My very old XP installation has outlived pretty much all of the original hardware (I think it's only the HD that remains of it.) In many ways it's a bit silly to run a 32-bit XP on a machine with an Intel Q9650 Quad Core@3GHz and since several weeks now a very decent graphics card.

So... if I shell out for a Win7 OEM license and an additional 4G RAM, will that feel like money well spent, or should I spend it in the pub instead?

Well, one big thing that makes Win 7 worth while is DX10 support. XP only supports DX9.

I think so. I think it won't be long before new games lose XP support, and you'll notice the extra ram too.

Does ROF use much, or any, DX10 though?

I can see for the future it'll be essential but right now I struggle to see the difference between screens and videos from my DX9 rig compared to Dx10 systems. The same goes for general gaming also. I keep waiting for fabulous DX10/11 innovations to be implemented in my games making the step up to Win7 seem essential, but for now they seem to be slow coming.

I dunno about RoF and DX10. If it doesn't have DX10 now it will at some point. All the new vidcards support it. Right now I am on XP myself but I am getting Win 7 soon.

OMG! I did the same thing on my old Q9650/XP machine.

You will enjoy the results!

I think it was implied, BUT I'll state the obvious, get Win 7 64 bit...

And yes, it makes a difference, well worth it though I picked it up legitimately at education price.

In my opinion - having recently changed from XP 32-bit to Win7 64-bit, it's worth the change to be able to get past the (less than)4G memory barrier.

DX10 hasn't wowed a lot, and there doesn't seem to be even a lot of enthusiasm. I saw a ton of videos online showing how it's not lightyears ahead of DX9 except for very specific, isolated areas. DX11 is supposed to be much better.

The issues I have with Win7 - and if you're a long-time computer user, you will have issues with it - are offset by the memory gain. But barely.

One of the first things I did was install a utility called ClassicShell, to overcome the completely idiotic way the Win7 start button works. If you liked expanding menus in the last several Windows versions...you can't do it in Win7. It's funny, every one of the greenies that tells me how great the new start button is immediately goes into how to use the Search...

...well, I never had to "search' when I knew where everything was because I kept the expanding menus organized. (The greenies were busy slapping links all over thier desktops). And if the new start button is so great, why do I have to Search?

(Here's a nice laugh: While they're busy telling you how great the search is, ask them to find a file somewhere that contains a given string. 'Member how easy that used to be? Not any more. I'd bet half the self-appointed Win7 'gurus' don't even know how to do it...but it was fairly obvious and easy, before this great new Search).

And the Search? One of the most vaunted features of Windows these days, is exceptionally good at encouraging people to completely abandon effort to store sh*t in any meaningful order. It's just plain ridiculous. Learn how to keep stuff in order, for God's sake.

All these people running around ranting about how great Win7 is were never really what I'd call truly into computers in the first place. They probably own iPhones and like anything with pretty icons and lots of search functions - mostly because they never learned to properly keep things organized on a computer to begin with.

Win7: Great for folks who like to look at "pretty" while having it hide "total clusterf*ck". Kinda the modern day technological equivalent of sweeping dirt under the rug. Hey - didn't your mom teach you not to do that? Moms are actually pretty smart, never mind computers.

True "computer people" understand file and directory structures; they started early on learning to keep things organized, and never had any problem using the structure as it's intended. Now, these 'wannabes' sling everything on the desktop...some don't even know how to recognize a shortcut (rather than a file saved on the desktop) and delete either with impunity...then wonder why the program is gone (Uh, 'cause you...deleted it..? "But I deleted those others and Windows said I could still run the programs..." Uh, yeah. Those were shortcuts. See the little white corner with the arrow in it? )

Oh, and they moved the damn 'show desktop' button. All the >>>way>>> to >>>the >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>bottom right hand corner.

After all this time of it being over on the left...really, Microsoft? Now that's intuitive, right there. Added bonus: It's now completely opposite most of that other stuff you click on often (back to the left...more...more...yup, right there. That stuff)

And the best part? You can't move it back. So much for Windows working "my way".

And WTF is with "Libraries"? They actually had to come up with an orderly-sounding name for something that further attempts to make that which is not at all related, somehow organized. Hey, why not just call it what it is? "A picture put here only to make the idiot user feel the contents are somehow organized, along with all the other unrelated crap in here". Well, OK, that's kind of long for an icon name, I guess.

Now - before anyone tells me "This is the new way, you just need to adapt" - don't take my word...go online and study sometime. You'll likely find that around 45% of Windows 7 users - who used anything *other* than Vista before Win7 - actually do not like the interface, including the start button fiasco and this stupid obsession with searching for everything. Most of them left XP 32 over the memory thing, just like me...and then were horrified at the interface.

Like I said, it is actually worth the move, if you're interested in the memory. But just barely. There are other 64-bit alternatives; both XP and Vista had 64-bit versions - neither worth it, again in my opinion.

A lot of truth in what you say KnowBreaks
mind you I could never go back to xp

Wow, quite the rant KB obviously the topic touched a sore spot for you.

"...horrified at the interface...", hmmm. More like frustration when you need to find a system tool that you knew where it was before --most certainly-- but "horrified" is a bit over-the-top. And yes, all I've ended up doing is pinning those tools to the task bar to avoid searching for them. So what? It speeds things up, roll with it and adapt.

Well, if the lack of a decent menu or search is the worst problem, it isn't a big problem. This machine is used almost exclusively for gaming, and there aren't that many games that interest me. For pretty much anything else the other 4 machines are various Linuxes. Ah, the joy of shell-scripts ...I even wrote shell scripts on my previous phone, to speed some things up compared to working with the klunku GUI. ;-)

Knowbreaks this is a fine abstract of my own experiences with Windows 7

I really wonder where the advantage is, to Win XP ? Win 7 may be better than Vista, but better than XP ? Where ?

And this search "function" in Win 7 is "DER LEZTE DRECK" to put it in german, mildly. Who the hell did that ? I mean i cannot even search for any file that has e.g. a txt behind the ponit, or *.doc files, or a jpg. It will only find it if you put your files in the "own documents" folder, but even there it will sometimes not find it. WTF ?

Next i shut off the indexing function in a vain attempt to let it have to manually search the harddisk and maybe find something THAT way even if it takes longer. Guess what, without indexing the search fuction does not work at all. NOT AT ALL. So you enable the indexing services again but now you are having this thing going up and down your harddisk all the time rattlerattlerattle but without ever finding anything. This is an utter effrontery do you hear this MickeySoft ?

I know there are meanwhile free proggies you can install that will find everything for you, but to not have this in an Operating system as a basic function ?

Let alone all this other stuff, what the hell did the developers think when they made that ? I have now more than 4 Gb but not a search function ?

I swear the very second they bring out sims for Apple or Linux they can stuff their "Windows" where the sun don't shine ! Maybe it's time to let PC sims die, if you have to run them on new MS systems. Windows ultimate BS version. Gawwwwd.

Yes i could go on and on lol



Edit: Small addition:

i have followed the discussion on the broken search function since roughly two months, when i installed Win 7 ultimate for the first time. It is not only the search function:

1. Search function does not work properly, and cannot be rectified.
2. User policy rights are screwed up and do not work properly. Changes you made in the policy editor do not work later, or for users that have not been included. Administrators are sometimes locked out; really sucks in networks.
3. The copying process took years when Win7 came out, they have improved it a bit, but copying still is much slower than in XP, or Vista.

But what really ticks me off is that some Mickeysoft administrators who well know what is wrong, "help" you with links where the issue is discussed and said to have been removed, but those internal tricks do not really work, and may sometimes even screw up your whole system. If someone insists that the links did not help the problem, it is either ignored or locked.

Greetings,
Catfish

Regarding the Search function in Win 7, this may help you search a little better when it comes to file types:

Go to Computer, click Tools at the top - then click Folder Options. Click the Search tab, click Always search file names and contents. Under the How to search area below that make sure everything is selected.

I agree Argon, I too don't seem to have the issues some of the other posters here have with Win7, and suspect it probably just stems from overall unfamiliartity with a new Operating System.

Like everything else, there's a learning curve.

I think some of you are missing the point...it isn't that I'm not smart enough to figure all this crap out...(I have, thank you)

The point is that I am having to spend *my* time having to figure it out - while using something that was supposed to make me MORE PRODUCTIVE.

A Seach function that requires me telling it to "Always find the sh*t that any normal human being will be looking for"? Well, that's certainly a productivity booster...

This is NOT my lack of familiarity. It is a list of complaints - shared by many, many others - not that "It's hard", but that "This makes no damn sense". It is about LACK OF INTUITIVE design. There's nothing intuitive about these new features.

As I explained: The people who take so easily to all this are the ones who never were good at properly organizing (hence their fondness of the serach), and all the pretty stuff that covers up what is becoming a bigger and more bloated, less organized, piece of sh*t with each version.

So I bought another 4G and a Win7/64 OEM. It's installing right now. I do hope that the installation process is not indicative of expected performance. After boot from the DVD there was something like 10 minutes during which I had nothing at all except a background image and a mouse pointer, and no indication of any processing. After searching on the net from this other computer for this problem, I heard the DVD drive spin up again, so obviously there was some progress. Select language and such, and another 5 minutes wait with another image "Starting up installation" (no other indication of any work being done.) From there it was just very slow...
_
/Bjorn

Maybe something going on with your hardware (drive/controller setup, etc. or just drivers for the drive controller) Probably best for now to just let it do what it wants to, then (barring some unforeseen catastrophe) watch performance after the installation. Probably not a good idea, IMO, to form much of an opinion just based on the installation. If something's wrong, you'll know soon enough. I don't think anyone would fault Win7 for it's overall performance compared to XP.

On that subject, I want to clarify my earlier comments - since it seems there's always someone who wants to take things out of context or contort what I've said (even though it's right there, in writing):

Going to a 64-bit system is worth it, overall, to gain access to the extra memory vs. a 32-bit system. Since, among Windows versions (only), the other 64-bit choices are not viable by comparison, that pretty much dictates you'll be going from XP/32 to Win7/64. That's the way most people - by a huge margin - have gone; many having skipped Vista altogether (for obvious reasons), and few having ever ventured into the early implementations of 64-bit OS (XP/64). XP/64, unfortunately, did (and will always) suffer from being among the earliest implementations - which carries with it the distinction of spotty driver support, and poor support overall. Win7 by comparison, is getting a lot of attention and user base, and will therefore become a lot more "polished" as time goes on.

Still, I think it's accurate to say that MOST people knowledgeable in computers who started using Win7 have done so to 'convert' to a 64-bit platform, and of those, they're willing to TOLERATE the obvious flaws just because of the memory gain.

Here's one way to measure this: How many Win7 32-bit users are there? I don't know, truthfully - but I'll by God bet it's not many. Why? Because few will be so willing to accept the 'funny business' in the new interface WITHOUT the benefit of extra memory access. I'd go a step further and say that the MAJORITY of those Win7/32-bit users are people who have no clue about memory, 64 v 32-bit systems, or much else to do with computers, really. They are simply picking Windows 7 because it's new, pretty, and different - and/or because it ships by default on whatever new computer they're buying.

And, let me say this again: MOST of the people who used some version of Windows OTHER THAN VISTA prior to using Win7 are NOT PLEASED with the interface. A couple of guys in here saying "It's all fine" proves nothing - go out and look on the "real" Internet (outside the mass of rose-colored bias that SimHQ seems to harbor) and study up - you'll see.

All that being said, bjorn, I think you'll find that - once again, OVERALL - your choice to go to Win7 was the best choice. I just prefer to be honest with myself and others about the entire picture; that is, calling a flaw a flaw.

I'll agree, I don't like much of the way W7 does things. I never use libraries - I put things in directories, where I want them. The show-desktop button is in a silly place - but since alt+tab gives you the option to go directly to the desktop, I tend to use that. Either that or the view-flip button on my mouse, from where I can just click on the desktop.

That said - there's more to W7 than just the x64 version and the (greatly improved) driver support that's now available for it. The way W7 handles memory - whether 2Gb or 8 - is greatly different to XP, and things run a lot smoother for it. Likewise, the way it handles errors is an improvement and a single application locking up is no longer likely to bring the whole machine crashing over, as was often the case in 98SE and XP. Superfetch is greatly improved over XP's prefetch, and you should find that with a reasonable amount of RAM, the programs you use daily should have greatly reduced loading times once the system's learnt what you use and when.

Bits of the interface are definitely a bit more unwieldy - but XP had elements of that with the "<YOURNAME>'s Documents" being a link rather than an actual folder. It was possible (after changing a user's name, or copying a MyDocs folder over to a new PC) to end up with an entirely illogical storage structure there. That said - I don't find it a problem because I simply ignore it; storing my files in exactly the same way I always used to. The Libraries end up only ever pointing at my files, in the places I want them - because that's where I put 'em.

Windows user since 1992 - I've used 3.10/3.11, 95, 98, 98SE, XP, MCE, NT3, NT4, 2000, Server2003, Server2008, CE3-5 inclusive, Vista and 7... and I know that 7's flaws are minor in comparison with the advantages over every previous version, whether that be x86 or x64.

Getting there - slowly. Now ROF is downloading 711 updates. Glad I have a reasonably fast connection.

Thanks but this was one of my very first tries, and it does not work.

It is really easy, create a new folder, name it games, shinizzle, whatever.
Save an e.g. self-made txt file there, maybe shinizzle.txt.
Close said folder.
Now type txt in "search" (.txt or *.txt does not work anymore) and be "overwhelmed" what Win 7 finds for you. Then try shinizzle or even shinizzle.txt, and look again.

You can likewise turn the indexing system and connected services completely off to force windows to search every directory manually even if it takes longer, but guess what - now it does not work at all, it does not find a file even in the "my documents" folder anymore. It does not even start to search, it just instantly tells you there is no file with that name and that's it.

This is not all i tried, there are several places where you have to teach Win 7 what it should do, not a central one that controls the others - so changing one setting in the setup probably does not do the trick when there are other places where you can change the same thing - which have, unfortunately, no connection to the central setup and will produce astounding results at variying places and programs.
You can read all this and some feeble tries to suppress the obvious in the 'net but it seems MS really screwed it up. If someone finds a real working solution without changing registry settings or downloading an external search program i would really like to see it. Up to then i refuse to praise the emperor's new clothes.

An advantage of Win 7 is that the crash handling is much better now during working, however also here there are some difficulties with the energy-saving or standby mode, ending in a blue screen. "Beat me, hurt me, make me suffer. I like it very much."

Greetings,
Catfish