Windows 7..... Interested?

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

Me and my wife were using Win7 Professional since end of september (msdn subscription), all in all it's perfectly fine out of the box. It's simply a Vista improvement. I don't know what kind of problems people had with Vista (I think there was a lot of ms bashing), but well. Win7 runs smoothly from the beginning. Vista became very usable in the end also. Vista in the beginning, that meant thousands of confirmations, thousands of cron-jobs and services. I like the libraries concept in Win7. Very usable OS.

[Coopmv]

Upgrade Assistant edition of PCmover can help upgrade quickly and easily from any version of Windows (version 2000 or later) to Windows 7.  The tech column in a recent issue of BusinessWeek has a discussion of this software ...

[Papageno]

I downloaded Windows 7 via BitTorrent yesterday and installed it on Parallels on my Snow Leopard iMac.  First of all, the Taskbar is a complete OS X Dock ripoff, it runs extremely slow and lacks that old Windows feel that bring back the memories of my first encounter with Windows 98 in an interval from using Mac OS 7.

[Fëanor]

So now that, after all, Win7 is officially launched, is there a reason to upgrade to this version?    (Win7 on a new machine is a no-brainer, I suppose.)  I don't see any urgency for it.

At home we have 2 WinXP Home, 1 WinXP Pro, and 2 Vista Home, (plus 1 Windows Home Server).  My dedicated music computer is the XP Pro.  I use Foobar2000 9.6.9 driving, via Kernel Streaming, an M-Audio Revolution 7.1 sound card that drives, via S/PDIF, an Assemblage 1.5 DAC.  Sounds good to me.  The M-Audio has an ASIO driver but that doesn't work properly; I get "burps" in the playback.  Anyway, I seem to get bit perfect transmission using the Kernel Streaming.

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

No need. Why should one upgrade? Except if you have fun in exploring the new stuff. XP is a good OS, I'd only upgrade if the need arises. I updated because of the fun of it, I'm working in IT biz and I wanted to have a major hard disk reorganization.

[DavidW]

No need. Why should one upgrade? Except if you have fun in exploring the new stuff. XP is a good OS, I'd only upgrade if the need arises. I updated because of the fun of it, I'm working in IT biz and I wanted to have a major hard disk reorganization.

Ditto.  Why fix what isn't broken?  A good OS just stays in the background, decent UI, not too slow, runs everything, all hardware works, it's secure and you're good to go.  If there is a problem with any of those I'd want to upgrade, but as it stands no reason to do anything but be happy with what I have.

[Benji]

I've heard some talk of Windows 7 running faster on a machine than XP was after a clean install, but i'm not sure how much of that is due to the shedding of accumulated system 'bloat'.

I'm sure my XP used to be a hell of a lot faster before I installed/uninstalled/reinstalled all the various software I have over the years, which weighs down the registry and clogs up the HD etc.

I have to admit i'd like to upgrade, but only because I like all the new bells and whistles. Thankfully I remember that the novelty of that wears off awfully quickly... I'll stick with XP thanks. 

[drogulus]

    Over time your older OS will have trouble with newer devices. But no, there's no reason to upgrade unless you just want to have the latest OS with easy upgrading of drivers. It used to be difficult with graphics drivers especially. You had to go through this elaborate uninstall/safe mode-install default VGA/reboot/safe mode-install new drivers/reboot. Now I just install over the old one and it works. In fact some driver installations are now handled as an upgrade or a patch....you patch the old driver to make it the new one. Is that worth upgrading for? It's not even close.....yes! Unless you have no need for the latest drivers for audio/video/chipset and rarely update hardware. Then you can just stick with what you have until it stops working.

[Scarpia]

I have an XP system which I will not upgrade.  On the other hand on a more recently acquired system I have Vista and will certainly upgrade because by all accounts Windows 7 is not as awful.

[drogulus]

    My PC came with XP and a free Vista upgrade offer which I sent away for. Recently I removed the Vista upgrade so I'm running XP and 2 versions of 7 (32 and 64 bit). Now I think I'll wipe out all the partitions and put 7 on the whole drive. For the first time I'll have a totally clean system with no preinstalled gunk. I'll have to buy the full version of 7 to do this ($199 for Home Premium).

[Coopmv]

Me three.  0:)

George,  I thought you were a Mac user?

[Coopmv]

Now that I am moving, I decided to get a PC since it has more memory and less than half the price of a MAC. 

I got a Toshiba Satellite Pro with 2 GB of RAM, Windows XP Pro OS and 250 GB HD. For only $499.

A Windows laptop offers good values for the money.  Mac is just too pricey.  You are better off using the money you save to get more music ...

[Brian]

QUESTIONS

I am a college student and am therefore eligible to upgrade to Windows 7 for $30.
My Windows Vista install is currently taking up 19.9 GB. I've got only 12 GB of free space on my hard drive. Everything is backed up and safe.
My computer runs decently, but not well; I feel like Vista has ballooned in size and slowness over the two years since I got it. No actual complaints, aside from actually having to reinstall Vista once due to some bizarre fatal error a couple months after installing.

So....
Should I install Windows 7? What should I be aware of in terms of system requirements? Shall I go for it?

[Coopmv]

QUESTIONS

I am a college student and am therefore eligible to upgrade to Windows 7 for $30.
My Windows Vista install is currently taking up 19.9 GB. I've got only 12 GB of free space on my hard drive. Everything is backed up and safe.
My computer runs decently, but not well; I feel like Vista has ballooned in size and slowness over the two years since I got it. No actual complaints, aside from actually having to reinstall Vista once due to some bizarre fatal error a couple months after installing.

So....
Should I install Windows 7? What should I be aware of in terms of system requirements? Shall I go for it?

If you are already running Vista and you can upgrade to WIN7 for $30, the choice is obvious.  You can also reclaim some diskspace that has been "wasted" by Vista.  I got my Enterprise Office 2007 for $19.95 plus shipping via a corporate discount and I grabbed my offer fast ...

[Scarpia]

Hehe, Windows 7 will fix everything wrong with Vista.     Reminiscent of the new Apple ad:

http://www.apple.com/getamac/ads/

[Brian]

Well, I now have Windows 7 and it works! Enough to let me post on GMG, anyway.  

However, just based on the first fresh start-up (not counting the install) and log-in, it seems to me that Windows 7 is just as slow, or at least as slow, as Vista had been. And it has been taking Firefox a very long time to load web pages, something that kind of surprises me. (Firefox itself took about a half minute to boot up - just saw a transparent white film across the screen with the Firefox heading.) I've got 26 GB free on a 99 GB hard drive; my computer's only two years old; I defragged my hard drive before installing; will subsequent boot-ups be faster than the first one?

Also, I notice that all of the install files - quite a few gigabytes - are still on my desktop. Can I go ahead and delete them?

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

However, just based on the first fresh start-up (not counting the install) and log-in, it seems to me that Windows 7 is just as slow, or at least as slow, as Vista had been. And it has been taking Firefox a very long time to load web pages, something that kind of surprises me. (Firefox itself took about a half minute to boot up - just saw a transparent white film across the screen with the Firefox heading.) I've got 26 GB free on a 99 GB hard drive; my computer's only two years old; I defragged my hard drive before installing; will subsequent boot-ups be faster than the first one?

Also, I notice that all of the install files - quite a few gigabytes - are still on my desktop. Can I go ahead and delete them?

Well hmm. There's something wrong. My computer is older than yours (I think - P4 3GhZ, 3GB Ram, but a quick HD for the OS) and everything runs smoothly. Also Firefox. With tons of addins. Directly after first install. You should ask Taskmanager, or better Sysinternals ProcessExplorer (also get "autoruns" from them) about what's happening while FF is starting.

Yes, things get better because of Superfetch, a mechanism which learns. On Vista, Application starts were about twice as fast as on XP, I could especially see that with huge apps like Photoshop.

Unless you don't need installation programs, of course you can delete them. BTW, I think defrag is a real waste of time.

[SonicMan46]

Well, I now have Windows 7 and it works! Enough to let me post on GMG, anyway.  

However, just based on the first fresh start-up (not counting the install) and log-in, it seems to me that Windows 7 is just as slow, or at least as slow, as Vista had been. And it has been taking Firefox a very long time to load web pages, something that kind of surprises me. (Firefox itself took about a half minute to boot up - just saw a transparent white film across the screen with the Firefox heading.) I've got 26 GB free on a 99 GB hard drive; my computer's only two years old; I defragged my hard drive before installing; will subsequent boot-ups be faster than the first one?

Also, I notice that all of the install files - quite a few gigabytes - are still on my desktop. Can I go ahead and delete them?

Brian - I'm assuming that you 'upgraded' over VISTA vs. doing a 'clean' install?  Did your laptop come w/ VISTA (or was that upgraded from XP)?  Also, did you run the Windows 7 upgrade compatibility advisor, which will checkout your hardware, drivers, software, etc. on the machine that your planning to 'migrate' to Windows 7?

I have a VISTA laptop about the same age - I'm not planning to put on Windows 7 but the upgrade advisor 'clear' the machine if I wanted to go that route; if your machine came w/ VISTA, then it should likely be ready to go; if not, then that could be an issue.  However, a 'clean' install (and more of a PITA!) would likely give you a zippier system.  As you already know, MS OSes just get so 'bloated' over a year or two and upgrades leave so much 'garbage' behind or unresolved.

But hoping that your next 'bootups' go fine - good luck!  Dave 

[Brian]

Brian - I'm assuming that you 'upgraded' over VISTA vs. doing a 'clean' install?  Did your laptop come w/ VISTA (or was that upgraded from XP)?  Also, did you run the Windows 7 upgrade compatibility advisor, which will checkout your hardware, drivers, software, etc. on the machine that your planning to 'migrate' to Windows 7?

I have a VISTA laptop about the same age - I'm not planning to put on Windows 7 but the upgrade advisor 'clear' the machine if I wanted to go that route; if your machine came w/ VISTA, then it should likely be ready to go; if not, then that could be an issue.  However, a 'clean' install (and more of a PITA!) would likely give you a zippier system.  As you already know, MS OSes just get so 'bloated' over a year or two and upgrades leave so much 'garbage' behind or unresolved.

But hoping that your next 'bootups' go fine - good luck!  Dave 

Still slow starting up, but otherwise I'm liking this so far. Everything's basically the same.     My laptop came with Vista and I upgraded.

[drogulus]

    I just bought Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit upgrade from the Windows site. I'm downloading it now. After doing a little research it looks like I'll be able to do the kind of clean install I want to do by booting from a drive and deleting partitions containing the old OS'es. I originally thought I would need the full version to do it this way. When the install is complete I'll have a folder called Windows.old that I can delete after moving over anything I want to save. I'll probably just delete it since my external drives have everything on them. When the process is complete I'll have a clean drive with a fresh OS install and nothing else. Then I'll install drivers, the core programs I use every day and set a restore point.