Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Kills 3-App Limit For Windows 7 Starter Edition
Chabil Ha' writes "Heard the rumors that the much-maligned Windows 7 Starter Edition would be able to run more than three concurrent applications? Today, the Windows team made it official: 'Based on the feedback we've received from partners and customers asking us to enable a richer small notebook PC experience with Windows 7 Starter, we've decided to enable Windows 7 Starter customers the ability to run as many applications simultaneously as they would like, instead of being constricted to the 3 application limit that the previous Starter editions included. We believe these changes will make Windows 7 Starter an even more attractive option for customers who want a small notebook PC for very basic tasks, like browsing the web, checking email and personal productivity.' Small consolation, of course, if you want to watch a DVD natively, but I'm sure this won't stop the Slashdot crowd from enabling it."
Still not using it.
At least someone realized that it was an epicly bad idea before the thing was released into the real world.
* Disable the thing that shocks you with an electric shock every ten minutes (every thirty minutes if your OS validates as genuine)
* Remove the requirement to take, PCR, and compare a DNA sample at startup to allow WGA to know it's the same person
* Take that thing out of the EULA that allows MS to terminate your license or you at any time for any reason.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
I don't get how it's "even more attractive"
MS: Ok so guys, you can only use 3 apps at a time on our new OS.
World: Well who would want to use that?
MS: Ok, we changed it back. Now it's even better than before!
Sigh.
After how badly Vista Basic failed I find it odd that MS would try again, and even more odd that they would make an even more basic version of it. (yes I know starter has been around sense xp, but they are trying to sell it worldwide now)
I predict that it will follow the same path as Vista Basic
A few companies will try selling it with cheep entry level systems for 400. No one will buy them, and those that do will complain about how much Win7 sucks. In the end the companies will be forced to put home premium in order to sell them.
If starter was free to download and basic was less then $30 (retail) I could see some value in them for home builders and people who want to upgrade and want a low cost and legit version of 7
Microsoft's line about netbooks being only suited for rudimentary computing tasks is full of shit.
I'm typing this on a eeepc: 1.6GHz Atom cpu, 2GB ram, blah blah blah. Microsoft (and others) may have this attitude that netbooks are only suitable for checking email, updating Facebook status, and the like ... and that you need a "real computer" for "real computing". That's absurd.
Yes, they're not the most powerful computers around. But they're about as powerful as desktops of five years ago. I run dozens of Firefox tabs, Skype, OpenOffice, GIMP, Picasa, Pidgin, my camera's timelapse software (Olympus Studio), and other stuff, often at the same time ... with no problems at all, and with plenty of CPU to spare. Of course I can do this -- people were loading old desktops this hard and nobody complained that they weren't "suitable for serious computing". If I wanted to run apache and serve webpages on this machine I certainly could -- I did it on my old crappy desktop when I was an undergrad, after all!
Saying that a netbook isn't a real computer is like saying a Toyota Yaris isn't a real car just because it only has a 100 hp engine. Sure, if you want to tow things you need something different -- just like if you want to play Crysis you need a desktop (replacement), and if you want to do lattice quantum chromodynamics you need a supercomputer.
A netbook is a small, full-featured computer that can make use of all of the flexibility of a full-featured operating system.
We believe these changes will make Windows 7 Starter an even more attractive option for customers who want a small notebook PC for very basic tasks, like browsing the web, checking email and personal productivity.' Small consolation, of course, if you want to watch a DVD natively
Wow. Microsoft basically took a market where Linux and Apple excel in (customers who just want to do basic tasks with minimal hassle) and crippled the features that make Windows even slightly attractive in that arena. Now they un-crippled one of those features. That's not "even more attractive"; That's "somewhat less ridiculous".
I have a new bullshit meter. It measures in units of "picosofts".
http://outcampaign.org/
Marketing has a very, very short memory. Not too long ago people where word-processing, spread-sheeting, data-basing, developing software and even Windows, heck, even using AutoCAD on a Pentium II. Or a 486 if you go farther back a bit more.
Time to stop posting so many helpful tips.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
This seems more like they were marketing it as going to be limited and people were turned off by that but it kept the product in the public eye. Waited for a bit. Now they're marketing it as without the limit as to improve the perception of the product, leading to more people wanting it.
From what I heard the early RC was light, stable etc but has recently taken on a rather hefty meal or ten making it as bloated as Vista was. It seems that the initial "light and snappy" version was only designed to get people to have a favorable impression, a bit like bribing the bloggers for favorable reviews. If this is true then Windows 7 is just Vista with a make over as many predicted all along.
From what I hear Windows 7 has as much chance of running on a netbook as Vista does, it'll be interesting how they take the knife to it to make it work as they are desperate to deny customers the choice of XP anywhere, while also denying Linux any of the market. All the while convince people to cough up a significant percentage of the netbook price for Windows. It's a fine balance and one that's gonna be hilarious to watch.
"It's not as good as Linux, but it may be as good as their own product from eight years ago."
Yeah, that's a real effective shill.
Yo dawg, I heard you like the Ackermann function, so OH GOD OH GOD OH GOD
.
But what about the technical aspect of this? Microsoft is pulling out all the stops in its attempt to create a "marketing buzz" for Windows 7. Was Vista really that bad that Microsoft has to attempt to manipulate the press and websites to this extent in order to give the illusion that Windows 7 is better?
If Windows Vista was so bad, do you really expect Windows 7 (a.k.a. Windows Vista 1.2) to be that much better? Or is the marketing effort the actual improvement here?
Does the Emperor really have clothes this time?
How can you really believe that? Do you really think that Microsoft released a great version that everyone liked, just to trick people before giving them a shittier version?? What possible motivation could they have to do that?
I swear, the die-hard MS haters make that company out to be some sort of cartoon villain.
For the record, my 6 year old laptop runs the latest version of W7 just fine. I doubt I'll put it on my desktop any time soon, but if/when my employer rolls it out, I won't mind.
I especially like the part about not supporting XP mode... so it can't run XP apps... which are the only apps spec'd to run on it. Granted, XP mode is a VM hack that really can't run on it, but if you're not sticking with Windows for compatability on your netbook, wtf are you sticking with Windows for? Honestly, the only remaining compatibility issues on Linux are precisely the things Microsoft has banned from starter.
You don't have enough RAM, plain and simple. Instead of $5 worth, you should go for $20 worth.
Not too long ago people where word-processing, spread-sheeting, data-basing, developing software and even Windows, heck, even using AutoCAD on a Pentium II. Or a 486 if you go farther back a bit more.
Not too long ago, I remember having to wait 15-20 minutes to TeX up my research papers, only to find out that I missed a curly brace somewhere.
Not too long ago, my spreadsheet couldn't import data from a MySQL database halfway around the world through the internet.
Not too long ago, the database that I run on that other computer would need a refrigerator-sized mainframe.
Not too long ago, developing software meant that it was faster to manually read for syntax errors than to just compile and have the IDE flag the errors. On a project 1/20th the size, at least half of which was implementing things that are now in libraries. Actually, as I recall, I didn't have an IDE, just a dumb terminal. The debugger was crap to -- it pales in comparison to what I have today.
Never used CAD software, but I bet dollars to donuts that in the 12 years since the Pentium II, it's also come a damned long way. And that's the problem with these comparisons -- people may have been doing the same tasks but they were still doing much much less than we casually do today. In many ways, we the usefulness of the tasks themselves expands to fill the available power -- our programs and environments get better and better.
If 10 years ago you would have told me that I'd be running a miniature search engine on my computer, crawling and indexing my filesystems to save me the trouble of finding files, I'd say you were nuts. Today, I can't remember how I lived without Google Desktop: ctrl ctrl + filename and the results are there. To say that somehow this is comparable to my computer 10 years ago because they both perform the same basic function -- allowing access to saved files -- is disingenuous. They are the same in the way that a steak knife and a chainsaw are the same. That all goes for the modern web, AJAX and all, versus the web that I browsed back in the dark old days. Same for programming, same for just about everything I can think of.
Computers do more than they did. This is a GOOD THING. Stop convincing yourself that somehow what they do now is good enough for the future. I hope it's not, and I'm working to make sure that it's not by pursuing more ways that my computer can do more for me.
You know, for posters on a technology site, there are a lot of people here who have no idea what the hell they are talking about when it comes to technology. I'll type this slowly so people can keep up:
WINDOWS 7 DOES NOT NEED XP MODE TO RUN XP APPS!
Windows 7, just like Vista, has native compatibility for XP apps. Win32 binaries execute just fine. It does not use a new API, etc. You can take just about any program and install it on Windows 7 and it'll work out of box. That even includes 64-bit Windows 7. It has the same thing that 64-bit Vista and XP do, called Windows on Windows 32. It allows for 32-bit apps to run in a 64-bit OS with basically no speed difference.
Here's a brief list of apps I've personally tested and found to work in Windows 7 64-bit RC1. This is by no means complete, just ones I've tested myself that I remember:
Firefox 3, Thunderbird 2, Office 2003, Office 2007, SSH Secure Shell 3.2.9, FreeSSHd, Textpad 5.2.0, Winamp 5.55, Acrobat 9.0, Cadence SPB 16.02, WMWare 6.5, Visual Studio 2008, WinMIPS64, Labview 8, Steam, Impulse, World of Warcraft, Mass Effect, Sony Vegas 8, Sony Sound Forge 9, Adobe Audition 3.
There's plenty more, this is just what I remember off the top of my head in a small sampling of different areas (consumer, programming engineering, audio production, video production, networking, etc).
Almost all apps will run fine in Windows 7 as is. Thus, most copies of Windows 7 do not have XP mode available, and even those that do don't ship with it, you have to download it.
So, what's it for then? Well three major classes of things you might encounter:
1) Apps with a 16-bit component, or entirely 16-bit. While 32-bit Windows 7 can run 16-bit apps with WOW16, 64-bit Windows can't. So, if you need to run a 16-bit app, XP mode will do that for you since it is a 32-bit XP VM.
2) Apps that interface with hardware that doesn't have Windows 7 drivers. An app that uses a dongle might be an example. If the manufacturer won't release a driver that works with 7, then you are out of luck. However, with XP mode, you install the driver in XP (is passes through USB devices) and you can use it.
3) Apps that install a kernel mode driver that is incompatible with 7. Again a lot of this will be 64-bit stuff since while 32-bit apps run fine in 64-bit Windows, all kernel mode code must be 64-bit. Again you might encounter this with old copy protection since that kind of stuff often like to use kernel drivers.
Now as should be pretty evident, that is really rare shit. This isn't something most people will have a problem with. However, some businesses do, and thus MS is offering them a solution. They are saying "If you have an old app that just won't work in 7 and you can't get it updated, just download a free XP VM from us, and run it in that."
That's all. Most Windows apps run JUST FINE with no update at all. Even those that do need to be updated, it is an update, not a complete rewrite. The fundamental APIs are still the same. You aren't redoing the whole thing from scratch for new architecture.
So please, stop with the FUD. Get your information correct.
P.S. Not including DVD playback is highly unsurprising because it isn't free. MPEG-2 and CSS both require licenses to include in software. It is not surprising MS isn't going to pay for those licenses on low cost software.
There are several things going on here. The first and worst is that of course they think they can put over their proposition by sheer force. As one of them once told me, "Vendors are coin operated". You can only get so far with that before you're being investigated.
Then there's advertising companies. Advertising companies recruit and train the most creative, intelligent and resourceful people they can find to fulfill their mission: to sell advertising. They have incredible surveys and statistics and magical advertising quadrants that tell you that the right thing to do is pay them more money, and they've got the numbers to prove it. That's right: they spend 90% of their time, intelligence and effort not to sell their customer's products, but to sell theirs. I have a story that goes with this. It's stolen, but I've filed the serial numbers off:
One day in northern Arizona I stopped at a one-pump gas station for a soda. As I walked to the lonely single cooler in the back, I passed by row upon row of salt. There was the picnic shaker, the kitchen cylinder we all know. There was rock salt, road salt, salt lick and salt brick. There was sea salt from 9 of the seven seas. There was powdered salt, granular salt, bacon salt and several kinds of cheese salt. I was amazed. I dragged my soda up to the counter, and said to the wizened old man sitting there, "man, you've got a lot of salt.".
"That's nothin'" he says. Look up here. He pulls down the hatch to the attic an it's full of bags and bushels and bins of salt. "And look down here" he says, pulling up a hatch to the basement, where it's chock full of barrels and bags and piles of salt.
"You must sell a lot of salt" I said.
"That's the funny thing" he tells me, "I don't hardly sell no salt at all. But that salt salesman that comes through here once a month, he sure does sell a good bit of the stuff."
Historically Microsoft's market dominance hasn't come from advertising. They got it by other means I'll leave you to investigate. You can start by checking out the Halloween Documents.
The answer to the third piece of this puzzle has to do with a discussion I was having yesterday with a friend of mine. He was frustrated with the constant reorganization of the company (not Microsoft) that he works for. After discussing it for a while, I came out with the idea that the permanent reorganization process was by design. With constant shuffling you might get the perfect mix of creative individuals unsupervised by a policy wonk long enough to have that perfect summer - the year where everything heterodynes into the magical project that delivers unexpected miraculous results. But most of the time you get a bunch of creative people frustrated by people who've risen to influence through the mastery of process. At the end we agreed (I think - I don't want to speak for my friend) that the churning was a necessary evil because left static the process geeks would build their empires and drive out the creative folk and the magic could not happen. Which would of course make the churning a brilliant piece of social engineering. Because Microsoft doesn't employ this bit of social engineering, once the founders took off the process geeks took over - with predictable results. Conservative and uncreative, these process geeks are the very target market for the advertising sharks I led with. Unfortunately for them, this disease is inevitably fatal.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Not at all, I believe they put out a hollowed out RC version without all the bloatware to try and convince people that it was a different beast than Vista and they should hold out for it rather than acting on an impulse to switch away from Windows. I believe they knew it'd never be released as it was but wanted people to think it would be and not notice the added bloat.
Don't you realize how nonsensical this is? Let's break it down in traditional Slashdot style:
1) MS knows people don't want bloat
2) MS makes a version without bloat, so that people will think the OS is good
3) People think the OS is good without the bloat, and want to buy it
4) MS adds back in the bloat at the last moment!
5) ???
6) Profit!
Seriously... why, upon reaching step 3, would they not just release it as is? They are not villains or sociopaths. They're just greedy. And in this case their greed would drive them to release the product that people want to pay money for.
Not as though this is something up for debate. I have W7 on my laptop in the other room. It runs fine. It's only using ~8 gigs of harddrive space, and that's including all the programs I've installed. For comparison, the "Windows" directory of my rarely used Vista install is about double that at 15 gigs. Seems like they must have cut some serious cruft.
And, lest I come across as advocating for this (or any) OS, let me state that the best I can say about W7 is that, if required to do so, I'd be okay with using it. I'm just tired of this childish notion that Microsoft is some sort of den of evil, when it's really just another business.
There's also a VGA port on the netbook.
I'm writing this on a 4 year old Pentium M, 1.5 GHz, 1.5 GB, 80 GB disk.
No reason to upgrade.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
It's mighty big of MS to allow their customers to do what every other OS ever invented lets them do.
I feel privileged to be allowed to run more than three applications.
Inventor, Artist http://www.Rubber-Power.com