Windows 7 (Home Premium)

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"After two Service Packs Windows Vista is now almost as good XP."

Not exactly a quote that make people want to buy the next big operating system from Microsoft and they knew it, as this time they allowed everyone to help beta test it first, for free!

Now the moment has arrived where Windows 7 is finally hitting retail stores but ... is it any good?

A pre-emptive strike ... first impressions are everything

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Apart from allowing everyone to use Windows 7 Ultimate months before it is released, Microsoft also offered quite substantial discounts on those who pre-ordered, this made upgrading to the new OS very tempting indeed for many.

So you could get Windows 7 from about £49.99, but they could be giving it away and it wouldn't be much help to anyone if the product wasn't any good.  Luckily for us, it's probably the most-stable OS we've had in years.

The overall look is much the same as Vista with a few exceptions.  The "Aero" effect has remained and looks as good as ever and pretty much everything looks shiny and crisp to the eyes.

Nevermind what it looks like ... is it fast?

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Over the last few days I have tested several games, applications and generally just the usual day-to-day tasks I would normally do and I have found that everything I've tried runs as-good-as or better than XP, generally more the latter.  Below you will find a list of the things I tested and the results, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Start-up time has reduced on my machine and I'm able to get straight into any program almost instantly.  This is the first time I have used a 64-bit OS so I was a bit worried like many others that some of my programs and games wouldn't work, so far though, I'm happy to report there has been nothing that hasn't worked.

Games / Applications running on Windows 7 test
 

Game/Application

  1. Mozilla Firefox
  2. Internet Explorer
  3. Internet Explorer (64-bit)
  4. Windows Live Mail
  5. Steam
  6. Windows Movie Maker
  7. 7-Zip (64-bit)
  8. VLC player
  9. Windows Media Player 12
  10. Windows Media Center


  1. Lord of the Rings Online
  2. Dawn of War 2 (64-bit)

Results

  1. Much the same
  2. Seems slightly faster.  IE has definitely improved
  3. Very fast indeed - needs Adobe Flash 64-bit to be released though
  4. Fast, makes my multiple e-mail accounts easy to manage
  5. Seems slight faster
  6. Fast, output to 1080p very welcome even if program is still quite limited
  7. Faster, large zip files seem to unpack in no time
  8. Much the same, maybe slightly faster start-up time
  9. Fast, still prefer VLC player but WMP12 is a step in the right direction
  10. This I like, it's fast and very user-friendly, TV in particular is very nice and with Sky-Player functionality coming soon this could become quite useful.

  1. Seems to have made the game run smoother, DirectX10 visuals are a nice little extra
  2. Runs better, Ultra graphics using DirectX10 make the game look even better

Looks good, runs good ... what else is there?

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It seems this time Microsoft have gone all out and tried to add in all those little things you've always thought "wouldn't it be great if...".  Move a window to the side and it will enlarge to fill one-half of the screen, move it to the top and it will maximise the window.  Shake the window and all other open windows will minimise.  It's things like this that make the whole operation that much smoother.  Jump-lists - one of the biggest additions according to Microsoft - are also something that after a while you'll forget they're there but you'd be lost without them afterwards.

Everything seems to have been made to be as easy to access and configure, so far the only problem has been networking to computers that aren't using Windows 7, it was quite easy to fix and everything now seems to be running nicely together.  Something which is also quite nice is the way Media Player 12 works with other devices such as a PS3 or Xbox 360, streaming all the content from your library is now very easy to do and works really well.  The "Play To..." tool which allow you to stream immediately to other devices will be something many find useful.

Come on now, there must be something negative you can say about it...?

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It's quite difficult to pick anything majorly wrong with this operating system but if I was being really fussy:

  • Customising the taskbar - you can't turn off the transparency completely - for some that want a solid bar, it's quite annoying
  • The Shutdown button - Two buttons would have been nice, one to shut down and one to restart, but no, we have to click the tiny arrow first
  • Unnecessary name changes - Things that have been changed for no apparent reason
  • The missing "File Edit ..." menu - Most of the time you have to enable it to see it, however I can't see why it would be hidden in the first place

The new "must have" operating system, or another "must avoid" operating system - like Vista
 

The Good
  1. Looks Good
  2. Runs Good
  3. Nice extra features
  4. Stable

The Bad
  1. Few small niggles
  2. This is what Vista should've been in the first place

The Verdict
I can honestly recommend this OS to everyone.
And I didn't ever expect to be able to say that...