After spending half a day fighting with MSDN subscriber downloads on the day of release on Thursday, anyone can now download it from http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/beta-ownload.aspx and give it a try. I of course had to test it out, see if the companies software I write installs and works on it ;). I fired up Windows 7 x86 in a Virtual Machine, I currently use VirtualBox which I think rocks ! about 35 minutes later it was done, install perfectly worked right off the bat. Runs a lot better than the Vista VMs I have and the only tweaking I had to do was use the Compatibility Troubleshooter to install the Guest Additions, but that was it.
Feeling confident with the new operating system I wipe my Dell XPS M1730 laptop and installed Window 7 x64 replacing my current Vista x64. It installed quickly ran and with no problems, only had to install the latest Nvidia drivers to get better resolutions, but then I had to do that on Vista too. You can pick Laptop Nvidia driver direct from Nvidia now and not the rarely update ones by laptop vendors. The rest of the hardware which was unknown after install was picked up by Windows update which was the Creative inbuilt laptop camera and the Ricoh Memory card reader. Been x64 bit I was a bit worried as Vista x64 half a year ago took me ages to get everything running and I really had to hunt around for the drivers, Windows 7 x64 just worked, nice.
It runs really well, it is slicker and snappier than Vista, it looks very much like Vista but the changes have made a huge difference. For a beta it is bloody good, well done Microsoft. Now to finish installing the useful software as TweetDeck won’t get any of my work done.
