Windows 7 is the new Messiah. (Sorry Obama!)

So does windows 7 come in 64 and 32 bit flavours or is it all 64 bit? and does the standard version have the compatibility modes that vista did or do you have to get the premium version?Wondering about upgrading and the Amazon UK description of features is pretty crap.

Originally Posted by youngscientist

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So does windows 7 come in 64 and 32 bit flavours or is it all 64 bit?

Both on the same disk.

and does the standard version have the compatibility modes that vista did or do you have to get the premium version?Wondering about upgrading and the Amazon UK description of features is pretty crap.

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Compatibility modes?

Here's the deal with compatibility mode for Windows 7 - I know, because I was just trying to get it to work yesterday on my copy of the RC1 build....

There are two flavors - first is the traditional "Compatibility mode" tab that you'll find in the properties of your executable. Other than being able to default the "run as admin" option, this tab sucks as much balls as it did in the previous OS versions.

The "new feature" that they tout is not really a new feature. It's just Microsoft Virtual PC running through a more integrated interface in W7. You have to download the MS V-PC add-on and then you download a pre-build XP virtual machine that installs via an MSI, rather than building the VM manually.

From there, it's pretty traditional VM operations though - you have a little more transparency when it comes to USB support and viewing the "Host OS" files but that's the only difference, the apps still run within their VM environment....

Which brings me to the reason why I was doing this yesterday... a revelation of a significant W7 flaw....

I had a simple goal. I wanted to use one of the dozens of "remote control your Media Center PC from your smartphone via wifi" applications that are out there and NONE of them work. Some fail because they are not 64bit compatible (and running in the 32bit mode doesn't fix the problem. Others fail because of the version-check on the software (will work on Vista64bit but not W7 64bit because of a single line of version-check code) some won't run because of legitimate architecture changes between Vista and W7.

I tried using several "compatibility mode" workarounds, as provided by Microsoft, they all sucked.
I've also had the same problem with legacy support for pre-Vista games.

I finally got one program to install, unfortunately it only worked with Winamp and not Windows Media Center but that's better than nothing - it failed to connect to the remote-control app on my phone because of some W7 firewall/security issues


With all that said - still better than Vista or XP

I'd assume that this is a driver issue that would probably be addressed in the near future. I wouldn't really call this a major problem. This is basically why the RC is available right now.

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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I'd assume that this is a driver issue that would probably be addressed in the near future. I wouldn't really call this a major problem. This is basically why the RC is available right now.

It's not a driver issue, as there is no new hardware (real or virtual) involved. We're talking about software that communicates over standard TCP/IP.

The problem is
1) similar to Vista's debut, certain programs will not be ready for the new architecture in time. Sure you can blame the developers but MS has to take some responsibility because....
2) W7's "run in 32bit compatibility mode" feature is not so hot
3) W7's "XP Mode" is essentially just a virtual machine with all of the current limits of a virtual machine, with the exception of better USB transparency.

I agree it's not a major problem, W7 will deploy painlessly to the majority of users but (as always) Microsoft fell short on considering how to support legacy.

so you think it's gonna be better than snow leopard?

Originally Posted by BrettChaotix

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It's not a driver issue, as there is no new hardware (real or virtual) involved. We're talking about software that communicates over standard TCP/IP.

Uh... are you sure? If there's no new hardware (real or virtual) involved, what do you think the problem is? Maybe you aren't communicating what you mean very well, but the operating system not recognizing the hardware seems like a driver issue to me.

Originally Posted by dtmt

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I've never really understood all the love for XP. I always found it to be just a bloated version of 2000. I mean, 2k was the first OS that brought home PCs out of the dark 9x/ME days, and I never really saw what XP really offered on top of that. Even thought Vista was a bit heavy on resources, I always found it to be a bigger improvement over XP than XP was over 2k.

XP is the first consumer OS that merged the Windows 3.0 path and Windows NT path. Win2K was a professional (Win NT) OS.

Vista > XP but most of Vista's major problems were untouched during SP1 (WiFi auto-release/refresh, network sharing/syncing/caching, etc).

Been running Windows 7 for around 2 months now, its very stable and blazing fast. A full restart of my system now takes less than 45 seconds (including all those BIOS screens).

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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I'd assume that this is a driver issue that would probably be addressed in the near future. I wouldn't really call this a major problem. This is basically why the RC is available right now.

No problems regarding compatibility mode. The "driver" issues is for the XP Virtual machine, where not all Intel/AMD processors were supported.

What a bunch of ****. I just checked out a review of windows 7. It looks like Mac OSX back in 2005.

Its sad how Microsoft ***** in a box and molds it to looks like Apple's OSX, and sells it to people trying to pass it off as a ruby.

I am still happy with XP, but if W7 becomes a success our vendors would probably stop supporting XP and we would be forced to go for W7. It's actually a bit scary how dependent we have become of Microsoft.

Eager to see if the release of the Google OS will change things. We are moving in the direction of having all our applications online and interact with them through a browser anyway. Quick access is the keyword here, and even though W7 looks good in that regard I can't justify the hardware spec. needed for it to run smoothly.

Originally Posted by TylerDurden

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What a bunch of ****. I just checked out a review of windows 7. It looks like Mac OSX back in 2005.

Its sad how Microsoft ***** in a box and molds it to looks like Apple's OSX, and sells it to people trying to pass it off as a ruby.



I think we just went up a notch.

Originally Posted by TylerDurden

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What a bunch of ****. I just checked out a review of windows 7. It looks like Mac OSX back in 2005.

Its sad how Microsoft ***** in a box and molds it to looks like Apple's OSX, and sells it to people trying to pass it off as a ruby.

Actually you meant how OSX ripped off CDE back in the 90s? Oh wait, or you meant OSX "uses" BSD?

Oh, Mac users. You're a special bunch.

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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Uh... are you sure? If there's no new hardware (real or virtual) involved, what do you think the problem is? Maybe you aren't communicating what you mean very well, but the operating system not recognizing the hardware seems like a driver issue to me.
Uh... I don't think you are understanding my problem - I'm not trying to install any new equipment, I just want to use my smartphone to control my desktop computer's media center capabilities. Both devices are fully functional when it comes to hardware/drivers. They can communicate on the wifi network with no problems. There is no new hardware involved that needs to be recognized because I'm not plugging my phone into my computer - they are communicated via TCP/IP which is 100% hardware independent, assuming your hardware complies with industry standards. The problem is when I try to install what's essentially a client/server package, phone being client, desktop being server, it blows up for one of the reasons listed previously. Either: the install fails (software issue) or it installs but fails to run correctly due to compatibility problems (software issue) Now, you could argue that the latter has some "hardware issue" characteristics but the problem isn't the hardware. The hardware/drivers are working correctly outside of this problem. The compatibility issues have to do with the new W7 and/or 64bit architecture and the (lack of) ability to run legacy apps. Using a virtual machine is not the same as "legacy compatible" so until some developers release a version of the client/server package that's truly designed with Vista/W7 64bit, I'm SOL.

Originally Posted by Brian278

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I never used 2000, but XP was the first Windows that wouldn't crash regularly. Even if a program acted up, it would just close that program. WAY more stable than Windows 95/98. For that I'll be forever fond of it.

Strong XP love here too. Going from 98 to XP was as big a jump as going from 3.1 to 95 to me it seemed.

2000 wasn't so bad either, but took more tinkering than XP did to get things to my liking.