A Bit About Windows 7
October 2009
With Windows 7 being released in the UK on 22 October 2009, we thought it was timely to take a look at Microsoft’s latest offering and pin it down to a simple set of facts.
Microsoft say they’ve listened to the end users – they asked what people needed from an Operating System and claim they’ve responded accordingly. Apparently the users wanted a simpler interface, faster start-up times and more direct access to the files and folders that are used routinely. Having spent a little time reviewing the new Operating System, it does indeed appear that these needs have been met reasonably well, although maybe not enough to justify a change from either XP or Vista.
The taskbar has seen the biggest visual changes, where the Quick Launch toolbar has been replaced with pinning applications to the taskbar. Buttons for pinned applications are integrated with the task buttons. These buttons also enable the Jump Lists feature to allow easy access to common tasks. The revamped taskbar also allows the reordering of taskbar buttons with the show desktop icon neatly moved to the bottom right of the screen.
Microsoft has published their minimum specifications for a system running Windows 7. Requirements for the 32-bit version are much the same as recommendations for premium editions of Vista, but the 64-bit versions are considerably higher.
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Minimum hardware requirements for Windows 7 |
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| Architecture |
32-bit |
64-bit |
|
Processor speed |
1 GHz 32-bit processor |
1 GHz 64-bit processor |
| Memory (RAM) |
1 GB of RAM |
2 GB of RAM |
| Graphics card |
DirectX 9 compatible graphics processor |
|
| HDD free space |
16 GB of available disk space |
20 GB of available disk space |
| Optical drive |
DVD drive (only to install from DVD/CD Media) |
|
There is an additional mode that simulates Windows XP; particularly useful for older applications for which there is no longer support in Windows 7. However, this requires an additional 1GB of memory and a further 16GB of disk space for it to be installed.
The simplest conclusion from looking at Windows 7 is that there are no particularly compelling reasons to upgrade from Windows XP (except that Microsoft support for the latter will end in April 2014) or from a comfortably working version of Windows Vista. However, in our opinion, it does appear that when buying a new PC, given the choice between Vista and Windows 7 the latter is clearly the superior in terms of usability and efficiency for business users.
Initial tests indicate all versions of Diamond Discovery software, from Prelude right through to Commercial, will work normally with Windows 7. We will of course be continuing our testing to cover different network environments and server configurations, plus ensure complete compatibility with Diamond Discovery Online.
If you need help or advice on the choice of Operating System to work with Diamond Discovery software, we encourage you to contact us .
Return to category: Newsletter: Brilliant News - October 2009