Windows 7 Beta 1 was released to developers at WinHEC 2008. 

Compatibility with Vista is a major focus.  Expect nearly all your drivers and software applications to be compatible with Windows 7 Beta 1 and future releases of the final Windows 7 product.

According to Jon DeVaan, senior VP of the Windows Core operating system started off by talking about the lessons learned through Windows Vista ,  “If something works on Vista, it should work on Windows 7.” He said over 95 percent of PCs have all the drivers they need for Vista today, and this will make it easier to transition to Windows 7

So far, game performance is way up and I’ve been able to run several top titles with no issues.  Frame rate is up and the game feels more smooth.

Business applications that I’ve tried run identically to Windows Vista.

A quick run through the performance testing indicates across the board performance increases.

Full Details on Windows 7 From Microsoft’s WinHEC Website

We won’t tell you where to download but you can check the usual torrent websites for a release featuring the 7000 series instead of the pre-beta 6000 series of beta version numbers.

We were able to find an verify a version by the name of:  7000.0.081212-1400_client_en-us_Ultimate-GB1CULFRE_EN_DVD

A curious side note is that a much larger percentage of people are arriving to our Windows 7 related articles from Apple Mac based computers that are running OSX.  What does that say about the state of customer satisfaction with Apples current operating system?  Your views on this requested in the comments.

Related posts:

1. Microsoft Windows 7 Beta - Game, Application and Utility Compatibility - What’s Stable & Works, What’s Doesn’t Work and What To Do About It! I thought it might help people if I shared a...
2. Windows 7 Beta Review - Already more stable than Vista SP2 Beta I’ve got two computers here running Windows 7 Beta.  They...
3. Vista SP2 Beta Audio & Network Problems - Warning To Potential Beta Testers Like most technology geeks I was excited to get my...

Like most technology geeks I was excited to get my hands on the Vista SP2 beta.  I was betting that this was finally the Vista that we’d all been waiting for.  The Vista that makes good on so many Microsoft promises.  I am now officially disappointed.

I followed the directions from lifehacker’s excellent website, downloaded the little batch file, ran it as administrator and added the super top secret registry entry that allows Windows Update to download an update my computer to Windows Vista SP2.

After a download of more than 200mb and an install that took about 30 minutes I rebooted into the world of Windows Vista SP2, the windows Microsoft should have shipped to begin with!

It’s faster, it’s better, it’s not complete yet……..but it’s close!

All my games run a lot faster and just everything is smoother, quicker and nicer…. except one thing.

The problem with Vista SP2 Beta right now is that on 4 of my 7 computers I installed it on, it broke the Windows Audio Service.

This is interesting because my computers contain a variety of sound chips/cards. The problem is not specific to any particular sound card hardware. It just crashes and asks if you want to restart Windows Audio Service. You answer ‘Yes’ and audio is happy again for about 10 minutes.

It also became confused when it saw two network adapters.  I found an installed one and would not allow me install or activate the second adapter.  Oddly, when I disable the on-board ethernet adapter, it does find and installs the PCI based second adapter.   In no case and through no amount of tweaking can I get that computer to access the internet or ping the DSL router.  After removing the secondary adapter, I placed it  in a Windows Vista SP1 machine.  It has zero problems in that machine.  It’s a networking bug in Windows Vista SP2 Beta.

Updates on all 4 computers affected to the audio drivers have had no effect.

Related posts:

1. Windows 7 Beta 1 Audio Driver Problems - BIOS Update and SoundMAX Audio Driver Update Fix After you install Windows 7 Beta 1, you may start...
2. Windows 7 Beta Review - Already more stable than Vista SP2 Beta I’ve got two computers here running Windows 7 Beta.  They...
3. RegClean - The Speed BOOST! Just Like a Fresh Install of Windows Vista - Scan Clean Repair Defragment Your Registry It really does clean the registry, defrag and compress the...