Being a popular new operating system means that there are those that would circumvent protections in the OS so as to make it seem legitimate. There are those that willingly take that risk in order to save themselves some cash, then there are those that are suckered into a new system preloaded with a counterfeit install.

Whatever the case may be Microsoft is ramping up their anti-piracy efforts with Windows 7 with their upcoming Windows Activation Technologies Update for Windows 7…update which will try to patch 70 or so activation loopholes and, seemingly, make the installations seem not so genuine.

The update is set to be released in a few days but it’s unknown as to when they’ll require it to be a mandatory install.

Source: The Windows Blog

Microsoft had a lot riding on their Windows 7 operating system, after all people weren’t exactly flocking to Windows Vista and XP has been getting long in the tooth as far as features were concerned. Their efforts seem to have done good but does all of the added newfangled-ness cause performance issues to pop up?

AnandTech does their usual thorough testing and pits Windows 7 against XP and Vista in a veritable feast of software performance evaluations and benchmarks showing you how 7 handles the most common application tasks undertaken by PC users. There’s a lot of info to digest here:

For Windows 7, Windows has been put on a diet in order to perform better on those machines. The most noticeable changes here are that Windows 7 eats less RAM and hard drive space out of the box than a comparable version of Vista did. There have also been some underlying tweaks to SuperFetch (it’s less aggressive on startup) and the kernel to improve responsiveness.

The tweaks are certainly there as can bee seen by the OS’ ability to eek out more performance from the same hardware.

Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 7 operating system is the most polished OS to come from the company, of course it’s going to have to be compared to Apple’s highly polished Snow Leopard operating system which means plenty of fodder for both sides to sling at each other.

CNET has tested out both operating systems on a model year 2008 MacBook Pro with some interesting results on both ends. Here’s a peek:

First off, the test machine is a 15-inch unibody MacBook Pro with a 2.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4GB of RAM, and a 512MB Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT video card. This is the 2008 model of the computer that comes with a removable battery and doesn’t have the SD card slot. (This is not the latest 2009 model that comes with a nonremovable battery, which packs a lot more juice.)

A test on the same hard drive would be much preferred given that they do go for the time based benchmarks and drive performance can differ especially when using drives from different manufacturers.

There’s nothing quite as scary as a new operating system roll out for businesses especially when they’ve invested quite a bit of time and money in acquiring licenses for Windows XP applications. Fortunately for them, and us, Windows 7’s XP Mode will smooth things over.

The Windows Blog brings word that XP Mode has hit RTM status and will be available to download for Windows 7 Professional, an higher, users meaning your XP applications will run in a nice virtualized environment that should make things go smoothly.

You’ll be able to grab your own copy of the software when Windows 7 launches October 22nd.

Source: Windows 7 Team Blog

When netbooks were introduced they saw a number of restrictions if they wanted to run the Windows XP operating system which, given Vista’s hefty requirements, was the only usable Windows choice. This time around they’ve eased up.

Microsoft is allowing netbook manufacturers to preload whatever version of the Windows 7 OS they’re content with no matter the machine’s specs. Of course you won’t likely find a copy of Windows 7 Ultimate on a bargain basement netbook so they’re somewhat safe on the hardware requirements front.

Good news for those fearing hardware requirements that would stop their shiny new netbook from running the best version of Windows 7.

Source: TG Daily

Zero Assumption Recovery

Developer: Zero Assumption Software
Usage: Data Recovery Software
Zero Assumption Recovery Website

Sometimes, through no fault of your own of course, things tend to go south really quickly on your storage medium due to the slip of a finger or yes even seemingly random corruption creeps up on you rendering your data unreadable. There’s usually a number of steps that go along with such a disaster anger, doubt, fear, and finally acceptance…fortunately there’s at least one last utility you can try that tries its darndest to recover your precious files.

Read more…

Microsoft has made some effort into buttoning up Windows 7’s security model compared to Vista which should see the operating system as the most secure Windows version to date. DailyTech delves into what the changes mean for users and some of the side benefits XP Mode brings to the table:

Many malware programs will also be crippled by XP-Mode.  This is because in the past Windows security software has used hardware virtualization extensions to detect malware.  It is common practice for malware to be written to not run on machines where hardware-assisted virtualization is detected.  However, as all Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate licenses come with XP Mode, this malware won’t run on a large portion of Windows 7 installs.  Modification is possible, but this will be time consuming and frustrating to attackers.

Given the amount of absolutely malicious software floating around out there that targets XP operating systems a move to Windows 7, or any other secure operating system, are sure to cut into botnet activity and other fraud…as long as the end user doesn’t willingly install the stuff that is. Yeah we’re all doomed anyway.

CableCARD is the cable industry’s standard for getting digital content to supported devices such as TVs, and in a few rare cases PCs, instead of having to rely on a large and clunky cable box. Unfortunately the PC option saw very limited usage due to Microsoft only allowing OEM PC builders to create CableCARD compatible computers.

Things have changed with Microsoft’s announcement that Windows 7’s Media Center will be able to natively handle a CableCARD so long as your hardware can decode all of the digital goodness. Here’s a few details:

Microsoft and CableLabs announced that customers will now be able to add digital cable tuners with CableCARD to a Windows 7-based PC with Windows Media Center. A new tool will be provided by Microsoft that assesses the PC’s ability to support the solution. This tool will analyze the customer’s PC and enable digital cable support if the PC meets requirements, opening digital cable options to Windows Media Center customers across the country. Microsoft also announced that, with Windows 7, it has increased the number of TV tuners that can be connected to the PC from two to four per tuner type, thereby allowing customers to simultaneously record or watch as many as four digital cable TV channels.

A great boost to those home theater PC users which should see adoption rates improve quite a bit. Hit the break for the full PR.

Read more…

Microsoft’s Windows 7 operating system is being touted as the best reason to upgrade from your old XP install clearly trumping the company’s Vista OS by quite a wide margin when it comes to user friendliness and system response.

Up until now there has been a hidden angle to the operating system, power consumption.

The company has done some optimizing with Windows 7 which sees it offering a better battery life compared to Vista, as reported by CNET, and in our own testing of the OS we saw much improved battery life compared to Windows XP.

Markedly so.

Perhaps it’s making better usage of power saving features or it’s doing more with less whatever the case is if you’re going to stick to Windows land and want to save a bit on the electric bill then the upgrade may be a little more tempting.

Microsoft’s Windows 7 is shaping up to be the operating system Windows users actually feel compelled to upgrade to. Gone are the early driver headaches and hassles that Vista users encountered but does it equal better performance in graphics intensive games?

TweakTown does their usual exhaustive testing of graphics performance under Windows 7 and Vista on a thoroughly high-end system. Here’s a peek:

Today we’ll be having a look at how the new Windows 7 operating system goes against Windows Vista which has really got a love / hate relationship going for so many people. The uptake on the OS was never great, which is the main reason why today we’re still including XP in our graphics card benchmarks. The main focus today will be VGA performance; we’ll have a look at one card in a number of our benchmarks and see how performance differs in the two operating systems.

The outcome isn’t very surprising so we’ll have to wait and see if either of them get the upperhand when running next generation’s crop of video cards.