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Post by yeoldecodger on Oct 22, 2009 6:40:19 GMT
Here we are Win 7 and I like it. Been playing with the beta for a while and finally found that this seems to work. Just need a touch screen now. But be careful any post June buyers of new Pcs that were promised that their Vista woud be upgraded free when w7 came out. Especially the people who bought the ACER ASPIRE X3200 quad core mini tower. It seems some machines are not eligible according to the Microsoft free upgrade list. Not what PC World seemed to be telling people, they tell buyers they are entitled. I have come across two so far, but have sugeested they challenge PCWorld and threaten Tradinding standards as being misled by them. I will update you when we`ve been to PCWorld today. Codger
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Post by jojo on Oct 24, 2009 15:46:41 GMT
Sorry to sound as if I'm stuck in a time warp, but in what way will Windows 7 be better than XP?
I understand it has a serious security flaw in the User Account.
I understand it encourages you to save your files, online.
I understand it has touch screen software. Which apart from being rather pointless, would seem to be an extra toy to slow it down.
I also understand that it is based upon Vista. That its architecture is essentially the same. So accessing the file you want will be a major pain.
But more importantly, my software which seems to run perfectly well on XP, might not work!
Then there's the usual problem with every version of Windows that there has ever been. namely, security flaws and bugs which will need to be ironed out.
If I'm missing something can someone, anyone, enlighten me as to why I should even be thinking about it?
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Post by elvisuk on Oct 25, 2009 1:47:10 GMT
I am using the W7 RC version and i also use Linux mint and i think it W7 is the best thing that M$ has got out at the moment now i have never use Vista but i can assure you that it is 100% better than what i have herd about vista .
I understand it has a serious security flaw in the User Account. Not that i no about?
I understand it encourages you to save your files, online. never hear of that before?
I understand it has touch screen software. Which apart from being rather pointless, would seem to be an extra toy to slow it down. never hear of that before?
I also understand that it is based upon Vista. That its architecture is essentially the same. So accessing the file you want will be a major pain. Never had a problem so far
But more importantly, my software which seems to run perfectly well on XP, might not work! i also use XP on my second computer and i have not had a problem so far with 32bit
Then there's the usual problem with every version of Windows that there has ever been. namely, security flaws and bugs which will need to be ironed out. You do get updates for the problems as with XP
If I'm missing something can someone, anyone, enlighten me as to why I should even be thinking about it?
It's fast, reliable and i do like it but not as much as Linux Mint )
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Post by nike on Oct 25, 2009 2:35:06 GMT
It's on again. I remember the same stuff when XP was first released, and again when Vista was released, (it was a fizzer but) now Win 7 is here, the same stuff is hitting the forums.
I've been using Win 7 since the Beta version, through the RC version, and now the RTM version, which I have on two of my computers. I have Win 7 32 bit on my laptop which my wife uses on a daily basis. She loves the program as it's so easy to use, (Her words!) and I have a PC running the 64 bit version of W7.
There have been a few hiccups along the way, but these were reported to M$, and they have been sorted in the RTM version. I quite like the program and later on down the track, I will update my main computer from XP Pro 64bit to Win 7 Ultimate x64 which I have on my backup PC already. Many of the hardware manufacturers have yet to provide drivers for their products, but they are in the minority. TV Tuner/Capture cards are in that category, and that is the main reason for my tardiness in updating my OS. I don't really want to purchase a new card just to get over this problem.
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Post by jojo on Oct 25, 2009 7:58:52 GMT
There may well have been the same stuff when XP was released. problem was, much of it was basically true. XP is good, now, simply because of the enormous number of patches and improvements it has had over the years. I personally stuck with Win98 for some time. I visited CIT regularly, (as we all do of course), to check on the latest problems. From Wikipedia. (So, basically, an advert written by Microsoft). .......... news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10156617-56.htmlCriticism mounting over Windows 7 security news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39611440,00.htm Windows 7 security faces growing criticism
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Post by nike on Oct 25, 2009 10:01:34 GMT
I think you are citing old news Jojo... This is from the first link you supplied and talks in the "Beta" stage of W7...
Microsoft said that latter issue, which still would require malware to make it onto a system, has been fixed in a more recent build of Windows 7 issued internally. That fix is likely to make its way to the public when Microsoft reaches its next public milestone, a so-called "release candidate" build
The RC has been out for some months and many improvements have been made since before the RTM was released. I'll continue using it as I really havn't seen or heard of anyone I know, running the appropriate 3rd party security in the last 10 years, have a computer taken over by a hacker or otherwise.
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Post by jojo on Oct 25, 2009 12:06:03 GMT
Have to agree with your point about malware nike. Seems to be a bit of a scare story really.
Most of those that get it do so either by running scrips from dodgy sites, pronography or pirate software/music/films and such.
A while ago I worte on here about my sister-in-law's computer which had been hijacked by some timeshare site. The stuff was so invasive she couldn't even use it off line. Turns out she let our 13 year old nephew use her compter while he was staying with her. I suggested that he had most likely been looking at pronography. Her reply was, 'Don't be silly, he's only 13!!!!!!
But I'm just a little alarned at the way CIT members especially, seem prepared to jump so quickly onto the Windows 7 bandwaggon, before the inevitable problems have been sorted out.
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Post by elvisuk on Oct 25, 2009 12:31:12 GMT
"But I'm just a little alarmed at the way CIT members especially, seem prepared to jump so quickly onto the Windows 7 bandwagon, before the inevitable problems have been sorted out."
Well i have been using it for a bit now W7rc and i am not intending on buying it for another 12 months when it stops working i may get a copy, but as with XP i whited for a year before getting a copy.
peapole will always go out and buy things when it is the bees knees what ever it is W7, iphones, PSP3, cars or whatever but i like to think that the peapole like me and every one hear at CIT have more sence then to jump on the bandwagon with out asking at CIT first.
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Post by ken on Oct 25, 2009 15:27:26 GMT
The reason I jumped on the bandwagon Elvis, I got a copy from Tescos for 54 quid. I had run it from BETA and knew what was going on. BETA x 64 was fine on The Beast, but RC wouldn't run my graphics cards. As my Acer Aspire laptop works great on RC x 64, I would have put the full version on that if The Beast wouldn't work. I installed it first on a spare hard drive, in my eSATA docking station just to try it and everything worked fine.
A word of warning here:
Anyone trying it out as I did, make sure you take the tick out of the box when you put the Product Key in. Its pre-ticked to catch you out. If you leave it in, it will automatically register as soon as your online. Then if you cant use it and put it on another computer, they will nail you for a second license. You can use your disks on as many computers as you like, but you have to buy a license for every computer.
Micro$oft have ironed out the ATI graphic problem and apart from a few compatibility problems with older software, everything couldn't work better.
I have now reversed things, have installed Win7 on the SSD and put my old XP x 64 installation on the spare SATA drive. Some of my older simulator programs wont work on Win7, but its no hardship to boot into XP x 64 from the docking station if I want to use them. Of course it's my favorites that wont run on Win7 x64.
I'm very happy to say; apart from my sims, its working as good and as fast as XP. MSN have just brought out a new Premium browser, which can be downloaded from the Members Centre. The old browser which MSN members have on their installation disks wont work. I use Office 2003 and that works just fine and Micro$oft have even brought out some extra software for it. This can be downloaded from Windows Optional Updates. Yes I am using the Updates for a change, as its a new product. I am using them selectively and wont install the Defender and that security crap. It interferes with the good stuff that I use.
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Post by ken on Oct 25, 2009 17:33:54 GMT
I just ran the Windows Assessment on the Beast. It wont allow me to use a 16 gig flash drive as Ready Boost as it says my SSD drive is fast enough without it. The Beast is working faster than it did on BETA and as I've said before it wouldn't work on RC. Heres the results I have got of the Windows Assessment, this is without running any overclock on the CPUs and GPUs. Captured using the Snipping Tool for the first time in my life.
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Post by nike on Oct 25, 2009 20:42:56 GMT
It's good to hear that the RTM is working well on the beast Ken. I am finding it to be an excellent OS myself. M$ may just have got this one nailed. There is still some holes to be plugged i'm sure, but a service pack for W7 will fix all of that. There is just so much involved in writing the code etc for an operating system, there just has to be some flaws in it here and there. It's great to see that they have got it as good as it is now.
Elvis, if some of us didn't "jump on the bandwagon" and try these things out, then nobody at CIT would be any the wiser, would they? Members depend on people like us to test these things out so that we can inform them of our findings first hand.
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Post by elvisuk on Oct 26, 2009 1:43:07 GMT
Yes Nike that's what i said i think?
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Post by nike on Oct 26, 2009 2:01:28 GMT
Yup ! You did
By the way, my main computer supplier is selling W7 Home Premium for $105.00AU ... That's £59.38 in pommie pounds, and US$97.17
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Post by elvisuk on Oct 26, 2009 12:42:23 GMT
Thats the best price £59.38 i have seen so far ;D
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Post by evergreen on Oct 26, 2009 15:24:42 GMT
Where do you buy a licence Ken and is it cheaper than buying a copy of the software at, say, Tesco which seems the cheapest at the moment.
Brian
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Post by millwall on Oct 26, 2009 15:56:41 GMT
Pc world were doing Windows 7 upgrade for £58 two days ago and it seems to be £69.95 now
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Post by jojo on Oct 26, 2009 20:13:38 GMT
I'm begining to feel like a minority here.
I just like to be sure something is going to work.
I'm sure Windows 7 is the best thing to happen to computers since.......electricity.
But I need my computer too much to risk fixing something that isn't actually broken yet. (I lost my last computer when I tried out Linux).
I am however, dancing with glee on the knoweldge that so many of my fellow CIT members are pleased with Windows 7.
When I know for certain that all of my software will work on it, then I'll rush to the nearest store and buy a copy of Windows 7.
Until then, I'll try to eagerly follow the reports and exploits of my wiser and braver fellows.
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Post by nike on Oct 26, 2009 20:53:04 GMT
Jojo, why not just purchase another hard drive, remove the one that you have XP on now, and insert the new one. Load W7 on it, and then try loading all your other programs on it one by one, to make sure they are going to work with W7. If they do, then your problem with W7 is over. Continue using it 'cos i'm sure you will find, like many of us, it's a worthy replacement for XP. If you don't like it, it's a simple matter to reinsert the old drive with XP back into the computer.
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Post by evergreen on Oct 26, 2009 23:00:19 GMT
Where do you buy a licence Ken and is it cheaper than buying a copy of the software at, say, Tesco which seems the cheapest at the moment. Brian I'm going away for a few days tomorrow morning; back on Friday night.
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Post by ken on Oct 27, 2009 17:17:06 GMT
Knowing Microsoft, it will probably be cheaper to buy another copy from Tescos Brian. The probably just give you a new number to put in and activate the new install, ( once you have paid for the license ) then send you an OEM copy. As its illegal to make copies of the disk, you would need another copy if you sell the computer. By sending you an OEM copy, they are justifying the extra expense.
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Post by jojo on Oct 29, 2009 18:17:11 GMT
Jojo, why not just purchase another hard drive, remove the one that you have XP on now, and insert the new one. Load W7 on it, and then try loading all your other programs on it one by one, to make sure they are going to work with W7. If they do, then your problem with W7 is over. Continue using it 'cos i'm sure you will find, like many of us, it's a worthy replacement for XP. If you don't like it, it's a simple matter to reinsert the old drive with XP back into the computer. Probably good advice Nike. I'm certainly not trying to bad mouth Windows 7 or say anything against it. I don't really know anything about it. I've naturally heard a few bad things. These have been dismissed, mostly on here. It is, no doubt, a wonderful OS. I look forward to using it, eventually. I just wanted to know if there is any particular reason why I should change now? Is there anything so good about it that the effort of changing is so worth it? Does it run faster? What exactly does it do that has so many dancing?
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Post by ken on Oct 29, 2009 19:19:22 GMT
Anyone using Vista would be mad not to change Jojo. It boots much faster than XP and the 64 bit version is faster than XP x 64. Flash has always been a problem with a 64 bit system, with Win7 they seem to have addressed this and Flash works much better although only on a 32 bit browser. Thats an Adobe problem, not Micro$oft. Gone are the days of having to find the right drivers, it finds just about all of them. Only ATI advanced drivers need to be put in to gain control of the GPU cooling, but Win7 will set up the graphics even on multi desktops. It seems to multi-task without bogging itself down. This was the problem with Vista, it wasn't capable of running itself and have enough resources left over for real work. Some of my older sims wont work on it, but I'm going to try running them on a virtual machine. You have to run Ultimate or Enterprise to run Windows XP VM though.
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Post by jojo on Oct 29, 2009 20:54:00 GMT
Thank you Ken. An answer at last.
I'm using XP home and from your description there doesn't seem to be any urgency to change at this time. The faster booting is attractive, but to be honest, I've gotten into the habit of doing something else while the machiene boots anyway. A habit I adopted from the days of DOS, which could take 20 minutes to load, sometimes.
Bit disappointed that I can't emulate XP without having one of the more expensive versions.
But, that's Microsoft for you. C'est la vie.
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Post by ken on Oct 29, 2009 21:57:57 GMT
I'm not sure if you can run a virtual machine on the lesser versions Jojo. Its the XP enviroment VM that needs the expensive versions. I have run the ordinary Windows VM on XP Home and installed Windows 98 on it, so that might work on Win7 Home. Its not a very big download, whereas the XP VM is about half a gig.
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Post by mikkh on Oct 29, 2009 23:47:51 GMT
Virtualbox is (and always was) free and weighs in at 69 MB www.virtualbox.org/wiki/DownloadsYou can install anything from 98 up to 7 itself on it - if you wanted to. And Linux, BSD or Solaris can be installed too I assume the massive size of the Microsoft software is because it comes complete with a ready to run version of XP? It must be heavily crippled, or very well packed to fit in 500 MB though. Having used VMware, Microsoft Virtual PC and Virtualbox before, I'd definitely go with the latter. It does everything the others do without the high price of VMware, or the restrictions Microsoft impose on you VMware and Virtualbox both have Linux versions too, so I can run Windows inside Linux should I so desire. Obviously M$ Virtual PC only runs in Windows.
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Post by ken on Oct 30, 2009 0:51:02 GMT
I dont think it contains XP as such. They just say it contains an XP x 86 environment, to run software that wont run on Win7 x 64. I just checked my download and it is 469Mb, which is a hell of a lot bigger than even Windows VM which is 30.41Mb
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Post by evergreen on Nov 1, 2009 11:32:10 GMT
Many thanks Ken. I think I will wait a bit and see how my wife gets on with Windows 7. I managge OK with Vista for what I want despite all the criticism it has attracted.
Brian.
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Post by ken on Nov 1, 2009 16:08:49 GMT
Your welcome Brian. If you can manage to use Vista, you will love Win7; it works in the same fashion, but it works properly. They have increased the oil flow, so it doesn't burn itself out just to tick over.
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Post by nike on Nov 1, 2009 20:48:11 GMT
I have just purchased a job lot of Laptops (5). These have an Intel Centrino 1.5ghz processor, 512mb of DDR SODIMM ram, 60gig hard drive with a DVD burner. Not the highest spec machine, right?
I have loaded Win 7 Home premium on two of them and didn't need to source any drivers for the onboards, they all worked straight up including the WiFi, although the generic video driver doesn't like Aero, so some of the screen savers like "Bubbles" won't work. If I can find a better driver for the graphics chipset, then that may help.
These machines run W7 suprisingly well, and no slower than the ones I have loaded XP Home on, so anyone with qualms about running W7 on a low spec machine, this will give you an idea of what it will run on. I plan to upgrade the ram in the ones I have put W7 on, just to make them that little bit better.
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Post by ken on Nov 1, 2009 23:25:47 GMT
I have hit a snag with Ultimate Kev.
I said in reply 8 that the new MSN Premium software from the Members Centre works fine on Home Premium. I cant get it to install on Ultimate, as it keeps trying to dial out. The Beast has never been fitted with a modem and I have disabled all the Services for devices not fitted. The default connection is through the Belkin G router and everything else is working fine. I have written to MSN for a solution, but have not heard back yet.
Don't be tempted to install the _n_ versions.
I tried Enterprise_n_ thinking I didn't need all the Windows media stuff. You lose a lot of functionality in the OS, which a 3rd party media player doesn't replace. Its not worth saving a couple of hundred Mbs of space. If you don't want to use the media, just shut it off in Add & Remove, Windows Components. The OS will retain the files that are needed.
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