Netbook Lounge » windows 7

HP to offer four versions of Windows 7 with netbooks

Stuart — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 14:10:07 +0000

Hewlett-Packhard has moved to ease fears that all netbooks could soon be shipped with the dumbed down “Starter Edition” of Windows 7 that we talked about a week ago.

HP is saying that its netbooks — and hopefully the other brands follow — will offer three versions of Microsoft’s upcoming OS. Those are the two primary editions — Professional and Home Premium editions — along with the dreaded Starter Edition designed for netbooks.

The Starter Edition seems almost redundant given that many have already tried the full beta version on their netbooks to great effect, something they couldn’t accomplish with the much maligned Vista OS.

According to Kyle Thornton, category manager for business notebook PCs at HP, they have also been testing the beta version of Windows 7 Ultimate Edition — this option aimed at gamers and hardcore PC users — on netbooks, so its possible HP may offer four versions with upcoming netbooks, which would be great.

Source: Computer World

Windows 7 on the MSI Wind @ jkOnTheRun

Stuart — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 19:11:33 +0000

The signs for Windows 7 on netbooks have always been promising since Microsoft claimed that it had been optimized with netbooks in mind. jkOnTheRun has put up some first impressions of the new OS on an MSI Wind Netbook and the overall tone of the review is cautious optimism.

Installation and basic navigation were significantly better than Vista and they report very little lag in maneuvering around the OS. He cited the Control Panel as an example of Windows 7’s performance in comparison to Vista, saying it took some time for Vista to open and render it, while 7’s was pretty quick, if not instantaneous.

Click here for the full rundown, but the signs look good for netbooks and Windows 7 after Vista’s failure to run at acceptable speeds on pretty much all netbook models.

Windows 7 prepares to tackle Linux on netbooks

Stuart — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 12:32:38 +0000

We recently reported that sales of Windows netbooks are outnumbering sales of Linux netbooks by more than 9 to 1! This information was according to leading vendors, most notably Acer, who given their 38% leading share in netbook sales are as reliable a source as anyone for this kind of information.

According to Mobile Computing News though, Microsoft is still taking Linux seriously – at least as far as netbooks are concerned. Perhaps not content with an estimated share of over 70% in the netbook market, they have come up with a plan to work their way on to even more netbooks.

We all know that Windows Vista and netbooks are not a good combination. Vista is generally too powerful and subsequently too sluggish on netbooks, demanding resources the majority of netbooks don’t have. This is why Windows XP is used with most netbook releases, but XP is not as efficient as the Linux OS. Microsoft has shrewdly opted to solve this problem by optimizing its new Windows 7 operating system to run smoothly on netbooks.

Windows 7 is scheduled for a full release in 2009 and is expected to be a lot better in terms of CPU usage and system memory usage compared to Vista. With that in mind, things look pretty grim for Linux, which could find itself truly demoted to a place on the netbooks of the niche, hardcore consumer.