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By the way as a suggestion of a new feature, how about wobbly windows?

HEHE I just love that feature from linux Longhorn =)

It is good that they are not spending time on such trivial (and mostly useless) stuff ;) There are other more important things such as consistent look and feel where they should be spending more time IMO.

Baby blue + red + green + black + 1995 DISCO GRADIENTS + 1995 shareware fake 3D glass effects

If you were in art school and submitted something like this, your teacher would slap you. This is the kind of thing they teach you not to do in the first weeks of class, this is basic stuff!

Those colors + 1995 DISCO GRADIENTS do not have any reason to be in a GUI, let alone ANYTHING except maybe in the nightmare world of the chair-throwing Monkeyboy King. It's like the Bizarro World version of OS X.

Is Steve Ballmer colorblind, is that it?

How did MS let this happen? HOW?! Vista's GUI design is an atrocity. A GRAPHICAL ATROCITY!!! Exposure to that color scheme kills brain cells!

I'm mad because I don't want to be stuck looking at this **** for another five years. If you are in the beta, please do whatever you can to convince MS to fix the GUI.

Woah there tiger!

Those screenshots are misleading anyway, i assume it's being run in a virtual machine which turns off the Aero effects. Yes when the Aero is turned off it's an fugly beast but with Aero on i think it's the nicest looking GUI for Windows yet.

This is how i have my desktop set up...

Capture.png

...and this is with the task bar stretched so you can see the glass in all it's glory :p

Capture2.png

Baby blue + red + green + black + 1995 DISCO GRADIENTS + 1995 shareware fake 3D glass effects

If you were in art school and submitted something like this, your teacher would slap you. This is the kind of thing they teach you not to do in the first weeks of class, this is basic stuff!

Those colors + 1995 DISCO GRADIENTS do not have any reason to be in a GUI, let alone ANYTHING except maybe in the nightmare world of the chair-throwing Monkeyboy King. It's like the Bizarro World version of OS X.

Is Steve Ballmer colorblind, is that it?

How did MS let this happen? HOW?! Vista's GUI design is an atrocity. A GRAPHICAL ATROCITY!!! Exposure to that color scheme kills brain cells!

I'm mad because I don't want to be stuck looking at this **** for another five years. If you are in the beta, please do whatever you can to convince MS to fix the GUI.

What will you do?

I mean you're suppose to use an OS for functionality.

How did you get firefox like that?

Menu to the right of the buttons.

Simply drag the Firefox icon on the taskbar to the left/right to place it in whichever order you want. This can be done with any program icon on the taskbar, even ones that are not pinned and just opened.

What will you do?

I mean you're suppose to use an OS for functionality.

+1 My suggestion to you, toadeater, is to swallow it like a man and learn to deal with change. Change is a natural progression of life, and don't think this will be the last time either.

Still can't deal with it? I know a guy named Steve Jobs who would love to empty your wallet... :rolleyes:

(j/k, do whatever want)

How did you get firefox like that?

Menu to the right of the buttons.

You can right click on almost any button, but for simplicity, right click on the home button, then choose. "Customize".

Then, drag the home, back, forward, stop, reload, etc. buttons where ever you want them to be.

You can right click on almost any button, but for simplicity, right click on the home button, then choose. "Customize".

Then, drag the home, back, forward, stop, reload, etc. buttons where ever you want them to be.

Exactly like that, just right click on the menubar select customize and then drag anything where you want it, for added space i then right click again and untick navigation bar and untick bookmark bar.

Wow, I'm surprised that beta 1 of Windows 7 has already been developed. I guess we can expect it in Q4 '09. Are there any plans to improve Windows Vista before/after the release of Windows 7?

Wow, I'm surprised that beta 1 of Windows 7 has already been developed. I guess we can expect it in Q4 '09. Are there any plans to improve Windows Vista before/after the release of Windows 7?

besides Vista sp2??

I would expect rtm around June early Jul 09, on store shelves by the first part of back to school time period for the 5 primary languages. and role out rest of languages as already laid out in 5 waves.

El

Speed, usability and more?

It's still not obvious to me, what's radically different to change the public and corporate perception of Vista, that's why i'm asking! After Vista, it would seem Microsoft really need to make 7 work to ween people from XP and of course Vista, but to me it looks like Vista with a new taskbar?!

Is there a huge jump in compatibility and/or reliability? Are resources reduced - it looks doubtful! I use Vista occassionally, it's not exactly alien to me!

It's still not obvious to me, what's radically different to change the public and corporate perception of Vista, that's why i'm asking! After Vista, it would seem Microsoft really need to make 7 work to ween people from XP and of course Vista, but to me it looks like Vista with a new taskbar?!

Is there a huge jump in compatibility and/or reliability? Are resources reduced - it looks doubtful! I use Vista occassionally, it's not exactly alien to me!

Resources are reduced. Hey! I have an idea, why not get the Beta 1 build and try for yourself? Afterall, we could tell you all what we are experiencing, but you won't know for yourself until you've tried it.

* I've corrected my post..

Edited by NeoFlux
It may seem a little ignorant, but so soon after Vista, and from ive seen... Why would you upgrade from Vista? What are the compelling new features, besides the taskbar?

On the outside, their may not be anything major. It has changes here and their and a lot under the hood. Here is just a few I can think of:

  • The new supertaskbar
    Media Center and Player have had some fine tuning done
    Updated Caculator (Has more uses for people to use in their day to day activities)
    UAC is much better
    Paint and WordPad got a major update
    Has an XPS Viewer built in
    Windows help system is better.
    Home networking is more fine tuned

As you can see, Windows 7 is a worthy upgrade. It blows XP out of the water and for users of Vista, it will be a better overall.

Thanks - where can I read more about it? Surely there has to be more to it, than enhancements to WMP/Media Center, Wordpad & Paint (isn't it simply the adoption of the ribbon UI?) etc?!

NeoFlux, I work and use Mac OS X everyday on a MacBook Pro, I only really use Vista because some of our developers work in ASP.net so I have to build and test code in Visual Studio and alike. I don't enjoy working in Windows personally, but I have to use it occasionally. Hence my curiosity to find out more, without committing to installing a pre-release OS. I figure that was the purpose of this forum; to discuss Windows 7? Are you suggesting Windows 7 Beta 1 is an open beta? Seems strange, but alas, point me in the direction and if my workload slows down, I'll see if this time, 'Wow starts Now'...

Thanks - where can I read more about it? Surely there has to be more to it, than enhancements to WMP/Media Center, Wordpad & Paint (isn't it simply the adoption of the ribbon UI?) etc?!

NeoFlux, I work and use Mac OS X everyday on a MacBook Pro, I only really use Vista because some of our developers work in ASP.net so I have to build and test code in Visual Studio and alike. I don't enjoy working in Windows personally, but I have to use it occasionally. Hence my curiosity to find out more, without committing to installing a pre-release OS. I figure that was the purpose of this forum; to discuss Windows 7? Are you suggesting Windows 7 Beta 1 is an open beta? Seems strange, but alas, point me in the direction and if my workload slows down, I'll see if this time, 'Wow starts Now'...

Their are several places on the internet to look for info. All you have to do is search google or other search engines for Windows 7. As far as Windows 7 being an open beta, it will be a public beta sometime next month. I know it has leaked on Torrents and such, but if you want to wait, it should be out in about 2 weeks for the public to download direct from Microsoft.

The only way to be sure Windows 7 is right for you is to use the software. Everyone has their own opinion of the prebetas and beta.

no no I bought this computer , but it would be nice if they gave them to us, yeah my connection is like 0.5 k a second, so yeah if anybody could help you would def make a soldiers holidays great.

There's no such high compression to help you :(

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    • Save 74% on this Complete 2026 CompTIA Certification Training Bundle by Steven Parker Today on offer via our Online Courses section of the Neowin Deals store, you can save 74% on the Complete 2026 CompTIA Certification Training Bundle. This comprehensive 2026 CompTIA training bundle is created for aspiring IT professionals who want a faster, clearer way to earn multiple industry-recognized certifications while building practical, job-ready skills. Designed around real-world expectations, the curriculum guides you from foundational IT concepts to hands-on technical mastery across A+, Network+, Security+, Cloud+, Server+, and Pentest+ domains. You'll develop the confidence to troubleshoot systems, secure networks, manage cloud and on-prem environments, and tackle complex technical challenges with a methodical approach that employers value. 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    • AMD RX 9070 GRE AI, Blender benchmarks vs 9070 XT, 7800XT, Nvidia RTX 5070, 4070 by Sayan Sen Earlier this week, we shared the first part of our review of AMD's new RX 9070 GRE. It was about the gaming performance of the GPU, and we gave it an 8 out of 10. As a follow-up, similar to how we did with the 9070 XT and non-XT, we are doing a dedicated productivity review for the RX 9070 GRE as well, where we compare it against the 9070 XT, 9070, 7800 XT, as well as Nvidia's 5070 and 4070. This will include AI, rendering, compute, and more benchmarks. AI performance, especially, is a very important metric in today's world, and AMD also promised big improvements thanks to its underlying architectural improvements. We will be pitching it against the data we already have for the RX 9070, and RX 9070 XT, but also the Nvidia 5070 FE, MSI GeForce RTX 4070 VENTUS 2X 12G, and Gigabyte Radeon RX 7800 XT GAMING OC 16G as they are in a similar price class, but also because we do not have a comparable 5060 Ti card lying around here that we can compare it against. Before we get underway, this is a collaboration between Sayan Sen and Steven Parker, who lent me his test bed. Also, there was no editorial input from AMD. First up, the specs of the RX 9070, 9070 XT, and 9070 GRE, which were given to us by AMD: Radeon RX 9070 GRE Radeon RX 9070 Radeon RX 9070 XT Boost Clock: Game Clock: up to 2.79GHz up to 2.20GHz up to 2.52GHz up to 2.07GHz up to 2.97GHz up to 2.40GHz Stream Processors 3,072 (48 CU) 3,584 (56 CU) 4,096 (64 CU) Ray Accelerator 48 56 64 AI Accelerator 96 112 128 ROPs 96 128 Texture Mapping Units 192 224 256 Memory 12 GB GDDR6, 18Gbps Clock, 192-bit Bus 432 GB/s 16 GB GDDR6, 20Gbps Clock, 256-bit Bus Effective Memory Bandwidth: 640 GB/s Infinity Cache 48 MB (3rd Gen) 64 MB (3rd Gen) Card Bus PCI-E 5.0 X16 Output 2x HDMI 2.1b 2x DisplayPort 2.1a Power consumption 220W 304W Recommended PSU 650W 750W Slot width 2x 3x Price (SEP) $549 $599 As you can see from the specs above, it is less than the standard RX 9070 in every way that counts, except for slightly higher Boost and Game clock speed. Design Moving on, the RX 9070 GRE we were given is an XFX Swift triple-fan, dual-slot design with two 8-pin connectors. At 30cm (self-measured), it will fit in most systems easily. There is no RGB either. The AMD Radeon RX 9070 GRE by XFX from all angles. Test system Our test system consists of the following: Lian Li O11 Dynamic Mini V2 Flow (Amazon|Newegg) ASUS Z890 ProArt Creator WiFi (Amazon|Newegg) Intel Core Ultra 7 270K Plus (Amazon|Newegg) Thermal Grizzly KryoSheet - 44x37 (Amazon|Newegg) 2x 16GB G.Skill Trident Z5 RGB (7200 MT/s in XMP) (Amazon|Newegg) Sabrent Rocket4 Plus 2TB SSD (Amazon) Windows 11 25H2 (Build 26200.8246) AMD shared a press driver based on the recently released Adrenaline 26.5.2 that we were required to use. We now move on to our benchmarks. First up, we have Geekbench AI running on ONNX. For some reason, the 9070 GRE does exceptionally well here in both half-precision (FP16) and single-precision (FP32). It manages to beat the RTX 5070 and RX 9070 non-XT, and is only behind the 9070 XT. Since Geekbench runs in short bursts instead of continuously hammering the graphics card, it seems the GRE's faster boost clocks are helping here. Next up, we move to the UL Procyon AI test suite, starting with the image generation benchmark. We chose the Stable Diffusion XL FP16 test since it is the most intense workload available on Procyon. The Nvidia cards do very well here, as even the 4070 out-muscles AMD's best fairy easily. The positive thing about the GRE is that it gets quite close to the 9070 non-XT in this test; this indicates that the VRAM does not play a very big role here, as SD XL relies on float16 (FP16). So this is something to keep in mind again. If you wish to work with float32 AI workloads, graphics cards with larger than 12 GB buffers would likely emerge as victors. Regardless, the gains are still massive on AMD's 9000 series compared to the 7000 series. Following image generation, we move to the text generation benchmark. This is one test where the 9070 GRE struggled, quite a lot. It seems that the 12 GB VRAM and lower memory bandwidth of the new Radeon 9070 GRE are hurting it quite a bit; the split is massive, especially in a test like Llama2, which packs 13 billion parameters. As such, in all the tests, the 9070 GRE is the slowest of the lot. Next, we tried Blender, and here the AMD GPUs were beaten by Nvidia. Rendering is something the Green team has always had a lead over the Red side, and it has not changed so far. On the positive side, though, the 9070 GRE shows significantly better results than the 7800 XT, which means AMD is on the right path. Catching up to Nvidia, though, will require a lot more effort. And we hope HIP and ROCm can keep improving. Wrapping up AI testing, we measured OpenCL throughput in the Geekbench compute benchmark. The RX 9070 GRE alongside the 9070 did not fare well here at all, even falling behind the 7800 XT. Interestingly, even the RTX 5070 could not beat the 4070 on OpenCL, so perhaps this suggests that OpenCL optimization may not have been a priority for either AMD or Nvidia in the modern era. Conclusion We reached the end of our productivity performance review of the 9070 GRE, and we have to say it's a mixed bag. Unlike the 9070 and 9070 XT, the GRE excels in some areas while losing ground fairly easily in others. Similar to how it happened in gaming, any time the card's memory subsystem gets hammered, it tends to fall behind the others. This was the case with text generation, wherein we saw the VRAM sometimes hit its maximum available 12 GB of usage with larger model sizes. So what do we make of the RX 9070 as a productivity hardware? It can certainly be used, but you have to know it has its limitations. For those looking for a GPU that can deal with more, AMD recently unveiled the Radeon AI PRO R9700, which is essentially a 32 GB refresh of the 9070 XT with some additional workstation-based optimizations. On a similar note, the new Ryzen AI Halo platform is something you can consider if you want to set up a local AI processing station. Considering everything, we rate AMD's Radeon RX 9070 GRE a 7.5 out of 10 for its productivity performance. Price is less of a factor for those looking at productivity cases compared to those considering the GPU for gaming, and as such, we felt it did quite decently on many occasions and can be handy if you need a 12 GB GPU and, for some reason, don't want to get Nvidia. Purchase links: RX 9070 / XT / GRE (Amazon US) As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases.
    • Does anyone here know if these updates are integrated into the UUP dump isos?
    • Motrix Next 3.9.4 by Razvan Serea Motrix Next is a modern, open-source cross-platform download manager built as the official next-generation successor to the original Motrix project. It has been completely rewritten using Tauri 2, Vue 3, TypeScript, and Rust, while still relying on the powerful Aria2 download engine for high-speed multi-protocol transfers. The app supports HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, BitTorrent, ED2K and magnet links, offering advanced features like multi-connection acceleration, task scheduling, bandwidth control, and batch download management. With a significantly reduced install size (around 20MB), it focuses on being lightweight, fast, and resource-efficient compared to traditional Electron-based download tools. Designed for Windows, macOS, and Linux, Motrix Next delivers a clean, modern UI inspired by Material Design 3 principles, with smooth animations and a minimal workflow. It improves usability through better download organization, system tray integration, and enhanced torrent handling including selective file downloads and tracker management. Motrix Next features: Multi-protocol downloads — HTTP, FTP, BitTorrent, Magnet, .torrent, ED2K, and Metalink tasks BitTorrent — Selective file download, DHT, peer exchange, encryption controls, metadata caching, GeoIP peer flags, and tracker probing Browser extension integration — Embedded Extension API with independent authentication, download confirmation, smart auto-submit, filename hints, referer/cookie forwarding, and real-time controls (Chrome Web Store · Edge Add-ons) Safe filename handling — Content-Disposition, RFC 2047, non-UTF-8, percent-encoded, and extensionless URL resolution with path traversal sanitization Download organization — Favorite and recent folders, optional file-type categorization, stale-record cleanup, and completed history backed by SQLite Concurrent downloads — Independent controls for active tasks, HTTP connections per server, segments per file, and BT peer limits Speed control — Global and per-task upload/download limits with day-of-week and time-of-day scheduling System integration — Tray operation, optional tray speed display, macOS Dock badge/progress, protocol handlers for magnet://, thunder://, and motrixnext:// Lightweight mode — Destroys the WebView on minimize-to-tray while Rust keeps the engine, task monitor, notifications, history, and extension routing alive Notifications and power options — Native task start/complete/failure notifications, keep-awake during downloads, and optional shutdown after completion Network controls — Scoped proxy support for downloads, app updates, and tracker updates, plus system proxy detection Auto-update channels — Stable, Beta, and Latest Across Channels policies with separate download and install phases Diagnostics — Structured logs, exportable diagnostic ZIPs, database integrity checks, automatic DB rebuild, and Linux GPU rendering fallback Personalization — Light/dark/system theme, 10 color schemes, 26 languages, and first-launch system language detection Motrix Next 3.9.4 changelog: Motrix Next 3.9.4 promotes the 3.9.4 beta cycle to stable. This release refreshes bundled engine binaries, improves task detail readability and copy actions, expands link handling for magnet and ED2K workflows, polishes responsive navigation and text wrapping, updates browser extension documentation, and refines network preference controls. New Features Task Detail copy actions — Added copyable values for task metadata and reusable render functions for long text fields. Magnet and ED2K lifecycle support — Added task lifecycle handling for magnet and ED2K links. History cleanup for deleted tasks — Deleted tasks can now remove matching history records. User-Agent management — Added user-agent management and improved related network preference controls. Browser extension documentation — Added the Firefox Add-ons link for the Motrix Next extension. Improvements Engine binaries — Updated bundled binaries for supported architectures. Task Detail readability — Long task names, URLs, tracker values, and copyable metadata now render more clearly. Deletion messaging — Refined localized task deletion text for clarity and consistency. Text wrapping — Improved URI input wrapping and task name multiline display. Navigation layout — Improved sub-navigation responsiveness. Disk allocation default — Changed the default file allocation method to trunc. Proxy controls — Improved proxy button styling in network preferences. Download: Motrix Next 64-bit | ARM64 | macOS ~20.0 MB (Open Source) Links: Website | macOS / Linux | Screenshot Get alerted to all of our Software updates on Twitter at @NeowinSoftware
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