Windows 7 Release Candidate starts bi-hourly hiccups today, seemingly affects nobody

Well here's an interesting one: starting today, users of the legendary Windows 7 Release Candidate should "begin experiencing bi-hourly shutdowns," yet we haven't received a single tip on this annoying "feature." We have only two assumptions: either our faithful readers have already moved on to the real thing, or you sly devils are on a hacked RC of some sort. In any event, you've got until June 1st to do a full reinstall (no upgrade options on RC, sadly), after which you'll be blocked from important updates and persistently bugged by a "This copy of Windows is not genuine" notice. Need more arm-twisting? Just picture Steve Ballmer hunting you down with a sledgehammer.

[Astounding Posted Mar 2nd 2010 2:13AM]

Student deal was too good to pass up.

Win7 is worth every penny.

THIS is what vista should have been.

[GregV8 Posted Mar 2nd 2010 2:14AM]

"[...] yet we haven't received a single tip "

So the the screenshot of the popup message I sent you guys didn't count??? bah.

[jeb1499 Posted Mar 2nd 2010 2:26AM]

I went from RC to Professional without having to pay, and using the upgrade option. I got a free x64 Professional edition from the MSDNAA from my school, and I simply edited one file in the install iso to allow upgrades for lower build numbers. Runs beautifully, no hiccups at all.

[Jason V Posted Mar 2nd 2010 2:29AM]

I moved my desktop over just this Sunday from rc1 to retail Ultimate. It would have been my laptop too, but I sold it a while back and had formatted it.

[blinddance Posted Mar 2nd 2010 2:46AM]

The irony is that I find Win7 so slow compared to OSX (altho being a great OS, it's not what I'm looking for) that I seldom use that partition more than 2 hours at a time.

Secondly, when I get the "This copy of Windows is not genuine"-warning, all I can say is O RLY.

[FitFan Posted Mar 2nd 2010 3:07AM]

[we haven't received a single tip on this annoying "feature."]

Microsoft let's you try their slick new OS for free for 9 months and tells you exactly what's going to happen at the end of the trial period, but it's annoying because ...

?

[linko Posted Mar 2nd 2010 3:22AM]

slmgr -rearm

[JoshUK Posted Mar 2nd 2010 3:34AM]

It is actually possible to upgrade RC with RTM, but it is fiddly.

[sni9er Posted Mar 2nd 2010 7:43AM]

@JoshUK took me no more than 20 mins was far from fiddly process (rc to ultimate rtm)

[mkhpalm Posted Mar 2nd 2010 4:41AM]

Haha, and the windows ship just keeps on sinking. Does MS actually gain new customers by making the most needy, naggy, whiney and most expensive OS? I mean I used to use it exclusively but its sort of like when you're dating a whiney, needy, high maintenance girl and suddenly you find a new one that is way more laid back and easy going. You sort of never look back once you truly sit down and get to know the cool girl. That is what windows was originally when they were at the top of the world with no end in sight. But looking at charts its been down hill ever since the introduction of WGA. And it just keeeeeps going down. People don't like to be nagged about everything. Just accept that you're making tons of money on the platform itself. I swear, its like bill gates started signing off the day to days and suddenly a bunch of business guys who have zero understanding of the field have taken over.

[Boss Skill Posted Mar 2nd 2010 7:56AM]

@mkhpalm

What are you on about? This is the Release Candidate, which was given away freely to use for about a year, with plenty of pre-warning that it will become useless after that time had expired.

[TWiz Posted Mar 2nd 2010 5:54PM]

@mkhpalm

Thanks for that entire paragraph of Idiocy. Here's an idea. Try making sense when you post a comment.

[LandShark Posted Mar 2nd 2010 5:23AM]

i was playing Starcraft 2 with my teammate. he suddenly dropped. it turned out he was using Win 7 RC

[balwheeler Posted Mar 2nd 2010 6:12AM]

The RC was sweet, but I tossed Ubuntu on the desktop computer I still had RC1 on. I had already upgraded to Win7 business on my laptop (the computer I use most often), though. Good to go!

[canado Posted Mar 2nd 2010 6:50AM]

Well I must be he only one then !
I don't want to move on as I ordered a new laptop, so now I m stuck with this restart.

What I hate the most is that there is no warning message before the restart : - ((

[spyguy Posted Mar 2nd 2010 8:08AM]

@canado

Check the first page. Some people said to change your system date to 1999 (since the days are the same)

[rkneo11 Posted Mar 2nd 2010 11:03AM]

I used Hazar's Remove WAT 2.2.5...
No more warnings, no logo saying RC on the desktop, even in system properties it no longer shows "(Release candidate)" and no warnings that it is about to expire and no restarts...
Before anyone comments on that it is piracy, I have ordered a OEM 5 user pack and it is on its way. But due to some problem it has reached the wrong person. So until it reaches me i'll be using the cracked version...

[Peenmaster Posted Mar 2nd 2010 2:28PM]

Anyone else have a random white box on screen? It's just kinda there, and then it goes away. Getting it the way of stuff...

[nudigital Posted Mar 2nd 2010 2:50PM]

I have one notebook that still has the W7 RC on it because I'm waiting to replace it. It has begun shutting down every two hours, contrary to what Engadget is saying in this article. Also, it doesn't seem like Windows spent much time on the auto-shutdown; I've had 3 BSOD's since it started the shutdowns and was not having any problems before.

[unseen Posted Mar 3rd 2010 2:45AM]

totally clean installed my windows 7 pro student upgrade this past weekend, (aka upgraded over w7 rc) pretty snazzy

[aikiwolfie Posted Apr 7th 2010 5:45PM]

I already use Linux full time on my PC and I'll be switching my dads PC to Linux as well.