A question that has been on my mind for the past few months is – has Windows 7 improved Microsoft’s street cred? Far from the bloated drama of Windows Vista, 7 has unleashed speedier working and some critically acclaimed features that have had many haters stop and take note. But is this enough to take Microsoft’s bedraggled reputation out the kicking zone? I am beginning to think the answer is yes…
Sure, they’ve made some mistakes in the past and there are plenty of fiddly issues with their systems that show the workings of a faintly deranged mind, but I’ve found that my years of working with Microsoft products have given me the kind of technical bushcraft that only surviving in tough software conditions can deliver.
While Microsoft is unlikely to ever achieve the casual cool chic of Open Source, perhaps it will escape the image of the snotty kid counting his coins in the corner. Certainly the benefits of the streamlined OS and its features has been noted in the news lately.
A recent survey released by Janco Associates shows how well Windows 7 is doing in today’s OS heavy marketplace. Windows 7 has definitely caught on far better than Vista ever did and is holding at 14.8% of the OS market in less than seven months. The survey also showed that there are more users of Windows 7 than there are of Vista – not a huge surprise when you consider how unpopular the latter was.
Then, to add another string to Windows 7’s bow, is the news that Windows 7 is a lot less power hungry than the latest release of the ever popular Ubuntu 10.04. The technical gurus over at Phororix have done some tests that pitted Windows 7 against Ubuntu 10.04 on two different systems – the ASUS Eee PC 1201N and a Lenovo ThinkPad T61.
On the generally fairly hungry Eee PC, Ubuntu used around 56% more power than Windows 7 Pro, while on the thinkpad, the difference dropped to around 14%. These results do indicate that your choice of operating system will affect how often you’re going to need to be near a power source.
Obviously this has nothing to do with overall operating system performance and functionality, this is merely a test on power consumption, but it does put Windows 7 into a much nicer spotlight than Windows Vista ever experienced.
Certainly manufactures are responding accordingly. ASUS have announced the launch of a Wintel tablet PC that will boast a 10” ultra-thin and light design powered by an Intel Atom and Windows 7. It will sit alongside its Android cousing (sister?) at Computex in early June so it will be interesting to see how well it works then. Not only that, but the ASUS answer to the iPad is going to boast both a Windows platform and a Google platform making these tablets extremely accessible to the masses.
Overall I think that Windows 7 is going to carry on being integrated into mobile, and desktop, devices and implementations. It seems to be defying the stigma of Microsoft madness and tackling previous issues with aplomb. Now we’ll just have to wait and see what happens next.
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