I've heard great things about 7 from early users - it's too bad Microsoft doesn't get it out in time for the back-to-school administrators, teachers and students . But I guess that gives people an incentive to fork over more money twice in a year.

Um, as opposed to the way mac users think ("A new OS? I've got to stand in line and get it today, because I can't live without its new features, unknown problems be damned!"), most PC users don't care.

Then again, if MS announced it was releasing it in June, you would be railing against them about rushing it out just to meet a schedule, rather than waiting until it is done.

And Apple doesn't rush any product out to meet the schedule of schools and such, so what's the difference?

Yeah, after convincing several large corporate environment to use Vista, MS wants Window 7 to replace it. Spending millions and millions on Vista rollout already, these guys are not about to jump into Window 7. Those who held back are still loving XP Pro.

How is this 'rheeming'? Are you saying that MS should not be releasing any new OS for another 5 years because corporations don't want to upgrade, or they just upgraded? And the fact that many are still running XP shows you that MS didn't ream Vista down their throats.

And is Apple any better? Maybe you didn't notice, but PCs you buy today can still run Windows XP or 2000. You can't buy a Mac today that could run Tiger, let alone Leopard or before. No matter if your corporation had standardized on Tiger.

Next move for MS is to make sure Sharepoint, .NET, .ASPX and ActiveX disables certain existing function on XP, and will only work for Windows 7. Then the corporate world will have to upgrade to Windows 7. Smart plan.

Exactly how would they do this? Are they hacking into corporate networks and deleting certain DLLs from their networks? Or are you saying that the corporations have no problem upgrading all their other system and network software to the latest and greatest, but the client OS, no, they insist on leaving that at XP or something.

Oh, and as we all say here, corporate IT depts are so lazy they have no desire to move to any OS they don't know, so they prefer to just leave everything at XP because its just easier for them.

I don't think most people and that includes people that use Macs "jump" to new versions of an OS. For businesses is it a big expense and most private people are happy as long as things just work. It really is the geeks that obsess about Win 7 and Mac OS X 10.6. Sorry to pop the bubble guys but that's how the real world is.

It's interesting to see all of the attitudes regarding XP, Vista and 7. There's quite the camp out there that still believes that XP is wonderful in every imaginable way, ignoring its crippling limitations, tendency to corrupt itself with time, its ineffective security, its general lethargy even on modern hardware and its reliance upon ancient legacy code for many of its core functions.

Some of the 7 detractors are on its case because it's functionally Vista R2, or alternately because it will be rushed and therefore plagued with issues.

The reality of the matter is that right now Vista is a more capable, more modern, more secure, more stable, faster, more pleasant OS than XP is. Its disadvantage is that it doesn't run well on budget PCs built in 2006, due to its flashy graphics, and it had questionable driver support upon release. Well, now that it's the middle of 2009, none of its real drawbacks are relevant anymore with modern hardware, and its capabilities shine in comparison to crusty old XP.

And then there's the Mac zealots, who conveniently forget about the growing pains of OS X 10.0, 10.1 and 10.2, which had plenty of issues and were nowhere near as nice as what we're used to more recently. Yup, OS X was nifty (just like Vista had its perks) but STUNK right upon release. Poor hardware support, poor software support, permissions issues, kernel panics, high resource demands and general unreliability all plagued the early releases, for years.

OS revamps are a b****, and given all of the hurdles required, Vista seems to be doing remarkably okay after a pair of service packs. It was the great XP stagnation that led to Apple's leap ahead in OS quality, not steps backward in Vista. And now, while it may seem like Apple has shot too far ahead to catch, Vista/7/Whatever'sNext have an opportunity to rapidly gain ground, just like how Apple suffered during the OS 8/9 stagnation and re-emerged once OS X matured.

And for the folks that wish that Apple could have taken advantage of Vista's weakness to penetrate the corporate world, while they made some nice inroads, they lacked the multi-pronged approach necessary to secure a foothold. The problem is that Microsoft's server platforms have been unusually solid and useful, with Exchange being the centerpiece. Apple has not yet delivered desktop software that is capable of interacting with Exchange properly, leaving Entourage as the sole usable Exchange client (in spite of its many faults), and Apple has not provided a mail/contacts/tasks/calendaring system that can rival Exchange. 10.5 Server, in spite of its obscene number of new features, failed to deliver in many of the most critical areas, particularly ease and potency of user management, software/update deployment, and, most critically, calendaring.

In the meanwhile, MS' entrenched server platforms have continued to work perfectly with MS' entrenched desktop operating systems and MS' entrenched office productivity suites, which all three boast more features, more flexibility and more support from third parties. Apple may make some inroads by delivering a much lower cost product, but there are certain features that the enterprise world just isn't willing to sacrifice to save a buck. Maybe 10.6 Server and enhanced Exchange compatibility of 10.6's desktop apps will make more inroads, but we'll have to see how well Apple delivers.

As a weird note: Apple is gaining plenty of ground in enterprise smart phones, due to having delivered some very effective Exchange support, simplicity and stability of service. By not requiring a separate problem-ridden and expensive server to provide connectivity the way Blackberries do and by not forcing users to suffer through Windows Mobile, the iPhone has managed to secure a very powerful position: an ActiveSync mail/calendar/contacts client that's actually easy to use, and actually works very nicely as a phone. Meanwhile, iCal server doesn't work at all with it. Go figure.

Go away. Logic and insight have no place here!

It is also interesting that XP has somehow gone from 'visually ugly and candy-like' to now 'appealing' (although I don't know why, to me Vista looks a ton better than XP's).

And what is really interesting is how most people on these boards who slam Vista or Windows 7 wouldn't be caught dead running any version of Windows. So why they care is beyond anyone's guess.

Actually the RC is extremely solid. I've been running it since release.

There may be a few issues with device drives and some obscure application compatibility (when does that NOT happen with an OS update) but largely the product is going to be a rock solid release vs. Vista's release.

I think that people at this point who are claiming disaster have not really used the operating system.