November 2nd, 2009

Clean install with Windows 7 upgrade media? Get the facts!

Posted by Ed Bott @ 10:13 am

Categories: Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Tags: License Agreement, License, PC, Clean Install, Microsoft Windows XP, Media, Microsoft Windows Vista, Windows 7 License Agreement, Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Windows 7

Last week I complained about Microsoft’s shoddy documentation of how its upgrade procedures are supposed to work. I’m delighted to report that I got a tremendous and immediate response from within Microsoft, offering assistance in my testing and also promising to clean up and expand their documentation. I spent most of the weekend working on a table that I’ll publish later this week. I’m also testing various upgrade scenarios to see which ones work and which require a workaround.

Meanwhile, an argument that should have died ages ago has reared its head again. If you purchase a discounted upgrade edition of Windows 7, can you use it to perform a clean installation of the operating system on a PC that doesn’t currently have Windows installed?

The answer is really simple. If you qualify for an upgrade license, then yes, you can use any number of workarounds to install the operating system legally. If you don’t qualify for an upgrade license, then those same workarounds might technically succeed, but your license is not valid. Will you get away with it? Probably. But if you’re running a business, you run the risk that an employee will turn you in to the Business Software Alliance, which could lead to an audit, civil charges, and eventually some stiff penalties.

Let me see if I can help uncomplicate things.

The overwhelming majority of PCs are sold with Windows preinstalled by an Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM). The rules are in the license agreement that you see when you first turn on that PC. You can find any license agreement for Windows (retail or OEM) at the Microsoft Software License Terms page. If you read the retail and OEM license agreements, you will see that there is absolutely no requirement to install the software in a specific way. Here, for example, are the details from the OEM license agreement for Windows Vista Home Basic/Home Premium/Ultimate. I have used bold type to emphasize key terms.

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August 18th, 2009

XP, Vista, or Windows 7: Which OS is more secure?

Posted by Ed Bott @ 9:01 pm

Categories: Security, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Tags: Operating System, Patch Management, Microsoft Windows Vista, Critical, Security Bulletin MS09-032, Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Windows Vista (Longhorn), Microsoft Windows 7, Microsoft Windows XP, Operating Systems

Over the past couple years, I’ve been regularly checking in to measure whether Windows Vista is living up to its promise of being more secure than its predecessor, Windows XP. (To catch up with previous installments, see October 2007, “One year later, Vista really is more secure,” and July 2008, “21 months later, Vista is still more secure than XP.”)

My metric is a simple but effective one: count the number of Microsoft Security Bulletins rated Critical or Important for different Windows versions over time. In both previous installments, Vista had a significant edge edge over XP, with far fewer updates required. Has Vista maintained its security advantage over the past year? And are there any indications as to how Windows 7 will fare, now that it’s been released to manufacturing?

The answer to both questions is yes.

It’s far too early to make definitive judgments about the relative security of Windows 7, but Microsoft’s shiny new OS had a banner first month. A total of eight Microsoft security bulletins were aimed at various Windows versions. Three of them were rated Critical for both Windows XP and Windows Vista, even with the most recent service packs. Another two security updates were rated Important for Windows XP and Moderate for Windows Vista.

But for all eight of the August 2009 security updates, Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 were listed under the Non-Affected Software heading. Not a single one of those security holes required patching in the new OS.

That’s the same pattern that Windows Vista established when it was new. And Vista has maintained its safer-than-thou reputation in the past year. I went through every single security bulletin Microsoft published for the past 12 months, from September 2008 through August 2009. The totals?

Windows XP: 22 Critical, 16 Important

Windows Vista: 18 Critical, 11 Important

That’s a 24% reduction in the number of patches rated Critical or Important—the kind that typically involve remote code execution or escalation of privileges. Or, to put it another way, that’s 3.2 patches per month for XP and 2.4 patches for Vista. (And the next time someone complains about the number of patches they have to install for Windows, be sure to show them that number: 2.4 patches per month, delivered automatically on the first Tuesday of each month, isn’t exactly overwhelming.)

So what’s the difference? Security Bulletin MS09-032 is typical:

This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability that is currently being exploited. The vulnerability in Microsoft Video ActiveX Control could allow remote code execution if a user views a specially crafted Web page with Internet Explorer, instantiating the ActiveX control. This ActiveX control was never intended to be instantiated in Internet Explorer. … 

This security update is rated Critical for all supported editions of Windows XP….

That vulnerability doesn’t exist in Windows Vista or in Windows 7. And both of those newer operating systems have an additional advantage. As the bulletin notes: “Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights.” That, of course, is the whole point of the user model that was dissed so thoroughly in Windows Vista. But it seems to be working.

August 17th, 2009

Windows 7 customers still paying for Microsoft's Ultimate mistakes

Posted by Ed Bott @ 9:27 am

Categories: Licensing, Windows 7, Windows Vista

Tags: Microsoft Windows Vista, Microsoft Corp., Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate, Microsoft Windows 7, Microsoft Windows Vista (Longhorn), Microsoft Windows, Operating Systems, Software, Ed Bott

Three years ago, when Microsoft was in the final stages of getting Windows Vista ready for its launch, I looked at the official price tag for Vista Ultimate edition and concluded:

“Yes, Microsoft really is price-gouging…. anyone who’s eyeing Vista Ultimate has every right to feel like they’re being ripped off.”

And even when Microsoft slashed Windows Vista prices last year, I still found them “higher than any sane person would pay.” That was especially true for Ultimate edition, which was your only choice if you wanted certain combinations of features, like Media Center and Complete PC Backup.

Now, as Windows 7 approaches its official launch date, will Vista Ultimate users get another gouging? Or is Microsoft getting ready to unveil another “special deal”?

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June 15th, 2009

Microsoft fumbles the digital TV transition

Posted by Ed Bott @ 8:40 am

Categories: Digital media, Media Center, Windows 7, Windows Vista

Tags: Media Center PC, Microsoft Windows 7, Microsoft Corp., TV, Digital Television, Service Alert, Media Center PCs, Microsoft Windows, Personal Technology, Home Entertainment

Microsoft’s Media Center program is nearly seven years old, and the version included with Windows 7 will be its fifth major revision. It’s one of the most polished features in the entire Windows family, especially in its support for multiple TV tuners: analog, basic cable, over-the-air digital (ATSC), satellite (in Europe and Japan), and CableCARD (in the United States).

With all that experience, you’d think that Microsoft would have sailed through the long-awaited transition to all-digital over-the-air TV broadcasts in the United States this past Friday. Instead, the company failed, in dramatic fashion.

It’s not like it caught the company by surprise. A Service Alert has been visible on the home menu page for Windows Vista Media Center users for the past two weeks or so:

Clicking through the multiple explanation screens produced a series of clear-sounding messages about what to expect in Media Center, depending on the type of tuners you were using. According to this screen, for anyone using an ATSC tuner there was “no additional action needed.”

That advice was wrong. Microsoft apparently forgot to plan for one of the side effects of the transition, in which some broadcasters changed broadcast channel numbers along with the switch.

I first noticed that something had gone wrong on Sunday, when I saw that a couple of shows on CBS and ABC had failed to record on Friday and Saturday, complaining that no signal was available. When I tried to tune in the channels manually, I got an error message instead of the programming I expected.

In postings over the weekend at The Green Button, the Microsoft-owned (but independently operated) community forums, I found other users complaining of the same issues. Media Center MVP Chris Lanier also noted the problem this morning.

There are workarounds for Windows Vista and Windows 7 that involve editing an XML file (in Windows Vista) and adding DTV channels manually (in Windows 7). Neither of the workarounds have worked for me.

If you’re a Media Center user, has this issue affected you? Leave a comment in the Talkback section below. I’ll be following up with Microsoft to see if I can understand what happened and when to expect a fix. If I hear from enough users, I’ll put together a more detailed follow-up post.

Update: A vigorous discussion at The Green Button here along with some possible workarounds.

A pair (so far) of cryptic updates from Microsoft here. The most recent was posted by chrisboedy around 21 hours ago [typos and punctuation errors in original]:

All, our services are all running as expected, however there was an issue which is causing the new data feed with some of the updated frequencies not to process through. We are currently working to resolve this and I’ll provide additional updates as I have them. I don’t expect this will be difficult for us to resolve, however the at that point, it’s just time waiting for the data to propagate to the front end servers for you all.

Expectation should be however that this will take ~24 hours to complete processing.

Additional input from GeekTonic and Ben Drawbaugh at EngadgetHD.

June 5th, 2009

Will the Windows 7 price be right?

Posted by Ed Bott @ 11:29 am

Categories: Licensing, Windows 7, Windows Vista

Tags: Best Buy Co. Inc., Microsoft Windows 7, Microsoft Windows Vista, Microsoft Corp., Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Windows Vista (Longhorn), Operating Systems, Software, Ed Bott

[Updated 12:20PM PDT with Microsoft comment.]

Engadget says they’ve unearthed a confidential memo from Best Buy that gives away some pricing information for Windows 7.

According to the memo, Best Buy will kick off its Technology Guarantee program on June 26. Beginning on that date, you’ll be able to buy a PC with Windows Vista Home Premium, Business, or Ultimate and get a coupon good for a free upgrade to Windows 7 when it’s released in October. That matches up with information I’ve heard as well and is consistent with how Microsoft has handled product launches in the past.

The other, more interesting detail is that Best Buy plans to pre-sell select versions of Windows 7 online, for a 16-day period that runs from June 26 through July 11. If the memo is accurate, you’ll be able to buy a Windows 7 Home Premium upgrade package for $49.99 and a Windows 7 Professional upgrade package for $99.99.

Several months ago, Microsoft’s General Manager for Windows, Mike Ybarra, told me that we we can expect “aggressive price points and some very good offers” when Windows 7 is released. This certainly qualifies on both standards. The comparable prices for Windows Vista are $129 and  $199, respectively, and the discounted prices at retailers like Newegg and Amazon typically knock only 10 bucks or so off the sticker. If Microsoft prices Windows 7 in line with Vista, the Best Buy deal represents a discount of 50% on Professional edition and more than 60% on Home Premium. Yeah, that’s aggressive.

Obviously, this limited-time promotion is lower than the average selling price that Windows 7 will command when it’s officially released. But I expect it’s only the first of many deals to come from Microsoft’s retail partners.

What else can we expect to see? Back in early 2007, Microsoft offered a so-called Family Discount for Windows Vista, which allowed anyone with a Vista Ultimate license to purchase two Home Premium upgrades for $49.99 each. I expect to see an improved version of the Family Discount this time around. If Microsoft wanted to aim directly at its archrival Apple, it could sell three Home Premium upgrade licenses (to be used only in a single home) for $199 or less.

Asked to comment on the contents of the Best Buy memo, a Microsoft spokesperson offered the following:

As announced earlier this week, we’re continuing to work with our retail and OEM partners to provide Windows 7 Upgrade Option programs and other offers to consumers interested in experiencing Windows 7, which will be publicly available on October 22nd. We’re excited to share additional details regarding these programs soon, but do not have additional details to announce at this time.

I’ve been told by other sources to expect additional details later this month and will pass them along when I receive them.

April 7th, 2009

There's nothing new about Windows downgrade rights

Posted by Ed Bott @ 10:21 am

Categories: Licensing, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Tags: Microsoft Windows XP Professional, Microsoft Windows Vista, Microsoft Corp., Section 14, Microsoft Windows, Operating Systems, Microsoft Windows XP, Software, Ed Bott

I’ve been laughing out loud for days now as I read the astonishing number of comments and reactions to the revelation that Microsoft is going to allow some customers who buy Windows 7 on a new PC to exercise “downgrade rights” and replace their shiny new OS with Windows XP. The implication is that this somehow represents a surrender on Microsoft’s part to the operating system that won’t die, Windows XP.

Sorry, folks, this isn’t news. It’s the way business versions of Windows have been licensed for as long as I can remember. Many businesses run on proprietary software that might or might not work with a new operating system, so business customers who buy a new PC with a Windows license can choose to replace the installed copy of Windows with an older version.

You can see the current version of this clause if you look at the OEM license for Windows Vista Business or Ultimate. Section 14 reads as follows:

14. DOWNGRADE. Instead of using the software, you may use one of the following earlier versions:

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional,
• Microsoft Windows Professional x64 Edition, or
• Microsoft Windows XP Tablet PC Edition.

This agreement applies to your use of the earlier versions. Neither the manufacturer or installer, nor Microsoft is obligated to supply earlier versions to you. You must obtain the earlier version separately. At any time, you may replace an earlier version with this version of the software.

Ah, I can hear you saying now, “But this is different! With Windows 7, Microsoft is going to give its customers the option to skip Vista and go all the way back to XP. That proves that Windows Vista sucks!”

Uh, OK. By that logic, XP sucks 50% more than Vista. If you bought Windows XP Professional on a new PC, your downgrade rights included the option to replace it with any of three previous Windows editions: Windows 2000 Professional, Windows NT Workstation version 4.0, or Windows 98 (Second Edition). Thank goodness we didn’t have blogs back in 2001, or they would have gone completely nuts over Section 1, paragraph 6 of the Windows XP Professional license terms:

Use of Previous Version Of Software. In lieu of installing and using Microsoft Windows XP Professional SOFTWARE, you may install, use, access, display and run ONE of the following versions: Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional, Microsoft Windows NT Workstation version 4.0 or Microsoft Windows 98 (Second Edition) (”Downgrade Software”) on the COMPUTER, provided (1) you agree that Downgrade Software support will NOT be provided hereunder by Manufacturer, MS or Microsoft Corporation, their affiliates or subsidiaries: (2) you agree that neither Manufacturer, MS nor Microsoft Corporation will provide you with the Downgrade Software or media; (3) you may not loan, rent, lease, lend or otherwise transfer the CD or back-up copy of Microsoft Windows XP Professional to another end user, except as otherwise provided in the transfer provisions of this EULA….

If you’re a corporate customer with a Windows Vista Business or Enterprise license acquired through a volume licensing program, you have the right to install just about any business edition of Windows. A Microsoft-issued downgrade rights chart (Word format) lists your options:

[C]ustomers licensed for use of Windows Vista Enterprise are licensed for Windows Vista Business, and it can be downgraded to the Windows XP Professional, Windows 2000 Professional, Windows NT® 4.0, Windows NT 3.51, Windows 98, or Windows 95 operating system. You would not, however, be able to downgrade to Windows Vista Home Basic or Windows Vista Home Premium, Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition, or Microsoft Windows Millennium as those are different products and not considered previous versions of Windows Vista Business.

The exact license terms for Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate have yet to be released, but when they are, yuo can expect to see wording that looks very much like the terms I listed above.

In other words, there’s nothing new here, folks.

February 6th, 2009

How well does Windows 7 handle 512MB?

Posted by Ed Bott @ 1:18 pm

Categories: Hardware, Windows 7, Windows Vista

Tags: Microsoft Windows 7, Microsoft Windows Vista, RAM, Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Windows Vista (Longhorn), Operating Systems, Software, Ed Bott

I’ve been spending most of my time lately conducting in-depth research into how Windows 7 works, in preparation for my next book. In the process, I’m discovering stuff that simply doesn’t become apparent to a casual tester. Case in point: Back in 2007, I looked at Windows Vista Home Basic and determined that it could run well on an older machine with limited resources, including 512MB of RAM. I never tried it with Vista Ultimate, nor would I have bothered. And since I don’t have that 2002-vintage test machine set up, I haven’t repeated those tests with Windows 7.

Earlier this week, I fired up a virtual machine running Windows XP SP3 so I could test upgrade scenarios with Windows 7. I couldn’t do a straight XP-to-Win7 upgrade, so I added a new virtual hard drive and installed Windows 7 in a dual-boot configuration. After making a few notes on how the setup process worked, I put the VM aside and went on to other work.

Windows 7 Ultimate x64 uses less memory than you might think

A few hours later, I went back to that new Windows 7 installation to look at a few details, and that’s when it struck me: This virtual machine was configured with a mere 512MB of RAM, and yet I hadn’t noticed any slowdowns during setup or in operation. Even more startling, I realized that I had inadvertently installed the 64-bit edition of Windows 7 Ultimate in this VM. But the most eye-opening moment came when I looked at Task Manager’s performance tab. I’ve pasted a screen grab of the memory gauge here.

The x64 edition of Windows 7 Ultimate running on just over 200MB of RAM? That was a pleasant surprise. I was also surprised to see that this clean install was using less than 9 GB of disk space in this VM. With my curiosity piqued, I configured a new VM using the same settings and did a clean install of Vista Ultimate, giving me a good baseline for comparing XP to its successors. Here are the stats for all three operating systems, with memory usage measured after all update operations had completed and the system had been idle for at least one hour:

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February 2nd, 2009

Vista gets a halo effect from Windows 7

Posted by Ed Bott @ 12:34 pm

Categories: Windows 7, Windows Vista

Tags: Ed Bott

Conventional wisdom says corporations have completely rejected Windows Vista. But I’m seeing evidence lately that Vista’s image is improving with age. A new report issued today by Benjamin Gray and his colleagues at Forrester Research confirms that Vista is getting a new lease on life in the enterprise.  Microsoft’s well-executed development of Windows 7 might be a big part of the reason.

Forrester surveyed 962 IT decision-makers at North American and European companies with more than 1000 seats (more than a quarter of the survey respondents represent organizations of 20,000 employees or more) and found that Vista is now installed on just under 10% of all PCs within enterprises. One-third of all respondents have already begun Vista deployments, and another 26% have plans to begin deploying Vista this year or next. Another 15% are going to skip Vista and go straight to Windows 7.

In other words, the supposedly despised Vista is about to do what its predecessors did and begin significant adoption after a few years of apparent snubbing. That’s what happened to XP, which had less than 10% total market share (corporate and consumer) after a year on the market and didn’t hit the 50% mark until four years into its lifecycle. Based on Forrester’s numbers, I would expect Vista to approach 50% share by the end of 2010, with IT pros watching Windows 7 to see whether its performance in the field justifies the great early reviews .

I remember reading surveys of IT pros about their intended adoption rates back in 2006 before Vista shipped. Most of those numbers predicted that Vista would be at least modest success for Microsoft. A year later, after Vista’s troubled launch and a tidal wave of bad publicity and devastating Apple ads, the numbers had swung to extreme pessimism.

And now, two years into Vista’s life, those opinions have swung back to a fairly normal adoption curve. Why? The number one reason is Service Pack 1, which made a big difference for Vista. The overwhelming consensus among reviewers was that it fixed a long list of bugs, including some deployment blockers, and improved performance noticeably. SP2 is just around the corner, and anyone who’s doing their own testing instead of believing what they read on Slashdot has had plenty of time to decide whether it’s a smooth stable update (it is).

Vista is part of the same family as Windows Server 2008 and Windows 7, both of which have earned almost universal rave reviews. Server 2008 is built on the same code base as Vista SP1, which adds credence to the idea that Vista wasn’t fatally flawed, only badly botched at launch.

Another factor in Vista’s favor is that the same management team that is doing so well with Windows 7 is also in charge of keeping Vista running. By hitting a steady series of public milestones with Windows 7, Windows boss Steven Sinofsky is restoring corporate confidence in Microsoft’s ability to ship software on a reliable schedule with predictable quality. That confidence makes it easier for IT pros to conclude that the early troubles with Vista were a temporary glitch and not a sign of things to come.

Ironically, deploying Vista SP2 is the most conservative option for Windows shops. XP is about to enter the extended support phase (on April 14, 2009). By contrast, Vista has more than three years left in mainstream support, which runs until at least April 10, 2012. The same instincts that make an IT pro conservative enough to stick with XP for more than seven years will also prevent him from adopting Windows 7 too quickly, no matter how glowing its reviews. Caution dictates waiting at least one year or one service pack, whichever comes later. All of which makes the currently supported, well-documented Vista SP2 the surprisingly safe choice.

December 1st, 2008

With Vista SP2, Microsoft is back on track

Posted by Ed Bott @ 5:05 pm

Categories: Microsoft, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Tags: Service Pack 2, Microsoft Windows Vista, Service Pack, Microsoft Corp., Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2, Microsoft Windows Vista (Longhorn), Microsoft Windows XP, Operating Systems, Software

Update 2-December: An alert reader points out that the original version of the graphics for this post used an incorrect date for the release of Windows Vista Service Pack 1. I have corrected the graphics to reflect the correct release date and interval between RTM and the estimated arrival of SP2.

From the other side of the world comes a report that Windows Vista Service Pack 2 will be released to manufacturing in April 2009, roughly a year 14 months after SP1. The Malaysian website TechARP has a pretty good track record with this sort of prediction, and my sources tell me that schedule sounds about right.

Meanwhile, here in the U.S.A., some people are inferring more Vista doom and gloom from this schedule. My buddy Dwight Silverman at the Houston Chronicle says “SP2 is being rushed out the door” to keep up Vista’s momentum. Eweek’s Channel Insider calls SP2 a “last-ditch attempt to drum up sales for [the] beleaguered [Vista] operating system.” The Register says “Microsoft seems to be in a hurry with this release.”

They all need to dust off their Windows history books to see that the reality is exactly the opposite. If Vista SP2 does make its official appearance in April, it will mark a return to normal development and release cycles for Microsoft, which lost its way badly with Windows XP.

I’ve got the proof, in easy-to-read chart format. Here’s a timeline of every Windows service pack Microsoft has delivered since the release of Windows NT 4.0 in July 1996. Each color-coded bar represents the number of days between each service pack and its predecessor (RTM, in the case of SP1 releases). See any patterns?

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November 6th, 2008

My favorite Windows Vista gadgets

Posted by Ed Bott @ 5:38 pm

Categories: Windows Vista

Tags: Microsoft Windows Vista, Gadget, Sidebar, ShareMaster Gadget, Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Windows Vista (Longhorn), Operating Systems, Servers, Software, Hardware

When I first began using Windows Vista, I dismissed the Sidebar as a gimmick. It didn’t help that the default gadgets Microsoft offered were of limited utility and that some early gadgets caused performance problems.

Over time, though, I’ve become a Sidebar convert. I haven’t encountered a performance problem with a Vista gadget since SP1 was released. More importantly, the selection of third-party gadgets has grown tremendously, and there are now plenty of good business-focused tools to choose from.

I thought about this the other day when Paul Thurrott mentioned his inability to find any gadgets that made the Sidebar worth using. I understand why he and a lot of other people think that, because Microsoft has done a pretty wretched job of surfacing any good gadgets. In fact, most people see the default collection that comes with Vista and, understandably, yawn.

That’s too bad, because if you know where to look there actually are some excellent gadgets. On my main desktop PC, equipped with two large monitors, I have plenty of room, so I keep the Sidebar permanently open. I have it docked on the left side of a 24-inch widescreen monitor, so that I can have access to the gadgets I use every day.

The clock is the only one of the default collection that I keep. The rest are all available from third-party developers. All of them work on Vista x86 and x64 editions, and I’ve tested most of them on the PDC build of Windows 7 as well. The full list (with download links) is available after the jump.

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