Windows 7 - A Personal Encounter

A number of friends have asked me about Win7. My answer to them probably has not been ideal (sometimes my mind can run in parallel tracks). Well I thought why don't I organise some points here from my own personal encounter with Win7 - hopefully as layman as possible.

BACKGROUND
I have been running the Win7 Ultimate RC1 for about 8 months now @ work & home. Last month I installed the Enterprise version @ work after their launch. I have to say I am very happy with what I am working with.

FASTER
Bootup and shutdown times are very fast. Even if you install more startup programs, it is still comparatively faster. Judging from the OS installed size (30 Gb), I have to say I am impressed with the startup time.

MORE COMPATIBLE
As compared with Vista. Win7 runs XP programs faster and a lot of hardware drivers are available, mainly learning points from Vista. I tried this with my arsenal of test programs and they all ran fine: IE, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, iTunes, Media Player Classic, Picasa, Notepad++, CS3, CS4, Avast, Garena, Daemon Tools, Virtual PC, Misc Games, Bittorrent, MSN, Skype. All my hardware works fine from the first install without any need to update the drivers!

BETTER TASKBAR
The Taskbar is now organised in icons with previews. For e.g. when you mouse over IE, all the tabs will show up above the taskbar in thumbnails. When you mouse over one of them, you will see the IE window displaying the content of that tab. This is called Aero Peek. If you have a YouTube video in one of the tabs, the thumbnail will also show the moving picture. I find this very useful when I have to shuffle between browser tabs / waiting for content to load - productivity gain. Unfortunately this does not work for Firefox and Chrome.

BETTER SCREEN MANAGER
I can connect my laptop to an LCD screen or LCD projector and it'd automatically detect and switch the view to extend / duplicate. If I am not happy with the settings, I can easily change the settings and manage the resolutions of each screen directly.

SECURITY is more friendly
The Windows Firewall and User Account control are implemented smoother with better prompts.

BETTER NETWORKING
The network manager is good. When I take off my LAN cable, it'd automatically connect to my WIFI. If I configured my network card to use a local IP (testing purposes) in an isolated LAN, my WIFI is still connecting me to the Internet. I can also link untrusted WIFI to Public for e.g. for stricter sharing / security controls.

BETTER SEARCH
From the Startup, you can search for the program and files directly. In fact, most of the time, I find the program by just using my keyboard. Hit the Windows key, type in the program name (or part of it), hit Enter.

BETTER WINDOWS CONTROL
Mainly from Aero Snap and Aero Shake. For Aero Snap, when I left click (and hold) a window's title and drag it to the edge of the screens, it automatically suggest a new resize. For Aero Shake, when I left click (and hold) and move the mouse from side to side, all the other windows will auto-minimize apart from the one I am holding. I find this useful in organising my desktop views.

BETTER DEFAULT FUNCTIONS
IE8, Windows Media Player, Record a Problem.

BETTER PROGRAM MANAGER
I can pin any programs I want to use regularly on my Taskbar as well as the Windows Startup bar. From the Windows Startup bar, when I click on the arrow beside the program name, I can also see the list of files that I recently updated with the program.

BETTER DESKTOP THEME MANAGER
Your desktop wallpapers can be your photo / wallpaper slideshows. Of course Aero gives you a very nice feel with transparency.

Notable Quirks

• If you cannot print, try printing a (text only file) or a test page first and try your doc again. Kudos to Henry who found this ;)
• Encountered 3 blue screens in the period used. No notable pattern though. It is probably due to some random hardware timing issue
• Taskbar disappeared once (on Enterprise version). I disabled the screen savers and everything seems to be OK ever since. This is most likely due to compatibility with custom screensavers.