Table of Contents

Intro

What It All Means: Windows 7 Review
So much anticipation has led up to the arrival of Windows 7, aka The Redeemer. But does it live up to the hype? Here we pass judgment, and then, because we like you, we give you a super-quick tour of its best features and tips.

Chapter 1

The Real Cost of Upgrading to Windows 7
Now that prices are announced and it's time to think about upgrading, here are all the different considerations you'll have to make. It's as smart a Windows upgrade as there ever was, but do your homework!

Chapter 2

How To Use Windows 7, or Why The New UI Is So Great
Windows 7 is Microsoft's biggest user-interface overhaul since Windows 95. It's no surprise, then, that even Windows veterans could use a crash course on how to use it.

Chapter 3

Device Stage Hardware Fun, Plus More Productivity Tips
Device Stage, the instant recognition of cameras, printers and other peripherals, is candy for the gadget-addicted, but knowing what works and what doesn't definitely matters.

Chapter 4

Windows Media Player and Media File Compatibility
Music and movies—not only are they more important than they were when Vista came out, but they also come from more sources in more formats. Windows 7 attempts to master them all.

Chapter 5

Couch Tricks: New Features for Windows Media Center
Our favorite "10-foot" media software shows up in Windows 7 with loads of new features—if you haven't yet seen why Media Center makes even TiVo look dated, you better pay attention.

Chapter 6

Important Changes to Networking and Security
When it comes to life online, there's no way to underestimate advances in networking and security. Windows 7 is full of them, and it pays to know what they are and how to use them.

Chapter 7

Natural Interfaces: Pen, Touch and Multitouch
Windows 7 comes of age at a time when the keyboard and mouse are giving way to newer more instinctive controls—luckily, it's got many of those controls built right in. Bonus: Here's a first look at the fun Surface-like Windows 7 Touch Pack which may soon be available on all touch PCs.

Chapter 8

Got Troubles? Here's How To Shoot 'Em Down
Even a good operating system can be bad once in a while. During the Beta test, we had our share of issues. Here's a discussion of many of the problems that can be solved, and a few that can't.

Is there something missing, a discussion you were hoping to have but aren't seeing here? We want to be thorough, so let's have it. Go ahead and hit us up, either in direct emails or to our tips line, with the subject "Windows 7 Guide."

DEVICE STAGE
Many operating systems have pre-installed drivers for printers, scanners and other products, but Device Stage takes the concept to a ridiculously thorough level, with not just drivers but specialized icons, pop-up menus and XML pages full of things you can do with your camera, printer, scanner, phone or whatever.

Devices and Printers
Everything you plug in or can reach via Bluetooth or the network appears in the Devices and Printers page, clickable from the Start menu. Gadgets that have been programmed for Device Stage appear with specific icons representing them; those that haven't still get one of many different icon categories. Click once on anything on the page, and the contextual ribbon menu at the top changes to reflect the functions of the device you clicked.

Services Splash Page
When you double-click a Device icon, you get a pop-up splash page decorated by the company who made the gadget, usually with functions you can do on your computer (browse files, import pictures, customize your printer) and stuff you have to go out to the web to do (order ink, visit online gallery, etc.). Though some of the services are nice, they can get shamelessly promotional. You probably won't spend a lot of time on this page, though, because most options are reachable in an even better way, via the taskbar.

Taskbar Icon and Menu
The real meat of Device Stage is found in the amazing Windows 7 taskbar itself. Here, you can see what's connected, and instead of launching some big cumbersome window, you can right-click the icon itself and get most if not all of the services right there in a pop-up. The only thing better would be the ability to customize the stuff that appears in that menu, but it's a start. Not all devices automatically show up in the Taskbar, probably because it could get annoying to have a Taskbar full of stuff. Cameras always do, but printers only do when they're in use, or when you double-click them from the Devices and Printers page.

Availability of Device Stage Content
The big hitch here is that the device manufacturer, be it Canon, Motorola or Apple, has to build a splash page and a services list. If they don't, you get a generic icon and generic services (open folder, import content, etc.). Our guess is that most manufacturers will get on board, but it's early. Also, though supported devices do show up instantly when plugged in, some services, like advanced printing and scanning features, require the install disc, so it's not always a guaranteed automatic play.

[More Device Stage details and images]

Multiple Monitors
Got an extra monitor lying around? Hook it up brainlessly using Windows 7 in literally two steps.

FILE PRODUCTIVITY TIPS
Once files are off your devices and onto your computer, there are new integrated ways to work with those files. Here are some tips for extra productivity:

ISO Burning
Yep, ISO disc burning is native to Windows 7. Meaning you no longer have to pay money—or hunt for something free—to manipulate disc images that you should have been able to manage in the OS ages ago.

Those Pesky DOCX Files
WordPad now opens the XML Word Doc files that not even earlier versions of Word itself can. It's good news, though to be honest, if you've upgraded to Windows 7 without upgrading to Office 2007, there's something amiss.

Send To
It may not be as sexy as Play To, but Send To can be helpful in pushing and pulling files around your system and your network. As Lifehacker points out, holding down the Shift key expands those options.

TASKBAR
The taskbar is our favorite new UI element of Windows 7. It's the biggest change from Windows past, and in our view, the best. But it might result in some confusion at first because it groups applications that are open and those that aren't into one big party—the theory is that it shouldn't matter if it's already running or not if you wanna open it. That might kinda remind you of OS X's Dock, but it works a bit differently and definitely still operates on the Windows paradigm. Combined with Aero Peek, which makes every window on the desktop transparent except the one you're highlighting at the moment, you can find any window nearly instantly, no matter how many windows your desktop is buried under.

Here's how it works: When you hold your cursor the icon of an open program in the taskbar (it'll have a hint of gloss it, while unopened apps are dull and non-glassy), a live preview thumbnail will pop up for every window it has open, and in applications coded for it, like Internet Explorer, a thumbnail of every open tab, too. When you hover over a thumbnail, it brings that window to the front, and makes everything else transparent, so you know it's the one you're looking for (or not). [More Taskbar details and images and why Windows 7 Taskbar beats Mac OS X's Dock]

Jump Lists
In applications coded to take advantage of the jump list, when you right-click an icon, you'll get a pop-up menu where you can quickly select common functions. In Internet Explorer, it shows your recent browsing history; in Windows Media Player, it'll let you play recent videos; and Windows Explorer will give you quick access to pinned and frequently used folders and files. Expect jump lists to be more useful as new apps are released for Windows 7 that build functions into the jumplist.

Aero Peek

Aero Peek, which we talked about above, is a big part of what makes the new taskbar so useful. When you highlight the thumbnail preview of an app window that you might wanna open, it makes every other open window transparent, so you get a clear view of the window you're looking at. Or, if you highlight a small button on the bottom right corner of the taskbar, every window will become see-through, for a quick peek at your desktop or gadgets, Windows 7's free-floating widgets (more on those below).

Pinning
Gone is the Quick Launch bar, where you used to store shortcut buttons to your favorite apps. Now they just hang out on the taskbar with open applications. When you "pin" something, like an app or folder, it's got a permanent spot on the taskbar for easy access. When the app is running or the folder is open, the icon has a glossy sheen over it. One quirk with folders: If you try to pin more than one to the taskbar, they're all collapsed into a single "Windows Explorer" icon. Also, if you pin a file to the taskbar, it's actually pinned to the icon of the program that opens it, so you'll have to right-click that icon to pop up the jump list (see below) and select it from there.

WINDOWS
Here's where we really get into what makes Windows 7's UI really special and so different from past Windows versions—the way you handle and manage windows, and by extension, applications. It'll change your life! Maybe! Okay, not really. But it will give you a warm feeling in your tummy. Or that could be the Mexican food you ate last night.

Aero Shake
Shake, rattle and roll, sucka. Aero Shake is the new UI thinger that's useless-but-neat. Grab whatever window you want to be the only one you see, and shake it. Everything else will be minimized. But then you have to have re-open all of 'em, so not that useful overall. Correction: Shaking again will revive all of the windows. Aero Peek, which we talk about above, is better.

Maximize/Minimize aka Aero Snap

Maybe it's just a side effect of splitting my time on a Mac, but I don't really maximize windows that much anymore, and I think the new Windows UI makes you less likely to do it, too, since it's easier to deal with having tons of windows open and scattered around your screen. But if you do wanna make a window of an open app or document swallow your entire monitor, just grab it and drag it to the top of the screen. You'll get a slick little animation indicating that when you let go of the mouse button, the window will blow up to cover your whole screen. To unmaximize, just grab the top of window and pull down—it'll instantly go back to its original size. Snazzy, no?

Also, on the bottom right-hand corner of the screen, there's a sliver of button you should check out. When you hover over it, it'll make every open window go all transparent so you can see your desktop. Click the button, and everything will be minimized. [More Maximize and Minimize details and images]

Left/Right Alignment aka Aero Snap, Part Deux
Another Aero snap feature: Drag a window to the far left or right of your screen, and when your cursor touches the edge, it'll make that window take up exactly half of your screen. Nice, especially on widescreen monitors.

DESKTOP/BASICS
Really, Windows 7's isn't too different from the Windows you've known and loved (or loathed) for years. It just has a handful of new UI features scattered throughout that make it easier than ever to multitask with Windows, with the side effect of making it look modern and kinda neat, too. Here's a rundown of the new ooie GUI hotness and what it does.

Gadgets

Gadgets, widgets, whatever you want to call them, they're little mini-applications strewn across your desktop that do useful things like tell you how cold it is outside, in case your apartment is like mine, where you leave all the windows open because your radiator is crazy hot and you're almost fooled into thinking it's 70 degrees outside, but really it's like 20. In a former life (i.e., Vista) they were like little ducks in a row, sitting on the sidebar by default, but now they're free-floating on your desktop, where they're more useful. I just wish there were more useful gadgets to download—now that they don't suck, maybe you'll see them start to come out. [More Gadgets details and images]

Themes
Microsoft has made themes—the unified look across your PC, like the color of windows and your wallpaper—more prominent than ever in Windows 7, and much easier to save, download and swap out too, depending on your mood. Just right-click on your desktop and press personalize, then you can change them, or Microsoft will direct you to where you can download more. Or, if you wanna be more pro, check out Lifehacker's guide to Windows 7 themage.

Shortcuts
There's a slew of new keyboard hotkey shortcuts that use the Windows key, making it feel useful for the first time ever. (And I've been using Windows for like, ever.) Two you should memorize right now: Win+T cycles through apps on your taskbar for quick access to programs, and Win+G brings all of your gadgets to the front. Check the whole list here.

Windows Explorer Preview
The preview pane was actually in Windows Vista, but Microsoft made it hard to find. Not so in Windows 7. Just press the little button above. It shoots out to the side a preview image of whatever file you've got selected, like a picture, movie, or even yes, documents, so you don't have to open 'em to see what's inside. [More Windows Explorer Preview details and images]

WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER
Windows Media Player is never going to be the prettiest girl in school, but Windows 7 gives it a few upgrades that definitely makes it more useful.

File Compatibility
For starters, Windows 7 now supports more types of media files, now including AAC in the audio department, and H.264, DivX and Xvid in video, with no third-party download needed. It also supports all of the formats it did before, including the earlier MPEG stuff and of course anything Microsoft had a hand in, not just WMA and WMV, but VC-1, too. This ability to read so much comes in handy in Play To, obsessively covered down below.

New WMP Interface
Though we haven't dwelt on it, Windows Media Player's interface was subtly redesigned. Not only is there a neat pop-up mini music player for when you want to see what's playing but you're doing other stuff, there's also a new set of tabs on the right-hand side, including a Play, Burn and Sync. The differences are subtle at a glance, but for people who were heavy WMP11 users, this new version, WMP12, has much improved workflow. (Ars Technica did a nice detailed walkthrough of the new WMP interface, if you're interested.)

PLAY TO
Speaking of "play," one of the most potentially groundbreaking features of Windows 7 is "Play To," the ability to send music, video and photos to any compatible devices on the network, without running any kind of proprietary software, and without any initial setup. Sending a song to a Sonos or a video to an Xbox is—theoretically—just a right-click away.

What devices will work?
The reason things work so well in theory is that they all support DLNA standards for sharing content on a network. You right click a piece of content in Windows Media Player, select "Play To..." and up pops any and all devices that can be commandeered. The good news here is that any media "renderer"—be it a networked photo frame or a PS3—that ends up supporting the standard will be able to receive anything you hurl at it from your Windows 7 box, and you'll even be able to grab content from servers and other computers and play them on the renderer of your choice. The downside is that there will surely be good products that don't support the spec for one reason or another.

What devices work now?
In our testing, we sent music to the Sonos and sent certain video files to the Xbox, though only when the Xbox was running the Windows Media Center Extender software. There are currently a number of other compliant "play to" products—such as the Roku SoundBridge—but since the spec itself isn't finalized yet, it's hard to just run a list. The DLNA itself will soon be announcing compatible products as they either come to market or receive the appropriate firmware update.

What content works?
As I mentioned, the computer can send media files to "renderers" around the network. At this point, it's not clear whether or not the computer can tell if the product can render the file—it sends whatever you tell it, and then returns an error if it can't be played. But soon, the computer itself will know the file compatibilities of devices on the network, and will transcode files on the fly if there's a better fit (say, from DivX to WMA). This stays in the "I'll believe it when I see it" file for now, but it's confirmed to be part of the deal.

[More Play To details and images; for a nice but long-winded video on the subject, click here]

New Context/Details Menu
Most menus share this new look, which pops up whenever you select a song, album, photo or video for playback. In each case, the page looks similar in structure but the information it provides is different. In the case of music here, you can select a track from the album on the first menu; in the secondary "actions" menu, you get choices like "Burn a CD/DVD."

Pictures and Slide Show Creator
Not only has the main pictures browser been tweaked, but now in a new slide show creator, you can hand-pick the photos you want for a slide show on the fly. If you go into the Picture Library, then select "slide shows" from the sub-menu, you can create a new list that puts you in control of the photos in your slide show.

New Video Now Playing Menu
The on-screen context menu while watching videos is also redesigned, and it's pretty unobtrusive. One thing Microsoft figured out with Media Center is how to use a gradual fade as a transition between menus and content in their UI. To check out the new Now Playing bar, just use the left/right keys to move through the options at hand. I'm a fan of it, personally.

Chronological Turbo Scroll for TV Schedules

In most on-screen TV guides, trying to browse a few days ahead is either slow and tedious or so fast you miss your target. In Media Center, the Turbo Scroll feature speeds things up a lot. If you hit the left/right arrow keys for a few seconds while browsing the onscreen guide, the channel listings become a blur, but over that blur appears a marker showing day and approximate time, so you can speed up, then stop on a dime when you get to the spot where you think your show is listed. It's probably quite useful, but as you can see in the video above, it's so cool, you'll do it even if you're not looking for anything.

Alphabetical Turbo Scroll for Music

Similarly, the music player also has a Turbo scroll feature. Again, if you hold down one of the left/right arrow keys while scrolling through any of the categorized music lists for a few seconds, it also begins to zoom through the album cover thumbnails/song titles/artists, with the general section of the Alphabetically organized library that it's in (Ab, Gi, Se, etc...). When you see you're getting close to the name of the album you want, the scroll also stops fast, and you are free to browse.

Video Playback Behind Menus
If you're watching a video (or listening to a song) and you want to exit to the main menu to look at something else, the video (or album art) will continue to play in a slick-looking dissolved background behind the UI. To check it out, just start watching a video or listening to a song, then exit to the main screen while selected media is playing. It's like multimedia multitasking.

Start Menu/Taskbar Launcher
The nice thing about bringing up Media Center in the Start Menu (or right clicking while pinned to the taskbar), is that it displays a list of frequently accessed sections of Media Center. This can be either specific files, like photos and videos, or functions, such as TV. This saves the trouble of having to burrow through 4 menus to get to something you already have in mind. After hitting the Start button, just click the arrow next to the Media Center icon to bring up the secondary list.

Album Art Grid
When you play a song in Media Center, not only is the album art for the selected song shifting from side to side on the screen, but there's a quilt of all the other album covers cascading down behind it in a fluid motion. It's nice to look at, not to mention a bit hypnotic.

Media Center on Xbox
Connecting Media Center to Xbox is pretty simple. You start Media Center on your Xbox, and if you haven't set it up as an extender with another machine already, it will ask you if you want to add one, then give you an 8 digit number. Then, you go into settings in Windows 7 Media Center and select Add extender and plug in that number. The setup process will begin, and voila, you have Media Center on your Xbox. Much of it looks and acts the same as it's Windows counterpart, with one added feature: If you use the Play To feature in Windows Media Player on your PC, it will work with Xbox Media Center. Pretty neat.

Inside Tip: In the beta, we learned that it was better for the Media Center PC to be connected via Ethernet or Wireless N to the router. (The Xbox can be connected wirelessly or via Ethernet, it allegedly doesn't matter.) If you have been experiencing a very sluggy Media Center Extender experience on the Xbox, try ditching slower connections and to your computer.

Virtual Channels
One of Win 7 Media Center's most anticipated new features is virtual TV programming, or virtual channels, that make up the enhanced IPTV features hinted at previously. More than just running promotional 2-minute clips, the goal for Microsoft is to offer on-demand full episodes, possibly even from Hulu and other content providers. MSNBC is currently up and running, and the feature looks promising with a nice looking on-screen guide, regularly updated content and the ability to make on-demand video playlists. You can eventually find these virtual channels under Extras. For now, it's just MSNBC that actually works, but the basic idea of mixing on-demand functionality in media center is pretty awesome.

Video Thumbnail Scroll
When you're playing back any HD video, and you're scrolling along the timeline (back or forward arrow keys, or dragging the timeline) there's a thumbnail that pops up, providing visuals on the scene you're about to skip to. It's like fast forwarding while using Netflix streaming, and it's a pretty useful, if subtle feature. I'd love to see it extended to all video playback.

Photo Wall During Music Play Back
When listening to music, if you select to "Play Photos," it will begin a slide show of sorts, that arranges your photos into a giant wall, then pans and zooms through the lot, fading in from grayscale to a full color view.

NETWORKING
Microsoft has tried simplifying its networking solutions overall in Windows 7, added more home-user features, and redesigned certain basic networking interfaces so that they actually kinda make sense.

Wireless Networking
Connecting to new wireless networks is something that has been made significantly easier in Windows 7. In the taskbar's notifications tray, there is a wireless signal icon just like in past Windows versions. But clicking on it now brings up a list of available networks around you. You can connect to an unsecure network, or enter in your security code on a secure network and hit the Connect button. Disconnecting is just as easy.

HomeGroup
HomeGroup is intended as an easy way for multiple computers on the same network to share their files, folders and smart content clusters known as libraries. Properly implemented, HomeGroup could be a step closer to brainless networking, and it makes sense for families.

If you access the HomeGroup tab in the Control Panel, you will be presented with the option (in theory) to create a new homegroup or join a currently existing homegroup. After creating a new homegroup, Windows asks you what libraries you want to share, and gives you a password for other computers on the network who want to join your homegroup. When the new PCs jump on the network, they get prompted to join the homegroup, and are asked for the password.

The strange thing is, other devices will still show up under the general network even if they are not necessarily connected to your homegroup. So while the tool does seem to simplify things, it may not be the last word when it comes to security. We experienced some hiccups in our trials of HomeGroup in Win 7 beta, so we have to see it in the final release to really identify whether it's going to work as billed or not.
[More HomeGroup details and images]

SECURITY
Windows 7 ramps up security options. Vista users will still identify the mostly painless Windows Firewall and Windows Defender mainstays, but Microsoft threw in some new security features—native biometric support and enhanced BitLocker protection, for example—and by letting people pick their level of User Account Control alert messages, Windows 7 aims for a safe but more user-friendly experience. However, by attempting to be more user-friendly, they may have inadvertently compromised some security.

User Account Control (UAC) Settings
Many complained in Windows Vista that User Account Control settings was an annoying feature, especially for people who were used to Administrator status and Administrator-type work. It was a necessary but evil feature. In Windows 7, Microsoft now gives you four different options for User Account Control, which you can access in the Control Panel. You can set the alerts to alert you when programs and you make a change, when only programs make a change, when only programs make a change but never dim the screen, or to never alert you at all. On the user end, it has become more convenient but seems to have compromised in security, since the Windows community has become recently aware that the new UAC is open to malicious scripts. It'd just be a shame to go back to constant UAC alerts in the name of security.

Action Center
Previously, you could access most of your security configurations in the Security Center. In Windows 7, everything from security to maintenance has been corralled into the new Action Center. It's accessible from the notification tray on your taskbar, or from the Control Panel. Here you can manage your network firewall, virus and spyware protection, UAC settings and more, along with basic troubleshooting and recovery. By being able to see everything in one place, Microsoft made it easier to identify potential problems at once. It may sound like your local news channel's 5 o'clock team of do-gooders, but this Action Center is certainly an improvement, and a better way to reach users than previous "centers," like Vista's Welcome Center.

Biometric Devices
Windows 7 comes with in-built support for biometric devices. In the Control Panel, you can set this feature to be turned off or turned on, and you can register fingerprints to act as your log-in password for Windows and other programs—so long as your drivers are working. In beta testing, Windows 7 didn't recognize my laptop's biometric scanner, even after I installed the proper drivers for it. Assuming you've got it working, Internet Explorer gives you the option of logging into sites with a registered fingerprint. This security feature is useful when logging into sites that require sensitive data, such as your bank, especially if you're afraid someone is snooping on you with a keystroke-logger.

BitLocker Drive Encryption
Windows 7 has revamped BitLocker to make it easier to encrypt hard drives. In Vista, BitLocker required you to set up a partition. Now, the BitLocker partition has already been set up. In addition, there is added support for encrypting removable drives such as flash drives. (Yes, they're calling it "BitLocker To Go.") Even if encrypting your desktop drives doesn't make much sense, it makes oodles of sense to lock down easily stolen portable devices such as your laptop and your USB drive. The encrypting process overall also has been simplified, which is great for people who aren't as familiar with BitLocker and general encryption. As was the case with Vista, BitLocker will only be available to Enterprise and Ultimate users.

TOUCH AND MULTITOUCH
In order to make use of the touch interface in Windows 7, you need a compatible PC with a touch monitor and the right drivers. We used an HP TouchSmart PC, which Microsoft has also been using in demonstrations.

In the video below, you can see the basic gestures associated with Win 7 touch:
Tap: A single click with an accompanying droplet-ripple effect
Tap and hold: The equivalent of right-clicking, indicated by a swirling circle around your finger
Flick: Inertial menu or window scrolling set in motion by a quick flick of your finger (there's also a related inertial "toss" behavior for flinging photos and other objects around the screen, where they bounce to a halt)
Type: A pop-up keyboard lets you type for real
You'll also see the multitouch gestures:
Zoom: Spreading or tweezing two fingers to make a picture zoom in or out
Rotate: Swirling those two fingers around to make the photo move
Draw: In Paint, you can even draw with two fingers
As applications harness the multitouch capabilities of the OS, more behaviors (like air hockey) will become apparent.

[More on touch and multitouch (including a virtual Air Hockey demo)]

PEN INTERFACE AND WRITING RECOGNITION
The Pen interface is similar to the touch interface, with inertial gestures and other new behavior. Though Microsoft's Tablet PC interface has been around for a long time, there are three key additions to the writing software: Custom dictionaries, math recognition and shape recognition.

Custom Dictionaries
This may not sound like much, but custom dictionaries make it easy for people who use Tablet PCs at work to get their weird job-specific terminology across. Think of a doctor and a prescription pad—how many tries does it take for handwriting recognition to tell a hastily written "fexofenadine" from a similarly scrawled "fenofibrate"? In this case, the doc would be able to add the terms, so they become at least slightly more distinct.

Math Recognition
I love this idea, since in all the years that I actually did math, I could never use a computer to do it, because I didn't want to figure out how to use all those symbols and keyboard shortcuts. (Mind you, I haven't done math in centuries, but still, I have painful memories of how confusing it was.) Now you just write the equation, with finger or pen, and you get the equation you want. Most of the time. The Math Input Panel (above) is a stand-alone Windows accessory that will paste into any math-aware application, but there's also a Math Input Control API for integrating into software.

Shape Recognition
Tired of your triangles turned into A's, or your boxy rectangles guessed as D's or E's? Now that the OS actually recognizes shapes, you can draw a flow chart or some kind of diagram and not worry that all your beautiful brainstorming will be converted to the bloody Roman alphabet. Note: We did not test this feature, mostly for an utter lack of need of any kind of flow chart, but it does sound business groovy.

WHAT MACHINES?
While there aren't that many multitouch computers on the market just yet, there are a few. HP has both the TouchSmart PC and the tx2 touch laptop, while Dell has an impressive multitouch-capable laptop too, the XT2. (If you're wondering about the embarrassingly similar names, Dell thought of theirs first.) There are new monitors cropping up all over, too, and as long as they have Windows 7 drivers, they're in business.

Most single-finger touch gestures—including all that fun with inertia—are also pen gestures, meaning most newer Tablet PCs will be able to run Windows 7 and look sharp doing it. If you've already put Win 7 on a Tablet PC and have something to share, please do. We have not had the pleasure.

BEFORE INSTALLATION
You've got to walk before you can fly, friends.

Minimum Requirements
• 1GHz processor
• 1GB RAM
• 16GB open on hard drive
• 128MB graphics memory with DirectX 9 support (optional, to run Aero)

Download a Copy
Windows 7 available from Microsoft until February 10th here:
32-Bit Windows 7 (use if you have less than 4GB of RAM)
64-Bit Windows 7 (use if you have 4GB of RAM or more)
Otherwise, you'll have to use Bittorrent.

Get a Product Key
You get a product key when you sign up to download the beta, but if you've somehow got the beta bits but no product key, go here. They'll set you straight.

Make a DVD or Copy to a Flash Drive
Either burn the Windows 7 image file to a DVD, or put the image file on a 4GB+ USB drive and use a mounting program to load it.

Dual Booting It?
If you want to keep your current OS and programs intact, check out how to set up a dual-booting installation of Windows 7.

INSTALLATION
You have a few options. The simplest is upgrading from your current Windows OS, but that can only be done from Vista. The other two options are a clean install (on a regular machine or on a netbook) and a Boot Camp install on the Mac.

Upgrade Install
This is by far the easiest way to go that will preserve all of your programs. Just create your Windows 7 DVD or flash drive and open the installer on your desktop like any other program. Windows 7 will take over from there.

Clean Install
A clean install is necessary if you are running XP, but it's also great for Vista users who want to start from scratch or would like the peace of mind of dual booting with another OS. To start from scratch, format your drive as you normally would and when you reboot, use a DVD with the Windows 7 installer image burned on it. That or boot from the DVD and follow the Custom options for a clean installation.

If you'd like to dual boot, you'll need to set up a partition first. Lifehacker has a great guide for that. Just make sure the partition is at least 16GB. With a new partition in place, most users will be able to reboot their system with the Windows 7 DVD in the drive and install the OS to said partition. But if you activate the partition and restart before the OS is installed, you could be in for a hell of a long night of troubleshooting.

Netbook Install
Netbooks handle Windows 7 surprisingly well. Just keep in mind a few points. Storage is a premium on most of these systems, so many will not be eligible based upon that criteria (you need 16GB free). And Aero is not happening since these systems lack the video memory. But there's a complicated workaround to activate Aero if you enjoy the torture of a laggy machine.

Boot Camp Install
If you own a Mac, you're looking at a Boot Camp installation of 7. Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions can work, but older Macs are best sticking to the 32-bit version. Boot Camp 2.1 supports the 64-bit installation in most recent Pro-branded systems.

Have your Windows 7 DVD (or flash drive with a mounting program) ready, and open up Boot Camp. You'll need to make a new partition that's at least 10GB in size (we'd recommend more, since PCs require at least 16GB). Follow the prompts, and Windows 7 will install.

One catch to keep in mind, however, is that you may need an OS X DVD to load necessary drivers into Windows 7 after installation is complete.

EXTRAS
Set a Backup Drive
Vista made backing up easy, but now you can easily customize just what files and folders you'd like to backup. Go to:
Control Panel -> Backup Your Computer -> Set up backup
It'll guide you from there.

Setup Index Folders
Make sure that Search is including the folders you want...and only the folders you want.
Start -> Search Programs and Files -> Type "index" -> Select "Change Search Options..."

Rock a Second Monitor
Oh, you know you've always wanted to. Now that you have Windows 7, hook up a second monitor in just two steps. Hit Win+P and choose an option. Done!

[More info about Installing Windows 7 and dealing with Boot Camp]

PROBLEM SOLVING AND EASY FIXES
Use Windows 7's Troubleshooting Tool
There's actually a tool, in Control Panel, called Troubleshooting. Open it up and you'll see various options like configuring devices, connecting to a network and checking to make sure your sound card works correctly. We won't go through each individual options here, but it's a very good place to start when you've hit a problem, before you turn to Googling.

Make Older Programs Work With Windows 7
This doesn't work 100%, but if you type "Program Compatibility" into the search bar in the Start menu, you'll find a compatibility wizard that helps make older apps work with Windows 7. (Sometimes, you can get to it by right-clicking an application that is having trouble launching.) Once you find your app—which may take a little bit of disk browsing if it's not displaying under the list—you'll choose one of potential issues and which version of Windows it previously worked for. In at least one case, we found that running through this made a non-starting app start up under Win 7, so it's good to know about.

Use Windows 7 Problem Steps Recorder to document your problems
And if you're having any sort of problems with Windows 7 you need a tech-savvy friend or family member to walk you through, try the problem steps recorder. It's an app built into Windows 7 that, when activated, records the button presses and mouse clicks you make in order to generate an HTML-based report of the steps you took to cause a problem. Sending this to your friend who also has Windows 7 will let him diagnose where you've screwed up, so you can STOP DOING THAT.

Diagnose performance issues with the Windows Experience Index
If you feel Windows 7 is running slower than it should, take a look at the Windows Experience Index. With those scores you can tell whether it's your RAM that's making your machine chunk, or your graphics card, or your slow hard drive. Then, replace each part as necessary.

Fix the Installer Bug
If you've been running Windows 7 for a few days and found that you're suddenly unable to install programs, here's how to fix it. It's an MSI installer issue, and all you have to do is open up a command prompt in Administrator mode and type:
reg delete HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SQMClient\Windows\DisabledSessions /va /f and press enter.

Fix User Account Control-Gadget Conflict
UAC may be decent enough in warning and protecting you of intrusions, but it can also get in the way. One bug in the beta actually turns off your desktop Gadgets if you disable UAC. Here's how you re-enable it.

1. Open the Registry Editor, or regedit.exe. You can search for regedit in the Start Menu.
2. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Sidebar\Settings
3. Right-click and create a new DWORD (32-Bit) Value called AllowElevatedProcess.
4. Right-click AllowElevatedProcess and click Modify. Set the value to 1. Close the registry editor. Your gadgets should work with UAC off now.

PREVENTATIVE MEASURES
Install Antivirus Software
Although Windows 7 is at least as secure as Vista, you're still going to want to install antivirus software on it. The easiest Win 7-compatible one we like is AVG, which runs just fine, protects decently enough and is free.

Turn Off Sleep Mode
It doesn't look like sleep mode has been optimized for all the millions of types of hardware configurations out there now—it is a beta after all. We'd suggest turning it off entirely instead of trying to find out whether or not your machine supports sleep/hibernate 100%. If you don't, you'll have to wake your machine up the hard way.

Tweak settings before they get in the way
SetteMaxer is a utility that's able to to tweak a few settings not easily accessible to the normal user, like disabling auto-reboot on a crash, disabling Windows Defender or disabling UAC. If you don't know what you're doing, you shouldn't tinker.

WARNING
Unfixable: User Account Control Security Hole
Unlike in Vista, there's no warning message when the User Account Control is changed. Someone made a proof-of-concept that exploits this into switching your UAC off and taking control of your machine. There's no workaround for this one unless you raise UAC to MAXIMUM (which is annoying), so be careful.

Like Elvis in '68, Microsoft is itching for a "comeback," and Windows 7 is the perfect excuse. In fact, this week in LA at the Professional Developers Conference, Windows 7 officially shoved Vista aside. Having suffered through the often deserved criticisms of that ill-fated OS installment, Microsoft's people are thrilled to tears to be able to talk about something (anything!) else. On Sunday, they took journalists through a lively 7-hour orientation on Win 7, then handed off a Dell XPS M1330 loaded with pre-beta Build 6801. Thankfully for the overworked, underappreciated developers at Redmond, it's surprisingly stable, and its look and feel already puts Vista to shame.

Here's a walkthrough of the system I'm looking at, some videos showing its basic performance, and then shots of more interface and system details demoed at PDC that will show up in the first beta build.

It's really hard to piece together everything I experienced at the seminar, so I'm going to start with the real, actual improvements I see in the system I've been fiddling with, and then expand into the more rhetorical stuff.

WHAT I'VE ACTUALLY SEEN
For starters, even the early build of Windows 7 feels like a fast, stable environment. There's a lot going on behind the scenes to make the OS more usable, one monumental improvement being how video memory is allocated for unseen windows. (Hint: It's not.) The result is a highly responsive machine that gets decent battery life. Though specs aren't out yet, Windows boss Steve Sinofsky confirmed that it could run on systems with just 1GB of RAM.

As you might expect, I'm already seeing smarter user-interface decisions. Here are three great examples:

Choosing a Wi-Fi network now takes just one click, straight from the system tray. How much of a no-brainer was that? Instead of the clicking on the insulting "networks are available" pop-up, you actually get the available networks. Speaking of the system tray, it now gives you more complete control over what you see—instead of just hide or show, you can get it to display particular notifications, as you see here:

The dreaded User Account Control lives up to its name with more control. Yes, this slider is how you will be able to reduce the number of pesky pop-up warnings, eliminating all the ones that come from Windows, for instance. There are four tiers of security in total, so basically two settings between Vista's tell-me-everything and don't-tell-me-squat modes.

The sidebar is dead—the gadgets roam free! Why should keeping one or two gadget/widgets alive mean sacrificing a fifth of your clickable screen? Now when you add gadgets, they stack up on the right, but you are at liberty to put them wherever you want, and they're always there, hiding under your windows. This is an idea I wish Apple would incorporate too. Speaking of Apple and things hiding under windows, there's an upcoming "peek" feature that I will show below in the up-coming section.

There are some other new interface elements that might be quite useful. Microsoft is sort of the opposite of Apple when it comes to organizing your media files: Apple helps you put them all in one place, while Microsoft says it's okay to leave them scattered around. Up until now, though, it was hard for Microsoft's software to keep track of everything. But there are two new tools, one local and one networked, that will help you track all kinds of media files.

Libraries let you clump together same-type content no matter where it is on the system. If you have pictures in one set of folders, and other pictures in another, and you damn well aren't going to merge the folder, you can still track them together by adding them both to the Photo Library. Libraries even show the contents of local external storage drives you add to them, though when you unmount the external drive, Library offers to ditch its folder.

HomeGroup is a re-do of classic workgroup networking, only with the home in mind. The feature will only work on Windows 7, so to test it I'd need a second loaner unit. Still, having set up a basic HomeGroup, at least the initial interface and Microsoft's literature suggest that this will simplify viewing content across multiple machines, and sharing printers and other products. Let's hope so, because it could also be one of those classic "Why won't this work for me????" networking wizards. (Or is it just me who gets those?)

Here are some other shots from the pre-beta unit I'm looking at, including:
• Ribbon interface now appearing on WordPad and Paint (and nothing else so far)
• Solutions Center that will soon be re-branded as Action Center
• New fast-launching "lightweight" Windows Media Player
• Subtler, but still cool, improvements to the main Windows Media Player
• Windows information page, so you can see the attributes of the system

VIDEO
I shot the following videos to get you some immediate sense of what it's like to use the Windows 7 laptop, but though in some instances it is compared to a reasonably similar system that is also fairly clean, this isn't any kind of test. It is interesting to note, though, that while the Win 7 boots way faster here (even with the other computer's BIOS startup out of the way), it actually takes longer than the other system to shut down. But yes, these are totally unscientific, just a nice thing to observe:

Totally Unscientific Video of Boot-Up Time

Totally Unscientific Video of Shut-Down Time

Super Scientific Video of New Window Resizing Feature

WHAT MICROSOFT IS PROMISING
The sad thing about the build that Microsoft handed out is that it's missing a lot of the neat stuff that they showed off at the conference, and have been hinting at elsewhere. Though we did see a lot of this stuff running on systems, we couldn't take photos or video—not even of the slides.

User Interface Improvements In the last video above, I say more UI to come, and I mean "in the beta." Here are the new promised UI effects—all of which make Vista's Flip3D look like the OS equivalent of the infamous "Mission Accomplished" banner.

While I'm a fan of the mouse hot-corner "Peek" function in the above photo, that lets you see gadgets or icons that windows could be obscuring, the biggest improvement to the Windows UI is probably in the Taskbar. It's gone through quite a few evolutions already, but this latest one is pretty great. Click on an app, and contextual menus pop up, giving you options like opening recent documents. The Taskbar can pull information that's already part of the program, so new apps don't need special programming to work here. Another aspect of the new Taskbar will be the preview feature, which will show you floating glimpses of hidden windows. (I'm still hazy on this one, so we'll have to revisit it once the beta comes out.)

Other improvements come in the natural-interface category: You can now write in math equations. (I think this is cool, even though it's been a very long time since I've actually written out any math more complex than a bar tab.)

Windows 7 will have great native touch and multitouch benefits too—none shown here unfortunately: Menus subtly enlarge when tapped with a finger instead of a mouse cursor; the mouse cursor disappears when the finger touches the screen; and iPhone/Surface-style pinching and stretching are now part of the OS.

Cool Device Tricks
As a gadget lover like most of you, one of my favorite parts of the conference was the device discussion. I am happy to report that, for starters, Windows 7 is itself a more aggressive media playback system, natively handling both AAC and H.264 as well as DivX and Xvid without third-party download.

It's also a DLNA 1.5 system with some neat tricks up its sleeve. Windows Media Player has a "play to" feature (at left) that you can reach via the Taskbar—one click and you can pull up a song, start playing, and even jump to the next.

But here's the coolness: You can use that same feature to pull songs from other places on the network. And you can send the song to play through a Sonos or other compatible player on the network, rather than through your dinky laptop speakers. You can even, theoretically, if everything's visible on the net, pull DRM-free AAC files from a Mac, and tell it to play on the Sonos, re-encoding it on the fly if the Sonos doesn't support AAC. In this case, the compatibility is only as good as the interface, and the interface is only as good as the compatibility, so I am eager to see how this is executed.

A nice servicey program for interfacing with gadgets and peripherals is called Device Stage. Yesterday in comments, it got maligned a bit as the new PlaysForSure, but that's a branding it doesn't deserve. Not yet, at least. The system allows camera, phone, MP3 player and printer makers to create mini interfaces for their devices. The products appear in the Taskbar when connected, with their own pop-up menus of activities, like offloading pics or uploading music. In addition to the pop-up Taskbar menu, each device will have its own pop-up page with links to ordering supplies or downloading the manual in PDF format, plus a photorealistic icon that will appear wherever the device is referred to.

For Device Stage to work, the third-party brands will have to provide their own content, but it will get served throughout the world by Microsoft. If there is no Device Stage present, you get the basic AutoPlay pop-up that we've seen for ages. When I asked Microsoft how aggressive they would be in getting companies on board with Device Stage, they said that the companies themselves were excited about the chance to do it. As someone who was bitterly let down by PlaysForSure, I can tell you, this ain't the same.

I realize I covered far more of the external bits and far less of the internal guts than some of you folks wish—nor I even touched on the new Windows Live and IE8 features, both of which are somewhat visible already—but it's early yet, and while I will always focus on usability, there will be a lot more to look at in the coming months as the builds get richer and the testing is more reflective of the final product. As far as exact dates go, Microsoft is reluctant to carve anything too deep into granite, but can you blame them?

For now, we should just be happy that Windows 7 appears to be on the right track. You can almost look at consumer-level Windows—that is, 95, 98, Me, XP, Vista and Win 7—like the first six Star Trek movies: They pretty reliably alternate between crap and quality. All I can say is, screw the Final Frontier, and hellloooo, Undiscovered Country. That, and thanks to Microsoft for talking about Windows 7 early and often. It helps. Just don't screw it up! [Windows 7 News on Giz]

UPDATE: For a brief technical look at what's great about Windows 7's innards, check out Giz Explains: Why Windows 7 Will Smash Vista

Update: We're there live.

The Microsoft Tablet team is working on a new Kitchen Client that'll include features like a family calendar, recipe center and a digital bulletin board. It sounds like it'll mix all of the features we saw in those Ricavision prototypes a while back. No word on when we can expect to see such a device, but the thought of having my toaster stream video doesn't sound like a bad idea at all. – Louis Ramirez

Microsoft Preps Windows-based Kitchen Client [ZDNet via Clipset]

When Aero is turned off, battery life is equal to or better than Windows XP systems. But with it turned on, battery life suffers compared with Windows XP...Laptop users who spent extra money on powerful laptops to handle the graphics requirements of Vista and the Aero interface are forced to run the aesthetic equivalent of Vista Basic, the low-cost version of Vista, if they care about battery life.

I don't know. If battery doesn't improve, we might start seeing more laptops with those static-electricity hand cranks on the side, like the original OLPC. – Wilson Rothman

Vista draining laptop batteries, patience [ZDNet via The Inquirer]