For -Hibikster-: Windows 7 Beta 700

[KagerouSama]

I'm trying this out too, atm.
However, -Hibikster- has been trying to create a thread for this and keeps getting taken to the review screen.

So... here's to getting things kicked off.

 

[-Hibikster-]

Thanks man, I don't know why I can't make a thread for some reason...

Anybody else as excited about this as I am? I started the download last night and it finally finished downloading earlier today....took about 23 hours but damn it was worth it.

It took roughly 30 minutes to install, which it did without a single hitch. It smoothly detected all the drives on the computer. Now what I found wierd was the fact that it only gave you the option to install either Upgrade or Custom, but once I selected custom it let me proceed with the installation normally. I guess this is how it is in this build. Either way the complete installation took two restarts and everything went through okay.

As the OS started I noticed that the videocard wasn't detected properly, as I went into the device manager I noticed 3 things not detected....So I did the first thing that came to my mind which was click windows updates...it downloaded 3 updates and asked me to restart...and once I did, everything was found and detected. The driver database on this OS is amazing.

Now that the videocard installed properly the interface corrected itself, the OS looks absolutely gorgeous. Now it's just a matter of going through the OS and learning how to get around it and what not.

Oh yea, it also asks you now to find an Antivirus online and recommends 3 right off the bat; Kaspersky, AVG, and Norton.

Also, it detected all 4 gigs of RAM on my laptop.

Anyone else install this on their machine? Thoughts? Compliments? Complaints?

 

[KagerouSama]

I have this running on less than recommended specifications.
I have it inside Virtual Box, running on Ubuntu 8.10.

The OS runs just peachy so far.
I gave it a 30gig expandable file.
It has 512M Ram (Griped for it during install) and runs well.
It doesn't have full range of the 128M NVidia I have, so it chugs a bit.

But it runs surprisingly well for being under par on hardware.

It now sees it's in VMWare.
The things I've added so far are Firefox 3, Flash 10, their Live essentials, AVG8, and a few drivers -notably for ethernet and audio.

It now sees the audio card, but something is misfiring in the layer I have between the OS and my card, So I don't hear anything--even with speakers at 100%.

My tower also keeps shutting down. This isn't a Windows problem. It's just an annoyance I'm dealing with. I'm ready to go through piece by piece to find what's causing it.

Out with the screwdriver sets... Sigh.

 

[OrochiEddie]

any images of the OS running?

 

[kernow]

yes, on google.

 

[thirdkind]

I downloaded the beta last night and installed it on my Mac with VMWare Fusion. I've messed around with it a bit and it seems to be running pretty well. Gave it a gig of RAM to work with.

Seems like a nice enough OS. The new taskbar is a ripoff of OS X's Dock, but borrowing from the best is normal (Apple included). I don't think it looks as good as OS X, but that's a personal preference. I'm sure there are plenty of themes available out there to make it look better.

I found a few minor usability problems, the most annoying of which was trying to figure out how to get rid of the desktop image and just make it a solid color. Turns out "Solid Colors" is an option in a dropdown labeled "Picture Location" in the Control Panel. Sounds stupid, but it took me about five minutes to find that. I think in all their attempts to make it easier to use, they may have overlooked some things and overthought others. OS X has its own annoyances, so it's not knock against Microsoft, just an observation.

Now what they really need to do is get rid of all this Home/Home Premium/Business/Ultimate bullshit and just sell one version with everything included at a reasonable price.

If they can get back to the speed and stability of Win2K, I'd buy a copy to dual boot for gaming.

 

[-Hibikster-]

This is the third day I've been using it. For the most part, it is very impressive. I am loving how the new Taskbar works. Now I can leave programs open and not be bothered with the taskbar looking overly cluttered. Sure the new pin/unpin feature might be a copy of the Mac's dock, but it is a great feature nonetheless and works seamlessly.

Yesterday I decided to shut off the computer and plug into it several different hardware devices, then turn on the computer and see what it does. It detected them all really really well, you can actually open up a list of all the devices that it's installing and it shows you the status of each individual device being installed. It's not like XP where you have to wait until each individual component installs.

So far, the only major problem I've had is with my Samsung Printer....I have a Samsung ML-1520 and it won't work with XP or Vista drivers (which is to be expected for the most part). The nice part though is Windows automatically searches for a compatible driver off of the manufacturer's website and the closest recommendation it found was the Vista driver for this particular printer straight from the Samsung website, which I found to be impressive.

I also plugged in my Saturn gamepad and that works perfectly as well.

Another issue is when I try to plug in my TV in my notebook's S-Video slot. I can't manipulate the desktop as easily as I was able to with XP. The interface is relatively new, so I'm not sure if I'm doing it right, but what is happening is I try and make it so that my laptop has 1280 x 800 resolution and my screen have 800 x 600 resolution...In XP this task was really simple; just click on each monitor and adjust the settings accordingly, but with 7 I can't seem to figure it out, all it can do is mirror the resolutions (both screens at 1024 x 768) and when I try to do something else, it just says cannot apply changes.

Throughout this week I'll be installing more programs to see how well they run, but here is what I installed so far:

Google Talk - No Problems
Windows Live Messenger (w/all the includes - Movie Maker Beta, Mail, Writer, Photo Gallery, Call, Family Safety) - No Problems
7 Zip File Manager - No Problems
AIM 6.8 - No Problems
Acer Alps Touchpad driver - No Problems

Other Observations:
They souped up the hell out of Wordpad, Calculator and Paint.

 

[SpamYouToDeath]

This seems to be a step up from XP, finally.

Still nowhere near as fast or featureful as Ubuntu, but still. Progress!

 

[-Hibikster-]

This seems to be a step up from XP, finally.

Still nowhere near as fast or featureful as Ubuntu, but still. Progress!

Featureful, that will come in time. The basic programs it comes with now are really good though...especially the DVD maker. It's very quick seamless, and efficient.

I just tried another bunch of programs and here's what I got:

VLC 0.9.8a - No Problems

TopStyle Lite 3.1 - No Problems

MagicISO 5.3 - No Problems

Acer Launch Manager - Basically to get the custom buttons working on my laptop...didn't work for the volume..all other buttons worked fine though.

uTorrent - No Problems

2DFighter Web Client - No problems (sweet)

Alcohol 120% version 1.9.2 - Didn't install properly...but if a program doesn't install properly, it gives you the option to re-install it with compatibility settings. I didn't accept it for this program because chances are it won't function properly (this is what happened with installing my printer).

Photoshop PS3 - No Problems (Oh my god....i've never seen Photoshop load so fast in my entire life...not even in a fresh install of XP did it load this fast).

Anybody got any programs they want me to try installing to see if it works? I got a pretty good rig so it can handle pretty much anything.

 

[KagerouSama]

Anybody got any programs they want me to try installing to see if it works? I got a pretty good rig so it can handle pretty much anything.

The same two programs that have been standards for 20 years now.
Carmen Sandiego
Oregon Trail.

You have to load from DOS floppies too!
None of this "backward compatibility" junk.

Heh... that's something I hadn't checked yet.

Have you checked for backward compatibility with anything?
Running in 95/98/NT/2K/XP?
Or has that been abandoned?