Last Look at W7

[Flasherly]

Had to give up the idea of my boot arbitrator over NT Loader. On the
same partition. By physically removing drives prior to the install,
it's possible to come back and boot into W7 from another non-M$/NTL
loader. Which I'm doing, having tried both my platter drives for the
fastest speed vantages when variously tied to the SSD W7's installed
upon.

Rebuilding the NT Boot Loader is another option, which is where it
gets it particular behavior quirks for stomping on other boot
arbitrators (not to exclude installing in conjunction, on top of
another OS, under the auspices of checking for any prior
installed/comparable M$ OS). Whatever. Pull your drives if you just
don't want IT happening.

Expect a boot-loader rebuild (apparently only off the W7 install DVD
"repair" facilities) will be enlightening, to say the least;-
Doubleplus good, though, if a binary streamed image of data to the W7
OS, proper, can be rewritten.

Hell of a gamer, that W7. Tried a couple of extant non-32 games left
around - Quake, Unreal, Forsaken. Never saw that sort of
compatibility, ease of use in XP. Soundboard, Xonar console, took a
little finagling, not much - interesting now, telephony (w/ a USB
microphone/console speakers) hasn't the need or degree of echo
delay/cancellation formerly required in XP.

Bit of a "heavyweight," although overall W7 appears solid, for the
most, considering expectations so far, transparently designed to
favorably inclined towards prior iterations of pre-NET/Framework code
for XP. Smart, of course. Nobody wants to shut down "the works" and
risk cutting their own throats;...save it ['ouch!,' says the old MS
CEO] for tablets and W8.1 incantations.

Yep. Think I'll keep W7 around for a desktop.

 

[Paul]

Had to give up the idea of my boot arbitrator over NT Loader. On the
same partition. By physically removing drives prior to the install,
it's possible to come back and boot into W7 from another non-M$/NTL
loader. Which I'm doing, having tried both my platter drives for the
fastest speed vantages when variously tied to the SSD W7's installed
upon.

Rebuilding the NT Boot Loader is another option, which is where it
gets it particular behavior quirks for stomping on other boot
arbitrators (not to exclude installing in conjunction, on top of
another OS, under the auspices of checking for any prior
installed/comparable M$ OS). Whatever. Pull your drives if you just
don't want IT happening.

Expect a boot-loader rebuild (apparently only off the W7 install DVD
"repair" facilities) will be enlightening, to say the least;-
Doubleplus good, though, if a binary streamed image of data to the W7
OS, proper, can be rewritten.

Hell of a gamer, that W7. Tried a couple of extant non-32 games left
around - Quake, Unreal, Forsaken. Never saw that sort of
compatibility, ease of use in XP. Soundboard, Xonar console, took a
little finagling, not much - interesting now, telephony (w/ a USB
microphone/console speakers) hasn't the need or degree of echo
delay/cancellation formerly required in XP.

Bit of a "heavyweight," although overall W7 appears solid, for the
most, considering expectations so far, transparently designed to
favorably inclined towards prior iterations of pre-NET/Framework code
for XP. Smart, of course. Nobody wants to shut down "the works" and
risk cutting their own throats;...save it ['ouch!,' says the old MS
CEO] for tablets and W8.1 incantations.

Yep. Think I'll keep W7 around for a desktop.

The 32 bit version is the one you want, if playing games.

The 32 bit OS runs 32 bit and 16 bit executables, while
the 64 bit OS runs 64 bit and 32 bit executables. If you
play nothing but really modern games, you can use the
64 bit OS. But older 16 bit content (some game installers
use a 16 bit installer), the 32 bit OS is good for those.

If you right-click an executable and select properties,
you can use the "Compatibility" menu to fake an older
operating environment.

When you install Windows 7 on a legacy system, it can
take over boot management needs, load its own MBR code,
put an entry in the boot screen and so on. If you then
delete Windows 7, you have to put back the legacy MBR.
Installing Windows 7 on its own disks, with all the
other disk drives disconnected, prevents such modifications
by the OS installer and means less cleanup work later.
Windows 7 will not meddle with your configuration,
once the installation process is finished.

Paul

 

[Flasherly]

The 32 bit version is the one you want, if playing games.

Nope. Last game I enjoyed was Descent - less accusatory for a
shooter than either Quake or Doom.

The 32 bit OS runs 32 bit and 16 bit executables, while
the 64 bit OS runs 64 bit and 32 bit executables. If you
play nothing but really modern games, you can use the
64 bit OS. But older 16 bit content (some game installers
use a 16 bit installer), the 32 bit OS is good for those.

Gee, that could be game in itself: Which 16-bit programs, you like,
that bit the dust. Best hold onto my main-squeeze XP. Hadn't really
fully or more directly considered 64-bit ramifications.

If you right-click an executable and select properties,
you can use the "Compatibility" menu to fake an older
operating environment.

I'll look Won't be anything like it was 10 or 15 years ago when first
installing XP, and shoehorning in all my old DOS and such favorites.

When you install Windows 7 on a legacy system, it can
take over boot management needs, load its own MBR code,
put an entry in the boot screen and so on. If you then
delete Windows 7, you have to put back the legacy MBR.
Installing Windows 7 on its own disks, with all the
other disk drives disconnected, prevents such modifications
by the OS installer and means less cleanup work later.

Wasn't all as much actually bad but discouraging;- I think no less a
contributing time factor of reading/steaming a DVD's abysmal thruputs
in today's high 3+ SATA/USB architecture.

Windows 7 will not meddle with your configuration,
once the installation process is finished.

It indeed well might, however deeply reading from a Microsoft
voluminous support base entails otherwise;- although, de facto, the
worst damage possible scenario is over after the install. I'd
imagine. I'd also add a satisfied note that the install went besides
smoother, faster in some residual once having physically removed my
plattered drives. Not quite divinely so, but much decidedly better.

I also might add, aside from an older 7-ish Ver., entirely DOS based,
on a HIRENs boot CD -- (if you haven't do check it out) -- Ultimate
Boot Cd V530 has a "mini" XP on it that ports well to an ISO image and
subsequent FlashStick Boot. Excellently deemed selected suites of
amply chosen programs included - in an essential sense, although
perhaps somewhat short for dated, even now, when judging a
counterpoint, (obviously, including commercial source simply isn't
feasible if at all workable in that environment), from a range of all
FreeWare "short and sweet," or standalone possibilities. Especially
new and potentially hazardous exposure to both a dedicated suite and
collection of programs from MBR and Partitioning Management;- geeky
almost fun UBCD stuff, except for some questionability about tossing
up a furball over destroying invaluable partitions. ...Accckkkk!!!

Anyway, the Hiren's CD is perhaps more essential than Ultimate Boot
]or anything similar on the USB port] showing, according to the BIOS,
for a primary boot device -- throwing off subsequently unprepared
direct programs assumptions, upon an invariability of system
dependencies, in fact that the first HDD will always be the HDD in
question of operands and manipulations.

 

[Flasherly]

shoehorning in all my old DOS and such favorites.

Seeing a $109 250G enterprise/server-grade SSD/Sandforce Cntrl.
Amazing reviews, though a smaller demographic sampling, a lot of
quality coming thru. Tempting, very, especially with Samsung
presently pushing $200 on a similar EVO.

 

[Flasherly]

Yep. Think I'll keep W7 around for a desktop.

Btw - got the W7 install DVD onto a bootable USB drive. Looks good
coming up, and can already see it's (much) faster than at DVD speeds
(hope for a full install closer to HDD trx rates - say, 5 minutes
would be suitably eyeball-popping).

Put it on my very best quad-channel Patriot Class 10 flashstick,
though. Not cool for my only one. Just wish I had another 10 of the
same, 32G and 16G sticks instead one 8G. That pendrive flies, has
chewed up serious data miles for me.

 

[Paul]

Btw - got the W7 install DVD onto a bootable USB drive. Looks good
coming up, and can already see it's (much) faster than at DVD speeds
(hope for a full install closer to HDD trx rates - say, 5 minutes
would be suitably eyeball-popping).

Put it on my very best quad-channel Patriot Class 10 flashstick,
though. Not cool for my only one. Just wish I had another 10 of the
same, 32G and 16G sticks instead one 8G. That pendrive flies, has
chewed up serious data miles for me.

Some of the Windows installers are decompressing
data files from their source. Using pendrive versus DVD
as a consequence, doesn't provide as much speedup as
you'd expect. It's because time is being wasted
on decompression.

If the Windows 7 DVD was uncompressed, it would
likely be in the 25GB range or so. You can determine
this with a little 7ZIP work, as to what sizes might
be involved. But I don't know how to coax the installer
DVD into using uncompressed prepared content. If you
could do that (only pay the price for decompression
when first preparing the USB flash drive), then the
install might then "fly" as it were.

Paul

 

[Flasherly]

Some of the Windows installers are decompressing
data files from their source. Using pendrive versus DVD
as a consequence, doesn't provide as much speedup as
you'd expect. It's because time is being wasted
on decompression.

If the Windows 7 DVD was uncompressed, it would
likely be in the 25GB range or so. You can determine
this with a little 7ZIP work, as to what sizes might
be involved. But I don't know how to coax the installer
DVD into using uncompressed prepared content. If you
could do that (only pay the price for decompression
when first preparing the USB flash drive), then the
install might then "fly" as it were.

Not really. But I wouldn't really have stressed as much a brief
mention, my ASUS is dirt dog slow. So, behooves me to switch and do a
top notch, quad-channel pendrive install.

Just finished, as matter of fact:

Starting past the W7 install menu, on to the drive/partition menu (I
selected then formatted the prior W7 installation). Clean drive.
Ready with those stop watches....

Four minutes until (all) the "media" portion of the install is
finished (copied isn't much, then the uncompression);- about another
four minutes, or so, for total completion to login, but that's all CPU
and storage dependent, as the pendrive isn't accessed further.

With the DVD I was running that would be in the neighborhood of 15
minutes.

Well!, I could have just slapped myself silly when first starting and
learning all this wonderful W7 stuff, over umpteen 15-minute installs,
MBR boot arbitrators, Win XP regurgitations, &etc. T'was sheer
horror.

But, I feel so much better now that I know it all. Even ordered
another 250G SSD to celebrate. Btw - just did my first Norton Ghost
of the W7 OS proper and it took/worked (also have the MS instruction
sets for rebuilding W7's NTFS Loader Partition, so that's next ...
sometime soon). Can't wait to get that new SSD to play two of them
against one other for binary sector backups!

Imagine what it must be like for those whom have the latest thunderous
multi-cores [to eat'm up compression &] to match a much better,
especially, SATA III architecture. This, my system, is the very
earliest (tho true) in a dualcore P4 for relatively low/infantile SATA
standards. The stories I've heard, such as SATA3 speeds so fast the
pendrives get near blistering hot. ...Maybe five times faster truputs
than my fastest quad-channel pendrive.

I'd expect a 1 minute Window 7 install from them. No more than two!

 

[Flasherly]

But I don't know how to coax the installer
DVD into using uncompressed prepared content. If you
could do that (only pay the price for decompression
when first preparing the USB flash drive), then the
install might then "fly" as it were.

I found one, multiboot flash drive arbitrator, that works*. First
tried YUMI - problems, although it does has a prepared/standardized
list of ISO installers (mostly *nix) for a rather good listing of
candidates to try.

*WinSetupFromUSB-1-4
freeware
WinSetupFromUSB is a Windows program, which prepares multiboot USB
flash or fixed disk to install any Windows versions since 2000/XP,
boot various Linux and *BSD flavors, as well as many Windows, Linux,
DOS based and other utilities. Since version 1.1 program can create
USB disk with Windows versions which support (U)EFI (Vista x64 SP1 and
later x64 versions), which USB disk can be used in both (U)EFI and
Legacy BIOS modes.

I've the W7 ISO installer - 2 vers of HIRENS, UBCD530, &
racy-5.5(*nix) - all on a 8G flash drive. Everything is ISO images,
of course, no problems, either, with W7 a FAT32 format (strange, I had
to store that ISO on a NTFS formatted drive) - although part of WSF
USB program is semi-involved with the initial physical USB: its, sic,
WSFUSB's format/MB bootload;- it's not a simpler just "copy the ISO
and boot" USB boot utility.

Totally kicks butt in a having already pulled all HDDs except the
intended target, say, for W7. If not "hot on the track" and coming in
on the "cold" to a fresh install, guaranteed, there will be something
worthwhile in those ISO utilities/OS helpful for correction a
situation. Sure beats having to reconnect drives and straighten up
boot orders, arbitrators, hidden/unhidden changes...run of the mill
crap which could wrong that does.

No confidence levels. Just keep on running it on new ISO's until the
flashdrive is full, whatever. It also had to go to MS for an
additional NT Loader (a standard network/IT item download). Nothing
it does prior is generally affected by subsequent additions - just
keep on piling up those menu items.