It is almost unbelievable that Microsoft are bringing out a new version of Windows when Vista was only released two years ago…but I suppose it is only in Beta. But we have it here to test and have been playing with it for some time.
First impressions are that it is very Vista-like! But we are fans of Vista here so that is a good thing. The install went very quickly and smoothly on a fairly basic Dell Optiplex 360 Intel Core 2 Duo machine.
So here is the desktop….
As you can see, it has the Vista Sidebar with the clock at the top, and the big Vista style icons. The most noticeable change here is the taskbar at the bottom. The quick launch icons have got bigger! And the open applications are just the program icon which is nice.
One note about the Sidebar, this is actually no longer just a Sidebar because the gadgets that you can choose to have there can actually be positioned anywhere on the screen.
If you hover over one of the icons on the taskbar that is representing an open application you get a preview of what is open, see image below….
And then you just click on the one you want to work with. Easy.
Also, if you right click on one of the icons on the quick launch/taskbar you get a menu specific to that application, rather then the good old standard right click menu. So for example you might get recent documents if you right click on the word icon that is down there or shortcuts to desktop, pictures, music, videos etc if you right click on the documents folder.
The main aim here I believe is to make things more accessible for users, ways to quickly get where we want rather than having to wait for windows to load before we can get to pictures etc.
Another nice, yet simple feature I would like to bring to your attention is a change to the start menu,
You will notice that in the top picture that programs such as Word and Paint have arrows next to them, if you were to hover over the program for long enough or click the arrow and you get….yes you’ve guessed it, a list of recent documents (see bottom image of the two above). Now that is a feature we really like!
That’s it for the first glance, coming up soon will be some nice simple features of Windows 7 Beta! Keep an eye out for that one.
See Also:
Windows 7 Beta