Rob Cheng
Dave Methvin
Steve Hogan
Lyle Schuknecht
Steve Bass
Harry McCracken
Chris Pirillo
Bill Pytlovany
John DodgeThe Dodge Retort – Windows 7 Release Candidate: Here goes!
By John Dodge
Ahhh, it’s Windows 7 installation day. No, I don’t have a orgasmically-equipped lab that will get me up and running in a 30 minutes. Rather, like you, I am a mere mortal trying to get a sneak peak at Windows 7 and to see if a netbook will run it. I have not advanced beyond Windows XP and my sense this experience will educate me on what a operating system for mere mortals should be if Windows 7 by chance is not that.
So I’ve read the installation page and understand the requirements. That Microsoft says it “could take a few hours†means that in my case, it’ll take days. One of the things that bugs me is how complicated Windows has always been and how little of the massive operating system I use or need. Most consumers will get it pre-installed on a new PC. For its part, businesses wait years before moving their IT gatekeepers recommend moving to a new operating system.
And I am trying to install Windows 7 on a netbook! It’s to risky to do it on my desktop given for many reasons, including the fact that the release candidate expires on June 1, 2010.
This all said, the release candidate is still pre-release and could contains bugs. Installing commercial upgrade you’d buy at Staples when it is released to the world this Fall should be easier.
WIN 7 INSTALLATION ON A NETBOOK - DAY #2
WIN 7 INSTALLATION ON A NETBOOK - DAY #3
This post is excerpted with Johns's permission from his Dodge Retort blog.
Related posts:
- The Dodge Retort: Windows 7 on a Netbook Review
- The Dodge Retort: Netbooks Getting Colorful (`cept Acer)
- The Dodge Retort: Windows 7 party hosting video bad, but spoofs are pretty good
- The Dodge Retort: 5 Reasons Why Netbooks Don’t Work for Work
- The Dodge Retort: Hopeful on Windows 7, But…
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23 Responses to “The Dodge Retort – Windows 7 Release Candidate: Here goes!”
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May 12th, 2009 at 8:36 pm
I don't quite follow you on this. I thought IE 8.0 is out and full of bugs?
May 13th, 2009 at 9:16 am
I believe Windows 7 is a new operating system, like XP. Not what some people think that it's the old Internet Explorer 7. Keep us up to date on your info. You guys do a great service for all of us.
May 13th, 2009 at 9:40 am
Installed it on a Dell Inspiron 1501 with 2 GB, replacing Vista Home Basic. At least compared to Vista, 7 is a champ. Under Vista, the laptop would lock up if you put a youtube video full screen and the wireless would stop working at all kinds of crazy intervals, requiring a reboot. Those have gone away. Everything else working well so far.
May 13th, 2009 at 9:59 am
Installed W7 on a laptop over the beta version of W7.
Once I had solved the 'burn an ISO' issues the actual installation went clean with apparently no hardware left high & dry.
So far it seems smoother than the beta W7 and better than Vista (not difficult).
Nice marketting trick by Microsoft. Let everyone have W7 Ultimate for a year then take it away slowly – most people will be forced to buy the retail version
May 13th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Since when has an version Windows been Complicated? lol
May 13th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
So, is this another gimmick from Microsoft to boost their sales? Give the public something to rave over then take it away. I had the same problems with Vista. I finally got the bugs out of it, now they come up with yet another system? If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
May 13th, 2009 at 2:24 pm
I've install W7 on my sony laptop and it's running pretty smoothly so far – 4 days one or two crashes it recovered from pretty quickly. Two drivers not recognised but once I downloaded the drivers from sony W7 found them easily and installed without any error – still trying to see if I can break it.
May 13th, 2009 at 5:17 pm
Purchased new Dell Insperon 1520 laptop in December with Vista Home Basic installed.
Frustration and agony followed using Vista. Dell Support was less then useless.
Vista Home Basic destroyed any delight in using a nicely made Dell laptop (it's their support that's useless!).
Vista would not run older software, particularly photo editing stuff by uLead and Powerdesk 6, an excellent Windows Explorer alternative.
Frustration drove me to firing up my eight year old desktop running XP with SP2 to carry out some tasks, Excel spreadsheets, internet banking, photo editing etc..
Dell laptop with Vista banished to cupboard periodically while I sulked and hugged my XP machine.
Frustration with Dell support led me to visit Dell store and part time sales employee, Harvey (God bless him) a Computer Science student at University.
I approached him at the Dell shop with laptop under my arm and asked if he had a large hammer with which to apply modification technique to Vista, and unavoidably My sexy red Dell laptop.
"mmmm" he said in deep thought after listening with a degree of intelligence I'd not come across before at the Dell shop.
"I suggest you wait until May 5th. and then download and install Windows 7". Inspired by Harvey's quite confidence and obvious intelligence I took his advice.
HUGE difficulty in burning Win7 RC .ISO file to DVD. Harvey once again to the rescue on 'how to'. God Bless him.
Oh, I should point out at this stage I am nearly 70, had two minor strokes and been using computers since early 80's with Digital C/PM machine – waaay before MS DOS stuff.
Anyway, with DVD successfully burned at last installation started. Process advises it could take several hours however Windows 7 installed in a little over two hours without a hitch.
Tears of joy fell from my old eyes – it was almost love at first sight (well 'use' really but you get the point). Installed old photo editing software, installed Powerdesk 6, and other XP compatible software AND 7 DIDN'T EVEN BLINK!!!!
Installed old Epson CX4100 printer. Sob, it worked.
In conclusion, Seinfeld fans may recall an episode wherein George thought the name 'Seven' was a great name for his first child and so far, two weeks into using windows 7, so do I. Almost overawed one might say.
Oh, only ONE negative so far, could not install Zone Alarm of all things universal. Spat the dummy but did not crash, got the advisory note that Windows 7 SP1 would be required first which was a bit of 'HUH?' moment for me.
Otherwise I am truly happy with Windows 7RC – so far, such an improvement on Vista I just have to wonder why Microsoft got it SOOOO wrong with Vista. And yes, I am aware 7 is based on the Vista anomaly but 7 works and has some some very nice new features.
Once again, thank you Harvey for your help and advice – God Bless you and wish you every success at University and in your career.
Leigh
May 13th, 2009 at 6:18 pm
W7 RC rocks! It is stable, fast, and better options for multitasking. XP is old, like win98 was when XP was released.
It seems that the there will always be people to stick to the old when something better is released.
May 13th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
PS-I've used Vista Prem and Vist Business since it was released, and I had no major issues with them. When I boot up XP I find it lacking in so many ways…
Install Windows 7; it's good for a year. Then upgrade to the final version – unless someone makes a crack to extend the life of the RC1 or RTM versions.
May 14th, 2009 at 12:57 am
Since i have a dual boot of XP and Vista I decided to blow away the XP parition and install windows 7 in its place. The reason is that since I use XP all day long at work there is not further need to use it at home as well. Installation was very fast and painless, Only driver issue was not locating the teaming driver from nVidia. Installed both 64 and 32 bit software on this 64 bit partition and also installed Vitual PC to install XP to run withing windows 7. That was also a very easy installation. Windows 7 is much faster and lighter on the resources, no crashes to date. This is what Vista should have been
May 14th, 2009 at 7:17 am
I'm Reading the Windows 7 stuff with HUGE amusement at the website:
http://techtalk.pcpitstop.com/2009/05/11/the-dodge-retort-windows-7-release-candidate-here-goes/
Having endured the all the pain of Windows, Windows 2000, Windows NT, Windows Chicago, Windows XP, Windows Vista … and now Windows 7, I still lament the lack of interest in DOS
… I am absolutely AMAZED that no one understands that Windows products have never been a real OS (operating system) because they all sit on the original DOS (disc operating system) invented by gates when he slept on the benches of the Harvard Labs that IBM desperately needed.
At the very best, the history of windows continues it's Frankenstein tradition of putting a head (the GUI system of windows) upon the original head (DOS) while pretending to be an operating system.
Manure by any other name is still manure, and people make a lot of money talking about it writing about it and even selling it to buyers who belive it smells like roses!
My "solution" is to keep getting beaten up by Microsoft because we all love it.
I have been using a MAC these past 2 years and eliminated much MS distress. But I do miss using some of the applications that are not yet available fo MACS.
Apple does have a remedy for those dedicated to their favourite applications windows.
It allows for windows emulation software to run the apps.
I recommend you all ignore the 7th Window
Allow yourselves to heal with a MAC (the cost is worth it) and return to being humans and abandon being geek freaks.
May 14th, 2009 at 8:36 am
I am an Windows XP pro user. When Windows first introduced Vista and the problems it had it One, didnt approach it the way they did XP. they are now approaching Window's 7 the same way they did XP. I have been using Windows 7 now for a few months and I do miss XP Pro, But i am willing to give it a chance. Installation was a breeze, if not better than XP's installation, In fact it was faster. I didnt have any driver issue's that seemed to plague Vista. I like the control panel, although I am not thrilled with media player. it seems to have irritate me. one i do not like the looks and it seems to complicated and I am not able to do just the basics. window media 9 or 10 was better. in appearance and to operate. I am still finding likes and dislikes for now so the jury is out. it can stand for more improvement. but so far its far better than Vista.
May 14th, 2009 at 8:39 am
konrad, err…you do know that the last Windows that was on top of DOS was 98/ME don't you? XP and later "emulate" DOS for older software, not very well I may add. And Bill Gates bought DOS. He didn't design it.
Just trying to keep it accurate.
May 14th, 2009 at 11:00 am
correction B Gates was given DOS then he worked out the bugs Im a builder/gamer and have been involved with the W7 test when it first came out I installed a 10 year old HP printer and the software was already in the OS installed 1990 SOF and it played like it was made for it now Im installing the res version to replace Vista as I will install Vista but will not guarantee it XP is a solid and easy to use OS but W7 is even better so far Microsoft has done a great job with W7 thats but thats just my view
May 14th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
Interesting comments above. I will continue to read these as it takes me considerable time to absorb all the pro's and con's flying back and forth.
You mentioned a trial version of 7, good for a year. That sounds like a novel approach from Mr. Gates. If the original OS for Vista could be re-installed if it does not work on my HPdv5, I might try it.
May 14th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
If Microsoft wasn't so expensive people would have no problem buying their products.
I'm sticking with XP as i can't afford not to.
Make it half price and i might consider it.
May 14th, 2009 at 4:13 pm
Agree w/konrad and Jerry's obs… Background: I'm older than dirt and cut my teeth on a behemoth Univac 1107 with "magnetic drum" storage in the early '60s using punch-card programming and overnight execution – almost destroying my fascination with computers forever. I moved on through Digital's Mini PDP-8S (yes, S for serial data bus) w/4K magnetic core memory, where you "toggled" in the binary machine code for the lowest level program loader, the PDP-11, the IBM-360 and the early micros (8080, 6502, 8087, 68000) in SBCs (heaven on earth with free CPU time) and cheesy Apple II, CPM, IBM PC (or, how to screw up a perfectly great technology with corporate inspired, narrow-minded things that "sorta" worked) and on and on.
So what, geezer, you say? I'll tell you what. The "development" of micro-processors, personal computers, their latter-day offspring, and the web have as much or more to do with the progressive expansion of the digital market to include more and more users who are less and less sophisticated about the underlying technologies of hardware and software. That is, it isn't that the real techies were shrinking in number or sophistication, their numbers were just being swamped out by the millions, now billions, of users who haven't a clue as to what's going on, or what could be going on – but think they do if they can talk about the latest and greatest.
Appealing to the ever-growing mass of unsophisticated and "first-time" users, is how the most successful marketers (like MS, Adobe, Apple, Unix etc) have been able dominate (and cripple) both technologies (software, now driving hardware design) with second- and third-rate Towers of Babel, rake in hundreds of billions in the process and, with their semi-monopolies, keep any competent contenders far from serious consideration. They are the GM's of yesterday who will be the GM of today when reality catches up to their crappy carryings on. Their only virtue has been "standardization", but that's true only at the lowest levels of function (achievable by other means) and, since they are marketing companies first and foremost, their impulse at any level above the lowest is to proprietize the function, optimize profits, and drive out competitors. (This is not a screed against capitalism, only against the failures of the referees of capitalism whose job it was to keep capitalism competitive and from taking us back to feudalism that strangles all progress in the name of "stability" and "continued existence" of the corporation.)
I won't repeat the dissection of MS software past – others have done that better than I ever could, but only point out that as the uses of digital equipment become more and more determined by the purveyors of those products and less and less by ourselves, we are all impoverished individually and as a society. W7 is just another step along the long road down from what could have been, and could be, to a world where we are controlled by people and organizations that have no responsibility to anyone or anything but themselves and their own welfare at everyone else's expense (and, spare me the stories of Gate's generosity with monies ill-gotten).
May 14th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
Is it just me, or does Windows 7 look a lot like Mac OS 10.5 Leopard? Not that that's a bad thing. If it will only run like a Mac, that would be something to cheer about.
May 15th, 2009 at 10:57 am
To Leigh Clark,
I really enjoyed your post, much moreso than the article.
A word of advice, from one who's been around PC's almost as long as you have: consider dumping Zone Alarm. I've been paying good money for Zone Alarm Security Suite for two PC's at home for several years, and, as a volunteer, administering it on 4 machines at a small rural computer co-op as well as assisting friends and neighbors. (They all have it because a major local ISP provides it for free.)
I've had some extremely frustrating problems with ZA over the years, and ever since the technology was taken over by Checkpoint, tech support has become worse than a bad joke in my experience.
Two things finally tore it for me:
1. An independent test rated the effectiveness of the ZA firewall somewhere around the middle of the pack, and the free Comodo firewall at or near the top.
2. After the last ZA upgrade, I had a dialog box pop up telling me that ZA was no longer compatible with guest accounts. This is critical for the computer lab as everyone but me has to use a guest account. So I asked tech support two clear questions in an attempt to clarify the exact implications of this message. Over one week later, they got back to me with a reference to the readme file that came with the update. I checked the readme, thinking maybe I'd been an idiot and missed the info I was after, but all it contained on this subject was the EXACT SAME TEXT that comes up in the dialog box. ARG!
I suggest you get yourself over to comodo.com and download the free version (and that's free forever, no crippling, no restrictions) of Comodo Internet Security.
I will admit, I don't know what their tech support is like because I've NEVER NEEDED IT.
Happy trails!
May 26th, 2009 at 6:30 am
Hello Mac users.
Why would you troll in a PC forum? I mean, I have nothing against Apples, I think they're cute really, but I have no intention of buying one. Why not pi$$ in your own threads about how great you think they are. Before you start flaming me for attacking you, I am not a M$ lover either, I use it out of necessity for work. I use Linux at home because I'm conscientious about money, and I like to learn new things. It just seems that the biggest $hit starters in most posts are Mac users,…..why? At the end of the day, it's only a computer!
July 25th, 2009 at 12:05 am
I've been struggling with Vista and all that unnecessary security. I was to the point of not using this brand new laptop and reverting to my 4 year old XP laptop for travel. I purchased a 128GB SSD, a Thermaltake HD docking station and used Acronis to clone the used space on the 320GB HD to the SSD. While the docking station with the SSD only ran at USB speed, it wrote and verified the HD in about 14 hours. I put the HDD in the laptop and put the 320GB Vista OS drive on the shelf as a backup. Installing the Win7 RC was simple, and luckily McAfee offers a Beta Win7 version for us licensed users. The only problem I've had is that I have a usb cable/converter for my glucometer for which One Touch has not released 64-bit Win7 drivers yet. My HP dv3510nx is now a welcome tool for me. PCPitstop performance shows it in the top 33% of laptops.
November 4th, 2009 at 2:50 pm
just purchased the official release of W7HP 32bit to install alongside XP. using the W7 upgrade disc installation went smooth with no problems. the only driver problem was the game port on my audigy soundcard. this dont bother me as i have never used a gameport in owning computers for over 8 years. i find W7 very responsive with no problems. i cannot believe how many updates i have had to install considering it has only been on the market around a fortnight. i have only had one or two problems with software but nothing that running in compatability mode did not fix. some of my software is very old. adobe photoshop 7 is an example and nero 7. i give windows 7 8.5 points out of 10. job well done.