Winders 7 RC.

[Pferox]

Well, I downloaded the ISO for both the 32 bit and 64 bit RC test, but because of some problems with my optical drive, I won't be able to install until I replace it.

Has anybody installed the RC? How is it running and what are your machine's specs.

I was thinking of upgrading both my server and my machine with it, that will give me about a year to test and decide on the costly upgrade, probably after I got hooked on it.

My server is only 512 k, and the suggested foot print for the RC is a gig, has anybody tried to run it on less memory yet?

I am running Vista now, so there is no big rush, but Jan and the server are running XP, and I will have to upgrade them pretty soon, whats your take on this?

[BassFishingCommunity]

Overlooked this thread.  Yes, I have tried both the beta & RC version of Win 7.  Minor changes, however the Vista SP2 is just at good as Win 7 in my opinion.  I recently switched to Mac but the wife still has Win 7 RC1.  Zero problems, but like I said Vista SP 2 is great too. 

[spetro]

Installed windows 7 over vista...Came as a free upgrade with new computer.  Can't see a whole lot of difference between it and vista.  Im running the 64 bit version/home.  Two hour upgrade....It was flawless.  Very stable and smooth.  I like it!

[Pferox]

I took the plunge and upgraded all three desktop machines on my network, I want to pass along some experiences. Its probably gonna take a few posts on it.

We went out and paid about 150 bucks for the Win 7 Home Premium pack with 3 licenses. It came out to be about what the going price for one OEM Disk would cost, so it is a bargain for us.

It is an upgrade, so you need to have a previous version of windows at or below the Home Premium tier. I still clean booted all three machines thus allowing the program to go in fresh, a habit I have gotten into a long time ago. The disk won't let you go from 32 to 64 unless you boot from the CD, then it will run right along.

The first machine I did was Jan's machine which is a PC Chips motherboard and a AMD Anthalon 64 x2 running a little over 2 Ghz. I wasn't sure if it was 64 bit compatible at first, since she was running XP SP3 - 32 bit.

It installed without a hitch, there were no problems, and all the drivers auto installed flawlessly. It scored out at a 5.0, with the processor being the lowest number.

My wife is very happy with the OS, it runs all her on line games without a hitch, something that hasn't been happening recently with her XP OS. I think that is because everybody is trying to get Vista and 7 compatible and leaving XP to the dogs, so to speak. The OS is clean, compact, and now that it is 64 bit, it uses all of her 4 gigs of memory.

I was pretty stoked when the first one out of the gate went through so well.

[Pferox]

The second machine was already running Vista 64, so I wasn't too worried about it installing, and it did fine.

It is a Gigabyte Mobo, and an AMD Phenom 9500 Quad Core running at about 2.5 Ghz. It is stable, but the satisfaction numbers 

The graphics come in at a 3.5, when the chip comes in at 6.9. I am sure that it is a driver problem, and am waiting for the next ATI RADEON driver update, this driver package also controls the network chipset, and it had dropped the 1 GIG board to running at 100mb.

It is very stable though, and Natalie, our cousin living with us is very happy with the performance, and that is all that matters. The interesting thing is that the graphics and network card all worked perfectly with Vista, so I am kind of in a quandry as to what gives on this.

[Pferox]

My machine was the last one I did. It had the same chip and memory as Natalie's machine, and I had an Asus gaming board which worked excellently on Vista Sp2 - 32.

When I went to install Win 7 - 64, all I got was a blue screen during the install. I tried to install Vista 64 first, thinking that I might sneak it all through that way, but no dice, even the Vista didn't want to fly. I tried taking everything off and installing stuff incrementally to see what the problem was, but to no avail.

I finally settled for a 32 bit set up, although I was pretty disheartened because I had specifically picked those parts to insure it was 64 bit compatible. After installing and running Win 7 32 bit for a couple of hours the blue screen crashes started to come back.

I had a an AMD Athion Dual Core, Black Edition I was saving to build a clocking toy machine, but decided that I might try that chip instead. Lo and Behold, both 64 bit OSs installed flawlessly, and my Experience numbers are excellent, they come in at 4.1, but the low number is because it is an older graphics chipset, the gaming graphics number comes in at 5.2.

The dual core, and Win 7 runs Call of Duty 4 better than any other setup I have had here. The only thing I can suppose is that the Quadcore chip and MOBO didn't want to play too well. The Chip was newer than Vista, so it was able to run it without a hitch in 32 bit, but when you put in the 64 bit flavors or the newer bits of 7, the incompatibility of the chip and board started to show up and cause devastating crashes.

This proves that stability is dependent on lots of things, including the ability of a chip to work with the motherboard, even if they say it is compatible, it might not be "just right".

I like the interface of Win 7, it was thought out well, although, since the service packs, Vista has become a good operating system itself. If I didn't have to get rid of XP bits, and the family pack wasn't around, I would be still running Vista, and would be pretty happy with it.

But if asked, I definitely would suggest an upgrade to Win 7 if I could, it is a very stable system right out of the box, and most of the problems are minor, and can be attributed to vendors not providing the proper code to run with the OS.

[tsmith35]

I loaded Win7 x64 in a VMware virtual PC over XP SP3. Windows score is 4.5 despite the GeForce 8600 (I don't game) and only giving the VM 1 gig of RAM. I am also able to use Aero glass. I guess I'll eventually get around to converting my physical PC to Win7.

Running a Core2Duo E6750 at 3.6gHz w/ 4gb RAM.

[Pferox]

That sounds great, I wonder if the numbers change when you change from virtual to actual.