Windows 7 A Success

After the epic failure of Windows Vista, pretty much anything would have been an improvement.  With talk of Windows 7, I have been skeptical of the positive chatter surrounding its release.  I have, however, had the opportunity to test Windows 7, and have only positive things to say about it

Windows 7 appears to be the perfect combination of Windows XP and Mac OS that I had once foolishly hoped Vista would be–the ease, speed, and functionality of a Mac, but the freedom of Windows.  The startup and shutdown of the operating system are extremely fast, as touted by Microsoft.  Programs run seamlessly side-by-side with no sign of lag when changing between windows.  It seems as though they have “trimmed the fat,” although I’m not too optimistic yet as I’m sure Microsoft’s usual patches will eventually run in the background and slow the system down.

The look of the OS looks very similar to that of Vista, with a few changes.  The Vista “Aero” look is still the same–pretty nice in my opinion, as long as it does not destroy resources.  My biggest pet peeve with XP and Vista was the windows toolbar; although I am nott a Mac man, I admit that Apple had it right from the beginning.  Now, the toolbar shows an icon for the open program.  If you click the icon with the window open, it minimizes, just like on a Mac.  It runs in the background, and does not seem to slow things down.  You click again, and it’s back open, where you were before.  Opening multiple windows of the same program merely cascades the icon on the toolbar, saving the most space possible.  The design is genius–thanks Apple!

The only problem I had with Windows 7 was during an attempt to install it on my desktop.  I could not install the driver for the wireless ethernet card that I had, but I’m sure it’s just because the driver needs to be updated–no big deal.  I installed Windows 7 on my laptop and before Windows was finished being set up, I was already able to connect to my wireless network.

I will be using Windows 7 for the next couple of months on my laptop and will continue to give updates on what I think.  If anyone has any questions, feel free to post in comments–I mean it’s an entire operating system, there’s a ton more I could ramble about.

Overall, I’d say that Microsoft has finally hit the nail on the head.