I've got it running on my iMac. I actually quite like it; they've clearly listened to a lot of the feedback regarding Vista. Unfortunately the Boot Camp software isn't compatible yet with Windows 7.

I like the new task bar, but it does look like they tried to copy the Dock on Mac with it.

Think of it more as a changing of times rather than a copy. I believe we've discussed this in the past and it was realized that Mac wasn't the first to offer this feature. No matter who had the original idea, I think it's a change of the times. If people like a feature, the developers should try to suit the customer's wants and needs.

Maybe you're right, I was just describing it from a mac-user point of view, because to me it looks really similar. I'm not trying to say that Microsoft are being copycats however. I like the change.

Am I the only person who doesn't like the dock at all? I think it's way too large (width wise) and takes up too much screen space. And I don't like the notification area.

It's just too much like Vista with a few tweaks that I'm not compelled to change to it, so I'm sticking with Vista for now. And people always say that Vista takes way too many clicks to do basic tasks, well I've set up my Vista to be extremely streamlined, and I'm not in the mood to do it again for 7.

I do like how it only takes up 30% of my memory instead of 50%, though. Although I never really go above 80% with Vista unless I'm rendering videos or something.

Yes, you are. There's always XP Mode... and probably windows standard scheme.

I don't understand why someone would want such a thick taskbar. It only wastes screen space.

I'm typing this from my laptop now with Win 7 RC. It's fantastic: big speed improvements over Vista, it looks good, lots of new features and perfectly stable enough for day-to-day use. The only thing I would say is, like many people have been saying, install it on a separate partition and don't do an upgrade. Hopefully mine was an isolated case, but when I did an upgrade it completely trashed everything - blue screens all over the place. Luckily I'd backed up my files and a clean install sorted it

@redmonke: Microsoft are aiming for a Summer 2009 release, not 2010 (article here).

It's a tiny amount, but appearance doesn't really matter to me either way. Performance does.

It only takes like two minutes to adjust it

How? I unchecked lock taskbar and couldn't resize it.

Personally I love the new taskbar, but if you really want to make it look like Vista again I would point you to this article.

Very cool, nice to know that.

Has anyone encountered any irritating glitches?

When I click my mouse two times to recover from Sleep mode and start using my computer again, my internet connection is gone and says, "Identifying..." It won't identify and I can't figure out how to reconnect. So I have to restart my computer to reconnect, but for some reason the shut down takes ten minutes. Anyone else having this problem?

I haven't had this problem, but it could be a problem with your wireless card driver. Check Windows Update if you haven't already; I've received several driver updates through there, including one for my wireless card that helped fix the few bugs I found.

I don't think that's the problem because I check for updates at least two or three times a day. It's that big of a bug, it can just get irritating sometimes...

What bugs have you encountered so far?

I might do so, it sounds pretty cool I'll have to ask Scott and Mum though and after my computer JUST crashing and it having almost no memory left from my sister downloading Sim's 2.

Not many - I had a few blue screens before I checked Windows Update and updated my drivers. Other than that there have just been a few minor niggles, like occasionally an item on the taskbar doesn't work quite right or something. Restarting explorer.exe normally sorts it out.

Ok, I'm installing Win7 on the Dell that my brother forgot the password on. Thought I might as well instead of installing Vista on the system since it only has 1gb of RAM. I'll see how it turns out.

On my 1gb system it still uses 60% of my RAM just on the desktop. Same as Vista did. I lol'd.

Maybe all these updates will fix it... Nope didn't do it.

It's now sitting at 70%. Windows 7 uses less resources my ass.

I turned off superfetch and now it's a bet better. I was really hoping for a little more dramatic change. But there's almost no change from Vista to Win7. That's with aero off for both.

I'm surprised you found that. Whilst I haven't done any benchmarks, my Windows 7 laptop feels much faster and more responsive than it did with Vista. My laptop does have 2GB of RAM instead of 1GB, but Microsoft were meant to have worked on making Windows 7 a good netbook OS...maybe XP will still reign for netbooks What specs does your Dell have, apart from the 1GB of RAM?

I don't have the laptop with me but I'm fairly sure it has a 1.8ghz amd dual core.

And I had a terrible chain of programs not responding. Had to wait 15 minutes for stuff to start working (even task manager froze).

The thing is that I've completely stripped the thing apart. Nothing runs on startup, have almost no services running, superfetch is off, so there's no reason I should not be getting substantial performance over Vista (which was almost exactly the same except it had supterfetch on but aero off).

I just think it's getting over hyped because people don't like Vista.

OK, apologies for pretty dumb questions but they are the only things I could think of:
1) Have you definitely installed the 32-bit version and not the 64-bit version (the 64-bit requires 2GB RAM)?
2) Have you definitely got all the latest drivers, particularly for your graphics card? These are normally under the optional section of Windows Update, so they don't install automatically and it's possible to miss them. I had a lot of glitches before I got the correct graphics card driver. If you did a clean install you may be missing some drivers which Windows Update hasn't provided, in which case you can get them from the Dell support site.
3) Did you originally do an Upgrade install? Because I had massive problems with an Upgrade install, but a Clean install worked fine.

And I really disagree with you about it being overhyped. There are some very significant and positive changes from Vista, which I can list for you if you wish.

1. Yep.
2. Yep, I watched them install (they're ATI and installed automatically. Even then I have my driver disk but it installs the same thing).
3. I wiped the partition and installed, to it's clean.

I just don't feel like there's a significant difference between them. Sure, 7 has some cool features, but nothing ground breaking.

Wikipedia has an article here on the new features in Windows 7.

As well as the new features, Microsoft have tried to improve the basic foundations of the system: Tech Radar have an article on the subject.

You're right that there's nothing really revolutionary, but there are some really important changes that I feel need to be recognised.

WIndows 7 Release date, 22nd October 2009

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8081003.stm

Wait, then why does the RC expire June 2010?

Probably to give you more incentive to buy it, you'll be more used to it.

Because it's not a complete release of the product. It is pretty much what the full release will be and they don't want everyone to keep a free version forever.

ive tried it. it's okay for windows... i still prefer mac osx though :-)

will someone please post what you need to have to download this? i've been wanting to but i don't know if my operating system can fulfill my request.

I've got to admit, I'm impressed how well 7 does with games. When I play Combat Arms (lol) on Vista, I can only play with a total of 8 people, and that's with some lag (gma4500, gotta tell ya). But in 7 I can have up to 12 people and have minimal lag.

Very cool.

what happens when it expires? i mean to the operating system in your computer?

It shuts down automatically randomly without letting you close/save your programs.

so i'm guessing it'd be a good idea to back everything up the day before it expires then.

I'm sure they'll give you a warning or something when it gets close, but yes it would.

so that gives me a deadline on when to buy that new 1TB external hard drive...

Finally decided to get around to getting the Rc, just waiting for the partition to format now. Anyone know what size the .iso file is that needs to be burned to a disk, I think the only disks we have left are tiny little ones.

EDIT@ LP, I remember reading somewhere it gives you a warning in May, or around then, then once June comes it shuts down every hour automatically.

You'll need a full size DVD. I think it's around 4gb? Something like that.

Ok that'l be 4.7, I think we have some of them.

Edit ages later: Installed fine Loving it so far, but how do I get my documents on my vista partition onto this one, don't wanna have to copy all program files and docs over.

Go to My Computer and click on drive G: (at least that's what it's called for me) then navigate to My Documents to get files like that.

For programs, you can't directly access them. I've tried with some games and it says it cannot find so and so.dll, and that's because it wasn't installed on that partition, along with it not being able to access the registry files on the other partition.

But firefox works fine (one less thing to install).

Looks like I'm gunna have a fun evening of installing programs

Ej you're probably already done but if you aren't i'd suggest you have a book and multiple blank DVDs to allow for a possible bad burn.

Managed to find a few in the cupboard, but the first one burn successfully and Windows 7 is now running fine, thanks anyway though.

great. i went through 3 DVDs trying to install Win7 so i thought i'd warn you. the first two were bad burns and the third was a good one.

Why did they burn badly? I've never experienced a burnt DVD that wouldn't work before.

I don't know. They just stopped in the middle of the process of installing. it got to "expanding windows files" and stayed at 0% for about 2 hours each.
at which point i stopped the installation and burned a new DVD.

That's really strange...I've burnt various installation discs for different operating systems before, and never had one that didn't work. I might just be lucky though

It may have something to do with the speed at which you burn it. If you do it as fast as possible then there may be issues, but if you do it at recommended speed or lower then nothing bad should happen.

i burned them at Maximum speed

That's never really a good idea, especially for such a major installation like an OS.

lol it worked in the end.