Mossberg on Win7: <i>After using pre-release versions of Windows 7 for nine months, and intensively testing the final version for the past month on many different machines, I believe it is the best version of Windows Microsoft (MSFT) has produced.</i><p>Mossberg on Vista: <i>After months of testing Vista on multiple computers, new and old, I believe it is the best version of Windows that Microsoft has produced. </i><p>Mossberg on Win7: <i>Like the new Snow Leopard operating system released in August by Microsoft’s archrival, Apple (AAPL), Windows 7 is much more of an evolutionary than a revolutionary product.</i><p>Mossberg on Vista: <i>Overall, it works pretty much the same way as Windows XP. Windows hasn't been given nearly as radical an overhaul as Microsoft just applied to its other big product, Office.</i><p>I do not care what this person has to say about operating systems, and by extension, about anything anyone writes about what he cares about operating systems.
Over the past three releases of Windows, I've noticed that I've become more alienated from the UI with each release. First with XP, then Vista, and now Windows 7, it seems like each release is just a little more annoying to use. It's like the two stories Joel Spolsky tells in the first chapter of "User Interface Design for Programmers". About every minute I try to do something and I'm just a little frustrated with how the UI reacts. Consequently, the first thing I do on any Windows computer is make it look and act as much like Win98 as possible.<p>It's the same thing with OS X. Right now my favorite UI to use is Gnome, because it acts mostly like Win98 with a few improvements that make sense to me (primarily virtual desktops). It makes me simultaneously feel like an old fogey shaking his cane at progress, and also like those ratpoison and xmonad users I could never understand.<p>I have often asked myself why this is. The obvious answer is I'm set in my ways and don't want to learn new things. Certainly possible, but I don't see that in other areas of my computer usage (programming languages, web design, etc). Sometimes I wonder if it's because these new UI improvements are largely meant to help your average user, but don't help me much. For example, both OS X and Win7 are optimized for only having one window per program open at once, but I often have many open. It frustrates me that it's harder to switch between those windows than in Win98.<p>I wonder if any of you other power users are experiencing the same thing.
<i>Has Mossberg always been the king of trumpeting diminished expectations, or is this a new thing? Is Microsoft a major Wall Street Journal advertiser?</i><p>So if a critic expresses a view contrary to your own views he's a shill? Great argument. Windows 7 is actually really good. And here's the shocker: so is Mac OS X.<p>Must we have religious wars over which bits are on your hard drive?
There are a lot of people working in the computer industry, and it moves much faster than other industries. This is why 10 years seems like an eternity for users to accept no real advancement.<p>Then again, if you aren't really into computers, and just use them, you might look at it as a tool like any other. My car is 10 years old, there are probably people at Ford who hate that I still have it, but I don't yet see a reason to change it.<p>Similarly, while I'm very aware of how the actions of one dominant company (Microsoft) have made the computing industry practically stand still, I am also mostly aware of this because I'm <i>in</i> that industry. There could be a Microsoft of vacuum cleaners, that has kept us away from truly great cleaning machines for the past 50 years, and I wouldn't know. People don't generally have the time, or take the time, to figure out which products could be truly great for them.
Windows XP hasn't stayed still for all that time. When XP came out, minimum specs were 64MB and a 233MHz processor, 128MB / 300MHz recommended. Try running an XP SP3 machine on those recommended specs today and you'll quickly see how limited it is, especially with browsing the modern web, or running any "big" productivity app, like a photo or video editor, or an IDE.<p>The fact is, XP has been quite scalable as hardware has moved on; it hasn't been a significant factor in limiting the amount of hardware juice getting through to applications running on top of it, which is one half of what you want out of an OS; and in terms of virtualization of hardware resources across multiple apps, the other half, for the majority of desktop usage it's been fine.<p>Windows 7 for me primarily means an improved kernel with more API functionality; a very confusing shuffle of configuration locations; a space-inefficient shell UI; and a start menu / task bar combination that I dislike compared XP's start menu and task bar. Oh, and less menus, for increased user frustration. (I'm not a fan of whizz-bang GUI gloss, it's generally the first thing I disable.) Win7 for me is a very mixed bag, but a necessary "upgrade", simply to track what end users and customers are experiencing.
<i>To most computer users, overall industry progress has seemed stagnant for nearly a decade.</i><p>If we are considering "most" computer users, then I'm not sure a majority really care.
exactly.<p>part of it reads as if he was defending it against macos (mentioned it 6 times).<p>then he describes in excruciating detail small GUI improvements that gnome (or any other wm i guess) pushed through in 6month (oh wow windows-previews in the taskbar).<p>he admits that in the area of networking there is still room for improvement but at least "now you can see all available wireless networks by just clicking on an icon in the taskbar". way to go!<p>but windows wins in other areas: windows7 has "some of the same kind" (!?) of multitouch gestures the iphone made popular. yeah.. how would i even..<p>Compatibility is also satisfactory: firefox, adobe, etc. work. good job MS! though he fails to mention that they don't work out-of-the-box. how could they: they are not in the box.<p>let's just hope their migration plan gets better when the next BIG THING gets pushed out in 10 years... or so. improving shouldn't be hard: it's not possible to upgrade without whipping your HD - assuming you now have an XP install.<p>oh right: that's basically everybody.
So, according to Marco, Win 7 will have to be better than Mac OSX in "ALL" the areas only then will it be able to better compete with it, else not. If Mossberg's review is biased (not that I'm saying it is), Marco's take on it is even worse.