Windows 7 System Requirements

JimmiG said:
Windows XP system requirements:
Processor: 233 MHz
RAM: 64MB
Disk space: 1.5GB
Graphics: Super VGA, 800x600

Windows Vista:
Processor: 800 MHz
RAM: 512MB
Disk space: 15GB
Graphics: 32MB DirectX9 capable

So Win7 still "heavier" than Vista, although not by much. The difference in hardware requirements between XP and Vista is massive by comparison, and one can certainly understand the criticism Vista received for its steep hardware requirements when it was released.

My Netbook will not be capable of running Windows7 - I've only got an 8GB SSD and 512MB RAM. Upgrading to 1.5GB of RAM is easy and cheap, but doing something about the storage is a little more tricky. TinyXP only uses a fraction of the 8GB SSD though and it does everything I need.
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there was also almost 8 years of hardware that came out since XP >.> keeping that in mind the reqs for Vista over all arnt that bad
when Vista came out a 1.5Ghz CPU with 1GB ram was avg

also to all you people running with out swap file you really shouldnt >.> windows use it for more then just a place to stuff things when it runs out of ram
 
Ur_Mom said:
Who the hell is going to put Win7 on a 1 GHz P3 with 1 GB of RAM anyway? Who owns those machines anymore? Not anyone who is going to fork out $150 for an OS... They are mostly older PC's that are good for one thing: internet and word processing (and Half-Life).
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My daughter has a 1.0 ghz P3 with Windows 2000 Pro which runs just fine for e-mail and online flashgames. Pretty snappy for what it does, ex-corporate PC from Ebay, $43 shipped.
 
Could we please, for the love of all things holy, only have a 64bit version? It's time to bury 32bit windows 6 feet under already!

What are we going to do about addressible memory limits? And beyond that, will the 32bit version handle more than 3.5-4GB of RAM? Have they worked around it yet? I mean, hell, by the time it ships we will have games that don't work optimally with less than 4gb RAM! Not to mention real work apps... photoshop, autodesk, etc.
 
As much as I love my 64bit version, if they didn't have 32bit they'd lose a lot of the corporate crowd. I see a lot more retail machines shipping with 64 now though, so maybe in another generation or two.
 
Advil said:
Could we please, for the love of all things holy, only have a 64bit version? It's time to bury 32bit windows 6 feet under already!

What are we going to do about addressible memory limits? And beyond that, will the 32bit version handle more than 3.5-4GB of RAM? Have they worked around it yet? I mean, hell, by the time it ships we will have games that don't work optimally with less than 4gb RAM! Not to mention real work apps... photoshop, autodesk, etc.
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On the 3.5g issue, nope, don't imagine there will be either. I have to agree though, outside of netbooks or other circumstances where you'd need a very small os, I don't see any reason to run 32 anymore considering todays common hardware. You're not going to do anything on a 32 that you can't do on 64. As for myself, the memory limit is why I moved to 64, and I couldn't imagine having to go back to only having 3.25g available. Tis the suck.
 
No, we can't, and we won't, probably for another decade at the minimum. There's just too much 32 bit hardware out there that is still in use and would cost trillions of duckets to just toss away and replace with full blown 64 bit capable hardware... it's just not going to happen. And since that hardware isn't going anywhere anytime soon, it'll need software that functions, and that means 32 bit code will around for a long, long time to come.

Especially on the most popular segment of computer hardware nowadays... Netbooks. Yes, we'll see 64 bit support soon but, that's still a niche side of the industry but it again needs software to make it go go go... 32 bits wide... :D
 
Joe Average said:
No, we can't, and we won't, probably for another decade at the minimum. There's just too much 32 bit hardware out there that is still in use and would cost trillions of duckets to just toss away and replace with full blown 64 bit capable hardware... it's just not going to happen. And since that hardware isn't going anywhere anytime soon, it'll need software that functions, and that means 32 bit code will around for a long, long time to come.
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Perhaps I wasn't talking about the same thing necissarily, but what I was referring to was actual 32bit only os's,......not that actual lack entirely of any 32bit code. Unless it's a machine that demands a very light os, I just don't see any reason why one would bother w/ a 32bit os anymore.
 
DeathFromBelow said:
7's requirements are slightly higher than Vista. Vista's min was an 800 MHz CPU and 512 MB RAM.

You can say what you want about Vista, but anyone who actually uses it knows it runs just fine on Atom systems. I think its funny to see people talking about 7's great performance compared to Vista when they're nearly identical.
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Won't be funny much longer...unless of course you enjoy watching the Vista fanboys jumping ship. :p
 
It may only end up needing ~7GB installed (plus another 10 for the massive amount of updates which are sure to follow), but it still sucks when the installer itself demands massive space.

Like Vista x64... 18+GB required for the installer to move forward, wtf?

And if the reason is that it first images the CD onto the hard drive, that should be an option.. why inflate the hard drive requirements if it isn't actually required? :confused: I have a 70GB OS partition just in case Vista decides to explode more useless shit all over it. Such a waste.
 
jfreund said:
My Win7 beta install was 10 GB or so after I disabled virtual memory (SSD RAID0 with 6GB RAM). Haven't checked lately to see how much space it's taking. Of course, I have all my data on different drives, and isolate the OS.
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You don't "disable" virtual memory, which includes a bunch of operating system memory management concepts like paging, segmentation, and the TLB. It's part of pretty much every modern operating system, regardless of whether or not you like it. I think what you mean is limiting the amount of space that the operating system is allowed to use on your disk for its virtual memory system.

Just correcting a misconception, that is all.
 
I have been running RC1 build 7100 for about a week now and have had
little to no problems. I am running an E8400 @3.0Ghz and 4 gigs of
mushkin 1066. Also have a Sappire 4850X2 1 gig.

Seven runs quite snappy frankly for a beta op system. I can't wait
for it to go retail. It has some really great (and useful) features. Here is
a screenie of my desktop.

1qg7jk.jpg
 
Joe Average said:
Why is when Microsoft has basically pulled off a miracle and made the best OS they've ever even dreamed of and made it fast, lean, and awesome, that people can't do anything but hammer them with idiotic commentary and jeer 'em for it... yet when Apple does the same thing - they fix the broken shit they pawned off on people - they get cheered for it?
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That's because Apple's fanbase is drawn to Apple from shear flat out lies from their commercials, are impressionable and usually quite stupid.
 
supaspoon said:
That's still twice the size, so I think his point remains. I'm running 64ult as well, and the hd footprint is my only complaint.
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On the contrary - you're going under the assumption that it's full at 40GB. In fact, I've got 20GB left, so we're still talking something significantly less than 55+GB.
 
Windows 7 is supposed to be a scalable kernel right? So running it on it's minimum spec should be just fine.
 
I don't think anyone was actually suggesting that someone disable the swap file ('least I'd hope not), but just commenting that part of the total space requirement estimates by MS include space potentially taken up by the swap file (which by default is set to grow/shrink on the fly, most power users probably change that), future System Restore points, initial space usage by install files, etc.

MS is simply erring on the side of caution, clearly with some tweaking you can get in well under that suggestion though... But for the average joe that's not gonna bother to tweak his install at all and will probably accumulate a lot of crud then the suggested requirement represents a more accurate picture.
 
It's 2009, just scrap the 32-bit already, if only 64-bit existed it would force developers to fully support it. If people are still using a Pentium 4 or something then they should not be using Windows 7 anyway. Stop wasting resources on 32-bit, it has no future. Make 64-bit as good or better than 32-bit insetad.
 
Why shouldn't they be using Windows 7 on a P4? I'd love to hear a rational reason for that. As long as it has 1GB of RAM it'll probably run just fine, if a P3 933MHz with not even half a gig of RAM can run WinXP fine then a P4 from four years ago can definitely run Windows 7 and it'd probably be a tempting upgrade for some users (and extra revenue for MS).

It's not like people that are using those systems really need a hardware upgrade, all they use it for is probably web surfing, e-mail, etc. But I'm sure they'll find some of the usability improvements in Windows 7 appealing as a lot of it is particularly aimed at non-techie types. Then there's netbooks, another non-software incentive to keep 32-bit alive for the time being.

I'm sure there's plenty of corporate incentive to keep the 32-bit path alive as well as they tend to run lots of legacy apps that may not run or port easily on 64-bit (and there's no reason in many cases to create new version of such apps). The world doesn't revolve around your rig, Firefox, VLC, and games...
 
It's 2009, just scrap the 32-bit already, if only 64-bit existed it would force developers to fully support it.
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No, it would just mean no one would develop for it because of the lack of marketshare and it'd never get adopted.
 
I've ran Windows 7 on many different hardware configurations and let me say this, I'm seriously wanting to cry foul on these 'minimum' requirements.

I had issues with Windows 7 on older, DirectX 9 compatible graphics cards, even after disabling Aero. A video card even as recent as a 6800 GT would not run Windows 7 without major graphical delays and problems. I'm talking like 2 to 5 minute lockups where the machine was unusuable and then would start working for a couple minutes and lockup again.

AMD X2 5200+
4GB Memory
6800GT

Soon as I replace the 6800GT with a more modern card (in this case, a HD3870) it starts working fine.

Anyone else using something as old as a 6800 GT able to get Windows 7 to work decent?
 
I call BS!!!

Those may be the "official" requirements, but I guaran-Damn-tee that Win 7 won't run at all well on any system that only meets those minimums. I'd expect that you'll have totally sucky performance on anything less than 2.5 GHz & 4GB of RAM. 20 GB of hard disk? Expect that to double or triple by the time you have all the needed drivers and updates needed to make Win 7 work well.

MS is scamming us. They want you to believe this BS, so we will adopt Win 7, and then when we actually get our hands on it, owners of older systems will be forced into a cycle of expensive upgrades to make they're PC's work at an acceptable level.

MS is desperate to avoid the Vista backlash this time, and so they'll try selling us any line of cr@p to convince us to buy win 7.

XP is not going away any time soon, despite MS's desire to kill it off, and I fully expect that we will find ourselves still using it for the foreseeable future.
 
lol Do some research, that's all I can say... You couldn't be any further off the mark here, and the sad thing is you don't seem to be remotely near kidding.
 
herald said:
I call BS!!!

Those may be the "official" requirements, but I guaran-Damn-tee that Win 7 won't run at all well on any system that only meets those minimums. I'd expect that you'll have totally sucky performance on anything less than 2.5 GHz & 4GB of RAM. 20 GB of hard disk? Expect that to double or triple by the time you have all the needed drivers and updates needed to make Win 7 work well.

MS is scamming us. They want you to believe this BS, so we will adopt Win 7, and then when we actually get our hands on it, owners of older systems will be forced into a cycle of expensive upgrades to make they're PC's work at an acceptable level.

MS is desperate to avoid the Vista backlash this time, and so they'll try selling us any line of cr@p to convince us to buy win 7.

XP is not going away any time soon, despite MS's desire to kill it off, and I fully expect that we will find ourselves still using it for the foreseeable future.
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They're called mim requirement for a reason :rolleyes:. I mean, you don't expect great gaming performance running a game off its mim req do you? In either case, how is MS going to surprise us if they're letting people try out the beta/RC1 for free? It doesn't make any sense. Also, no one is making these people with old system to upgrade. You can keep your beloved XP. I for one thinks it's a great thing that OS are using the resources of modern day technology, rather than be limited by yesterday's tech.

If you love your XP so much, then stick with it. No one is making you upgrade.
 
dagas said:
It's 2009, just scrap the 32-bit already, if only 64-bit existed it would force developers to fully support it. If people are still using a Pentium 4 or something then they should not be using Windows 7 anyway. Stop wasting resources on 32-bit, it has no future. Make 64-bit as good or better than 32-bit insetad.
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Windows 7 will havea 32bit and a64bit versions, i dont see the problem... as said, alot of hardware and software is 32bit still, and if it works, people wont want to have to go buy new items just to use a 64bit version.

It is smart for MS to make 64 and 32bit, makes them alot more money.

Developers will go 64bit when it will benefit them.
 
I managed to get 7 running on a P3/1GHz with an old 40GB hard drive. It runs perfectly well. W7 is I think the first Microsoft OS that actually runs well at the minimum requirements. I don't know why people are talking down on W7's performance on lower end hardware. In 512MB, low-compute-power environments, it's heads and tails above Vista, and not far off XP. Frankly I'm almost a bit disappointed by the DirectX9 requirement more than any other, because that one requirement aside, 7 is a better "old machine" OS than Vista is.

I'm also surprised at how few people are seeing the long-term view of OS optimization. If you haven't noticed, Microsoft is getting its clocked cleaned in the mobile market. Everyone saw how easy Apple retrofitted OSX for the iPhone, and now Android, WebOS, etc are all crowding in and making WIndows Mobile look like the late-90s mobile platform that it is. Server 2008 and W7 are the first evidence that Microsoft knows how to slim down an operating environment, which gives a lot of hope for their future mobile OS efforts. If W7 can run reasonably well on a P3/512MB while remaining a full-featured desktop OS, then it's already not terribly far off being mobile-friendly.
 
herald said:
Those may be the "official" requirements, but I guaran-Damn-tee that Win 7 won't run at all well on any system that only meets those minimums. I'd expect that you'll have totally sucky performance on anything less than 2.5 GHz & 4GB of RAM. 20 GB of hard disk? Expect that to double or triple by the time you have all the needed drivers and updates needed to make Win 7 work well.
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You didn't read the thread, did you? I (and many others) are running it on a Netbook that is very close to the minimum requirements, and it's perfect.
 
next week i will have a PIII 1Ghz with 512mb of ram and i will install the RC1 build on it and see how it works for a "min requiremnet" system, on a rig this old, with any OS, you wont be doing much, heck, hit a flash site and it would pin the system.
 
Arainach said:
No, it would just mean no one would develop for it because of the lack of marketshare and it'd never get adopted.
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And Bingo! You can't force crap on people that they don't want or give a fuk about.
 
Just wait until it get released then the requirements will be twice as has high. like me (high)
 
MrGuvernment said:
Windows 7 will havea 32bit and a64bit versions, i dont see the problem... as said, alot of hardware and software is 32bit still, and if it works, people wont want to have to go buy new items just to use a 64bit version.

It is smart for MS to make 64 and 32bit, makes them alot more money.

Developers will go 64bit when it will benefit them.
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the thing is people dont need to buy any thing new for 64bit if there PC supports it
which most do now
and windows on windows64 most 32bit stuff runs fine
and if you havent noticed most OEM PCs are coming with 64bit Vista any more and more will have 64bit windows 7 too im sure with ram prices so low every one has 4GB of ram now
 
Well there are only 2 reasons for the x86 edition over just releasing the x64 is that there is a really common processor that doesn't support x64, the Atom. With netbook sales rising and notebook sales falling, Microsoft doesn't want to miss out on those sales and have to sell dirt cheap XP licenses for them. The other reason is that some business apps that are umpteen million years old don't play nice with WoW64 (Windows on Windows) and just choose not to work. Personally I've never had something that wouldn't run but I don't use ancient business software either.
 
Damn no editing,
@ Herald: You obviously have NO fucking clue what your talking about, I ran Windows 7 on a 1.6GHz Turion and 512MB of RAM for a couple months and it was fine, work just about as well as XP did. This was with shared graphics memory too, so even less RAM is actually available to the OS.
 
Uberbob102000 said:
Damn no editing,
@ Herald: You obviously have NO fucking clue what your talking about, I ran Windows 7 on a 1.6GHz Turion and 512MB of RAM for a couple months and it was fine, work just about as well as XP did. This was with shared graphics memory too, so even less RAM is actually available to the OS.
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Well, I hope you're right. I DO understand the difference between gaming performance and "usable" performance levels. I Set up PC's all the time, and I know that not everyone needs a gaming system. Vista was such a horrid load of cr@p that ti tainted everyone's perceptions. If these "minimum" requirements are for real this time, then It will be a good thing.

Still, for myself, I'll stick with XP until Win 7 has been out on the market for a while, and we see how it does.
 
Azhar said:
Yeah, I'm thinking Microsoft needs to bring up the minimum requirements, or at least post a decent recommended requirement, or else lawyers are going to be all over them again like they did during the "Vista Capable" fiasco.
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People are running it on 1GHz machines with 1GB of RAM and it is useable. Up the memory to 2GB and you're good to go for basic eamiling and web surfing.
M$ makes a product that doesn't use as much power and people bitch.
If you can spend $150 on the OS, then you can spend $150 and get a motherboard, CPU and RAM that can run the OS. Shit, Fry's always has a mobo/cpu combo for $100 or less, they also always have memory on sale.
 
herald said:
Well, I hope you're right. I DO understand the difference between gaming performance and "usable" performance levels. I Set up PC's all the time, and I know that not everyone needs a gaming system. Vista was such a horrid load of cr@p that ti tainted everyone's perceptions. If these "minimum" requirements are for real this time, then It will be a good thing.

Still, for myself, I'll stick with XP until Win 7 has been out on the market for a while, and we see how it does.
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Count me out of 'everyone'--Vista runs like a champ for me.

Except it likes to use a lot of RAM.
Crysis is buggy + unoptimized
Bill Gates really said 640k maximum
Al Gore invented the net
FUD
FUD
FUD

:rolleyes:
 
Elios said:
the thing is people dont need to buy any thing new for 64bit if there PC supports it
which most do now
and windows on windows64 most 32bit stuff runs fine
and if you havent noticed most OEM PCs are coming with 64bit Vista any more and more will have 64bit windows 7 too im sure with ram prices so low every one has 4GB of ram now
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Think more the buisness sector though, not so much person users, many companies have custom software that only works on certain OS's, sometimes it wont work on 64, and only on 32bit, so if MS can make money on a 32bit OS still, why not sell one, i dont see the problem really.

they will sell a 32bit and a 64bit version, buy what you need.
 
MrGuvernment said:
Think more the buisness sector though, not so much person users, many companies have custom software that only works on certain OS's, sometimes it wont work on 64, and only on 32bit, so if MS can make money on a 32bit OS still, why not sell one, i dont see the problem really.

they will sell a 32bit and a 64bit version, buy what you need.
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thats what emulation is for and why the XP emu ap is FREE with Windows 7 bis
but you know just ignore that >.>
 
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