Microsoft finally confirms Windows 7 for 2010 launch

It's all a silly misunderstanding, we tell you. Microsoft has been holding fast to its "three years" development time frame for Windows 7 since forever, the problem is that it's never been clear when that three year period started. Well wonder no longer, Microsoft has finally officially confirmed that the three years started at Windows Vista's general availability release, which was January 30th, 2007. Obviously that doesn't mean will have Windows 7 on midnight of January 30th, 2010, but it does mean we can look forward to sometime within that year for a release. Microsoft plans to give an exact release date only once Windows 7 "meets its quality bar for release." Sounds like a good metric to go by, if you ask us.

[Thanks, Isaac]

[John @ Mar 13th 2008 10:14AM]

Screw them. I'll still use XP.

[Aguiluz @ Mar 13th 2008 10:24AM]

It took me a great headache to adjust from XP to Vista. I don't want to know how hard it would be to adjust to that.

Personally, I would like MS to sell "bare" versions. Meaning it is windows 7, without the performance-eating crapola designs in it.

[Michael LaFramboise @ Mar 13th 2008 11:02AM]

Boofuckinghoo?

I've been using Vista on my MacBook Pro since the day it came out and didn't have any problems w/ it. While it won't make me switch from OS X, its no worse then XP. If your 5 year old computer can't run it... well, get a new computer. Its like whining about your '95 Civic not being able to participate in the 24 Hours of Le Mans...

People just like you whined about XP when it came out. All about it requiring a whoopin 128MB of RAM compared to 16 which '98 required, and about how it couldn't run on your 200mhz P2 any more.

[Neal @ Mar 13th 2008 11:17AM]

Sometimes it's nice to say "I told you so"

http://www.engadget.com/2008/01/28/windows-7-isnt-headed-for-2009-says-microsoft-more-like-2011/

" That's the problem, no one but Engadget said 2011.

MS said 3 years. They didn't say 3 years from now, just 3 years, which is what they said 1 year ago when Vista came out. That means there are 2 years left.

I'm sure they are very happy for you to assume they mean 3 years from NOW, which means they can let you assume wrong, and then over-deliver when it ships in 2010, 3 years after Vista launched, just as they promised.

Then again, I am sure that hating MS will still be the "in" thing then too, so you will find a reason to bash why they lived up to the expectations I am certain."


" They said 3 years or so prior to Vista being released. You can find numerous times where it was stated something along the lines of "5 years is far too long between releases, we'll be going back to a 3 year release schedule." Taking into account that Vista has been out the door more than a year now, 3 years is actually 2010, so you were wrong about '01 and wrong about '11. It's ok, I know math can be hard."

[Motoken @ Mar 13th 2008 11:45AM]

@Michael LaFramboise, stfu,
People get mad when windows takes more ram for doing nothing. like right now, my vista is, idono doing some stupid search indexing crap that i will never use. yet i cant turn it off, and it hogs ram from my GAMES. you know GAMES, you mite not know what that is, you being a mac user, but games need an awful lot of power, and it sucks when vista is taking up 1/2 a gig of ram.

people like XP cuz there are less useless processes hogging the system.

[Hax Or @ Mar 13th 2008 11:46AM]

Neal... ahaha.

Get over it.

[Tom B @ Mar 13th 2008 12:07PM]

seriously... isn't it a problem when they're moving on to a New OS without really addressing the problem that is Windows Vista? What makes me confident that they're going to get it right next time?

And besides... this means nothing... all it means is we can expect a few years of delays. I was hearing about "Longhorn" back in like 2001... 6 years later out pops Windows Vista.

[jhaks @ Mar 13th 2008 12:16PM]

@ Motokin

First of all the indexing and search feature kicks ass. Second if you don't want it then turn it off. Surprise! Yes, you can turn it off if you stop complaining!

[Cal @ Mar 13th 2008 1:34PM]

@ Tom B

Windows 7 is completely new OS, it is going to be built from the ground up, not just XP with fancy themes, some new features and higher specs. Supposedly they are trying to optimise 7 for performance.

[Chebwa @ Mar 13th 2008 2:11PM]

Congratulations on being unable to adjust to new technology. Idiot.

[T-Bone @ Mar 13th 2008 2:30PM]

@Motoken

You say GAMES like games are important(while demonstrating you have no idea how Vista actually uses RAM).

[Evan @ Mar 13th 2008 3:02PM]

@Cal
They said Vista was a completely new OS, but at it's core it's based on Windows Server 2003.

[Juaquin @ Mar 13th 2008 3:37PM]

Vista uses all the available RAM it can get to pre-fetch files and perform background services that improve your experience. But the INSTANT any other program needs that RAM, it gives it back, meaning your game can have all 4GB if it needs it (minus the background operating system processes that keep your computer running). It's actually very smart - why not use all the RAM you have at any given time. It's more efficient.

[insertAlias @ Mar 13th 2008 4:11PM]

@Juaquin
Exactly. We can only explain it so many times. The "ram hogging" and "resource hogging" comes mainly from a service called Superfetch. It profiles you, and loads components of commonly used programs into memory. That's why you may have 50+% ram usage at idle. But load up a heavy program, and notice that the ram usage doesn't increase as much as it should. Superfetch just released some of the ram it had been using. Also, if you use certain programs with great frequency, they will load faster and faster. Case in point, Visual Studio. I had XP on my laptop, and Visual studio started slowly. I replaced it with vista, and it still started slowly. But after a while, it started faster, and now it starts much *faster* than it did in XP.

By the way, the FOSS equivalent of Superfetch (prefetch) will be included in Hardy, I wonder if people will complain about that?

If you really want the illusion that more free ram will help your vista system, type "services" into the start menu search bar, and select services. Disable superfetch. Done.

[Jeff @ Mar 13th 2008 8:00PM]

I've heard some good things about Windows 7, and MS seems to be going the right way these days... As much as I'm never going to buy Vista, it's not quite as bad a some make it out to be. That said, when Minesweeper takes up ~70MiB of RAM to run, there is a slight problem. But hey - it looks pretty!
One person I mentioned that to joked about it running Minesweeper from v3.1, through a sequential series of emulators... thus justifying the overhead :P
If they do a decent job on v7, I will probably buy it eventually, but at heart, I'm a F/OSS guy.

[Puneet @ Mar 13th 2008 10:15AM]

xp sp2 for me unless this win7 has increased performance

[mcatrage @ Mar 13th 2008 10:37AM]

I'm pretty sure SP3 will be out so if it's alright with you I'll upgrade to that.

[Jeff @ Mar 13th 2008 8:05PM]

Unfortunately, when support ends, it's not going to be very practical to use XP for long. You're definitely going to take a performance hit when MS stops patching all the sploits. I'm not saying anything about your skills personally, but the average person is going to get hit hard with malware when it can run free.

[Darkest Daze @ Mar 13th 2008 10:12PM]

I hope you don't game, cause it'll suck when you try playing games that require 3gb's of RAM and 1GB of vRAM to run decent on that 32-bit OS. Seeing as how games now can use 2gb's of RAM and 512mb of vRAM now, that's not a stretch for 2 years away.

[Zal @ Mar 13th 2008 10:15AM]

*Crosses fingers and hopes current PC can last 2 more years before upgrading...*

[Pete @ Mar 13th 2008 6:04PM]

Umm... this is Microsoft we are talking about... that isn't really Windows 7... that is Windows 2017 with a 'Silent' 201 at the front. They are slyly telling you the real release date... rather than the fictional one that is generally off by quite a bit.

[y3k.nik @ Mar 13th 2008 10:15AM]

so the vista successor is out in less than two years?

From all the complains I have heard of Vista, should i hold off buying a new laptop for another 2 years?

but then, what if blu ray becomes obsolete by them..

Oh the confusion!!

[Nick Catalano @ Mar 13th 2008 10:47AM]

a) Blu-Ray won't become obsolete in 2 years, if you see them in most consumer laptops in Q1 2010 is another story...
b) There are always new technologies down the line but the thing that I would imagine you WILL be seeing in laptops in the next 2 years is a rapid expansion of the use of SSDs
c) Check out Intel/AMD's roadmap

2010 isn't all that far off...

[Matt @ Mar 13th 2008 10:54AM]

I have used vista 3 times and those times. It looks great and i think a good step but I have gone back to xp. I just did not find it suited my needs. Slow file transfer, 3rd party programs crashing, 1st part programs crashing. Nero not working at all. coasters, burns not fixing. The whole system locking up trying to do one process. These "features" happened with more than one program. Not just with optical media related programs.

Now its all well and good saying "arr but nero is not vista". This is true but having a pc that is not fit for purpose (in my eyes). Doesnt mean i can accept that.

I am not vista or xp fanboy. When the day comes that vista improves to the level that i need and maybe one could nero and other programs on vista. Then i am stuck with xp.

Now its great that theres some of you where its worked out perfectly good for you but others it just has not.

[boe @ Mar 13th 2008 11:12AM]

You don't have to hold off on buying a new PC but I'd just use XP instead.

[y3k.nik @ Mar 13th 2008 11:17AM]

heres to hoping my 3 year old dell will last me another 2 years... sounds like a long shot to me!

is it me, or does this version look a lot like vista anyways?

It really doesn't make a lot of sense in my mind to release an os 3 years after releasing vista, especially when people are not willing to adopt it!

Sigh, if only apple had BD in the macbook pro release, life would have been so much easier!

[Cal @ Mar 13th 2008 1:42PM]

You could get a cheap laptop, or an eee to tide you over.

[Marc @ Mar 13th 2008 10:17AM]

after using vista for 7 months i still haven't had a problem... WTF is everyone talking about?

[kevin_ho @ Mar 13th 2008 10:24AM]

yeh, most of those naysayers probably haven't even used Vista. All the negative opinions on Vista are created by Apple fanbois, I reckon..
+1

[Chewedtoothpick @ Mar 13th 2008 10:26AM]

They just hate it for two reasons:

It's Microsoft.
It's New.

If you think back, you will recall how XP received a similar hub-ub when it came out, and people were quick to realize how good it was.

I have been on Vista for a year now, and I have had absolutely no problems.

[MEAT! @ Mar 13th 2008 10:32AM]

Anyone that claims "I haven't had a problem" with regards to ANY computer software is either forgetful, deliberately misleading you, or has a radically uncritical outlook of computers.

It is not possible to use any operating system for seven months and "not have a problem." Every computer user, no matter how advanced or how infrequently he or she uses the software, WILL experience unexpected, unwelcome, or unstable computer behavior. No matter what popular computer software it is, it is nowhere near perfect. You cannot use XP SP2 and "not have a problem" for seven months. Nor Linux, OSX, or DOS.

My guess is Vista has posed to you what most people would consider a problem--it's just you have overlooked it or are so lenient that you tolerate problems that most people would complain about.

[CHEESEMAN @ Mar 13th 2008 12:12PM]

i have used vista, it came with my R61 Think pad. there was nothing "wrong" with it. other then the fact that it used almost 500 mb of RAM for idle processes. when XP uses at most 200. i actually have it down to almost 90 :)

[Mike @ Mar 13th 2008 10:35AM]

My experience exactly. It's cool to bash Vista, but there's no real problems behind it. It seems that vista bashes either
a) Don't know how to run a computer, and find problems that are really their own
b) Are stuck in a windows 2000, 'things were better in my day' mentality, or
c) Have never actually used Vista on a regular basis

[josh @ Mar 13th 2008 10:37AM]

@Marc

I bought a new laptop, with Vista Home Pro, a few weeks ago and returned it the next day. Vista was too restrictive, wouldn't allow me to use command line arguments, and would ask me if I wanted to use a program that I just double clicked - every single time. I'm sure you can turn these controls off, but seriously, how about these controls be turned off initially and then allow us to turn them on. I felt like I had a great 'looking' operating system with parental controls on it. I was insulted. Plus MS was trying to sell me AOL, assuming that I didn't already have an internet connection. Next, there was so much crap (useless programs) pre-installed. Finally, to get the new laptop to where I wanted it, i.e. remove the crap, take off the "parental controls", etc... It probably would have taken about 20-30 hours (including updates, etc...). So yeah, being a CISSP and having knowledge about different operating systems out there, I have to say that Vista is more secure than XP because it restricts users to non-power user functions, but by far this does not mean it is a secure platform. My next computer will be a Mac.

[m.edgar @ Mar 13th 2008 10:38AM]

Erm...where to start?

OK, what about performance; it sucks. Moving/copying files, more clicks to get things done (the whole UI is almost designed like qwerty...made in such a way as to slow you down!), built in defectiveness like DRM and 30 millisecond polling of hardware to check if it has changed, snafu'd highdef, horrible and destructive diskaccessing. I chalenge you to change your mobo without a reinstall (xp has the same problem, but there's ways to get around that, if you're lucky).

Vista takes long to get adjusted to. Not because it's 'new', but because of it's horribly designed UI. Ubuntu and Leopard (or whatever animal it's called) takes less time to get used to.

Vista sucks on a hardwareacces and software-use level. XP does everything Vista does, minus several of Vista's flaws.
The people complaining about Vista are likely more knowledgable about computers than you are, thus they know what's wrong, why it's wrong and why they should complain.

[MEAT! @ Mar 13th 2008 10:41AM]

@Mike

"My experience exactly. It's cool to bash Vista, but there's no real problems behind it. It seems that vista bashes either
a) Don't know how to run a computer, and find problems that are really their own
b) Are stuck in a windows 2000, 'things were better in my day' mentality, or
c) Have never actually used Vista on a regular basis"

a) I'm pursuing a bachelor's in computer science, and you'll have to take me at my word when I say the problems I had in Vista were real. (E.g., screen resolution randomly changing, cursor disappearing, dwm.exe frequently crashing, slow network performance, slow file performance, taking ten minutes to boot up, etc.)

b) I never liked Windows 2000, and think XP is dated and ugly. I want something that can run Windows-compatible software but that looks and behaves as well as modern versions of Linux or OSX.

c) I bought a laptop that was designed for Windows Vista, used it on a daily basis, and tried hard to like it for nine months. I went back to XP.

Now you know a 'Vista basher' that doesn't fall into your neat categorization.

[Tommy @ Mar 13th 2008 10:44AM]

Vista was rushed to market. Microsoft didn't give any other software or hardware company time to get compliant drivers and software ready. Lots of customers bought a brand new PC that came with Vista, mostly not of their choosing, just to find that their Logitech Keyboard wouldn't work, and their HP printer wouldn't work. Remember the Mac Ads about "Your Printer won't work with Vista, I say Buy a new Printer. Ask not what Vista can do for you; Ask what you can Buy for Vista"

Also, Vista's increased User Account Control (UAC) "security" prompts users every 10 seconds "Vista needs your permission to continue".

All in all, early adopters were really screwed by Vista. It has yet to be widely adopted in the business world because of the UAC changes that require software to be re-written to work properly. Many businesses are running software designed 10-20 years prior. They don't take kindly to having to throw more development money because Microsoft says so.

[Steve A. @ Mar 13th 2008 10:46AM]

@ Josh

MS doesn't add any 3rd party software to their OS, the computer's manufacturer does. Blame them for your bloatware & AOL install prompts.

[Rob @ Mar 13th 2008 10:59AM]

@ Josh

haha. i loves guys like this. "oh i have extensive knowledge about operating systems." and two lines before that "microsoft is trying to sell me AOL internet.. blah blah blah" haha. no idea whats going on.


anyway. i've had vista since the release date. had no major problems. disabled UAC, cuz i dont need that. so that doesnt bother me. and since SP1 i can say that I've had no problems. nothing unexpected. xp blows.

[Scott @ Mar 13th 2008 11:01AM]

I find it funny how these people that say "people only hate it because it's Microsoft and it's new" at the same time constantly ignore the complaints of people that HAVE used it and STILL prefer Microsoft products over anything else, but then when the next anti-Vista article comes up, they'll say the same damn thing again.

I mean, are you just entirely incapable of believe other people's experiences or what?

[boe @ Mar 13th 2008 11:12AM]

While Vista may be OK for you - anyone who runs XP on the same equipment as Vista - EVEN new stuff - Quad Core 3 GHz, 4 GIGs of RAM, fast hard drive, good video card - XP just runs FASTER -that is what everyone is complaining about. For those who don't believe me - just GOOGLE Windows Vista XP benchmarks.

YES they have benchmarks that include SP1 - and XP is still faster.

No - there are no FIXES for the speed problems with Vista as so many have said - there are fixes to improve performance but those aren't FIXES - they only increase performance - but as any 3rd grader can tell you two times zero is still ZERO = Vista.

[Ayle @ Mar 13th 2008 11:21AM]

@Boe
And I'm sure Dos run even faster than xp on that box...

[Robert @ Mar 13th 2008 12:00PM]

I sorta agree with Marc as well as MEAT! on this one. I have had Vista since October and while I have had problems, they have been minor and not disruptive of getting any real work done. I have automatic updates turned on and have noticed improvement in the performance of my system over time.

I realize that any OS has issues. I use OSX as well and it also has its own problems. But like Vista, is not disruptive to my workflow.

[Dave @ Mar 13th 2008 12:14PM]

I'm sure Vista is super if you don't use anything much more complex than Wordpad and Solitaire but as a programmer I hate it with a vengence.
Microsoft have long recommended not placing changeable files in the same folder as the executable but many of their own efforts broke this rule but that didn't matter because it was not enforced. Vista changes all of that, there are many things that you just cannot do in Vista which breaks lots of old code. To ensure programs that work in all previous win32 envoironments work in Vista is a major PITA.
There are many other "security" aspects of Vista which cause all sorts of problems for the software designer

[jhaks @ Mar 13th 2008 12:42PM]

@ Scott

Just because someone has a bad experience using a machine with Vista doesn't mean it is attributed to Vista. I have heard many people who have used Vista and say it is rock solid and a great OS. Then there are people who have complaints. Some people have real insight and some just complain and make noise. For example the fact that getting to certain network configuration panels is a little lengthy is one of my complaints, however it is not a very big problem. Then there are people who complain without understanding what is truly going on and blindly blame the OS.

My cousin had a problem with Outlook in Vista where it would take a few seconds to perform any task, like load emails or click menus. Influenced by Vista's negative press and the fact that Outlook worked fine for him in XP, he concluded that Vista sucks. He asked me to take a look at the problem and it turns out that all the performance problems were caused by Google Desktop which came pre-installed with the machine and had embedded itself into Outlook. After uninstalling it everything worked fantastically. I didn't say anything to him about his false assumption but hopefully he doesn't make anymore in the future.

[vb @ Mar 13th 2008 1:56PM]

@Dave:
So you were doing something in your code that MS has said is bad practice and that you should not do, and now you're complaining when said code doesn't work anymore???


For everyone complaining about Vista and saying they'll wait until Windows 7 to upgrade: Windows 7 will not run faster than your XP anyways, it'll probably run slower than Vista on the same hardware. Every time a new version of the OS comes out, it runs slower than the previous version on the same hardware.

This has always been the case: Win98 was slower than Win95, Win2k was slower than Win98, XP was slower than Win2k, etc. The only reason why you don't notice that XP is slower is that the hardware has gotten a lot faster in the 7 years since XP was first released.

If you want the fastest Windows ever, just run Windows 1.0. It's so much faster than XP. It'll boot up in less than a second and you can still run your notepad on it.

[CosterMonger @ Mar 13th 2008 2:07PM]

@MEAT!
UXTheme.dll patch {free}
or
WindowBlinds {$$}
will take the ugly out of the XP

[Marc @ Mar 13th 2008 2:27PM]

OK people. I'm thrilled with all your enthusiasm in my posed (although I'm fed up with all the emails) and from reading through all the comments I seem to have noticed one particular trend.

The majority of people who have trouble with Vista are those who have tried to exploit it or any software on it. This reflects the opinions of many other people I've talked to in various forums. A lot of complaints involve the use of unlicensed programs. The general rule of thumb.... as it appears, is only buy quality hardware and software. And, in fairness, technology evolves so rapidly that wouldn't this generaly be a good ethos?

[MEAT! @ Mar 13th 2008 2:58PM]

@Marc
"...from reading through all the comments I seem to have noticed one particular trend. The majority of people who have trouble with Vista are those who have tried to exploit it or any software on it."

Didn't like Vista on hardware designed for it:
josh
myself

Didn't like Vista on unspecified hardware:
m.edgar
boe (I think)
Dave

Implied he or she was pirating Vista:
...no one did.

Implied he or she was "exploiting" software:
no one.

How, exactly, did you come to the conclusion the the majority of people who dislike Vista are pirating it or other software? Did you even read the opinions and experiences posted in this thread?

[dan @ Mar 17th 2008 2:08PM]

m.edgar..

Wasn't QWERTY designed to swap key strokes from one side to another so that they wouldn't get jammed? Not to slow you down. Makes it more uncomfortable.

Anyway man, stop moaning. I think most people who have problems with vista don't know how to use a computer. I've had a few problems but after 5mins on google I managed to fix it. Also, many problems are with 3rd party developers and users being stuck with rubbish hardware. It's cheap! Buy a new computer! Use an alernative OS, if your computers that old, Feather linux, Damn small linux. If your not happy with Vista, try something new! Experiment :P You'll either realise Vista is wonderful or appauling lol.