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Hands-On With Windows 7's New Features
Barence writes "Microsoft has released the first pre-beta code of Windows 7, and PC Pro has a series of in-depth, hands-on examinations of all the new features. The revamped user interface has clearly gleaned more than a little inspiration from the Mac OS X Dock, but it goes further than the Apple concept with 'jumplists,' new gadgets and an updated system tray. The much-vaunted multi-touch controls were there to play with, and it seemed to work well. Networking has been given the full treatment, with new features HomeGroup and Libraries. Windows 7 debuts a new feature called Device Stage that has the potential to be unbelievably handy ... or a complete disaster. Finally, several new features could make PCs easier to manage and secure for IT departments, such as BitLocker To Go and Branch Cache." All in all, these features together lead some people to the conclusion that Windows 7 will "suck less than Vista" — that last link from reader ThinSkin, who also points to a related sampling of screenshots from the current iteration of Windows 7.
I'm wasting my mod-points already awarded to previous posters just to reply to this.
No, it very probably will NOT outperform XP.
If you want something that outperforms XP, try Windows 95, or Windows NT 4.
If you want something that runs 21st century software and games, buy Vista or Windows 7.
I can't stand all this "will it be EVEN SLOWER" crap. Of course it will, but who gives a shit? Computers are getting faster MUCH MUCH more quickly than operating systems are getting slower. I did a degree in computer science 10 years ago using a computer which had less RAM and Mhz than my *phone* does now!
I wish people would stop moaning that any given operating system is 3 or 4% slower than the previous version. Do you really want to go back to using Windows 3.1 just because it's slightly faster? I sure as hell don't.
My guess: ME
I call it: Moron Edition
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
It's a huge hassle and the only reason Apple gets away with it is because their solution, iTunes, is actually pretty darn good.. and it helps to have a previous technology to launch it with (QuickTime) and additional services that tie into it (iTunes Store).
Ugh. I hate iTunes, it's the worst part of dealing with an iPod and the reason I haven't gotten one myself (my wife has one). It's slow, buggy, crashes, and I'll be damned if I can figure out how to actually get a song onto or off the iPod (oh wait, can't get them back off.. thanks Apple!).
The "high performance" OS - or distro, if you want to be pedantic about it, supports a small subset of hardware and software.
The Windows PC can be found pretty much everywhere, doing pretty much everything, on hardware that has no standard configuration.
Sorry, I seem to have forgotten, could you remind us where the PPC/SPARC/Itanium/ARM/MIPS/eee701 versions of Vista are on sale?