XP or 7?

I hate hunting down drivers also so I slipstreamed everything into an unattened install disk using nLite.

Afterwards, I used BartPE & ImageDriveXML to make an image of the harddrive after installing & configuring my "core" programs.

I'll admit that it took a whole day to do, but I normally try out a lot of different trial CAD programs to see what is out there and need that "clean install" after 3 or 4 months of installing and uninstalling programs.

 

funny, never needed to clean install since vista. it's the thing i love most about it. and for quick restores i have windows home server backups.

so all the hazzle you have is gone, longhair.

but i know that way, been there, done that it was fun.

 

It's not representative - after the first page I played along with the Windows 7 fanboys and exaggerated the issues just to see how far they would go in order to discredit anyone who doesn't worship Windows 7. As Bog noticed, I didn't actually mention any specific issues aside from the ethernet driver and the webcam.

Here's what really happened:

1) I install Windows 7, notice that no drivers are installed, come here and post about it.
2) I poke around some more, notice that my ethernet driver is an unidentified device in the Device Manager, get the driver from Dell and install it.
3) I run Windows Update and get everything except the webcam working after a couple reboots.
4) After a couple hours of frustration mentioned elsewhere in this thread, I got the webcam working.

I was cursing at Creative, not Microsoft, while I was trying to get the webcam working (I used to have an Audigy, biggest piece of trash I've ever put into my computer) but I still don't like the fact that Microsoft installed a driver that doesn't work rather than say, doing nothing and leaving it as an unidentified device or better yet, just stating that the webcam is incompatible with Windows 7 in the Upgrade Advisor.

 

Hey Peon:

If you haven't found the link yet, here it is - M1330: Got AHCI working under WinXP... no slipstream CD, no floppy drive.

Had it bookmarked a long time ago.
Just remember to download the latest AHCI driver from the intel website.

Cheers!

 

and again, continue cursing creative. the webcam identified itself as one that is compatible to the microsoft driver so they supplied it to you. but it wasn't one of those, and thus didn't work. microsoft relies on devices to report only stuff they really can. but this webcam looks like it reports itself as a standard webcam => the default microsoft driver gets installed. but it doesn't work as standard webcam, it needs the special driver.

while it really really is annoying, it is by no means the fault of microsoft. you know that yet. i just try to explain why the hassle happened.