Windows 7 has a very nice, unique feature and that is virtualization. You can create virtual Windows XP, and as many as your system can handle. There’s no limit on how many of them you create, and each one can be different. The Virtual Windows XP is easy to set up, you can create your own password and everything. Drivers are already installed so you don’t have to worry about pulling out those old CDs or searching the internet just to get your XP to work. The whole system connects to your Windows 7 just as if it was just another application.

Virtualization

The Virtual XP machine is one of the easiest to set up. And it’s exactly what it sounds like, a Windows XP inside W7. You can custom allocate RAM as well as space to the system. The system connects to your W7 automatically as well, all your drives under W7 will show up in XP as network drives. It connects to the internet, bypassing driver installation, but you can also change that setting so that the XP works independently and connects to the internet separately. There are tons of easy to understand settings that you can employ. Also, you can install drivers, connect usb devices, and other peripherals to the system. For example, I have an old webcam that does not work on Windows 7 64-bit system, ie it does not have drivers, so I booted up Virtual Windows XP and installed the drivers as I would have on my old XP. Then, I installed MSN messenger on the Virtual XP and got on webcam with one of my friends. It does not lag my system, and it did not cause me any trouble. At times, the XP drags but I blame that on my old system and it’s not something that’s too noticeable. You can set up the width of the Virtualization as you would a window and if you look under properties of the desktop and check out the monitor settings, the settings will always adjust accordingly. I like to keep it small so that it can only house one application (idk, it’s just my habit). Here are some of my screenshots (click for fullview):

Windows 7 drives as network drives under XP

All of the old applications are still present

All of the starter old applications are included, such as the Windows Media Center, Solitaire, all of the games. accessories and such. Newer applications work on it just the same as they would on XP. I installed, for example, the newest Windows Live Messenger without trouble and it works the same as it does under my Windows 7.

Menu bar

On top of the console, there’s a “menu bar” with different uses. Under action, you can put the XP console to sleep, shut it off, restart it, and turn on the full screen mode. Once in a full screen mode, the menu bar shows on top (with the theme) and does not obstruct anything.

Under USB, you can choose which devices will connect to the Virtual Windows XP. Let’s say you have a flash drive that you want directly to connect to the XP. Once you plug it in, you simply go under USB and you enable the drive under the Virtualization. My W7 also had to download one or two additional drivers to smooth out the process but all was done pretty quickly.

In Tools, you can disable the integration features ie. the network drives, and the internet won’t connect. Then you have options. Under options you can choose a wide list of features to enable or disable. You can create new COM ports, add drives, configure logins, and all that other pretty stuff. Most of the options are unfortunately inaccessible while running the XP, so you’ll have to “shut down” the system. Then go to your programs and under “Windows Virtual PC”  click on “Virtual Machines”, right click the machine you want, and click on “settings”. That’s the easiest way so far that I’ve found to change the more rigid stetting.

Settings

Next, ctrl + alt + del, okay, this is kind of a funny feature and the combination has done what it has always done so no need for explanation here.

To shut down the Virtual XP, just click on the “x” in the corner as you would while using any other application and the shut down process will start.

Best usage

The best way to use the Virtual Windows XP is only when it is absolutely essential and use it only running two  or three programs at most. When is it essential?

• when you have a device that does not have updated drivers under W7 and therefore doesn’t work, as was the case when I couldn’t get my webcam working
• Older programs are another case but before you do that, see if the company posted any updates/patches that will make the program work under Windows 7, it’ll save you a lot of resources.
• Nostalgia is the last reason yeah, I know. stupid but whatever

I suggest you allocate at least 512MBs of RAM to the system, a few gigs of your HDD, and you’ll be good.

The Windows XP virtualization is a pretty cool addition to the W7, and it surely makes upgrading easier for people that have older hardware and older software they need to use. For me, it gave me a way to use my old webcam and have fun exploring the old XP.

I’m dead serious with the title. I’ve installed W7 a couple days ago, and I have been testing it in ever way a person like me would use Windows 7 for. Look, I am a very non-lenient consumer when it comes to OS, Imaging Programs, and anything to do with web-development. I have my reasons for rejecting Vista, I have my reasons for rejecting a new computer, I have good reasons why I use Linux only for school work. Everything I use on my computer, I criticize and I KNOW exactly what the product needs to perfect. Well, I’m on Windows 7 right now, and before I give you my review of the system, let me tell you about my computer: I have a Dell Inspiron 1501, here are the specs:

• Processor: AMD Turion 64 MK-36 2 GHz (single core AMD)
• Ram: 1920 mb (DDR2 SDRAM)
• Graphics Card: ATI Radeon Xpress Series 1150M (128mb)
• HDD: 160 gb SATA

Everest Computer Specs

I bought my computer about three years ago. It’s a nice neat laptop with lots of wear and tear. The only two components I upgraded hardware-wise was my RAM (from 1gb) and my HDD (from 80gb). So far, I’ve run XP Media Center on it, XP Professional SP2, Sp3, Vista Ultimate, Ubuntu 7.10 – 9.04, Fedora 8 and up, Mandriva 2008, Slackware, and yeah, the list goes on. And except for minor driver problems under the Linux distros, the computer runs perfectly. I’m a very heavy user as well, my computer runs about 15 or 16 hours every day, and I run multiple programs at once. Here’s what I have opened usually: Dreamweaver CS3, Photoshop CS3, Firefox, Word, Win Explorer, and Winamp. This might come as a surprise but my system does not freeze up while running all those programs. Not even under Vista. My Windows 7 rating is 2.9 Here’s why Windows 7 is so amazing:

Windows 7, so amazing

I’m currently running the 64-bit version of Windows 7 ultimate. YES, 64-BIT ON A SINGLE CORE PROCESSOR. My computer is comparatively weak to anything else on the market, but I can still run W7 64-bit. Before I get into my own personal tests, let me tell you about some lesser known features W7 has: The Little Things in W7

• snipping tool, sticky notes and other accessories. The snipping tool lets you take a screenshot of your computer screen with your own parameters ie, you can choose what part of the screen will be “screenshotted”. This is eternally amazing. The Sticky Notes are the same as the sticky notes in Ubuntu, for all you Linux fans. Among the other accessories is the new Wordpad that makes you want to reconsider buying MS Office
  

  Snipping Tool

  

  Sticky Notes

• Order Changing. In the new taskbar, you can finally change the order of the opened apps. That means, you can open all your applications separately and then move them around so that the order is pleasing to you. And it is! I’ve been waiting for this feature for a long time
  

  Order Change

• Show Desktop. The new show desktop button all the way on the right does something that I’ve awaited for a long time as well. When you press the button again, all your windows will un-minimize in the order they were before. So now, you have a “show/hide” desktop button. VERY USEFUL!
• New Status Bar. Okay, the new status bar on the bottom right, next to the time, finally does not infinitely expand. Rather when there is too many status icons, you get a little arrow that if you click, you get a small menu of your status icons. No longer will our Taskbars be plagued by endless status icons!
  

  Windows TaskBar

• Gadgets. I was a fan of the sidebar in the Vista, but one thing bothered me. It was a “bar”! another one that restricted the screen. I could not move around the widgets (or whatever they were called) as it suited me and I was always brought down by the sheer impact it had on my screen. Now, I have two or three gadgets up there that do not restrict me in any way
  

  Gadgets

• TaskBar Icons. The taskbar icons are great. They don’t take up a lot of space, and you still know what’s going on. When I was running Windows XP, I had a single great problem, too many tasks in my taskbar. The text combined with the icon in previous Windows OSes took up too much space. Now I have a single icon that tells me about the program.
  

  Taskbar

• New Windows Media Player. I’ve never truly used the Windows Media Player until now on W7. I always used Winamp but the WMP made me change my mind. I’ve already gotten rid of my old Winamp. Not only is the interface super-friendly with its playlist on the right, the library in the middle. Well, let me show you:
  

  Windows Media Player

  As you can see, I’ve got a playlist on the right where I can drag any songs from the left. Trust me, there is nothing easier than this new WMP. Oh and also, you know how sometimes you rip a CD on your computer and all you get is “track 1, track 2″ with no metadata? WMP solves that, you can right click the album and “find album info” through which you can add ALL of that metadata. You’ll manually find the right album and the computer will add the metadata to those songs (such as title, album name, artist etc).

• Codecs, I was impatient so I installed the codecs right away, but apparently, I did not need to. W7 contains codecs to almost anything imaginable. It plays mp3, avi, wma (haha joke!), rmvb, basically anything out there.
• Windows Media Center, I’m not a media center person, and if I was, I’d probably get XBMC that probably tops everything out there but I have to give credit to Microsoft for WMC, it’s good. I mean, it’s really good. You can set up your library, it launches fast, and it’s not as annoying as the media center for XP
  

  Windows Media Center

Performance The performance is my main issue with Windowses, especially with Vista. When I had the original Vista install, my computer would freeze up, put my processor into overdrive, near-damn burn my ram. I solved that with a few quickfixes, such as getting rid of the sidebar, uninstalling a lot of crap, and optimizing it. I ended up with a beautiful, fast system. With Windows 7, I did not have to do anything like that. Somehow, whenever I launch a program, my processor goes to 100% for about ten seconds and then goes back to about 40%. Mind you, I use a single core 2ghz AMD processor. So to me, that’s amazing. After this initial spike, nothing ever changes no matter what I do in the application. Sometimes, the processor is used even less, at about 20% its capacity. My RAM is dead-set to 50% (ie 1gb) and usually starts out on 30% use when I boot up my computer. To me, just that is amazing. But let’s see what happens when I actually start using the system. I installed Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Illustrator, and Flash CS3 on my computer. I had no problem installing them, and they haven’t crashed…yet. The programs launch beautifully and faster than they have on my XP system setup, or my Vista set up. Once I launch Dreamweaver, I get about a 3% addition to my RAM use, and my processor keeps its current usage. And basically, no matter what I do on Dreamweaver, neither the processor usage nor the RAM usage changes significantly. The RAM usage stays the same, topping out on 54% (I have WMP turned on, and Firefox with five different tabs). When I launched Photoshop, it took less than 10 seconds to boot up. A record for me, because sometimes I had to wait almost a whole minute. My RAM usage jumped five percent to 56% and whatever I did, the RAM meter would move one or two percent, that’s it. The processor keeps jumping between 20% to 50%. The response of the program is immediate, which is something I’ve never achieved under XP or Vista.

So what now?

W7 basically knocked the wind out of me. The features, the easy of use, the interface, well everything about it basically won me over. I’m not even sure I’ll install Ubuntu 9.10 now, it seems a bit stupid because Windows 7 provides me with everything and at a significantly less power drain and better responsiveness.

All in all, I’m in love
Share and Enjoy:

]]> http://www.davepcguy.com/archive/windows-7-the-best-thing-to-happen-to-computers/feed/ 2 http://www.davepcguy.com/archive/ubuntu-9-10-karmic-koala-is-here/ http://www.davepcguy.com/archive/ubuntu-9-10-karmic-koala-is-here/#comments Thu, 29 Oct 2009 17:56:24 +0000 Admin http://www.davepcguy.com/?p=764

Karmic Koala

source

Phew, I was waiting for this. Ubuntu 9.10 has officially launched today. Go take the feature tour and see what it’s basically about if you know nothing about Ubuntu or Linux. So, here we are, 9.10 is here. It came out with three different versions:

1. The Desktop Version: The version of Ubuntu meant to run on basically any computer built in the past almost ten years (I’m not joking).
2. The Server Edition: This one is meant to run on servers. It has all the required features (MySQL, PHP, Apache) as well as other derivatives
3. The Netbook Version: I can’t believe it came out this early, but the fully supported Netbook edition is already out!

Also, don’t forget to visit Kubuntu, the 9.10 version is already out too! The new KDE release is packed with it. The Edubuntu is as well (this is the distro meant for education).

Highlights:

• the system is faster and more reliable.
• the booting system looks neater (oh yeah, it looks way nicer)
• the audio system has been completely reconstructed for wider support and better performance
• One Hundred Paper Cuts is up and running, dealing with all your every day annoyances with the system, and helping to solve those annoyances
• Ubuntu One project is also up and running, and with it, you get 2gb of online storage space that you can use with your Ubuntu installation
• Programming is much easier with the use of “Quickly”  (should I try this one out? )
• For the netbook users, there’s a new, better interface system
• Empathy is the new messenger. Yes, I have to stress this one. I’m a long time proponent of pidgin and so I’ll have to truly see what Empathy has to offer
• For the SERVER EDITION, Cloud computing has simplified lots with the Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud (UEC)
• All of the applications, of course, have been updated including OpeOffice, Mozilla Firefox, and others

Other News:

• The Kubuntu Netbook release will come out pretty soon, very exciting!
• The Technical Overview of Ubuntu 9.10 is complete

Windows 7 is here! Dave already installed his and will probably write an article about it, but before THAT happens. Let’s look at all the other stuff we’re looking forward to.

If you arrived at our homepage, you’ll notice a ticker above that is counting down the release of:

Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala!

The RC has already come out and I’m looking forward to the real thing in a couple of days. So what’s it packing under the hood?

New Features:

1. New boot routine called “Upstart” that will enable FASTER booting!
2. New software installation interface that replaces the old “add/remove” thing. It’s called the “Software Center”
3. New GNOME, well, that was expected but I still need to include it here! This one, unfortunately, replaced my beloved pidgin with empathy
4. The list goes on.

So let me just quickly tell you what’s actually EXCITING about this release. We’re finally seeing the new GRUB 2 on Ubuntu, which provides Linux users with countless new features that I have no idea what they are (perhaps a better UI?). There’s also a new firewall that’s supposed to be dumb-easy to use. Finally, for all you Netbook users, there’s finally a KDE Kubuntu Netbook distro release in the 9.10 series. I surely appreciate that, because I love KDE and can’t wait to see if Kubuntu 9.10 will be my lucky distro that will actually work on my laptop!

Also, among the less-exciting news. The new EXT4 partition format is up and ready to go. The new linux kernel is as well (but they come out all the time, so nothing new for me)

Windows…8?

I’ve read a lot of crazy articles on Windows 8 lately. It’s really stupid, 7 has only come out a few days ago. Nevertheless, if you get on slashdot, you’ll spot an article discussing the future Windowses once in a while. They theorized upon the 128-bit systems, even 256-bit systems. It’s really crazy, and I can’t wait to see it. Here’s a concept video I found on youtube:

It came out about 5 months ago, and to be honest, I can see it as being the future windows. I mean, it’d be great if we finally got rid of that whole task bar thing, and separated the start button from the taskbar. Anyways, if you want to read up on the Windows 8 mania, go ahead. No one is stopping you. Here’s a good site to start.

OS…X?

Alright, I’m sure you’ve already figured out, I’m not much of a mac fan but I do have to give it credit for coming out with a new OS this year to counter Windows 7. The “Snow Leopard” has tons of new feature that you can read about on Wikipedia. To me, honestly, it seems like Apple  finally got the right idea and started copying what GNOME and KDE have already accomplished (not to say Microsoft does not do that either) including the multiple desktop feature….that’s in there, right? I’m not just making it up? Okay, it’s there, people just don’t know about it

A Tribute to W7

Windows 7 is really not old news. I can’t wait to use it on my computer to replace my old XP. Many users will probably do the same, Vista was not worth it. I’m honestly happy it has finally come out.

So, I applaud Microsoft for coming out with what looks like, in Dave’s words, the “true successor to XP”.

See you next time!

IBM and Ubuntu article

I was roaming around slashdot and found an interesting article on the Linux distro Ubuntu. It turns out IBM and Ubuntu are walking hand in hand together, trying to counter Windows 7 dominion (it’s coming out pretty soon, isn’t it?). I personally love Ubuntu but I can never migrate to it because Ubuntu does not have any of the Adobe products that I love to use (ie. Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver…) which means I use Ubuntu only when I’m at school and need a quiet, reliable OS that loads OpenOffice within a couple seconds.

Ubuntu is highly reliable when it comes to speed. My computer loads within half a minute with Ubuntu while it takes up to five minutes until my Windows XP SP3 connects to internet and Open Office loads up. Nevertheless, I still can’t use Ubuntu for every day tasks I’m involved in (by every day, I mean PHP, HTML, and CSS development that requires me to use DreamWeaver). Hopefully soon, I’ll migrate to Linux and use something other than that blasted Dreamweaver but until that day comes, I’m stuck with Windows.

What’s amazing now is that Ubuntu, a single Linux distro, has all the might of IBM behind it through the Microsoft-free PC project. With that comes the Open Collaboration Client Solution software which right now encompasses Lotus Symphony and Notes (do a little research on those, okay?). What it means for users like me is that there will be an increase of Ubuntu apps to replace its Windows counterparts. Now, don’t get all Ubuntu-HxC-User on me because I know there is a database of Linux applications to replace Windows software, but we all know it’s just not the same. Using Adobe Photoshop CS4 is not the same as using Gimp. So don’t even try that on me.

The point is, if IBM backs Ubuntu, that means software developers as well as computer users will try it out! Especially now that Windows 7 is coming to replace Vista through a costly upgrade.

May the best OS win!