I'll try it out when I buy another HD..

I wouldn't be surprised, they did this exact thing back with Vista before it was released.

I've got it installed on another partition. So far, it's fantastic. IE8 is pretty nice.

I love the new taskbar. Its preview and switching features are better than anything I've ever seen. It basically takes the OS X dock and s***s all over it.

Installed it (Without burning a disc) and so far my only complaint is that it's not detecting my speakers and/or sound card.

Edit: And I just noticed the IE icon on the task bar apparently displays your DL progress by shading over the back square with green. Neat.

Thanks. I know what I'm doing to a point, and as long as I won't lose any files by doing so I should manage.

I'm installing a dual boot on my laptop now. Hopefully it won't blow anything up. I'm interested to see how well it'll run considering my laptop is fairly old.

Benchmarks of the beta show it outperforming Vista and XP.

I can't get it to work when I mount the image it says that it cannot load the DLL, and when I boot from CD it tells me that it cannot find install.wim or win after I choose to install it.

The new Paint, new Calculator (showing programmer mode), and the file history extension of the start menu. It's not just file history though, it can be used for other things, like common tasks (like create new <whatever>).

Paint has several new features. It has a few simple vector shapes, which can even be resized after being placed on the canvas. There are new brushes, including crayon, pencil, market and oil paint. The paint actually runs out as you drag the brush along. It's like Painter, only crappier.

Bah a side effect of dual-booting with XP is I can't access many of my XP documents because of permissions issues.

I'm also trying to figure out a way to be able to use most of my apps without having to reinstall a duplicate copy for 7. Most of them seem to run fine (albeit fresh, since obviously it's not using the old XP registry), like Firefox, but some just don't run or are buggy and I might have to reinstall a duplicate =/

If I don't buy another HD,what's the best way to partition a drive that I'm currently using, so I don't have to nuke my whole XP installation when this expires? Can I do it from setup without screwing anything up?

You have to partition a HDD before you install windows on it

Maybe with windows setup, but not with other software.

No I'm saying you already installed windows, cutting it into partitions is probably too late

You can manage your disks and partitions in Windows Management console

I don't remember what XP can do, but Vista can shrink and extend partitions. See if you can shrink one of your partitions and create a new partition in that space. Then you can run the Windows installer, from within XP, and install to that partition.

I don't see any options for shrinking partitions...guess I'll pick up another HD.

You can just make a GParted Live boot disk if you want to repartition a drive without formatting it (but backup anyways). I just did that this morning. (Google for it)

Btw this is tremendously stupid but I did it anyways so might as well warn other people --

If you're doing the dual-booting thing and find that you can't access your My Documents folder or whatnot from your 7 installation, DO NOT force access by taking ownership of the folder unless you want access STRIPPED FORCEFULLY from your primary (old) Windows installation thus forcing you to once again take ownership when running on that installation and causing a WAR of the OSs <_<

It let me access it after a UAC prompt.

It let me access only after a UAC prompt to confirm that I wanted to take ownership / if I didn't take ownership, I wouldn't be able to access it at all =/

Edit: Also, my sound in XP seems to have mysteriously died for no reason. My hardware isn't busted because sound works in 7. This doesn't make any sense because I didn't even touch my XP partition and sound worked until I restarted to complete the 7 installation. Wut.

Will it be worth to switch from XP to this when it comes out?

I want DX10, so I'll probably end up switching to something..likely this, if I like the beta.

Gotta find another HD...or do a serious backup/etc and free up one of my drives entirely.

JLee I was adventurous (read: stupid/lazy) and shrunk my XP partition without backing up <_< and all went well. But yeah.

I wonder...would it be possible that Vista sound card drivers would make my sound work in 7?

There is a way to import your profile to remove this problem, I just don't know how it works on Windows 7, just that it would be stupid for it to nto be there because Vista has this option.

I decided to try Win7 on a spare pc, I'm also having problems getting the onboard audio to work.

I'm really not that impressed. The new taskbar will take some getting used too. It's tough for me to make a performance comparison since this spare PC doesnt have the horsepower my main computer does. It looks and acts pretty much identical to Vista. Some might disagree but I think a fair analogy would be: Win98 -> Win98SE :: Vista -> Windows 7. I feel if XP users go flocking to Windows 7 its merely to spite Vista, not because Windows 7 really represents anything they want in an OS.

I get this when I put the DVD in-- just wanted to see if it would work. I'm not sure I trust booting into setup with data that I want to keep on the HD! Maybe I can clean house and slim down to free up a drive..but with over 300Gb on there, it'll take a while.

My sound actually works in 7, but not in XP anymore

I've started the backup process...trying to free up an entire drive. We'll see how that works. USB 2.0 isn't fast enough.

...why would customers give up what they like and pay money for another product that they don't want just to "spite" a product they don't have or want?

Woo, BSoDs galore.

At least networking is working now.

Though my USB drives aren't A reboot should fix that. Again.

Stupid question...my XP installation is on D: drive- can I install Windows 7 on C, and still have a dual boot option?

Logically they shouldnt, but they will. It's basic Marketing 101, How to sell snow to an Eskimo.

El oh el wow.

So after installing 7 on a dual boot, my XP sound stopped working as mentioned earlier. I went back into XP, reinstalled all the relevant drivers, no dice. Did a few System Restores, no dice. Researched via google and found people mentioning that my laptop model had problems with sound randomly dying. No fixes, though. This would sort of make sense, except sound works perfectly for me in 7. Okay, dead end.

Then I found some reports of people dual booting XP and Vista (with XP installed first) and then the sound in XP (but not Vista) randomly dropping afterwards. I thought, hrmf, maybe the same thing happened with the 7 install. This made more sense. Looked around for another four hours for fixes or patches or whatnot, still no dice. Blah.

On a whim I decide to boot off a flash drive to see if sound would work in Ubuntu. It does. Hrrrfm, I think grumpily. I boot back into XP, ready to tinker some more, and then suddenly, the sound starts working. Wut.

I'm now afraid to boot into 7 again for fear of breaking the sound again. I'm probably going to forget tomorrow and do it anyways, but seriously, wut.

Maybe I should disconnect my XP drive before I install 7.

Just to be safe.

Vista drivers worked for my X-Fi. Of course, I had to run the installer in Vista compatibility mode before it would even install. I'm betting Creative will support 7 about as well as Vista, that being very poorly.

Well, it installed fine..but when I reboot, it doesn't give me an option to boot into 7. I have two XP options (always have, oddly enough)..but nothing for Windows 7. Maybe I should try the 2nd XP listed?

Can someone explain/confirm for me real quick what the new "Libraries" that seem to have replaced User Documents are? They claim to be a way to organize files "without moving them from their original locations ..." so basically, a folder of symbolic links to files everywhere?

You can add multiple locations to a single library and it'll merge the visible contents. I have four TV folders on four different drives, yet my TV library shows them all as one folder.