Installing the Windows 7 Beta
January 11th, 2009Here I am, typing this blog post with Windows Live Writer inside of Windows 7. I had installed the beta once before on my desktop, but it was a torrented copy, and it was installed on a spare hard drive. (Also it as 32-bit, when I want 64-bit.) I downloaded the beta from Microsoft, which included getting a key, and installed the beta today, overwriting my Vista installation.
From my previous installation of Windows 7, I discovered that the installer allows the user to start a “complete” install from within a current installation of Windows, unlike the Vista installer, which requires the user to boot from the install disk. I discovered from this installation that the user still needs to boot from the install disk if he wants to format the drive that the current installation of Windows is on.
Downloading the Windows 7 Beta
January 10th, 2009If you’re curious about Windows 7 beta, downloading has resumed after Microsoft added a few more servers to handle the extreme demand. As far as I can tell downloading resumed within the last 30 minutes. I jumped on the oportunity and am downloading the 64-bit English version now. After specifying those requirements I was brought to a very brief survey page, which asked such things as my name, email address, job, and current OS. After that I was brought to the following page, which was pretty straightforward. (I blocked out the product key, duh.)
Windows 7 Beta Availability
January 7th, 2009The Windows 7 pubic beta will be available on the 9th. The code that Microsoft will make available for download was actually built on December 12th of last year. Get more information about it here.
Hey, there’s stuff on windows7.com!