What exactly is Win 7 supposed to do?

Is this more like a super version of a SP pack add on to Vista, or this a whole new OS they are talking about in the future?

 

It'll be _Vista SP2 - in the way that XP SP2 was as compared to XP SP1 (i.e., a fairly significant revision, but still the same OS at heart).

 

In my opinion it will be identical to vista essentially but everyone will love it because it has a different name than vista.

 

Highly doubt that part. Microsoft's got a bigger hole to climb out of than just a name change. It's time to give the marketing people a bigger budget and roll out an extreme ad campaign.

 

Well it is going to be a lot faster with a lot of new features. The indexing feature is going to be a service and not a user program and every part of the OS is getting a overhaul. There are rumors that 7 will be capable and coded for parallel processing which would make this a unbelievably fast OS. There is going to be a lot of work done on the UI and is going to be capable of better multi monitor support. 7 will be nothing like Vista on launch and in my opinion will destroy OS X. Anyhow there is so much more to list but if you would like to know more here is a sweat website - http://blogs.msdn.com/e7/

 

From what I've read, it will be based on the same kernel that Vista is based upon. The leaked versions have build numbers of 6.1.xxx, and Vista builds are 6.0.xxx, so to me, that means there won't be any radical kernel changes. I believe it will be similar to Vista, but maybe with a smoother interface and some new bells and whistles. I don't think it will resemble a service pack.

 

I found a copy of an alpha version a couple of weeks ago... and well even throught installation it said windows vista, except under the lincense agreement, on the welcome page and various other areas, it does say windows 7.

head over to youtube and look for the videos other people have posted.

 

7 is going to be huge. It will be way faster and stuff like indexing is going to be greatly improved. There are going to be a lot of new features and I am excited to see way better multi monitor support.

 

Windows 7 will be Vista done right.

 

Any idea when Windows 7 is being released?

 

Exactly...

I believe it's gonna be what .Vista was suppose to be w/ out the glitches!

Edit: According to Wikipedia!

 

early 2010 according to microsoft

 

whenever someone decides to leak it

 

Pre-beta will come out in less than 2 weeks. It's available to people who attend a M$ event, but expect it on all BT trackers within 24 hours.

Microsoft knows this so that when people say Windows 7 isn't what it claims to be, M$ will say this is only a pre-beta and blah.

 

Except that Windows 7 is mostly UI changes, with only minor changes to the core OS. By contrast, XP SP2 was mostly about rewriting the internals, and had very few UI changes.

 

Can you say Microsoft Office ribbons on everything? =x

 

I for one am pretty excited about Win7.

So far, it seems MS is on the right track.

 

I think that Win 7 is going to be a little of a rush job. Like XP before it, they are basically going to continue most of the Vista GUI but use the guts of server 2008. That should make a for a pretty solid and stable OS

Of course, I have not been anti-vista from the start. Like most people, I was disappointed by the release and rebelled by switching to linux for awhile. I now use SP1 and while a lot of my old programs are now useless, and I have random crashes or driver issues every now and again, I have no serious beef with it. I have tweaked most things to get the 'first time user' crap out of my face, and appreciate the better graphics. Would like to see MS come up with even more GUI improvements however, as I think linux AND OSX are still superior in that respect.

 

Unfortunately, from what I've read and seen, you've got it backwards - Win7 will have the guts of _Vista, but a new "touchy-feely" UI. According to MS statements/leaks, Win7 will be built on the kernel of _Vista, and from what MS showed at one of the dog-and-pony shows earlier this year, and some scuttlebutt I heard, MS is pushing to make the UI as touch-based as possible.

 

I don't see alot of the problems with Vista Currently. Right now I'm using Vista 64 bit and havent' seen to many issues, if any. The only real incompatibility errors would be that firewall I was used to (ZoneAlarms) doesn't have 64 bit client. Even then though I got Comodo which works better (IMO) then ZoneAlarms.

I can understand the compatibility and stability issues pre-SP1, but alot f this vista stigma comes from the fact that to many computers were pushed out early on that were "Vista Compatible", yet ran vista like crap. A single core processor, and 1 gig of RAM isn't going to cut it if you want to run vista well and people failed to realize this initially.

The only real problem would be for businesses. Lets face it if you use something for 7 years then everything you use will basically become compatible with that OS. Operating Systems, atleast in my experience, tend not to have the greatest backwards compatibility; especially for third party apps, old drivers, and private programs. So really the only way Vista could be a good success with most businesses (which i would say does account for a large chunk of users) would be to make it completely backwards compatitble. What are the chances of that though.

I do realize that there were alot of problems with Vista initially when it came out but SP1 fixed alot of those, or atleast I believe so.

Like was stated I think the big reason for Windows 7 is that they want to change the name since Vista has such a stigma around it. I mean they are keeping with their traditional releases alittle more (4 years vs every 3 years), but I think its more to do with the Vista name.

 

Too true, I think Vista was just ahead of its time, slightly. It was too demanding on most systems when released (considering that the majority of PC buyers buy entry level-to-moderate level computers) and now the playing field for those markets is only just catching up to that spec.

I think it will be bad news all over again if Microsoft bring out another demanding OS, so using Vista as a template is actually a good idea if it sticks to the same spec requirements.

Besides, aren't quite a few OS's rubbished on release when compared to their predecessors?

 

Glad to hear that Thanks. Just couldn't bear the thought of a whole new OS already.

 

Actually, it's a WHOLE new OS. Only it uses Vista as a BASE.

It's not a Service Pack in ANY respect. It will be a complete separate product from Vista.

 

Windows 7 will definitely not be Vista SP2. Vista SP2 is already in the works and is planning to be released before Windows 7. Vista SP2 Beta has already been released to developers.

Read Here: http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1643

 

Ok. If it's semantics we're after, we'll call it _VistaSE.

 

I wonder what Vista SP2 is supposed to deliver? And I must say, it seems really early to already be releasing a second SP soon.

I guess it'll be for the best, in any case.

 

As funny as that sounds; you're still wrong.

Win7 and Vista are two separate products/OSes. Like Win2000 -> WinXP.

 

Well, since the current kernel version of Win2000 is NT5.0.2195 and the current kernel version of WinXP is NT5.1.2600 that's a very apt point you make, except for the fact that it more or less demonstrates the truth of what I'm saying, because WinXP was not, in fact, a major revision to Win2000 - at least as far as the guts and plumbing are concerned - just a fanciful reworking of the GUI to make it look like the change was greater than it really was.

For comparison, the current kernel version of _Vista is NT6.0.6001, and the first kernel version of Win7 is reputed to be NT6.1.6801. Thus, just as, by implication from the versioning, WinXP really wasn't a significant jump over Win2000, but more of a glorified GUI change, by similar principles Win7 will essentially be a revised version of _Vista with, in all likelihood, a fancy-shmancy new GUI to make it look like there's more going on than there really is.

Please, please, please - ignore the man behind the curtain!

 

The closest analogy will be the difference between Windows 95 and Windows 98, and lets be honest - Win 98 was a glorified service pack that you had to buy. So, Windows 7 is just going to be a glorified service pack of Vista that you have to buy and has the ribbon attached to everything.

 

Windows 7 = Vista with a whole heap of extra Aero effects which are BS in my opinion anyway.

It may however be a better platform. Who knows!