Windows 7 Introduction.

Windows 7 is a product by Microsoft. Mainly a Operating System, after many critics from Vista, Microsoft decided to group up all their customers feedback and there you have it, Windows 7. Windows 7 comes in six editions, Windows 7 Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional, Enterprise and Ultimate. Windows 7 is said to be faster, more compatible with older hardware and software, better looking and more time saving then Vista or any other version of Windows.

Windows 7 Editions

 

SKU's for Windows 7

All of the editions have their own specialty, for example, Windows 7 Starter is mainly focused on netbooks and value PC's. Home Basic is for normal home users that don't expect much out of their system and will only be available to certain countries. Windows 7 Home Premium is focused on users with normal expectations, maybe for college use or home use. Windows 7 Professional is mainly targeted towards enthusiasts and small business users. It includes all the features of Windows 7 Home Premium. Some additional features include operating as a Remote Desktop server, location aware printing, Encrypting File System, Presentation Mode and Windows XP Mode. Windows 7 Enterprise targets the enterprise segment of the market and will be sold through volume licensing to companies which have a Software Assurance contract with Microsoft. A few additional features are included in Windows 7 Enterprise such as support for Multilingual User Interface (MUI) packages, BitLocker Drive Encryption, and UNIX application support. Windows 7 Ultimate is a version where it has all the same features in Windows 7 Enterprise but it will be available to home users.

Below is a gallery of the desktop view of each versions of Windows 7, click on the image for a larger preview...

 

Windows 7 Starter	Windows 7 Home Basic	Windows 7 Home Premium
Windows 7 Professional	Windows 7 Enterprise	Windows 7 Ultimate

New and Improved Features

You have two options, you could just view most of the new features in a list, or read the whole article. Click on any link below for a explaination by Microsoft.

64-bit Support Accessibility Action Center Aero Aero Peek Aero Shake Audio and Video Backup and Restore BitLocker Calculator Desktop Device Management DirectX 11 Domain Join Gadgets Games Explorer Getting Started HomeGroup Internet Explorer 8

Jump Lists Libraries Location Aware Printing Multiplayer Games Paint Parental Controls Performance Improvements Play To Power Management ReadyBoost Remote Media Streaming Ringtone Editor Snap Snipping Tool Startup Repair Sticky Notes System Restore Tablet PC User Account Control

View Available Networks Windows Anytime Upgrade Windows Connect Now Windows Defender Windows Easy Transfer Windows Experience Index Windows Fax and Scan Windows Firewall Windows Live Essentials Windows Media Center Windows Media Player 12 Windows Search Windows Taskbar Windows Touch Windows Troubleshooting Windows Update Windows XP Mode WordPad XPS Viewer

 

A large number of features from Vista was brought over to Windows 7, some of it was improved and some left alone. A few features also were brand new.

Starting of with the multi-touch possibilities in Windows 7, Vista had included touch functions however it wasn't multi-touch capable, Windows 7 introduces multi-touch with various gestures. From flicking to pinching, Windows 7's multi-touch is just amazing. With multi-touch, many things are possible, view a play list of videos at YouTube by user ComputerGuy2010 which shows off a few multi-touch gestures here to learn more about it.

Other than multi-touch, Windows 7 includes functions that may help people to do their daily work faster and more efficiently. A few features that are available in Windows 7 that do help people in their daily tasks are Aero Snap which allows you to work with two windows in a much more easier and simpler way. All you do is drag and drop the windows to the corner of your screen, and there you have it, You are able to work with two windows at one time. This also help users while copying files, you can easily do it with this feature.

The image below shows Aero Snap while having two windows open side by side....

(Click on image for larger preview)

You might have already noticed how easy it would be for a person to edit files. Well, I and so do a few of my other friends thought that this feature wasn't all that useful as you can just resize it manually. However doing that will take up more time, you will first need to minimize the window then adjust the size and finally position it. So this feature is proven to save time.

Jump list are menu options available from right-clicking any of the icons on the taskbar or by holding the left mouse button and sliding up on an icon. Each application will have unique jump lists which will correspond to the features unique to the application whether it be recent files opened or common tasks. For example, a Microsoft Word jump list might display all the recent documents opened. The Windows Media Player jump list, for example, displays recently played tracks and playlists that have been played. Internet Explorer's jump list displays recent history of Website and the ability to open a new tab or start InPrivate Browsing. Windows Live Messenger's jump list displays select common tasks such as instant messaging, signing off, and changing online status. While up to 10 menu items may appear on a jump list by default, Windows 7 provides the ability to customize this.

Jump list is similar to options, its available while you right-click on any of the icons on the taskbar or by holding the left mouse button and sliding up on an icon. It will then bring up a list, where there is options. Each application will have unique jump lists which will correspond to the features unique to the application. Time to have a peek at this feature,

(Click on image for larger preview)

As you see, for Microsoft Paint, it shows the recent edited files. Like I said before, the available options varies from applications.

View the gallery below of different applications using the jump list feature...

 

Control Panel

Windows Explorer

Control Panel

Control Panel

Neat right? That's not all, many other features are included in Windows 7. Windows Search in Windows 7 is now at version 4.0, in Vista Service Pack 1 it was only at version 3.0 and Service Pack 2 had version 4.0. Windows Search simplifies daily tasks, it allows you to search around your documents, this feature comes in very handy once you have many documents around your desktop and in your Documents folder. It also searches your hard drives for the specified file.

Jump list is also available in the start menu, it has the similar function but its just on the start menu. Refer to this picture for more information.

 

(Click on image for larger preview)

 

Well for games, we have significant improvements. There was a game that wasn't able to run on neither XP or Vista but somehow it works on Windows 7, the game is called South Park Rally. At least according to Wikipedia.

Windows 7 also has much better support for DirectX 11 which is available in both Vista and Windows 7. Performance vise, Windows 7 has support for the Windows 7 scheduler for Intel Hyper-Threading Technology, enabling better performance on hyperthreaded, multicore Intel processors. Windows 7 games compatibility is much more impressive, look here for the list of supported games in the pre-RTM version, now with RTM/GA. Much more games are supported. Project Natal is also rumored to work on Windows PC's, most probably will only support Windows 7 and not Vista. That are most of the improvements for Windows 7 if you are more concerned about gaming.

A new and optimized taskbar has been the most noticeable change in Windows 7, it involves a whole new design and shape. The start orb will glow when you hover to it, unlike Vista. If you would like to know how much it glows, just hover to the taskbar orb on the top left of this page and have a look.

Getting to the applications and other features, we will start off with Windows Media Player. Yes, Windows Media Player is now at version 12. Its only available with Windows 7, for other operating systems, it hasn't been released. There are many advantages using Windows Media Player 12. The best so far is that it supports MOV files which are generally used by many, especially to capture video using digital cameras. Other than just playing MOV files, it plays 3GP, AAC, AVCHD, DivX, and Xvid files too! The user interface has been redesigned such that the Now Playing view, plays media in a separate minimalist window with floating playback controls, and also gives access to the current playlist, visualizations, and enhancements.

Here is the screenshot of Windows Media Player 12, both in the full version and the minimalist version.

( Click on image for larger preview )

Getting on to the Action Center, Action Center lets you to decide which alerts you want to see, and also which you don't. It actually keeps an eye on all of your security applications. When the application needs you attention, it will just appear on the taskbar... like this

( Click on image for larger preview )

A very simple application to maintain your security. You can view a screenshot of it here at out Screenshot page.

I'm not going to talk about Windows Media Center, well actually because its roughly the same as in Vista. So as the other basic features, like the games available, calculator and all those oter Windows Applications.

 

Hardware Requirements

Windows 7 has a required amount of Hardware Requirements, like every other Operating System. Vista had very demanding Hardware Requirements. Windows 7 requires a less amount of Hard Disk place, Memory, Processor speed and others

Here is the table of Hardware Requirements for Windows 7 according to the Microsoft Windows site.

Architecture	32-bit	64-bit
Processor	1 GHz 32-bit processor	1 GHz 64-bit processor
Memory	1 GB of RAM	2 GB of RAM
Graphics Card	DirectX 9 graphics processor with WDDM driver model 1.0(For Aero)
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

However running BitLocker will require a USB Flash Drive in order to use BitLocker To Go, Windows XP Mode will need an additional 1GB of Ram and 15GB of hard disk space and finally it will need a processor capable of hardware virtualization with Intel VT or AMD-V enabled.