Windows 7

[tribalmasters]

I am so happy with my PC right now!! The power of Windows 7, the peripherals that allow night time use and tonights addition thanks to an unexpected gift from a stationary company is the best ever - a line-in to SD card/USB stick recorder! Now instead of the Audacity mess I can just hit record when some spine tinglingly good track comes on the radio! Ahhh, just like Minidisc

My 3 sound cards(attempt to get sound working with Windows 7) 2 have burst into life and now work almost correctly!!! There is still the now useless Soundblaster inside and the USB card is stuck in 5.1 but the onboard sound is now loud enough to use and sounds good!

 

[larktdl]

windows 7 looks like MS is trying to look like a mac and made even more of the background stuff you could tweek in XP hiden. i still cant figure out how to defrag in vista

Not hidden, do a search google for Windows 7 god mode.
Aw forget that here is the link
How to Enable Windows 7 GodMode

The disk defrag utility should be located under accessories or system tools.

 

[larktdl]

I am not sure why so many are hesitant to upgrade. My wife uses her computer for the basics - Internet, e-mailing, printing and on-line games. I am not trying to sound like a ... here but if she can do the transition from xp to 7 so can the rest of you. Of course, I guess it helps if you have an IT guy as your hubby

 

[john doe]

been using the rc for about 9 months. soooo much better than vista. hasn't crashed yet. vista on the other hand 1 little malware and the thing freaks out and you have to wipe and reload.

 

[5cardstud]

I love Windows 7 ultimate. I couldn't use vista without disabling all that control stuff. I hated vista. But windows 7 ultimate is great. I like the compare two pages feature the shake, the resize by pushing the window up and down, it loads in seconds. But one thing I do with all windows is turn off all that security crap and use my own security. I got Kasperski for that and I haven't had anything get past it. And I go on alot of dangerous sites for viruses. I got Windows 7 ultimate for one pc for $37.00 and free for my other one. Got Xp on my windows 98 pc for running older games. But 7 is the hit.

 

[NCC]

I'm of the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" school. I successfully sidestepped Vista, even though I bought two computers during its reign. I paid extra to have XP on one machine, on the other it was a no-extra-charge choice. But then, I'd heard lots of bad press and bad word-of-mouth concerning Vista. I haven't yet heard much about Win7, pro or con. I won't go out of my way to "upgrade" ... but, maybe I won't so actively avoid it, like I did Vista. My computers are doing what I want them to do, why mess with that?

 

[tribalmasters]

I'm of the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" school. I successfully sidestepped Vista, even though I bought two computers during its reign. I paid extra to have XP on one machine, on the other it was a no-extra-charge choice. But then, I'd heard lots of bad press and bad word-of-mouth concerning Vista. I haven't yet heard much about Win7, pro or con. I won't go out of my way to "upgrade" ... but, maybe I won't so actively avoid it, like I did Vista. My computers are doing what I want them to do, why mess with that?

You'll love it!! It seems to be the same speed as XP Service Pack 3 but can be even faster when gaming! You get all the fancy features of Vista such as the search without the crap!

My Windows 7 home premium even came with a handy automatic backup system which not only backs up your files but also creates a disk image so you never have to reinstall your programs again!!

 

[MickiO]

I'm of the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" school. I successfully sidestepped Vista, even though I bought two computers during its reign. I paid extra to have XP on one machine, on the other it was a no-extra-charge choice. But then, I'd heard lots of bad press and bad word-of-mouth concerning Vista. I haven't yet heard much about Win7, pro or con. I won't go out of my way to "upgrade" ... but, maybe I won't so actively avoid it, like I did Vista. My computers are doing what I want them to do, why mess with that?

I sooo agree. Oh, I might eventually get a new pc one day, but unless there's some problem with my WinXP and Win7 does something magnificent that is totally necessary to correct that "problem", I'll go with what I have already tested & tried.


I already know what works well for what I use my pc for, and that's WinXP..


Especially when I've heard ppl say they went with Win7, and or Vists, and had nothing buy problems or didn't like it, and now they want to go back to WinXP, but now, they are having problems getting rid of the OS so they can re-install WinXP again. 8-oI've heard ppl say it's nearly impossible to go back, and that once it's on there, it's on there. .I don't like that idea either.


I have heard my own share of horror stories about Vista, but I must say, I have heard some pretty good things about Win7 as far as the OS itself. .However, I recently read an article saying, that Win7 will use 90%-95% of pc's RAM. .And accordingly to many, it does this because it runs fasters than other OS and will make use of nearly all of a pc's RAM. .saying "if RAM is not used, it's merely wasted, so why not put it to use". ha,


Other say, Win7 runs fine as long as they don't try to run large programs or anything that requires more than average 512, anddon't have too many programs open/running at once.. . They go onto say, that if your pc doesn't have alot of memory, Win7 freezes up and that this has been a issue with some Win7 users.. A few have said even at 1G they have experienced issues that were not present or didn't appear with their pc's before upgrading to Win7.


Who needs that? .Sure, if you buy alot of extra memory, I'm sure Win7 sounds like great, but not everyone can do that. I know for me, if I do any upgrading, it will be to have more memory, not my OS..

 

[crmartin]

For an easy way to access a lot of Windows 7 utilities, etc, download:Windows 7 in a box - The Ultimate Desktop Tool for Windows 7

Works great and it's free.

 

[larktdl]

I sooo agree. Oh, I might eventually get a new pc one day, but unless there's some problem with my WinXP and Win7 does something magnificent that is totally necessary to correct that "problem", I'll go with what I have already tested & tried.


I already know what works well for what I use my pc for, and that's WinXP..


Especially when I've heard ppl say they went with Win7, and or Vists, and had nothing buy problems or didn't like it, and now they want to go back to WinXP, but now, they are having problems getting rid of the OS so they can re-install WinXP again. 8-oI've heard ppl say it's nearly impossible to go back, and that once it's on there, it's on there. .I don't like that idea either.


I have heard my own share of horror stories about Vista, but I must say, I have heard some pretty good things about Win7 as far as the OS itself. .However, I recently read an article saying, that Win7 will use 90%-95% of pc's RAM. .And accordingly to many, it does this because it runs fasters than other OS and will make use of nearly all of a pc's RAM. .saying "if RAM is not used, it's merely wasted, so why not put it to use". ha,


Other say, Win7 runs fine as long as they don't try to run large programs or anything that requires more than average 512, anddon't have too many programs open/running at once.. . They go onto say, that if your pc doesn't have alot of memory, Win7 freezes up and that this has been a issue with some Win7 users.. A few have said even at 1G they have experienced issues that were not present or didn't appear with their pc's before upgrading to Win7.


Who needs that? .Sure, if you buy alot of extra memory, I'm sure Win7 sounds like great, but not everyone can do that. I know for me, if I do any upgrading, it will be to have more memory, not my OS..

For pc hardware that is 32 bit the maximum amount ram that Win 7 (also applies to vista and xp) will see is 3 GB, so installing 4 GB is a waste unless of course you know how to fine tune the swap file (virutal memory) settings.

If you want a Windows O/S that will utilize more than 3 GB of ram you will need to install the 64 bit version.

 

[tribalmasters]

Out of memory errors and having to close a program is alot more pleasant than disk swapping! Besides, I wonder if the memory Windows 7 is using is just a disk cache? Linux sits there and seems to eat up the memory but gives it up when needed maybe 7 does the same!

 

[john doe]

i've got win7 running now and with firefox taking up the biggest chunk of memory i'm still only using 512 of ram. vista and xp both used more than that.

 

[Darmeen]

Especially when I've heard ppl say they went with Win7, and or Vists, and had nothing buy problems or didn't like it, and now they want to go back to WinXP, but now, they are having problems getting rid of the OS so they can re-install WinXP again. 8-oI've heard ppl say it's nearly impossible to go back, and that once it's on there, it's on there. .I don't like that idea either.

I think those people are telling stories. Here at the radio station, we have a computer that runs the station 24/7. Something happened with the install of XP and of course they couldn't find the disk and CD Key to reinstall it. The boss went to Office Depot and bought Win7 (the only thing available)...well, it wasn't til the next day that we realized when the software company (station software) says it ONLY works in WinXP, they aren't kidding. The audio cards we have for that comp WILL NOT have Vista/Win7 drivers...and running in compatibility mode doesn't work...we are relying on split second relays and such, not a big deal on a personal machine, but when running a radio station that requires zero down time, the 1 to 3 second delay before the relay fires is no good. The software company would not offer any support as long as we were running on Win7.

We found the XP disk and Key eventually and reformatted the drives (RAID array)...Win7 gone. Format is a format is a format...

Literally all those people would have to do is insert the WinXP disk, restart to that drive, and let the install of XP format the hard drive. Of course they should have their files backed up, but there is ZERO reason why Win7 would not allow them to format the hard drive, especially if you booted to the CD.

 

[MickiO]

I think those people are telling stories. Here at the radio station, we have a computer that runs the station 24/7. Something happened with the install of XP and of course they couldn't find the disk and CD Key to reinstall it. The boss went to Office Depot and bought Win7 (the only thing available)...well, it wasn't til the next day that we realized when the software company (station software) says it ONLY works in WinXP, they aren't kidding. The audio cards we have for that comp WILL NOT have Vista/Win7 drivers...and running in compatibility mode doesn't work...we are relying on split second relays and such, not a big deal on a personal machine, but when running a radio station that requires zero down time, the 1 to 3 second delay before the relay fires is no good. The software company would not offer any support as long as we were running on Win7.

We found the XP disk and Key eventually and reformatted the drives (RAID array)...Win7 gone. Format is a format is a format...

Literally all those people would have to do is insert the WinXP disk, restart to that drive, and let the install of XP format the hard drive. Of course they should have their files backed up, but there is ZERO reason why Win7 would not allow them to format the hard drive, especially if you booted to the CD.

Thanks Darmeen for letting me know this That makes me feel better knowing it IS possible. I know enough about computers to know that it should be, but figured either there must be some traces left behind because of unknown issues with Win7 or else the person(s) did not know how to do it.

Didn't want to experiment, lol, but hearing this from you, confirms what I suspected, that it was probably the user that was experiencing problems, and not formatting, or doing/not doing something, and notthing actually wrong with the OS, Who knows, lol.

anyway, thanks for the info!

 

[tribalmasters]

Damn! I was about to suggest virtualisation until you mentioned the sound card and relay issue I guess a badly behaving sound card in Win7 can't be fixed even if it did run XP virtually!

However, sometimes a format isn't a format but only if the MBR gets broken which can easily be fixed at a command prompt, Windows deals with that anyway these days

I hope your radio station box is fixed up now, that RAID array will hopefully give many years of problem free disks!!

I just ordered some 1u servers from eBay, that will be my first ever hard RAID lets hope the hardware and setup program keep the RAID in check I tried it before with my PC but it turned out to have fake RAID which caused all kindsa problems!!!!

 

[Darmeen]

Damn! I was about to suggest virtualisation until you mentioned the sound card and relay issue I guess a badly behaving sound card in Win7 can't be fixed even if it did run XP virtually!

However, sometimes a format isn't a format but only if the MBR gets broken which can easily be fixed at a command prompt, Windows deals with that anyway these days

I hope your radio station box is fixed up now, that RAID array will hopefully give many years of problem free disks!!

I just ordered some 1u servers from eBay, that will be my first ever hard RAID lets hope the hardware and setup program keep the RAID in check I tried it before with my PC but it turned out to have fake RAID which caused all kindsa problems!!!!

Oh, we tried everything possible in Win7...virtual machine was decent, but the delay just sucked for live radio...with over 500GB of music, it is a PITA to back everything up for a conversion either way...so we were dreading going back to XP...but we are happily back to WinXP SP3...really made me miss doing IT work...the challenge...I think I am going to start that computer repair business up...I can work out some contract deals with the businesses around here that use Dell Service (talk about a joke), train some of the bright highschool kids to do minor repairs (if they don't already know) to handle the ma and pa computer issues.

 

[Claasy]

Got a win 7 and win xp dual boot on my computer. I've logged many hours on windows 7 to give it a chance, but so far I don't have any reason to make a permanent switch. Many of my older games and applications I've tried installing on it just don't work, despite extensive playing with the compatibility feature.

Add in that it just doesn't seem any faster, and the only thing it's got over windows xp is the cool windows aero stuff.

Hell they even took out quick launch from win 7, I had to do a registry tweak just to get it back.

 

[tribalmasters]

Oh, we tried everything possible in Win7...virtual machine was decent, but the delay just sucked for live radio...with over 500GB of music, it is a PITA to back everything up for a conversion either way...so we were dreading going back to XP...but we are happily back to WinXP SP3...really made me miss doing IT work...the challenge...I think I am going to start that computer repair business up...I can work out some contract deals with the businesses around here that use Dell Service (talk about a joke), train some of the bright highschool kids to do minor repairs (if they don't already know) to handle the ma and pa computer issues.

I forgot just how much fun computers can be too! Thats why I treated myself to these 2 used HP 1u rack servers from Ebay! One for me and one for a friend hehe! They are only dual Pentium 3s at 1.4GHz but hey its a little piece of the data center bought home!

They are beautiful inside, not a PCB or wire out of place, no dust which is suprising being a server and all!! Theres a big blower by the heatsinks though! They have Remote Insight Lights Out which allows complete control with web browser even when the server is off including turning it on and looking in the BIOS and even allowing the local CD drive to be used as the server's drive!

If anyone is bored with computers get one they are an interesting geeky conversation piece and make loadsa cool noises too!! Rescue a server from the data center today!

--EDIT-- they are Compaq/HP DL360 g2s in case anyone wanted to know

 

[Darmeen]

Hell they even took out quick launch from win 7, I had to do a registry tweak just to get it back.

They may have removed 'quick launch' but you can pin anything to start bar, so you can create your own quick launch. You can also pin anything into the Start Menu.

 

[t3hp00ky]

Working as an IT I have realized that most of the complaining around Vista and Win7 is coming from user related issues. Users errors are the number one error.

People that have spent the last nine years using XP have been used to the 'feel' and 'look'. I used to like XP as an administrator because I knew all the security loop holes while working under a domain. (Number one reason I use OS X at home.) Made my life so easy, but when we switched to Vista, I had to forget about all of them (and learn new ones). Vista is a relatively secure OS (LOL I made a funny, windows < secure OS.)

But with the Windows 7 switch on the horizon, I really can't wait. It's really nice, as long as you don't make it bug out with all the crazy apps that Windows users love to install (like really now?!). It seems to make better use of a page file, it comes with both a 32-bit and 64-bit installation. It has a clean GUI. What more could people ask for? (at least until a computer can fart out espressos and lattes.)

It has a learning curve as all new technology does. Switch to it, and give it about a year. You'll be saying to yourself, "Wow, I can't believe I used to hate this!" Now as for the price, that's something to complain about

If anyone wants some access to some Windows 7 books, I can maybe get you a copy. Hit me up on the side.

I saw somewhere someone mentioned linux...