I downloaded the public Windows 7 CTP (community technology preview) last week and now have it dual-booting on my laptop. I must admin, having downloaded and tried the early previews of Windows Vista I was expecting to find a slow, buggy mess of an operating system with some hints of what was to come. I am happy to say I was wrong!
I have included some of my thoughts and opinions below, but please do leave a comment regarding your own as I am really interested to hear what you all think.
Windows 7 Install
Microsoft have really done a nice job with the install stage of Windows 7. They havde taken the improved user interface of the Vista install and streamlined it so that you only have to answer around 6 questions during the whole process. I was even more surprised when my wireless drivers weere foudn during the install and I was able to connect to the internet and download any available updates. The whole installation took around 15 minutes from start to finish. No problems at all!
Also, it should be noted that the system requirments for Windows 7 have actually been REDUCED from those needed for Vista. This is a big deal for Microsoft to do this and it appears that they are finally listening to the thousands of people that screamed about this when Vista was released.
Hardware Detection
With Vista alot of people, myself included, had problems with the compatibility of hardware and availability of drivers. Again, Microsoft have greatly improved this. They claim that due to Windows 7 being based upon the Vista OS, that any Vista drivers will work with Windows 7 as well. Hardware manufacturers have had a good amount of time now to produce these drivers, so these are available for virtually all hardware these days. I was able to install any drivers that were not automatically detected (of which there were not many) by using the Vista drivers.
Performance
There seems to be a good improvement in performance with Windows 7. I have found that the startup is quicker than Vista and the time for the OS to wake from sleep or hibernation has greatly improved as well. Obviously, it remains to be seen what this performance is like once I have been running the OS in anger for a couple of months, but I am hopeful the performance will be a definant improvement over previous releases from MS.
User Interface and Usability Improvements
The task bar has now been changed to allow to you “pin” programs that you regularly use to it, meaning you have quick access to anything you need alot. The other thing I have found to be really useful are the context menus now available by right clicking on a program on the task bar. For example, if I right on the IE icon on the task bar, I get a list of my recently visited sites and for media player a list of my most commonly played music.
The side bar has now been removed in Windows 7, which now allows you to place the gadgets anywhere on the desktop.
Verdict
There are loads more things I really like about Windows 7 which I have not mentioned here. It is a massive improvement over Vista, without introducing any major over arching new functionality. My take on Windows 7 is that it is “Vista the way it should have always been”, which is a very good thing!
I would definantely recommend that you download the CTP and try it yourself in a virtual machine or on a seperate partition. The final release is not due for another 12 months, so this means that Microsoft have got a good amount of time to tweak and further improve it.