11 ms·

Microsoft's Quiet Success Story: Windows 7

69 points by ALee 17y ago

sliverstorm 17y ago
In my personal opinion, because of Windows' position in the market place, they do not need or want glam and glitz and 'gushing reviews'. The best result for them is the silent, global adoption of a product that simply does it's job, and does it well. No one raves about *nix, but it dominates the server market, and encapsules the high-end computing market almost entirely. flash-bang-whiz is a hallmark of the underdog, the has-been, the also-ran. It could be said, for someone in their position, no news is the best news. (Some flash can be useful; see the 80's and 90's, with hot sports cars working to bring average Joe's into the showroom to buy other things. Similar concept to loss-leaders, except it functions through image instead of discounts.)
- henning 17y ago
  Hopefully this means they won't make god-awful internal music videos like that Bruce Springsteen one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPv8PPl7ANU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPv8PPl7ANU I feel dirty linking to it.
- aaronbrethorst 17y ago
  What does that make Windows 95 with its insanely hyped launch? "Windows 95 was an event. People lined up for blocks outside computer stores (like Egghead) at midnight to get their copy of Microsoft's newest operating system. Rolling Stones' song "Start Me Up" set the tone for the launch." (http://www.betanews.com/article/10-Years-On-Windows-95-Remembered/1124901092 http://www.betanews.com/article/10-Years-On-Windows-95-Remem...)
  - sliverstorm 17y ago
    Win95 was kind of the creation of a new type of computing. Now that the market exists, it doesn't need to be sensationalized to get a toehold. At least, that's my first thought.
yesimahuman 17y ago
Honestly, it's good to hear. I really like Windows 7, and I appreciate that a lot of work has gone into making me more efficient as a user. I'm a Mac/Windows/Gnome user currently and I have to say Windows 7 is my favorite desktop OS so far (except for web development, I like a native *nix shell). It's great to see progression and what MS is capable of in the face of competition.
- endtime 17y ago
  >Windows 7 is my favorite desktop OS so far (except for web development, I like a native *nix shell). I'm exactly the same. I've found that logging into a Linux machine and tunneling X actually works fine for me; it's definitely an easier solution than dual booting.
- nailer 17y ago
  It's also the only OS that has full scalability. You raise the DPI, everything on screen is increased in size, and 95% are still crisp. Only think is I wish you could make the dock icons bigger.
- sliverstorm 17y ago
  > except for web development, I like a native nix shell I like the shell for anything nitty-gritty, and cygwin doesn't quite cut it. I figure if they would build a Windows UI on a *nix core- essentially the same feat as OS9 -> OSX- so long as it was at least decent, I'd probably willingly pay full retail and never stray, at least for desktops/laptops.
  - iamelgringo 17y ago
    They are actually starting to build powershell into a lot more of their core apps. You can really do a lot of cool things with powershell. It's just an ugly looking language, IMO, so I tend to use iPython as my scripting language. It's really nice to be able to drop in to PowerShell if you need it, though. I run Win 7 at home, on all my boxes, and I'm running Win3K on EC2 as a server. I can remote in from my phone, as well as my netbook without any problems. My deployment is automated and scripted. I'm going to switch to Server 2008 soon, so I can get a remote shell if I need it.
dan_sim 17y ago
During March Madness, they pitched Windows 7 with the feature "shake a window and all the other windows minimize". It's not really related to this article but I just felt it was very odd from them.
- clammer 17y ago
  Yeah, I almost never use that. But I really like how I can drag a maximized window and it normalizes or drag a normalized window to the top and it maximizes. I got a mac mini for some iPhone development and I'm constantly perplexed at how their window managment works. It seems everything is always normalized. I like the mini well enough, it just feels weird to me.
  - dan_sim 17y ago
    Plus, it is so hard to use. Sometimes I shake a window and it doesn't work. Like if there was a concept behind it that I couldn't understand.
- superkarn 17y ago
  I can see it being more useful/friendlier with a touch interface.
henryw 17y ago
on a side note, the author looks a lot like the PC guy from the mac ads.
- nanexcool 17y ago
  The author is Dan Lyons aka Fake Steve Jobs.
- sabat 17y ago
  In real life (i.e. not photos), Dan doesn't wear his glasses much, and looks way less business-y. He's also not pudgy like John Hodgeman.
whereareyou 17y ago
Windows 7 is so much better than vista. I almost switched to a Mac, but gave Microsoft one more chance. I am glad I did.
- cakesy 17y ago
  Vista is so bad, I will never use a Microsoft OS again, if I can help it. XP was fine, don't see the need for change.
- baskinghobo 17y ago
  Vista wasn't so bad, to me Windows 7 is Vista with more speed and better UI.
mkramlich 17y ago
I suspect it's because Apple's success story is louder. (ie, bigger, more so, better, etc.)
mkramlich 17y ago
Let me guess: somebody near the top of Microsoft said, "Apple's kicking our butt. Time to copy^H^H^H^Her, I mean, try to catch up again." And somebody else said, "Yes, boss." And the result: Windows 7. I haven't used it as much as I have Vista and XP, but from the amount I have it feels like that's what the case is again.
- mkramlich 17y ago
  Posting to HN is like playing roulette. Post a comment in one thread that you think is true and funny, bingo, gain 26 karma. Do it again in another thread, bang, lose 4. I never know ahead of time which case it will be. The net trend is positive, at least. On-topic: just went to Microsoft's site and read their Top 10 Reasons why Windows 7 is so cool, and, as I suspected previously, 90% of the gee-whiz features touted were already in Mac OS X. One could argue that Apple is historically treated by Microsoft as a sort of external, unwitting R&D arm. Except it's better than their internal R&D in one crucial area: Microsoft doesn't have to pay for it!
  - j23tom 17y ago
    The problem is if r&d grows above 10% on desktop os market. They should punch apple now.
  - jacobolus 17y ago
    > Posting to HN is like playing roulette. A hint: your comment that got dumped on here (1) has little/no useful content, (1a) is only barely related to the article, (2) is a tired cliché, (3) is snarky to the point of being mean spirited. I hope that even if you get a “positive net trend” with similar comments, it doesn’t encourage you. If you’re going to angle for “funny”, the joke has to be some combination of surprising, new, or especially relevant. Because most throw-away joke lines fail these criteria, they tend to get voted down: they’re mostly an uninteresting distraction from whatever other conversation is going on. Also, your second comment is just a repeat of the lame joke of the first comment.
    - rbanffy 17y ago
zoba 17y ago
As an owner of a Windows Mobile 6 phone, I am hoping that 7 is also a magic number for their mobile OS as well. I can certainly agree that the move from XP to 7 and Vista to 7 was excellent.
- billybob 17y ago
  As a guy who does tech support for cell phones, I am hoping that Windows Mobile phones disappear from the earth.
doron 17y ago
We started a transition from XP to windows 7,for staff. and after the dramatic drop in support calls, the gained speed, and the general approval of users many of which are natives of Apple, our only problem is that we are not doing the transition fast enough. 7 is a very solid experience, Without fanfare it seems under the radar Microsoft is gaining ground, i have a suspicion they are actually using the lack of limelight to their advantage.
initself 17y ago
Windows XP isn't long in the tooth. With a good set of registry edits, an SSD drive, Firefox and Google Chrome, I don't even notice it's there.
- Locke1689 17y ago
  You should be careful. A lot of security features that we take for granted nowadays (stack protection, privilege separation, etc.) are poorly featured or nonexistent in Windows XP. If you aren't running any services and are running behind a firewall it may not be a big deal, but it's a good thing to keep in mind.
- chadgeidel 17y ago
  FWIW, Windows XP doesn't support the TRIM command on SSDs. http://www.anandtech.com/show/2738/10 http://www.anandtech.com/show/2738/10
enjo 17y ago
While it's technically a huge leap forward, I still just can't grok the UI. My wifes machine is on Windows 7 and it just (for whatever reason) is unusable to me.
- j23tom 17y ago
  let me guess ... you are an apple user ? ;)
- rbanffy 17y ago
  Same here. The control panel is absolutely baffling. I never know where a given feature is hidden. I've been a Linux user - from XP to Red Hat to Debian to Ubuntu - for a while now and every time I have to do something more complicated or unexpected on Windows, I waste an unpredictable amount of time. It's not user-friendly, unless you choose your users with great care. There are reasons to run Windows: Office (mostly specialized Excel plug-ins), Visual Studio (if you develop for Windows, it's not like you could get away running something else), games and specific hardware support, but, apart from that, I can't imagine why I would want to use it. Just last night I was on my company-issued laptop, wondering why I could view pictures I took with my phone, but not drag them to a folder on the desktop. I had to e-mail a couple of them and spent a good 15 minutes trying to figure out a way not to copy them one by one, something that, oddly, I could do. For me, the most effective setup is a Linux (or other Unix-ish OS) with Windows on a VM for the Windows-specific stuff. And for games that won't run well on a VM, there is always the Playstation.
  - mistermann 17y ago
    When you're in control panel, in the upper right hand corner, start typing what you're looking for and it will ajaxy filter down to what you're looking for. This is such a useful feature that they should have delivered years ago, and they should make this WAY more obvious in the UI, as I doubt most people realize this. You can often find what you are looking for just by doing the same from the start menu now rather than going into control panel. As for your photos issue, if they were still physically on your phone, I suspect this would be caused by your phone not properly supporting some standard interface, but that's just a guess.
CWuestefeld 17y ago
Most of the article is pretty good, but in its analysis at the end, I think it loses it. It may be that as the computer market has grown more mature, it has developed what consultants Al and Laura Riese call the "mushy middle." That's the huge dead zone that lies between sexy, expensive products at the high end and the low-end products that appeal to bargain hunters. In computers, Apple holds the high ground with its expensive laptops. The low end ... is also becoming Apple territory, thanks to the iPhone and the iPad, both of which are basically small, simple computers. The author seems to be redefining his terms in the middle. Yes, Apple does hold a fancy, expensive high ground. However, I think it's a stretch to think of the iPhone and iPad as a simple inexpensive low ground. These products cost more than a typical "middle-ground" desktop (if you're only looking at price), and more than a cheap netbook like my eeePC (if you're considering capabilities and price). As far as I can see, Apple only holds the expensive high ground, across several markets (notebook, phone, ultraportable tablet/netbook, media player). Each of these markets has a midlle and low ground beneath the Apple boutique range.

69 points by ALee 17y ago

In my personal opinion, because of Windows' position in the market place, they do not need or want glam and glitz and 'gushing reviews'. The best result for them is the silent, global adoption of a product that simply does it's job, and does it well. No one raves about *nix, but it dominates the server market, and encapsules the high-end computing market almost entirely. flash-bang-whiz is a hallmark of the underdog, the has-been, the also-ran. It could be said, for someone in their position, no news is the best news. (Some flash can be useful; see the 80's and 90's, with hot sports cars working to bring average Joe's into the showroom to buy other things. Similar concept to loss-leaders, except it functions through image instead of discounts.)

henning 17y ago
Hopefully this means they won't make god-awful internal music videos like that Bruce Springsteen one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPv8PPl7ANU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPv8PPl7ANU I feel dirty linking to it.
aaronbrethorst 17y ago
What does that make Windows 95 with its insanely hyped launch? "Windows 95 was an event. People lined up for blocks outside computer stores (like Egghead) at midnight to get their copy of Microsoft's newest operating system. Rolling Stones' song "Start Me Up" set the tone for the launch." (http://www.betanews.com/article/10-Years-On-Windows-95-Remembered/1124901092 http://www.betanews.com/article/10-Years-On-Windows-95-Remem...)
- sliverstorm 17y ago
  Win95 was kind of the creation of a new type of computing. Now that the market exists, it doesn't need to be sensationalized to get a toehold. At least, that's my first thought.

yesimahuman 17y ago

Honestly, it's good to hear. I really like Windows 7, and I appreciate that a lot of work has gone into making me more efficient as a user. I'm a Mac/Windows/Gnome user currently and I have to say Windows 7 is my favorite desktop OS so far (except for web development, I like a native *nix shell). It's great to see progression and what MS is capable of in the face of competition.

endtime 17y ago
>Windows 7 is my favorite desktop OS so far (except for web development, I like a native *nix shell). I'm exactly the same. I've found that logging into a Linux machine and tunneling X actually works fine for me; it's definitely an easier solution than dual booting.
nailer 17y ago
It's also the only OS that has full scalability. You raise the DPI, everything on screen is increased in size, and 95% are still crisp. Only think is I wish you could make the dock icons bigger.
sliverstorm 17y ago
> except for web development, I like a native nix shell I like the shell for anything nitty-gritty, and cygwin doesn't quite cut it. I figure if they would build a Windows UI on a *nix core- essentially the same feat as OS9 -> OSX- so long as it was at least decent, I'd probably willingly pay full retail and never stray, at least for desktops/laptops.
- iamelgringo 17y ago
  They are actually starting to build powershell into a lot more of their core apps. You can really do a lot of cool things with powershell. It's just an ugly looking language, IMO, so I tend to use iPython as my scripting language. It's really nice to be able to drop in to PowerShell if you need it, though. I run Win 7 at home, on all my boxes, and I'm running Win3K on EC2 as a server. I can remote in from my phone, as well as my netbook without any problems. My deployment is automated and scripted. I'm going to switch to Server 2008 soon, so I can get a remote shell if I need it.

dan_sim 17y ago

During March Madness, they pitched Windows 7 with the feature "shake a window and all the other windows minimize". It's not really related to this article but I just felt it was very odd from them.

clammer 17y ago
Yeah, I almost never use that. But I really like how I can drag a maximized window and it normalizes or drag a normalized window to the top and it maximizes. I got a mac mini for some iPhone development and I'm constantly perplexed at how their window managment works. It seems everything is always normalized. I like the mini well enough, it just feels weird to me.
- dan_sim 17y ago
  Plus, it is so hard to use. Sometimes I shake a window and it doesn't work. Like if there was a concept behind it that I couldn't understand.
superkarn 17y ago
I can see it being more useful/friendlier with a touch interface.

henryw 17y ago

on a side note, the author looks a lot like the PC guy from the mac ads.

nanexcool 17y ago
The author is Dan Lyons aka Fake Steve Jobs.
sabat 17y ago
In real life (i.e. not photos), Dan doesn't wear his glasses much, and looks way less business-y. He's also not pudgy like John Hodgeman.

whereareyou 17y ago

Windows 7 is so much better than vista. I almost switched to a Mac, but gave Microsoft one more chance. I am glad I did.

cakesy 17y ago
Vista is so bad, I will never use a Microsoft OS again, if I can help it. XP was fine, don't see the need for change.
baskinghobo 17y ago
Vista wasn't so bad, to me Windows 7 is Vista with more speed and better UI.

mkramlich 17y ago

I suspect it's because Apple's success story is louder. (ie, bigger, more so, better, etc.)

mkramlich 17y ago

Let me guess: somebody near the top of Microsoft said, "Apple's kicking our butt. Time to copy^H^H^H^Her, I mean, try to catch up again." And somebody else said, "Yes, boss." And the result: Windows 7. I haven't used it as much as I have Vista and XP, but from the amount I have it feels like that's what the case is again.

mkramlich 17y ago
Posting to HN is like playing roulette. Post a comment in one thread that you think is true and funny, bingo, gain 26 karma. Do it again in another thread, bang, lose 4. I never know ahead of time which case it will be. The net trend is positive, at least. On-topic: just went to Microsoft's site and read their Top 10 Reasons why Windows 7 is so cool, and, as I suspected previously, 90% of the gee-whiz features touted were already in Mac OS X. One could argue that Apple is historically treated by Microsoft as a sort of external, unwitting R&D arm. Except it's better than their internal R&D in one crucial area: Microsoft doesn't have to pay for it!
- j23tom 17y ago
  The problem is if r&d grows above 10% on desktop os market. They should punch apple now.
- jacobolus 17y ago
  > Posting to HN is like playing roulette. A hint: your comment that got dumped on here (1) has little/no useful content, (1a) is only barely related to the article, (2) is a tired cliché, (3) is snarky to the point of being mean spirited. I hope that even if you get a “positive net trend” with similar comments, it doesn’t encourage you. If you’re going to angle for “funny”, the joke has to be some combination of surprising, new, or especially relevant. Because most throw-away joke lines fail these criteria, they tend to get voted down: they’re mostly an uninteresting distraction from whatever other conversation is going on. Also, your second comment is just a repeat of the lame joke of the first comment.
  - rbanffy 17y ago

zoba 17y ago

As an owner of a Windows Mobile 6 phone, I am hoping that 7 is also a magic number for their mobile OS as well. I can certainly agree that the move from XP to 7 and Vista to 7 was excellent.

billybob 17y ago
As a guy who does tech support for cell phones, I am hoping that Windows Mobile phones disappear from the earth.

doron 17y ago

We started a transition from XP to windows 7,for staff. and after the dramatic drop in support calls, the gained speed, and the general approval of users many of which are natives of Apple, our only problem is that we are not doing the transition fast enough. 7 is a very solid experience, Without fanfare it seems under the radar Microsoft is gaining ground, i have a suspicion they are actually using the lack of limelight to their advantage.

initself 17y ago

Windows XP isn't long in the tooth. With a good set of registry edits, an SSD drive, Firefox and Google Chrome, I don't even notice it's there.

Locke1689 17y ago
You should be careful. A lot of security features that we take for granted nowadays (stack protection, privilege separation, etc.) are poorly featured or nonexistent in Windows XP. If you aren't running any services and are running behind a firewall it may not be a big deal, but it's a good thing to keep in mind.
chadgeidel 17y ago
FWIW, Windows XP doesn't support the TRIM command on SSDs. http://www.anandtech.com/show/2738/10 http://www.anandtech.com/show/2738/10

enjo 17y ago

While it's technically a huge leap forward, I still just can't grok the UI. My wifes machine is on Windows 7 and it just (for whatever reason) is unusable to me.

j23tom 17y ago
let me guess ... you are an apple user ? ;)
rbanffy 17y ago
Same here. The control panel is absolutely baffling. I never know where a given feature is hidden. I've been a Linux user - from XP to Red Hat to Debian to Ubuntu - for a while now and every time I have to do something more complicated or unexpected on Windows, I waste an unpredictable amount of time. It's not user-friendly, unless you choose your users with great care. There are reasons to run Windows: Office (mostly specialized Excel plug-ins), Visual Studio (if you develop for Windows, it's not like you could get away running something else), games and specific hardware support, but, apart from that, I can't imagine why I would want to use it. Just last night I was on my company-issued laptop, wondering why I could view pictures I took with my phone, but not drag them to a folder on the desktop. I had to e-mail a couple of them and spent a good 15 minutes trying to figure out a way not to copy them one by one, something that, oddly, I could do. For me, the most effective setup is a Linux (or other Unix-ish OS) with Windows on a VM for the Windows-specific stuff. And for games that won't run well on a VM, there is always the Playstation.
- mistermann 17y ago
  When you're in control panel, in the upper right hand corner, start typing what you're looking for and it will ajaxy filter down to what you're looking for. This is such a useful feature that they should have delivered years ago, and they should make this WAY more obvious in the UI, as I doubt most people realize this. You can often find what you are looking for just by doing the same from the start menu now rather than going into control panel. As for your photos issue, if they were still physically on your phone, I suspect this would be caused by your phone not properly supporting some standard interface, but that's just a guess.

CWuestefeld 17y ago

Most of the article is pretty good, but in its analysis at the end, I think it loses it. It may be that as the computer market has grown more mature, it has developed what consultants Al and Laura Riese call the "mushy middle." That's the huge dead zone that lies between sexy, expensive products at the high end and the low-end products that appeal to bargain hunters. In computers, Apple holds the high ground with its expensive laptops. The low end ... is also becoming Apple territory, thanks to the iPhone and the iPad, both of which are basically small, simple computers. The author seems to be redefining his terms in the middle. Yes, Apple does hold a fancy, expensive high ground. However, I think it's a stretch to think of the iPhone and iPad as a simple inexpensive low ground. These products cost more than a typical "middle-ground" desktop (if you're only looking at price), and more than a cheap netbook like my eeePC (if you're considering capabilities and price). As far as I can see, Apple only holds the expensive high ground, across several markets (notebook, phone, ultraportable tablet/netbook, media player). Each of these markets has a midlle and low ground beneath the Apple boutique range.