Looking beyond Vista for PCs
Microsoft Corp.’s new Windows 7 computer operating system hopes to pull off a major trick with memory.
Not computer memory, but ours.
It’s supposed to make us forget Vista.
The Vista operating system, which Windows 7 will officially replace later this month, had a terrible reputation almost from the time it debuted in 2007.
Because of Vista’s technical foibles, sluggish operation and inability to play nicely with some other programs, consumers and professionals shunned it in droves, refusing to update from Microsoft’s old, reliable XP operating system.
Apple Inc. made fun of Vista in a set of hilarious TV commercials, and Microsoft struck back meekly with ads that proclaimed Vista wasn’t as bad as you thought.
The Windows 7 upgrade, which will sell for $119 for the Home Premium consumer version, is a chance at redemption. But it’s also a campaign to head off the first real competition Windows has ever had in the PC field.
Next year, Web giant Google Inc. will introduce its first operating system, Chrome OS. Because it will be a so-called cloud computing system -- with many of its operations living on the Internet -- it’s already hyped to be extremely fast, with the ability to constantly evolve.
Like Windows, Chrome OS will work on PCs. But unlike Windows, it will be free.
At first, Chrome OS will be just for the small laptops known as netbooks. But if it is successful and is expanded to full-size laptops and desktop computers, it could be a formidable challenger.
Which is perhaps why, although there is nothing revolutionary about Windows 7, Microsoft has striven mightily -- and in some ways successfully -- to at least catch up with and foresee the competition when it comes to user friendliness.
A prime example is its computer search function, which is frustratingly slow on Vista and previous Microsoft operating systems.
The new search on Windows 7 is a tremendous improvement in that it can almost instantly find a word or phrase anywhere on the computer, whether in documents, e-mails or even the names of photos and songs.
But outside of Microsoft, that kind of search is nothing new. Google Desktop gave PC users the ability to do it starting in 2004. And Apple made lightning-fast search part of its operating system in 2005. Finally, and perhaps not coincidently, Windows has gotten up to speed.
Microsoft is also looking forward by updating its enhancements for tablet computers that use touch screens. Indeed, the company says that on the day Windows 7 officially debuts -- Oct. 22 -- several manufacturers with which it works will introduce PC-based tablet computers.
That’s a proactive move to head off Apple, whose long-rumored tablet is reportedly in development for introduction early next year.
Microsoft has already made copies of Windows 7 available to the press, which is a sign of either hubris or confidence.
Luckily for the software giant, a preliminary look at the operating system hints mostly at the latter.
Windows 7 has a look that resembles Vista, which is to say ugly. But early testing by me and a couple of colleagues found the new operating system to be faster and less troublesome than its predecessor.
It’s also not nearly as bulky. The standard version of Windows 7, unlike Vista, will run on netbook computers.
Windows 7 sports a few enhancements that are so consumer friendly you have to remind yourself they were created by Microsoft. The software giant, which at times has seemed nearly impervious to consumer woes, is out to make friends while it can.
From our testing, here’s how Windows 7 performed in several key areas:
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Installation
Upgrading from Vista to Windows 7 went smoothly, taking about 50 minutes to two hours, depending on what was on the computer and its speed.
An upgrade advisor program scanned existing programs and flagged possible compatibility problems. In one case it found two major programs that would not run on Windows 7 -- iTunes and the Panda anti-virus program. But updated versions of these programs were installed without a hitch and then ran just fine.
If you want to jump from XP to Windows 7, that can be done but requires an extra step. You first have to take all your files -- documents, photos, etc. -- and put them on an external storage device.
After installation of the new operating system, you put them back on the computer, and you’ll also have to reinstall any programs that aren’t part of Windows 7.
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What’s missing
In the past, Microsoft operating systems came loaded with e-mail, calendar and video programs.
No more. They’re not on Windows 7.
But don’t despair -- they can be downloaded for free from the company’s Windows Live site.
Most potentially problematic is the new e-mail program that replaces Outlook Express and Windows Mail. But a test of transferring content from Windows Mail to the new Windows Live Mail program went well. The mail program also includes a calendar application.
(The standard version of Outlook that comes with the Microsoft Office suite is not affected by the new operating system.)
One item that stands a good chance of not working after the upgrade is a virtual private network used to access a remote computer. That’s not a surprise -- VPN settings sometimes have to be adjusted to fit a new operating system.
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Speed
We didn’t have access to equipment needed to scientifically measure the speed of Windows 7 operations.
But programs and Internet browsers appeared to move at far snappier speeds than on former Windows versions.
Especially impressive was Photoshop photo editing software, which got a terrific speed boost post-upgrade in our tests.
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Screen design
Yuck.
I don’t know what consultant (probably a committee) advised Microsoft that everything had to be tinged with baby blue, but it gives Windows 7 a vague, messy look.
The other color choices, if you can find them (Windows 7 does not make changing the appearance easy) are just about as wishy-washy.
Apple’s Mac OS X operating system, by contrast, has a crisp, architectural look that’s much more pleasurable to view hours on end.
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Screen organization
Windows 7 comes with several new tricks for manipulating and organizing open documents, Web pages and applications.
At the bottom of the screen is the task bar with block-shaped icons representing the open windows. It looks suspiciously like the dock feature that has been a part of Mac OS X for several years.
And it has a couple of cool enhancements. When you move the cursor over the icons, thumbnail views of that program’s open windows appear. Click one, and the window pops to the front.
Also, if you right-click on an icon, a handy list of commands, such as print, pops up.
There’s an especially nice feature that allows you to easily re-size two windows so that they are side by side, each taking up half the screen. Then it’s a simple matter to copy and paste (or even click and drag, depending on the program) from one to the other.
Microsoft seems to have “borrowed” several Apple features over the years, but this side-by-side trick is so useful that it would be swell for Mac users if Apple appropriated this one.
So at the end of the day, is the Windows 7 upgrade worth $119? That depends on how you feel about your current PC operating system.
If you have XP and it’s working perfectly for you, it might be just fine to stick with it, especially if you’re only doing basic e-mail, word processing and Web browsing. But keep in mind that XP is 8 years old and eventually probably won’t be able to handle state-of-the-art programs.
If you have Vista and can’t understand why people put it down, you could stick with it too.
But Windows 7, at least in our preliminary tests, has some real advantages in speed, user friendliness and stability. The only problem we had was waking the computer from sleep in a couple of instances. We had to do a full restart instead. Hopefully, this will be solved by the time Windows 7 goes on sale
So, upgrading seems to have real advantages.
But you have another, money-saving choice: You could wait a year or so and see what Google has up its sleeve with Chrome.
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Times staff writers Jon Healey, Jim Granelli and Jerome Adamstein helped test the software.
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A new Windows
Microsoft’s new Windows 7 operating system, which later this month supersedes the much-scorned Vista, sports several new consumer-friendly features. Here are our three favorites:
Search: At long last, Windows gets a decent search function to speedily track down words or phrases on stored documents or other files.
Snap: This handy feature allows a user to position two files side by side and then easily copy and paste from one to the other. You could have your notes on the left side of the screen, for example, and the great American novel you’re writing on the right.
Taskbar: The icons of programs are lined up along an edge of the screen in this much-improved taskbar. Hover your cursor over an icon and you get thumbnail views of all the program’s open windows, no matter how far they’re buried under other stuff on the screen.
-- David Colker
