Microsoft’s Windows 7 Still Bloated

Microsoft could remove a lot of bloat, as well as headaches for the users by abandoning the registry.

You’ve obviously never tried to run Vista (or now Windows 7) on old hardware before. The specs say one thing, but a few months ago I ran a slightly stripped down (vLite) version of Vista on a computer w/ AMD 700MHz processor, 384MB RAM, a slow old 20GB hard drive and some very old video card. It not only ran, the performance was decent for small tasks like browsing the internet. Windows 7 supposedly runs faster, so I wonder how it would run on that system. Check YouTube for videos similar to what I did, you will find even less powerful hardware running it fine.

From what I have seen, Windows 7 integrates 3D imaging in the desktop environment like never before. Also required for this is anti-aliasing and anisotropic filtering. Mac OS is not 3D (nor is it likely to be) and so does not require heavy duty math processing. Yes, basically, it is eye candy, but since I am using my eyes as a integral component to my computing, I’d say it’s worth it.

You obviously have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.

Not only is this post approaching zero information content, but it’s claim - that (i) Win 7 is bloated, and (ii) you can tell this bloat from suggested system specs - is quite frankly absurd.

How can anyone be excited by an announcement, after 2 years, to fix the weaknesses in a product that was launched two years late? Microsoft’s Windows 7 is more of the same, and that’s not going to drive sales. Read more at http://www.ThePhoenixPrinciple.com

Hello,

During the beta test cycle for Microsoft Windows Vista, I installed one of the later builds on an IBM ThinkPad T23 (Intel Pentium III 1GHz, 1GB PC-133 SDRAM, 8MB(?) SVGA and a 40GB HDD). The Aero Glass interface was disabled, but it did work for basic tasks like browsing the web.

Microsoft Windows 7 is just at its first beta release, so it clearly has a way to go before it is released. It is likely that performance characteristics will change between the build available now and the released build. Who knows? Perhaps it will perform well on your Apple MacBooks now and even better with the production version.

I’m not sure why the size of 16GB for the operating system is an issue. Today, new notebooks typically ship with 250GB hard disk drives, and 500GB-750GB hard disk drives are the norm for desktop computers. As it is, 500GB notebook hard disk drives go for around $150 and 1TB desktop hard disk drive for around $100, so it should not be a big deal to replace your computer’s hard disk drive. I swapped out the 80GB SATA HDD in my ThinkPad T61p notebook computer and replaced it with a 500GB model in about three minutes just using a small screwdriver.

One thing to keep in mind is that Windows Vista (and presumably Windows 7) provides application compatibility modes for programs back to Windows 95. If Apple were to provide backwards OS compatibility, that would be the equivalent of going back to Mac OS 7.5, I believe. Windows Vista also comes with programs like Movie Maker and DVD Maker. I do not use either, so I don’t know how well they perform or how much space they occupy, but they come for free with the operating system.

Perhaps the best choice for you would be to wait until Microsoft Windows 7 comes out, then buy a computer which meets or exceeds the recommended system requirements, that way you won’t have a bad experience with it by using it on older hardware.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

You’re failing to consider one important fact: Windows ans OS X are entirely different operating systems. There’s different things going on behind the scenes. And to be perfectly honest, there’s a heck of a lot more going on behind the scenes with Windows than with OS X.

Let’s start with legacy: Windows literally supports applications dating back to Windows 95 days. OS X can’t say the same. OS X’s APIs and libraries are dwarfed by the sheer amount available to developers in Windows. Hardware support in OS X can’t even be compared to the amount of hardware support in Windows. Windows ships with far more services than OS X.

What am I saying? I’m saying that they’re different operating systems intended for different purposes and, at times, different audiences. Apples and oranges, they can’t be compared.

That being said, the hardware requirements for Windows 7 shouldn’t even be an issue. While they may be “more” than OS X, they’re certainly ridiculously underpowered for 2009. The machine I bought in 2003 could support Windows 7. The majority of people aren’t running machines that old as their primary. And the people who still are? They probably don’t need or want Windows 7.

So please, give it up already. There’s plenty of other places to attack Windows (and trust me, from my evaluation of Windows 7 so far, there are quite a few). This isn’t one of them. Move along.

- Adam

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Nice quality blog post, very usefull information. thanks

I think all you winpc fanboys are making excuses. There is no reason for a OS to use 16gb od HD space unless its BLOATED. I do care that i have to replace my 2 year old laptop to run win7. And you talk about backward compatibility? Thats why Windows is so bad. The registry and having to support way back years ago. Apple made the switch. MS should too. Instead of just piling all this stuff on top of it each release. There will be many versions again as always. The hardware specs are a major issue. My aunt cant afford a new laptop to run win7. Neither can I. Excuse me Adam R but my machine is a little over a year old and cant run it due to GPU requirements. How dare you say they dont want or need it. You friend DO NOT have a clue. Your a fanboy. It is not Apples and oranges because they are both desktops OS’s. now your making excuses to why we shouldnt complain about having to buy a new hard drive. You say we cant complain about it taking 16gb of space my hard earned cash paid for. You buddy, are such a fanboy your blind.

Your PC will run fine under Windows 7. 64MB video card doesn’t mean shit. It means no aero. It might even run aero actually, since aero isn’t even intensive (despite what people say).

You can go under those specs. Windows 7 runs fine on netbooks.

Emeek, you idiot, windows 7 is actually 9 gigs, but you can’t do anything with 9 gigs and windows 7. SEcondly, I have not had any compatibility issues or registry issues (not that I care if there was :\). It really doesn’t bog down you’re system enough to complain enough. Also, windows 7 on 128MB of vram:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTr0iePloAk

If you want to pose any more arguments, please do so, I’m actually enjoying this

I can’t seer my hard drive after installing windows 7! It’s the beta version and currently I installed on a 500 gig sata!

Any advice on how to see my hard drive?

It was there when I had the format option!

Looks like the Windows Fanboys are in denial over this one. Windows is still bloated I can make a nice Linux installation with a truckload of extras and I’ll still not clear 5 GiB with Linux and its software (My /home is another story, but the size of MP3s and movies is not up to an operating system, it’s up to standards and encoders. )

The sad truth is that the CORE of an operating system shouldn’t clear a gig. I use Arch Linux: It’s base install is roughly 430 MiB. Installing a GUI and sound only boosts it (For me) to about 700 MiB, the bulk of which is X.org and drivers.

But Windows has an inexcusable problem: Bloat. And not just Windows, compared to any operating system, Windows’ software, whether made by Microsoft or not, is forced to be much bigger then their counterparts. I did a build of a program I’m working on on both Linux and Windows. On Linux the program was barely 3 KiB. On Windows it was over 10 times as big with little change to the code (The enforced and frankly stupid WIndows API and breakaway from standards you are forced to make to get any programs to work with Windows.)

Windows vista is bloated. Home Basic with no extras is 12 GiB…. twelve GiB!!!

And now Microsoft is trying to pass Windows 7 off as “streamlined?” Compared to what? Vista? Bacause comparing it to any other operating system OUTSIDE the Windows line shows that Windows is still a bloated mess: Linux installs average from 300 MiB to 3 GiB. OS X 3 GiB to 5.

Windows 7 is claiming to be 9 GiB without extras? Sorry, Windows sufferers, that’s not streamlining, that’s called “making Windows only slightly less bloated.”

Until you can install a MODERN Windows thatactually compared in size to Linux or Mac OS X, Windows will always be bloated.

And don’t give me the 3D deskop crap, because I can easily name a LESS hardware-intensive and MUCH LES bloated compositor that puts Vista’s 5 visual FX to shame: Compiz Fusion, for Linux, which can run comfortably in 512 MiB (Some reports say even 256 MiB) of RAM with has over 96 visual effects.

Don’t give me the “it’s bloated because of features” bullshit, because Linux has way more features than Windows and doesn’t take nearly as much RAM or hard disk space as Windows.

You people are missing the point; Mac OS X should be tiny in comparison to Windows. Mac OS X need only run on a small range of hardware and so it does not need to include many drivers. Windows, on the other hand, will run on anything with a x86 processor and so needs a lot more drivers to work out of the box because it is compatible with much more.

As for Linux being smaller, that’s quite interesting. I would have thought that the DLL system should shrink the size of applications due to code being relocated from the application to shared files in the System32 folder.

Think about only one piece. A pc that runs farcry well is insufficient to run a plain vista / win 7 os only. Thats bloat, perfect and powerful.
On netbooks win 7 shows a bit more than 2.x at ms power index, enough to run a plain os without aero and less for proper office applications.