Windows 7

[audtatious]

Bah.....Until I get used to this I will miss XP.

Anyone else hate the shock value of the changeover? No, I never went to Vista so this is completely new.

[Warped161]

yeah if you skipped vista then your in for a big surprise as to how much things changed.

[adrianfromthecastle]

dreamscene is cool

and readyboost is cool

so w7 gets a from me...

but then again, it doesnt take much to get me entertained. lol

[audtatious]

Yeah, I'll get used to it. Right now I dislike it as it's "change" but as I use it more and more I'll be OK with it.

[MinisterofDOOM]

I HATED XP. A lot. I was still a Win98se guy until 7 hit.

Win7 saw a lot of "it's about time" back end improvements that help PCs make better use of modern hardware. More intelligent thread process management, better use of SSDs, etc. Plus the GUI was made MUCH more efficient versus Vista. Windows 7 does the best job of combining ease of use AND functionality of any Windows edition so far. I can tell it to do what I want, but it also does a good job of taking care of itself.

Win7 is also really secure. Most industry analysts agree that Win7 is actually MORE secure than OS X. Which is reassuring, even if I have never had virus problems anyway since I actually use common sense.

With Win7, Windows went from being a necessary evil to a genuinely praiseworthy consumer OS.

I did do a short stint with Vista before switching to Windows 7 shortly after it was released. I was not fond of Vista's desire to tell me how to use my computer. Nor its terrible inefficiency on nearly every front. I preferred XP to Vista but that's like saying I'd rather be burned alive than drowned.

[C-Kwik]

From an end user (the typical not so computer saavy kind) standpoint, there isn't that much difference. There are a lot of nifty things (my fav being the ability to maximize restore windows just by dragging the window around by the header bar). The biggest difference seems to exist when trying to change settings. The organization is much different and takes some getting used to. But there is a ton more flexibility with settings overall as well.

I preferred XP to Vista but that's like saying I'd rather be burned alive than drowned.

Haha. Always the cynic. Oddly, aside from the changes in what goes on in the background, there isn't that much difference between Vista and Win7. But its still a significant improvement regardless. The little things can make such a big difference.

[otterman]

I went from XP to 7 also. I actually love it, I know I'm not using it's full potential but all it's pretty colors amaze me.

[audtatious]

Organization is what I have to learn on it. With XP, 2000, 2003, etc. I'm used to things being in certain locations. Now, not so much.

It sure is more secure. Took me a bit to determine why I could not ping it as I usually remote desktop into that system.

[MinisterofDOOM]

Something you can do to add a bit of configuration convenience:http://www.tomshardware.com/ne....html

Consolidates control panel and other settings into a single list. No shiny dumbed down categories, just a list of the options you can change. You can change the word before the dot to anything, doesn't have to be GodMode.

[C-Kwik]

Organization is what I have to learn on it. With XP, 2000, 2003, etc. I'm used to things being in certain locations. Now, not so much.

I was playing around with mine and found something that might help. If you go into the control panel, in the upper right, you can switch the view by to icons which expands the list to be more like the classic view.

[audtatious]

cool, I'll give it a try

[MinisterofDOOM]

XP had the stupid simplified control panel view, too. In every edition since then I've quickly swapped to classic view. I don't see how having to delve through MORE levels (after trying to guess what category your desired control panel is listed under) makes things better.

One of the things I really like with Win7/Vista over XP and prior windows editions is that drive icons show the drive space usage numbers and graphs by default; you don't have to right click and look at the drive properties to see it.

One thing I really HATE about 7/Vista is that I can't just hit Windows > U > U to shut down my computer. That tries to use Find to search for things starting with U. BUT there's another quick way to shutdown: Alt+F4 will bring up the shutdown dialog if the desktop is in focus (just hit windows to bring up the start menu to quickly switch focus to the desktop).

Another stupid thing I didn't like is that by default, the power (formerly shut down) button in the start menu doesn't power off, it hibernates. You can change that, though, by right clicking the taskbar, going to the Start Menu tab, and then picking Shut Down from the Power Button Action drop down menu. Now you don't have to use the stupid "more options" arrow just to turn off your damn computer. Does anyone actually use hibernate/suspend?You can also change the function of the HARDWARE power button (as well as the start menu power button) if you go into the advanced settings for any power profiles you have set up.