Most of you know that I've been a staunch supporter of Vista on these forums over the last couple of years..........I had a major driver problem a few days back that could only be recovered by a full re-install of Vista, anyway I decided if I was going to do that I might as well get Windows 7 instead, doing either meant I had to re-install all my proggies anyway!

Now here's the rub....It's only after installing and using W7 that I now realise what a complete bag of spanners Vista really was!!
If you still have Vista and think it's great, and I know there are others who think like that, just as I did, then do yourself a favour and move to W7, it beats Vista hands down.

What do I mean by that?.....Programmes run quicker and better, Vue 8 for instance had no tool tips showing in Vista and hadn't since version 6, now they show properly,  Poser imports would slow it to a crawl, now it flies, IE8 runs much smoother and faster also, in fact my whole computer is faster in every way, and yes I have installed everything I had under Vista.

Sorry for the gushing praise of W7, but I am truly elated and surprised at the difference!

I agree with you almost completely, except that I don't feel any need to bash Vista over it. I never had any problems with Vista. But then again I also build my own computers and all my hardware for the past three years was assembled with Vista in mind. There are ways of beating Vista into total submission, which is what I did, and anyone with good hardware and the patience to de-Vista it shouldn't have problems either.

But yeah, Windows 7 is considerably faster and far more efficient. I'm still not allowing UAC, but I found that disk indexing in Widows 7 is far more efficient and less annoying than with Vista, so it's nice to be able to turn that feature on for a change.

One thing though, don't let Windows 7 install drivers for anything. Do not turn on the feature for checking for driver updates, do not believe anything Windows ever tells you about updating drivers for any hardware, or you WILL have problems. Always get drivers for hardware from the manufacturer when possible. I mean hardware such as motherboards, input devices, video cards, sound cards and so on, not SATA drives or CD/DVD drives.

Also, if you use a pen and tablet for Photoshop, Zbrush, whatever, disable the Micro-crap from the Services as well as turn off the optional features for pen input in the Control Panel, since Windows 7 will totally commandeer your pen and tablet controls otherwise.

It takes a while to set up properly. Files with a .bat extension can't be added to the taskbar. I'm still waiting for a truly "pro" version of Windows that excludes all the nannyware, bloatware and crapware and just gives me an OS, but I have a feeling that's not even being worked on.

All things considered though, Windows 7 is the best Windows yet, IMO. It probably has a lot to do with their new open beta policy. Hopefully they'll continue that into the future.

From most reports it seems MS has Done a nice job on Win7

So how much does this bug fix cost?

Quote - So how much does this bug fix cost?

+/- $300 for Win 7 Ultimate Full Retail version, around 200 for system builder OEM and $100-something for upgrade.

Quote - I now realise what a complete bag of spanners Vista really was!!

I'm still having nightmares over my brief experience with Vista from February 2007!!!  LOL

I think I ended up with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from all of those "   STOP!!     Are you sure you really want to do this!!"  type pop up messages!!

i payed 130 euro like 200 dollar for a OEM version of Win 7 Pro ...
Thats the full Pro version without a nice box ... its handy to be a system builder ...

" And YES that is LEGAL ..  " but the reseller must know you as a System builder ..

Win7 does have a problem with internet connections .. mine loses the connection for time to time.. and no real reason why .. they say there is a SP comming in Dec ..

Chris

took a careful look at the versions out, and we went with Home Premium here - if we need the features in Pro / Ultimate later, I can add those with various free and shareware and none of the machines we have currently can reach Home's Ram limit sooooo....

cost us $199 for 3 seats, 32 / 64 included. (the Family Pack)

love it. the Laptop which was running Vista went from a slow sluggish crash prone wreck to smooth fast running and a pleasure to use... my Desktop flies....

just the wifes machine to do now...

Windows 7 is what Vista should have been.
I've heard rumors that Vista was pushed out to the market prematurely, that W7 was what the Vista developers had in mind - and finally realized.

Quite happy with Windows 7 here.

By the way, a Windows OS without all the nannyware - it exists. 2008 Server Core. But you lose the GUI.
Good idea, actually, why should one have a complex, CPU and RAM consuming GUI on a server? They're all managed remotely anyway.

Yeah well ... those prices .. we still get ripped of in europe anyway ..
A 3 pack 32/64 for 150 Euro .. i wish we had that ...
Im looking for 64 bit win7 ..but the price ..wow.. i need to eat Mr.Microsoft ...

But so far i like Win7

cost us $199 for 3 seats, 32 / 64 included. (the Family Pack)cost us $199 for 3 seats, 32 / 64 included. (the Family Pack)

I didn't have any problems with Vista, but I agree 7 is a much more polished product. 

I really like some of the features such as
Window Key + (Right Arrow or Left Arrow) to dock a window to the right (even works across multiple monitors).  This is great for some presentations where you need to show say a word document and another application side by side.

Windows Key + (Plus or Minus) - Zoom in and out..

That Problem Step Recorder is great too, if you have ever had to help someone with their PC problems, PSR to the rescue. 

Windows Key + T to cycle through your collapsed task bar icons

Minimize with Shake, grab the title bar of an app and give it a good shake, all the other windows will minimze and get rid of that clutter.

PerfMon finally got a little love, and now you can use RESMON to get a much better view than that old task manager.

S'funny you should bring this up. Vista just finished eating my system. It came with my box, so I suffered with it. But something in the OS got mangled and screwed up. I thought it was a hardware failure, or the GPU failing. But everything checked out, until he checked the OS and hundreds of problems showed up.

He had an extra copy of XP, so loaded me up with XP Pro. Everything is up and running and running faster than ever. Vista was a hog, and seems to have withered on the vine after Win 7 came out. But I'm happy reverting back to XP. This just occured and I have some tweaking to do yet, but everything is running smoothly so far.

Once I can afford Win 7, I'll probably upgrade, though.

-- Jeff

Now go back to XP and see all of your programs run even faster then they do in W7.

W7 compared to Vista ---- W7 is Fast.
XP Compared to Visa ---- XP is Lightning Fast.
So, XP compared to W7 --- XP is Fast.

XP, everything runs save, smooth, fast and lot's of money saved and lot's of hassle avoided.

No they dont...

I have 2 precise equal systems same MB, mem, Gfx , HD all the same..
One runs win7 pro and one runs Xp pro ..
And the Xp pro loses on all counts...
I did the same with Vista when it came out..
and vista was slow slower slowest compared to Xp pro

 Xp is faster then Win7 .. dont think so ..

Btw we did a test in the PC shop with 6 equal systems .. and on ALL Win 7 was faster..
And in the shop we tested 32 and 64b systems ...

Quote - Now go back to XP and see all of your programs run even faster then they do in W7.

W7 compared to Vista ---- W7 is Fast.
XP Compared to Visa ---- XP is Lightning Fast.
So, XP compared to W7 --- XP is Fast.

XP, everything runs save, smooth, fast and lot's of money saved and lot's of hassle avoided.

Is it possible to make a clean upgrade from Vista to W7 without having to install every program again?
I'm tempted to buy the W7 upgrade, but I don't want to reïnstall everything. It will take me days.

best regards,

Bopper.

worked just fine on my laptop here. I know that it's recommended to wipe and start over, but I'm lazy ... had no problems at all.

one caveat. you cannot upgrade Vista 32 to Win7 64. you do have to start over in that case.

Hey Boppertje :}

That i have tryed ..but it gave me troubles 3 time in a row..
And the time it took to get it working only half right took just as long as reinstalling all stuff again..

So im only advicing clean fresh installing..
Others might have a good result ..but thats just the problem... 10000000 pc's gives a 10000000 diff, settings ...
And thats what makes it so difficult to advice yes or no ..

But i say save time and copy your Runtimes to other HD and such .. then Clean install Win7 ..
It was by far the best solution we found ...

Groenten en fruit !
Chris

Quote - Is it possible to make a clean upgrade from Vista to W7 without having to install every program again?
I'm tempted to buy the W7 upgrade, but I don't want to reïnstall everything. It will take me days.

best regards,

Bopper.

Quote - So how much does this bug fix cost?

Makes me think.  XP was a bug fix to Me.  7 is a bug fix to Vista.  It'd probably be a good idea to skip the next version. 

Didn't mean to bash Vista, but I had a major problwem with it which ended with me getting W7.
Windows Update tried to update my graphics driver and screwed my whole system, a reinstall was the only option, which is why I decided on W7.
Bopper: I did a clean install and it took me roughly 6 hours to put back in Poser 6, 7 and 8, Vue 8 Infinite, Photoshop CS3, Pageplus X3, DivX, Comic book creator, Adobe reader, etc.
Takes little time if you've backed up properly first!
Cost was £169 for Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit.

 My main problem with every version of windows is that it get's gradually slow, buggy and unreliable just by using it for a few months. Let alone if I abuse it and install/uninstall/test in it.

Right now vista is about to die on me, the taskbar flikers, boot time takes forever, sometimes my user session wont close properly, bluetooth crashes while not in use, and a long list of etc.

I use linux too, more than windows actually, and I abuse the poor system with beta kernel recompilations, test packages, test servers, all kind of libraries and software, and is as stable as the first day.

I'll switch to W7 soon and see how that goes, I've tried it and it does runs great.

Thanks all for the advice. I think I'll wait for the upgrade untill I have more time, probably after christmas. I'm not worried about my runtimes, because I have most of them on separate drive. It's about all the software I'm worried about. But W7 sounds very promising.

regards,

Bopper.

I think I will upgrade too after Christmas. I need a 64-bit OS anyway, and Windows 7 will have a much better driver support then XP-64. 

IN October I bought the wife a new laptop with Vista - upgradeable to  W7

then  a few weeks later I bought myself a new desktop with W7

I must say  I should never have accepted the  15 mos free Macaffee  that came with my W7 machine,  but I guess that is solveable..... and also I will  upgrade her to  W7 ......

I also  seem  to notice  positive reviews, in general  for W7.

She has no complaints  about Vista,  but then  again she is probably not the harshest critic  ;-)

I do  think  that  P7  and other ap.s  ran  faster and smoother on  my old machine that  died - which  was runnning XP -( basically equal  processors  and equal  RAM to my new machine.)

I MISS that old  machine  and XP !!!!

The only thing I miss about XP is the less resources expensive it is, but the number of virus, trojans and general malware is just too much, I rather run Vista and it's (still weak) layer of security. W7 is inbetween when it comes with resources, and runs great on older machines were vista would just die out. My bother is using W7 on its old Celeron 2.2 with 1Gb of ram and he says it's great.

Quote - Makes me think.  XP was a bug fix to Me.  7 is a bug fix to Vista.  It'd probably be a good idea to skip the next version. 

Begging you pardon but ME is based on the older Win95 code base while XP was built upon NT6. Very, very different systems - not a bug fix.

In terms of efficient Windows systems, I still believe that Win2000 beats all, hands down. Mainly because it was barely more than a kernel with none of the multimedia crap. I guess Microsoft thought it wasn't flashy enough.

I remember reading somewhere that software manufacturers intentionally cripple software. When they need a new version, they activate certain modules which become  new "features"

From what I've seen and tested so far, Win7 looks awesome. Fortunately the Vista debacle persuaded me to switch OSs, from which I have never looked back.

I don't know, but I had very very bad experiences with Win2000, constant kernel errors,  user sessions that would get corrupt after a couple of uses, page file getting blocked, blue screens, weak login protocol that allowed script kids to gain admin passwords. A real mess, I preffer WinXP, which felt like a Win2k bugfix + eyecandy.

Now I don't think W7 is a bugfix of Vista, I think Vista was a Beta version of W7 :bored:

Buy the Windows Ultimate version and you're entitled do download a version Windows XP to run on your system as well.

Rªnce

A few bits:

* You can get away with buying just Windows Professional, and not Ultimate (there's not enough benefit to Ultimate IMHO to make it worth the jump in cost - Windows 7 Pro has XP Mode (a compatibility mode) built in, whereas the home versions do not.

* If you're stuck with using any version of Windows, 7 is the way to go - it is what Vista had been promised to be. To Microsoft's credit, they made UAC less annoying, memory management actually works, and you don't get sent to drive hell

• All this said, I have actually seen, in the two months I've used Windows 7 on my work laptop so far:
              - two BSODs (one kicked in when opening VMWare vSphere client, the second playing a flash game in Firefox).
              - one complete reinstall (KMS/Key Management System had corrupted, and refused to re-validate after fixing the corruption). Shifted from Win7 Enterprise to Win7 Professional.

• FWIW, in testing I've found that DAZ|Studio runs rather nice on Windows 7, but refused to run worth a damn under Vista on the exact same laptop.

IMHO? If I had the choice and the cash, I'd have a MacBook Pro (and if this upcoming bonus is big enough, that's exactly what I'm gonna get  :)  )

" If I had the choice and the cash, I'd have a MacBook Pro" 

Gonna hafta send Steve and a coupla the boys around, make you an offer ya can't refuse. Besides, I hear Shuttlesworth has thrown in helping Google so surely any self respecting penguin will hold out for Chrome and not defect to the latte sippers?

Experiences vary. I too found Win2K very stable. With XP, the first thing I do is turn off all the visuals and take it back to the "classic" UI. I've never really noticed the slow down after use that some people report, even though I hardly ever defrag the HDs and I do a lot of installs of applications, utilities, development components etc. I do clean out the registry at least once every couple of weeks but that's about it. One thing I do recommend is using a virtual machine or something like Sandboxie if you're going to be testing something or need an app for only a short time. I stuck with 2K until I started to have a need for XP only apps and will probably do the same for XP & 7.

Quote - ...a complete bag of spanners!!...

...Vue 8 for instance...

What an eloquent colloquialism! ^^     Thank you for this info;  I have three Vista machines which I plan to convert to Win7, and I also think I am going to get Vue 8 Infinite (which I'll need to learn from scratch).

Attached Link: http://reviews.cnet.com/windows/microsoft-windows-7-professional/4505-3672_7-33704140-2.html?tag=txt;page

It took three-four reboots of Poser 6 before it became stable enough for me to use.  I ended up giving that machine to a (gamer) friend who LOVED that little Acer.

I'll try Poser 6 & 7 on Windows 7 and hope for the best.  I know I need a new desktop anyway as my older machine has finally given up the ghost.  I could probably fix the old boy but it's way past time to upgrade.

I, like lmckenzie, run my XP Pro machine in a very Win2K mode and have LOVED Windows XP.  Until I test Windows 7 XP is my favorite OS of all times.

Thanks for all of the info.  Tasty thread.

Rªnce

Edit to add link: