Oolite Bulletins

Does anyone know what Windows7pro64 might be like on HewlettPackard Elite PC's They also offer
"Windows XP Professional (available through downgrade rights from Genuine Windows® 7 Professional)"
.. .. any experiences with this?

HP TouchSmart 9100 is another option being explored .. .. again, any experiences anyone

I am not a regular user of Windows, so any comments would be appreciated.

Cheers

ZB

Unless you have specific hardware requirements that prevent use of Win7, I find no use for XP anymore. If there are specific software requirements for WinXP, unless they're a 3D app, the in-built XP-VM solution in Win7 works fine to cover those. But honestly, I've not hit anything yet on my laptop or my work machine that requires those things... So it's been smooth sailing for me on Win7. YMMV.

Thanks that's what we wanted to hear, I suppose. HP is recommending Windows7 on workstations with downgrade avail., but I don't know much about Windows xcpt that Vista is &%#@÷¿ (NOTE to MS personnel "&%#@÷¿" is code for "Practically Perfect In Every Way") Uses limited to big number crunching only, but end users will be running Windows some sort of 64bit + prbly want cute graphics
but sounds alright so far & thanks again
Kind Regards ..ZB

Actually, since SP1 came out for vista it's been pretty good actually, but since that happened around the time of the 7 launch, and 7 is a while lot better, no-one noticed
To answer your question win 7 is a darned fine OS, and you should be dumping XP for win 7 sharpish. XP is having more and more trouble coping with modern hardware, and it's showing it's age too.

allikat wrote:

Actually, since SP1 came out for vista it's been pretty good actually, but since that happened around the time of the 7 launch, and 7 is a while lot better, no-one noticed

Actually I quite like Vista....!

Not used 7 yet, but Vista in my humble opinion is the stablest Windows so far, and I have used every Windows from v3.0!

JazHaz wrote:

Actually I quite like Vista....!

Not used 7 yet, but Vista in my humble opinion is the stablest Windows so far, and I have used every Windows from v3.0!

do not comment... do not comment...

goran wrote:

JazHaz wrote:

Actually I quite like Vista....!

Not used 7 yet, but Vista in my humble opinion is the stablest Windows so far, and I have used every Windows from v3.0!

do not comment... do not comment...

I have to agree. I see your and raise you

Well i still use XP, i like it. got a new machine w/ 4gig onboard and was dithering over getting win7 64bit, but there's all sorts of cack on boards about lack of 64bit drivers (some were older posts, i'll assume most providers have caught up now) etc. thing that put me off on the W7 info tho said you can run it in XP mode but you need an extra 15gig of HDD space (!) and preferably another half gig onboard mem. seems way excessivve for something simulating an earlier and theoretically less complex product?
just using XP 32bit at the mo, may well upgrade later when W7 has bedded in ~ i make it a policy never to buy an OS in its first year or so, let the bugs and service packs get sorted first!

Just to clarify a few things - Vista SP1 released almost 2 years prior to Win7 going gold. And yes, it stabilized / improved MUCH of Vista's issues, but to be frank, I found more issue with the early drivers than Vista itself. But that's typical for the relationship between MS and hardware vendors.

Also, the reason the XP compatibility has a 15GB & ½ GB recommendations is that Win7 isn't just providing a rough estimate of XP's behavior like was done in the past when you set compatibility for an app. It's actually a complete XP Virtual Machine with XP files, XP DLL's, dedicated harddrive space, etc. It's a very good solution in that respect. It's also the way forward to transition to Singularity.

Cmd. Cheyd wrote:

If there are specific software requirements for WinXP, unless they're a 3D app, the in-built XP-VM solution in Win7 works fine to cover those. But honestly, I've not hit anything yet on my laptop or my work machine that requires those things...

Yes, that is what bad news I found out around new year, looking up notebooks bundled with this or that.
I will most probably need winXP for running an old 3d editor, that in its current patched form has display issues on Vista / win7 (parts of the scenery you want to edit vanish out of sight.)

I don't really know if / how much it uses hardware 3d acceleration, and I will want to try out using that old software in Linux+wine / crossover first.

If that does not work out, I will have to go/ stay with winXP.
Good thing is the computer shop around the corner offers additional /replacement "real" XPpro (CD+license) for almost every business notebook. "Additional" (dualboot) at roughly 40 extra €.

I am still unsure if I would want winXP AND win7, or just the XP.

I have a few weeks experience with win7/64 altho home premium version.

I have to say, if you plan to go for 32 bit programs most of the time, choose 32bit system. I've noticed a minor problems with compatibility already, alto the fact that I have ATI GPU might also have something to do with it.

I know about incompatabilities / troubles when using old 32bit commandline scripts, very annoying. (you know the stuff that came with dos4gw and such ...)
Even with the xp-mode (that xp is 32bit, I think) users ran into heavy troubles, as win7 always tried to execute them with it's own commandline thingy, which is 64 bit or something.

As almost all affordable notebooks come with 4GB RAM max anyway, I don't see no reason to go for 64bit in the first place.

For my 2cr worth:

Win 7 is the best OS that Microsoft has released IMO. Reminds me (in terms of satisfaction) of Win 98. Strange, I know.

Win Vista has a lot of bad press, but I didn't have much problems with it (however, the better the hardware the better Vista seemed to run - it's kind of flaky on the missus' laptop).

XP - good for it's time, but you have to say goodbye at some point.

Hurrah.

Ooo - make sure you get 64bit. With 32bit you can only access 3.3 gb of memory - with 64 bit you can go way above that. More memory makes for a happier PC.

Cheers

Gareth3377 wrote:

For my 2cr worth:

Win 7 is the best OS that Microsoft has released IMO. Reminds me (in terms of satisfaction) of Win 98. Strange, I know.

Win Vista has a lot of bad press, but I didn't have much problems with it (however, the better the hardware the better Vista seemed to run - it's kind of flaky on the missus' laptop).

XP - good for it's time, but you have to say goodbye at some point.

Hurrah.

Ooo - make sure you get 64bit. With 32bit you can only access 3.3 gb of memory - with 64 bit you can go way above that. More memory makes for a happier PC.

Cheers

That's not strictly true about the 32bit XP and 3.3GB of memory - XP can access 4GB, but once it's set aside the equivalent of your gfx card memory, the buffers from your HDs etc - that's then taken away from the 4GB limit - that's why most people only see closer to 3GB when they check...

To delve into on what DH said-
ANY 32-bit OS (XP, Vista, Linux, Mac, you name it) has 4294967296 (2^32) addresses it can allocate to memory. BUT, your other hardware has to also have addresses, so that max amount is lowered by the amount needed by the other hardware components. This address space doesn't reduce the amount of ram on the system but it does reduce the number of addresses the CPU can allocate to memory. This is why some folks can address 2.8GB, others 3.3GB, and someone else 3.8GB.

And just to answer for whoever is about to ask - 64-bit OS's can address 16.8 million terabytes.