Some features may require advanced or additional hardware. Windows 7 was designed to work with today's multi-core processors. Commercial servers, workstations, and other high-end PCs may have more than one physical processor.
Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate allow for two physical processors, providing the best performance on these computers. Windows 7 More Support for Windows 7 ended on January 14, We recommend you move to a Windows 11 PC to continue to receive security updates from Microsoft.
Need more help? The quick-launch area that most Windows XP and Vista users are so used to is now gone. In place of it is the ability to pin your applications icons in the taskbar for easy access, regardless of whether the application is itself running. Sadly, the classic Start menu has also been disabled in Windows 7.
Hopefully, Microsoft will turn it back on in a future service pack, or determined hackers will find a way to replace it. Figure shows the new taskbar in Windows 7 with several application icons in it. As these applications are used often, they are given permanent spots in the taskbar for more information about pinning, see the section Pinning Applications to the Taskbar. As you can see in Figure , the Media Player application does not have the rectangular border around it—this signifies that the application is not running currently.
In the taskbar is another button known as the Show desktop shortcut. The Show desktop shortcut is the button on the extreme right of the taskbar see Figure Another cool new feature in Windows 7 is Aero Peek. Aero Peek displays live previews of active applications when you move the mouse over the application icon in the taskbar. Figure shows Aero Peek in action when the mouse hovers over the IE icon in the taskbar.
Aero Peek requires an Aero-capable video card and a Windows 7 edition that supports Aero. Aero Shake and Aero Snap will work on any Windows 7 system. Windows displays the live previews of all running instances of IE. When the mouse hovers over one of the live previews, the selected window appears, and the rest of the windows turn transparent. To select the window, simply click the live preview. When an application has too many open windows, the title of each window will be displayed in a list instead of live preview thumbnails.
You will notice that all other windows will now be minimized, leaving the current window. To get all the other windows back to their respective states, perform the same shaking action again and they should now all appear again. How many times have you tried to arrange multiple windows on your desktop so that you see the windows side-by-side? In Windows 7, when you drag a window to the left side of the screen, the window is automatically docked onto the left of the screen see Figure , occupying half the screen.
Likewise, when dragged to the right, the window will be docked to the right. When dragged to the top, the window will be maximized. Besides dragging, Windows 7 provides several shortcuts see Table for window management. Microsoft first introduced gadgets in Vista. In Windows 7, gadgets are not confined to the sidebar which itself was docked to one side of your screen in Vista but are free to roam about on your desktop see Figure This time, both of them were updated to use the new ribbon interface that was introduced in Office Besides the Paint and WordPad applications, another longtime built-in Windows application has also received some new improvements.
The Calculator now has two additional modes in addition to the Standard and Scientific modes : Programmer and Statistics see Figure Besides the two new modes, the calculator also allows you to perform conversion tasks such as unit and date conversions.
It also provides worksheets for you to calculate mortgages, vehicle leases, and fuel economy see Figure In this chapter, you have seen the various editions of Windows 7 and the system requirements that you need to satisfy in order to run it. Over the years, Microsoft has streamlined the installation process—and Windows 7 is no exception.
Windows 7 performs exceedingly well, and stays out of your way thanks to a less naggy UAC. In the following chapters, you will learn more about each of the new features of Windows 7 and how you can use each of them to your advantage.
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In January , Microsoft ended mainstream support for Windows 7, and the five-year extended support phase began. In January , the Windows 7 support lifecycle will officially end. But four years is a long, long time, and if you prefer the familiar environment of Windows 7 over its successors, you still have lots of options available.
If you navigate your way through the confusing maze of Windows licensing rules, you'll find that the best deals go to PC manufacturers, which means you'll find the best new and refurbished PCs with Windows 7 preinstalled and ready to run. If you just need the software, you can still buy Windows 7 software in shrink-wrapped retail and OEM packages, sometimes at prices that are literally too good to be true.
If you're an IT pro or developer who needs Windows 7 for testing, you also have subscription options, although they're less of a deal than they were six years ago. For students, the best options come with newer versions of Windows. Most of the details I include in this post apply to Windows customers in the United States, but you should be able to find similar offers in other countries.
My goal in this post is to point you to deals that customers legitimately qualify for. I am not trying to encourage attempts by anyone to get away with something you're not entitled to. If there are restrictions for a specific offer, I've noted them here. By far the best way to buy Windows 7 today, six years into its lifecycle, is to purchase it preinstalled on a new PC.
You get a warranty and, more importantly, you get the OEM's assurance that the hardware and software were designed to work together. This option also spares you from the pain of Windows setup, especially the hassles of hunting down essential drivers and system-specific updates when you upgrade or downgrade a PC.
There's a catch, though: As of October 31, , any new PCs they offer must include the more expensive Windows 7 Professional. Machines that were manufactured before that date with Windows 7 Home Premium can still be sold. Normally, the sales lifecycle for PCs with Windows 7 preinstalled would have ended long ago, but Microsoft extended that deadline in February PC manufacturers will no longer be able to sell new PCs with Windows 7 Pro as of October 31, , For details, see "What the Windows 7 Pro sales lifecycle changes mean to consumers and business buyers.
The trick in shopping for these machines is to skip the front door and go straight for the business section. Among online merchants, for example, Dell offers filters to show all available desktops and all-in-ones and laptops running Windows 7. HP has separate pages for business desktops and laptops , but you have to look at each model to find the models with Windows 7 available.
Big online retailers that serve business markets should have similar selections covering a wide range of brands and the full spectrum of prices. There are plenty of sites where you can find "factory reconditioned" PCs for sale at legitimately low prices. Amazon-owned Woot, for example, always has lots of choices in its Computers section , although you'll have to dig into the specs to confirm that the operating system you're looking for is included.
I don't recommend taking a chance with random sellers on eBay or Craigslist--not when there are so many well-established merchants that offer proper warranties and return policies, as well as an assurance that the underlying Windows license is legitimate.
Under Microsoft's arcane licensing rules, you can legitimately purchase OEM copies of Windows 7 any edition. However, the license agreement with those copies explicitly prohibits you from using that software on a PC you build or refurbish for your own personal use.
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