Behind the scenes with Windows 7

companies will always have to cut corners in order to achieve cheaper prices than their competitors

Very true, but the PC market is also a good example of how those price cuts eventually level out to an industry standard, like the price of flash memory, for example. Prices will eventually hit bottom, but rise again to a level that reflects actual market values.

Also figuring into the equation is the natural decline in parts prices once the bugs have been worked out of the manufacturing process and been streamlined.

Honestly, there aren't any costs involved in building a Mac that are significantly higher than for making PCs. Intel chips are still Intel chips. Hard drives are still hard drives. Monitors are still just monitors. Apple having had years to prefect and streamline the manufacture of its computers, seems reluctant to pass the resultant savings on to its customers. And it's losing out as a result, relegating itself to the limited income that comes from a largely cult following.

I'll consider a Mac as soon as they become competitively priced with similarly equipped PC's. Till then, the Apple premium isn't really worth it to me.

you get what you pay for. the computer market seems to be the only one in the world where people forget the fact that cheap has negative as well as positive connotations. a product purchased is not a "bargain" if it does not perform well enough to justify the money saved. but the pc market has people forgetting that companies will always have to cut corners in order to achieve cheaper prices than their competitors

Meanwhile, back at the ranch... iBotnet comes home for dinner.

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/TECH/04/22/first.mac.botnet/index.html

Apple Sued Microsoft and LOST. Windows and all it incarnations is the Result. My biggest irritation with Microsoft's program development is its inability to provide a clean operating system. Eventually there will be a Trillion lines of code with Windows 13 incorporating parts of all of its previous forms. Why can't an operating system be like a Video Game, Starcraft for instance. All of the bells and whistles can be Mods and can be tabbed as needed instead of being force fed whether you want it or not. I'm tired of being treated like a simpleton.

jackseoul Said:

Go to your archives and pull out a couple of pages from tech resources as well as the dailies – you gain perspective on the day to day arguments and the side agreements made by Gates (MS) at the time. Most of the issue between Apple and MS were solved out of court, including the $150000000 question.

Why don't you do that and get back to us. You won't do it because you can't do it. I used court records to prove I was telling the truth. You are pathetic.

If you had proof you would provide it. Isn't it a Pity?

GoodDonkey,

You only choose to quote only a portion of the truth. After the GUI lawsuit Gates invested in Apple! Why, when MS was looking at Apple from 6 feet up? Go to your archives and pull out a couple of pages from tech resources as well as the dailies – you gain perspective on the day to day arguments and the side agreements made by Gates (MS) at the time. Most of the issue between Apple and MS were solved out of court, including the $150000000 question. Half truths are just as much of a lie.

elbudamexicano - "There are some hard core computer geeks here. Who the hell cares about Windows 7???"

Well, as it seems you've read the geeky article as well as our geeky posts, it would seem YOU care. ;-)

if you go back to 1985-1986 MS Excel/Word/Works were big Mac sellers and Microserf probably made more money selling those (to Mac users) than they did selling MS-Dos products.

Because of the Microsoft agreement with Apple, Apple lost the "look and feel" patent case (a weak case anyway since Apple copied Xerox-Parc designs anyway).. But now you have design patents (VW New Beetle etc). The agreement Apple made with Microsoft allowed MS to basically use whatever Apple had as their own --> a very dumb agreement, but it gave MS-Dos users a very nice OS eventually (Windows).

Whoever said Windows is the dominant server environment clearly isn't into computers. It has been Unix/Linux(with a few Macs) for almost a decade. -and that includes all the big universities.

It's all mobile now. Mobile laptops, iPhone etc. The PC era is coming to an end.

Microsoft has a new blue screen of death saver -just kidding that has always been the Ctrl-Alt-Del.

Been using windows 7 for the last 4 months and I say I will not be going back to XP...well not even when I migrated to Vista. For all the nerds who wants to talk about computers and for all the people who wants to look cool, I don't care. I want to use my PC to be productive, be able to edit some files, record, watch and that without too much learning curve. I don't speak the language of geeks nor follow the cult of the "cools". I use my PC and I am glad there is windows.

Have fun with your bloody Windows 7 that will surely be obsolete in a few months! It is all a rip off! Just like that Vista crap!

Thanks, Donkey

Behind the scenes? More like "behind the blue screens of death."

I don't know why so many people hate vista... I had it sense day 1 :) and it has been a blast!! I also had XP from day 1 and it also was a blast to use!! The only thing I don't like is that MSFT is cutting Vista lifespan soo fast!! :( But if people aren't happy then back to the drawing boards it is. Either way I love technology and I will try Windows 7, and if I like it I will buy it... If I don't like it... Then I will get back to my Vista :)... I just hope technology goes forward and not backwards...

jackseoul said:

Bill Gates didn't bail out Apple!!! Apple sued Billy-boy for stealing Apple's GUI, which Apple paid MS for developing. The real thief is Gates! Apple laid out a clear and concise Gui which MS thought was a great idea. I believe MS paid $150,000,000 or so under pretense that it was for development. MS also threatened that it would immediately cease development for Word for Mac if Apple won it's case. No more lies!!

You need to get your facts straight.

First I will prove that Bill Gates invested in Apple Inc. exactly like I said. In the link that follows you will find the following statement:

Microsoft chairman Bill Gates said today As the Macworld turns that the software giant will invest $150 million in Apple and will develop and ship future versions of its Microsoft Office, Internet Explorer, and development tools for the Macintosh.

http://news.cnet.com/MS-to-invest-150-million-in-Apple/2100-1001_3-202143.html

The exact language of the stock purchase can be found at the following law website (Findlaw for Professionals): http://contracts.corporate.findlaw.com/agreements/apple/microsoft.1997.08.05.html

The title is PREFERRED STOCK PURCHASE AGREEMENT

DATED AS OF AUGUST 5, 1997

{By the way it just happens to be the $150 million you mentioned)

Yes, Bill gates was sued (Actually Microsoft). Apple Inc. lost the lawsuit to Microsoft and the Supreme Court refused to hear the case on appeal. The case you referred to is "Apple Computer Inc. v. Microsoft Corporation", 35 F.3d 1435 (9th Cir. 1994).

The case can be reviewed at:

http://bulk.resource.org/courts.gov/c/F3/35/35.F3d.1435.93-16883.93-16869.93-16867.html

or

http://www.precydent.com/citation/35/F.3d/1435

Wikipedia also details the results of the case as follows:

Apple lost all claims in the lawsuit, except that the court ruled that the "trash can" icon and file folder icons from Hewlett-Packard's now-forgotten NewWave windows application were infringing. The lawsuit was filed in 1988 and lasted four years; the decision was affirmed on appeal in 1994, [1] and Apple's appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court was denied.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_v._Microsoft

The only thing Apple won was that HP infringed by using their trash can icon.

Apple Inc. was still losing in the Supreme Court in 2007 in an unrelated case.

http://news.cnet.com/2100-1014_3-6180188.html

It is a plain fact that I did not tell any lies.

GoodDonkey,

Bill Gates didn't bail out Apple!!! Apple sued Billy-boy for stealing Apple's GUI, which Apple paid MS for developing. The real thief is Gates! Apple laid out a clear & concise Gui which MS thought was a great idea. I believe MS paid $150,000,000 or so under pretense that it was for development. MS also threatened that it would immediately cease development for Word for Mac if Apple won it's case. No more lies!!

To design Windows 7, Microsoft analyzed billions of pieces of data. It studied exactly what PC users do in front of their screens.

Wow, they've been watching you PC users!

Jeff Lee,

Nope. Industries rely very heavily on PCs, especially as servers, and industry use is largely behind the PC's massive market share of over 90%. MACs largely cater to brand-conscious kids who want to be trendy. PC architecture boasts off-the-shelf parts, etc, which makes it relatively easy and economical for industries to upgrade and maintain.

Not so fast! Mac's can run Mac OSX, Windows, Linux, Unix... Also, most mid to large co's use a mix of different servers so that "PC" viruses don't jump from PC to Mac or Unix. I've used NT, Unix & Mac servers. Makes sense huh? Many large co's use Unix or Linus. Mac OS X is a fully certified UNIX operating system. Windows just has a large user base who can't shake Microsoft.

Macs use the same parts as PCs!!! Same Intel chip (for a long time now). Same hard drives, etc.

There are some hard core computer geeks here. Who the hell cares about Windows 7???

• Back story: Microsoft’s research showed that people often had six or even 10 windows open at once, which gets distracting. Shake is one of several features designed to help people tame all the open windows.

I know a lot of people that are into porn will like the shake thing.

"Macs have a reputation of being machines for designers, engineers, architects, etc."

Nope. Industries rely very heavily on PCs, especially as servers, and industry use is largely behind the PC's massive market share of over 90%. MACs largely cater to brand-conscious kids who want to be trendy.

PC architecture boasts off-the-shelf parts, etc, which makes it relatively easy and economical for industries to upgrade and maintain.

"Macs have a reputation of being machines for designers, engineers, architects, etc."

.... not sure about that.. maybe designers, artists, ...or even students, kids with a nice paycheck from parents, but stops there.

engineers, architects, etc I think mainly use windows or other hiher performance os/specilized packages.

Anyway using windows 7 now, its much better than vista and xp.

Behind that great marketing cant, anyone else wondering where they got all this data from?

Microsoft's Customer Experience Improvement Program, available since Windows XP and now implemented across a wide family of Microsoft products, allows users to voluntarily and anonymously send clickstream data to Microsoft. I assume this is where the "billions" of data is coming from.

In additon to CEIP, Microsoft utilises a large number of user study groups and other feedback to examine the usability of each feature. Take for example, Windows Online Crash Analysis with OS integration, another Microsoft innovation.

I can't wait for the production ("RTM") build of Windows 7. It will be exciting! :D.

To design Windows 7, Microsoft analyzed billions of pieces of data. It studied exactly what PC users do in front of their screens. It tallied hundreds of thousands of Windows surveys.

Behind that great marketing cant, anyone else wondering where they got all this data from?

Windows 7 is more like Vista SP1, or what it should have been.....

Windows 7 quieter than Vista

As I recall, somebody said back during the development phase that they wanted to make windows 7 less "annoying" than vista. I thought "annoying" was a good description. I liked XP better.

neverknow2 said: All of the features of Windows are from Mac. Nothing new here.

Steve Jobs got windows technology from the same place as Bill Gates; from Xerox! It is a historical fact! The current Mac OS is Unix/Linux based. Mac's were notoriously unstable until they based there OS on Unix (Mac's OS 10). I remember this girl bragging to me how Mac's were so much more stable than Windows. In a graphics class my Mac crashed over and over again. It was because I have a habit of keeping many windows open at one time; back then about 20 windows open crashed a Mac but not Windows. I now tend to keep 30 - 40 windows open at one time and usually 20+ tabs open on my Firefox.

Disillusioned said:

That's hilarious! Mac/Unix came along way before Bad Billy dropped out of college.

Mac has never, ever done a thing for Unix. Bell Labs turned out their 6th edition of UNIX a year before Apple even existed. Just because Apple stole/borrowed Unix/Linux technology like they stole/borrowed Xerox GUI technology does not link Apple to Bell Labs in any way, shape or form. Your association of Mac with Unix is misleading as it is a one way street of Apple sucking off Unix/Linux.

I have owned 4 Mac's and about 7 or 8 pc's in the past decade. I prefer the power I can build into a PC any day.

By the way, neverknow2 and Disillusioned, don't ever forget that Bill Gates bailed Apple out when it was ready to crash and burn. That is when Apple got a loan and/or Bill Gates purchased Apple stock and he began MS Office for Mac's.

That is not to say that Linux isn't the greatest operating system in the world in its own right.

Mac is a Porsche, Windows is a Reliant Robin.

Alleluiah !!!

Do we need JT to snowjob us with all this MS inspired b$hit ? No. And suffice it to say that Vista has been a spectacular flop and that professionals continue to use XP to their satisfaction.

I have been using XP Pro on the same machine for 7 years now, and managing and maintaining it sensibly : I never had any infection, never had any reason to reinstall.

Some things I consider in this ridiculous debate between Mac and PCs:

Usability: I can use the Windows OS with no problems whatsoever because it's what I grew up with and learned on. I don't stumble lost through menus. I don’t find myself gnashing my teeth in frustration looking for applications. I don’t even often think, “Hey, wouldn’t it be better if this OS did blah, and blah, an blah?” I can use my computer just fine. Mac, on the other hand, pisses me off to no end because its "intuitiveness" takes me to places I don't want to go, I can’t find applications I want, and windows seem to randomly disappear. Does this all mean the Mac OS is inferior? No. It just means I'm used to Windows. That’s all.

In the meantime, far more software I like to use on a regular basis is produced for PCs than for Macs, so much so that Mac, upon finally recognizing the market disadvantage it had in this, introduced Windows emulating capability into its machines in order to woo customers who were concerned about lack of useable software. Does that mean Macs are useless? No. It just means software makers prefer to make products for the PC because that’s where the money is. Sure, we can get caught up in a long, drawn-out debate over market monopolies and unfair trade practices, but it still comes down to simple economics.

Stability: Windows 3.1 had lots of problems. Windows ME, not so many, but still, not quite there yet. Windows XP, my current OS? I haven't experienced the tired "blue screen of death" refrain – Mac users’ favorite cliché – but twice in the entire 6 years I've been using XP. And the causes were due to faulty hardware and incompatible software from a smaller vendor. Windows has gotten measurably better, and will continue to get better until it meets most, if not all user expectations. Market forces demand this.

Security: The most readily perpetuated myth on the planet, in terms of computing, is that of the much vaunted – but scarcely proven – invulnerability of Macs to security breaches, like viruses.

The worst kept secret on the planet: Macs really aren’t any better than PCs in warding off the predations of an inspired and dedicated hacker. Mac just haven’t been targeted as much. And, oh yes, there have been viruses that targeted Macs specifically. Bon appetit.

Interesting “study” conducted recently: Out of the three most popular browsers out there, OS X’s Safari was the easiest to crack and exploit. Enjoy:

http://arstechnica.com/security/news/2009/03/chrome-is-the-only-browser-left-standing-in-pwn2own-contest.ars

I took particular pleasure in watching an acquaintance squirm when the spiked version of “Star Wars: Episode 3” he stole from the web crashed his Mac. Good times, particularly after he spent the better part of half an hour a day earlier explaining to me how secure his Mac was.

All things being equal, Mac users really should be hoping and praying that their preferred platform never gains the popularity of Windows, because that would then place a nice, fat target on their beloved system’s behind. But then again, it may already be too late.

Does this mean Mac’s OS X is a piece of garbage? No. It just means it hasn’t taken its lumps yet because the bullies haven’t noticed it. Get a little bigger and let’s see where Mac’s “secure” status stands.

For all the experience PC users and software engineers have in 20 years of warding off attacks, or cleaning up the aftermath, I giggle at the prospect of millions of uninitiated Mac users who never took the time to figure out how their machines work wet themselves at the first sign of a truly nasty virus that wipes their data or pilfers their personal info. Like the driver who weeps at the side of the road for lack of Triple-A, as well as the know-how necessary to change a simple tire, Mac users by-and-large, are really unversed in how to deal with actual computer crises. They lack self-sufficiency – a trait I find . . . cute.

But is this inherently bad? Not necessarily. Not having to worry about viruses allows for far greater productivity on the whole, leading to a sort of complacent bliss. I mean, wouldn’t it be great if there weren’t a-holes in the world who turned their talent with code towards making the lives of others miserable? But life isn’t like this, and viruses are out there for all of us to enjoy. And like the kid who’s been protected from colds and flu bugs his entire life, the Mac immune system is going to get its ass kicked the first time it’s really exposed to the harsh world outside.

http://www.wired.com/politics/security/news/2007/11/mac_trojan

Cost: Having experience in digging myself out of virus-dug holes, as well as absolute comfort with using my Microsoft-based OS, this is really the only major biggie for me. Macs are expensive. Really expensive. For the same bang, you can pay three-fourths to one-half less for a Microsoft-driven platform, and be perfectly happy doing graphics-heavy apps or software heavily reliant on fast and powerful number crunching, like massive databases. And I’ll admit that, sure, Macs are excellent machines for graphic arts or music applications, which is swell . . . if that’s all you plan to do. But for that price-tag, unless you’re in the high-end music or graphic arts business, there isn’t anything appreciably more advantageous to owning a Mac over a PC, since they both do just about the same things – except for being able to say you paid more for the Mac.

It used to be that Mac was prettier, sporting stylish designs never before seen in the marketplace. Not anymore. It used to be that Mac had lots of spiffy “intuitive” features. But judging by what some Mac users are saying in the above thread about Microsoft 7, that gap seems to be disappearing. So all we’re left with in the end, in terms of comparison, is cost. Which leads to my final point . . .

Arrogance: There’s this irritating background noise from Mac users that seems to be saying, “Because I own a Mac, I’m better/smarter/more sophisticated than you.” Like the car owner who believes that driving the newer Volkswagen Beetle and listening to NPR lends intellectualism to the driver, or the coffee drinker who flocked to Starbucks in the 90s for the perceived status it conveyed, but fled to the smaller, obscure local “coffee house” with an identical menu when Starbucks became too “mainstream” to maintain the façade. Mac owners seem to measure their own worth, and the worth of those around them, based on what machine they use to view the same news feeds at Slate or Yahoo. And it’s downright silly.

The unjustifiably high price of Macs will forever guarantee that they remain the “Porche” of personal computing, dooming the brand to a 10% market share for eternity, remaining stagnant while Microsoft catches up and surpasses Apple with its own unique innovations. This will most certainly happen unless Apple and the people who use their products shed some of this elitist attitude and snobbery, and let others into their little club at a reasonable price – Yeah, we know how far down the price of memory and hardware has dropped in recent years, Apple. You aren’t fooling anyone, except Mac users.

But it seems they don’t want to; the same users who gloat that Macs are the preferred machine of “designers, engineers, architects” ( . . . and musicians. Let’s not forget the musicians – because all Mac users possess latent musical talent, as demonstrated by their ownership of a Mac, doncha’ see?), would just as soon preserve that myth, living vicariously through the glamour and allure those occupations possess, drifting with blissful ignorance in an existence, that apart from the Mac on their desk or in their lap, is no more remarkable than that of someone using Microsoft, Linux, or any other OS out there.

Windows 7 wil be a welcome addition to the Microsoft family for those computer users who live in the real world.

The True - Wow, alot of that zipped over my head, but what I did get is that OSX is only riding on the shirttails of windows anyway, and not developing or innovating much other than its flashy gimmicks in order to sell to mindless fanboys who really do wet themselves over the fact that they can 'pinch' thier photos. While at the same time, you need to use shift and the arrow keys to select multiple items. Yeah, and a one button mouse is such a leap forward. yup, take away the gimmicky stuff, and the sytem is crap and just a weakly little inbred cousin to the original, battle scarred windows monster. Which is at least not afraid to go ahead and make something other than a toy to scoop up our money with. Oh, and there isnt anything meaningful that a mac can do that a windows machine cant. If you cant handle windows, get back on your trike-with-training wheels-for-the-masses-mac. Fashion victims.

Oh, and I hate those mac ads with a passion.

POOR APPLE FANBOIIS!!!!...

For OS X these are good things, and Apple is not so heavily investing in SSE3 for things GPUs should have been doing versions ago.

However, there are some major architectual things Apple is still not addressing with regard to GPUs, as multi-GPU support is limited to the driver abilities from ATI and NVidia instead of an inherent part of the OS.

OS X also hands over GPU and OpenGL to NVidia and ATI instead of managing the GPU itself. This means several applications accessing the GPU will have to cooperatively play nice. This is like System 9 where the CPU was not pre-emptively managed by the OS and one Application could lock up the entire system, only on a GPU and 3D processing level.

This is stuff Microsoft Vista was designed to do and can do even more than we could go into here. A lot of the Vista WDDM and Vista Video system came from GPU and performance related investments from the XBox 360 world.

For Apple fans what you point out is great.

However, stating "will bring Apple above & beyond anything in the PC world," is a giant leap off the Apple marketing truck and not even close to reality. It isn't close to catching up to Vista that is 2 years, and something the developers and more advanced PC users already know and are using today.

Technical people really should have paid more attention to Vista and actually read a whitepaper or two. Heck it seems like the Apple engineers barely understand what Vista is doing, let alone the Linux and OSS movement that is still working on OpenGL composers and other video tricks that are a generation behind core features of Vista.

Under estimating or ignorning what Microsoft is doing is why they always stay ahead of the technology curve and when the next level of hardware hits, they are already able to use it while everyone else races to catch up. - Just like this topic and the dual NVidia GPU switching that Vista inherently handles without a second thought seamlessly. I hope I don't step on your stereotype, but I'm an OS engineer and lecturing OS theorist.

OS X is architecturally a nightmare, and only successful because of brilliant marketing. A modified driver and scheduling patchwork by Apple slapped on a generic BSD to MACH kernel interface. Rather than even addressing the monolithic nature of the BSD/MACH design, Apple added a few Band-Aids to the kernel model to keep the queue in a reasonable state for multithreading. Heck OS X isn’t even a 64bit OS because of fears Apple has of breaking the fragile 32bit driver model in OS X.

(OS X allows applications to use 64bit memory addressing, but the OS itself is 32bit. And even in the 64bit options it allows applications to use are basically limited to just more memory space, and none of the other features of a 64bit processor. Windows NT/Vista are 64bit OSes to the CORE, and not only use for itself but also offer the full set of 64bit features and optimizations to 64bit applications. The NT 64bit model also uses the extra 64bit address space for tricks like shoving two memory read or write operation into a single one and using the full 64bit memory space, speeding up even 32bit applications.)

Windows is based on the NT architecture which is a more elegant design, and is at least a theoretical generation ahead of OS X. (Take one example: NTFS, it is 16 years old, and the *nix community is still trying to catch up to features and speed NTFS offers. ZFS is the only thing on the horizon that might finally achieve this Holy Grail.)

I won’t go any further on the massive conceptual differences between NT and *nixes in general. However, people that do what to understand, go look up ‘client/server kernel NT’ or even pull up any of the original NT design books/whitepapers on why the UNIX model was an option but not used because of the inherent flaws in what makes the UNIX model. Even just check out the NT object model that is in contrast to the I/O device textual model of a UNIX design.

As for usability and UI design theories, OS X still has too many hooks into 1980s concepts that even Microsoft abandoned 13 years ago. (For example: Take the concept of Menus, they are a poor GUI concept from the beginning, but the only way to get all the features into a graphical application. So even as 'graphical' the UI in OS X is, everything is still designed around menus, which are nothing more than textual word lists, that were functionally implemented on character based UIs back in the 60s.

(Vista and Office 2007 is just one example of moving away from dated UI concepts like Menus, and even if not perfect, at least the Microsoft Research team is putting a lot of effort into moving forward to what is 'next', unlike Apple and OS X.)

All this aside, if you like OS X use it, but don’t assume PC users are stupid or haven’t seen the light. It is more like they haven’t drank the Apple marketing kool-aid or are technically based professionals or even theorists and teachers like myself that make a living by designing, creating, and understanding Operating Systems.

PS. No I do not work for Microsoft…

Weasel, have you heard the expression "you get what you pay for"? Well, if you are satisfied with Windows there is absolutely no reason to buy a Mac, and the same goes to anybody else, get and use what you are satisfied with. I find the price of Macs satisfying and worth the machine itself, so I have no problems with buying that particular brand.

If anyone couldn't see the parody in my words I wont elaborate more. Just can't remember which was first? The egg or the hen?

I have used Mac OS and like it but haven't had problems with Windows either.

Why you Mac fan boys just don't live with your superior system and leave us stupid PC users alone?

I'll never become a Mac user because I'd hate to turn into the kind of person who posts about how much better Mac is than Windows... in the end they're all just boring old computers!

People in front of windows PCs are usually shaking their heads thinking Why didn't I buy a MAC.... XP was a better OS than Vista, Soldave is right, XP didn't require all of the updates and re-installs like Vista does. So what was Microsoft doing in the time between XP and Windows 7?? Answer: losing market share and stock value!

What do these people who claim they have to reinstall windows two or three times a year actually do with their PCs?! I have had XP on one of my systems since 2002 and it's done virus research, photo & video editing, games, internet browsing etc and never needed to be reinstalled.

PCs/Windows copies Macs? That's a laugh. I have two words: Intel chips

Windows has seen me well for ages, despite the fact that it needs some maintenance, oh well, so does my car. Im looking forward to 7, but more so to 8, as they say it will be larger bit os. Oh yeah, and every time I ever used a mac it froze and had to be emergency shut down. One couldnt even shut down from teh button and needed the powerto be pulled. I do know how to use a mac, i was using one for deign purposes. They have thier plusses and thier drawbacks.

Well... Windows user since 3.1 and have been using Mac for less than a year....

All I can say is WOW... I should have ignored the scaremongering from Microsoft many years ago and given Mac a try...

I thought the transition would be soooo difficult but the entire OS seems so intuitive... I still have 2 windows machines - gathering dust - and will switch my entire future computer hardware purchases over to Mac - where I can run windows as well btw for those 1 or 2 programs that don't have a Mac version...

"Seeing is believing" and "Trying means Buying"...

Win 7 is going to be the best windows ever but it will still only be a Windows version of OSX from what I have seen...

Cheers,

Sounds like they studied a bunch of stupid people.

all Mac versions are actually Windows!

That's hilarious! Mac/Unix came along way before Bad Billy dropped out of college. Windoze will never compare with a Mac no matter how hard they try to copy the interface. I've been using Macs for over ten years and I can unequivocally state Macs walk all over anything Windoze has ever done or will ever do. Macs have a reputation of being machines for designers, engineers, architects, etc. Is that because they are Mac geeks is it simply because it is a much more stable and user-friendly OS? I have three Macs and two Windoze machines. The Macs have never even hinted at reinstalling the OS, but the Windoze machines get reinstalled two or three times a year cos of spyware/viruses or just because the system has gone into a spin with the all too familiar 'blue screen of death'. XP is as good as Windoze will ever get. If you consider that to be good.

It's just lamb dressed up as mutton. Or, should that be 'lame' dressed up as mutton.

Nop, from my point of view all Mac versions are actually Windows! When you open programs in Mac what pops up? Windows!!! So go Windows go! (just drop the price)

neverknow2 - Similar to what people were saying about the iPhone, and that was a success.

Zybster - not sure about the questions, but I'm sure if you checked out Windows 7 (which I believe people can download a beta of) then you might be able to find answers.

several of the "new features" in Windows 7 I've been using for several years on my Mac.

All of the features of Windows are from Mac. Nothing new here.

It's interesting, several of the "new features" in Windows 7 I've been using for several years on my Mac. "Task Bar" sounds very much like "Dock", What's the difference between "Shake" and "Expose?", the "Libraries" use the functionality of "iPhoto" and "iTunes", where your media files are brought together. The "Jump List" sound interesting, but how do you decide which function of the program are important?