KR

Microsoft announces Windows 7 pricing, unveils upgrade program (Download Squad)

Jul 2nd 2009 4:30PM Ed,

While I agree the step from Vista to 7 doesn't "seem" like much, the reality is that there is much more than could be added using 3rd party tools. You can't tell me there's a tool that will warn logged in users that you are trying to remote desktop and let them close their programs waits for them instead of kicking them off (a handy feature for those of us who let people use our computers). Try to add HomeGroups using 3rd party software, it's a great feature that simply just works. For a complete list, I'd suggest reading Paul Thurrot's site: http://www.winsupersite.com/win7/win7_skus_compare.asp

Your suggestion of third party add-ons and disabling background processes to achieve lower memory is an oxymoron. You have to be pretty damn clever to be able to add software and lower memory usage just by disabling services. Either you install add-ons and add more memory usage or you disable slow services and leave it as is. Wouldn't you rather have it just built in?

Finally, remember that a lot of people still use Windows XP because we disliked Vista. Companies skipped Vista and are waiting for 7. The jump from XP to Windows 7 is huge and this price ($99) is more than reasonable (details: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10272259-56.html).

I totally agree, however, that a jump from Vista to 7 shouldn't cost so much, even as an upgrade and especially not the MSRP. I was able to get by hardly ever having to buy Windows... we had MSDN, got a lot of licenses from that, and haven't really had to install a new OS in a long time.

At the same time, if you think about how much you use your OS compared to its initial cost, it's not that much. Let's say you use your computer pretty infrequently, maybe 2 hours a day. If you paid $2/hr for the OS, it would only take you less than half a year to pay for it. Most of use use our computer a lot more than that. I used it for at least 10 hours this week. Yah, it's a lot up front... but not that much in the long run. You probably use up $300 going out to eat within 6 months (or less).

I installed 7 RC1 on all my computers (2 PCs and 1 tablet) now and the jump in performance is pretty amazing, all the devices are now much faster than they used to be.