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Before getting into the finer points of my opinion, let me just say that I absolutely love Windows 7… and not just because I’m a Microsoft enthusiast/evangelist, either. Windows 7 is what I wish Windows Vista had been; the perfect step up from Windows XP. Vista had the potential and the technology, but we all know that when the driver issues were ironed out, it had (and still has) the bad name to contend with. I was sent a review copy of Windows Vista Ultimate SP1 which I did indeed install and make my main OS. For the most part, I had nothing but good things to say about it when I reviewed it but I just never got past a couple of issues. Windows 7 has corrected those issues in spades… well, all but one:

The inability to get the OS to retain folder views the way you want them.

Seriously, Microsoft… wtf is going on with that? Vista, Vista SP1, Vista SP2, and now, Windows 7. If you’re not going to fix it, then remove the, “Apply to All Folders” button from within Folder Options. I’m no expert coder or anything… far from it, actually, and while I understand that there are certain issues that may be unfixable within any given state of, “final” code, is this really something that can’t be fixed? Do none of you internally get annoyed with this issue? Do you need to see this as being an annoyance only through results of billions spent on R&D? I don’t know, maybe I’m just being petty here, but if an OS is going to be changed in drastic ways to make its usage as productive as humanly possible, having to change folder views seemingly more times than not is rather regressive of such efforts, no? Am I the only one out there who experiences this with the frequency that I do? I seem to get a little more annoyed each time it happens… and if you think reading this paragraph was repetitive and slightly annoying, man, let me tell you about this little bug in Windows 7 I hate where Folder Views aren’t remembered… lol.

Now, with that said, I love everything else about Windows 7. It’s fast, sleek, doesn’t feel clunky and weighed down like Vista does, gives you options for more control with UAC without having to run command line scripts to totally disable it, and my absolute favoritist, favorite, faaavorite functionality… the new taskbar. Naturally, there are mixed opinions about it but I absolutely love it. It was *very* easy for me to not just get used to, but fall in love with (unlike the ribbon bar, which I *STILL* have to spend time searching for functionality I want to utilize in *every* application that uses it). Check out the following screenshot of my desktop (click it for a full-sized version):

Now, if that happened to be my taskbar on XP or Vista, my OCD would be kickin’ in to close a bunch of stuff out… but it’s not the XP or Vista taskbar. It’s Windows 7′s and all that stuff is pinned there, just waiting for my use and here’s the great thing (for those of you who aren’t familiar with exactly how 7′s taskbar is different): When you click on an item that’s pinned to the taskbar, whatever loads, utilizes the very same space in the taskbar, so it’s not like quick launch where you have some things like IE and Show Desktop right next to the Start button, then you click on something like IE and it loads the application in a completely separate place on the taskbar as has been traditionally done pre-Windows 7. For instance, in the screenshot above, see how I have IE and Firefox beside one another? If I click one of those, you’ll see it go active. That’s it! If you want to actually see which web pages you have open, you simply hover over the pinned task and a thumbnail preview pops up. Nice and clean, keeping your desktop clean of shortcuts (anything I would normally have on my desktop as a shortcut, I pin to the taskbar) AND your taskbar by managing your space as efficiently as possible.

Now, in that screenshot above, I’ve set my icons in the taskbar to be small. For one, it feels like it takes just a little bit less real estate on my desktop and I’m able to pin more items to it. If I happen to fill that row up, I just drag the taskbar upwards and I’m ready to fill another row. Excellent stuff! Oh, and moving the, “Show Desktop” functionality to the far right-hand side of the taskbar handles two things:

1 – Gives you the ability to just pull the mouse to that corner thoughtlessly. No need to *look* to make sure you’re pushing the Show Desktop button instead of something else in the former Quick Launch toolbar.

2 – Completely nixes the need for the Quick Launch toolbar. By default, the only item in the Quick Launch toolbar that didn’t actually launch anything was the Show Desktop button. Move that, and every bit of the functionality of the Quick Launch (I just accidentally typed, “Quick Lunch” there, lol) is prime to be integrated with the taskbar in just the way Microsoft did it.

Oh, and I like the taskbar, by the way. Just in case I didn’t mention that.

Something else I dug was the speed with which Windows 7 installed. Even from DVD, it installed quite fast! Seemingly much faster than any of the pre-RTM builds I installed, but that could very well be subjective to my observations on any given day I installed a build of Windows 7. All of my drivers installed fine without complaint or fault (I can’t say the same about Vista), and everything I’ve installed thus far just works. That’s it, it just. works. Exactly like I want.

Actually, there *is* one thing that doesn’t work for me that also didn’t work on Vista that I have to figure out: FarCry *will not* run without immense amounts of trial and error. I can get it to run up to a certain game patch level, but even then, there’s a point in the game that loads incorrectly such that you have to start over… only to get back to that point and be met with the same issue. It seems like a map issue and everything else could be drivers. I’ve tried placing the older DX dlls the game looks for in all the necessary places, but no dice. If/when I figure it out, I’m going to place a guide on how I got it to work so that others with the same issue may find success.

So… aside from FarCry not working and the:

IMMENSELY-ANNOYING FOLDER VIEWS GARBAGE YOU WON’T FIX, MICROSOFT

Windows 7 is in all ways perfect for me. I think it could very well be exactly what Microsoft needs to pull itself out of the throes of Vista… AND get XP users to finally upgrade to something else without feeling like they’re pulling teeth. Honestly, to all you XP users, let me say what Windows 7 is just as stable and just as fast as XP right out of the box… for me, at least. It’s definitely worth your time and investment to upgrade to Windows 7 if you’re still lovin’ on XP (or even if you’re using Vista; happily or not).

I hope to obtain a review copy of Windows 7 in which I will *thoroughly* review the heck out of the OS and – unlike having to do for another site with Vista – will post right here on UX Evangelist for those of you who are interested and for those who may accidentally stumble upon my site who are looking for a solid review of it. Feel free to chime in, in the comments section and let me know about your Windows 7 experiences.

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

PS – I *have* experienced one BSOD in Windows 7, but I haven’t been able to reproduce it yet. So far, it seems like just a fluke but it’s worth noting that the blue, the myth, the legend continues on…

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