Windows 7 home
I don't know why I do this. It's an early-adopter, obsessive compulsion thing, I guess. I promised myself I wouldn't, but I like to keep our system up-to-date and was enticed by the reviews claiming that Windows 7 offers a lighter touch over Vista. My system could benefit from that at the moment. That, and the 3-pack price deal (brilliant!) "until supplies run out," brought me in.
Let me say, since the days of DOS there has never been an upgrade that went smoothly (keep your MAC comments to yourself, please, I've heard nasty things about Leopard, too). Each upgrade seems worse than the one before, not surprising as our home systems are more complicated and expected to do more than ever before. When it came to upgrading to Vista, I shared a blistering meltdown on Amazon about my experience, although I will say, once the problems resolved I enjoyed using Vista very much.
Here it is -- I inserted the Win7 disc, it let me know where I might run into trouble, upon their recommendation I uninstalled a couple of programs and reboot, et voila, no DVD drive. Gone. Panicked. How can I install a program by DVD if the system doesn't recognize that there is a DVD? A quick search on the internet revealed an easy resolution through the "registry edit," whereupon the drive magically reappeared.
Forward motion. Restart the install. To be fair, the process does warn that it could take several hours -- not several hours of you staring at the screen and having to participate, but several to complete. It did take several hours to install on my system. I did the laundry, watched a movie, it didn't require my involvement. I checked in occcasionally. At a couple of points I thought the operation had jammed up and worried that I would have to start all over.
Nope. Patience and just let it do its thing.
I've never had an upgrade go so smoothly. In three days I won't remember how to use Vista. I liked it, but I'm feeling that this upgrade is better than the last (as it should be).
Let me say, since the days of DOS there has never been an upgrade that went smoothly (keep your MAC comments to yourself, please, I've heard nasty things about Leopard, too). Each upgrade seems worse than the one before, not surprising as our home systems are more complicated and expected to do more than ever before. When it came to upgrading to Vista, I shared a blistering meltdown on Amazon about my experience, although I will say, once the problems resolved I enjoyed using Vista very much.
Here it is -- I inserted the Win7 disc, it let me know where I might run into trouble, upon their recommendation I uninstalled a couple of programs and reboot, et voila, no DVD drive. Gone. Panicked. How can I install a program by DVD if the system doesn't recognize that there is a DVD? A quick search on the internet revealed an easy resolution through the "registry edit," whereupon the drive magically reappeared.
Forward motion. Restart the install. To be fair, the process does warn that it could take several hours -- not several hours of you staring at the screen and having to participate, but several to complete. It did take several hours to install on my system. I did the laundry, watched a movie, it didn't require my involvement. I checked in occcasionally. At a couple of points I thought the operation had jammed up and worried that I would have to start all over.
Nope. Patience and just let it do its thing.
I've never had an upgrade go so smoothly. In three days I won't remember how to use Vista. I liked it, but I'm feeling that this upgrade is better than the last (as it should be).
Product Features
- Install Windows 7 Home Premium on up to three PCs in your household
- Windows 7 Home Premium makes it easy to create a home network and share all of your favorite photos, videos, and music--you can even watch, pause, rewind, and record TV
- Make the things you do every day easier with improved desktop navigation
- Start programs faster and more easily, and quickly find the documents you use most often
- Easily create a home network and connect your PCs to a printer with HomeGroup
No, I am not a Microsoft fanboy. I have had my issues with Microsoft in the past, and even have a Mac Mini and an iMac on my home network. Even Vista presented significant problems out of the gate, and did not become stable for me until after Service Pack 1. But that said, I am really impressed with this latest incarnation of Windows.
This Family Pack is three Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade licenses for not much more than the price of a single license. It is quite a good deal if you have multiple XP and/or Vista PCs in your household to upgrade. My package arrived on October 21, the day before the general release date. There are 32 bit and 64 bit upgrade disks in the package. I did an in-place upgrade of my fully loaded 64 bit Vista Intel i7 920 system with 6gb system memory and 9800GTX nVidia video (yes, I know that clean install is the preferred method, and I will be getting around to it when I have the time). I had run the Microsoft upgrade advisor ahead of time and it informed me that my old version of Acronis True Image would not work, so I had uninstalled it ahead of time. The upgrade advisor was good with everything else, so I was confident the upgrade would work well, and indeed it did. In fact it worked perfectly, despite the fact that the system had a complex configuration of many diverse applications, including Lotus Notes, a number of multimedia applications, including Photoshop CS4 and Lightroom, and the system is an integral part of my home network running Windows Home Server. The upgrade took about ninety minutes and several reboots. But no hiccups. This was by far the cleanest new OS install that I have ever experienced with Microsoft, and I have done them all since the DOS days. I cannot say that the system is significantly faster, or that boot or shutdown times are significantly improved, but I did not expect that. It does "feel" more responsive. The code is much tighter I am sure, and the new taskbar and other goodies are very nice. Based on my initial experience, Microsoft has done a great job with Windows 7 and proven that, yes, even elephants can dance.
This Family Pack is three Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade licenses for not much more than the price of a single license. It is quite a good deal if you have multiple XP and/or Vista PCs in your household to upgrade. My package arrived on October 21, the day before the general release date. There are 32 bit and 64 bit upgrade disks in the package. I did an in-place upgrade of my fully loaded 64 bit Vista Intel i7 920 system with 6gb system memory and 9800GTX nVidia video (yes, I know that clean install is the preferred method, and I will be getting around to it when I have the time). I had run the Microsoft upgrade advisor ahead of time and it informed me that my old version of Acronis True Image would not work, so I had uninstalled it ahead of time. The upgrade advisor was good with everything else, so I was confident the upgrade would work well, and indeed it did. In fact it worked perfectly, despite the fact that the system had a complex configuration of many diverse applications, including Lotus Notes, a number of multimedia applications, including Photoshop CS4 and Lightroom, and the system is an integral part of my home network running Windows Home Server. The upgrade took about ninety minutes and several reboots. But no hiccups. This was by far the cleanest new OS install that I have ever experienced with Microsoft, and I have done them all since the DOS days. I cannot say that the system is significantly faster, or that boot or shutdown times are significantly improved, but I did not expect that. It does "feel" more responsive. The code is much tighter I am sure, and the new taskbar and other goodies are very nice. Based on my initial experience, Microsoft has done a great job with Windows 7 and proven that, yes, even elephants can dance.
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