Microsoft launched the next version of Windows, dubbed Windows 7. The problem is: a majority of current Windows users still use XP, which is getting to be nine years old now.After the launch of Windows Vista, people had no option but to buy PCs pre-loaded with Vista. Some paid extra to "downgrade" to Windows XP.
The main issues with Vista? Widespread reports of sluggishness, frequent hangs and crashes, and incompatibility with certain software and hardware. Vista was basically a troublesome experience.Somewhere down the line, Microsoft had lost touch with consumers. And it has worked hard to correct the shortcomings.
Windows 7 was available for thousands of Beta testers worldwide since January, and Microsoft listened to what they had to say. Many bugs have been ironed out -- this time before the official release of the product. According to PC vendors, market acceptance of Windows 7 is much higher than it was for Vista. This is good news for the new PC market and Microsoft. To quote most reviewers of the pre-release versions: "Windows 7 is what Vista should have been".
And Windows 7 is a "make-or-break" situation for Microsoft, especially after the Vista debacle. But Wired magazine summed it up aptly: "Although Windows 7 will be familiar to XP users, fundamentally it's different enough to make you change the way you think of Microsoft."
Why Windows 7 will encourage thousands of PC users to spend their money to upgrade:
** Speed - It's faster on the same hardware
** Compatibility - It has lower hardware requirements and works well on older machines and netbooks
** New features - Windows 7 is prettier than Vista and comes with new features like aero peek, aero snap, aero shake (to handle multiple open applications and windows better), easier home networking
** Longer battery life - Users will get better battery life with notebook PCs since Windows 7 makes more efficient use of system resources.
** Hardware advantages - It will boost performance with newer multi-core CPUs
** Increased security - The new Windows Action Center integrates security and maintenance into one package
** New Media - Native support for Blu-Ray, ISO image burning and new media formats and codecs to fully take advantage of the digital age.
Will businesses upgrade?
This is a particularly tricky question. It takes time to deploy an operating system on a large scale and decision makers may be hesitant of shaking up a current system on XP that "works" and has nothing wrong with it.
Even so, it makes sense to consider that:
** After almost nine years, XP is beginning to show its age; it cannot last forever
** Rather than upgrade hardware, companies can spend the same amount to upgrade to Windows 7; of course, this probably only applies to PCs less than 3-4 years old. Beyond that, it doesn't really make sense to stretch the hardware
** Windows 7 offers much improved security
** There will be inevitable compatibility issues with XP as it gets even older, plus discontinued support from Microsoft
But Microsoft also faces major challenges with Windows 7:
** Windows 7 does not offer a very smooth transition from XP -- there is no upgrade option, only a fresh install; the data however remains
** There could be possible employee training and network management issues for corporates
** The economic slowdown will hamper upgrade
** Vista still casts a shadow on business users of Windows and turnaround will take time
** Chinese pirates have already hijacked the launch of Windows 7 and copies with authentic-looking packaging sell for as little as $3 in China
** Prices for the full versions are likely to be high, which is a problem
Noticeable Changes In New Additions
While superficially explored the feature set so far, here are a few noticeable changes:
The revamped taskbar - Groups similar windows in a single button, shows preview of all the grouped windows when you rollover a button and shows a specific window in isolation against the desktop when you rollover it's preview. Navigation just got better! However, I don't like the way the "Show Desktop" button has been pushed to the system tray end of taskbar. I'd rather have it near the start button because of the frequent use. Someone at Microsoft listening ?
Desktop themes - While the extent of customization remains similar to that in Vista - changing window colours and wallpapers - the desktop wallpaper shuffling is a refreshing feature. You can auto-set the shuffle frequency to 10 secs, 30 secs - 1 day. More themes are available online and they are fairly elegant.
The Action Center - This gives you notifications about "actions" to be taken, like installing an anti-virus. I haven't explored this completely but it looks like an integrated Security Center + Performance Management + System Restore + Troubleshooting console
Paint - Not many changes here except that it borrows the ribbon format for menu from Office 2007 and does a god job of it.
Gadget Gallery - The gadget gallery has all the gadgets in Vista. But Windows 7 gets rid of the "Sidebar" and will let you place gadgets anywhere on your screen.
Windows explorer - This has pretty much been left unchanged except for the tree-style navigation added on the left of every explorer window, as opposed to Vista which allowed only the favorite links to be placed in the left column.
Specific Applications
IE 8 Beta 2 - Call me biased or cynical but IE just doesn't seem to work for me. After the install, IE 8 just refused to connect to my institute's proxy server forcing me to install Firefox from my external disk. And guess what.. Firefox worked like a charm. So did Google Talk with the same proxy. Eventually when IE did manage to connetc to the proxy, it was not only sluggish while switching tabs but also noticeably slow in rendering web pages.
Norton Internet Security 2009 - Stay away from this if you're using Windows 7 beta. Althogh I could get it to install properly, after 2 rounds of updates from the internet and a reboot, I was stuck with a CHKDSK error screen on every reboot and a message on my desktop telling me that the disk is corrupt. Had to do a complete disk format and re-install of Windows 7 to get things back to normal.
Kaspersky 8 Technical Preview - Microsoft site rcommends 3 AVs for the Windows 7 beta - Norton 360 Beta 3, Kaspersky Preview 8 and AVG Internet Security. Norton 360 didn't dwnload due to "export restrictions to India". So I decided to go alongwith Kaspersky. Worked smooth.. fixed some viruses on my disk that Norton 2009 couldn't detect and doesn't seem to be going heavy on my system either.
Windows Media Player works well with MP3 and common video formats like AVI. Pretty much the same experience as Vista.
Other programs that work fine so far are : Open Office, Google Talk, Firefox, 7z compression utility, IrfanView and iGetter download manager.
Businesses will not immediately switch to Windows 7. In the long run, yes. Right now, there aren't many tangible benefits (or at least none that have been properly communicated). But it's a whole different story for consumers. After having used Windows 7 for over six months now, I can tell you Microsoft has something big here. They've finally got their act together!
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