Windows 7

[RyaNtheSlayA]

Kingmohd,
The way I see it is this. If you want a Windows OS you have two options:
32bit/lower speced computers - XP
64bit/higher speced computers - 7

Now there are thousands of OS options out there, but if you have to have Windows I have come to adopt that point of view.

Duct,
I only want one so I can record game footage for the site. The actual tv interface is less of an issue for me since most of the shows I want to watch popup on hulu anyway.

This is true, except, with even mid range computers built 4 years ago, Windows 7 is a viable upgrade, not neccessary, but it works well (for instance my IBM ThinkPad T43)

[Jrecee]

I went to bestbuy and played with it today.

Seems like windows. The start menu programs section was annoying though. It stays in the corner and you have to scroll up and down. Didn't figure out if there was a way to change it though.

[darthmunky]

I just want to know what makes people want to switch to Win7.
As far as I know XP is damn stable and everything works on it, why go through the trouble of upgrading?

Basically, people want something new. Usually, people got the latest OS. But the reason people stuck with XP is because Vista was a complete failure. If Vista would have been a great successor to XP, everyone would have got it (or not downgraded from it). Now Windows 7 is out and every review is saying it's great. So people want it. I mean c'mon, XP is 8 years old. When XP came out, it would have been idiotic to still have Windows 95.

Here's a cool article. 7 reason to get W7 and 6 reasons not to get it
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2 ... 576,00.asp

[lordofduct]

Duct,
I only want one so I can record game footage for the site. The actual tv interface is less of an issue for me since most of the shows I want to watch popup on hulu anyway.

If that's so, getting a regular analogue one will do just fine for you.

They usually have an analogue NTSC (or PAL) tuner, Composite and S-video in.

You can probably get an older hauppauge for cheap now a days seeing as digital is flooding the market. My Hauppauge 500 MCE which cost like 130 bucks 4 years ago is not in production now and sells on ebay for like 40 bucks.

If you have PCI-e I can trade you my ATI Theatre 550 pro.



The plug underneath the two coax's takes the ATI AIW AV adapter... they look like this:

http://www.pcsurplusonline.com/index.cf ... uct_ID=164


It's hardware encoding (it encodes to MPEG-2 on the card so it barely needs any system resources to record) and the video quality is pretty good. A tiny bit better then the Hauppauge in my opinion. I just like the Hauppauge more because it has greater driver support, and they come as dual tuner cards.

[RCBH928]

So it is just a new XP.

Personally I like XP because I know a lot of stuff runs fine on it, I believe you can even run older games like from '99 on it. I am trying to play it safe and keep the XP.

I am no computer buff, but I think most people got 32-bit machines or are the new processors considered 64-bit?

[lordofduct]

So it is just a new XP.

Personally I like XP because I know a lot of stuff runs fine on it, I believe you can even run older games like from '99 on it. I am trying to play it safe and keep the XP.

I am no computer buff, but I think most people got 32-bit machines or are the new processors considered 64-bit?

All new Intel chips have a 64-bit mode (Core 2 Duo and later, this includes i7 and i5). Most AMD processors (not sure what one's are hot on the market right now) are 64-bit, and actually have been 64-bit for longer then Intel has.

Oh something some of you may want to know about Win7. Professional and Ultimate comes with a virtual machine seamlessly integrated into it to run XP software which you can choose to install as a XP vm application. This will allow you to run the application with XP support easily. The virtual machine is integrated seamlessly into the GUI so when the applicaiton is actually running it looks like any other app... it just is installed to a different folder.

Also the 64-bit Win7 can use this layer to add better support for 32-bit applications... or use the already existing 32-bit support layer.


The only issue with 64-bit has been driver support. Stuff that deals with hardware needs to be coded for 64-bit. All my hardware has already had drivers released for it that work on Win7 in 64-bit mode... accept auzentech (my sound card) who has one released, but it's missing a lot of features (auzentech is lazy like this... they have been saying they'll release a driver for Linux for years now, and here I am still using a generic driver).

Alcohol 120% and Daemon Tools also have notable issues (due to the ASPI layer). Last I check Daemon Tools still doesn't have a Win7 version working... Alcohol 120% does, but my license ran out a month before the release... I hate Alcohol's licensing plan... grrrrr.




I'm really liking Win7 64-bit. It's actually functional as opposed to earlier WIndows 64 OS's. It has a lot of interesting support layers and security layers that make me feel better about using it over XP (XP even with SP3 is just a death trap waiting to die... I only run it as a VM and keep a back up of the virtual disk at fresh install to back drop when I need).

The undlying part of Win7 is nice. As for the GUI though... it leaves a lot to desire. But that's just my personal preference, I don't really like this contemporary GUI crap people are jumping all over today.

Yes Win7 takes a lot from OSX in GUI design just as Vista did (this isn't Windows robbing OSX, it's just similarities in GUI... GUI is not OS... proof in case my Linux box has 3 gui's installed).

The new application task bar set up at the bottom is just awful. It feels like OSX dock, visually a little different in that it isn't centered and all animated like it is in OSX. But the functionality is nearly identical. In that you can sticky apps there for easy access... and when an app is running it sits down in THE SAME SPOT. Distinguishing between running applications, and hot links, is not intuitive (one of my biggest gripes with the OSX dock as well). I don't know, but I prefer the old school Windows 95 task bar. It makes sense, it is intuitive, you know exactly what the fuck it means. It also makes having multiple windows of the same app open annoying to manage (like say 4 browser windows... which all of us probably do a lot of!)

Another thing that annoys me is the lack of virtual desktops. My main reason for remaining with X11 as my GUI server here on Linux. Mac finally released it, but Windows hasn't fucking bothered yet!? I mean I get it, they didn't want to look like they were copying Mac... but come on, Mac is just uncovering a feature that has existed in X11 since... the 90's. I mean shit guys, way to be over a decade behind in GUI features!


But as a whole, Win7 feels very nice. I like it... I haven't dug around to see if I can turn off this application hotlink bar thing they have (hopefully I can)... and if I can then as a whole... it's a very nice replacement to XP for me. Not a replacement for my current OS though. Dual boot WIN!

[lordofduct]

http://www.lordofduct.com/temp/movie_01_01.avi

this is my current GUI and OS... how could I leave this? (oh and no it doesn't flicker in real time, that's just the video capture software not being able to keep up with OpenGL).

[darthmunky]

My processor is an Intel Core 2 Quad CPU @ 2.40GHz (4 CPUs)
Is that 64-bit?

[lordofduct]

My processor is an Intel Core 2 Quad CPU @ 2.40GHz (4 CPUs)
Is that 64-bit?

I said:

All new Intel chips have a 64-bit mode (Core 2 Duo and later, this includes i7 and i5). Most AMD processors (not sure what one's are hot on the market right now) are 64-bit, and actually have been 64-bit for longer then Intel has.

Core 2 Quad is after Core 2 Duo... I only brought up i7 and i5 because they are the latest processors by them and they don't show it on this list: http://www.intel.com/technology/intel64/


Essentially, Core 2 Anything will be 64-bit.



In the end all processors are being made 32 and 64 bit compatible by AMD and Intel. And people should probably be hopping on the boat. With software like Adobe CS4 suite suggesting a minimum of 2 gigs memory for some of it's software in the sutie. And OS's being memory hogs (Vista needing minimum of 2 gigs to be any bit functional, and Win7 isn't going to be any different guys). 64-bit is a must go. We're hitting the 4 gig roof fast... and the ONLY way to get more then 4gigs is 64-bit!

The software makers and hardware driver makers aren't going to ramp up there 64-bit development until the user base is there. But the user base isn't jumping in until the developers are there. Some one has to take the step, and I can assure you, the developers have made a huge step this round of OS's (with Win7 and OSX 10.5), so the time is really now. If you're going to get Win7 GET 64-BIT!

That and memory is getting cheap. When I bought my i7 chip, I got 12 gigs of DDR3... for 200 bucks. That's pretty freakin' cheap considering I got 12 GIGS! With it I'm capable of running 5 Virtual Machines with 2 gigs on each at once and still do all kinds of stuff in my host.

[darthmunky]

Crap... I got 32-bit.