Windows upgrade a hit in Hamilton

BY CHRIS GARDNER

The next upgrade of Microsoft's computer operating system, Windows 7, is a surefire hit with one of New Zealand's biggest website design companies a year before its release.

Enlighten Designs, in Victoria St, Hamilton, has been putting the first Beta, or test, version of the replacement for Vista through its paces for a couple of weeks.

Senior developer Sam McKoy can't speak more highly of it.

The commercial version of Windows 7 is described by Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer as "Windows Vista with clean-up in user interface [and] improvements in performance".

Set for a January 2010 commercial release, it is likely to go through two more Beta stages and two release candidate stages before then.

Mr McKoy, who is running Windows 7 Beta with XP at work and on his home machine without any other operating system, said the new system made him wish he had upgraded from XP to Vista two years ago.

"I really like it," Mr McKoy said. "But we are still really testing it."

Beta, or test versions, of software are usually unstable when plugging in external devices, such as printers, but Windows 7 Beta was better than the commercial version of Vista.

"Everything is just working and I am quite amazed," Mr McKoy said.

"We could not even try Vista when it first came out and it could not do what we wanted it to do.

"Everything I have thrown at Windows 7, it's just taken to."

Mr McKoy said he loved the revamped taskbar in Windows 7.

In Windows 7 the order in which the icons appear can be set and stay put, plus they're easier to see.

You can also see a full-screen preview before switching to the window.

"It's absolutely fantastic and I love it," Mr McKoy said. "It's a fairly big jump from XP. It's like they have discovered the rear-view mirror is in the wrong place and so they have moved it for you. It should definitely do a lot better than Vista."

Enlighten Designs chief executive, Damon Kelly, said his company was running Windows 7 because it, and many of its customers, would migrate to it as soon as it was commercially available and getting a handle on it now would save it and its customers cash.

Many of his staff were using Windows 7 Beta in a virtual environment, meaning if it crashed, for any reason, the previous version of Windows Vista or XP would carry on operating the machine.

Enlighten Designs won the Partnering Award of the Year at the New Zealand Microsoft Partner Awards in 2008 and won the innovation category at the Westpac Waikato Business Excellence Awards in 2007.

Hamilton software tester Colin Hopper, who has been putting Windows 7 Beta through its paces for nearly a year, said Windows 7 promised to be the best Microsoft operating system yet.

Even at Beta 1 stage, Windows 7 was extremely stable and reasonably fast compared with its predecessor, Windows Vista, he said.

"For an early test version, Windows 7 is extremely stable, has great graphics, and good driver support, and installs quickly and painlessly," Mr Hopper said. "Windows 7 also has a new Activity Centre icon on the taskbar which now lumps most, if not all, housekeeping tasks that Windows has in this one place. It also tells you when you have major problems that need attention. Security, maintenance, troubleshooting and recovery options are all in the Activity Centre accessed via the icon on the taskbar."

Mr Hopper said running older programs, or installing drivers, was a little easier with Windows 7 because it had a "troubleshoot compatibility" mode which takes the user through a series of questions on the software or hardware and tries to fix the driver or install an older version.

"I found this worked when nothing else I tried did when I tried to install a Realtek sound driver."

Mr Hopper said Windows 7 seemed to be what Vista 7 promised to be.

"Windows 7 is a thinner stripped down Vista and promises to be faster. It is at an early stage yet, but for Beta 1, it is amazingly stable, quick, and promises to be the best Microsoft operating system yet."

Mr Hopper said users of all previous versions of Windows might be shocked to discover no email program bundled with Windows 7, but Windows Mail Live worked well with Windows 7.

Ben Green, Auckland-based Windows business group manager, said since Windows was installed on 95 per cent of the world's computers and most businesses replaced computers every four years he expected Windows 7 to be on about a quarter of business machines within a year of its release and nearly all of them within four years.

Microsoft will release an Enterprise edition aimed at businesses, although the details of what will be in it are under wraps.

DirectAccess will give mobile users of Windows 7 seamless access to corporate networks without the need for a virtual private network.

BranchCache will mean users in branch offices will wait less time to download files from the wide area network. BitLocker To Go will help protect data on any removable hard drive, including USB keys and compact flash cards, by using password required encryption.

 

- © Fairfax NZ News