Try Before You Buy

Want to try the next generation Windows operating system? Afraid you might get frustrated as most were with the "forced" upgrade to Windows Vista?

Is it really worth your hard-earned bucks or are you better off with whatever you are currently using?

The good news is you can try Windows 7 for 90 days FREE before buying it. You can download the whole Windows 7 trial from the Microsoft website.

The fastest way to download Windows 7 is through BitTorrent protocol, using a BitTorrent compatible client (e.g.: uTorrent, Vuse, BitComet). The ISO image of Windows 7 64-bit is about 3GB while the 32-bit version is about 2.3GB. We are only interested in the 64-bit version of Windows 7 because the 32-bit edition does not offer anything greater than what Windows XP can do. So we will go straight with the 64-bit version which can make use of more memory than any 32-bit version of Windows can.

Untouched ISO Image
What we need is an "untouched" ISO image of Windows 7. Untouched means it was not modified in any way because there are many leaked versions of Windows 7 out there in the BitTorrent communities. Those leaked versions are often pre-activated and at times have malwares within them. Or, even if they do not have any embedded malwares, they are sometimes activated in a wrong way. And we do not want that either, do we?

The untouched ISO image of Windows 7 is one that came originally from the MSDN website. This ISO image is the exact image of the disc you burn to a DVD±R. It is the same exact disc that you can get from any retail store (except that you did not get it from a store).

It is crucial that you check for the authenticity of the ISO image that you have downloaded. The ISO file should be bit-for-bit the same as the one provided by MSDN. This ensures that there are no alterations and no corruptions while downloading the file.

Torrent File
The torrent file for the ISO image can be downloaded here (mirror1 / mirror2 / mirror3). This torrent file is about 16KB. Do not confuse the torrent file for the ISO image. The torrent file is simply the container for the ISO file. You load up the torrent file using your BitTorrent client, and your BitTorrent client will be the one downloading the 3GB ISO image file. Depending on your ISP provider, it might take you hours or even days for your download to complete.

Integrity Check
After the download is completed, you may want to check the integrity of the ISO image file. To do that, you will need an MD5 hash checker. You can either use HashTab or HashCheck. Or any other hash checker you want.

The ISO image file should have an MD5/SHA-1 hash of:
  MD5: F43D22E4FB07BF617D573ACD8785C028
  SHA-1: 326327CC2FF9F05379F5058C41BE6BC5E004BAA7

The file name is not that important. But the extension name should be .iso.

If everything else is checked, that is, the hash checksum of the ISO file you have downloaded is the same as stated above, then we are ready to burn your ISO image as an image disc.

Contributed by: Emil Baseleres

Moving to Windows 7

Why Windows 7 Again?
Because it is new! But new does not necessarily means better. It depends - depends on different hardware configurations and COSTS.

If your PC has less than 4GB of RAM, I would not recommend you to upgrade to Windows 7... yet. No, don’t be silly.

I saw a guy once in Bohol, when I was in IDEA Philippines, who had installed Windows 7 on his office PC having only 1GB of RAM. What the heck? I guess he wanted something new, which he probably thinks it is better than Windows XP. I wanted to explain to him the advantages and disadvantages between Windows XP and 7 in the simplest clear-cut way.

However, the problem is... I don’t speak Boholano – the native dialect in Bohol. Worse is I don’t know how to do sign language either. (sigh) Yes, he is deaf. "Que sera, sera".

Thought I must admit, somehow I was amazed, because Windows 7 actually ran fine on that office PC. But is somewhat slower that its previously installed Windows XP.

To simplify your choice of whether to upgrade to Windows 7 or not, I came out with a very simple equation:


If any of the 3 variables is false, then you should stick with Windows XP. If your PC is already running Vista, but has less than 4GB RAM, then you should upgrade downgrade your Vista to Windows XP. If your PC is already running a Windows 7 32-bit version, then you should downgrade to Windows XP also. You only have two choices here: either Windows XP or Windows 7 64-bit.

Everything Else is a Moot Point
If your PC is already running Vista 32-bit, or Windows 7 32-bit, then you might as well go back to Windows XP; because Windows XP is a lesser resource hog and can run your programs faster than any 32-bit OS.

Windows 7	Home	Professional	Ultimate
Retail Upgrade	$119	$199	$219
in Peso	≈P5,000	≈P9,000	≈P10,000

Official Windows 7 Editions Pricing
We live in a third world country. There are alternative ways of getting Windows 7 to your PC without spending P10,000 in cold cash... legally (wink).

Contributed by: Emil Baseleres

Hacking Windows 7

For whatever justification or religion that you may have; this post might be considered "illegal". So we will tackle this subject as "for educational purposes only".

Why Windows 7?
Windows 7 is the successor to Windows Vista. It was released to the public just two years after the substantial criticism release of Windows Vista. Windows 7 is exactly the same as Windows Vista, but without the bloated features and with the newly tweaked user interface.

On the same hardware configuration, Windows XP still outperforms both Windows 7 and Windows Vista. This is the main reason why I do not recommend Windows 7 to most of the people. However, if we compare your ubiquitous 32-bit Windows XP to the new 64-bit version of Windows 7, the tables are clearly pointing out in favor of Windows 7. I did a small benchmark of WinRAR both in Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 using the same machine.

	Windows XP (32-bit)	Windows Vista (32-bit)	Windows 7 (64-bit)
WinRAR 3.91	719 KB/s	647 KB/s	743 KB/s
Difference	0 %	–10 %	+3.3 %

As you can see from the table, Windows 7 64-bit version is about 3% faster than the ubiquitous Windows XP. That gained speed is enough for me to permanently switch my preferred OS to Windows 7.

I got my laptop about a year ago with Windows Vista 32-bit pre-installed. It has 4GB RAM. After a few days (less than a week), I reformatted it with Windows XP because I wanted to see if Vista was really worth it. It wasn’t. My Vista 32-bit doesn’t have the full access to my 4GB RAM. The same plague that exist with all Windows 32-bit OSes. So for months, I kept using Windows XP instead of that pre-installed Vista; until I tried Windows 7 64-bit lately. I didn’t bother with the 32-bit version of Windows 7, because Windows 7 32-bit is almost the same as Windows Vista 32-bit. I am more interested with the raw unexploited power of my 64-bit CPU.

After setting up Windows 7 64-bit on my laptop, my whole 4GB RAM are clearly being utilized. My GPU is properly being used by the Aero user interface. My RAM is always full because of the SuperFetch technology. My 64-bit capable CPU is properly utilized. Windows 7 64-bit has completed my laptop, a marriage made in heaven by Microsoft.

Contributed by: Emil Baseleres