Loko’s Domain You live and learn. At any rate, you live.

Balmer’s keynote is finished and the reports are everywhere. Ballmer said that the next Windows O/S is the best version yet. The world may agree with him soon because Windows 7 Beta will go public as of today, Friday, January 9th. I find this an excellent time for everyone who has an unused computer to break it out and install the beta. I’ve been testing it out for a while with multiple combinations of software, my favorite suite of system protection, and a lot of non-Vista friendly productivity software. As a friend of mine said, my thoughts exactly, Windows 7 beta build 7000 seems RTM already.

Once again, flocks everywhere are comparing Windows 7 to Mac OS X and their taskbar. I have to admit that I was not only skeptical of Windows 7 as a whole, but the new taskbar dubbed Super Taskbar. I am not only impressed, but it forks off from any taskbar I’ve seen in all the dozens of operating systems I’ve used. You are able to pin an application on the taskbar, as promised, but you gain a wealth of easily accessible Recent History and other options by one lonely click. No longer will mousers worry about the keyboard enthusiasts preach about wasting time navigating with the cursor. The new taskbar is fantastic.

Another jab at Windows 7 is the dreaded resolution to DLL hell called the SXS folder. Windows 7 possesses virtualization for backwards compatibility. The problem has been that this folder can climb to enormous levels quickly, especially so soon after installing Windows 7. After I was done with my first sweep of applications, the SXS folder was between six to seven gigabytes. After another week of testing, the folder did not increase. 7GB is a worthy trade off. This beta actually ran smoother than Windows XP on my current desktop, especially after I combed through services.

Next up I should mention multiboot capabilities. I have a GRUB controlled boot load that has Windows on default next to several Linux operating systems. After installing Windows 7 in a separate NTFS partition, it did take over as expected, but I was able to update the GRUB with no issues. After the boot configuration update, Windows 7 will boot up as the primary by default, but you have 30 seconds to choose either an Earlier Windows Operating System or boot into Win7. After which, you can choose to boot into any other Windows operating system. Simply put, I have had no problems with WinSeven in a large multiboot environment after installation. That might mean something to someone other than me.

Aside from most of the eye candy, Windows 7 is stable and impressive. It runs well enough on the old Dell I have laying around without turning off any visual effects. Not to mention I had a fleet of software running at full capacity. I may only have 2GB of RAM in this system, but multitasking not only became a lot more manageable, but customizing how you want to multitask is a huge perk. You can now easily edit the taskbar button grouping options in Taskbar Properties among other choices.

Microsoft will finally release an operating system that not only seems secure and stable on release, but one that doesn’t irritate us with user control prompts for every action. This brings up the mention that UAC can be configured to be relaxed for the most part without shutting the entire service off. Helpful options like this are sprinkled throughout Seven nicely and are not difficult to find. If you have a very basic idea of what you want to do, you will probably stumble into the necessary radio button or check box. While Vista was geared towards gamers and PC enthusiasts, Windows 7 looks to be geared for everyone else.

We will mark Vista down as the second black eye from Microsoft following Windows ME. While not nearly as terrible as ME, the constant annoyances, lack of backwards compatibility, and heavy hardware requirements deserve to be placed near the mantle of failure ME currently resides. I don’t know why Microsoft decided to follow up an operating system that has been around for seven years with a possible successor that could not run any software or drivers dated before 2006. At least they managed to release a proper beta before people began to lose hope. Windows XP was resurrected with SP2, Windows 98SE had SP 2.1a, and a lot of software and updates cannot install without SP4 in Windows 2000.

Microsoft also discontinued Live OneCare and will be releasing their own free antivirus program for Windows. I see this as another great move by Microsoft considering the wealth of garbage antivirus protection that can cost an annual subscription of $80. I trust this is an action taken to push Symantec to try to push out quality software for once, along with Trend Micro, AVG, and others. Too many consumers are being duped into buying protection suites that do little for protection and more in terms of setting up, registering, dealing with spam as a result, false positives, and lengthy, resource sucking scans.

This year is beginning to look up for Microsoft, but consumers may feel cynical after purchasing Vista. These may be the same people that felt cheated from investing in an ME machine. They are undoubtedly a lost cause, but Windows 7 definitely picks up the slack after losing a portion to Mac and Linux. Those that have found love in Linux may vow to never return again, but we have not hit that pivotal point in history where we no longer need to run Windows. Many will have to return, but at least it could be a delightful reunion with what appears to be an actual replacement for Windows XP.