Windows 7 Woes

DeviantDiscordian · Subject: Windows 7 Woes Thu Oct 29, 2009 11:43 pm

Since Windows 7 has been mentioned a little in the "Post your Desktop" thread, I'd like to give my thoughts on it. Primarily on the issue of compatibility.

I have now been running Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit for a little over a week now, And while it has it's advantages, it has several pitfalls with compatibility that I discovered after I was asked in another forum about compatibility with Windows 95/98/etc programs. Namely 16-bit applications, like some of my game installers.

32-bit Windows has 16-bit compatibility, and the apps will still work if you use 95/98 compatibility mode.
64-bit Windows has 32-bit compatibility in a similar manner and has no native support for 16-bit whatsoever.

The more expensive editions (Professional, Enterprise and Ultimate) have "Windows XP Mode" as an available download which gets around these problems as it uses a virtual machine, but it requires a processor with enabled hardware virtualization support, which mine does not have.

Other than the 16-bit issue, I have had no other problems with the OS, compatibility or otherwise, and it is very much an improvement over Windows Vista.

UAC still bugs the hell out of me though.

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Anime-Junkie · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 1:39 am

Quote:

UAC still bugs the hell out of me though

UAC:
Are you sure you want to do this?
Yes
Are you sure that you're sure?
Yes
Are you absolutely sure that you're sure?
Yes
Are you absolutely positive that sure that you're sure?
Yes
Are you absolutely positive that you're absolutely sure that you're sure?
Yes
Program is not compatible with Windows 7.
*Rage* Very Mad

I run 32-bit Windows 7 Evaluation (I should be running 64-bit, since my computer has 4Gb of ram, and only 64-bit can use all of it).
I'm a bit wary of 64-bit because of compatibility issues, and the fact that most programs don't utilise 64-bit's potential.

DeviantDiscordian · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 6:23 am

Anime-Junkie wrote:

I run 32-bit Windows 7 Evaluation (I should be running 64-bit, since my computer has 4Gb of ram, and only 64-bit can use all of it).
I'm a bit wary of 64-bit because of compatibility issues, and the fact that most programs don't utilise 64-bit's potential.

I can certainly understand being wary of 64-bit's compatibility, but as I said above, the only issue I had was with 16-bit applications everything else that I've checked seems to work fine.

I went for 64-bit for a few reasons, the memory addressing issue you mention being one of them.

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Oldman40k2003 · Moderator Posts: 142 Join date: 2007-12-09

DeviantDiscordian wrote:

Namely 16-bit applications, like some of my game installers.

Hmmm, have you tried running them in dos-box? Depending on how much "Windows" they require, it might work. Another way to get them working would be to run a "virtual machine" that runs a copy of XP (and it's 16-bit compatibility layer.) on top of your real OS.

DeviantDiscordian · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 9:35 am

Oldman40k2003 wrote:

Hmmm, have you tried running them in dos-box? Depending on how much "Windows" they require, it might work. Another way to get them working would be to run a "virtual machine" that runs a copy of XP (and it's 16-bit compatibility layer.) on top of your real OS.

Yeah, that's what I was planning on doing. I was mostly posting about what the OS itself supports natively and what the "experts" at Microsoft have as a solution, since compatibility was one of the major issues brought up about both Windows 7 and 64-bit Windows in general.

I don't really need 16-bit support anyway, I only need it for the game installers. The game themselves are 32-bit apps so that leaves a little leeway for workarounds. Like installing them on an 32-bit OS and then copying the files, since the games don't make use of the registry.

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Anime-Junkie · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 9:42 am

I suggest you watch this video, it's very informative about windows.

Karbo · Evil admin Posts: 1665 Join date: 2007-12-08

hehe nice to see your feedbacks, I was quite curious myself about this new version ^^
After this nameless crap that was Vista and which was one of the argument that made me turn to Macs >>

Anime-Junkie · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 11:53 am

Karbo wrote:

hehe nice to see your feedbacks, I was quite curious myself about this new version ^^
After this nameless crap that was Vista and which was one of the argument that made me turn to Macs >>

Indeed, Vista was TERRIBLE. As a life-long mac user, I've always had the ease of use. But I still know my way around windows. I own a machine running windows 7 evaluation, as I stated before.
Some of my woes include:
Team Fortress 2 freezes quite often. Which is extremely frustrating for me and my team mates.
Steam requires admin privileges to run well, which invokes UAC.
In fact, at least 50% of my applications require admin privileges and UAC.

I heard there's a way to disable UAC...

DeviantDiscordian · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 11:57 am

Anime-Junkie wrote:

I heard there's a way to disable UAC...

If it's the same as the proper thing, You will find it in the Action Centre, on the left panel. It will require a restart.

I found that lowering it's level has little point other than removing the screen dimming. It may be a little less intrusive than on Vista, but it's still annoying. On all the systems I have used I disabled it in less than an hour.

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And here is my random video for the moment.

Anime-Junkie · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 12:22 pm

DeviantDiscordian wrote:

Anime-Junkie wrote:

I heard there's a way to disable UAC...

If it's the same as the proper thing, You will find it in the Action Centre, on the left panel. It will require a restart.

I found that lowering it's level has little point other than removing the screen dimming. It may be a little less intrusive than on Vista, but it's still annoying. On all the systems I have used I disabled it in less than an hour.

Yeah, I lowered the level. The screen dimming is annoying.

Pendragon · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 2:40 pm

Yes. More proof that someone threw a rock through Windows and now it's as worthless as a calculator without batteries. Such a crappy OS.

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Malahite · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 3:44 pm

Anime-Junkie wrote:

I suggest you watch this video, it's very informative about windows.

I'd be very wary about taking any sort of Windows information from Mac, considering that most of their "Buy a Mac" commercials tend to revolve around nothing but gross exaggerations of their competition's flaws.
Windows Commercial: "Hi, I'm [x], and I'm having fun using my Windows PC." *Insert this a dozen times*
Difference from a Windows commercial: Cut out lots of smiling faces, the Windows logo, and save you two minutes of your life.
Mac Commercial: "Hi, I'm a Mac." "And I'm a P-" "YOU SHUT YOUR FUCKING VIRUS-INFECTED WHORE MOUTH BEFORE I LOCK IT UP MORE THAN YOUR OS >(. Now, buy me because I'm a clean virus free OS that does everything. "
Difference from a Mac commercial: Tone changed from haughty to irate.

Regardless, Windows 7 has been accepted by practically everyone as an improvement over Windows Vista. Of course, that has differing interpretations ranging from "It's a marvelous OS for people to use" to "It's Windows 98 made 64-bit".

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timing2 · Moderator Posts: 117 Join date: 2009-06-29

DeviantDiscordian wrote:

it is very much an improvement over Windows Vista.

As a software developer, that is debatable.

But for the end-user experience, I agree, Windows 7 is an improvement over Vista. It had better be, for Microsoft's sake - their market share in the OS department has been steadily dropping over the years. And I bet Microsoft never allows another 5 year gap between major releases like they did between XP and Vista.

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Archmage_Bael · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 7:03 pm

i cant imagine how hard it would be to program an entire operating system, all the libraries, the .dll's would be a pain.

vegasmazza3 · Subject: Re: Windows 7 Woes Fri Oct 30, 2009 11:35 pm

I don't understand everyone's complaints about Vista... since I got it like a year ago on a comp I haven't had problems... aside from the annoying UAC... which I disabled. Maybe most of Vista's issues were fixed by the time I got it... I'm hesitant to upgrade (I get a free upgrade on my laptop) I fear horrorible things... maybe I'll do it in December... when I have more time and they work out more of the kinks.

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