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I never had any problems with Vista x64 (given that I didn't install on release, so drivers etc. had matured somewhat). I don't have any problems with 7 on the same system.. but equally I don't really see many advantages either. I wouldn't have it if it weren't for a very good offer on preorders...

Having recently gone from Vista 64 to 7 64, I'd say (personally): 1. It's certainly not a big upgrade, at least on a machine that's not low-end. There are some improvements which are worth having, but I don't think I'd have paid full price for them (I got it at the discounted preorder prices)...

Hear hear. I've not run either on a low-end system so I don't deny that there might be improvements there, but I've run Vista and 7 on this system and not only is any performance difference undetectable but generally using the operating system is on par with Vista for me. (I also reactivated...

I'm on an X38 motherboard running Windows 7 and don't have any problems. I can't remember if I ever installed any chipset drivers, but there isn't really much reason to do so nowadays anyway.

Yep.. I believe it's worse than useless today though, and ends up breaking things (particularly Office). So if that was the program deleted, I wouldn't be incredibly surprised.

I upgraded recently from Vista x64 to Windows 7 x64. It basically feels like Vista, but it seems slightly more likely to have random slowdowns (probably not due to the OS itself though). So, it really seemed much like a sidegrade to me; I was happy with Vista before, and am generally happy with...

It irks me when people imply that 32-bit addressing can be used for more than 4GB memory. It's impossible; 2^32 bits = 4GB. PAE only works by adapting the kernel for 36-bit addressing. Furthermore, PAE is, at best, an interim solution: 32-bit processes are really starting to approach the...

I sleep my desktop and hibernate my laptop whenever I'm not using them; I don't know why you would leave them fully powered if you're not using them? (I guess Folding@Home is a reason, though I prefer to keep my power bills down.) However, I have left a Windows 2000 machine used as a server on...

Windows 3.1/MS-DOS 5.0, then 6.22 Windows 95, release then OSR2 Windows 2000 Professional Windows XP Professional Windows Vista x64 I skipped 98 and Me entirely. Not sure if I can be bothered to switch this system to 7, but I preordered a copy of that for whenever it becomes necessary.

As far as I'm aware, Libraries are basically a new implementation of Vista's saved search feature, which never got much press?

That's why the click is on the Secure Desktop, where it can't be automated. The only theoretical extra security you get in a single-user environment by typing in the password is that people who are physically in front of your computer can't bypass UAC (but, as has been long established, if you...

I've always liked Vista (probably because I didn't install it on release, and when I did, it was on a new machine), and have never been overly excited about Windows 7 - it brings some improvements, but nothing I consider particularly compelling for an upgrade. On the other hand, for £45 (the...

BranchCache and DirectAccess are both features requiring Windows Server 2008 R2, so unless you're using that on an enterprise network, they're not going to be beneficial to you. As the name suggests, Enterprise Search isn't going to help you find things on your local computer any better, either.

Mine has apparently got to 27.9GB in 1.5 years' use. 17GB of that is the WinSxS folder; I'm not sure if some files are being counted twice as I believe many files there are actually hard links? I guess if I ran the SP1 cleaner I'd recover some of that space.

Likewise; I never format if it's not unavoidable. I've never reinstalled Vista on this machine, which is about 1.5 years old, nor Windows XP on my laptop before. I did have to do it to Windows 2000 due to a motherboard upgrade, and to a Windows 95 machine on which the hard drive was killed by...

It may be different if it's volume-licensed, but standard Vista discs are not version-specific (only 32- or 64-bit specific) - any 64-bit disc can be used to install any 64-bit version of Vista. So I'd say that it probably would work.

I know I'm in the minority, but I'm not interested in upgrading to 7 on this machine as I'm happy with Vista and don't see any need to pay and incur the upheaval in moving to a pretty similar operating system. There are a few features I'd like, such as WDDM 1.1 and Aero Snap, but I'll wait until...

While I did look, I didn't see anything (and haven't heard anything) suggesting that the OS corrects colour in non-aware programs. The existence of system colour profiles itself is not a change from Vista, which also supports them (although 7 has more support). However, that post on the...

I'm not aware of Windows 7 having any major colour management improvements compared to Vista; if that's correct, then non-colour-aware programs won't be affected by OS-level settings.

Since the majority of games are 32-bit (and generally not, as far as I'm aware, large address space aware), they can't use more than 2GB RAM. There is a benefit to having more than 2GB of course, since the OS is also running - therefore 4GB is a fairly optimal amount of RAM for a gaming system...

Since Vista SP1, Windows reports installed RAM rather than usable RAM. Since a 2^32 bit address space = 4GB, and the video card and other hardware need address space too, usable RAM will always be less than 4GB. Although PAE supports a 2^36 bit = 64GB address space, consumer versions of Windows...

You mean that the benchmarks come out differently when you change the file size? If so, that's not unexpected - large files emphasise sustained throughput, whereas lots of small files depend more on seek time (and there are generally more overheads incurred).

Although PAE does allow use of up to 64GB of addressable memory (by using 36-bit addressing), the extra memory isn't available in consumer versions of 32-bit Windows due to driver compatibility issues. It's showing installed ram since SP1, as stated.

The guy who won the Pwn2Own competition said that Macs are actually much easier to get into, provided you find a security flaw in some program (and, of course, they exist in pretty much any code) because they don't currently have the OS-level security features: I've been using Windows since...

Not that, but they've suggested that the only reason it's not NT 7.0 is for compatibility reasons, something which I've never been entirely convinced by: It's true that programs check the major version number and that changing that risks causing incompatibility issues, but there are already...

Very much so. Despite Microsoft's claims to the contrary, Windows 7's version number being NT 6.1 is very accurate, as it is a refinement of the Vista platform - just like XP was NT 5.1 and refined Windows 2000 and brought that to the consumer market. Vista did have the problems that any new...

I'm another member of the minority who don't like the new taskbar; I'm glad to see it's still possible to add the old quicklaunch. That's not my biggest problem with it, though - mostly I really hate grouping, and that's pretty engrained in the way that the Windows 7 bar is "supposed" to work...

Engadget have already been horrified: http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/03/windows-7-skus-announced-yes-your-worst-nightmare-has-come-to/2 Not entirely justified to say that "It's worse than you could have possibly imagined", considering that there's exactly the same number of SKUs as Windows...

I play games, and definitely wouldn't reboot; quite to the contrary, I usually keep my web browser, IM client etc. open in the background. For the small (negligible?) improvement a stripped-down version of Windows for gaming would offer, I doubt many people would want that inconvenience either.

The Volume Shadow Copy service is responsible for System Restore in Vista/7 and it makes shadow copies of everything (this allows it to also do Previous Versions). XP's System Restore is system files only. This is why Vista/7 need a lot more space for System Restore.

Memory address extension in PAE is operational in Server versions of Windows, but Microsoft disabled it for consumer versions because a lot of consumer hardware drivers never expected to see 36-bit addresses and would cause problems when confronted with them. If you're going to break...

I'm not sure; many EULAs do explicitly give you the right to make a single backup copy, but I'm not aware of any legal right to make a copy. As far as I know, it's technically illegal at the moment to rip copyrighted music here, but even the record industry here doesn't think that should be...

I'm sure the only discount there will be for Vista owners is the Upgrade version. When the Windows 7 beta was released, they were clear that would not be giving out any free copies to public beta testers: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/beta-faq.aspx

There is certainly plenty of code in Windows which is for legacy support; I was just reading the first bonus chapter (available online free) from this book, which goes through some of the compatibility changes which have been made in the past...

I don't have any desire to switch from my Q6600 right now - I don't really come across tasks where I'm CPU-limited very often. I don't anticipate getting a new CPU before Sandy Bridge at least, as part of an entirely new system.

Vista isn't immune, but the patch has been available since October for it as well. I assume that Windows 7 builds prior to the hotfix would probably have been vulnerable too, but the public beta was months after that and I'm sure it has the fix already. Microsoft's bulletin about Conficker/B...

Just a point - it's impossible to disable virtual memory, though it is possible to disable the page file (as to whether that's a good idea or not is a different matter). All processes will always have virtual memory because that's the way every modern desktop memory manager works, and even...

I'm skeptical of this "keeping version 6.x for compatibility" thing. What, Microsoft are never going to change the major version number of Windows again now? There is already a compatibility system which can lie about the version number in order to keep fickle programs happy, and Vista drivers...

I'm not planning on moving to Windows 7 on this computer, so I'll be running Vista SP2. None of the new features are likely to affect me though, and the rest of it is mostly patches I already have (or Windows Search 4.0, which I also have), so I'm not really waiting for it with much anticipation.

There are reasons for continuing to sell Windows 7 with a 32-bit version. But I would definitely like to see them sell 64-bit as the default - let 64-bit be the version you buy at retail and have to send in for a DVD if you still require 32-bit support, and pressure OEMs to install 64-bit on...