Windows7 Evangelist

A flaw that has been present in Microsoft software since 1993, and still affects Windows 7, has been published by a security researcher.

Tavis Ormandy published details of the flaw on the Neohapsis mailing list on Tuesday.

The problem lies in the Virtual DOS Machine, Heise security explained on Wednesday.

Workarounds include users disabling the MS-DOS subsystem by starting the group policy editor and enabling the "Prevent access to 16-bit applications" option in a sub-menu of the computer configuration tab, according to the Heise article.

For more on this story, read "17-year-old Microsoft flaw affects Windows 7" on ZDNet UK.

17-year-old Microsoft flaw affects Windows 7 | Tech News on ZDNet

If you’ve been waiting with bated breath to dual-boot Windows 7 on your Mac, your time has come. File under "better late than never": Apple has now updated Boot Camp with support for Windows 7.
With separate downloads for 64-bit and 32-bit versions of Windows 7, the download also requires an authentic copy of Windows 7 or Windows 7 upgrade, and is only supported on more recent Intel-based Macs; no Macs produced before 2007 will support Windows 7, as outlined in this Apple support page.
If you’re upgrading your Mac’s other side from Windows Vista to Windows 7, you’ll first want to download and install the Boot Camp Utility for Windows 7, which "safely unmounts the read-only Macintosh volume on Microsoft Vista."
Let us know in the comments if you have any issues with the update.
Note: If you are already running Windows 7 on your Mac in Boot Camp, you can simply run Apple Software Update while booted into Windows to get the updated Win7-friendly drivers.

Boot Camp updated: now supports Windows 7

Connectify v1.1 for Wi-Fi-enabled Devices Creates Instant Hotspots for Friends and Co-Workers Saving Time and Money

PHILADELPHIA, Jan. 20 /PRNewswire/ — Connectify, Inc., today announced Connectify Version 1.1, a free software application for Windows 7, which turns any Wi-Fi-enabled computer into a wireless mobile hotspot for Internet access, as well as file and photo sharing.  Months after launching, hundreds of thousands of users are now sharing their Wi-Fi connection with friends or co-workers.  Connectify is building a strong community of Wi-Fi-connected users who are reaping the ease-of-use and financial benefits of a shared WPA2-secure wireless personal area network (PAN).

Connectify enables consumers to have their own mobile hotspot and, thus, creates a personal area network, whether at home or on the road.  Connectify connects dozens of different Wi-Fi devices at a time from a single computing connection – digital cameras, printers, music players, personal computers, and more.

"Connectify solves a real issue of making your wireless devices work together.  With Connectify running on your Windows 7 laptop, you have control of your network and how you want your devices to work seamlessly together," said Alex Gizis, chief executive officer of Connectify.  

Several new features were developed for Connectify users enhancing its overall usability – available now:

• Eye-Fi Support: Eye-Fi Wi-Fi-enabled SD cards can now connect locally over a Connectify hotspot, streaming photos from your Eye-Fi-enabled camera to your laptop instantly.

• Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) Support: Share your hotspot without typing long passwords. Connectify hotspots can export user’s settings to a USB Flash Drive that can be used to instantly set up and connect other Windows computers.

• Clone your Network: Quick access is now available to setup a Connectify hotspot that mirrors your home network. Wi-Fi-enabled devices will automatically connect to your Connectify hotspot just as they do to you home wireless router, creating an instant repeater.

• Intel Cards: Intel 5100/5300 wireless card support is now official.

"Connectify is a real breakthrough in mobile communications," said J. Gerry Purdy, principal analyst with MobileTrax LLC, a market research firm.  "Now, Windows 7 users can create their own mobile hotspot where ever they go and, thus, enable all of their Wi-Fi-enabled devices."  

Connectify is available for free, so turn your Windows 7 PC into a Wi-Fi hotspot today, and join our connected community.  Go to http://www.connectify.me/ to download the application.

About Connectify

Connectify develops innovative wireless solutions for the military, business, and consumer markets.  The Connectify software team is dedicated to bringing real wireless sharing to everyone; building communities, and saving people time and money as well as improving the cross-platform wireless experience. For more information, please visit: http://www.connectify.me/about.html

Connectify Free Mobile Hotspot Windows 7 Software Generates Over 250,000 Downloads — PHILADELPHIA, Jan. 20 /PRNewswire/ –

Microsoft has been introducing beautiful theme packs for Windows 7 users via Personalization Gallery. After the inclusion of Coca Cola and Pepsi themes, ‘Nothing but 7up’ has been added to the official collection of Windows 7 themes. It is a fresh new theme based on 7up, a popular brand of a lemon-lime flavored non-caffeinated soft drink.

This theme features 7 high-definition wallpapers with a resolution of up to 1920 × 1200. Installation process as usual is extremely simple and easy. Simply follow the steps below to download and install this theme.

Step 1: Download 7up_Windows7.themepack file from Personalization Gallery here.

Step 2: Once you have downloaded, double click on ‘7up_Windows7’ file to install the theme.

Step 3: Now simply apply it via Personalization options in Windows 7.

This themes will only work on Windows 7.

7up Theme for Windows 7 | Redmond Pie

Microsoft has a history of bundling really bad backup programs with their operating systems. The company has been accused of a lot of monopolistic behavior, but their backup programs often seemed designed to not threaten the market for third-party competitors.

So I wasn’t prepared to like Windows 7’s Backup and Restore. But much to my amazement, I kind of do. It does image backups for system protection and file backups for regular data protection–and does both for the Home Premium as well as the Business and Ultimate editions. For file backups, it defaults to backing up exactly what you should be backing up (libraries, appdata, and a few other important folders), and lets you tell it to back up any other folders you want to protect.

Backup and Restore can backup files incrementally, saving only those created and changed since the last backup. And it does versioning–if several versions of a file have been backed up, you can pick which you want to restore. It defaults to restoring the most recent backup, and generally avoids the confusion that versioning causes in some people.

And it’s all very easy and direct.

Not that it’s perfect. Backup and Restore allows you to pick which drive you wish to backup to, but won’t let you pick a folder in that drive. It can be pretty picky about restoring an image, to the point where I wouldn’t use it for image backup. You can save to a network, but not over the Internet. If you’re looking for something better, see 7 Backup Strategies for Your Data, Multimedia, and System Files.

PC World Senior Editor Robert Strohmeyer (full disclosure: He’s my editor) created a video showing how to set up a scheduled, automatic backup with Backup and Restore. But since I don’t believe in automatic backups–at least not to local media like an external hard drive–I’ll tell you how to back it up manually.

(What do I have against automatic backups? For them to work, the backup media must always be available. This is fine if you’re backing up over a network or the Internet, but an external drive that’s connected to your PC 24/7 is vulnerable to the same disasters that could destroy the data on your internal hard drive. It’s best to connect a backup drive only when you need to.)

To launch the program, simply click Start, type , and select Backup and Restore. Plug in your external hard drive and click Set up backup. Make your own decisions in the setup wizard, but when you get to the last page, click Change schedule. Uncheck Run backup on a schedule (recommended), and click OK. You’re set up.

To back up your data (and you should do this every day), plug in the external drive, launch Backup and Restore as described above, and click Back up now.

You can continue working as you back up.

Windows 7’s Built-in Backup – washingtonpost.com

Microsoft made Windows 7 operating system available from October 22, 2009 which was about three months back. A Microsoft centric Spanish blog Muywindows posted exclusive screenshots of Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Demo installer. Obviously, we foresee first Service Pack for Windows 7 in works at Microsoft’s Labs.
Usually, the first Service Pack from Microsoft comes at least after a year the launch of Operating System. Windows Vista was launched on January 30, 2007 and its first Service Pack came out on February 4, 2008. Now, Windows 7 was launched globally on October 22, 2009 so ideally, we may expect the Service Pack 1 to arrive sometime year-end. That’s when the Microsoft’s Professional Developers Conference takes place.

Windows 7 Service Pack 1 is purported to have about 150 updates in the current build. One may expect support for newly released hardware and USB 3.0 supporting devices along with several other fixes. The blog also revealed that Microsoft will send them Windows 7 SP 1 Demo preview in coming few weeks. This Service Pack 1 will be passed to selected Testers in July and final version is expected in late 2010.

It’s kind of early to predict when exactly will Microsoft release this first Service Pack. If we compare it with Apple’s releases then Mac OS X Snow Leopard also got major updates in two weeks after the OS was released. Unlike Microsoft, Apple doesn’t offer any ‘Service Pack’ for its OS but does release major updates time to time. 

Techtree.com India > News > Software > Windows 7 SP 1 Screens Leaked

Windows 7 hit the open market late last year amid much trepidation. Would it be an improvement over the much-maligned Vista? Would it give folks a reason to upgrade? Or would it force Microsoft to again extend the life of Windows XP? Well, the initial reviews are in and they are favorable.

If you, like most folks, haven’t made the leap to Vista, Windows 7 looks and feels much cleaner, sleeker and modern. For those adventurous souls who did go to Vista, Windows 7 solves a lot of the problems introduced by its predecessor.

This is really the crux of the improvement of Windows 7—improvements in the user interface—something Vista promised but did not quite deliver on. Aero Peek makes every window transparent except the one you’re actively working on. This makes other windows and icons much easier to find, almost an "aha!" moment. Why didn’t we do this years ago?

Something else Microsoft has done to make the transition to 7 simpler and faster is the inclusion of the Easy Transfer application. Although Easy Transfer was included in Vista, it was not heavily used for obvious reasons. Easy Transfer lives up to its moniker, facilitating the migration of users, files, settings, documents and other items from your old PC to your new, provided the old one is running XP Service Pack 2 or higher, or Vista.

Easy Transfer requires that the two PCs be connected via a network connection, a proprietary cable or media such as CD/DVD, USB flash drive or external hard drive. Easy Transfer basically replicates your old environment in Windows 7. It even migrates mail from Outlook Express to Windows Live Mail. Be careful, however, if you have viruses or malware on your old computer: Easy Transfer might take those over to the new.

Speaking of mail, Windows 7 does not include Outlook Express, instead replacing it with Windows Live Mail. Of course, you can use any of the popular e-mail client alternatives like Thunderbird, Opera, Eudora and Pegasus. Most business users will probably utilize Outlook 2007.

An item that caused much consternation with Vista is still included in Windows 7. Users of Vista complained endlessly of the User Account Control features, which would pop up incessantly. While toned down quite a bit in Windows 7, it will still take some getting used to for people who never employed Vista.

One last caveat. Before making the leap, review all of your existing applications to determine whether they are compatible with Windows 7. Some might require an upgrade or outright replacement to work under the new operating system.

John Agsalud is an IT expert with more than 20 years of information technology experience in Hawaii and around the world. He can be reached at jagsalud@hawaii.rr.com.

New Windows 7 drawing generally rave reviews – Hawaii Business – Starbulletin.com

Greg Abrams is the vice president and CTO of PC Plus Technologies Inc. in Auburn. He can be reached at grega@pcplustech.com.

10. Peak Performance
Not everyone will like the new taskbar, and not everyone will bother to learn how to get the most out of new features, but every single Windows 7 user will benefit from the performance improvements.

9. Staying On Task
The Windows 7 taskbar has many new features that make it more intuitive and helpful. Features like Live Previews, Jump Lists, and Taskbar Pins make programs and commonly used documents easy to access.

8. Touch And Go
Microsoft has implemented multi-touch for touchpads, which allows for easy zooming into specific areas of the screen. This is essential with the explosion in popularity of small portable computers.

7. Desktop
New features like Aero Shake, Aero Peak and easy Maximizing, Minimizing and Tiling of Windows will help desktops to feel less cluttered.

6. Enhanced Explorer
Better file management in Windows Explorer means more flexibility and file control and less time wasted searching for documents.

5. Fully Accessorized
Windows 7 comes with Windows Media Center pre-installed and it also boasts improved tools like Paint, Calculator and Sticky Notes.

4. Home Office Assistant
HomeGroup is a new feature that makes it easy to connect all of the computers so you can easily share files, video, and devices (printers and scanners).

3. Strong Security
BitLocker To Go is a new Windows 7 feature that effortlessly encrypts any external USB drive by right-clicking on the drive’s icon and entering a secure password.

2. Music Made Easier
Windows Media Player now offers support for the iTunes AAC format. Now you don’t have to open up iTunes on your PC to play those tracks and you can also play back iTunes libraries on other PCs over the network without having the Apple software installed on your system.

1. Complete Control
A new user account control sliding scale lets the user determine how often applications are interrupted. Settings range from turning the security feature off completely, to notifications every time a piece of software raises an eyebrow at your settings.

10 Things I Know About…Windows 7 | Worcester Business Journal

Microsoft Corp. has been transforming desktop virtualization as a way of making Windows 7 work nicely with old applications, for example Windows XP’s apps. But, after the support from the software giant, can the enterprises adopt the desktop-virtualization? The answer would be diffused.
It is predicted that the desktop virtualization will see a possible uptick in the acceptance for various reasons. At present, different vendors are providing Virtual Desktop Infrastructures (VDI), which uses similar hypervisors that allow many virtual machines to run on a single physical host and the end user will have a private "desktop." VDI can permit upto 50 PC operating systems, each of which serves a single end user.
Further, the services also changes support for peripherals, multimedia and other Web- and PC-focused technologies. Therefore, the enhancements in the user interface have made desktop virtualization more acceptable.
Extending the life of an old PC
According to various analysts, some companies are unwilling to upgrade their PC hardware enough to support migrations to Windows 7. Desktop Virtualization is the phenomenon, which delivers and manages corporate desktops and to respond to various user needs in a flexible way. Further, it is possible to use a computer or other device to access data or applications that live somewhere else.
Migration to Windows 7
It is reported that running virtual Windows 7 desktops would be cheaper than using the original software individually, but is costlier than using the virtual XP desktops. Meanwhile, market analysts suggest that by migrating to virtual Windows 7 desktops, it provides more control to IT for conserving the whole process inside the data center and by saving the hardware and support costs as well.
According to various consultants, Windows 7 implementation requires upgrading hardware, updating custom-built software, training end users and updating the security on PCs with the new operating system. The process can be very costly and requires service disruption, therefore needs proper guidance before switching.
Microsoft’s impasse
Besides supporting desktop virtualization, the software giant also wants to run its main business computing platform. The company does not want that all of a major company’s PCs would be virtualized. But, the company says that customers should virtualize according to their usage and flexibility – not just aims to cut costs.
The new OS, Windows 7 itself has better management, security and stability compared to Vista, therefore saves money. Hence, it could save further costs in VDI implementations that involve instances of the OS running in separate VMs.
Various Virtual applications

Users can have various web applications like browser interface for an application running on a server, view their data remotely and streaming applications. Streaming application provides more PC-based memory and processing power, but exerts more pressure on the network than remote viewing.
Discussion
According to a leading research firm, the desktop virtualization market will be around $1.8 billion in 2012. Therefore, it seems that Windows 7 could be a catalyst for some additional virtualization, but the switch over to Windows 7 platform will certainly requires proper consultancy and backup.

Would Windows 7 boost adoption of Desktop virtualization? – IT articles, Hardware & Software, Computer vendors in India, IT industry in India : Latest IT News

By Paul McDougall
InformationWeek
January 15, 2010 01:52 PM

Windows Vista was widely shunned by businesses, but there are indications that its successor, Windows 7 will fare better in commercial environments.

Windows 7 screen shot

(Click for larger image and for full photo gallery)

Microsoft noted this week, for instance, that numerous businesses are moving from to Windows 7 as they update their client systems.

The account wins for Windows 7 include Bergen County Camera, of Westwood, NJ, Latin American tractor distributor Hidrau Torque, Ames Golf & Country Club in Iowa, and the Gurgaon, India-based Galaxy Hotel.

The wins were noted in a blog post by Windows senior marketing director Erwin Visser.

Galaxy IT director Yogesh Kumar said the hotel upgraded to Windows 7 to take advantage of BitLocker security and what he said was Windows 7’s enhanced stability over previous OS’s.

"We are seeing efficiency improvements in virtually every facet of our internal operations, from guest registration and check ins, to accounting and IT support, all due to Windows 7" said Kumar, who was quoted in Visser’s post.

Microsoft needs Windows 7 to be a hit in the business sector, as well as on consumer devices.

Windows sales were off a whopping 39% in Microsoft’s most recently announced quarter. Investors will be watching the company’s next report, slated for Jan. 28, to see whether Windows 7 has stopped the hemorrhaging.

Windows’ sales slump in recent quarters was due in part to the fact that businesses shied away from Vista en masse. Many corporate IT managers cited concerns about Vista’s incompatibility with older applications, intrusive security measures, and heavy horsepower requirements.

With Windows 7, Microsoft has toned down the obnoxious security warnings. The new OS also features XP Mode, which allows apps built for XP to run seamlessly in Windows 7. Windows 7 also carries lighter hardware requirements than Vista in some versions.

Microsoft is hoping it’s all enough to convince corporate IT managers to finally move off XP and onto its newest flavor of Windows.

Windows 7 Scores Enterprise Wins — InformationWeek