Day One and I decided to install the Windows 7 Beta. I am not normally into running beta’s however have heard some great things about Windows 7 I decided to give it a try. The ISO I installed from the Beta site was just over 3GB in size and downloaded easily. Once I had it I used the Roxio 2009 to take the ISO and create a Bootable DVD.
We installed it on:
Intel Core i7 Motherboard DX58SO
Intel Core i7 Extreme Processor
6GB Kingston DDR3 HyperX 1066 Memory
Seagate 300GB SATA
ATI Radion 4850 512MB
Creative Labs X-FI Titanium
Cooler Master Haf932
Cooler Master V8 CPU Cooler
Cooler Master Ultimate 900w Power Supply
We decided to obviously go with the 64bit install to make use of the memory and see if the issues we had run into with the XP64 Bit version at release would be prevalent with the Beta U7.
Install took about 2.5 hours as we partitions and formatted (Had Windows 7 handle that) and ran through the install process. In set up we had the option to choose a Home Network, Business Network and Public Computer install. We have chosen the Home Group which will allow us to connect and share with other home users in the Home Group.
We have another XP Pro Machine and a Vista Machine on the Network and will check the functionality of this network which seems to be on the surface, similar to the Network Setup when connecting to the Xbox Live Network?
We did not notice any glitches with install which can usuallly be experienced with Beta Installs. We were also able to setup the included Internet Explorer 8 which has a nice new menu feature and was very responsive to the system.
While we are testing this on a Upper End spec system, it has performed flawless through set up. The Famous UAC control was easily located and gave us the option to how we want the User Account Control to respond when Downloading, Installing, Etc. We adjusted the UAC by going into the Control Panel, User Accounts and Family Safety and then the User Account you want to manage. An option pops up that will allow you to adjust the settings.
We visited the Adobe site and Downloaded and installed the Flash Player, No Issues which then showed us the Flash on our Website. There was no prompting that we should download this feature but can assume this will be changed in the full release of Windows 7.
We did notice the sound was choppy with the WDM drivers under Windows 7 so we took the gamble and visited the Creative Labs site where we downloaded the Titanium Drivers Only and fixed the choppy sound on Internet Playback.
We installed iTunes and again, experienced no issues at present. We will atempt to install NOD32 AV and Office, which we hear may have some install issues with the Beta build which is Build 7000.
One issue that will take some getting used to for me is the inability to change out the Menu to the Classic Start Menu. We attempted to located it but read various Web Postings that the Classic Menu Option was not included and getting used to the XP/Vista style task menu may speed up use. I am sure I can get use to this.
There are some customization options for the Menu which allow you to pin programs not only to the Start Menu but also to the Taskbar itself and easily select the screen orientation for the Menu. I didn’t the Gadget Sidebar with this install, a menu offered the Desktop Gadget Gallery however, I would rather not see this feature, and on first look it is not run by default. I like what
I see so far, we’ll report on more later.
Andy