Hi guys, i have been spending about the last two weeks testing RTM windows 7 professional (when i can find time), and i find this product name to be a complete oxymoron. From first glance to a good exploration of settings and features of the "New" operating system from M$, there appears to be nothing (short of the ability to join an AD Domain) that is professional about it. Configuration Menus and very basic system functions that have been part of windows since the release of windows 2000, seem to have just vanished or been reinstated EXTREMELY poorly. The "Pin/un-Pin" feature on the taskbar is absolutely ridiculous. Quicklaunch was a standard toolbar with shortcuts, but for some reason someone thought it wasn't good enough. Now if i attempt to use this pointless "Pin" feature, everytime i open a window for one of the "pinned" programs, the icons slide back and forth across the taskbar making a confused mess of running tasks and non-running ones, not something i could deal with on a daily basis. I don't want to rant too much here, so i thought i would state just a single grievance (out of many) that i have discovered. It seems that microsoft has completely forgotten that they still have enterprise/business customers, and that employing five year old children with radical and completely useless ideas to "improve" (i disagree) their operating systems is not a good idea. I had a little chuckle when i first saw the RTM build number and kernel version (6.1.7600). It seems that M$ may quite possibly be the first software (un)developer in history to successfully and legally market a service pack (to a previously released product) as a new product. (In My opinion, this IS windows Vista SP3). I would hope that i am not the only user on these forums that has this opinion, IT and administration is hard enough as it is when the operating system with the largest market share is getting developed with the ideas of one of the smallest. I don't want a mac, and i especially don't want one that is this much of a stress and pain to deal with. Any feedback?
I find the pinned taskbar quite good actually, the open and non-open programmes are easily distinguishable. I've chosen a slightly more purple colour for the taskbar though. I find it much better than Vista, just requires a change in habit. Many people hate change, they get to used to a certain product/design/situation that when it changes, even if for the better, they do not like it. That said, I do not believe the changes in Office 2007 are positive, you can whinge about the stupid design move as much as you like as far as Windows 7 goes, I think Microsoft have made many positive changes, and if far superior to Vista. Funny thing is, regardless what is claimed it is essentially just a heavily updated vista, the reason why it came out fairly quickly compared to Vista and why it sports the 6.1 version number. It is like 95/98/98SE/ME, and 2000/XP/2003 in that regard.
The new taskbar is one of the best improvements for Windows for a long long time. Windows 7 is such a great operating system compared to XP. XP is the worst OS around. I love Windows 7. Kudos to Microsoft for making this.
XP's security is very poor. Vista is a great OS if you run it on advanced hardware. But Windows 7 has the speed of XP and the style/security of Vista. That's why Windows 7 is the best.
Well I'm going to be 100% honest and truthful with everyone that reads these forums. I only use a Windows Operating System because it's the only operating system that can run a lot of the newer/older games that I play. If I weren't a gamer at all; I have to say that I would most likely be running a distribution of Linux. Linux can do everything that Windows can do and do it extremely efficiently. However; as of right now it really can't run many newer games. Granted you have Windows emulators on Linux that do a half-ass job like Wine, something like Cedega, etc. The day will come when the World stops relying on Windows and starts moving to Linux as the next platform of choice. I think the only reason that most businesses even still use Windows is because it's easier that even a monkey could setup up a webserver. Sure it's easier; but it has more overhead in the end and definitely uses more energy consumption to do it. I'm not arguing which is better. Each has their own advantages. For gaming there is Windows; for everything else Linux can do it better Notice how I didn't even mention MAC even once, haha.
The configuration menus are very basic for a reason. This is so that the average user who isn't a geek can somehow figure out how to customize the OS to their own liking. As in Vista, all the nitty-gritty stuff has been relegated to the command prompt. It's very ironic that, even in an OS released in 2009, the most advanced features can only be changed via DOS (and possibly via Group Policy). I guess this could be part of the next wave of pathetic Apple ads slamming Win7, but then again whatever features you do get in the GUI are meant to be the easiest to learn how to manage.
About the taskbar, I don't know what don't you like about it. I for one love it. Maybe you're just one of those people who don't like change regardless of whether it's good or bad, I don't know. If that's the case, then simply stick with Vista or XP or w/e you were using before. It's not a must to obtain the latest OS in the market. Secondly, you CAN get quicklaunch in Windows 7 following easy steps. Google them. @Gethsemane: You can pin My Computer, Recycle Bin ..etc to the Windows Explorer (which is pinned on the taskbar).
I can only say I totally disagree with the person who started this topic. Especially as there is nothing ridiculas about the pin un pin feature. This enables you to merely pin to the taskbar your favourite application shortcut as well as the start menu. (As I am sure you know). I am fine with this feature. It really just shows how Windows 7 has different reactions from different people with different needs.
this guy is completely ridiculous..........Windows 7 was supposed to be the successor of Windows XP but M$ launched another build in between xp nd 7 nd it's called Vista.In the course of time vista took some of da features like flip,transparency etc dat were actually planned to be delivered with Windows 7.So Windows 7 is not Vista SP3 instead Vista is an interim build between xp nd 7.U can even verify dat frm wikipedia.
Linux is still YEARS from mainstream desktop OS. I love how people talk about how Linux is going to be the future... by time linux is even ready to grab a large market share everything will be done online. I am not saying Linux isn't a good OS, it is fine, but there is so many things that I can do with Windows that I will never be able to do with Linux. The biggest fallback of Linux is it's LDAP feature set. People toot the horn of Linux but in no way is there a mail server out there that is better than Exchange and there is not a better LDAP implementation than Active Directory. Office Communicator 2007 R2 is a perfect example of software where there is no equivalent in a Linux program. Dameware NT Utilities is another, and the RSAT is another. I don't want to have to remote into a server to be able to admin my Exchange Boxes, I don't want to have to remote into a server to be able to manage users and groups. I don't want to have use RDP, I want to be able to use concurrent console sessions. If I wanted something for surfing the web, multimedia, and something that I can customize how I want it, and then compile and uncompile everything to get it to run for me. YUM and RPM have come a long way for Linux but there still isn't a great installer suite out there like there is with Installshield, WISE, and NSIS, and MSI. SSH built in is a good thing, and so is the security but in order to script things I need to learn pearl which is a lot harder than batch scripting or powershell.
I fully agree with the original poster. If you are in an enterprise / business environment you don't want too much change forced down your throat as it means down time to retrain employees. This is lost productivity. I don't think that new pin bar adds to productivity. MS should have given the option to enable or disable it. Way to difficult for the average user to get the Quick lanuch back. Yes, there are many great new features in Win7 but at least one can turn all the animation fluff and aero crap off. Waste of system resources.
I agree that it's vista in a sense. But i also agree that it actually is way better (read : faster) then vista. I find the new taskbar and xp mode to be two very good improvements. True, the taskbar is different, and at first it is a bit annoying, but that's cause it requires some getting used to. A lot of ppl don't like something that's different then what they're used to, as allready stated by burfadel. i don't like the fact that 2d accelleration still isn't fixed in win7. it has been proved to be more then 4x slower than xp, but that'll be fixed with sp's soon i hope. All in all, i think, besides some early bugs (ex : 2d) and (to me) the obvious still vista-look, it's a great improvement. The first good OS since XP, cause Vista was a big fluke imho (you could call Vista the Millenium of the new millenium ).
Honestly i dont know whats all the ruckus about windows7 is all about. It's the same old stuff. Wait for windows8 to get that 128bit goodness! XP is still good to go. It's not like most programs arent backwards compatible(Cept directx10 maybe). Well it's just the way i see it. XP is like that 30 year strong and tough old guy . Vista's that 25year old guy who did everything wrong possible while se7en is Vista's kid brother who learnt from his big brothers mistake.
Well ,everybody has to learn from their big brother, right ? And as for that 128 bit goodness, what's the purpose if u'll have to wait another couple years to taste it ? I mean, 64 bit is going for years now, and STILL most apps aren't supporting it. The software business is way behind compared to the hardware devellopments, and always will be. So when win8 comes out, hopefully by then 64bit will be fully software supported. 128bits ? not a chance. You'll have to wait for that untill win8 is out and running for quite some time.
xp security isonly poor because it is out of date OS but at its time when it was first launched the security was brillant but windows 7 all the way for me love it
I updated my OS from WinXPpro 32Bit to Win7 Ultimate 64 Bit by following the info given in the repository a couple days ago... So far im mostly pleased with Win7. But it was not the simplest task to find all drivers for my hardware. At first my soundcard (Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 HiFi) didnt work despite the fact that the update function downloaded and installed an applicable one. And for my wlan card (Abit Airpace PCie with Atheros Chip) there was simply nothing... Which was a bit weird because Atheros Chip based wlan cards are not rare out there. But lucky me i have a 2nd PC to look for drivers and found some so in the end my hardware works flawless now. (except for an old flatbed scanner,but well..) It took an evening or two to learn Win7 to adjust it to my needs and preferences but its realy not that hard,because its a M$ OS after all and there is the same "logic &"philosphy" behind them. Win7 is a very novice friendly OS and in this friendliness it is more advanced than WinXP. It has more logical structured assistents and the handling is a successfull positiv rethink of earlier tries. Of course this makes Win7 bloated and is a bit anoying to those who are used to make all adjustment manually but with an effective 64Bit engine under the hood and enough fast ram and cpu power who honestly gives a f... All`n`all i like it. I guess Win7 64Bit will repeat the success of XP 32Bit. Im sure about that. At the latest when games require 64Bit and D3D 10 to run optimal. And that time is very near and partly now (f.e. Crysis,Call of Juarez).