Does 7 fix or improve these issues when compared to XP?

-wireless connectivity to a known network
not talking about roaming on a laptop and connecting to various networks, just improved reliability of wireless connection to a single home network.

-USB schizophrenia
by which I mean the annoyance of having XP not recognize a USB device that was just plugged into it, but on a different port.

-single step shutdown.
how many times have I left my machine running because I forgot to hang around to choose which of the 3 shutdown options i wanted after pressing shutdown.

-real shutdown
really shutting down rather than staying on with a dialog asking me if I want to kill an unresponsive program.

Vista and Win7 have extensive power options far more advanced than XP. One thing that Win 7 improved over Vista is that the button is by default shutdown and actually has that text on it--a lot of people didn't catch what was going on there, batteries on laptops were dying...not pretty. So, ONE button off of the start menu to shut down, a shortcut from XP and Vista's default setting. For portables, there are more options for closing lid etc, all including hibernation. Hibernation is improved over XP as well, which would still drain the battery some. Set the pc power button to shutdown the same way, but it seems like XP had that IIRC.

If you shutdown, you will still get a dialog if there is a 3rd party app running (Pinnacle profiler does this for me, but nothing else seems to have this trouble), but it's immediate otherwise under normal circumstances. It doesn't happen in either Vista or Win7 remotely as often as it does in XP, and it doesn't take minutes for the notice to come up.

Wireless connectivity...really depends on hardware, it picks up fine though. Driver support is already good from what I can tell. Connecting is easier and more security options. You can set various connections, each with different security settings based on being at home, office or in an unsecure public environment. It doesn't maintain the same settings until you change them manually. Note when setting up a new connection that "public" refers to being openly discoverable on the network by other computers on the network, but "private" refers to discovering other computers, but keeping your own undiscoverable. Seems backwards to me, but from the pc's point of view I guess it makes sense--it doesn't refer to the network, but the pc.
The network and sharing center also simplifies and customizes your sharing options on your network with basic radio buttons.
Vista and Win7 are leaps and bounds more advanced than XP, particularly in this area.

I haven't seen any USB issues, but I know what you mean. I'm sure they handle IRQ's better.

Just to add a couple of things.



I think you're encountering a well-known Windows-wide problem. Windows will search for new wireless networks periodically, causing spikes and disconnections. Download WLAN optimizer to disable Background Scan, and enable Streaming Mode. No install necessary. Other than that, I'd be more likely to blame the router or adapter. If you're using a wireless N adapter, please use WPA or any encryption that is *not* WEP. You will have problems. If you were using WEP, change the encryption in your router, and rename the SSID broadcast to ensure Windows will reconnect under the new settings. Update your adapter drivers, update your router firmware. Hopefully the above will fix the problem. Also, use either Windows Wireless Zero or your manufcaturer's wireless utility to connect. Whichever you're not using, turn it off. I've seen many a conflict resulting from this.

W7 has a new system of managing and configuring wireless networks. This can be a godsend or an annoyance depending on where you stand. If you just install your wireless adapter drivers without any bundled Wireless utilties and let Windows handle the rest, I think you'll like W7 for wireless networking better.


Hard to answer, b/c XP should not be doing this anyhow. I wonder if there is a problem with the chipset drivers or the Windows USB system driver. Check device manager to see if there are problems.



XP *should* shut down all hung apps after a default of 20sec IIRC, but like Kryptonite pointed out it doesn't while W7 works properly in this respect. You can easily alter this value easily in any Windows OS to your liking.

XP has always done this depending on the device, plugging a USB device into a differrent root hub will require XP to re-install the drivers which a goodf percentage of the timwe it for some reason fails to find even though they are already installed. I have seen this many many times of lots of differing machines.

FWIW I use G gear and my connection is rock solid. I attribute that to using Cisco gear exclusively. I use WEP and I do not broadcast my SSID.

I loved XP and a week into using 7, I see no real benefit. I am using 64 so I now get to use all of my RAM but, my games play just as well and my computer is just as reliable as it was on XP.

WEP is not a secure protocol and should not be used, switch to WPA or better, not broadccasting your SSID is almost as useless. They'll both stop your luddite neighbours from getting on your network but anybody who wants in will be hardly be slowed down by them at all.

Nobody in range of my WAP has any idea how to even connect to a WAP not broadcasting it's SSID. The possibility that anyone in range of my WAP could even explain what WEP was, let alone crack it is so small that I could not even care.

I check the syslog on occasion to check what has become associated to my WAP. In the 6 years I have been using WEP, I have never seen an unauthorized connection.

I agree WEP is not the strongest protection but, it's good enough for my home environment.

EDIT: Actually, this might be a fun little project... I need to find a copy of Cisco ADU that runs on Win7.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/tech/tk722/tk809/technologies_configuration_example09186a008054339e.shtml

Correct, the network still shows up, just no name. A script kiddie will find an app for that in no time. There really isn't any reason not to switch to WPA/WPA2, it doesn't slow you down.

If your games run just as fast on Win7 as they did in XP that's a GOOD thing. The OS is a generation better but you still see XP-like performance on the same machine. That says a lot for it.

A quick search on youtube for "fast wep hack" yields this (and plenty more):

Skip to 50 seconds or so to skip the obnoxious music.

Ouch. Yeah, gonna implement WPA2 tonight

EDIT: I spoke to the wireless guru at my job and he said I do not need the Cisco ADU if I run Win7 as the OS has the functionality that the ADU used to supply on older OSs.

Thanks for the answers, and pointers to some things that might work for XP. Is the the WLAN optimizer you are referring to? I hate to dl 'utilities' unless I get a word-of-mouth recommemdation
http://www.martin-majowski.de/wlanoptimizer/

Maybe an x86 problem, or device dependent? I've run x64 for years and have never seen this behavior. I also just tested it on an x86 SP3 machine and cannot reproduce it. I did not get the "installing device software" notification either. There's always a pause which I chalk up to device recognition time -- if there is driver business going on behind the scenes, they are always installing quickly and successfully -- enough that I wouldn't suspect anything is wrong. If they aren't there's definitely something wrong with the driver.




That should work fine, the only incompatibility is when you are using draft N and WEP. You'll need to use b/g if you're running WEP in N mode. On the topic of security, WPA is the way like Dano said...but users are still vulnerable if they use weak passwords. You don't have to be a genius, just have a working networking knowledge, download a utility and click "Brute Force." If you've got the strongest signal in the area with a good broadband speed, leeching might cross someone's mind



That's the one I hope it is able to help you