by Brent Randolph
There’s been a lot of talk lately about the release of Windows 7, Microsoft’s newest release of the Windows Operating System. As such, Windows 7 is a culmination of technologies originally found in Windows XP and Windows Vista. Key features involve newer and tighter security, faster, more attractive graphics, and better support for new and upcoming hardware. Microsoft hopes that Windows 7 will make up for the shortcomings of Windows Vista, and be viewed as a viable upgrade for users still hanging on to Windows XP.
So is Windows 7 right for you and your organization? Is it going to be a worthwhile upgrade?
We think so, and below we’l l outline why, as well as delve into some of the changes you can expect to see.
So what do you need? What kind of hardware is required to make Windows 7 run as fast and stable as Windows XP?
OBT Recommends
- Dual-core AMD or Intel CPU, running at least 1.8Ghz per core
- 2 to 4 GB of RAM
- 128MB DirectX 10-capable video card
- 250GB of hard disk space
With this configuration, your computer should be able to provide an experience similar to a fast Windows XP computer. Of note, all OBT configured systems built since January 2009 should handle Windows 7 just fine.
Why all this new hardware and memory? When Windows XP was released, the fastest computers were usually a single CPU running less than 1 GHz and seldom contained more than 1GB of memory. A 3D capable video card usually had less than 64MB of ram, and was meant for games, not office work. Compared to today’s computers, those systems were as powerful as your current DVD or Blu-Ray player.
Today’s software not only uses 3D graphics for games, but also for daily tasks as mundane as simply arranging windows and icons for a more efficient desktop environment. The CPUs of today’s computers work in conjunction with your graphics card to crunch numbers quicker than we’ve ever been able to before. In order to use all these new technologies, a new foundation has to be laid. Windows XP simply cannot perform optimally on newer, faster computers because it doesn’t know how to properly instruct the new components to do their jobs. As a result, Windows 7 was built from the ground up to take advantage of the hardware of today and tomorrow, ensuring that your software should continue to work properly.
So, if all you do is create and edit documents and spreadsheets, why does ay of this matter to you? Most importantly, computers get old. Numerous updates of existing software, larger databases used by system security software, and more and more protective background services can, over time, slow down your computer. Previously, simply reformatting and reinstalling your Operating System and applications was the best way to increase performance; so much so that Microsoft itself recommended doing so every 12-24 months to maintain an expected level of performance.
This is not as true today as it once was. Sure, installing the base Operating System and applications can actually give a boost in performance, but once all the anti-virus, anti-spam, anti-malware, and anti-adware software is installed (required to properly protect your computer from threats,) that speed boost is quickly negated by all the additional overhead required for these applications. Upgrades are inevitable, and as software is updated, so must be the hardware in order to keep up. After a certain point, Windows XP will hit a ceiling of what it understands a computer to be, and must be deprecated and replaced. Windows 7 is not immune to these problems, but does handle the duties much more efficiently, and can take advantage of newer hardware to maintain a better level of performance.
Under the hood, Windows 7 does many things different than XP, including how internet connections to and from your machine are handled, how applications access system memory, and more robust configuration of user privileges. From the user’s perspective, only a few things have changed, and many for the better.
So What’s New?
Windows 7 includes much better methods of managing your desktop, such as a newly redesigned Start Menu, task bar, icon management, and window management. An example of one of these new features is something called “Aero Peek”, which is a method of seeing what applications and windows are currently running on your computer. Simply hovering the mouse cursor over the program’s name in the task bar will give you a thumbnail of that application and it’s windows, allowing you to pick only the window you need.
The new Start Menu is laid out in a way that makes it easier to find the application you’re looking for, search for documents and files on your hard drive, and access network shares and system settings. A few things may take a little getting used to, such as the location of certain control panels (Mouse settings immediately come to mind), and Start Menu keyboard shortcuts have changed a bit.
For example, previously opening the Command Prompt could be done by hitting the Windows key, typing ‘r’ (for Run), and typing ‘cmd’ (or ‘command’). The new method is a bit quicker, as now you simply hit the Windows key and type ‘command’, eliminating the “Run” function. By contrast, hitting the windows key and typing *any* letter will initiate a search for all files and programs on your hard drive. On a fast computer, this works wonderfully. On older, slower systems this does not work as well as one would hope, but still extremely functional.
Managing your open Windows is also much easier. Now, if you want a window to go full screen, simply drag it to the top of your display and it’ll automatically resize. Want to compare one document to another? Now you can drag a window to the right or left side of your screen and it’ll automatically resize to use exactly half of your screen-space. Drag the other document window to the opposite side, and view them side-by-side. The alt-tab function has also been tweaked, showing not only a small thumbnail of the application window, but also showing only the highlighted window on your screen, making all others transparent.
When is all this going to happen?
Microsoft is ending official support for Windows XP in July of 2010, and all extended support in 2014. New hardware will most likely not include drivers for XP, and while some drivers may remain available for a few more years, they’ll only be maintenance releases, and won’t be capable of adding or opening up new features. OBT is officially ending new XP installs on January 1, 2010. As of that date, we will no longer be building computers with Windows XP. Existing installs will continue to be supported in the future, basically for as long as we can get hardware support for devices. However, just as Windows 98 will no longer install on native hardware, XP, too, will eventually fail to install on new computers.
All in all, Windows 7 is a solid upgrade over Vista and XP. XP is now 8 years old, and showing obvious signs of aging. Windows Vista was -- to many – slow and bloated, but users will see a marked difference in Windows 7 performance. System stability also seems improved over both XP and Vista, and while the system feels quicker overall, some things are still a measure in patience.