Windows 7 to get thumbs up, but netbook sellers say thumbs down

Jane Ryan
Tuesday, 30 June 2009 14:58

Business IT - Technology

Paul Pritsis from Another World Computers in Melbourne says that while the idea is a good one, until netbooks are upgraded, he won’t recommend the new operating system to users.

“If netbooks ran dual core processors I’d say yeah, go for it, but they are under powered,” Pritsis said.

“I think that a lot of people will go back to XP if they want performance.”

There are those who disagree with this outlook, ITPro.co saying that while the specs on Windows 7 are similar to Vista, the new program runs better on netbooks than earlier versions.

“In our own tests, we found that Windows 7 ran well on netbooks,” a spokesperson for the retailer said.

While the compatibility of the new program with netbooks has been argued both ways, Microsoft demonstrated at a conference last year that Windows 7 has been designed with a focus on light weight computers. Those who attended were granted a peek at a 1GB netbook running Windows 7 apparently with little or no trouble.

The cost and technical difficulties encountered in producing a USB option for netbook users have also been raised by industry professionals: while a DVD costs cents, a USB drive large enough to accommodate an operating system costs dollars. And that’s before the potentially arduous task of writing the software to each unit has been undertaken.

Hewlett Packard (HP) spokesman Brad Swiney said in a statement today that Windows 7 Upgrade Option would not be available in thumb drive format in Australia when the new system is publicly released on October 22.

“As part of the Windows Upgrade Option Program, Windows 7 Upgrade is only available on DVD,” he said.

“A DVD drive is a requirement for installation of the Windows 7 Upgrade media but the DVD drive itself can be internal or external.”

HP’s comments did not rule out future changes or plans for the non-upgrade version of this operating system.