Testing Windows 7

Today, I installed the pre-release copy of Microsoft Windows 7. Instead of totally screwing up my own PC, I decided to attempt the install on a Microsoft Virtual PC lab. By the way, this is what Virtual PC is supposed to be used for.....testing beta software. At least that is what I use it for.

A couple of things to know if you decide to try out Windows 7:

1) You must already have a copy of Windows Vista SP1 installed in order to upgrade to the pre-release version of Windows 7.

2) If you have an actual DVD in ISO format, that would be best. But for those of you who "obtained" a copy like I did....with a setup file and the rest of the files just in folders on the DVD. I had to copy the entire contents of the DVD to the desktop first and then run setup.exe from there.

3) Supposedly, you will need the Windows Vista RC1 key or Vista beta key from last year if you wish to activate Windows 7. I personally do not care to do this, I just wanted to see how it works and how it looks. There are ways around activation....but I do not recommend doing it since its against Microsoft TOS.

After the installation was finished....Windows 7 looks almost exactly like Windows Vista. It did seem to load faster than Vista but I was running it on Virtual PC which makes all versions of operating systems faster. I will follow up with another post about Windows 7 and its features sometime this week.

Read more about Windows 7 here: Windows 7 news