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Windows 7 Pre-Orders Top Vista's In Just 8 Hours
Barence writes "In order to ensure Windows 7 got off to a better start than Vista in the UK, Microsoft slashed the cost of Home and Home Professional by a third on promotional copies which were sold on a 'first come, first served basis while stocks last.' The promotion ensured Windows 7 shot to the top of Amazon's charts when it was released yesterday, with the online retailer claiming that 'sales in the first eight hours outstripped those of Windows Vista's entire 17-week pre-order period.' The price of pre-ordering Windows 7 has now shot up to £80, after the £50 copies sold out within a day."
It has come to my attention that a new version of Mac OS X, dubbed "Leopard" by Apple, Inc., is nearing release. Upon researching these claims, I have come to the conclusion that Leopard is the state of the art in consumer, workstation, and server operating system software and will make Apple's Mac lines the most technologically advanced in computing today.
But don't take my word for it. Let's take a look what Leopard has to offer and what its competitors sorely lack.
Back to the Future
One important feature of Leopard is real-time backups. With a new app called Time Machine, the user can voyage back through previous versions of files with a radical new graphical interface. Lost a file? Throttle your physics-defying space-time warping program and retrieve it. Rumor has it that Steve Jobs has built certain Macs with "physics processors" that may allow actual time-travel with Time Machine. For now, however, retrieving lost files and backing up your documents are easier in Leopard.
Windows, meanwhile, offers what they call "file versions," which is included on a tab at the back of the properties window. Once you find this tab, you must then read and understand all of the tiny text under the tab, then proceed to look for the version of the file you want. But what happens if you delete the file? Well, there's no properties window to open for a file that doesn't exist, so you're completely out of luck. And backing up your hard drive? There is a tool for this, but it's sadly not as good as Time Machine.
Trading Spaces
Another feature users of no other commercial operating system have is called Spaces. Spaces is, or are â" depending on your dialect â" extra desktops the user can devote specific windows and tasks to. For instance, instead of distracting yourself with MySpace, LiveJournal, and iChat while you write your dissertation, you can put all the windows and programs from your Internet lolling on one desktop and the apps you're using to get yourself a PhD on another.
Linux is a popular "hacker" operating system with "virtual desktops," which work the same as Spaces but are uglier and less standardized. For instance, if you load up one desktop manager for Linux, the virtual desktops feature may be stored fifty windows deep while another one may have it turned on already, stealing windows from new programs away without saying a word. Couple this with the fact that virtual desktops are abbreviated as VD and you have another win for Leopard.
Twice As Wide
For system administrators and graphic designers out there, 64-bit support in Leopard will be a huge boon. 64-bit chips can work on twice the amount of data that a 32-bit chip can, so you can get more work done in the same amount of time. Leopard supports 64-bits quite well and but can also run 32-bit programs seamlessly, allowing the user to hang onto older versions of programs and never noticing the difference. As the industry moves from 32 to 64 bits, Apple will make the transition completely transparent for its users.
Windows and Linux users have it a little harder. Windows comes in two versions, each on a different DVD. If you use Linux, watch out. You have to download the program code for the operating system, tweak it by hand, and then reinstall everything. Not for the faint of heart, eh? And there's the added risk that your program will need the same treatment if it's not ready for 64-bit. Good luck with that if you have actual work to do.
The Upshot
What does this all mean in the bottom line? You'll get more work done. You won't have Windows complaining about signed drivers and blue-screening when it doesn't get its way. You won't have to join a mailing list and kiss up to the developers of the app you need support for. In the same amount of time needed to install Vista, for instance, you can install Leopard, set it up, and download and install all the updates available for it.
With Linux, you'll be searching through your text buffer for the right command utility after the instal
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Why do you have such a high proportion of Microsoft (Windows, Xbox, Zune (really, Zune?)) to non Microsoft posts?
here, please do Raymon3 in his with the work, or
If you post the words mod troll it will be modded troll. So don't say it will be modded X.
The more you know!
Well, the sign's right there every time he looks up from his desk, so it's
natural that he's often thinking about it.
the only reason windows 7 looks so good is because vista was just that bad....
If Windows 7 success is judged by how cheaply they sell it for, then how many more people would want to try it if they gave it away for free?
... Because if any company released a truly desirable product people would be willing to pay a premium to own that product. Yet Microsoft & Amazon are trying to claim success by reducing its price... (talk about lies, damned lies and PR)).
(Also surely this Microsoft & Amazon PR stunt is actually the opposite of success?
There are 10 kinds of people in the world... those who understand binary and those who don't.
This isn't a troll. Please read before you moderate.
I swear, the company can do nothing right for some people
Did they ever fix the very long list of performance problems which were crammed into Vista and later? Last I saw Vista's performance was still MUCH slower than XP for most tasks. Early tests against pre-release Win 7 (yes, I know...prelease) looked like more of the same Vista performance with only slight performance tweaks here and there. And keep in mind, for most tasks, XP is still slower than a descent Linux distro.
So who wants to upgrade to find they are running TONS slower than they could with Linux or noteworthily slower than XP, only now have DRM and bothersome security dialogs all over the place?
Seriously, with Windows pulling so much legacy crap + incompatibilities + forced emulation for many legacy applications + device driver compatibility issues + device driver shortages + performance problems + large memory overhead + built in DRM restrictions, aside from business, why does anyone care about Win 7 when XP is already better by almost every measure?
Newer isn't always better; a fact MS has consistently proved over the last half decade or so.