Anyone else tried Windows 7 ...?

[MichaelSM]

I've given it a one week trial (Windows 7 Ultimate RC) and it's awful, really AWFUL.
I gave it its own hd so's there wouldn't be any conflicts with other partitions.

My computer is pretty old as in Celeron 1.8 and 1.25g RAM so not much to skite about but that's way good enough for my 8.10 plus Virtualbox with XP.

Windows 7 can't detect my SBLive pci sound card, so I'm stuck with a Logitech USB headset which is OK up to a point, but every time I unplug it then plug it in again, W7 makes a point of re-downloading its drivers!

Skype won't work.

There's no Office suite on the 2.4 gig dvd! (a bit like Debian) so it's AbiWord just to read documents.

And it's so SLOW to load browsers - up to a minute - before a box pops up asking for IE8/Opera to be default browser. Gimme a BREAK!

To be fair; my so-called 'broadband' at home is pretty slow. I have W7 as a dual-boot on a Macbook which when I'm at work is much faster with browsers on that network.

But here at home, all applications load very fast on 8.10.

So why am I preaching to the converted?

Well; four years ago I ditched XP because it was detected as a pirated install, and I had zero interest in paying money for an OS if free ones were available. Ring any bells out there?

Since then, after trying a zillion Linux distros, Ubuntu is by far the best. One by one, they fail at certain points here and there which becomes utterly frustrating.

So why did I bother with Windows 7?

Easy. Rather than slanging off at MS, I thought that it was a good idea to compare their latest RC with Ubuntu and my experiences with other distros.

W7 fails in every category. It makes XP look marvellous!

Oh yes. W7 detected my Netgear USB adaptor ..WOW .

If W7 were a Linux distro, I wouldn't have given it more than a couple of nights to test it then chop it. But, because it's MS's latest release - which is BIG news in the IT world (squillions of dollars of investment after all) - I fiddled with it for a week. And gave up....

Let alone the thought of actually having to PAY for it in October!

So, many thanks to Ubuntu's developers whom through feedback from gentle users like me have built an OS which meets most of the requirements of a PC owner.

When Microsoft eventually collapses, it won't be due to undermining by Linux distros. It will be the result of perpetuating a business model which - like GM and Chrysler - failed to deliver a reliable product at a fair price.

What was once a locked-in scenario has had to compete with leaner and cheaper alternatives. Measured only in months, not years, virtualisation has taken off.

And when it comes down to it; why pay a lot of money for a dodgy product when a free and better alternative is available?

Michael.

[dark_prince]

Yep! I tried that on my brother's Athlon 64 2.0 GHz with 1 gig ram. Its crap even more crappy than vista. We are still using windows XP (my brother and me on my PIII :P)

Slow as hell and ram eating OSs are Vista and Win 7 variants

[Bölvaður]

(this thread should have been created in the community cafe subforum)

There has been mixed views on this release candidate, some peole love it as it sucks less than their previous releases. Some dislike it as it isn't that much improvement and is still unusable to people that aren't really in the windows world.


Windows 7 can't detect my SBLive pci sound card, so I'm stuck with a Logitech USB headset which is OK up to a point, but every time I unplug it then plug it in again, W7 makes a point of re-downloading its drivers!

Let me guess.. in ubuntu you use pulse device detector to use the usb headset and sound blaster card for different applications (rythmbox → soundblaster, openArena → usb headset, skype → usb headset)

I had similar problem in xp with the found new hardware... except that I either could have usb headset or built in soundcard, only one driver... only 1 device... very bad fail.

[powel212]

One great thing about windows 7...

I administer all of the computers at work and the average computer user is very habitual about computer use. They get used to doing things one way and have a great deal of trouble changing their ways.

So.. I have a hard time getting them use the Linux that is installed on each and every machine at work but only as a secondary boot option.

So this is where win 7 is great...

People hate change but eventually Microsoft will make it impossible to run XP so people will have to buy the new win7... At this point all of the people I work with will have to change their habits but...

I will guide them to make the change to Ubuntu instead of Win7. After all if you have to change your habits you might as well use an operating system that actually does what you want.

Powel

[philinux]

I'm running it in virtualbox. Does not seem to offer any improvement over vista.Better boot to logon time but same drag waiting to be able to use desktop.

Reason I'm using it:-

Waiting for moonlight to work on ITV.com catchup service which uses silverlight. :p

[growled]

I haven't tried it yet but I really don't expect too much out of it. I sort of like Vista and I hear that 7 is Vista improved, so I will probably like 7.I doubt if they will come close to Kubuntu, though. Kubuntu is just down right awesome.

One thing about Vista (and to a lesser extent 7) is it runs best on newer hardware. It might run decent on an old box but it will run great if you have a decent computer.

[PumaSpeedCat]

I am running Win7 on a spare tower I have lying around, the specs.

Intel Celeron D : 3.0 Ghz
Mem: 4 Gb
HD: 100Gb
DVD/CD (+- RW, Dual Layer): LiteOn

So far all is good....but I still agree with many of the users here in this topic, Ubuntu is still by far the best, both in user-ability, and speed!



Yes, Win7 boots fast, (as promised), but still seems sluggish in other ways. If they would have only switched over to WinFS (which should have been in Vista, but rush rush was topic) their OS could have been at least a close comparable to Ubuntu in speed.

So with that said, I still say Ubuntu is Excellent!

-- I run Ubuntu on a Dual Boot on my lappy, Vista/Ubuntu.

The ONLY thing bad I have to say about Ubuntu is the 64-bit. My lappy is an AMD 64-bit Dual Core processor, and 64-bit Ubuntu doesn't detect it as being a 64 bit processor, so I run Ubuntu 32-bit.

Other than that, Ubuntu kicks M$ butt out of the water...(only having to use M$ for the past ??? years...since Win 3.1)

Thanx for letting me speak my piece! :D

[Mark Phelps]

Yes .. have been using it since the early beta days ...

It's going to be a hit with the Vista crowd because it's quite an improvement to Vista -- and I say that from personal experience, not based on "reviews" from others. I've run it on three different Vista machines and in all cases, it was a significant performance improvement over Vista. Same hardare. Same apps. Loads in under 10 seconds (login-to-working-desktop) when Vista takes a minute or more to do the same. All the Vista drivers and hardware work just fine. All the Vista apps work just fine without any upgrades needed.

It may fare better with the WinXP crowd because it performs a lot better on older, less powerful, slower machines than does Vista. Installed it as a test on an older 1.6GHz Celeron (that's right -- Celeron!) 768K machine, and not only does it load and run faster than XP (on the same machine), after one round of Windows Update, it found and installed all the needed drivers for my 8-year-old hardware! Plus, it offers various "compatibility" modes for installing older drivers. My XP drivers work just fine with Seven on that box.

It's going to be more of the same <fill-in-the-MS-Windows-OS-Name>SUCKS comments from everyone else.

[linuxgeek123]

i tried downloading 7 (it took me 2 weeks) and when i finished the file was corrupt so **** windows

[LowSky]

Personally I think it isn't that bad. I kinda like it.

Now compared to most of the others who posted I'm using a much newer/faster machine. AMD Phenom 9950, w/ 4 GB of RAM, 74 MB WD Raptor, etc.

Installing, Ubuntu, but Microsoft has made installaiton much easier than it has been, I will admit.

Startup time, go to Ubuntu 9.04 using EXT4

Installing applications, tie: Windows will run anything I ask it to as most applicaitons use Windows, Ubuntu has apt-get which makes installation/removal easier. I used applicaiton that both OSes have verison of so the comparison is right on.

Loading applications, tie: Both seem to be the same, Windows does have the annoying thing sometimes of asking me if I want an applicaiotn to do a certain thing that access a file or the internet, but one click it usually never comes back, except for bittorrent. Ubuntu has odd flash issues here and there, and some applicaitions have fuzzy support for linux, I use 64bit OSes and sopmetimes 32 applicaiont don't want to play nice in Ubuntu, Windows does seem to suffer form this..yet.

Networking, tough but goes to Ubuntu, windows does have the advantage of letting me network my files better and lets me run them off my PS3 as a frontend, Ubuntu requires Samba and MediaTomb to do the same, and to be honest both are annoying to set up. Windows has an issue with disconnects, it takes forever for the connection to come up and sometimes you need to reconfigure it to do so.

Driver Support, Windows... everything works out of the box, including my TV tuner card, which as of this weekend I just got working on MYthTV for Ubuntu. The Linux driver is so new I was the one who made a tutorial for MythTV users on this Forum. >sarcasm on< YAY ME! >sarcasm off...<

Use as a media center, right now for me its Windows. As great as MythTV can be, configuring it is a pain in the rear. Windows was nothing more than point and click. Sure Windows uses its own DRM to encode TV that I record, but for now I don't mind. MythTV doesn't look as polished, perosnally MythTV needs to look at what the people behind Boxee have done, their interface is stunning in comparison.

Last but certainly not least.

Windows 7 doesn't give me a boot up error when my printer is turned during boot.
Also Windows can write a 1GB file to a Flash drive without stuttering or failing, Ubuntu has given me nothing but pains for both.

So when it comes to doing things like web surfing and day to day I love Ubuntu, for Media Center I like Windows 7. So maybe its time for me to build a new box for my media center.

[MysticGold04]

Yes, I've tried it however, my Intel network card is not recognized, so I haven't done much with it except install it. It looks just like Vista from a fresh install. It also took me almost 2 days to get the .iso file when I initially downloaded it.

My wife's and daughters laptops are both Vista and seem to run fine at this point. I will not buy Win 7 to upgrade them with, unless I can get it for free. I have a Vista partition on my laptop that is running Ubuntu 9.04 that I boot into on occasion, install updates, etc.

[qjmoss]

i tried downloading 7 (it took me 2 weeks) and when i finished the file was corrupt so **** windows

"**** windows"


Where in the world have you come up with the idea that because your file is corrupt, it's..windows fault

[Skripka]

i tried downloading 7 (it took me 2 weeks) and when i finished the file was corrupt so **** windows

I downloaded it. It took 6 hours at a stable 150 KB/sec. Install took 30 minutes to a 5400 speed drive. Win7 works like a charm.


Why is it windows' fault you had a corrupt file???? Jeebus.

[Greenwidth]

It seems like Vista with a decent service pack to me..

[Twitch6000]

I tried windows 7 rc home for about a week myself.

It was just to bloated and such for my liking.

So I will be sticking to Windows Xp and GNU/Linux :).

[Skripka]

I tried windows 7 rc home for about a week myself.

It was just to bloated and such for my liking.

So I will be sticking to Windows Xp and GNU/Linux :).

Wierd, Win7 is FAR faster than XP here. FAR faster-even with XP on a 7200 speed drive and Win7 on a 5400 speed HDD.

[Keithhed]

I grabbed a copy, tried it. Meh. Its still windows. I'll stick with Linux.

[cmat]

It seems like Vista with a decent service pack to me..

Vista was the new coke and 7 is bringing back classic. There are a few performance tweaks here and their but it's not really exciting. It feels like Microsoft made W7 out of necessity to compete on the netbook stage.

In typical Microsoft fashion will we see any improvements made in W7 appear in Vista in later patches? Doubt it. Heck, Time announced Windows Vista one of the biggest technological blunders of the last decade.

[rob2uk]

Time announce Windows Vista one of the biggest technological blunders of the last decade.

Second only to Windows ME

[Swarms]

Wow thread full of bias, and I am talking to:

The people who try to run it on antique computers.
The people who download it on antique internet connections and are surprised it is slow.'
[x]The people who just takes a quick glance at it and believe that they now know everything.

MichaelSM, you are perfectly able to use applications like OpenOffice and Abiword, so quit complaining.

[LowSky]

Wierd, Win7 is FAR faster than XP here. FAR faster-even with XP on a 7200 speed drive and Win7 on a 5400 speed HDD.

I dont know about Twitch6000 compalianing about performance or bloat (what bloat?), but you have to remember that XP wasn't designed to run on multicore chips, while windows 7 is. So XP may actually run better on an older machine while the newer one that can use the newer technologies like multicore chips to effectivly run faster.

[rob2uk]

Jeebus, it's an RC.

Final release is over a year away.

A lot of things can and will change before then.

So far W7 is looking good - each build has improved on something - but Ubuntu is still my OS of choice.

I'd like to reserve final judgment for the finished product, but I'm not going to spend that much money on something that I may only use for a month, and it'll probably be a while before I get to have a play with it on a customer's machine

[Yashiro]

It runs well on XP era machines.
Video and Audio is way ahead of Linux as usual. The desktop compositor is alot smoother too.
The new taskbar is interesting and the extra window gestures are useful.

There's no performance based reason to avoid it like so many avoided Vista.

[LowSky]

It runs well on XP era machines.
Video and Audio is way ahead of Linux as usual. The desktop compositor is alot smoother too.
The new taskbar is interesting and the extra window gestures are useful.

There's no performance based reason to avoid it like so many avoided Vista.

I agree with you on everything but the audio. For whatever reason my front audio ports do not work at all in Windows 7, while in Ubuntu they work with no issue.

[ryno519]

I really like the task bar on Windows 7.

[.Maleficus.]

wow thread full of bias, and i am talking to:

the people who try to run it on antique computers.
the people who download it on antique internet connections and are surprised it is slow.'
[x]the people who just takes a quick glance at it and believe that they now know everything.

michaelsm, you are perfectly able to use applications like openoffice and abiword, so quit complaining.
+ >9000.


Edit: Did the board just remove all of the capital letters from my quote?! WTF...?

[travis.cthall]

On my system Windows 7 is really fast, nice and responsive...
Something that hasn't came our way from Redmond since 95...

[Twitch6000]

I dont know about Twitch6000 compalianing about performance or bloat (what bloat?), but you have to remember that XP wasn't designed to run on multicore chips, while windows 7 is. So XP may actually run better on an older machine while the newer one that can use the newer technologies like multicore chips to effectivly run faster.

Well the bloat I am talking about is aero,all the eye candy stuff,and uac... sorry I still hate that thing lol...

Windows Xp for me leastwise runs faster of course I do have a more up to date driver for nvidia on it aswell.

I am not one for fancy effects and such thats why even on linux, I just use metacity with composting instead of using compiz...

I wouldn't even use that if it wasn't for my love of docks.

I can say though vista users will love windows 7.

[fatality_uk]

I ran it on my Samsung NC10.
Worked ok.
On a desktop, ran well.

We are being "asked" by our Microsoft account manager to look into Win7 for next year. The likelyhood is, if I can get SonicWall running well, I will be using Ubuntu with KDE.

[geoken]

Vista was the new coke and 7 is bringing back classic. There are a few performance tweaks here and their but it's not really exciting. It feels like Microsoft made W7 out of necessity to compete on the netbook stage.

Your post makes no sense. In a mere 3 sentences you've managed to make and completely contradict your claims. You first claim that Win 7 is an admission of Vista as a failure and a return to XP (aka your new coke analogy). Then in the next sentence you suggest that it's exactly like Vista except with a few tweaks. Do you not see the inherent contradiction there?





In typical Microsoft fashion will we see any improvements made in W7 appear in Vista in later patches? Doubt it.

Are you serious? MS backports a hell of a lot more than anyone else. MS backported WPF to XP, what does Ubuntu backport?

[LowSky]

Personally I think they should call it Windows year of release

it would make thing so much easier to understand for normal users

And dont get me started on the rest of naming structure, There should be a Home version and a Business version. We dont need 10 verisons of the same OS.

[Sewje]

On my Laptop it's actually not better than Vista SP1 yet, so can't really say I would change to it on my Laptop. Which is pretty strange.
On 3 other computers I've installed it on, it has been a better experience than Vista.

But Linux is too customizable for me to give up, and you can't really beat Linux's competitive pricing.

[MichaelSM]

Haven't been back to this thread since my rant.

First up. It's chicken vs egg with sound (turns out) becos Creative never bothered updated their drivers for older SBLive cards for Vista and W7. So I bought a $25 Ritmo Vista-capable sound card and it worked with W7.

With W7 running hopelessly slow on my PC, but brilliantly on my Macbook, a techie friend suggested that I needed a new pc box with duo(?) core or quad-core whatever to run W7 on a PC.

Look, it's about time I updated my PC. Its architecture is way back in 2003, The BIOS wouldn't let me load W7 from the disk, so I had to do a WXP install plus SP2 (Yawn) just to fire it up.

The sheer BLOAT of W7 limits its potential buyers. It's a program designed to force MS users globally to spend squillions on new hardware just to accommodate the OS and its demands on RAM and processor speeds.

It's a global wake-up call to the excessess of a gigantic Corporation locking in every Tom, ****, and Harry to its whims.

I don't have Jaunty yet. Like every Ubuntu release, it will have responded to the suggestions and inputs of thousands of testers.

Yeah there will be some bugs. But it will run happily on most PCs with older processors and 512 RAM.

Basically, Windows 7 encourages the junking of trillions of PCs which could run Linux distros easily. If only people knew ...

But they don't.

End of rant.

Michael.

[Skripka]

Basically, Windows 7 encourages the junking of trillions of PCs which could run Linux distros easily. If only people knew ...

But they don't.

End of rant.

Michael.

Breaking news.


New software requires new (er) hardware. It has been like that for the last 25+ years.


MacOSX was such a winner when it came along because they terminated legacy hardware support. Windows will need to do something similar sooner or later.