Windows 7 RC: First Observations
Only a few days after the Release Candidate of Microsoft Windows 7 was released, I took the plunge and installed it on my primary laptop. Previously, I was running Windows Vista Ultimate x64 and I was really disappointed in how sluggish the system felt, especially when entering or leaving hibernation. With little to lose except for a bit of time, I completely removed Vista and installed a fresh copy of Windows 7RC.Se
Setup and Configuration
If you’ve ever installed Windows Vista, the setup process for Windows 7 will be very familiar. While there are some minor aesthetic changes, the process appears to be mostly the same. However, one difference that you may have noticed is the spare 100-200MB partition in front of the system partion that setup creates automatically during a clean install. This partition is created so that Bitlocker can easily be activated later if the end user chooses to do so. As I will describe later, this makes enabling and configuring Bitlocker drive encryption very easy for the end user.
Once setup completed, I checked Device Manager to see what devices were missing drivers. For the most part, the Vista drivers for these devices worked fine. The Lenovow website did not have a working driver for the fingerprint reader, but I managed to find a beta version through the hardware manufacturer website. Overall, the install process was relatively painless.
Interface Changes
Clearly, Microsoft focused on the interface in this version of Windows. The first difference that most users are likely to notice is that the task bar has received a major overhaul. Open application windows are all grouped under a single icon in the task bar, and the title of each window is no longer displayed. Surprisingly, this isn’t a bad thing thanks to the new behavior of task bar icons. For example, hover over an application icon, and thumbnails of all open windows for that specific application are displayed above the task bar. If you then hover over one of those thumbnails, all other windows become transparent so that you can see the application window, courtesy of the new ‘Aero Peek’ feature. Right click on the icon and you are presented with additional application-specific options or items. For example, right clicking the Internet Explorer icon shows frequently visited sites, while right clicking the Remote Desktop Connection icon will show recent and pinned remote desktop connections.
Hovering over the very right side of the task bar sets open windows to transparent so the desktop is visible. Clicking the right side of the button minimizes open windows, just like the 'Show Desktop' icon in previous versions of Windows.
The ‘Show Desktop’ icon that was in the quick launch menu in previous versions of Windows is now a permanent, yet inconspicuous, part of the task bar. Clicking on the thin blank button on the right side of the task bar will minimize all open windows so that the desktop is visible. However, if you only need to see the desktop and would rather not minimize all open windows, you can hover over this area instead of clicking it so that windows are temporarily transparent.
I’m sure there will be users that will cringe at the idea of learning to use a new task bar with different behavior, especially since the former has been in use since Windows 95. However, after a few hours of using it, I’d imagine most users will be comfortable with the new features and concepts that this task bar introduces.In my opinion, it is significantly improved. In the long run, I think most users will be happy with this change and will have a hard time looking back.
Bitlocker is a Bit Better
Hard drive encryption has become a hot topic recently, especially in the realm of laptops and mobile devices. The implications of data loss or theft are far reaching and, depending on the industry, can result in a company receiving large fines, fiscal losses, negative public image. To defend against this, organizations have started to mandate hard disk encryption in order to prevent data from stolen or lost devices from being recovered by malicious third parties.
Turning the Bitlocker feature on and off in Windows 7 is very easy.
This time around, Microsoft did things right and pre-configured the hard disk partitions during setup to support Bitlocker encryption. Turning on Bitlocker is very easy in Windows 7 (assuming your computer has a Trusted Platform Module). Simply go to ‘Bitlocker Drive Encryption’ in the control panel and click ‘Turn on Bitlocker’. The wizard will go through the process of saving a recovery key and then proceed to reboot the system and configure the Trusted Platform Module. After booting, existing files on the hard drive are encrypted in the background. The machine is still usable during this process. The disk encryption process finished in about 2 hours on my laptop. Since encrypting the drive, I have noticed little performance impact. Even my battery life seems to have remained fairly consistent.
Intuitive Device Management
Not only was pairing my Windows Mobile phone easy, the Windows Mobile Device Center was automatically installed afterward.
Microsoft seems to have tried to streamline the administration and configuration of peripherals for the in Windows 7. A new area in the control panel, called Devices and Printers, allows users to quickly view and add device connections to their system. Previously with Windows Vista, I had inconsistent results establishing a Bluetooth connection with my Windows Mobile phone. Sometimes it would work great, but most of the time it took several tries to actually get the laptop and phone to pair and begin a sync. With Windows 7 RC, my experience was quite intuitive. From “Devices and Printers” in the control panel. I clicked ‘Add a device’ and selected my mobile phone, which Windows had automatically found. A pre-generated code was displayed to pair my phone. After entering the code on my phone, the pairing was complete and the phone appeared in the devices list. If that wasn’t easy enough, Windows 7 proceeded to detect that the phone was a Windows Mobile device and automatically began installed the Windows Mobile Device Center. Impressive.
There’s More
I’m continuing to find other new features and changes in Windows 7 that I really like. Some of these changes are more subtle than others, but the majority of them seem to share a common goal of making the interface more intuitive, responsive, and efficient to the end user. Even the minor changes to components, such as the Resource Monitor and the wireless connection task tray feel like great improvements when compared with previous versions of Windows. And to compliment all of this, Microsoft seems to have made no compromises in the areas of security, reliability, and performance. Microsoft really seems to be taking the shortcomings (both real and perceived) of Vista seriously. As for me, I am going to continue using the release candidate and look forward to the official release of Windows 7 at the end of this year.
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