Do I need Windows 7?

[hrh_disney_queen]

If anyone has it already, did it improve anything for your PC? Our PC is for playing, email, and homework. DH has a Mac, which he uses for work. He won't touch the PC. (aka Mac Snob) Anyway, I don't know much about what the upgrade is supposed to do. Any thoughts?

 

[bicker]

We need some more information -- especially what operating system are you using now?

There is a compatibility tool to ensure that your computer can support Windows 7:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/get/upgrade-advisor.aspx

Make sure you run that before you go much further, and make sure you follow the directions (have everything connected and turned on).

Windows 7 can provide significant advantages in terms of performance and reliability.

 

[Blue.Fairy2]

I am running beta 7 and I love it! I need to go out and purchase the final version(missed the deal-arggg)

I think my computer runs smoother and I have a lot less IE problems with 7 than vista.

 

[Papa Deuce]

I had to buy a new laptop for my DJ business... Bought it this morning online... it comes with Windows 7.... and all I kept thinking was that I wish it was running 32 bit XP.... because I KNOW that the DJ software will work on XP... fingers crossed on Windows 7 64 bit.

 

[LexiC123]

I purchased a new computer in June that's running Vista, and have had nothing but problems with it. I plan on upgrading to Windows 7 in the hopes that it will be less of a headache for me.

Adding insult to injury, I missed out on getting the upgrade for free by 10 measly days (the cutoff was June 26th - I ordered my computer on June 16th), so now I have to lay out the $$ for the upgrade. I just hope it's worth it.

 

[OK!]

I bought a new laptop a couple of weeks ago with Win 7 and LOVE IT. It's a little hard for me to tell the difference in terms of performance because a lot of things on this laptop are upgrades from my old one (not the least of which being double the RAM) so it's difficult to attribute the performance improvement to any one thing, but I can tell you it hasn't crashed at all (and it has been on pretty much continuously) since I bought it.

 

[FireDancer]

I had to buy a new laptop for my DJ business... Bought it this morning online... it comes with Windows 7.... and all I kept thinking was that I wish it was running 32 bit XP.... because I KNOW that the DJ software will work on XP... fingers crossed on Windows 7 64 bit.

Windows 7 works a bit differently than past releases in the way it handles legacy programs. Without getting into overly technical details in the past the new operating system held all of the code needed to run past programs. For example, Windows XP had all the necessary code to run Windows 98 programs. While this sounds great it makes for a bloated OS that has a lot of functionality that is used a very small % of the time. Windows 7 instead launches a virtual environment to run old code if it isn't compatible with Windows 7. This should be transparent to the user.

Long story short, you should be able to run XP programs better under this set up than you would have under the old way of doing things.

If anyone has it already, did it improve anything for your PC? Our PC is for playing, email, and homework. DH has a Mac, which he uses for work. He won't touch the PC. (aka Mac Snob) Anyway, I don't know much about what the upgrade is supposed to do. Any thoughts?

If you are running Windows 7 then I would definitely install Windows 7. However, do not do an upgrade, do a fresh install. I would never do anything other than a clean install of any operating system period.

If you are running XP you will have to use the compatibility tool mentioned earlier.

 

[Jennasis]

Can't help you...we're a LINUX household. Dh won't even let me say the word Microsoft or windows in the house.