At a company get-together in Atlanta yesterday, the boss signed a gold DVD of Windows 7 to signify that it's now ready to send out to the manufacturers to be installed on PCs and copied onto DVDs for retail sales.
The final version is build 7600, although there's very few changes between that and this RC version, build 7100, I'm told. Actually, after the first couple of months of the beta, back in January and February, when we were sending in feedback regularly on little problems, there really hasn't been much to complain about at all. We were cautioned not to use that beta on our everyday regular PCs, but most of us ignored that advice, and have been using Windows 7 now ever since last January as our first choice for an operating system. My other PC has XP on it, and I found myself neglecting that for days at a time - only turning it on to update its security.
I've seen reports from self-styled experts which are critical of Windows 7 because to change from XP will require a clean install, rather than an upgrade which preserves your data and programs. There's a reason for that - not all the suppliers of the programs which have worked on XP have updated those for smooth operation on Windows 7. Many do work on Windows 7, but some do not. The fuss over whether to make the change seems rather pointless to me, because you can't fight progress, and sooner or later, XP is going to be taken off life support, and that will be that.
Windows 7, ever since the beta, has been faster than either Vista or XP, and it is also much easier to use than Vista, and more convenient than XP. The ten million of us who have been testing it and enjoying the experience already know these things. It's the rest of you who need to discover all this for yourselves. Windows 7 is the best Windows yet, and once you spend a while using it, you likely won't find yourself wishing you had XP or Vista - trust me.
Promises promises: ME was promised to be outstanding and almost crashproof, the same with XP, with Vista, and now 7.
ReplyDeleteNot bothering anymore; leopard.
"Wellcome to a Different Experience", something an old fart like myself certainly deserves.
I´m happy (digitally).
:-)
The additional "l" is not a fault of the leopard OS, it´s just my typo, hehe.
ReplyDeleteI´m about to scrap my old system, which is ten years old, well almost 11. I could work well with it alright.
But a Mac really makes a difference. I have a MacBook and an iPod touch. Can´t do without the stuff any more. The iPod is for a quick check of my flickr account, twitter, email and so on.
I also watch videos on it, lying on the sofa, hehe.
A wonderful modern instrument!!
@ Monsieur Beep:
ReplyDeleteSo you finally retired that old Millennium Edition - Congratulations!
You probably don't want to know this, but Windows 7 is a lot more like Leopard than you might think, and the time is probably coming when we will have one universal operating system with the best features of both in it.
Dwight, who fixes my computers for me was formerly an Apple dealer, and switched to PCs and Windows a couple of years ago. When I asked him "Why?", he said "Because I don't want to limit myself to servicing only five or ten percent of the market. I'm in business to make money, and working with the ninety percent market share makes a lot more sense to me." I have to agree - Apple's Imacs may be great, but they've never been accepted by the bulk of the business community, which prefers Windows.
You can find market share information at this website.
Yes, but Apple´s share in the market is on the increase, I get the impression they even are lowering their standards a bit to get access to the mass market, with their small new notebooks.
ReplyDeleteI won´t be forgetting Windows altogether, because my wife is going to purchase a Notebook (probably a Sony or Acer or Fuji Siemens) next week, with the darn Vista installed. I´ll upgrade to Win 7 as soon as poss.
I mean Windows isn´t crap, but even so: a Mac is, oh my god, even the keys of the MacBook on which I´m writing this have a totally different feel.....
I´m in love with this machine! (3 times per week, to keep me young, hehe).
Have a good weekend my friend, always looking forward to your Win 7 and biking articles!
@ Monsieur Beep
ReplyDeleteIf that new notebook has Vista on it and you buy it between now and when Windows 7 is released on October 22, you get a free upgrade to Windows 7 when it is available. That's around here, anyway, so check for it there as well - and you can still download
a free copy of Windows 7 Release Candidate until August 20, I think.
They will give you the key codes for it. Problem there is that you have to do a clean install from that to the final version later on.
But I think you and your wife will like Windows 7 - it's got the sidebar gadgets, and the new taskbar with thumbnails similar to what I'm told the Macs have... so
check into this. Windows is improving, believe it or not.