Reports: Windows 7 may not improve performance much

While many of those who have played around and tested an early late alpha version of Windows 7 have noted that it feels pretty zippy, especially for such an early version, InfoWorld says early benchmarks show the software is just on par with its predecessor., which is more than a disappointment.

In a article written on Monday, InfoWorld said that Windows 7 is a “virtual twin” of Vista when it comes to performance. Uh oh, if that type of thing spreads…bad news for MS.

Microsoft’s efforts to position Windows 7 as better performing could be stunted badly. At the same time, bear in mind, this is a pre-beta version. Early releases often lag in performance since optimizations tend to be among the later steps in operating system development, at least for most software developers.

For its part, Microsoft is encouraging folks to withhold judgment until a later beta is released more widely.

“Microsoft consistently encourages people to hold benchmark tests until software is finished and ready for broad release,” Microsoft said in a statement.

This would be a good thing to keep tabs on, though. Hopefully when later versions are released, benchmarks will be better.

Sunday’s Techie Notebook

Here we are with another techie Notebook for Sunday. Here are my short takes on a few things making news on this cloudy, cold morning (Northern CA, USA):

- Windows 7 has hit the BitTorrent download sites apparently. But it’s a pre-beta from ages ago, and people are saying it isn’t different enough from Vista to bother. When you download a really old build without all the changes made, this is what often happens. Various other publications with access to newer builds and minus the anti-Microsoft agenda are claiming it really is a step up usability (and stability) wise from Vista. We’ll see. I’m taking a wait and observe approach after the disappointment of Vista.

- An inside source has stated that electronics giant Panasonic is in talks to buy out and absorb Sanyo. This seems to be the direction of corporate survivial these days: Merge. It would cost around 6 billion USD for it to happen, so its not a done deal yet, but if completed, it would cause some major ripples in the electronics industry and make Panasonic the largest elec. corp in Japan in terms of sales.

- Remember that big Android security flaw we reported here a few days ago? Well, they patched it up according to this article. Reports are that the update went well and all is good in Android land.

Vista SP2 in beta testing - But will anyone care?

The next update to Windows Vista will enter beta next week, bringing with it support for Blu-ray drives and Bluetooth, and a few bug fixes, among other enhancements.

In a blog posting on Friday, Microsoft confirmed that a beta version of Windows Vista Service Pack 2 will be released next week, probably later in the week.

The software maker said earlier this week that it was working on Vista SP2, but wouldn’t go into detail.

In addition to the above fixes, it will include Windows Search 4.0, the latest version of Microsoft’s desktop search technology. Why they think it will replace Google is anyone’s guess, but it’ll be there anyhow.

I think at this point, those that use and like Vista will use it regardless, and those who could care less, won’t care about this service pack at all. It may be time for MS to cut their losses and move on to “Windows 7″ at this point.

The Operating System: To be Obsolete?

As the Internet becomes more of a focus on what we do, I wonder, is Windows — indeed, any personal computer operating system — still relevant to our day to day experience? Of course it is to a degree, but it isn’t as central as it once was.

Think about it for a second: do you care anymore which operating system you use? I honestly don’t. For a few years, I owned both a PC and a Mac. I could use Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, Apple’s Safari or Mozilla’s Firefox to access the Internet and general websites. I could write an article on one computer, send it via an email message to the other one, play games over the Internet, and it worked very well. One reason Apple and the Mac are suddenly gaining a little market share is that people have come to realize that they do not really need Windows or any OS anymore. Any OS will work just great for general application. The browser and the Internet have already rendered them largely irrelevant.

That said, the OS is not dead yet, and won’t be for some time, due to way things are engineered. But the day could come where an OS will simply fade into the background and be largely a blanket over the same bed you sleep on every night, so to speak.

Software (i.e. the OS) has to serve as the conductor between you and your hardware, overseeing memory usage, disk access and and related stuff. Those are the core functions of an operating system, and they’re still needed, even on a machine that relies only on the Internet. This is Computers 101.

How you interact with an OS remains an important thing. The operating system pilots and directs the interface between human and machine. If you don’t think the OS matters, spend some time talking to Windows hardliners and Macintosh fans. They have a real bond with the look-and-feel of their computers. It IS the computer to those users.

If you rely on the internet to find or store everything, this is a very bad idea, for many reasons. It is the weak link of a system, and it’s much more likely to fail than a PC’s hard drive is. So the operating system is here. For now. But within 10-15 years, that could definitely change.

True Internet/TV convergence - It’s almost here

As an avid TV viewer and internet junkie, I’ve always had that dream, the dream of a television-viewing experience where the Internet was not only always accessible but integrated right into the experience. There was no switching back and forth between environments. I viewed what I wanted when I wanted online or via broadcast and tapped into information about what I was viewing through a small bar or window that could either sit on the screen or be safely minimized. If I saw something that I wanted to buy, I didn’t have to grab my laptop or switch out to Windows. I simply accessed the information about the product right on the TV screen, and bought it right then and there.

Now, a group of events appear poised to make this dream a (partial) reality. Last week, Intel and Yahoo! announced a somewhat unlikely partnership that would result in Internet-enabled HDTVs that play and use on-screen Yahoo! widgets to give viewers direct access to Web-based content, applications, and contextual advertising. It could be the germ of what might become my idea, brought to life. In fact, execs at Intel and Yahoo! did note that viewers might be able to, say, buy the shoes Lauren is wearing on an episode of The Hills, or anything similar to that sort of thing.

The digital TV part is pretty much going to be taken care of soon. The FCC’s decision to strong-arm the nation and broadcasters into the digital spectrum is probably the best thing to happen to television since color, IMHO. Sorry, all you people still fiddling around with your rabbit ears, but it’s an idea that really needed to happen at one time or another, for a lot of reasons. Those complaining about next year’s switchover on February 17, 2009 might end up feeling quite differently once they see everything the programmers and partners can do with a digital screen.

The Intel/Yahoo! tool and the Sidebar feature look like a really good start. I love that these toolbars can slide on and off the HDTV screen, providing you with instant access to content you’ve stored online. What’s missing, of course, is the deeper integration that would offer direct interaction between your live TV show and the Internet as I mentioned earlier, but I know that’s coming. So, for example, on Deal or No Deal, you could play along with the contestant, select your cases, and even see what’s in them (via an overlay). You could also select a winning case and, perhaps, be entered into a live drawing—maybe you’d compete directly against the on-air opponent for a million dollars! This is the type of digital world I always envisioned.

So do these exciting developments represent true integration and convergence? Not quite yet. In fact, significant hurdles remain. Few of the glowing reports about the Internet TV revolution and the surprise Intel-Yahoo! partnership mention that not enough people have broadband access anywhere near where their TV is located (or have broadband period in some areas of the country). So consumers either need to wire their homes (not gonna happen) or add access points near their TVs. An obvious alternative would be for these Internet-ready TVs to come wireless-ready, too. But these hurdles will be overcome. Eventually.

Blackberry vs. iPhone - Who will win?

The batteground has been marked, the weapons are sharpened. The war has begun.

Research In Motion, maker of the BlackBerry handheld e-mail device, is moving deeper into the consumer market, where it is sure to run up against tough competition from Apple iPhone, which has expanded its reach this year into various international markets.

Earlier this year, RIM forged a partnership with social networking site Facebook that lets BlackBerry device owners access information from their Facebook pages.

Now, RIM has announced partnerships with a host of new companies that will give BlackBerry owners access to Windows Live Search, Google, getting tickets on Ticketmaster, MySpace, and TiVo. This gives it a huge head start against Apple, but RIM lacks their “flash factor” and deep advertising pockets. The bevy of partnership announcements is just the latest move by RIM to tap into the consumer market.

A Hewlett-Packard PC with Linux?

According to a recent story in BusinessWeek, Hewlett Packard has been exploring the possibility of using something other than Windows Vista for some of its computers. The article has some denials from HP spokespersons, but their denials seem weak and uncertain in wording, so odds are, they’re correct in some form or another.

Apple and Mac computers are grabbing increasing market share; at least some of Apple’s new sales are coming at the expense of companies like HP and Dell. It has to be frustrating to Windows OEMs like HP that they don’t really control the complete user experience the way Apple does. HP has a history of wanting to control the user shell more closely, so that loss of control must really irritate them at times.

The idea that HP might create its own operating system from scratch is crazy (and expensive and unnecessary), so they had no problem denying that rumor. Part of the article, confirmed by HP, was about their efforts to “innovate on top of Vista”, in HP’s words. That could simply be some tack-on applications, or added functionality at the BIOS level for certain functions, but I have a hard time believing that would solve a lot of consumer problems. It may even create a whole new set of compatibility issues.

The big question is whether HP is pondering the use of Linux on its consumer PCs. This is territory already explored by the successful Asus Eee PC. That tiny notebook offers both Linux and Windows — but it’s Windows XP. Microsoft has made it clear that XP is OS-non-grata its future plans, so the Linux option may be HP’s best alternative. This would turn the whole OS/PC world pretty much upside down, and MS would be none too happy to see one of its biggest partners defect to Linux.

There are plenty of Linux distributions that HP could use, so the engineering effort could boil down to making sure that high-quality Linux drivers are available (sometimes not a given). HP could push most of that work down to their chipset suppliers such as Intel and NVidia. Sure, they’d want to brand their Linux user interface with some sort of custom HP look, but that shouldn’t take long and wouldn’t cost much, more than likely. Some Linux gurus would probably volunteer testing and ideas for nothing, just to see it happen.

HP has tried to be a good partner with Microsoft in the past, and hasn’t always been rewarded with much loyalty for the effort. One example came to light in a lawsuit where MS told HP execs that Vista would require high-end video hardware, and HP accelerated a redesign of their product lines to support the new chipsets Vista needed. Then, Microsoft backpedaled and said that less-capable video chipsets, the ones in HP’s soon-to-be-defunct products, could be labeled “Vista Capable.”

Microsoft has some options to keep HP consumer products Linux-free. Microsoft will probably use the carrot of a price break or marketing money, similar to the way Intel appeased OEMs with the Intel Inside program. In essence, Microsoft can price Vista or XP in a way that “pays” HP to not use Linux. That may ultimately be an offer HP can’t refuse. Either way, MS needs to step up and do something it appears, or an HP box with Linux may become reality.

Windows 7 in official closed beta, on track for wider beta by December?

Microsoft is on tap to talk publicly about and show off Windows 7 at two of its upcoming tech conferences this fall. But that does not mean the Windows team necessarily will be distributing bits at those shows.

A small and select group of testers (read: MS supporters more than likely) already have gotten their hands on Windows 7 builds. Microsoft has released two M (or ”milestone”) designated Windows 7 builds (M1 and M2), plus various interim updates, to select customers and partners who have been sworn to secrecy. And the Windows client team is in the midst of putting finishing touches on M3, if you believe the whispers.

But Beta 1? Currently it’s not in the cards for Microsoft to release this code to testers until a week before Christmas, according to folks claiming to be privvy to Microsoft’s Windows 7 schedule.

Might there be some kind of pre-beta — something like a Community Technology Preview (CTP) build — that Microsoft will deliver to a broader set of private testers than those currently getting regular internal builds? Odds are this may happen, but the consensus seems to be not to expect Microsoft to distribute Windows 7 bits more widely until the Windows 7 is  feature-complete or very nearly so. After the Vista incident, this may be a very smart move.

On September 10, Microsoft acknowledged that it plans to use its Connect site to sign up potential Windows 7 testers at some point. Christina Storm, a program manager on the Windows Customer Engineering feature team says: ”When we release the Windows 7 beta, we will also be collecting feedback from this (Windows Feedback) panel and asking for participation from a set of Windows 7 beta users. Our current plans call for signing up for the beta to happen in the standard Microsoft manner on http://connect.microsoft.com. Stay tuned!”

If Microsoft does release Beta 1 of Windows 7 in mid-December, that will mean the company is aiming to deliver the final Windows 7 product less than a year after the official beta begins. (Microsoft has said, publicly and privately,  that late 2009 is their target date for release of Windows 7. The “you can’t claim we’re late” date remains the first part of 2010.)

Would a less-than-year-long beta be unprecedented? Not really. Short betas of products pretty much cast in stone aren’t unusual from the Office team. But looking at MS’s early track record with bugs in initial releases, I can’t say it makes me feel better that its on track this “quickly”. I’d much prefer they take their time, and get it right.

iTunes 8 causes major Vista headaches

You think that Apple has the resources to test iTune 8 on all kinds of platforms, so there’s little excuse for this sort of thing.

Reports are emerging this morning that the newly released iTunes 8 doesn’t like Windows Vista very much, though the Apple forums indicate its a more sporadic problem.  Some are seeing the much beloved blue screen of death after connecting iPods, etc with iTunes 8 running.

The solution seems to to be to uninstall the whole thing and reinstall it, and apparently the USB driver file with it may cause a conflict on some Vista systems, depending on the devices installed. Lovely. Even Apple seems to have fairly low regard for Vista, it seems.

One of the issues with this is the secrecy with which Apple does its beta testing; this is what typically happens when you don’t do widely public testing, with its myriad hardware configurations and users of various skill levels. I understand their perspective on this, but…you end up with a product that doesn’t always work on different types of configs the way it should. Hopefully, Apple will patch this one up pretty quickly and all will be well.

Here’s the Apple thread (Warning: it’s big and loads slowly).

Vista Service Pack 1: What’s new?

Windows Vista has been a moderate success but hasn’t blown any of us away by any means.

Slow and steady adoption continues through upgrades and new system purchases.  Most critics cite security issues and ease-of-use as failures (UAC?!?).  As some features are pretty exasperating at times to use.

The primary goal of this new operating system form windows to to enhance security of the Windows Operating System. One setback for the Vista’s predecessor, the Windows XP, is that it was very susceptible to malware  and viruses which cause computer to either breakdown or be hacked.

Microsoft has been known for releasing service packs of their software to the public for eta btesting. This allows the company to add and improve the features of their latest product. On February 15, 2008, Windows Vista Service Pack 1 was introduced to the market, readily downloadable by beta end-users.

Aside from security, Microsoft also targeted performance as an added improvement to their latest operating system. Microsoft touts that Windows Vista SP1 has many enhancements as compared to the original Vista.

The key areas if these improvements are device support, power management, application compatibility, security, performance, and reliability.

One major improvement of the Windows SP1 is desktop search. Windows SP1 allows a user to change search engines from that of the built-in Windows search engine to a third party such as Google.

Another improvement is the introduction of a new security measure for Application Programming Interface (API) and this will bring in more security for users who are frequently practicing P2P or peer-to-peer file sharing.

Some see the SP1 release as acknowledgement from Microsoft that Vista was flawed.

Microsoft of course is merely doing what they always have - never first to market, but after constant revision they usually end up with a winner.

A quick rundown of some of the critiques of Vista and SP1.

Software Compatibility

Critics claim that so much codes have been changed in the Windows Vista that it causes many programs to crash and mutate. There are many observed side-effects upon usage of the operating system and it is not compatible with other existing programs designed for other Windows applications.

Laptop Battery Life

According to users, Windows Vista can drain a laptops battery faster than Windows XP because of its added features. Because of its higher requirements, higher power consumption is a side effect.

Hardware Compatibility

Although this speculation was dispelled when Microsoft announced the requirements for Windows Vista to run, many end-users cannot use the operating system if their computers are bought earlier than 2005. For some, they may use Vista but they cannot enjoy other features, as their computers’ hardware cannot support Windows Vista’s requirements. The impact is the level of frustration for many end users who purchased the product and yet cannot fully access its features.

Cost

Windows Vista was criticized as overpriced—more expensive than Windows XP.

All in all, this attempt of Microsoft to provide better operating system will have it wonders and flaws. As with any other product, nothing really comes perfect. The bad thing is, purchasing a new operating system such as this is not wise for people who are not computer savvy. And with computer savvy I do not mean the simple end use type. What I mean is really computer savvy in which the degree of knowledge extends to that of program compatibility. If you purchased this operating system and it does not support your other existing soft wares or programs, you will end up using your old one.

Performance

Many comparison tests have been run (you can pick and choose which are more believable). But consistently Vista does not show up as a better performing OS then XP.   Users were hopeful that the SP1 would rectify some of those stability and performance issues.  From reports of beta testers it appears unchanged.  Vista Sp1 appears on par or sub-par to XP on both stability and performance.

One could try to argue that the security gains on Vista are worth the performance hit -  but that’s just no fun.  You’d hope after 5 years of OS development things would improve across the board.

We will see what changes are made in the Vista Sp1 release which should hit windows update in the next week or two!

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