Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s chief executive, was characteristically upbeat at the launch of Windows 7, the new version of its operating software in New York today. Mr Ballmer had good reason since Windows 7 (whether or not is numbered correctly) looks like a good product.
Microsoft has had enough of being pilloried by Apple for the complexity and unreliability of Windows. The software not only appears to be more reliable and much easier to use than previous versions but it does things like setting up a home network and streaming video across it with impressive ease.
The most notable absentee at this morning’s launch, however, was the netbook. When Mr Ballmer unveiled the array of computers from Microsoft’s partners running Windows 7, none of them that I could see were netbooks, the cheap and popular portable machines about which I have written.
Indeed, Mr Ballmer went out of his way to claim that many people were dissatisfied with the slow graphics performance of netbooks. Instead, he showed off some small laptops that had faster chips and superior graphics cards from manufacturers including Lenovo and Hewlett-Packard.
It was yet another heavy-handed attempt by the Wintel industry to wean customers off netbooks, which are so cheap – and thus offer such low margins – that companies like Dell seem to be making them only under protest. Michael Dell recently made scathing remarks about the category.
Microsoft is only allowing netbook manufacturers to install the hobbled Starter edition of Windows 7, thus depriving users of some of the most attractive and time-saving aspects of Windows 7 – in particular the improved desktop navigation.
The truth, however, is that full-strength Windows 7 runs perfectly fine on netbooks. I have this on authority from a senior Microsoft engineer who told me he had installed Windows 7 Ultimate on his netbook with no problem whatsoever.
This encouraged me to defy Mr Ballmer’s advice today and buy an Asus netbook, which comes with Windows 7 Starter edition. Despite the heckling from the industry against customers who dare to like an inconvenient product, that should do me fine.
I do, however, have one advantage. Microsoft handed out a copy of Windows 7 Ultimate (in fact, Windows 7 Ultimate Signature Edition with Mr Ballmer’s inscribed on it) to journalists at the event. So I plan to upgrade my netbook with it and will let you know how it goes.
Those who want to upgrade their netbooks from Starter to Home Premium and did not get invited to today’s event will have to pay $80 for the licence in the US.
