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For the Windows faithful, it’s been a tough eight years. With the launch of Windows XP in 2001, we thought we were poised on a brink of a new world of NT-based goodness—but two years and uncountable exploits later, the future of Windows was grim. Facing a never-ending torrent of new ‘sploits, worms, and trojans, Microsoft fired back with the single greatest operating system update of all time—Service Pack 2. In the single fell swoop of SP2, Windows XP went from Swiss cheese to secure, and once again we were poised to enter the promised land with… (wait for it)… Vista.
Of course, we all know how Vista turned out. Haunted by poor performance in everything from games to disk access to networking, Vista is widely considered to be Microsoft’s biggest failure. Nonetheless, Vista laid the groundwork for a host of new technologies, all absolutely vital to pushing Windows into the 21st century. Vista’s new, modern driver architecture was designed to move core functionality from the kernel (where any instability can bring down the whole system) to user space—an absolutely necessary development. Likewise, Vista’s proper enforcement of permissions for both users and applications enhanced security, even though UAC remains very annoying. And once vendors fixed their driver flaws and Microsoft squashed some underlying bugs, Vista morphed into an entirely workable operating system, even if we still wouldn’t describe it as “good.”
So, as 2009 draws to a close, we find ourselves testing another new Microsoft OS: Windows 7. Building on the now-mature technologies introduced with Vista, but with a renewed focus on performance and ease-of-use, Windows 7 seems poised to succeed where Vista couldn’t. We’ve finally received a final build of Win7, and have run it through the wringer in both the Lab and in the real-world. Here’s what we found.
While support for new hardware and improved security are perfectly valid reasons to upgrade your OS, the sexiest benefits of an operating system upgrade are all the new features. Indeed, from a completely revamped user interface to brand-new features designed to make organizing and sharing your files easier, Windows 7 delivers much more than some new wallpaper and a different color Taskbar. (Though there are lots of new wallpapers.)
The most obvious changes from previous versions of Windows to Windows 7 can be found in a redesigned user interface. Sure, much of the interface remains the same, but Microsoft has completely overhauled key elements, starting with the Taskbar.
After 14 years of nothing more than cosmetic changes, Microsoft’s redesign of the Taskbar combines the pure window organizing power of the classic Taskbar with the application-launching, multi-purpose convenience of Mac OS X’s Dock. In addition to showing the applications that you currently have open, the new Windows 7 Taskbar also hosts shortcuts to your most commonly used applications. Click a shortcut when the app is running, and it brings the most recently used window to the foreground. Click the same shortcut when the app is closed, and it will launch the app.
But that’s not all. Drag a file onto a shortcut in the Taskbar, and Windows will open the file using that app. Hover your mouse over a running application’s icon, and it expands to show live thumbnail previews of all of that app’s windows, floating just above the Taskbar. Mouse over a thumbnail, and Windows will bring that particular window to the foreground. You can even close individual windows from the thumbnail previews.
For anyone who regularly finds himself with more than 10 windows open, the new Taskbar is a dream come true.
Another core enhancement to the OS comes in the form of Jump Lists. In short, Jump Lists put frequently used files in a convenient menu that’s a simple click away from the shortcut icon on the Taskbar or on the Start Menu. Apps that support Jump Lists will display the list when you right click on the shortcut, or when you left-click and drag the mouse up away from the Taskbar. Additionally, some apps will automatically populate their Jump List with files you recently opened.
Along with the redesigned UI elements comes a whole new world of user-interface shortcuts. There are really too many to get into here, but the best of the new shortcuts allow you to maximize a window by dragging it to the top of the screen, minimize it by dragging it to the bottom, maximize to half your screen by dragging it to either edge, or (our favorite) minimizing all other windows by shaking the one you want to focus on. Furthermore, enhancements to alt+tab let you immediately find lost windows, and you can use the Windows key and numbers 1 through 0 to launch the first ten shortcuts on your Taskbar. And when those apps are already open, you can cycle through multiple windows by pressing the app’s keyboard shortcut again.
Windows Explorer also receives some much-needed love. The changes since Vista are relatively minor, but they serve to make the left-column of Explorer the quickest way to navigate to any folder on your hard drive, network, or even in the cloud. Furthermore, you can arrange the different categories in any way you want, quickly add special folders to the Favorites section, and even hide sections you don’t use.
The other main place to access the file browser is the shortcut bar on the right column of the Start Menu. In Windows 7, there are more folders that you can choose to display there, including Downloads and Recorded TV. However, you still can’t place any folder you choose in one of those precious slots.
The controversial Ribbon, which replaced traditional menus and shortcut bars in Office 2007, is prominently featured in Windows 7. In the applets that ship with the OS, you’ll see the Ribbon featured prominently.
Comments are closed on this article
n0ctis
August 12, 2009 at 8:57pm
My Core 2 Duo absolutely loves Win7. In the months I tested the RC, I had not one problem. I put it through the ringer, too.
________________________________________________________________
.: vires et honos :.
QUINTIX256
August 12, 2009 at 11:39am
Gordon, from the begining, called the first Phenom "not a bad processor", and an excelent upgrade for anyone with an AM2+ mobo; those who don't want to go out and completly replace their system. It was just nothing compared to the Core 2 in terms of average insturction per cycle.
Software benches should scale proportionately across all CPU architectures based on each respective CPU's performance. Why not use the most powerfull one to show the most contrast, and avoid testing it on every possible CPU configuration?
Hideous thought for this magazine!? I have no idea how you even thought of such a ludicrus thing. There is simply no evidence behind your claim.
Minimum requirements? What on earth do you mean?
Oh, lets not forget memory usage. Prefetch/IO caching anyone? How many games or other demanding apps you use actually soak up 8 or 16 gigs? You know, I would like the memory I paid for to actually be used, otherwise there is little point in having more than 2 gigs.
Maximum PC is founded on a "seperation of church and state" between writers and advertisers. Your and everone else's accusation of them being in bed with Microsoft and Intel is completly unfounded.
You can have your recession. I'm not participating.
burpnrun
August 12, 2009 at 1:01pm
Quote: "You know, I would like the memory I paid for to actually be used, otherwise there is little point in having more than 2 gigs."
Exactly. XP runs fine in one gig. Moreover, XP is "just good enough", and neither Vista nor Win7 make a compelling case (certainly financially) to rush out and buy the next great sucker from Microsoft, waste time installing/upgrading to it, buying wer versions of application software, searching for and installing newer drivers ... in general, totally irrational behaviour.
I'm constantly amused/appalled by the fanbois notion that because an OS is bloated and a pig, you should go out and buy gobs and gobs of memory to feed it and make Microsoft (and memory manufacturers) happy "Then, damn it, it better use all that memory, or else I'm not getting full value for my lemming-like behaviour". Wow.
Any idea how silly and lemming-like this is? "Gotta upgrade to Win7 because it uses more memory that I have to go out and buy". Step back and take a breath.
Also, no one is suggesting "testing it on every possible CPU configuration". But wouldn't it be more*real* and valid to test it on a mid-range motherboard/CPU combo (take your pick) rather than the latest wet dream of overclockers that 95%+ of us *don't* have? Then you'd get more real world benchmark results. Yeah, so it won't boot in 20 seconds but, for 95%+ of us, it won't either. So let's see what the *real* world results of these turkeys are, rather than presenting the best case situation all the time ... and then disappointing 95% of PC users who get nowhere near the kind of performance of an i7.
I suspect that Vista and Win7 is a turkey on most of our PC's, and that XP (or "W2K enhanced", which is all XP really is) would fly in comparison, run all our existing software, and permit us to get on with life rather than prostrating ourselves before the great God of "Upgrade for Upgrade's sake". Get a life.
Of course, saying that there's no compelling case for upgrading XP to Vista or Win7 hardly satisfies advertisers, does it? No wonder people these days aren't spending a cent to buy a newpaper, magazine, etc., and are getting their news and values from other sources.
QUINTIX256
August 12, 2009 at 5:16pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prefetcher
I wasn't talking about bloat. I'm not sure where you got that.
You can have your recession. I'm not participating.
willsmith
August 12, 2009 at 1:14pm
The OS was tested on a variety of different machines, ranging from $250 netbooks with 1GB of RAM up to high-end gaming machines. The benchmarks listed in the article were run on a Core2Quad with 4GB of memory, which isn't out of line, since 4GB of DDR2 RAM costs less than $50.
I could see what you were saying about memory usage being really crucial in 1997, when 2MB of RAM cost $200. There's absolutely no reason not to have 4GB or 6GB of memory in your machine if you use your computer for more than web browsing and checking email.
If I rated operating systems based on how much memory they use, instead of the benefit that they give me, as an end user, I'd still be recommending DOS 3.0. It used 2MB of memory and did everything I needed back then. New versions of OSes do more than previous versions. They're going to use more resources, but that's OK, because the hardware continues to speed up at a much faster pace than the software.
I didn't think it was necessary to spell this out, but I will anyway, because a lot of people didn't get it. A positive review of an OS doesn't mean you should zip out and upgrade all your apparently ancient computers immediately. It simply means that the new OS is good, and that we recommend it for enthusiasts who want to try it out and that we think it's good enough to put on newly built machines. I'm not going to come to your house and make you put Windows 7 on your computer if you don't want to, no one will do that.
I'll also remind everyone that when AMD was making CPUs that were faster than Intel's CPUs, we constantly recommended AMD hardware. We recommend the hardware that's the fastest, whoever makes it. If Via rolled up with a new CPU tomorrow that was faster than i7, we'd recommend that instead of i7 in a heartbeat.
n0ctis
August 12, 2009 at 9:02pm
That completely nonbiased, "separation between church and state" attitude in MaxPC reviews is one of the core reasons I love this magazine so goddamn much. Gordon's fanboy rant a couple of years ago in the podcast summed it up very well also. Keep up the great work, guys.
________________________________________________________________
.: vires et honos :.
burpnrun
August 12, 2009 at 2:13pm
Will: Two megs for DOS 3? Gimme a break. Anyone who had 512K of ram in those days was the luckiest (certainly the richest) stud buzzard on the block. I had 64k, and those DOS "dir" commands just flew by one the 14" green and black CRT. Maybe you're thinking of Windows 3 (or 3.01 or WFWG). Yeah, I go back that far, and further. But that's not the point that I made, and you know it. XP is "good enough". For that matter Vista (if you have low self esteem, a high pain threshold, or low standards, or all three) is good enough too.
I surf, rip, cut DVDs, do video editing, organize photo collections, yahoo voice the world, run Office 2K, play WOW and a few other games, et al ... all on XP with one gig on an Athlon X2 5000. Certainly more than your "only web surf and e-mail" jibe. And do you know what? It flies. Many apps simultaneously, too! WoW, eh? So yeah, I'm hardly going to rush out and buy the latest and greatest bloatware based on a magazine's "recommendation".
But maybe you *should* put into articles the qualifier mentioned in your 4th (second last) paragraph in your response. Because that certainly wasn't the thrust of conclusion of the article.
Finally, your "We recommend the hardware that's the fastest, whoever makes it" comment. I'd understand your "recommendation" better if this was an article about the fastest processor, but it was unfortunately about an OS. That's why I suggested that "The 7 Mag" would be a better name for the site. Covers off the forelock tugging in a "two-fer".
A more faithful devotee for you might be this one: http://www.maximumpc.com/article/reviews/windows_7_review#comment-37827
dracx619
August 12, 2009 at 5:44pm
1 gig of ram for video editing? what do you use, windows movie maker? pinnacle? some other noob software? please, im a REAL editor and if i were to use 1gig of ram on any platform and any system to do what i do, it would take like a bagillion times longer. i use minimum 4 at home at 8 at the studio. i used to edit with 512mb of ram, but that was like 7 years ago, was using movie maker and it would still take forever to do the simplest thing.
willsmith
August 12, 2009 at 2:44pm
Please help me understand this. No where in the review did I say "Hey if you don't have this new thing, you're a worse person or your computer sucks without it", but people are incredibly defensive about operating systems. I have a pretty thick skin, so it's not upsetting me, but I just don't get it. I said "This new thing is better than the old thing, here's why, and we like it." This is, quite simply, a review of a product.
When we review a new videocard or hard drive, people don't come out of the woodwork to let us know that their old 320GB drive is perfectly adequate for them.
What is it about operating systems that makes everyone go completely batshit crazy?
n0ctis
August 12, 2009 at 9:12pm
You'll find that some people wish to simply earn 'cred' by expressing discontent with the newest thing they havent tried, rehashing the generic opposition phrases repeated all over like one giant pissing echo chamber.
________________________________________________________________
.: vires et honos :.
pcfxer
August 12, 2009 at 8:44pm
I'm a programmer and my OS drives my development. If I am lazy and let the OS/compiler let me know when to allocate resources - UNIX and linux work beautifully, but Windows...well
1. They have a developer environment which is supposed to be encapsulated from the rest of the OS.
2. "supposed to be" but they decide to hack Visual studio for performance reasons and allow it to eat into places it shouldn't be.
3. Crash VS and you'd be darn sure to need a reboot. What's the point? That is how MS develops, they have a great initial intention and decide to shortcut here and there because it's easier rather than better.
Some of this is speculation, because as I say, there is no source code so I can't really slap my finger down and say, "seeee, this is the issue."
Having said that, I've always been out of the woodwork and trying to understand people's obsession with Windows OSes (??). What 'fun' is there? All you do is click buttons and change some numbers, where is the true tweaking and hacking? I think most people go crazy because the OS drives the need for hardware when an OS should embrace hardware and optimize it further. They don't go crazy over hard drive or video card reviews because they don't need to buy more and more hardware to use it. Old hard drive out, new hard drive in.
New windows in, more memory (not enough? add more), better videocard, finally hundreds later, Windows is running fine. For me, Windows is paying for access to Direct X and that is all. But that's me. I may try Windows 7 when I revamp my system but for now... Windows x64 (server 2k3) it is.
dag1992
August 12, 2009 at 3:00pm
No point in beating a dead horse Will. Although I admire your logic, some people just don't get it.
nekollx
August 12, 2009 at 1:22pm
Speak for yourself will. When 7 goes retail i plan to hire a crack hit squad to hunt down anyone useing less then Vista andout them out of my misery :P
------------------------------
Coming soon to Lulu.com --Tokusatsu Heroes--
Five teenagers, one alien ghost, a robot, and the fate of the world.
nekollx
August 12, 2009 at 1:06pm
you are aware that there is a pentium 2 out there runing win 7 right? I mean if you read this site you would know that so i presume you knew that already.
Also presuming you read this site you would know that intel is scaling bace the core 2 line. In the near furutre all we will be able to buy is i3, i5, and i7.
But of couse you knew that? Right? RIGHT?
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Coming soon to Lulu.com --Tokusatsu Heroes--
Five teenagers, one alien ghost, a robot, and the fate of the world.
burpnrun
August 12, 2009 at 2:32pm
I also know there's a Harris 286 @ 20 Hz running Windows 3.x in Real Mode. In my basement. So what. That P2 boots Win7 in what, 15 minutes, and installs it in 24 hours or something? What's your point?
Yeah, I know about the new i's coming. Meaning what? Doesn't change what the 95% of people are using today, who are wondering if how Win7will run on their machine.
Right? Right? (and one more Right?, to not be outdone).
QUINTIX256
August 12, 2009 at 5:23pm
I'll bet Windows 7 will run beautifully on a quarter gig of ram and a 1 ghz pentium 3.
You can have your recession. I'm not participating.
pcfxer
August 12, 2009 at 8:31pm
I have PC-BSD running on a Toshiba Libretto with a Pentium 133 and 32 MB RAM, installs in 6 horurs and boots in five minutes. PC-BSD is free too, who would've thunk that free is better than paying for something?
QUINTIX256
August 14, 2009 at 12:13am
FreeBSD, otherwise known as Free BullSH********. BSD fans can be the worst trolls. Just switch to one of the many smallish linux distros out there, if you are not just trolling.
You can have your recession. I'm not participating.
winmaster
August 12, 2009 at 7:27pm
Windows 7 needs a full gig of RAM to run. I'll be recommending 2 to people who are upgrading.
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The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
nekollx
August 12, 2009 at 11:22am
you ARE aware there is more then 1 page to this article?
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Coming soon to Lulu.com --Tokusatsu Heroes--
Five teenagers, one alien ghost, a robot, and the fate of the world.
MeTo
August 12, 2009 at 11:15am
http://www.maximumpc.com/article/reviews/windows_7_review?page=0%2C2
Shows 9 gig ram (6 gig avilable) That means win7 is using 3 gig at that time thats the only way i can judge it at this time. Could be more if you are doing anything like playing games,defraging,chkdsk what ever. I have read win7 takes most of the avilable ram to speed up the job at hand.
willsmith
August 12, 2009 at 1:30pm
That actually means that the motherboard I shot the screen on has something jacked up and it's reporting RAM wrong. It's a machine with 6GB.
pcfxer
August 12, 2009 at 10:28am
Bingo, the only code audits that MS will ever do is for people that give them more money (as if they need more) or people that have better lawyers than they do. Unfortunately, that is the type of software world that Bill put MS into.
I find it funny that people pay hardware to run software though, the old computer "models" were concentric rings around hardware now it's the inverse (with Windows that is). And that people swear that 7 is "better". What is better? How can they tell (there's no source code to prove it)?
n0ctis
August 12, 2009 at 9:17pm
How can they tell? Excessive testing usage. The "better" people refer to is user experience in the ways they've used it.
________________________________________________________________
.: vires et honos :.
poet_will
August 12, 2009 at 6:54am
I really do. I have been running the RC for months now and have had only one crash, and I think that was my fault. The only thing I do not like about it is the network file sharing. With XP it was dead simple to share files/folders with any other OS. Now, with Win 7, I can't access any shared folder with Ubuntu or XP. I have tried adjusting I dont' know how many settings in Win 7, but have had no luck. I can't even find anything on google that fixes it. The Homegroup thing sucks, IMHO.
nekollx
August 12, 2009 at 10:07am
my vista machine runs for weeks at a time, is a laptop, and has never crashed. Ever. In 3 years. Despite the macine having to be RMA several time Windows Vista never crashed. A program may crash but the OS.
Never.
And they dis Vista.
------------------------------
Coming soon to Lulu.com --Tokusatsu Heroes--
Five teenagers, one alien ghost, a robot, and the fate of the world.
DriZzLe
August 12, 2009 at 4:19pm
I have been running Vista 64 bit for 2 years now, & have had ZERO bsod. that is right,not a one. XP?...too many to count. Why? Vista(& 7) kill the program or driver causing an issue, not crash the whole os. Best thing MS ever did to an os.
Magius
August 12, 2009 at 6:43am
... Same games, same hardware except for the videocard, very different scores. I'm not sure about you noobs but all I see is that performance in Win7 is greatly impacted by device drivers. Is that a surprise? No. However some posters seem to prefer glossing over this and call a winner.
Performance in Win7 will only get better with new iterations of drivers. Right now it is better than Vista and almost on par with XP. Just as Vista turned around after developers polished their drivers so will 7 after a few months.
I am not looking back. There are too many little things that I like in the new OS and far too many little things I needed to fix on Xp to make it as good (and less annoying).
dracx619
August 12, 2009 at 3:19am
what will be interesting to see is how 7 compares with the other two OS using a newer proc with hyerthreading and on an SSD since apprantly 7 is optimized for that. other than that, as was mentioned earlier, it isn't all about the "raw numbers." as has been my experience, 7 has been much better in every way but even if it was just a few percentage points slower than my xp partition, i would have still wiped it off my system, which ive done now =)
VaMage
August 12, 2009 at 12:49am
I find it interesting that it only took 8 years to get close to XP's performance. Given how bogged down Vista & 7 are in DRM schemes designed to do one thing, make the MPAA and the RIAA happy, it's a miracle they work at all.
OH WAIT, those guys have pretty much kissed DRM goodbye as the bad idea it always was, but WE are still loaded down with an OS that checks virtually every instruction that hits the CPU to be sure we are all being good little boys and girls. THAT is the number 1 reason Vista sucked, and it is the number 1 thing holding 7 back. The idiocy of it almost meets the irony.
Note 1: Once upon a time there was a concept called "a code refresh", it is a principal that M.S. should learn, along with programming on purpose, but they never will. Add to that a crap file system, a crap memory model, and a crap stack and you get Windows.
Note 2: About DRM history, anyone remember the late 80's, when the software companies gave it up as costing THEM too much for too little return, as well as alienating their customers? Those that don't learn are doomed to repeat, and that means all of us for putting up with this bull shit.
Note 3: About activation, another MS irony if there ever was one. As a paying customer for every O.S. that runs in my house, and as an "enthusiast", the best possible choice, for me, is to buy Windows 7, AFTER someone releases an "honest" crack of it. That way, I'm not a thief, but every 6 months when I refresh the bloody O.S. I don't have to leap through M.S.'s hoops like the well trained pets they wish we all were.
Of course that's illegal, as is getting cracks of games you buy so you don't have to have flip disks for a living, or just like the people who are getting SCREWED by the industry now saying they can kill the DRM servers and expect you to buy your music all over again, which I would call THEFT, but who instead go out and grab a DRM free copy of the SHIT THEY PAID FOR!
The worse this gets the more I think the Pirate Bay should be given a community service award.
VaMage
American by Birth, But Southern by the Grace of God.
ghot
August 12, 2009 at 12:24am
.....that EVERY Windows version since XP has gotten som far from the efficiency and ease of use of XP, thats it's no longer worth comment. Backup: nothing beats norton ghost. Security: anyonhe with any comprehension of security can run XP as secure as Vista orWin 7. Productivity: Don't make me laugh. Max PC: the last 6-7 issues can't seem to do even a comprehensive review of anything but Core i7's. These are facts, plain and simple. OS speed: no contest.
Since I don't have the opportunity to post screenshots...complaining that I don't prvide proof...is inane. Geek Quizes...waste of space.....taking apart components....which almost everone has lying around and can do themselves; waste of space.
The burden of proof is on the article writers...not the readers...!
Prediction: Deja vu....MS CAN write a decent OS they simply won't. It is the responsibilty of the reporters to call them on this...not me.
There are talented good people working at max PC...they should start acting like it. There are many other news sites available....simply reading a few, will open your eyes and save your money. I could quote the expert overclockers that have proven that XP overclocks better.....but, so could you.
How many more issues have to come and go before the Intel-centric Max PC updates an AMD Best of the best motherboard....MSI K9A2 Platinum...lets be serious :/ Even Newegg.com has that motherboard deactivated.
The Maximum PC of today is a weak comparison of the Maximum PC of a few years ago.
Take an OS, and edit out all the efficiency, and what you have left is a post-XP Microsoft operating system :)
QUINTIX256
August 12, 2009 at 11:51am
THEN TELL US WHAT THE BENCHMARKS ARE YOU DOLT!!!
You can have your recession. I'm not participating.
nightkiller
August 12, 2009 at 4:43am
Backward compatibility with previous versions of Windows is key to the continuing acceptance of the OS as the benchmark by which all others are measured. That MS was able to accomplish this while at the same time completely rewriting the core components to accomodate demands from hardware, security and operability, is no mean feat.
I can only imagine how much more impressive the performance of Windows would be if Microsoft was able to discard all code present to allow backwards compatibility.
But then, isn't that the reason they've included Virtualization for some levels of the product? Microsoft has always been sneaking in changes into the OS by first giving it to "lesser" products so that the end user could get used to the idea before it actually makes it into the flagship product. The Ribbon interface comes to mind, first seen in Office 2007.
Microsoft has already started modularizing the kernel with Vista and continued this process with Windows 7. There will come a time when the core OS will no longer be backwards compatible with previous versions. The end result will be an OS with better performance for a much smaller group of programs.
You choose a flightless bird as a mascot and wonder why it doesn't take off?
pcfxer
August 12, 2009 at 10:41am
There is a time to destroy backwards compatibility and it is done via transitioning. Write API to allow old programs to work at the majority of their performance and features and forget about the intracacies. Start hiring (not contracting) people to implement the futures of the OS.
It is hard to nail down in one sentence, or one post on the internet, what is inherently wrong with Windows but I can tell you for one thing: they don't care. Why would they? They make boat loads of money, they have extensive volume in whichever market they choose and the ultimate audience - lazy North Americans who couldn't be bothered with the "truth" of it all. A microsoft project manager receives a task, hires some contractors to do the work and calls it a day.
When you're a hollow company like Microsoft there is no vision and without vision you don't get a fundamentally code correct OS with particular design philosophies like, POSIX and ANSI. Microsoft gives what the majority of people want (including those in business suits that make the decision for better or for worse) and they simply couldn't care less about the means to get there.
A service pack should be a full on code audit with all teams communicating to each other about hammering out some good quality code - think Snow Leopard. The only reason this hasn't happened is that the task has never been trickled down from above...
horzo
August 12, 2009 at 4:09pm
Hmm...I'm confused.
North Americans = lazy & unenlightened
OS X = the pinnacle of forward-thinking OS design
OS X = Apple product
Apple = North American company
Ahhhh! Logical disconnect!
pcfxer
August 13, 2009 at 1:45pm
Your logic is flawed. I referred to the subset of North Americans when I said, "...lazy North Americans". I am referring to some people's innate ability to accept everything at face value and to never question anything - thus thinking for themselves. Unfortunately this is a large subset.
blackcat77
August 12, 2009 at 12:00am
It was okay and, as everyone seems to agree, as far as eye candy, it's the best. But for me at least, there were a lot of little issues -- WIndows Explorer was crashing all the time, a few wonky drivers, etc -- and I just decided to put Vista back on and I'm very impressed with it's stability.
I'm not a benchmarker and I don't really like to mess around with computers as much as I just want them to work reliably and do what I need. It really seems to me that with the release of SP2, Vista has evolved into an outstanding OS. There are no compatibility issues, I don't have to hunt around for drivers, I can play my games at least as well as on W7 and some are noticably quicker.
Maybe about the time that W7 gets its SP1, I'll move on, but there's just not enough motivation for me to change at this point.
ghot
August 11, 2009 at 9:24pm
Deja vu....it looks to me that XP is STILL the best OS...
Side note....I've run some of the "missing" benchmarks on XP Pro SP2 and Win 7 RC and....I know why they are missing.
It's kinda sad when a supposedly impartial magazine...isn't ! This entire article is just a rehash of the very same BIASED reviews during the Vista release. Two years from now, the market share reports will no doubt prove my point. Even the overclockers know that XP Pro, overclocks better than Vista or Win 7.
Instead of trying to report a silk purse made from a sows ear, it would be trully refreshing to see honesty for a change. I LIKE MS, well at least when they released the best OS to date....Windows XP Pro.
Sure I'll still buy Maximum PC...even though they are slowly losing credibility..there is enough OTHER info in the Mag to make it worth while. I understand the economic pressures that Max PC must be under, but I still don't understand some of the latest articles. You may as well just rename the Mag.....Maximum Intel/Microsoft and get it over with.
Sincerely,
Dissillusioned and saddened
Take an OS, and edit out all the efficiency, and what you have left is a post-XP Microsoft operating system :)
mesiah
August 11, 2009 at 10:34pm
You obviously just don't get it. Attempting to argue with you is most likely a waste of time. But most people don't base their opinions of best OS on sheer benchmark numbers alone. Yes, XP outperforms windows 7 in just about every benchmark by a small margin. I don't know about you, but I don't run my pc with a stop watch in my hand clocking everything I do. Its not just about raw speed, its about the UI, the visual appeal, user friendliness, customizablility, security, and any other number of things. You may be able to soup up your car and run sub 12 second quarter miles at the drag strip, but that doesn't make it better than a Ferrari. Speed is nothing without the style to back it up, and I'm sorry but XP in this day and age looks as bland and outdated as dos.
As for your side note, you bash MaxPC for purposefully omitting these eye opening benchmarks that you were kind enough to run on your own, but then you yourself Don't even mention what they are. So unless you want to divulge this information and show some numbers your harsh criticism is completely baseless.
QUINTIX256
August 11, 2009 at 10:03pm
"Even the overclockers know that XP Pro, overclocks better than Vista or Win 7." Bull.
That’s like saying my engine can reach higher RPMS with a different steering wheel. What OS you use has absolutely relevance to how much higher you can push your clocks. What, will Linux out overclock Windows? Give me a break.
You can have your recession. I'm not participating.
QUINTIX256
August 11, 2009 at 9:05pm
"designed to move core functionality from the kernel (where any instability can bring down the whole system) to user space"
Uh, didn't Linus describe that as for the most part impratical? Version 7 of the windows kernel is still a Monolithic kernel so far as I can tell (they call it Hybrid, and Linus calls that "marketing").
You can have your recession. I'm not participating.
pcfxer
August 12, 2009 at 10:46am
Linux is monolithic, but the core components are modular (still monolithic though), Windows is monolithic (I guess??), FreeBSD is monolithic and OS X is a hybrid (BSD runs userland stuff and communicates with MACH [implemented in a monolithic style])
The quote you posted is quite a feast of discussion. Moving core functionality from the kernel does not mean that the OS will be more stable at all. GOOD QUALITY code means the OS WILL BE more stable. Where or how implement crap code, does not change the stability.
knexkid
August 11, 2009 at 7:11pm
Well now I certianly don't need my next issue of MaxPC since I bet this article is the feature. Oh well, when my subscription runs out I won't care that much because I would say 60-70% of the mag ends up on maxpc.com anways. Well I have been pretty happy with only a few glitches, but I have one HUGE complaint, and if anyone can help me that would be great:
-In XP (I don't know about Vista, I was a fellow hater and never used it) you could manually rearrange files in a folder. Win7 you can't! I had a bunch of pics that I wanted to do a slide show in a certain order, but all had pretty random file names. In order for them to play in the right order, I had to rename EVERY SINGLE FILE to 1,2,3,4 etc. In XP I could just drag the files into the right order and the folder would remember my order. Is there any way to bring this feature back?!?! Thanks!
Also, for this review, I assume you are using the RTM build 7600?
willsmith
August 11, 2009 at 7:18pm
Anything but RTM would be labeled a preview. We don't review pre-release software.
There's a ton of other great info in the November issue about other hardware and software that isn't online, and won't be for a month or so. However, it will make it this way eventually.
winmaster
August 12, 2009 at 7:43pm
This article will be the main feature, and all of the news will already have been posted on this site. There's probably another feature on this site that will be in the mag too. And what isn't already on this site will be there within a month of the mag comming out.
You lost my $12 for this year, MaximumPC. Hopefully the ads I never click on will provide you with enough revenue to make up for that.
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The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
knexkid
August 11, 2009 at 7:31pm
Derr...should have thought of that. I guess since the actual retail version isn't available I wasn't really thinking....any hoo how.
