hard data it collects on how customers are using the product and where they are getting tripped up. (Microsoft has a number of opt-in programs that allow the company to get data on Windows use and problems.)
In some cases, the company found that a little change can make a big difference. By studying Vista, Microsoft learned that often when a program wouldn't install in Vista, it was because the application's designers had hard-coded the program to work with only a certain version of the operating system. That's why Microsoft decided to make Windows 7 officially version 6.1 rather than 7.0.
During her years at CNET News, Ina Fried has changed beats several times, changed genders once, and covered both of the Pirates of Silicon Valley. These days, most of her attention is focused on Microsoft. E-mail Ina. 
*hi-five*
Heck, make it a commodore PET! My pet will beat your 1541 :) :)
ahhhhhhh, nostalgia!
http://www.pcworld.com/article/153624/under_the_hood_windows_7_is_vistas_twin.html
so if you hate Vista, you will hate win7
Get off this "registry" horse before it throws you off and gives you a kick. Obviously, you don't use Windows so I don't know why the registry or Windows viruses bother you so much. It makes me feel sad for you.
Third-party applications cause 99% of the problems in your OS. We see it on Windows, we see it on Macs, and we see it on Linux distros. Now we are beginning to see it on our phones... The most widely used devices will have more developers and the more developers you have the more chances of installing something that will corrupt your system.
Why am I even bothering? Its obvious you have some insecurities.
Go patch OS Leopard thats deleting files when do a simple copy and paste.
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My goodness you're fun. Do yourself a favor and stop pulling these factoids from your backside. Your credibility has so far fallen deep into negative territory. Like politician territory here. "Read my lips, no new taxes." "I did not have relations with that woman." "No one could have guessed that terrorists would fly planes into buildings."
I use Leopard daily at work, so unlike you I have a clue what it's like. It's not perfect (what is??), but compared to the nightmarish slavery you winblows users suffer it's heaven. WGA doesn't exist anywhere outside the winblows plantation because it's an affront to thinking people. Neither does the abomination known as the "registry". As a general rule of thumb, OS X "just works". Want to know why? It's really nothing more than Apple's flavored candy on top of an OpenBSD derivative. Yeah that's right, it's Unix under the covers. You know, that OS designed back in the early 70's as a multiuser networking OS and has been improved on ever since.
Without walls and ceilings, who needs windows or gates? (Answer - slaves!)
After playing with the Windows 7 beta release, I found that it's more like Vista Second Edition, so that version number is actually appropriate.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/153624/under_the_hood_windows_7_is_vistas_twin.html
That article is blatantly biased and based off of a Alpha Release
Real fair eh?
That article is 5 months old, completely biased and technically lacking. Honestly, to assume that "under the hood" is exactly the same because the thread count and memory consumption of the system process is comparable borders on gross negligence. That's like saying a pinto and a ferrari are comparable because they both have 4 wheels and can get up to 60mph (eventually). The author has a very clear bias against vista. Most responsible testers wouldn't even bother testing an alpha release against an in-market product. Clearly, the enthusiasm in the market for the beta release is telling a different story than this article. In the end, carve out a few gb of disk space and test it for yourself. Stop listening to every wannabe computer dork with a keyboard!
Matt
we cant run our Database program (goldmind) on our vista machines, it would cost thousands for a nice server , sever OS, a the Goldmind upgrade,
recently a vista machine crashed, an put xp back on it
we are goin online based databased since vista , 7,... cant,,
so some of the guys, including me, are gettin some macs since you cant use it on vista
If the design suite works fine on existing computers, then use the existing computers. It's really not Microsoft's problem if third party companies don't release versions of their software to support new operating systems. In fact, Microsoft probably goes TOO far to support old versions, leading people to believe that their MS Dos 2.0 DataEase app should continue working forever.
I don't know the exact stats, but I'd bet that MS supports their old os's longer than most companies support their products. "Who moved my cheese!"
Virtual PC is now free, and the terms for licensing XP for a virtual machine are pretty reasonable. Failing that, Microsoft is just finalizing a "desktop compatibility" system that works much like Parallels for the Mac, where apps apparently launch in Win7, but actually RUN in an XP/2000 environment.
No it would be more like telling a car maker that they cant make a car that does'nt run on 1950's styled gasoline.
"We can't afford to upgrade goldmind"
"so some of the guys, including me, are gettin some macs since you cant use it on vista"
Real intelligence right here we can't afford to upgrade a program so instead were going to buy a bunch of 1000+ macs to run our legacy software instead.
Wow never seen such stupidity in my life.
-Mister Winky
Windows XP has been sold in Europe without WMP installed. Uninstalling/disabling WMP should have no effect, either negative or positive, for business users. If they need a media player, there are more than enough available for free. There are many reputable Media Players available for free.
There are even many reputable, cross platform media players available for free. That would mean that a media file would absolutely be able to play on any other computer, no matter the OS, with zero worries that the media player would interpret the file slightly differently, sputter on playback or corrupt the file at all.
The fact that MS is offering a granular solution just shows they're finally starting to realize people are fed up with being pushed around.
Frankly it makes not only ALL the same mistakes as Vista it's WORSE. It still treats memory like a RAM disk. It's unnecessarily system intensive and couldn't run on a friend's $2K laptop, so this talk about working on netbooks is total bull.
...and let's not forget DESIGN shall we? Aero is only the skin, the muscles have disappeared. *** are my cut, copy, paste, and delete buttons in Windows Explorer? The organize menu and lack of customization will never be made up by shiny anything, I've got an Aero theme for XP after all without having to suck up a GB on load (I use 1/4GB typically when everything is already running including IM programs, torrents, Photoshop, seven or eight browsers/versions, etc).
...and My Documents; you STILL can't change the entire location of the My Documents folder in 7 just like in Vista where you can in XP. That means all your personal files can't easily be moved in a single click to the D:\ to avoid being formatted when Windows takes a dump...and I have NEVER seen any OS NOT take a dump. So reliability flies out the door on this point alone.
Gaming? Please if I want over-texturized shrubs I'll go outside and look at them in RD (Real Definition). I'm plumb happy with XP and DirectX 9 and a company willing to burn us gamers by only giving us DirectX 10 at the cost of killing our hard drives by loading crap that we will never use in to our memory? Yeah we like our performance, any gamer who willingly uses Vista has no clue *** they are talking about. Don't let that cloud your perception though...because after all most of us are sticking with XP and Windows 7 is clearly not going to change that. Go ahead Microsoft, pull XP it off the shelves and force us to torrent it instead. Or maybe they'll wise up and make Windows 8 just XP with Aero, DirectX 11, and improved networking without committing GUI and performance suicide...but then again they'd rather ask people who clearly don't know what they want.
As for gaming Im with you there... every game that has been released for DX10 only has been a huge flop and with 66% of the systems out there running XP developing for DX10 is business suicide. I'm pretty sure microsoft is trying to kill gaming on PC's though.
Also, I've moved the My Documents folder to a different location - not sure why you couldn't get it to work.
lnconnux: XP was kernel version 5.1, what's your point? That a point release on a kernel is not a new OS?
Vista was a transitional product, attempting to bridge the older NT kernal with new technologies like the Windows Presentation Foundation (new windowing subsystem, more or less) and the Windows Communications Foundation (new infrastructure for app interaction). Such transitions can be difficult, and Vista's poor performance was an example of that. It doesn't mean it was a bad idea.
"My Documents" is being replaced by the "Libraries" concept. You can put a folder anywhere you want, and include it in your Library. You can, in fact, put such a folder on a different drive and access it just the same way you did with "My Documents". This is actually a more flexible, usable approach that makes it easier for multi-user households to share things like music, photos, and video.
Win7==Vista++? Seeing as I actually liked Vista, I don't have a problem with that.
when vista first came out I bought a $2000 laptop for it. It ran so miserably for its parts I downgraded it. Its sad when you have a new laptop that has a dedicated graphics card, that cant run the photo screensaver.
Lets see if I can remember the specs
-Intel core duo @ 2.0 ghz
-2 gb's ram
-Nvidia geforce 7900 (I think)
-120 gb hard drive.
though it does get a bit slow when i try to watch hulu on 1920x1050 when connected to my tv.
So if 7 is broken will they then drop it like they did Vista and jump to 8?
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so Windows 7 is really Windows 6.1? That last paragraph makes absolutely no sense.
The awful thing is that when I posted this work around to the contact us page of Mustek, I checked back a month later to see if proper XP drivers where out, and they had just published my work around on their website.
Pure laziness.
Microsoft got it right this time, games work properly, components work wonderfully and the eye candy is better by far. My test system is still running stably on a p4 1.8 with 1 gig of ram on a 160 gig 5400 rpm sata notebook hard drive..... Vid is a used and run almost to death EVGA 8400 with 256 megs of memory.
And stability is the name of the game is it not?
This machine in it's current configuration is not vista ready or approved and could not even get it to load the os up. 7 loaded up... With xp this machine in it's current configuration would only run up to Half life 2 deathmatch before it became sluggish, with 7 it will run Team Fortress 2 well.....
Super pi mod interestingly ran the same under both os choices , 123 sec@one million places!
That is why I said Mac fanbois need not apply to my statement, familial digs, now if I could just bust him away from the dark side of the ..."Intel"... processor and get him to the AMD core group of gamers!
Heh, Not to mention, I will not grace applerocks or others with any argument, that includes microcarp shills and any other hate spewing neophyte. I just put in my opinion and that is that!
Now if the world would just support the Linux Os and let the others go away, then we may say..."Free at last"...
Hey Dave, Richard, Eric, Jason, Dad, Mikey, All Burgaw peeps, Raliegh folks, Lumberton Fellows, Duke brethren, NC State Fans, and Wilmington Beach Folk!
To add insult to injury, if you try to complain at symantec, their chat system requires use of Internet Explorer, and tries to jam an ActiveX control down into your machine just to chat. Ha ha. Get a clue.
or was it Windows 6.1? I am confused? Who cares anyway? They lost the plot.
This was appropriate at the time, since XP as an OS didn't function much differently from 2000. Vista incorporated enough new technology to rate a full version upgrade, though. And, no, Win7 doesn't represent any great leap from Vista, though it does clean up a lot of legacy stuff. I'd say it's actually a bit more of a progression than XP was over 2000, but not enough to justify calling it a full-version upgrade.
People don't need revolutionary any more.
OS X I love!!!! and Linux Ubuntu.
If they separated this distribution, that is, put Windows 7 Trial DVDs where the old AOL Version 57.0 CDs were at the grocery line, and you can buy a serial online, they'd get some PR boost, I'm sure. We can already get Windows thru torrents, but I think they should go a step further and provide it themselves.
- by tekwiz4u March 4, 2009 1:48 PM PST
- All you nay sayers need to stop the hate and give Windows 7 a shot! Being negative on an beta OS does not help its progress to evolve. If you want Windows to succeed, help the developers improve on it. They have a forum on the MS site for feedback to make it better. If you WANT to move away from XP, HELP WINDOWS 7 and make it pounce on OSX. We are coming to 10 years of XP, so we need something new. I know some dont like MS as a company in general, but lets not penalize the OS that we grew up with. Contribute to its success!
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- by ZetaZeta_ March 4, 2009 2:21 PM PST
- Technically it's feature complete, and I heard they aren't reading feedback from the Send Feedback button any more, but the fact remains that they did make *some* changes, even though a Beta is generally to test stability, etc.
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- by Dalkorian March 5, 2009 9:38 AM PST
- Your comment seems to have neglected those of us who honestly and seriously want winblows to fail miserably. WGA is an affront to all thinking humans and should never be tolerated. After that screw up with ex-pee, I will never again give M$ one thin penny of my money, nor will I install their infected crapware on any machine I control. The only reason it's still on one machine of mine is twofold - I had to reinstall it to get my files back out of it and I have a number of games that run in winblows that I enjoy playing. That's all the winblows partition is to me now, a game console. That's all it ever will be.
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- by tekwiz4u March 5, 2009 10:57 AM PST
- @Dalkorian
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- by sanenazok March 6, 2009 8:06 AM PST
- @Dalkorian: did you just cover the unit on slavery in your 6th grade social studies class? Get off this already.
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- by monkeyfun14 March 9, 2009 6:55 AM PDT
- @Dalkorian
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (111 Comments)You're right though, bashing a product, especially on a blog article, without explaining exactly what's wrong with the system ("pig disgusting lipstick" etc.) you're doing nothing to make the system any better, and should just make your way to the exit.
If I want to work on my computer, I fire up Ubuntu and it gets out of my way. When I want to play, it's ex-pee. My next major computer purchase will be a Macbook Pro and a Linux variant (likely Ubuntu) will continue on all home-built boxes. Fista and this new fista sp 3 and all future winblows variations are not welcome on my hardware and never will be. Slavery is an affront to me and to all real Americans, slavery to an evil empire like M$ through insecure crapware like fista is an affront of another couple orders of magnitude. Being asked to pay to be a slave to an evil empire, well, wars have been started over less.
I've heard my friends cursing and swearing at fista (and they blithely continue to ignore the dangers I keep warning them about), why would I want to pay money to subject myself to that?
Without walls and ceilings, who needs windows or gates?
Seems like your hatred for Windows clouded your vision. Have you even tried to Windows 7? And where does slavery play into Windows? Unless you're chained to your desk and your windows are painted black, start to get out more and have choices my friend. The 'Fruit' shaped logo is 'not all be all' by any means.
I honestly can't take anyone seriously who uses such a childish vocab in their postings.
Winblows , M$, Fista
US Education system at work I suppose.