Comments on: Windows 7 on a Mac Mini

Hi, I'm a Mac and a PC. CNET News' Ina Fried tries out Microsoft's latest OS on an older Intel Mac.

[fooldog01]

Big surprise. Here come the elitists to ruin a perfectly good discussion...

[jstwondrng]

About a week ago, I loaded Windows 7 on my Mac Mini without much of a hitch. I had a few problems with the system locking up, but with suggested system tweaks, I was able to fix that issue. I am, however, having problems with running apps such as MS Movie Maker beta. It says my system doesn't have the required hardware specifications. Also, when I turn on 3D acceleration, the system hangs. Aside from these minor issues, it runs fine...

[gp2792]

what tweaks did you use? mine locked up once or twice, but I thought it was the blue tooth issue.

[homercles82]

It's a mac mini, not exactly the model of power computing.

[tipoo_]

My sisters year old laptop got a 3.2 on the WEI...a 2 is just sad.

[ironbyghte]

I don't think Microsoft cares who's hardware you put Windows on.

[ScaryMonkey69]

I tried out Windows 7 and Vista Enterprise using Microsoft's Virtual PC. On a 2Ghz Dual Core Opteron w/ 2 Gb RAM, Vista Enterprise took over an hour to install. Windows 7 took 30 minutes!!! Much more responsive, faster, and less resource hungry.

I think Microsoft should've called it "Windows Vista-As-It-Should've-Been"

[Waam]

Now lets get Windows 7 to run on an iPhone and you got yourself an article.

[DarkCocoa]

I am currently running Windows 7 on a Silver '08 Macbook using VMWare. It has worked out nicely for me other than the fact that I have also had issues with Word suddenly shutting down and the sound driver not working correctly. The sound is not really an issue but having Word shut down intermittenly has been annoying, though it has autosaved. It also might have something to do with VMware because that also suspends the system when Word closes...

[kirkules]

I tried it using a First Gen Macbook. Running Tiger 10.4.11 and using Parallels 3. Seemed to work fine.

[BenzTech]

I'm running Win7 in Fusion on my Mac Mini. It's usable. Definitely seems snappier than Vista did.

Also running the beta through Boot Camp on a unibody Macbook. Works great once I figured out that for some reason I had to use a three finger click to simulate a right mouse click (the boot camp software lists it as a two finger click). Also have this running on Fusion in case I need to run something Micrsoft specific inside the Mac OS (pretty much just my Zune software).

Also am running this on a 64 bit AMD platform with 4 Gb of RAM. Couldn't run the 64 bit beta though, since it wouldn't recognize my Netgear USB wireless card. Switched back to 32 bit and I haven't bothered to boot it to Vista all week. Only real problem I've noticed so far is that it blue screens when I try to play a physical DVD in Media Center. As long as that's an issue with it being in beta, I'll be all over this when it goes to a full release.

[MarkyGoldstein]

Apple is still much stronger regarding their Operating System design...

[JeremyRC]

What the heck is the point of this? You're running a pre-release OS, on older hardware (and it matters not that it's a Mac) with insufficient RAM in a virtual machine. What are we going to learn:

1) It "runs"
2) The performance is horrible
3) Windows 7 is much less fun without its fancy graphics

Really, we could have guessed this. Add to this the fact that the Mac Mini doesn't have exactly scintillating hard disk performance (Many Macs do - this just isn't one of them) and the lack of pizzazz is even less surprising. Really this is an exercise in the blindingly obvious.

Why is there is hysterical fascination with Windows 7 at CNet?! It's Vista 1.5 - a completely known quantity. Microsoft have made some changes to the UI (mostly for the better) and the world is more ready for Vista now than it was (drivers are mostly in place, application compatibility is better - a change that's largely happened on the APPLICATION side of the equation). Is Windows 7 hugely different to Windows Vista? No, but time has moved on, it's not that Vista has changed it's more that everything else has changed around Vista.

Do I think most Windows users should be excited by Windows 7? Well if you still have problems with Vista, most likely you'll still have them with Windows 7. If you did have trouble with Vista, you may find the source of your pain has been addressed, and that makes Windows 7 easier this time around. If you like Vista, well great, Windows 7 isn't a retreat.

So if you have a Mac Mini what does this mean to you? Nothing. Are you likely to want to jump from Mac OS X to Windows 7? Probably not, you're most likely settled in Mac OS X and Windows 7 doesn't change that, nor does it offer a compelling reason to switch.

Is Windows 7 dreadful? No, this is a mature product (given that it's Vista with a makeover) and not the shock to the industry that Vista was. Is the UI better? I think most users will think it is. Can Microsoft mess this up? Absolutely! We don't know how many SKUs (versions) they will launch - personally I think they should have one version, but a "home" and a "professional" would be a huge improvement. They Might try and charge too much. Does Windows 7 have any "game changing" features? No, the improvements aren't "game changing" the only thing that might be is "multi-touch". But even this requires a new machine (or at least a new display), new applications that make use of it, and even then while this "demos well" how will users adapt to this new way of working (arms outstretched to interact with the computer).

The real challenge for Microsoft is to get the flock across from XP, until that's done Apple are just a distraction. Long term, they have to create compelling applications that keep people using the PC. Here Apple are threat number one. Mac OS X is a much more productive application development environment, Apple's prodigious first party applications are testament to this, and for Microsoft a huge headache.

Users don't choose Operating Systems, they choose applications. How much fun is a computer without applications? What's the real difference between a Mac and a PC without applications? Windows 7 will only really matter if it enables new and compelling applications - something that CNet seems to have forgotten.

[topgunb2]

Such a long post, I couldn't read beyond first paragraph , yawn!

[Orion Blastar]

My Windows 7.0 score goes all the way to 11, none higher. Windows 7.0: Spinal Tap Edition. Drummer sold separately as they tend to die really quick in random accidents.

[slinkysly]

I had this problem. I think Bootcamp uses empty space at the end of your partition to create a Windows partition. In my case I was using VirtuaBox and I suspect some of those files were near the end of the partition. As opposed to backing up everything and reinstalling try creating the smallest possible bootcamp partition you can then deleting it. You may find that in the process data has been moved and you can then create a larger bootcamp partition. I repeated this twice from memory. I can't remember exactly as I moved back to PC and sold the Mac. (That makes me an exception then ;-) ). But it did cause me grief initially.

The reason why this works I think is because Mac OS X manages file fragmentation automatically without having to have a dedicated defragmentor as is the case with Windows. Reducing the partition size then increasing it must 'force' some defragmentation to occur.

[slinkysly]

Argh. Ignore the above comment. This was placed in completely the wrong place and has no context - now. Grrr.

[obharath]

Hi Ina, Nice article as always. In the screenshots I can see transparency or Aero enabled. Can you please share what graphics card your mac mini has. thx