Last year I wrote an article titled “After Windows 7: What Microsoft Should Do” and gave my opinions of what Microsoft might have up their sleeve for the version coming after Windows 7’s release later this year. Here’s a slight update to those predictions.
Firstly, system requirements seem to be about the same as Vista, except that 7 provides superior performance on the same hardware. This will be good down the road, when those who bought Vista upgrade, and find their hardware working more efficiently. I’m currently using the Release Candidate version and have played a few games. Supreme Commander runs well, just as well as it did on Windows XP. Unfortunately I never tested this under Vista, but considering the amount of processes Vista spawned, and Supcom’s use of every spare CPU cycle, Windows 7’s spawned processes don’t seem to choke down my hardware as much as Vista did.
Secondly, for users of the “Professional” and “Ultimate” versions of Windows 7, a Windows XP virtual machine is included. You’ll be able to run software specifically written years ago for XP on Windows 7 with little to no compatibility issues. This was one point I made in the previous article. In order for Microsoft to ease adoption of a radically changed operating, they would need to provide a virtual machine of the older software stack.
Now, its not known whether or not the inclusion of an XP virtual machine is the precursor to a rewrite of the entire Windows codebase, although it is an interesting thought. Is Microsoft testing the viability of packaging a “legacy” stack and gathering usage statistics? I guess once the new Operating System is released into the wild we will see.
Steps toward modularizing the features of Windows are being taken in Windows 7. This is an evolution from Vista’s in-place upgrade technology, allowing users to upgrade their edition of Vista by purchasing the offset price of the edition they wish to upgrade to. However, its my opinion Microsoft is shipping every feature completely installed regardless of the edition installed on the computer. The cd-key input during the installation of Vista determines which features are enabled. It might be possible to change a file and unlock the features of higher-cost editions of Windows 7. Its not known yet if this is possible, but if so, Microsoft will have to come up with another way of keeping software pirates at bay. I still maintain that having a basic installation of Windows that costs much less than what MS is selling it for, then allowing users to buy the features they wish for small prices and downloading the needed files to enable that feature is a better business practice Microsoft can adopt.
But in the meantime, those of you are thinking of upgrading from Vista to Windows 7, head on over to Amazon.com and pre-order your copy now. Windows 7 Home Premium
and Windows 7 Professional
