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]

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 16th 2008 3:14AM]

I've used Vista extensively and suffered many issues, especially regarding boot and program load times, network connectivity, and hardware compatibility. In fact, one Dell Vostro PC at my workplace is soooooooo slow to boot that I've just taken to leaving it on all the time.

On my new PC, which was purchased for me by my company about a month ago, I specified that XP SP2 be installed from the factory. It's a Dell Latitude that is quite powerful and could handle Vista (insofar as any PC can "handle" it). But, my version of Adobe Creative Suite (ver.6) is not Vista compatible. So, in order to avoid shelling out $1,300 bucks for a new version of Adobe CS, I got my new PC with XP instead of Vista.

That said, my regular use of both Vista and XP SP2 has led me to one overriding question that I have absolutely been unable to answer:

What advantage does Vista offer over XP?

Personally, I can't find a significant meaningful difference between them. I can't point to even *one* thing that Vista does that XP does not.

So, if Vista isn't doing anything that XP can't do, except hogging system resources and creating hardware and software incompatibilties, where is the incentive to switch from XP to Vista?

As others have said, older OS's run faster on newer machines. I've always thought that, in fact, the newer machines were the machines that the older should have been made for in the first place. Why does MS always seem to design their OS's for twice the available hardware available at the time of release?

Look, I like MS software. I am not a Mac user and have no desire to be one. But, MS really needs to figure out that smaller, leaner, meaner, and faster is superior to a bunch of bells and whistles that add nothing to the ability of the OS to complete fundamental tasks.

Let's face it -- Most people use their PC's for very limited purposes: office functions, Internet surfing, E-mail, photo and video editing, and gaming. That's it.

What has Vista added to any of these experiences? Nothing I can see. I'll stick with XP, thanks.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 16th 2008 11:08AM]

XP to Vista, half my programs didn't work anymore. Now what type of compatibility issues are gonna pop up now? No thanks, fix what is broken first. I wish I could go back to XP. Freight88

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 19th 2008 1:31AM]

Guys, Windows 7 is not a new OS from the ground up. It's basically a Vista overhaul (a serious overhaul). I just had some coworkers visit the OS design guys at Microsoft. They are going to aim for 3 years because they are not going to go crazy and add all the useless crap people still can't use (like Vista's graphics solution for one out of many examples). They are just going to fix all the BS that is in Vista and make sure it's not called Vista. Believe me when I say Microsoft wants all future marketing of the products to be so far away from the name 'Vista' because even though there are a lot of Vista machines out there now, they are getting a black eye because computer companies are still choosing to sell WinXP.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 19th 2008 1:36AM]

PS It will be better to keep your WinXP machine and upgrade when Windows 7 comes out

(or f'it...don't even given Microsoft your money anymore if you bitch...go buy a Mac...that is what a capitalist society is all about...)

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 3rd 2008 7:41PM]

I really dont see the point of MS releasing windows 7 in 2010 i mean vista just came out in 2007. By the way i wasnt gonna switch to vist but my piece of junk toshiba crashed after being only a year old and they wouldnt honor the warranty because they said it was due to faulty hardware which was installed by the factory. So I was really worried when i got stuck with vista but i have now discovered that it is by far superior to xp

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 5th 2008 6:46PM]

"meets its quality bar for release." I think that should have been the release schedule from the beginning.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 4th 2008 7:33PM]

same here... i got it when it bearly came out and its great

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 5th 2008 12:09AM]

I run a quad-core 2.4; 4GB ram - 8800GT, etc. etc. - XP still kicks the crap out of Vista for games. Why should a new OS hog up so much more of my specs than the older OS? I can see a moderate increase - but what we ask of an OS hasn't really changed that much. Not enough to justify the performance hit, anyways.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 5th 2008 2:14AM]

Vista = Mac OS X 10.1
Windoze 7 = Mac OS X 10.2

Nice job, MS R&D! You'll only be 8 years behind Apple when you release Windoze 7.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 14th 2008 3:29AM]

windozer = apple brainwashed fanboy
nice job zombie, now go buy some 3 times more expensive hardware (the same as on a PC only branded Apple) with good looking icons on it and "beautifully typed fonts" 10.1 or 10.2, which do you prefer?

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 28th 2008 12:19PM]

I reckon Windows 7 will be the dream of Vista, realized.