sleepingdragon
December 29th, 2008, 04:30 AM
OK. We've all heard the hype of 7 being faster, lighter and even more better than Vista (an easy claim to make). Well, I decided to give it a try and managed to lay my hands on build 7000. I'm using VirtualBox for installation - all the usual odds and ends are configured (net, audio, drives, Guest Additions) as well as a mere 512Mb of RAM and a 30Gb virtual drive allocation.
Let's see if 7 is as light as they're promising...
To allow the casual reader to get to the basics, I'll do the Pros and Cons first, then go back over each one in further detail.
PROS
It's fast.
Memory usage is greatly improved over Vista
Installation is friendly
UAC has been tweaked to be a little more sensible
Initial configuration is useable
Stable (as far as I can tell)
CONS
The desktop is terrible
It's still using a lot of RAM (but not as much as Vista)
Security software (i.e., anti-virus) is still needed
Customisation is still lacking
Start then with the PROS
It's Fast.
Yep, no doubt about that. Without any other apps loading at boot, it will easily do it in 30 seconds. Win 7 seems to aim for the desktop as quickly as possible, then loads other services in afterwards. This isn't a bad thing, but it does skew the times a little when comparing it to the time taken to load a fully-running desktop.
By comparison, I also did a Hardy clean install for comparison in Virtualbox. 7 gets to the desktop quicker (28 secs compared to Hardys' 42), but Hardy loads all of it services in more quickly. For the casual user, 7 appears to win it, but 7 remains sluggish until everything is loaded in, and that can take over a minute. Overall it's a big improvement over Vista and the dev team should be rightly congratulated on it.
Memory usage is greatly improved.
Again, another winner here, but still no top prize. I had 7 running in 315Mb of RAM with no other services. That's quite acceptable, but as we all know, Ubuntu can go far lower. I was, or course, testing a beta. I'm sure MS can drop a few more Mb from that figure, but then again, they haven't added their usual amount of bloat to it - yet. Still, it's better than Vista and there certainly are some improvements. RAM is freed up in a much more prompt manner, and runaway processes are kept in check very well.
Installation is friendly.
Installation was actually rather easy. Just the usual questions about language, username, drive usage, etc., and it all went rather well. It took about 30 minutes - very quick. There's not more I can say about it really, you don't get a lot of info on-screen, but the options were easy to figure out.
UAC is more useable
UAC has backed off a little - thankfully. It can also be modified from never showing up at all right through to "Ask Permissions for absolutely every damn thing they do". Nice to see MS actually listening to their users for once.
Initial configuration is useable
The firewall is set, the desktop is clean, IE is just a click away. Overall, the initial foray into the 7 desktop isn't a nightmare - they've kept it quite minimal and friendly.
It's stable.
For a beta, it's very polished. I have yet to receive one error message, problems are handled gracefully. Intrepid looks bad compared to 7. Hell, even I had to go back to Hardy after the games I had in Intrepid. I used to consider Windows as non-competition; now, I'm not so sure. MS have certainly upped their game. Good stuff, competition is healthy.
Now, for the CONS
The desktop is terrible
Despite the underlying technical merits of 7, the desktop still sucks. There will no doubt be a few more tweaks to it before the RTM version, but if you have *fond* memories of the Fisher Price colour scheme that was bestowed upon XP, then you're going to *love* this. It's still gaudy, the colour palette options to get you away from the default colours are no better, and if there was a way to polish a turd, then MS have found it. Well Done.
Beyond the colour scheme, it gets no better. Options are hidden until you deliberately ask for them (not always a bad thing, but it makes setting up much more frustrating). Windows have a nasty habit of appearing directly behind the focused window - you're trying to set up software and the little info window isn't showing, until you move windows around. Hopefully that's a bug that will be corrected before someone pitches their monitor out of a third-floor window. IT'S REALLY ANNOYING - STOP IT.
If you're used to Vista then the menus are really no different - just faster. You can't find anything, moving things around is something close to stupid and overall you feel isolated from what you're really trying to do. Here's a tip to the MS devs: stop trying to take over the actions of the user. Let them get on with it and provide options in the menus, just like you used to do.
It's still using a lot of RAM
Better than Vista, but 315Mb of RAM trying to look pretty (and without Aero) is a little excessive. When I put AVG on there, this went up to 357Mb. Ouch. Compare that to this machine. I'm typing now in FF3, I also have a text file up and all my services running (including Compiz) - all in 210Mb. 7 could do a lot better, but at least the values are somewhat more realistic than Vista.
Security software is still needed
That same old problem is back. As soon as 7 was installed, I was promptly asked to activate Windows Defender and was also prompted to look online for a compatible anti-virus. The Windows Marketplace for vendors isn't ready yet, so I went ahead and installed AVG (free edition)... 50Mb of download for a damn AV. Disgusting, it really is. AVGs only saving grace was that it installed nicely and worked from the word go - no reset required. So, 7 has already gone through a spyware scan and an AV scan before I can get working - such fond memories... and so the bloat begins.
Customisation is still lacking
You get a choice of folder colours - wallpaper changes are a given (of course). That's it. Oh, you can change the taskbar size... WOW. MS are still getting to grips with this customisation stuff. Perhaps they've come to realise that people like to layout their desktops according to THEIR needs, not to the ideas laid out by MS. They'll get it right one day.
Overall, I'm going to give MS 70% on this. Under the hood there's some really good performance improvements, but the user experience is still terrible.
Just as a few additional extras, here's some weird stuff.
DVDMaker refused to run because there was no DirectX compatible graphics card. I can only assume they wanted to use the GPU to improve video rendering times. Simple games like Solitaire ran like mud for the same reason, it required advanced GPU toys to move the cards (WTF?), the problem was so bad that a simple card game was actually unplayable.
When 7 is loading, there's a glowing icon in the middle of the screen. It's basically the four-colour MS flag with a wobbly aura. Kind of reminds me of the Colorfire screensaver, but more subtle. That is not a good thing to look at/focus on at 3am. It hurts - MS, please stop it. It's actually hard to focus on the damn thing.
Let's see if 7 is as light as they're promising...
To allow the casual reader to get to the basics, I'll do the Pros and Cons first, then go back over each one in further detail.
PROS
It's fast.
Memory usage is greatly improved over Vista
Installation is friendly
UAC has been tweaked to be a little more sensible
Initial configuration is useable
Stable (as far as I can tell)
CONS
The desktop is terrible
It's still using a lot of RAM (but not as much as Vista)
Security software (i.e., anti-virus) is still needed
Customisation is still lacking
Start then with the PROS
It's Fast.
Yep, no doubt about that. Without any other apps loading at boot, it will easily do it in 30 seconds. Win 7 seems to aim for the desktop as quickly as possible, then loads other services in afterwards. This isn't a bad thing, but it does skew the times a little when comparing it to the time taken to load a fully-running desktop.
By comparison, I also did a Hardy clean install for comparison in Virtualbox. 7 gets to the desktop quicker (28 secs compared to Hardys' 42), but Hardy loads all of it services in more quickly. For the casual user, 7 appears to win it, but 7 remains sluggish until everything is loaded in, and that can take over a minute. Overall it's a big improvement over Vista and the dev team should be rightly congratulated on it.
Memory usage is greatly improved.
Again, another winner here, but still no top prize. I had 7 running in 315Mb of RAM with no other services. That's quite acceptable, but as we all know, Ubuntu can go far lower. I was, or course, testing a beta. I'm sure MS can drop a few more Mb from that figure, but then again, they haven't added their usual amount of bloat to it - yet. Still, it's better than Vista and there certainly are some improvements. RAM is freed up in a much more prompt manner, and runaway processes are kept in check very well.
Installation is friendly.
Installation was actually rather easy. Just the usual questions about language, username, drive usage, etc., and it all went rather well. It took about 30 minutes - very quick. There's not more I can say about it really, you don't get a lot of info on-screen, but the options were easy to figure out.
UAC is more useable
UAC has backed off a little - thankfully. It can also be modified from never showing up at all right through to "Ask Permissions for absolutely every damn thing they do". Nice to see MS actually listening to their users for once.
Initial configuration is useable
The firewall is set, the desktop is clean, IE is just a click away. Overall, the initial foray into the 7 desktop isn't a nightmare - they've kept it quite minimal and friendly.
It's stable.
For a beta, it's very polished. I have yet to receive one error message, problems are handled gracefully. Intrepid looks bad compared to 7. Hell, even I had to go back to Hardy after the games I had in Intrepid. I used to consider Windows as non-competition; now, I'm not so sure. MS have certainly upped their game. Good stuff, competition is healthy.
Now, for the CONS
The desktop is terrible
Despite the underlying technical merits of 7, the desktop still sucks. There will no doubt be a few more tweaks to it before the RTM version, but if you have *fond* memories of the Fisher Price colour scheme that was bestowed upon XP, then you're going to *love* this. It's still gaudy, the colour palette options to get you away from the default colours are no better, and if there was a way to polish a turd, then MS have found it. Well Done.
Beyond the colour scheme, it gets no better. Options are hidden until you deliberately ask for them (not always a bad thing, but it makes setting up much more frustrating). Windows have a nasty habit of appearing directly behind the focused window - you're trying to set up software and the little info window isn't showing, until you move windows around. Hopefully that's a bug that will be corrected before someone pitches their monitor out of a third-floor window. IT'S REALLY ANNOYING - STOP IT.
If you're used to Vista then the menus are really no different - just faster. You can't find anything, moving things around is something close to stupid and overall you feel isolated from what you're really trying to do. Here's a tip to the MS devs: stop trying to take over the actions of the user. Let them get on with it and provide options in the menus, just like you used to do.
It's still using a lot of RAM
Better than Vista, but 315Mb of RAM trying to look pretty (and without Aero) is a little excessive. When I put AVG on there, this went up to 357Mb. Ouch. Compare that to this machine. I'm typing now in FF3, I also have a text file up and all my services running (including Compiz) - all in 210Mb. 7 could do a lot better, but at least the values are somewhat more realistic than Vista.
Security software is still needed
That same old problem is back. As soon as 7 was installed, I was promptly asked to activate Windows Defender and was also prompted to look online for a compatible anti-virus. The Windows Marketplace for vendors isn't ready yet, so I went ahead and installed AVG (free edition)... 50Mb of download for a damn AV. Disgusting, it really is. AVGs only saving grace was that it installed nicely and worked from the word go - no reset required. So, 7 has already gone through a spyware scan and an AV scan before I can get working - such fond memories... and so the bloat begins.
Customisation is still lacking
You get a choice of folder colours - wallpaper changes are a given (of course). That's it. Oh, you can change the taskbar size... WOW. MS are still getting to grips with this customisation stuff. Perhaps they've come to realise that people like to layout their desktops according to THEIR needs, not to the ideas laid out by MS. They'll get it right one day.
Overall, I'm going to give MS 70% on this. Under the hood there's some really good performance improvements, but the user experience is still terrible.
Just as a few additional extras, here's some weird stuff.
DVDMaker refused to run because there was no DirectX compatible graphics card. I can only assume they wanted to use the GPU to improve video rendering times. Simple games like Solitaire ran like mud for the same reason, it required advanced GPU toys to move the cards (WTF?), the problem was so bad that a simple card game was actually unplayable.
When 7 is loading, there's a glowing icon in the middle of the screen. It's basically the four-colour MS flag with a wobbly aura. Kind of reminds me of the Colorfire screensaver, but more subtle. That is not a good thing to look at/focus on at 3am. It hurts - MS, please stop it. It's actually hard to focus on the damn thing.