And while I am at it, how about some cudos for Cali for being open minded and honest. Too many people in both camps get bogged down in brand loyalty and miss the fun of enjoying both!

Can’t believe Don McAllister didn’t tell you all about it. :-D

http://wordpower-software.com/WordPower/fiwi.html

http://lifehacker.com/5277207/windows-7-versus-mac-os-x-leopard-the-feature+by+feature-showdown

scroll down 1/2 the page and read & watch the ” Alt Tab” Feature in action, you might like it …They finish this comparison by saying: ” Aero Peek still wins, hands down” ..In case you dont want to follow the link here are some of the results that you probably also wont agree with on lifehacker …

Windows Taskbar versus Mac Dock-Winner: Windows 7 Windows taskbar
Windows 7 Aero Peek versus Exposé?Winner: Aero Peek
Windows System Tray vs Mac Menu Bar Winner: Windows 7 System Tray
Leopard’s Time Machine vs Windows Backup—Winner: Leopard’s Time Machine

I use both Apple & Windows and have no problem saying like many Apple reviewers that win 7 is a very good, even as Mossberg put it a elegant version of Windows…. It literally is a ” toss up” they both have pros and cons .It is a win for anyone that chooses to use windows or apple…Thats all i will say on this subject……Take Care

Regarding the Win 7 debate, about half of my students are currently running the beta version on their machines, and no one had anything bad to say about it. They all think it is Microsoft’s best effort so far, even the hard-core XP users.

For those of you whining about Cali’s presentation and enthusiasm; that’s exactly what keeps so many of us coming back to her site regularly. She shows us new tech hardware and software and shares her opinion with us in a fun and interesting way.

Thanx for your review…… I agree with you, I also am enjoying Windows 7…

He basically says the days of saying Apples OS is
better than Win OS is pretty much over.Reading comments on his site it seems apple users are
not ready to accept His, yours, engadget,maximumPC, Leo Laporte and many others favorable reviews…These are people we trust to be honest with their reviews.

It would have been very easy to give a bad review which was probably expected and even encouraged by fellow apple users.You could have focused on the negative like some of the above comments but you saw the OS for all the positive and changes it made since XP and Vista which is commendable. Like Mossberg states:

…. ” it’s much more of a toss-up between the two rivals. Windows 7 beats the Mac OS in some
areas, such as better previews and navigation right from the taskbar, easier organization of
open windows on the desktop and touch-screen capabilities. So Apple will have to scramble now
that the gift of a flawed Vista has been replaced with a reliable, elegant version of Windows”….

I also tried the win 7 RC1 and found it a joy to use, so much i purchased two licenses…One
for My older PC and one for my Mac.

No OS is perfect as many are quick to point out not even my OSX….But now you truly got the best of both worlds for your work & Play… Love the show.

In a recent ITIL training I attended, the concepts of Utility and Warranty were discussed, the former being a measure of how useful a service or product is — whether it does what’s needed — and the latter being a measure of how reliably it performs — whether it’s there when you need it.

Most of the utility Windows brings to the table, it copies from Apple. This has been known for a long time by those honest enough with themselves to look into the matter. Yes, sometimes they may make some changes (some better, some not) to the features they poach from Apple, but the fact remains that Apple is still the de facto R&D department for Microsoft, Dell, and HP, just to name a few companies that couldn’t innovate if their share price depended on it. (Luckily for them, there’s always someone to copy.)

As Bertrand Serlet (http://is.gd/4fpLF) so eloquently put it in this year’s WWDC address: “Underlying Windows 7 you have the same old technologies: DLLs, the Registry, Disk Degragmentation. No end user should ever have to know about that.” He goes on to list other issues.

We all know who’s the clear winner here in terms of Warranty. If a virus or malware attack doesn’t eventually take down a Windows machine, its own poorly engineered kernel will do itself in eventually. My employer handles dozens of server reboot requests per week in its data center. Want to guess how many are Windows servers vs. how many are Unix-powered?

Until Microsoft takes a radical step like the one Apple took in migrating from OS 9 to OS X — completely reinventing Windows from the ground up with no more dependence on the broken NT “technology” of the mid-1990s (loosely based on VMS, incidentally) — their OS line will continue to be inferior to OS X (even Linux, these days) on the desktop and Unix/Linux in the data center.

I appreciate your affinity for all things shiny and happy, Cali, and your obligation to cover its release for the benefit of those in your viewership who will be forced to use it. And this latest release may indeed put a few of Vista’s UI problems to rest and look sexier than past releases (thanks, again, to their borrowing Apple features, for the most part). However, what you have in W7 is a shiny container filled with… well, let’s just say less than desirable contents with which you’re probably familiar as a dog owner.

Just my 2¢. /* End rant. */

Shawn

Also +1 to Christian Baptiste. IMHO Win 7 is a slightly better Vista Service Pack, and therefore should go for $30 like Snow Leopard did.

Oh, btw, is this new law already in effect that basically says that reviewers have to disclose if the subject of a review has been sponsored ?

Sorry Cali, I love your show but IMHO there’s nothing geeky about Windows. And that is partly because of the heritage of the OS, but also because of the way Microsoft has treated Windows users.

I also don’t share the same opinion that others had of Vista. IMO Vista was a huge improvement over XP but poor marketing and poor reputation damage control by Microsoft gave it the undeserved Windows ME 2 reputation. In reality other than the annoying popups and making me install programs as an administrator when I already am, other than those two issues I thought Vista was pretty cool.

7 seems like Vista with just a few enhancements that seem long over due. And compared to Mac OS upgrades, 7 seems a bit too expensive. IMO – the move from Vista to 7 should be around $50.00 range. Fixing popups and better windows management does not warrant $200 from my wallet.

Just to put some perspective on the pricing though,,, it is still hard to argue bang for the buck when comparing a Windows machine to a Mac. Last year I was finally ready to give a mac a try, that was until I priced the machine I wanted. I finally ended up with yet another PC and the reason was because I was able to get a Dell i7 64bit Vista machine with 6GB ram and a smoking video card for close to $1,000.00 the equivalent Mac was more than $4,500.00.

When apple finally makes there machines affordable I will be first inline, until then I am fine with PC (Vista or 7).

For people who have always used Windows, rejoice, for your experience will now be what ours has been for a decade.

For those who have used Macs, observe, Microsoft has begun to catch up after two short decades of our ever-changing technological landscape.

Its also nice that it will be much cheaper to buy on OCT, 22nd when it comes out!

Well done Microsoft well done.

It’s so rare to see it, I don’t understand why people are bitching about it. OS X is just as annoying, have to enter in a password for installs and can go as far as the system preferences, too. Again, turn it off when doing your initial setup, and you’re golden.

If you’re worried on a PC about “OMG it’ll get infected instantly!” you can always pre-download most of your software, do the main installs, turn on UAC and then connect to do system updates.

@moylan big ugly buttons? the only one I see is maybe the “Windows Button.” The taskbar you can change back to XP/Vista style, or enable auto-hide. I don’t see this any different than the OS X dock.

I’ll agree that all the different versions of Windows is ridiculous. I understand they have a huge market to cater to, but how about Windows Home, Business, and Server… that’s it. This whole windows starter thing is absurd.

the restrictions that have been mentioned online over the past while have put me off further. no windows classic mode. cheapest version unable to change back ground image. i know i’ll be getting calls in a few weeks from poor sods who’ve been lumbered with this rehash of vista. they’re on their own.

i’ve used windows since win386 but have been using macosx at home for the past 3 years on a mac mini. nothing here to make me switch back. though starting to dislike the security prompts since upgrading from 10.4.

while i like macos i can’t make myself buy a macbook as i hate the lack of buttons on the touchpad. not a fan of multitouch. if you want to zoom in and out just have a button with a + or – on it.

so next portable will have to be a netbook running ubuntu. at least i can convince that os to do things as i want. only thing missing from ubuntu is itunes as you need itunes to set up a new ipod or iphone.

The MacOS freaks out there will hate this but MacOS is a toy, windows is a neccesity… I am a power user on both.

`apexadam – Apple/PC user since 1985

And honestly, people who think anyone who says anything bad about windows makes them an Apple fanboy/fangirl, you are pointing the finger in the wrong direction. Some of us actually have honest judgements and can see the flaws and advantages of both sides, as opposed to thinking you must pick one side to devote your loyalty too.

@Bob D you have some valid points there, yes!

Don’t get carried away, though, this still has many of Windows’ flaws.

High prices and multiple versions.

Mediocre speed. It is vastly improved over Vista, but the time from when you boot until you can actually do something is still too long. I often start my XP virtual machine rather than 7 because it is just quicker. It is, however, fast enough to run acceptably on netbooks, which is huge for Microsoft.

Annoying activation/authentication routines. Want to upgrade your laptop’s hard disk? Be prepared to call Microsoft, read them a million digits and convince them that you are not stealing their OS.

Buying a new machine and want to move your existing applications over? Be ready to reinstall everything. Want to move your apps to a different directory? DOS could do this, Windows has problems.

Most importantly, the underlying rot of the registry is still there. Your system will bog down and become unstable over time, and reinstalling Windows will be an annual routine as usual if you install and test out many apps.

When my Macbook was out of commission for a few days, I noticed how annoying using 7 was, even though I think 7 is by far the best version of Windows yet. I particularly missed Spaces and Spotlight.

Also, while it is correct that with default settings Windows 7 does ask less often for a security confirmation than it did in Vista, every real geek should mention that this was only achieved by lowering the default security settings, i.e. if Win7 is set to the same security setting as Vista, it will also ask equally as often as it did before. Or the other way around: on default settings, Win7 is less secure than Vista.

I find it especially useful with a widescreen monitor