Windows 7 released last week. A lot of people, myself included, are calling it Vista 2.0, but Microsoft would like to distance itself from the Vista name. If you have newer hardware, i.e. less than 2 years old and lots of memory and good video card, you probably shouldn't have any issues with upgrading as long as you're careful. I downloaded the beta of 7 and was running it in a virtual environment on my Mac and was satisfied, but I have no plans to buy it for my 5ish year old AMD Athlon system: it's just too old and underpowered comparatively (I use it as a Tivo repository). My virtual machine is going to be deactivated by MS in a month or so, at which point I'll go back to using my virtual XP image. Still, it worked well.


Here's some thoughts/recommendations:

I cannot emphasize this too strongly: BACK UP YOUR COMPUTER BEFORE UPGRADING!

You can get an external hard drive at Best Buy or Staples et al for $50-75ish. Microsoft says that you have to reformat your hard drive if you're upgrading from XP (you don't have to if you're upgrading from Vista, but it's always a good idea to do it). There are reports of people not having to reformat when upgrading from XP and earlier, but don't take the chance: BACK UP YOUR COMPUTER! MS includes a utility to restore your data from an external HD after installation, but I have no experience with that as the install that I did was to a new virtual image and had no data migration with it.


There are reports that some people are having problems downloading updates if they bought/downloaded the discounted price student edition. I'm sure MS will get that sorted out very soon.


I haven't heard of any horrible major third-party software problems with it, but I'm sure there will be some. Like I said, this is basically Vista 2.0: most of the major bugs have been ironed out of Vista, so 7 should be a fairly painless experience.

My normal morning routine is to check email, then before I start breakfast, load all my comics, which includes a look at Wired and Slashdot.

I didn't do that this morning because A CERTAIN POODLE woke me up at 6:30 to go out in to the snow and conduct poodle business.

So after I write my post on Windows 7, I see Wired has posted a Wiki page on backing up your Windows PC.

http://howto.wired.com/wiki/Back_Up_Your_Data_on_a_Windows_PC

only upgrade when I get a new computer.  More because the old systems aren't available anymore than actually wanting a new one.

. . . until Obama declares Windows 7 PC backup neglect a national emergency too??!!

Man, am I tired of the hyperbole about EVERYTHING these days.

(grump grump can we talk about Halloween or kittens, plz?)

I can haz nashunal emurgensee plz?

We bought ourselves new laptops for our anniversary (new for Joey - I've never had a laptop). They came with Windows 7. Joey said that was ok because they were new, but he knew about the problems encountered if converting. My home computer has XP, WHICH I like better than W7 so far. I can't see that it does anything for me and I don't like the way it looks. JMO



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I have newer pc and laptop that came with Vista. I am used to it and like it ok but I still wish I had had a choice because I would have gotten XP on all my machines.
Thanks for the info!

I am having new kitten . . . urges. I have 3 domestic - 2 inside, 1 in/outside and Cole the African Serval - Outside. I would love a Siamese mix.
I train the babies to NOT get on counters, tables, etc or claw the furniture. And my kids are good about this too. I just don't want to go thru the training part. Must be getting old.

Enjoy!






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my cat? He knows he's not supposed to get on the counters or table, but does it for attention. And for some reason he feels an urge to climb up my new sofa and chair when we both know he can jump onto them easily. Silly cats.

I like my XP, though Windows 7 sounds pretty good, like maybe they finally did things right for a change, but since my computer has no problems ATM, I'll stick with XP. Think my next computer will be a Mac, eventually.







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We're upgrading our computers that are running Vista already.

The XP computers aren't getting upgraded because they don't have the horsepower to run Win7.

We always do clean installs. We regularly wipe and reformat and reinstall just to clean out garbage.

My biggest concern is our security software - I need to go check and see if it will still work ok w/ Windows 7.
















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