Author Topic: windows 7 beta available for free Jan 9 (!) (Read 144,006 times)

Hirudin · « **Reply #75 on:** January 10, 2009, 06:24 PM »

Quote from: Deozaan on January 10, 2009, 04:21 PM

Here's how to get your license key for Windows 7 Beta. I just tried this and it worked for me.
...

Worked for me too! Thanks a ton!

Eóin · « **Reply #76 on:** January 10, 2009, 07:22 PM »

Just installed the x64 version here. Installed fine on a 3rd HD alongside a Vista and XP install

Seems quite nice I must say, like the tweaked taskbar a lot.

cmpm · « **Reply #77 on:** January 10, 2009, 07:26 PM »

Thanks Carol, those are working nicely now.

These links are working too.

http://www.downloadsquad.com/2009/01/09/direct-download-links-for-windows-7-beta-iso-surface/

And the key getting facts posted by Deozaan work as well.

Darwin · « **Reply #78 on:** January 10, 2009, 07:29 PM »

I'm downloading from MS now (64bit version). I'm planning on installing onto a spare harddrive that I have lying around and swapping it in and out of my notebook for kicks. Quite keen to see how it stacks up. Happy days!

fenixproductions · « **Reply #79 on:** January 10, 2009, 08:36 PM »

Ehhh. "No install.wim" error during install.

Hirudin · « **Reply #80 on:** January 10, 2009, 09:40 PM »

Hmmm... It appears that there are only 10 keys*. I have them in an easily paste-able list, but I'm not sure if I should post them.

* At least using the method Deozaan posted earlier, some people are saying that some keys they got yesterday are different.

nontroppo · « **Reply #81 on:** January 10, 2009, 09:44 PM »

Installs quickly on my Macbook under VMWare. Resource usage is slightly higher than XP, but that could be due to unoptimised VMWare drivers (VMWare Fusion advised to use Windows Server 2008 profile for install). Not having used Vista since earlier last year, I don't remember but still lots more services than XP running, but according to the Windows 7 Dev blog they've been further optimised for lower CPU and thus lower power requirements.

I love the new taskbar, unification of the launch/management space is long overdue. As I moaned on the other Win 7 thread, forcing fundamental functionality (proper window management) to only work under aero is obnoxious. I really hope that aero is available for all versions of Win 7 when it comes out...

nontroppo · « **Reply #82 on:** January 10, 2009, 10:24 PM »

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Carol Haynes · « **Reply #83 on:** January 10, 2009, 10:30 PM »

ROFLMAO

40hz · « **Reply #84 on:** January 10, 2009, 11:50 PM »

Well, I finally got the 64-bit version downloaded via the direct links provided by Download Squad.

It's currently installed on my AMD test box (Athlon 64 2.20ghz/RAM=2gb/NVidia chipset with onboard GeForce 6100 graphics) which is probably not the best platform to run it on. But it is equivalent to what most of my clients are using (if they're running a 64-bit CPU) so it provides me with some idea of what to tell them when/if they ask.

First impressions: very smooth install on a raw drive with only 2 reboots. Total time for the install was a little over 25 minutes from initial power-up to a functioning desktop with no surprises along the way. (I thought putting a Betta Splendens on the default desktop was kinda cute.)

All my major hardware was recognized except for one 1Gb NIC card. This card also needed a driver installed under XP so it's no big deal (although Ubuntu 8.04 did recognize and configure it automatically).

I only ran into one glitch so far. At one point, when I went to change the desktop theme, Windows Explorer crashed and had to restart itself. Other than that, everything seems to be working ok. I'm going to have to really push it when I figure out where everything is and get a little more comfortable using it. Microsoft obviously put some serious thought into the new control panels and system management tools.

IMHO: The "new look" is functional but boring with a capital B. (What is this fetish with baby-blue lately?) The best I can say about it is that I like it better than Vista.

Fingers crossed

nontroppo · « **Reply #85 on:** January 11, 2009, 12:54 AM »

Quote

IMHO: The "new look" is functional but boring with a capital B. (What is this fetish with baby-blue lately?) The best I can say about it is that I like it better than Vista.

Indeed I ***hate*** that namby-pamby squealing-boy-sprog blue that MS seems so fond of (which has plagued Windows in one form or another since Win 9x IIRC, it just spread in quantity in Win 7...). Oh, and on visual rants, MS still hasn't sorted out fit-and-finish with the window border, there is still a fugly 1px cyan border on the right+bottom of windows, a cheap fake transmitted light effect that fails miserably. And why still have that obese 4px window padding!!!. OS X (graphite) still wins fit-and-finish by a long run for me.

cmpm · « **Reply #86 on:** January 11, 2009, 01:30 AM »

http://windowsteamblog.com/blogs/windows7/archive/2009/01/10/here-s-where-we-stand.aspx

MS seems surprised at the demand-THE DEMANDS- for Windows 7. That we expect improvements in performance and quality and stability from this product.

After so many getting disappointed by Vista, wtf do they think the demands will be?

Eóin · « **Reply #87 on:** January 11, 2009, 01:33 AM »

Maybe just me but I've always liked the blue, sure beats ubuntu brown

40hz · « **Reply #88 on:** January 11, 2009, 02:47 AM »

Quote from: Eóin on January 11, 2009, 01:33 AM

Maybe just me but I've always liked the blue, sure beats ubuntu brown

It's not just you.

I use Ubuntu.

Anything beats Ubuntu brown.

Ehtyar · « **Reply #89 on:** January 11, 2009, 03:00 AM »

I liked the XP blue, i HATED the Vista blue (if indeed it was blue), and I'm loving the Windows 7 blue.
'Course I still have bliss on my desktop (not that i see it very often

).

Ehtyar.

app103 · « **Reply #90 on:** January 11, 2009, 03:02 AM »

Are the old school classic themes and taskbar available in Win7?

Deozaan · « **Reply #91 on:** January 11, 2009, 04:25 AM »

Quote from: app103 on January 11, 2009, 03:02 AM

Are the old school classic themes and taskbar available in Win7?

~~You mean like Win9x? Nope.~~

EDIT: I was wrong. You can get the classic themes from an Ease of Access theme, as shown in other posts below.

fenixproductions · « **Reply #92 on:** January 11, 2009, 04:32 AM »

2Deozaan
How does it look like without whole fancy-glassy Aero stuff? Is it possible to disable theming service?

Deozaan · « **Reply #93 on:** January 11, 2009, 04:45 AM »

Quote from: fenixproductions on January 11, 2009, 04:32 AM

2Deozaan
How does it look like without whole fancy-glassy Aero stuff? Is it possible to disable theming service?

Since I'm running it on MS Virtual PC 2007 and can't install the VM video drivers without causing problems, I don't have Aero enabled. But I think it still looks just like Aero, except no transparency.

As far as I can tell there is no way to disable themes. At least not from traditional methods.

But look at this interesting shot:

a_lunatic · « **Reply #94 on:** January 11, 2009, 10:19 AM »

The Ease of Access Themes are what your looking for

Carol Haynes · « **Reply #95 on:** January 11, 2009, 10:23 AM »

On the MS forum they report it installs correctly (with graphics drivers) for VirtualBox and VMWare 6.5

There seems to be the suggestion that you install it as a Server 2008 machine (or otherwise Vista) in the new machine profiles.

I posted a query about the problem I had with Win7 not installing properly and there have been quite a few responses which seems to suggest it might be integrated NVIDIA graphics related or otherwise just MS's NVIDIA graphics drivers.

See: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7itproinstall/thread/2664066a-242b-43ad-ad97-1a84fae53295

nontroppo · « **Reply #96 on:** January 11, 2009, 10:24 AM »

Quote from: app103 on January 11, 2009, 03:02 AM

Are the old school classic themes and taskbar available in Win7?

The classic look is still there if you mean this:

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You access it from Control Panel > Change the Themes > Ease of Access themes.

You need to set small icons on the taskbar to look more Win9x like. But the cool thing is that the taskbar still retains the benefits of the new unified launch/manage interface. So you get classic look but better functionality. Except for the fact the best new features (aeropeek, thumbnails and window visualisation are all locked into aero as I keep moaning about).

You can also turn theming on/off as in previous windows from the display performance dialog:

[attachimg=#]

Win 7 is starting to play up a bit, I've had Windows activation reset itself with no changes to virtual hardware or software. And on startup today it has sat telling me it is configuring windows software whatever that means for 5 minutes instead of, you know, starting.

Windows activation is such a horrid system, I wish they'd remove it once and for all. It doesn't affect pirates one bit, but does annoy everyone else...

Carol Haynes · « **Reply #97 on:** January 11, 2009, 02:45 PM »

I have had another crack at installing the 32-bit version.

Many people suggested it was a graphics issue so I installed a GeForce 7300GT OC PCIe card and disabled onboard graphics.

Win7 then installed - however there were some motherboard devices not recognised (SMbus was one).

I went to nvidia.com and ran the driver ID tool and it appears that Win7 incorrectly identifies my nForce 630MA motherboard as a 570.

There are no other Win7 drivers available at NVidia so I downloaded the Vista motherboard driver (which includes onboard graphics).

Installing the Vista driver for the correct motherboard and then restoring the onboard ghraphics adapter got my system working (at least in 32 bits - I haven't retried the 64 bit version). All devices were installed and working correctly.

As soon as the system booted up Windows update offered my the nvidia 630MA Win 7 beta driver. I let it install it and this killed my system again back into the reboot scenario.

I have now restored the vista drivers and told WUpdate to ignore the beta driver update in future.

It would appear that Win7 has problems identifying some motherboards correctly and also the nvidia beta motherboard/graphic drivers available from MS seem to be the problem - even when you do install the correct ones manually.

Hope this is helpful to others - how do I report this issue to MS ?

For future reference it would be really useful to know how to install Win7 with basic VGA support to be able to bypass these issues in future installs.

I have another issue now - I installed this in VMWare 6.5 but there is no Aero interface available (And without it it looks horrid - especially the Taskbar is grim). I tried running the system performance routing to see what level the system was running at and I can't get that to complete at all - it just hangs trying to optimise media decoding ??

Anyone using VMWare 6.5 got past this - or managed to get Aero working?

nontroppo · « **Reply #98 on:** January 11, 2009, 03:38 PM »

No, neither VMWare nor Parallels can run the windows experience index to completion, and hang in the same place you found. I tried editing registry values to force aero to show, but it didn't work. I know VMWare are working on getting aero supported, don't know why they find it so difficult as they are DirectX 9c compliant.

Eóin · « **Reply #99 on:** January 11, 2009, 04:04 PM »

Since I installed on a HD and it detected my 3d card fine I can post some Aero screenshots. I knocked the resolution down to 1024x768 because there was no need for massive captures I felt.

As you can see there are ribbons everywhere, but think they work really well myself. They especially adapt very intelligently to windows being resized. I can't see myself playing with it too much, Vista is running rock solid and I'm very pleased with it as my main OS. But when 7 is officially released I can see myself switching over almost instantly.

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