Any thoughts on Windows 7 yet?

I'm pretty happy with Windows 7, and I've been running it on my laptop since the beta in January. I'm running Pro 64-bit ($30 if you're a student from win741.com) and I've had no problems with a variety of games, both brand new and old. The interface is a definite step up, and a lot of things have been subtly changed to work better and make more sense. Networking and media sharing are finally where they should have been years ago. While benchmarks seem to peg it as about the same speed as XP (depending on which test they're using), everything feels snappier and multiple apps don't slow down the system as much. It's great if you're a multi-monitor user, with shortcuts like WinKey+P to switch displays and WinKey+Arrows to arrange windows. Drivers now download automatically through Windows Update, and the whole install off a thumbdrive took less than half an hour.

All that said, though, I wouldn't buy it at full price. It has some definite improvements for laptops and netbooks, and it's all around nicer, but certainly not enough to make it worth US$200 or more. Unlike Vista, which was harmed by immature drivers at release, there's no reason to want to downgrade, so get it with your new computer with a DX11 card, but there's not much advantage to installing it on your year-plus-old PC.
 
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Why not just build/buy a new rig for Win 7 and keep your old one for your older games?
 
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Well, I'll be upgrading to Win7 Pro (for the XP mode) in the spring, but that's less because I feel the need to upgrade OS than the need for a beefier laptop for gaming purposes. Dragon Age is all this one can handle and then some.

Sad thing is, all those neat D10/11 features will be disabled by me to promote less lag in games. So I really couldn't care less about the features.
 
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Corwin said:
Why not just build/buy a new rig for Win 7 and keep your old one for your older games?
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Well, that's what I actually plan to do. I have a working Windows 98 machine and a DOS machine still lying around. But I haven't used either one in a couple of years since I don't really have the room in my apartment for a whole other PC setup. Once I build a Windows 7 machine, my XP machine will probably end up gathering dust, while tons of older games remain on my shelves unplayed.
/The whining ends here. :)
 
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All of this talk about dual boot systems has me thinking, why does it just have to be 'dual' boot? Can't I set it up so I can choose to boot to Dos, Windows 3.1, Windows 98SE, Windows XP and Windows 7. I like punishing myself, I might actually try to do this when I set up my new computer.
 
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Ands it's still inferior to linux and only reason to stay with it are games…
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Pthththh - like there's really another reason to have a home PC other than games. ;)
 
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Sir Markus said:
All of this talk about dual boot systems has me thinking, why does it just have to be 'dual' boot? Can't I set it up so I can choose to boot to Dos, Windows 3.1, Windows 98SE, Windows XP and Windows 7. I like punishing myself, I might actually try to do this when I set up my new computer.
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I tried a mix of Win XP with Win98 and today's hardware is too advanced for Win98. The only option is to use Virtual PC.
 
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skavenhorde said:
I tried a mix of Win XP with Win98 and today's hardware is too advanced for Win98. The only option is to use Virtual PC.
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You know, I installed VMWare specifically to play some Close Combat action under Windows 98, and come to find out that ATI doesn't make a win98 driver for my 4850. JUST because there's 10 years between the release of the OS and the card, and JUST because Win98 is totally unsupported, those bums think they can get away with not making me a driver. Well they've lost my business.

I'm going back to 3DFX.
 
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I had one of those too; nice little card in its day. You guys forgot to set up a boot for 98ME as well!! :)
 
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Yeesh said:
You know, I installed VMWare specifically to play some Close Combat action under Windows 98, and come to find out that ATI doesn't make a win98 driver for my 4850. JUST because there's 10 years between the release of the OS and the card, and JUST because Win98 is totally unsupported, those bums think they can get away with not making me a driver. Well they've lost my business.

I'm going back to 3DFX.
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Wow, you got all hot and bothered over that? When I tried intstalling Win 98 a few years ago I figured it wouldn't work, but thought what the hell it's worth a shot.
 
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Yea, I know. I just didn't find it funny, so I took it at face value instead. You know how many headaches I've had because of these upgrades? It's not something I find particularly funny. Nor do I bitch about how they don't have drivers for outdated operating systems. I don't expect them too, I just think it's a pain in the butt getting the latest and greatest. I've always been happy with 'sorta new and just okay' :)

I know my opinion is in the minority, but it is a huge pain every time Microsoft dishes out their latest 'shiny' new OS. I got lucky with Vista and it didn't take off as Microsoft planned, but this one looks to me it's the real deal which means I have about 2 - 4 years (if that long) before the games start coming only for Windows 7.

The easiest thing to do would be just buy a whole new computer. I just don't have the space or money for that, but there is time to save my pennies for a new one, I guess. More likely I'll just keep doing what I do and figure out ways of making older games work on newer operating systems.
 
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skavenhorde said:
Yea, I know. I just didn't find it funny, so I took it at face value instead. You know how many headaches I've had because of these upgrades? It's not something I find particularly funny. Nor do I bitch about how they don't have drivers for outdated operating systems. I don't expect them too, I just think it's a pain in the butt getting the latest and greatest. I've always been happy with 'sorta new and just okay' :)

I know my opinion is in the minority, but it is a huge pain every time Microsoft dishes out their latest 'shiny' new OS. I got lucky with Vista and it didn't take off as Microsoft planned, but this one looks to me it's the real deal which means I have about 2 - 4 years (if that long) before the games start coming only for Windows 7.

The easiest thing to do would be just buy a whole new computer. I just don't have the space or money for that, but there is time to save my pennies for a new one, I guess. More likely I'll just keep doing what I do and figure out ways of making older games work on newer operating systems.
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The worst thing about Windows 7 is that it's basically Vista with a few things removed and a few conveniences added.

It's all marketing and bullshit made necessary because they elected to release Vista as a bloatware OS - when they should have simply disabled certain features and made them optional extras, and hardware developers needed more time to perfect drivers.

But that's all due to the nature of capitalism and how you must ensure continued profit that has little or nothing to do with actual tangible value :)
 
DArtagnan said:
The worst thing about Windows 7 is that it's basically Vista with a few things removed and a few conveniences added.
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That could be said about most Operating Systems.
 
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I was an XP hardcore supporter, but tested Win7 for a while and decided to switch when it was released. I installed it a couple of weeks ago on a new hard drive, the other hard drive with my old XP installation on dual boot... well, that other option in my boot screen is gathering cobwebs. I like Win 7 and have had no problems with it so far. Granted, I rarely play old games, right now I'm playing Elven Legacy (no problems), 1701 (no problems) and xxx (MMO beta) no problems.

Advantages over XP? Well, for one, I can use more than 4GB RAM now (I have 4GB right now so it's only about 300MB more than XP would see, but still). There's also Direct X 10 and 11 (though none of the 3 games I've installed so far use it). It also boots much faster (timed last time I booted... 18 seconds).

Is it a must? no, not yet. But if you're getting/building a new computer, absolutely make it Win 7.
 
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Advantages over XP? Well, for one, I can use more than 4GB RAM now (I have 4GB right now so it's only about 300MB more than XP would see, but still). There's also Direct X 10 and 11 (though none of the 3 games I've installed so far use it). It also boots much faster (timed last time I booted… 18 seconds).

Is it a must? no, not yet. But if you're getting/building a new computer, absolutely make it Win 7.
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The memory thing isn't Windows 7 specific. That's the 64-bit architecture, and you can get that with Windows XP 64-bit. However, Microsoft don't support that OS anymore.
 
JDR13 said:
Speak for yourself, there are quite a few games that get visual and performance boosts from DX 10, and that matters to a lot of people.
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Being not rational was, is and will be the reason to install new Internet Explorer version as soon as it gets out, too.
So, mind me, I'm not in that "lot of people" who chase trends. And I still say, I am pleasantly surprised with Win7 and I adore the new OS. But not for new directX. I found some other tiny bits and stuff that make me happy. And I have to say this also - if you ask me, I don't need DX10/11 at all.
Although I like Win7 I can't nor will press others to install it. If you have XP-SP3 that works with everything you need, then there is no reason to buy Win7 unless you're going for a new PC.

Necrosis said:
By the way, has anyone here tried DosBox under Windows 7? Or any of the GOG games?
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Sorry but no, I haven't tried DosBox and I didn't buy anything from GOG (yet).

DArtagnan said:
The memory thing isn't Windows 7 specific. That's the 64-bit architecture, and you can get that with Windows XP 64-bit. However, Microsoft don't support that OS anymore.
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Why would they still support something that - works flawlessly? That support would get payed for doing nothing. ;)
 
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DArtagnan said:
The memory thing isn't Windows 7 specific. That's the 64-bit architecture, and you can get that with Windows XP 64-bit. However, Microsoft don't support that OS anymore.
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True, guess you could get Vista 64 instead but... that would be sort of silly.
 
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