Windows 7

It’s a shame we can't just upgrade between builds...

Taylor Campbell4 said:It’s such a shame they don't allow upgrades between builds...

That’s the biggest tragedy of all... honestly.🤷

Chris Fox65 said:I can't speak for what you've got, but my "RC" build (7100) doesn't expire until March 2010... and as for that other question, I guess you'll just have to wait until the official version actually drops to know for sure. As for cracks? I haven't the slightest clue, though I don't really care to find out since this RC version lasts me through March 2010, and by then, I'll most likely be using the retail version—maybe even buying it, who knows? But if I don't, I'm sure there will be billions of cracked versions floating around anyway.

PS, just hit the Start button and type "winver" into the search bar... a little window should pop up telling you exactly when the expiration date is.

Could you maybe explain a bit more clearly how to check how long an RC version lasts? What do you mean by winver...

Just hit the Start button and find the "Search programs and files" box. Type in "winver" (no quotes needed!) and smash 🙂

Nathan Gray4 said:So, you just hit the Start button, find that "Search programs and files" box, type in "winver" (don't bother with the quotes, obviously), and then just smash 🙂

Fair enough, I get that, but what I was actually wondering is if there's some way to see when the activation period actually runs out.

Is Windows 7 hitting RTM by the end of next month?????
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=1021

Yeah, I think I’ve heard that one before... seems like that’s how it goes, I guess...

That's just wild xD

I have a question that might be a bit complicated, but I’d really love an answer from someone who knows their way around a system (though please, don't feel pressured to reply immediately if you're busy...). I didn't want to start a whole new thread since this covers Windows 7 and a few other things, so here goes:

Up until now, I've been running Windows XP, and I always made it a point to keep my documents—My Documents, including photos, videos, app installers, and so on—on the D: drive. I started doing this years ago after hearing an expert during a seminar suggest it was much better practice, so I won't bore you with the backstory. My process was simple: just right-click My Documents, go to properties, change the folder location from C: to D:, and the entire My Documents folder would migrate to the D: partition.

Now I'm wondering how this works in Windows 7. Since we have these Libraries now, does that change anything? I'm a little worried it might make navigating my folders more confusing than it used to be.

I'd love to hear from the more advanced users here—how do you handle this on your own PC? Do you follow the same setup I use, or do you do things differently?

I know most people have a D: drive for extra data, but I haven't seen many people actually moving their My Documents folder over there; it seems like most people just manually copy files to the D: drive, which feels inefficient to me. I want my documents, videos, photos, and everything else to automatically land on D:. I'd like to do the same for "Downloads" too. I'm currently trying to figure out the best way to set this up in Windows 7, given that the default folder structure isn't quite the same as it was in XP...

Hmm, looks like I’ll need to spend some time this week moving those five main folders—My Videos, My Documents, My Music, My Pictures, and Downloads—from my C: drive over to the D: drive. Back when I was using Windows XP, I only ever had to worry about messing with My Documents.

Now, my next step is probably going to be using a partition manager to shrink the C: partition; if my files aren't living there anymore, there's really no reason to keep it sitting at 250 GB. The built-in Disk Management tool in Windows 7 just won't let me shrink the C: drive, though. I tried using Partition Magic—or whatever it's called—but it wouldn't work for me. I think I saw some mentions online about specific programs designed to shrink system partitions on Windows Vista... so I'll try to track one of those down and see what happens.

Taylor Campbell4 said:Hmm, looks like I’ll have to spend some time this week going through those five main folders—you know, My Videos, My Documents, My Music, My Pictures, and Downloads—to move their file locations from the C: drive over to the D: drive. Back when I was running Windows XP, I think I only ever had to bother doing that with My Documents.

I guess what I'm really thinking about now is whether I should just use some kind of partition manager to shrink down my C: drive, because if all my files aren't sitting there, there's really no reason for it to be hogging 250 GB. The built-in tool in Windows 7 won't let me shrink the C: partition, though. I tried using Partition Magic or whatever it's called, but it just isn't working for me. I think I saw something online about specific programs designed to shrink system partitions on Windows Vista... so I might try to track one of those down and see if they actually work.

Exactly. It's the same deal on Vista; you have to move each individual folder one by one.

Man, you definitely don't need 250GB just for the C: drive, and if you're looking to resize things, you can actually do that through Computer Management. You just hit Start, right-click on My Computer, go into Manage, then select Disk Management, and then you can right-click the C: partition and select Shrink Volume.
If you haven't spent much time messing around with partitions before, I'd honestly suggest you don't go poking around too much on your own; maybe ask someone who knows what they're doing first.
For actual partitioning work, Acronis Disk Director Suite is pretty solid, and it's what I usually rely on for stuff like this.

I know I don't actually need 250 GB allocated to my C: drive, but the system won't let me shrink it any lower than—to be exact—244.1 GB. It keeps telling me there isn't enough available space to perform the shrink. Apparently, it can't shrink past the location of certain unmovable files. I’m going to try running a defrag, though I have a feeling I’ve already attempted that without much luck. If that fails, I'll probably just give Acronis a shot.

In my experience, there isn't much deep philosophy behind working with partitions—I've looked into this quite a bit over the years—but I do know you can still mess everything up if you happen to have a run of bad luck...

BTW, I'm not sure if I've missed something here... take a look at this screenshot http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/1953/capturefpa.jpg

So, I have two drives here: one is a primary drive (it's new to this PC), and the other is an 80 GB drive that was the primary on my old computer.
The way this is displayed is throwing me off a little. For instance, E: shows up as Healthy, Active, Primary Partition, while C: and D: are also listed as primary partitions—meaning I have three primary partitions total. But is E: acting like a logical drive?
I'm not sure if this points to some kind of error in my settings?

I’m honestly not sure if you’re just looking at some weird glitch in your settings or what. That partition isn't even that massive, so if I were you, I'd probably just move all your data over to another drive, wipe that partition clean with a fresh format, and then we can see what actually happens. Looking at my own setup here, I don't even have any partitions that look anything like yours.

Sam Perez22 said:I'm not sure if it's just some weird setting error. That partition isn't exactly huge—maybe try moving the files off to another drive, reformatting that partition, and then you'll see what happens. Looking at my own setup, I don't have any partitions like that.

Honestly, I'm a bit lost on your response. I can't tell if you actually caught what I was asking, nor am I quite sure what you mean about not having those kinds of partitions...

PS: I'm not planning on formatting anything right now since I need all my data intact—everything with the drives seems fine for the moment, so there's really no reason to go through the hassle of formatting.

Here’s a little sneak peek at what Windows 8 will look like

http://windows8center.com/

Timothy Taylor42 said:Here is a sneak peek at what Windows 8 is going to look like.

http://windows8center.com/

It looks really sharp, though I think there’s definitely going to be a bit of a learning curve to get used to it.

How much RAM does Windows 7 actually pull?

Paul Morgan74 said:How much RAM does Windows 7 actually eat up?

Well, I guess it really just depends on which version of 7 you’re planning to run... if you're sticking with the 32-bit version, you'll probably see it taking anywhere from 1 to 3GB, but since I'm running the 64-bit version myself, you're looking at a minimum of 3GB, though honestly, if you want things to actually run smooth, I'd definitely suggest having at least 4GB to play with...

LOOOOOOOOL
Come on, man, stop spreading misinformation.
I mean, 1GB is basically the bare minimum in both scenarios—but if you're looking at 1.5 to 2GB, that's more than enough for Windows 7.

Well, I finally made the jump to Windows 7, which means I can finally ditch those annoying transformation packs once and for all. 🙄
Now, I’m running into a bit of a dilemma: does anyone know how to bump up the font size in Mozilla? It feels like this entire forum is crammed onto a single page because everything is so tiny. On that note, what kind of resolution are you all running? I’ve got a 20-inch monitor set to the recommended 1680 X 1050, but honestly, everything looks microscopic on this screen. 😠