5 Ways MS can kill the Windows 7 Buzz

[ExNavy11]

Just read this article which raises some good points.

From: 5 ways Microsoft can kill the Windows 7 buzz - Download Squad


Millions of you have the Windows 7 beta installed, and for the most part people seem to be enjoying it. It's been almost universally praised as being "everything Vista should have been" and "Microsoft's most stable beta to date."

Yes, the internet is all atwitter about Windows 7 and that should be great news for Microsoft. Unless, of course, they manage to suck the wind out of the sails.

How would that even be possible?

1. Keep confusing everyone with the versions

Yesterday it was announced that there would be six versions of Windows 7 for sale. Half of those, however, you'll never really see as a consumer, because the emphasis will be on Premium, Pro, and Ultimate.

The Upgrade won't actually upgrade your existing OS, just your license. Wait, what? So the Upgrade requires a doing a fresh install? Oh, that's not misleading average consumers.

There isn't going to be a netbook version, but Starter will be available everywhere. It's only an option as a preinstalled OS from system builders. But you won't want Starter anyway, because Ultimate runs fine on under-powered systems. And you can only run three apps simultaneously with Starter, which severely hampers usability.

But they're still going to release it. So there.
2. Offer non-compelling Ultimate extras

Vista Ultimate owners, I feel for you. Where are your awesome extras? What is it that cost you almost $400?

What will Windows 7 Ultimate get you? Bitlocker? Really? Most potential Ultimate users probably already have a good encryption solution like TrueCrypt, which is free. Booting from a virtual HDD? Interesting, but why not stick with your favorite desktop virtualization app, like VirtualBox or VMWare?

Wait, wait! You get all the language packs, and that's exciting, right? I guess that's good news if you're a polyglot.

3. Fix things in a way that unfixes them

So long, annoying UAC! Man, that sure was a drag in Vista. The downside is, malware written by a 6-year-old can now disable your UAC completely without you ever knowing about it. As Long Zheng pointed out, all you need to protect against that is a simple prompt when something tries to shut off or modify UAC. Is that too much to ask?

The biggest unfix: startup repair. In the name of all that is holy, why does it need to take 40 minutes? I can pull my hard drive, install it in another desktop, run chkdsk on it in Windows, and throw it back in the offending system in about a quarter of that time. I can reinstall Windows 7 from scratch in that amount of time.

Thanks, but that kind of fix I can do without.

4. Don't provide killer examples of your new functionality at work

Federated search connectors are an awesome idea with tons of potential. Who has come up with the most interesting ones so far?

Microsoft? Nope. Enthusiasts.

Why is that? If this is really an exciting development, then why aren't there some really great connectors for download from the Personalization site?

And what about IE8? It's going to be right there on most Windows 7 desktops, so why aren't there any really cool web slices? Even the MSN offerings stink, and they don't render properly half the time.

5. Release Windows 7 before it's ready

Vista took a beating because it wasn't fully cooked when Microsoft pulled it out of the oven, and people weren't too happy about it. Don't get me wrong - even in its present state, Windows 7 can out-OS Vista. It's just that there are bound to be issues that pop up if it gets rushed out to consumers before 7 is totally ready.

The temptation is strong for Microsoft to get the RTM done in time for the 2009 holiday season, but this release really needs to be a complete about face from what we saw with Vista.

 

[Slimy]

Terrible article imo. Digg bait, that's all this is.

 

[PhreePhly]

Obviously, the author of the article doesn't know how to read.

Addressing his 5 points:

Versions

Win7 will essentially only have 2 versions Home Premium and Professional. Ultimate is not the same as Vista Ultimate. It is a single User version of Enterprise. Will not be available in the retail channel (i.e. Best Buy or Staples or Office Depot).

Ultimate Extras

What Ultimate Extras? Again, author has no clue about the versions

Unfixes

UAC - Well, the people got what they wanted. UAC in Vista worked. It was annoying for the first week or so installing new software, but after that, was rather unobtrusive, but the media rags posted enough articles by clueless hacks to scare the general public, for which UAC was designed. The greatest security risk to Windows is the average user.

Startup Repair - While the author can quickly and easily swap disks and re-install, etc. the average user is scared sh@$less to try that. Taking 40 minutes to perform a repair is the best solution for them. Those of us who know how to fix using better tools and methods will continue to do so.

Provide Killer Examples of Technology

The author is correct here. MS sucks at that. WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) is a great GUI tool for apps, but MS has provided few examples of its power. This is where Apple really kicks MS's a55. If the create a new technology or paradigm, they make sure they have showcase apps in the next OS iteration.

Release Win7 too early

What a weird argument. We have no idea what MS's release schedule is. They are collecting data from the general release Beta, their internal build, etc and from that they will decide if a RC is warranted. I think the success or failure of Win7 will have more to do with vendors having drivers ready to go. Most of Vista's perceived failure had to do with vendors (nVidia, I'm looking at you) not being ready. Not really MS's fault.

PhreePhly

 

[1Bowtie]

Great rebuttal Phree

I agree whole heartedly!!!!!!!!

 

[garysgold]

Great rebuttal Phree

I agree whole heartedly!!!!!!!!

+1

Welcome to the Seven Forums, 1Bowtie.

Gary

 

[Barman58]

+2 PhreePhly

And Welcome to the Seven Forums, 1Bowtie.

I guess the guy must sit on his mouth because he certainly talks thorough his ....

 

[1Bowtie]

Thanks for the Welcome guy's and (gal's also)

Glad i found this forum, enjoy reading useful info and good responses. Have it bookmarked along with MSFN as two of my favorites. I am dual booting XP Pro and Win 7 beta and am very impressed how things are working in this beta, NO prob's at all so far.

Thanks again

1Bowtie

 

[PhreePhly]

Thank you all for the support.

As an avid Vista user (now Windows 7), I am so tired of listening to the whining about how bad Vista was. I don't think the tech magazines and blogs realize the enormity of building a Windows release.

I used the Beta and RC builds of Vista and installed Vista on a laptop that was not marked as Vista capable. I had to search out drivers and actually ran it dual-boot until reliable drivers were out. In May of 2007, I blew away my XP partition and went to Vista only. I happily ran Vista up until the New Year, when Windows 7 came out.

The sad thing is that architecturally, Vista is far better than XP. MS has learned much about usage and security in the 7 years of XP and applied much of that knowledge to the Vista kernel. Why do you think that Windows 7 Beta is so good? Could it be that it is built on a solid foundation? Would that foundation be Vista?

I have used OSX, and while there are a few things I really like, for the most part, it is not nearly as robust as Windows. Apple has a very narrow hardware footprint to build to.

Linux is interesting as a hobby. I think it is amazing what the OSS crowd has been able to accomplish, and Ubuntu is actually a pretty well put together distribution, but I don't think the majority of Linux proponents understand what it means to run an enterprise organization.

Windows wins because of ease of use. Windows wins because of (and in spite of) backwards compatibility. The organization I work for still has VB3 apps that they use on the enterprise scale. No amount of pleading to the upper management to bring these apps into the 21st century works. And they still run on Windows 7. That is amazing.

The ignorance in the blogosphere is amazing.

PhreePhly

 

[DonaldTheGiver]

I will fully agree that vendors need to be more ontop of the driver game for the new os's, an average user which most of us here are not, has not a clue how to go out of there way to find and or make drivers work on an os that they are not made for, vista is a perfect example, look how many people had simple things like printers that wouldnt work on vista and there was no support for the solution in many cases. Driver database is for sure something that needs to be kept in mind by vendors and MS alike.

 

[PhreePhly]

I will fully agree that vendors need to be more ontop of the driver game for the new os's, an average user which most of us here are not, has not a clue how to go out of there way to find and or make drivers work on an os that they are not made for, vista is a perfect example, look how many people had simple things like printers that wouldnt work on vista and there was no support for the solution in many cases. Driver database is for sure something that needs to be kept in mind by vendors and MS alike.

What is MS supposed to do? They had Vista in Beta and RC for over a year. MS had a DDK (called the WDK - Windows Driver Kit) available for almost nine-months before RTM. The only vendors that had any excuse for being a bit late were the Audio driver vendors. Apparently, MS made a rather significant change to the driver model during the RC phase, so that the Vista audio drivers needed a bit of tweaking after RTM.

Were you around for the Win98 -> XP transition? There were many printers and scanners that became obsolete due to vendors not wanting to update drivers. Many people ranted and raved about MS incompetence and why the need for a new way of doing things. Win98 was fine and XP made their systems slow. XP needed 256 MB RAM to run, and Win98 could run on 64 MB, XP is a resource hog, etc. Sound familiar? Just like Vista, a resource hog, unnecessary GUI change, etc.

It's funny to watch history repeat itself.

PhreePhly