32 q MAXIMUMPC | oct 08 | http://www.maximumpc.com
K>HI6
(^) revisited
38 q MAXIMUMPC | oct 08 | http://www.maximumpc.com
What Microsoft Must Change for Windows 7
By now, we’ve got a pretty good idea of what’s working and what isn’t in Vista.
Here are our recommendations for how Microsoft should proceed with Windows 7
Fight Piracy a
New Way
Face it, activation is a failure.
For power users who frequent-
ly upgrade their PCs, dialing in
to reactivate the OS is beyond
irritating. Instead, Microsoft
must come up with a novel
way to punish pirates without
annoying its paying customers.
(May we suggest displaying
massive popup ads in pirate
copies of Windows?) For
legitimate customers, a realistic
home-licensing program—buy
one copy at full price, get four
more upgrades for $50 to $100
each—would go a long way
toward creating goodwill.
Streamline
the UAC System
We definitely approve of the
spirit behind User Account
Control—it’s good to warn
users when they’re doing
something risky. However, the
implementation is so chatty
that it trains users to auto-
matically click Approve on any
popup they see. This is insanely
dangerous behavior that must
be fixed in Windows 7.
Add Something
Inspirational
Say what you like about Steve
Jobs, but he stirs the Apple
faithful into a frenzy with his
promise of “one more thing.”
Apple has done a great job of
adding features, applications,
and functionality to OS X that
inspire its users. Some of that is
just marketing mumbo jumbo,
but the tight integration and the
user-focused design of Apple’s
integrated apps impress even
the most die-hard PC user.
64-Bit is the
New 32-Bit
It’s time. The 64-bit revolution
is upon us, and it’s time for
Microsoft to lead the charge.
The hardware is available and
common, and software vendors
should have been planning
for the 64-bit change for the
last five years. Please, Micro-
soft, make the 64-bit edition of
Windows 7 the default install.
And while you’re at it, allow users
to install the 32-bit and 64-bit
versions of Windows on the same
machine without buying two li-
censes. Anything less is just crass.
Create Fewer
Versions
We understand that creating
many versions of an OS with a
few key differentiators can help
drive sales at the higher end.
But it’s a viciously consumer-
unfriendly practice that needs to
be stopped. Nothing’s worse than
finding out you’ve purchased the
wrong software or that because
of obscure upgrade paths you’re
railroaded into buying an incred-
ibly overpriced version of the
OS whose only differentiating
factor is that it works with your
rig. Actually, one thing is worse:
finding out you can’t return that
already opened Vista box for a
version you can use.
Jettison Backward
Compatibility
So many of Vista’s problems
are directly tied to backward
compatibility, but we have the
perfect solution. Instead of
building backward compat-
ibility into the OS, ship each
copy of Windows with Virtual
PC and bare-bones images of
Windows XP. Let users run old
apps in a virtualized OS, and
strip out all the cruft that’s
required to make them run
natively in Windows 7.
Make Performance
Paramount
We expect to take a small per-
formance hit in games anytime
we upgrade our operating
system. We don’t like it, but we
understand that it’s the way
things go. What we can’t abide
is taking massive performance
penalties in basic computing
tasks—like transferring files
over a network. There’s no
wiggle room on this one: Get it
right the first time.
Upgrade
DirectSound3D
A picture may be worth 1,000
words, but we like good audio
too. There’s more than enough
blame to pass around between
Creative and Microsoft for
Vista’s sound woes. At this
point, we don’t care who is at
fault, we just want a succes-
sor to DirectSound 3D in the
next version of Windows and
DirectX.