Finally got a new compute and (of course ) it had W7. Yes, I'm probably the last person on earth to make the change. And no, I don't want an IOS machine.

I was perfectly happy with XP, but I wanted more processor ( i5). I imagine that XP can't take advantage the extra cores.

But, some complaints - maybe somebody here can help me out.

1. Fooling around and tried to make a text file on the C drive -- can't get there. It says to contact the admin -- I AM THE ADMIN -- at least the account says so(!). I even used a command window -- nope. Maybe there's a security deal I don't know about.

2. What did they do to Explorer ? (Win Explorer not IE). Took a perfectly useful interface and made a mess. I know it's supposed to look more like IE, but I don't know why. It seems much harder to use, and it has all kinds of extra garbage.

3. Why can't I get a detail view in control panel?

4. In general, I hate the way MS keeps glittering up the interface. I do have a book that talks about turning off some of the 'aero' features. I'll be doing that.

I like stick shifts too -- go figure


hj

 

It does take some getting used to - it's a completely different beast from XP.

Which flavor of 7 do you have? Some versions have limitations or restrictions that other versions don't have (for example: "Home" vs "Ultimate")

Try shutting the User Access Control (UAC) off - that will save you a lot of grief.

The closest thing I've found to a detail view in the Control Panel is to set it to "Small Icons"

If you think 7 is nasty, you should see what MS is doing with Windows 8. That's one I don't think I will ever touch...

 

HJ your not alone..

I am still running XP and hate Win 7

I agree with everything you posted and can add about 100 more.. Don't get me started..LOL

1. What do you mean about creating a TXT file on the C Drive?? Are you in Wordpad or notepad and trying to save it to C drive???
Windows & does have extra security that screws up many simple functions that XP allowed..

2. I agree the old windows explorer was much better.. The new one just plain sucks..

3. In control panel just change to category view on the upper right.. It is the best you can do in Win 7

4. I agree MS is just putting out to much visual crap and took away some functionality..
Everything in Win 7 takes 1 or 2 steps more than it did in XP..

5. By the way I drive a manual tranny..LOL

6. Did I mention Windows 7 SUCKS!!!!!

 

I was able to set mine to "classic view"...Turned all that aero crap off ..

 

i have a laptop that has win7 pro in it. it is sitting in the bag with a dead battery. i tried for over a month to figure it out, then finally gave up. there is absolutely nothing wrong with XP.

just because you think your new operating systems poop don't stink, there are 500,000 people out there that will assure you that it does indeed reek!! .

 

download this
Classic Shell: Features

IT will help

I got win 7 at work and HATE HATE HATE it.

I cant stand the "transparent" windows

my other problem is my vision sucks, So I use a large monitor with a low res (20" 1074) BUT win7 doesnt like this spec on my monitor AT ALL. (In fact I only had 4 resolution options) A different monitor sorta fixed that, but its not great.

Also still cant get used to the search.

I guess it will grow on me, or maybe its cause I've been using xp since it came out.

 

Thanks for all of the replies.

I've heard about turning off the UAC from a few sources now. Downside is that it opens the door for sneaky downloads. Might experiment with that.

I've also heard that you can set the appearance to Win 2000 -- have to check that out. I know that you can turn a lot of that 'aero' crap off.

DJ -- I was just trying to make a text file for the sake of doing it. I tried notepad and I even tried opening a command box and using that to copy it.
No go. Although I was fooling around with batch files -- so maybe I was saving it as that. In any event, it doesn't seem to like plain files on C:. It wants you to use a folder.

What's next - traction control ?

hj

 

One more XP Pro user hatin' on the Win 7!!

Did get a few ideas here though---the Classic View thing I might need to look into.

What I don't like is every CD I rip or video download goes to those infernal "libraries" which seem to have inaccessible (to me) controls or naming features I have with XP.

My IT buddy swears by every damned new bit to come out, has it the same day and of course its the latest, greatest and I simply MUST install it too! He's quite dismayed I don't find Win7 as exciting as he does---or course I don't have 30 years experience in these machines either!

 

I'd just like to get the $$$ these clowns get for scre*ing perfectly good programs; it's not limited to OS's....

Take a great program, foul it up beyond use, put a pink bow on it, get paid major $$$$'s.... I would like to have a "chat" with them.

 

You are correct..

Software people don't subscribe to the theory.." If it ain't broke don't fix it"..

They just try and make things pretty to get people to buy it..

Reminds me of the scene from Tommy Boy when he says I can take a crap in the box and mark it guaranteed..LOL

Tommy Boy Guarantee - YouTube

 

Anybody who knows me knows I'm not a fan of Micro$oft and, if I didn't run so much stuff that required Windows, I'd probably be running a Linux box now. However, I'm going to play devil's advocate here.

There actually was a very good reason for MS to drop XP. While XP was a huge improvement over the 95/98/ME versions, it was still based on an old and outdated NT kernel. Is it still useable? Sure it is, BUT, just as is the case with every version of Windows that has ever been released, XP was, very much, "broken" - particularly when it came to security.

Windows XP had a large number of security issues that, while the average home user probably either didn't notice them or weren't too overly concerned about them, in a corporate environment, those issues can be HUGE. Microsoft kept releasing patch after patch after patch to try and address these issues, but there were too many and, each time a "hole" was patched, another one would pop up to be exploited by hackers, malware authors, etc.

Also, with the advances being made with both hardware and software technologies, XP simply couldn't keep up.

Rather than continuing to beat the dead horse that was XP, Microsoft decided to address all these issues in a whole new, updated operating system. What they came up with was the cluster**** known as Vista. Learning from their mistakes with Vista, Microsoft eventually came up with Windows 7. The premise behind this was to build a stronger, more robust, and much more secure OS than XP was. Yes, there were some cosmetic changes to go along with that but, nothing that can't be overcome.

I HATED Vista, but I like Win 7. It took some getting used to at first, but after becoming familiar with it, I see absolutely no reason to go back to XP. I've found 7 to be faster, more secure, and has superior crash-recovery capabilities over XP. 64-bit processing is superior in 7. Yes, the Aero theme does eat up system resources, but most home users who aren't gamers aren't affected by it.

My biggest issue with Microsoft and Windows 7 is the price tag attached to it. They blame the price hike on software piracy, but that's a big steaming load of BS if ever I heard any - I'm thinking it wouldn't be pirated so much if it didn't cost $120-$220 per license...

The way things are looking, 7 may be the last version of Windows I'll run. From what I see of Windows 8, I don't like it - and I can see it quickly getting dumped into the same "fail" group with ME and Vista unless Micro$oft pulls their heads out of their butts.

 

speaking of 7
I`m not nearly as savvy as most but I have a question that maybe can be answered here. When I pull up pictures in the libraries section is there a way to show a preview of pictures rather than showing icons that have to be clicked on to show whats in there? Hope this makes sense. Thanks

 

In the top-right, there's a dropdown labeled "Change your view" - set that to "Extra large icons".

 

Thanks Terry
Is there a way to replace the generic landscape icon with a picture of whats actually in it? I hate having to click on each icon just to see whats in it.

 

You should be seeing the pictures instead of the icons. It displays the pictures as "thumbnails".

Try this:

Up in the upper-left corner, you should see "Organize" - click on that. Go to "Folder and search options" and in that window, click on the "View" tab. You'll see a box with a list of things with checkboxes next to them - the top one, under "Files and Folders" should say "Always show icons, never thumbnails" - make sure that box is unchecked - then click on "Apply" or "OK".