Windows Vista

Squawk Box January 16: Windows 7 Beta

by alec on January 16, 2009

It had been seven days since the Windows 7 beta was released so it seemed fitting that we talk about it. Last Friday morning we discussed Windows 7, people’s experience with it, and the controversies surrounding it.

Several people on the call were running Windows 7, on a variety of platforms ranging from netbooks to Mac’s and various Windows machines.  We talked about various aspects of the experience, including the Device Stage. The consensus was that the OS was fast, lighter-weight than Windows Vista, and stable. 

We also discussed a few of the controversies:

  • What does Windows 7 mean for Ubuntu?
  • Should Microsoft have used BitTorrent to manage the download?
  • What will Microsoft do with Windows 7 and the burgeoning netbook market?

On the Calliflower Conference Call: Jonathan Greene, Jonathan Jensen, Jim Courtney, Frank Abrams, Mike Pruyn, Dan York, Maxim, Sergio Meinardi, Jeb Brilliant, Rob Enderle, Dave Michels, and Chuck Willemsen.

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Windows Experience Index: Vista vs. 7

by alec on January 11, 2009

One of the claims that Microsoft makes about Windows 7 is that it performs better than Windows Vista.  Riddle me this, then…  why does the Windows 7 Experience Index for the same PC differ so radically under the different operating systems?  The following images were snapped on the same hardware, but booted with either operating system.

These are the Windows 7 scores.

image

These are the Windows Vista scores.

image

Windows 7 rates the processor and memory higher than Windows Vista, but the 3D performance and hard disk transfer rate lower. 

It’s a mystery. 

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Windows 7. The Vista “dot” release

January 11, 2009

At 6:00 AM yesterday morning I started downloading the Windows 7 x64 release. By 9:30 AM I was installing it.  Yes, I admit it, I’m a keener. I’ve used every Windows beta since Windows 3.1 in 1992, and I still find it a thrill to be on the bleeding edge of new technologies.  I also [...]

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Windows 7: That Ol’ Black Magic?

January 9, 2009

One of the monitors on my desk at the office has been logged in, via remote desktop, to my home PC all day long.  Why?  Well, at home we have a nice fat internet pipe, and I’ve been waiting for my chance to download the Windows 7 beta.  Unfortunately, Microsoft appears to have been caught [...]

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Squawk Box June 6

June 6, 2008

* AT&T’s release yesterday of their NetReach bundle. Starting at $79.95 per month it gives you residential DSL, WiFi access at 17,000 US hotspots, and 3G data access. Competitively priced, apparently, but a game changer? Maybe not.
* Paul McGuiness, manager of U2, blames ISPs, handset manufacturers, and pretty much the whole world for the destruction of the music industry… this in a year when U2 made $355 million touring. We agree that he lives in an irony free zone.
* Verizons acquisition of Alltel for $27 billion!
* Jerry Yang and Carl ICahn? ICahn has been railing against Yahoo’s board, and publicly said that Yang is done if ICahn gets his way. We’re not very sympathetic to Yang’s plight.
* Windows XP gets rescued again… for some classes of device. Is the mantle of “cockroach OS” passing from DOS finally? Most on the call are still running XP, and many see themselves switching to a Mac when it comes time to upgrade. Ouch!
* Time Warner’s metered internet use trial. Om Malik says it’s the thin edge of the wedge. Calculations showed that the metered bandwidth was just enough to provide a non-compelling video experience. The call was full of Canadians who observed that we already have metered bandwidth usage in this country.
* And for grins, we did a roundup of the latest iPhone rumours including the infamous box shot from Australia…

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Running out of memory

April 23, 2008

You’ve all heard about the rig I’ve got at home now.  Quad-core pentium, dual monitors, big disk, and so on.  Well, I’m upset.  I’m running out of memory.  Windows keeps telling me to shut down apps. Why?  Windows Vista 32 bit.  It has a cap of 3G of memory.  Actually, it’s 4G, but that includes [...]

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Egg anyone?

September 9, 2007

I've got a bit of egg on my face today.  August 29th I wrote to Microsoft about Windows Vista quality.  I made some strong statements about my views on Windows Vista quality, and, it turns out that I was wrong. The problems I had with Vista were caused by a faulty 1 Gig stick of RAM.  When I pulled [...]

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Windows Vista SP1 and Quality, revisited

August 30, 2007

Coincident with my note to Microsoft about Windows Vista quality yesterday, Microsoft let it be known that Vista SP1 would be going into beta in a couple of weeks, and surprise surprise, a substantial focus is on quality.  Following the email I sent, two Microsoft senior execs responded yesterday — Steven Sinofsky who runs with the Windows [...]

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IMSafer Parental Controls Wizard

February 11, 2007

It’s a “trimming the inbox” Sunday around here.  I’ve just blasted through some 500 odd emails that have been languishing in my inbox.  In the better late than never category… amongst those mails was a note from my pal Brandon Watson about the Windows Vista support he and his team have built into their IMSafer [...]

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Will the real Windows Vista requirements please stand up

December 10, 2006

What are all the fashionable press people writing about for the launch of any new Microsoft OS?  The stories debunking Microsoft’s system requirements are de rigueur, of course.  BetaNews takes a poke at Microsoft’s claims yesterday, quoting from a whitepaper by analyst firm iSuppli.  Microsoft’s claims are a little ludicrous, which makes them an easy [...]

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