Windows 7 beta 64-bit version leaked just in time for Steve Ballmer's keynote

It looks like the usual suspects are at it again, showing their baldfaced contempt for copyright law by disseminating a 64-bit version of the Windows 7 beta. When we saw the 32-bit version a couple weeks ago things looked pretty good, outperforming Vista and XP in "real world" tasks, so we're hoping that its older brother performs on the same level. There's a strong possibility that the public beta will be announced at tonight's keynote, and if it is Engadget will be on hand to dish out all the gory details.

[DaTwo @ Jan 7th 2009 4:16PM]

Wow, just found it myself 10 min ago :)

[Jimmy @ Jan 7th 2009 4:41PM]

I've been dual-booting my desktop with XP / W7, but now that the 64bit version is out I think I can get rid of my XP install. Everything seems to work perfect with Windows 7 for me... I was pleasantly surprised. :)

[Quix @ Jan 7th 2009 5:12PM]

Ballmer keynote? Should be a sweaty good time!

[York @ Jan 7th 2009 5:56PM]

Paul, Hybrid SLI is SLI with two different models of graphics cards, like a GTX 260 and a GTX 280. They don't want to support it because a majority of the system crashes in XP were caused by graphics drivers, and two different graphics cards compounded the problem. They disabled it in Vista, so this isn't new. You have been, and still will be able to do regular SLI with two of the same graphics card.

[Robert @ Jan 9th 2009 4:28PM]

Do i have to be pre subscribed to something to get Windows 7?

[Korey @ Jan 7th 2009 4:17PM]

Gotta love viral marketing, especially when the marketers play dumb!

[Makavre @ Jan 7th 2009 4:24PM]

yeah, .... specially with such an original name from the releasing group "DSC" ....

[Zu @ Jan 7th 2009 4:27PM]

Not quite viral "marketing" if they're actually giving out a free product demo. This gives you a chance to review the actual product yourself not some BS advert.

[Korey @ Jan 7th 2009 4:50PM]

Viral marketing doesn't refer to cost of what's being marketed as much as the fact that the product is out there, being handled and reviewed by people who will hopefully spread the word on that product before the product's final release.

It's low-cost marketing with potentially large results (whether those results be good or bad for the company depends on the people)

[Decoy @ Jan 7th 2009 6:59PM]

I like the stealth marketers who post in these threads. Particularly ones who says something like:

"Windows 7 looks like it might be okay. Time will tell. Maybe Microsoft will blow this one again. What's GREAT is the new docks for (PMP) available at (URL)"

or

"After a few days with Windows 7, the first thing I have to say is that the “Dock” or task bar, or whatever they call it, is lame. It’s lame because it’s just there and really preforms no apparent functional task (maybe that will come later on). There also seems to be an issue while playing MP3 files using Windows Media Player 12, Approximately 2-3 seconds data will get cut-off from the beginning of MP3s as Windows Media Player 12 tries to retrieve meta-information from internet and write it to any MP3 file with a Meta data header larger than 16KB."

[Patriks7 @ Jan 7th 2009 4:16PM]

Damn, right after I downloaded the 32-bit one over the weekend!
Luckily I got limitless internet :D

[rock99rock @ Jan 7th 2009 4:25PM]

I hope you arent with Comcast :)

[Paul Chapel @ Jan 7th 2009 4:28PM]

After a few days with Windows 7, the first thing I have to say is that the “Dock” or task bar, or whatever they call it, is lame. It’s lame because it’s just there and really preforms no apparent functional task (maybe that will come later on). There also seems to be an issue while playing MP3 files using Windows Media Player 12, Approximately 2-3 seconds data will get cut-off from the beginning of MP3s as Windows Media Player 12 tries to retrieve meta-information from internet and write it to any MP3 file with a Meta data header larger than 16KB.

The only positive things I can say is that the cosmetic layout of menus is quite different from XP (Yes, I downgraded back to XP after several problems with Vista), the organization of tasks/groups seems to be well thought out. It also appears that Microsoft has taken an initial interest in the customers dissatisfaction with many aspects of Vista. Many have either been eliminated or refined for Windows 7. The UAC has not been annoying as reported with Vista. The UAC only popped up in when something was affecting the kernel. Installation of my own software has not been a problem. There were some audio driver issues on one machine but they were resolved using released Vista drivers. None of this is really stuff that Microsoft should be praised for, however, seeing that this is really the way Vista should have been from the beginning.

The biggest problem is that Microsoft needs to give people a more compelling reason to move to Windows 7. I won't be buying Window 7 because Microsoft has reported they won't support SLi, or do away with the activations, DRM, WGA or the myriad versions that made Vista such a confusing buy. Those concepts have failed miserably. But I also hope they don't bloat this version, because even though I don't plan to buy it, I will be pissed if I get any phone calls from relatives asking me why their install is suddenly running slow.

[Soulsaber @ Jan 7th 2009 4:30PM]

Paul, you do realize it's a beta? It's not perfect.

[Patriks7 @ Jan 7th 2009 4:36PM]

I'm in Central Europe so no Comcast :D

[Alex @ Jan 7th 2009 4:38PM]

I agree with Paul about the new taskbar. Lame, confusing, and pointless.

[rock99rock @ Jan 7th 2009 4:42PM]

@Paul

The new taskbar is pretty freaking sweet, the Peek function is quite intuitive. I guess you only have one window open most the time, or dont switch windows that often?

I concur with your WMP12 comment, though that will most likely be fixed via windows update in a few days time.

However, are you an old man who likes to complain about the weather too? W7 is by far already the best consumer Windows iteration not available. The fact that i can run it on older hardware faster than the XP operating system it was designed for tells me much about MS and how they are going back to the true roots of computing. No longer will you have to toss your machine because it is 3-4 years out of date, and cant be upgraded hardware-wise. Think of how much this changes the green aspect of tossing old hardware? It can all be repurposed with the LATEST software and run it without a hitch.

"I won't be buying Window 7 because Microsoft has reported they won't support SLi, or do away with the activations, DRM, WGA or the myriad versions that made Vista such a confusing buy."

What would you seriously benefit by windows supporting SLi? Are you trying to run your screensaver at 120fps? After seeing the Chinese debacle, i cant really blame MS for all the activation/DRM/WGA implemented in the OS's. They are losing billions of $ to pirated versions of their software. I probably use to account for a few $ myself. Also, if you didnt notice, they are cutting back on the versions of the OS offered this year, so that point is moot.

[Angus Hedger @ Jan 7th 2009 4:44PM]

Windows 7 WILL support SLI/Crossfire with Drivers from AMD(ATI) and nVidia, Just the same as it is now.

It would be stupid to expect MS to write the drivers FOR nVidia/ATI!

[Paul Chapel @ Jan 7th 2009 4:45PM]

One more thing I forgot to mention. File copy speed for me is very slow. I don't know how 7 scored faster than XP and Vista in this area. Has any else had a similar experience?

[nohone @ Jan 7th 2009 4:46PM]

Paul, you just proved yourself to be a liar and a plagiarist. How do I know? A few days ago you said that you did not know the difference between 32 bit and 64 bit OSX (remember the post about the settings panel in Snow Leopard?). If you do not know the difference between 32 and 64 bit, some of what you wrote here is a little suspect - you may have tried WMP and found a problem with playback (doubtful) but how do you know that WMP is populating metadata and data sizes? So I took some of your exact words, and did a search on Google. I searched for "Windows Media Player 12 tries to retrieve meta-information from internet and write it to any MP3 file with a Meta data header larger than 16KB." where you copied from a different forum and found this link http://www.nowpublic.com/tech-biz/microsofts-windows-7-beta-leaked-version-could-corrupt-mp3-files

If you want to lie, then at least try to find original lies.

[zephxiii @ Jan 7th 2009 4:46PM]

@paul, wow, must be a n00b if you can't figure out the taskbar, it is freakn awesome when you have a bunch of stuff open. I "got it" right away, it is great.

[Snowdog @ Jan 7th 2009 4:47PM]

Geez, you windows fanboys are hopeless. You rank Paul low when he has the most informative posting here??

[nohone @ Jan 7th 2009 4:51PM]

@Snowdog

It is easy to be informative if all you do is browse other forums, copy and paste the problems others have had and investigated, and represent those as his own.

Copy and paste - he must not be using an iPhone.

[rock99rock @ Jan 7th 2009 4:53PM]

@Snowdog

puh-lease

[Paul Chapel @ Jan 7th 2009 4:58PM]

@rock99rock

I would be impressed with Microsoft if they had released this beta in 2003, when Longhorn was promised, but they didn't. We've waited eight years for a beta to be a little faster than XP, which is silly to be overly happy about. I want SLi because gaming is probably the number 1 reason to have Windows right now. I just bought a Macbook Pro during Christmas and there really isn't anything I can do in Windows, that I can't do OS X and OS X has less viruses and better stability. So Microsoft better get their azz in gear on the gaming support or it will be bye, bye Windows forever. I already have Call of Duty 4 for OS X. There ain't too much more I want to play, except for a few Valve games.

And the dock thing is so obviously an OS X rip off, that I'm sure to be low ranked in exactly thirty seconds from this post, because as with most things with Microsoft Fanboys, the truth hurts the most. The truth must be buried lest another person, who may not be so enamored with MS, reads it and goes out to buy a Mac, which in the minds of MS fanboys, might bring on the end of days or something.


Anyway, I've tested Windows 7 and so far it just seems to be Vista Lite or Vista SP2. Not impressed.

[Neha @ Jan 7th 2009 4:58PM]

Why are you guys feeding Paul to effete preening iBoi? This tart is hilarious but let his delusions about OSX Kitty just be.

[Quix @ Jan 7th 2009 5:12PM]

Paul & Alex: this is the Engadget comments section. Criticism of Windows or anything else Microsoft is not tolerated. Thank you.

[Hamidxa @ Jan 7th 2009 5:11PM]

Paul,

First of all, you sir are an idiot.
Secondly, stick with Apple.
Third, Windows 7 outshines OSX any day of the week and twice on sundays.

[rock99rock @ Jan 7th 2009 5:11PM]

@Paul Chapel

LOL your lack of intelligence sickens me. You were talking about SLi for gaming? As in drivers written by nVidia/ATI? Where do you see that SLi is not supported on W7? Did you just make that up like the rest of your post? How the hell is the dock a ripoff of OSX? Did Apple plagiarize MS by using icons in 1952? How many pots have you smoken today? Normally i would say you can keep your dignity by not switching to OSX, but you lost that a long time ago didnt you?

I honestly can say that you are in it for the attention now, as I havent seen anyone else that is not impressed with W7, besides the most white-encased Apple fanboys of which you now belong. It is a shame really that you cant see the OS for what it really is. Too much too late you say? God will forgive you. Why can't you forgive MS? I am finished with you.

Good DAY sir.

[Chris @ Jan 7th 2009 5:14PM]

Paul,

I don't see how the dock and old windows taskbar are much different, except maybe in appearance. They both have buttons representing programs. With the quick-launch menu open on the old taskbar, its mostly the same as what they have now, with a few small differences. They took good ideas from another representation of a taskbar, and included it in their own. I like the new taskbar, it's peek features, and see absolutely no problem if it looks a tiny bit more like a dock.

[Paul Chapel @ Jan 7th 2009 5:17PM]

@rock99rock

I read about the lack of SLi support on Engadget, just like everyone else.

http://www.engadget.com/2008/11/06/microsoft-disses-hybrid-sli-and-crossfire-wont-support-them-in/

I probably got low ranked for what I said in that post too, LOL. Anyway, I could really care what people think. I'm just giving my impressions so far. If Microsoft had given me some real features, I would be the first to praise them, but they just haven't. It's not my fault that Microsoft can't get their crap together.

[Chris @ Jan 7th 2009 5:21PM]

I do agree that Windows 7 is what Vista should have been. As someone who doesn't want to pay for a mac (and is very comfortable with windows), I am very excited to finally get an operating system that runs better than its predecessor.

[rock99rock @ Jan 7th 2009 5:25PM]

@ Paul

Ok, im coming back out of retirement to thank you Paul. I never saw that post. I wish I had, else i would never had tried to explain anything to you.

Ive never seen anyone low ranked for 13 different posts in the same thread. You must hold some sort of record. Good luck in life!

(re-retired)

[Paul Chapel @ Jan 7th 2009 5:31PM]

@Chris

I was committed to Windows XP, but for the last few days I've been using Pixelmator on OS X, which is a pretty good alternative to Photoshop; Final Cut Express, which blows away Premiere; Handbrake, which encodes commercial DVDs; Time Machine, which blows away Shadow Copy; and then there's EyeTV.

I don't have this software yet, because it requires a dongle to use. My best friend has and it completely blows Media Player away. Probably the best DVR on the market right now.

So in other words, the software available for OS X really impresses me and I've had a MacBook Pro for less than a month. I'm rethinking my reliance on XP. I might pick up an iMac if a new one comes out in a couple of months.

[nohone @ Jan 7th 2009 5:40PM]

"I've had a MacBook Pro for less than a month.", "I might pick up an iMac if a new one comes out in a couple of months."

It is possible this is a different Paul Chapel (I doubt it, nobody else is stupid enough to use their full name), but notice the first commentor and especially the date the comment was made here: http://amgadhs.com/index.php/2008/10/my-new-apple-mac-mini/

Lying again, are we Paul?

[melloncollie @ Jan 7th 2009 5:45PM]

That's hybrid SLI you moron. It's something completely different.

[jackal @ Jan 7th 2009 5:53PM]

paul,

Microsoft never said it wasn't going to support SLI or Crossfire in Windows 7, it said it wouldn't support the hybrid iteration where you pair a (usually incredibly low end ) video card with an IGP (probably because NVIDIA's solution doesn't work well, and ATI's solution is only compatible with a handful of sub-$50 videocards). Apparently, you either didn't have enough common sense to actually read about how Hybrid SLI/Crossfire differs from its performance oriented cousin (if you had, you wouldn't confuse them as being the same thing) or you didn't actually bother reading the article you just cited before making an ass of yourself.

[Paul Chapel @ Jan 7th 2009 6:11PM]

@jackal

I'll look into that. If that is true, then score 1 point for Microsoft. I'm playing around with some hardware configs right now, but so far, it's hasn't worked for Window 7. I'll let you know what happens at a future date. The problem is, Apple DOES support this technology and I already have a MacBook Pro, so score 2 points for Apple.



@all my stalkers

I never said I've never used OS X for less than a month, as I've admitted in this post,

http://www.engadget.com/2008/12/22/microsoft-extends-windows-xp-deliveries-to-may-30-2009/

Direct quote - "I've had the luxury of having a friend that exposed me to a lot of stuff before I ordered my Macbook Pro, so I've actually cheated on my experience thus far."

So I've used my Microsoft mouse on my best friend's Mac, big deal. I would also like to point out for a few people thinking about OS X, that there are some cool emulators available for Macs.

Snes9x
for playing Super Nintendo ROMs (go to vimm.net for ROMs)

Sixtyforce
will allow you to play Nintendo 64 ROMs (go to doperoms.com for ROMS).

The reason I mention this, is that I used to knock my friend for having a Mac and his lack of games. One day, he just casually started playing Super Mario Brothers 3 and then switched to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, which he knew were old favorites of mine. At some point that evening I broke down and said, "Dude, how the heck are you playing that stuff on your Mac?"

He was using a Logitech gamepad, which I didn't even know was possible for Macs. The next day I brought over my Microsoft mouse, because I hated his Mighty Mouse and I've been playing around with OS X ever since. I think it's ironic that I got interested in Macs because of games, old as they may be.

[Paul Chapel @ Jan 7th 2009 6:17PM]

Oops, I meant to say that "I've never said that I have used OSX less than a month." In other words, I bought my MacBook Pro cause I my best friend has exposed me to OS X for several months.

And yes, in case you're wondering, you do feel cooler owning a Mac. People actually do double takes when you're sitting at a table at Starbucks. I even had a pretty intense conversation with a girl who wanted to see my MacBook. Didn't get her number, but boy, I got close.


Low Rank coming! LOL.

[dan @ Jan 7th 2009 6:57PM]

"I even had a pretty intense conversation with a girl who wanted to see my MacBook. Didn't get her number, but boy, I got close."

Hahaha. Ahahahaha. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

[Metkis @ Jan 7th 2009 9:45PM]

@Paul: I'll save you some of the trouble of 'looking into it'.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scalable_Link_Interface

[loosely_coupled @ Jan 7th 2009 11:27PM]

And people wonder why companies don't want pre-release products leaked...

[V Langs @ Jan 8th 2009 2:19AM]

can we all agree that paul chapel is the most ridiculous engadget poster? he's trumpeted even clak and ieye and whatnot.

seriously, are you 15? you have to be close to that age by the way you post (i'm gonna post like i'm super cool and brag about stuff i have even though i don't own anything but a pos computer). I'm not an old geezer but you my friend put shame on teenagers (i've exited that age, thank you)

don't talk about sli for no reason, since when has microsoft wrote sli drivers? that's like asking you to finish my product after i've put in 99% of the work. microsoft makes good generic drivers but they'd never go near the high end offereings from nvidia and ati.

your emulator comments are past ridiculous as all emulators were initially windows releases converted to mac. I don't even want to believe you brought roms up in a pc vs. mac gaming conversation. and logitech or otherwise OS X has extensive support usb devices.

as for looking cooler with a mac, you disgust me that you take your macbook to starbucks to sit around for no reason, did you have your mom drop you off there? you bring shame to all mac AND windows users a like (a feat you deserve an award or something for)

I think i refuted everything it took you to say in MULTIPLE posts....in one post.

oh and the girl comment, are you serious?!

[Daniel @ Jan 8th 2009 1:05PM]

@Paul

Okay, I can't take this any more.

First, I read a little bout viruses and XP/Vista. last virus I had to deal with was like 3 or 4 years ago and installing AVG fixed that fast. Ive had a couple issues with stability, namely a couple of factory defective motherboards, no instability due to MS or even secondaries (driver/software) except the occasional small homebrew app that had a bad line of code.

Most all viruses and instability are user errors.

I will admit, the taskbar is a lot like the mac bar... the icons are squares now. That being said, the taskbar is very much the normal windows bar, just without all the wasted space dedicated to text. As MS says, all they did was combine the quick launch with the task bar. Sure, thats what the mac bar is essentially. Except I find the windows 7 taskbar to be way more intuitive. Just roll over the icon and BAM! preview. It even has the transfer bar there, with a great graphical representation.

Oh, and that crap about media player, hasn't happened to me so all I hear from you is "QQ". And with sustained transfers from HDD to HDD at 80-90 megs per second I am very happy. Actually, thats the fastest it has ever been for me.

I also love that all of my XP drivers and software run in Win7 and have yet to cause a lock-up.



So all i can say is, how bout you try installing windows 7 instead of making crap up on a forum where most all the readers have already tried the thing out and know how full of crap you are.

[E. Leigh @ Jan 7th 2009 4:18PM]

Now this is what I was looking for...

[bangladeshiluv @ Jan 7th 2009 4:21PM]

no thanks.

[Neha @ Jan 7th 2009 5:00PM]

Jamaat Banglu? If so GTH.

[adrian @ Jan 7th 2009 5:08PM]

I have to agree with Paul Chapel on one thing:

WGA / Activation = Mess.

How the hell Microsoft can even charge users for Windows 7 after the mess they made with Vista is beyond me.

Vista was a classic case of Microsoft billing Windows users worldwide to beta test their unfinshed product. And now MS is looking to bill those users again now it is finished (Windows 7).

Still, Windows is not a MS money machine for nothing you know.

[Good_Bytes @ Jan 7th 2009 6:01PM]

@adrian.
How about you use Vista 64-bit. Instead of listening to no life Mac fanboys that have nothing to do in life than create hundred of accounts on the web and report all these lies. Why Vista was not very successful.
- Last minute decision to release a 32-bit version (which ended up being buggy. Now its fine with SP1). Try the 64-bit. Let's not forget investors pressure in forcing Microsoft to release the OS.
- Lack of engagement part of Microsoft to push the 64-bit version, so many thought that Vista 64-bit is like XP 64-bit, and teh 32-bit is the real deal.
- Lack of documentation for company to switch form XP to Vista, Server 2003 to 2008. Many IT's tries to configure Server 2008/Vista the same way as XP (misses the option that they are looking for and think it's gone), performing the same registry tweaks, which brakes the OS.
- Lack of pressure companies to make drivers for the dam OS.
- Bad review sites. Sites that optimize Vista (even doens in using BootVis for XP under Vista) to optimize it, and disable important features in Vista (such as Pretech and Superfetch) and force in XP driver or use beta/early release of Vista drivers to say how stable and determine the speed of the OS is. Yea... I'll do a race against you, and I'll cut one of your legs, let you bleed to death... I wonder who will win?!

All this tarnished the image of Vista. However, in reality Vista is very good OS. It's impressive memory management (remember when Windows 2000 and XP (about a year later), the memory management was said to be abysmal. Well this is not the case in Vista.
Yes Vista takes more RAM as it has the kernel on the RAM all the time, and then you have Super Fetch, which many don't know how it works and presume that their ~1GB of RAM used is Vista, and taken for ever. And don't see how it works and benefit them. I guess no one cares about application startup time being reduce by half up to 6 times faster... oh well...

Anyway, this is getting out of hand. I can spend all day talking about how wrong you are. But I'll let you do the reserach for yourself. And you can always check my and other posts on Vista on this very website. This was talked extensively, even in great details, and conclusions are very positive.

[CraigJ @ Jan 7th 2009 6:39PM]

@Good. I used Vista for 18 months, and while it is true that applications tended to launch faster, already being in memory and all, that actually running them was slower than xp. I also found on disk copies to take twice as long (which is a big problem when the files are 16+ GB), and had issues with screen painting when running multiple VPCs. Now, I have very specific needs, primarily being that I need access to multiple, active VPCs, and I need to copy them frequently, as my job is maintaing multiple versions of a codebase and needing to do clean installs. I used to have to repeatedly ghost my machine, and VPC is a frigging lifesaver in this regard. After a year and a half I gave up and wend back to XP64, and my life is easier because it's a lot faster.

I really, really wanted to like Vista. I did my best to live with it, but in the end it was just too bloated, and slow for what I do compared to XP, and a recently discovered issue in SP1 relating to domain trust relationships which stopped me from RDPing (which if you're interested in I can provide all the details) was the final issue for me. For reference, I have a nice fast Dell Optiplex dual core machine with 4GB or ram, dual sata 2 drives and a dual channel ATI video card with 256MB RM - I'm not trying to run this on a 3 year old machine from Costco.

Having said all that, I'm really liking Windows 7, and if the beta turns out to be solid I'll be grabbing it in a couple of weeks and trying it out. I don't really care about the dock, or any of the new features. I need speed, and since I have a fairly new machine IS isn't going to buy me a new one and the only way I can get it is from the OS.