So far, we have heard only about new touchscreen features as well as – and probably most interesting – MinWin, a much smaller kernel of the operating system that takes up only 40 MB of memory.

well the problem is not with the kernel taking up so much memory, its all the other crap that windows its self adds. windows is a bloated application, you can't call it a os because it hasn't been a os for awhile now. whats windows 7 going to take 3 dvd's for install?

Looks like Microsoft is feeling need the need for a new Windows... soon. Now how could that be with Vista being such a huge success.

And I don't consider 40MB small for a kernel, but I suppose you see these things a bit different when you are used to Linux. ;)

Just how big are the kernels of Vista and XP then?

Another Windows !!!!!!!!!!
they should fix the current one instead !

If it is like Vista, it will probably be a memory and resouce hog and be the only real choice in operating systems on new computers. It would be nice if new computers came with an option of which operating system one wanted instead of which one Microsoft wanted us to have. I would have eComStation installed instead of Windows. http://www.ecomstation.com

Microsoft's success is it's marketing model. Mac and Linux just don't get it yet - Mac from a price standpoint and Linux from the apps side.
Linux apps need to get on the ball and and ship with the dependencies (dll's) needed. Mac's need competitive pricing. Folks don't buy Mac's because of the big gulp at the prices. They also do not get a sense of satisfaction from downloading files to configure software. They consider it a PITA.
They're just giving Microsoft more opportunities to get it right with no consequences when they don't.
As far as a new Windows in 2009, don't hold your breath.

I don't know about the rest of you, But I'm getting tired of hearing this over and over again... Give 'em a break for christ sake, everything they do, you people end up hating on 'em... Jeez... You're all like lonely housewives...

Anyways, I'm not a MS Fanboy... I agree with John, they do need to look at their current OS rather than put in development into the next one...

MinWin won't necessarily be included in Windows 7 as you seem to be implying. The kernel will obviously be there, but the point of MinWin was to show that the basic core kernel of Windows is still quite small after all of these years.

If they can actually hit H2 2009 that would be amazing.

I agree with ThomFrost to an extent. Much of windows doesn't even involve the kernel (which most consider to be the real OS). On the other hand, most distro's of linux also have huge kernels and Mac hasn't made a new OS since OSX, they mostly just add features like resizeable docks (woohoo).

Microsoft is at least addressing the problems they have and working on an entirely new system, which is always good. They can take this opportunity to trash the bloat (with the exception of the libraries that developers want - which usually account for most of the "OS" size).

I can only hope that Windows 7 is actually a new OS, and not just a collection of "hey, this looks cool" stuff like Vista seems to be (don't get me wrong, I use Vista and greatly prefer it over XP, but it seems that a lot of people had whiz-bang pet projects that were just thrown into the OS).

As for the release date, who knows. Either way, the OS will be over-hyped and people will be pissed when it doesn't reach their extravagant expectations.

Well,

I even think is was an article features on Tom's. Microsoft is taking a huge hit in their wallet because of large companies not renewing their software maintenance contracts. Those contracts stipulates that within a 3 year period, you the software subscriber receives a free update of the OS and other supported products.

With the gap between XP and Vista release, those big companies paying for software maintenance figured it was no longer worth paying for support because M$ was releasing the new software after the support period ended.

So, there we have it. M$ wanting to please their paying customers, and also the fact they said they were going to release (again seen on Tom's) a new OS within 3 years of Vista release.

And as far as the kernel, it is looking more and more like a linux kernel to me.....

Jay

Wahoo - I'm stoked MS is giving up on Vista same as every IT professional already has. If they gave up right now I think it would be best for everyone as Vienna has got to be better than Vista and hopefully this time better than XP.

I will never roll out any VIsta machines until it is AT LEAST as fast as XP for file transfers, copies, and network throughput. I also work for a gaming company along with financial, university, venture capital etc. I will probably only role out A vista machine if they are working on a game using DX10 - otherwise everything will remain XP as frames per second in Vista is horrible.

I have no idea what the developers of Vista were thinking but slow downs are not acceptable - you can run a virtual copy of XP in Vista if you need fast file copies and transfers and network speed and fast video performance - umm on second thought, why not just stick with XP - save the money on the hardware and the OS?



http://gizmodo.com/337768/battlemodo-windows-vista-service-pack-1-rc1-vs-shipping-vista

http://www.news.com/Windows-XP-outshines-Vista-in-benchmarking-test/2100-1016_3-6220201.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/vista-sp1-performance-dud.html

If MS doesn't get Vienna to perform at a faster speed than XP on identical equipment - chances are I will move to some form of linux for my end users.

I disagree about them needing to concentrate on improving the current version of Vista - I look at Vista as a house full of mold and lead paint - some times it is easier to wipe out what you have in place and start again.

Vista shows no promise of ever having network throughput, file access, copies, moves and transfers even close to XP and will probably never see FPS in gaming close to XP.

Mind you I am not an MS hater - I run XP on a few thousand PCs and 2003 on a couple hundred servers. I also do support other OS's but in a much smaller percentage. I am not however an MS fanboy who says Microsoft can do no wrong. I don't think Vista can be salvaged and just like Windows ME - it is time to put it out of it's misery. Frankly Windows ME wasn't as bad as Vista in my mind but at least MS moved on quickly.

Hopefully the developers for Vienna will only be given P4's with 512mb of memory and all files will have to be saved on the server - that way they might actually try and make it perform at least as well as XP does. Yes I can buy a faster PC only to make it run as fast as my old PC running XP - but for what benefit - I don't see anything in Vista that offers benefit to users. No one who doesn't really understand PCs know what the right answer is to the UAC and it is in your face every two seconds so every either just turns off UAC even though it nags you when you boot or they say yes to everything. UAC is an abomination.

I just forked out big time to get vista, now there'll be another one within 2 years?

damn

Sure there are smaller, but when you consider that 4GB can be found for under 60 bucks, a kernel that takes up 1% of that seems pretty darn small.

With that said, i haven't a clue what XP or vista's kernel uses.

As for David Clay's Mac/Linux piece, I think you're mostly correct, though I think Mac is all about marketing. I just don't see Linux becoming a contender in the next 5 to 10 years. It's nice that it's small and free, but the lack of commercial apps hurts it.

Finally, David's dead on about a new windows in 2009. It's unlikely to happen. As I recall, Windows 95 was supposed to be out by mid to late 1994....instead it came out fairly late in 1994.

It'll be late.

Apple comes out with a new OS ever 2 years and people love, M$ tries it and people go nuts saying we don't need another OS M$ is just greedy.

I'm not really an M$ supporter but I find people (mostly the sheep) funny as heck. I wonder how many love there right hand but hate there left hand? Maybe we can get a university to study this phonomena.

I don't get it ie 'An interesting feature that has been highlighted by Microsoft is the ability of the M1 software to handle a heterogeneous graphics system consisting of multiple graphics cards from different vendors." Well, windows 2000 can do that! I've got multiple cards in this machine, with multiple monitors, and W2000 supports it out of the box...

I remember hearing that "longhorn" (then thought to be what vista is now, not the server software) was supposed to come our arround '04, and it was late. However I think a lot of people liked the idea of Win XP. One OS that lasts for a really really long time. It helped make a lot less issues for compatability, and now XP is really a great OS (especially considering what it started as).
As for vista itself I think they only really released it in order to get people to buy new computers and end the stagnation in the hardware market. It is obviously not a finished product, as Karson said, it's full of "wihz-bang" eyecandy, and nothing to really make life easier or better. But a 2 year lifecycle? That seems a little rediculous. I thought we had "arrived" and that new releases would be more on like a Mac schedule adding features, but not actuially changing anything in the core. But here we have a new new windows? Sounds like a mistake.

Gates is retiring. Maybe this is the reason. Maybe they found out they cannot keep the old trend (that used to generate jokes around) that new OS, new system, and hardware manufacturers pay MS for their increased sales. If XP does everything Vista does, and better (cool visual interface and stuff too, and with fewer chances of getting sued by the EU because of including the cool/memory hog UI with the OS), then there is no reason to go to Vista except for the trouble of resisting it when you get a new PC with the OS ready.
Vive la resistance!
So maybe next time people will buy the new OS because it is better performing on their hardware and new hardware because it will be better performing with their software, but not on a tight link. If true competition was around, Vista would not have even ever come out in the first place. That's what shows MS's superiority. They can come out with something like Vista, and still be in business as strong as ever!

@ David Clay: There's a reason why Apple's stock is worth nearly 5 times what Microsoft's is. Microsoft is proving with Vista that they've nowhere to go but down, and they're hell bent on it. "Monkey Dance" Ballmer will be holding the reins. They continue to prove that they can only copy, not innovate. Windows still lacks features that were in Mac OS X when XP came out, and Microsoft continues to fail miserably at security. On the other hand, Apple's marketshare continues to increase, with retail stores that are spreading exponentially. BestBuy is expanding their store-within-a-store program to get in on the Mac sales. When Gateway was forced to close their stores because they couldn't profit from peddling Windows PCs in their specialized stores, Apple started opening stores right and left, and they're wildly successful. Every year Macworld overshadows anything said at CES. Despite XP being obsoleted, the vast majority of computers shipped with XP in 2007, not Vista.

Microsoft needs a new OS ASAP, to convince people that there's a reason to buy it, because Vista is a bloated, insecure failure.

@ Karson: You apparently don't understand how Apple is handling Mac OS X. the 10.x versions are not like Service Packs for Windows. Between 10.4 and 10.5, Apple added 300 new features to Mac OS X. Can Microsoft say the same about Vista? Vista obviously doesn't work as well (or as fast) as 10.5 Leopard, even on twice the hardware. 10.5 benchmarks *faster* than 10.4. Vista *is not* faster than XP, even if you have 5 times the hardware. I've seen people toss their new Vista machines in the trash and go back to using their old XP machines, because they don't realize that they could just reinstall the new machine with the old OS.

Between the release of XP and Vista, Apple released *three* new operating systems, each an improvement upon the last, with a *fourth* immediately following Vista.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Mac_OS_X
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Microsoft_Windows

The Vista failure is also furthering Linux, with Ubuntu-installed PCs available through Dell, SuSE preinstalled on Lenovo ThinkPads, and even Linux machines on sale at Wal-Mart. Their marketshare may not compare to Apple's, yet, but given time and the crap that Microsoft's churning out, I wouldn't be surprised if more people continue to switch to Ubuntu when they realize that it's free, it'll work on their current hardware better than Windows does, and every six months, there's a newer/faster/better Ubuntu, which doesn't force them to reboot every time that they do an update, that understands what security is, and that offers a ton of free software, easily installed by clicking a few things in Adept.

Microsoft has too many competitors on too many fronts to keep dropping the ball, and their competitors are either winning (Google, Apple with the iPod, Nintendo), or gaining ground rapidly. I'm not holding my breath, though.

To Abishek - the point is that we pay at least £50/$50/€50 for this stuff everytime we buy a PC and we have no (or very little) choice and what we're being forced to buy is just not of good enough quality - we'd all be complaining loud enough if the govt. slapped a tax of that amount on a new PC

I recently bought the laptop I wanted except for one unwanted feature - Vistuuurgh. So choices were, stick with Vistuuurgh, roll back to XP Pro (not a bad OS in my opinion) or go with something completely new. In the end, I went with openSUSE Linux (tried it and others in VMWare Player first). It is an excellent OS: fast, reliable and actually makes *use* of the new resources rather than just swallowing them. There are some negatives though - drivers are a real pain: WLAN didn't work without some serious investigation and a firmware upgrade, I still haven't got bluetooth working (not that I've tried very hard) and the multiple dependencies when installing an app can be very frustrating.

Overall though, other than times I have no choice, I won't be going back to Windows as my main OS.

40mb just to boot the kernel is TOO MUCH. Linux, BSD, Minux, and others open source OSs can do that with much less resources (eg: Minix can boot at a 386 system with 16mb of ram... and it´s not just a kernel... a full unix-like system! with no graphics, of course).

Mark this words: Windows7 will lauch at 2010 if not 2011. People will adopt it at 2012, 2013... by that time, Syllable and others Open source OSs will be mature enought, less resource hungry and will do everything the user needs. And... windows will loose big part of the market :)

It would be great if Microsoft used an open source os to build the next version of Windows but they would probably steal it and keep everyone else from using it. :(

I was thinking ReactOS - an open source clone of WinNT - but they would probably mess it up.
http://www.reactos.org

In the original article, MinWin was running a kernel, shell, webserver and after bootup there was 7mb left in memory. The 40mb wasn't just the kernel.

ALRIGHT! HELL YEAH!

Man, I can't wait to experience all the NEW, wonderful, exciting, BUGS! OH, I CAN'T FORGET THE NEWER, AWFUL, viruses, also! Can't wait to try the Master Beta, UH, I mean "Official" release!

YEEEEEEEEHAW! I got crabs!

I'm intrigued to see what the next Windows is like. I for one am not in anyone's, Microsoft, Apple, or Linuxes camp. I was running XP Pro on my older home cpu until my hd died Tuesday night. I played with Linux in the past so since I ordered a new 500GB hd online and it won't arrive until Friday I've been running a live CD of Kubuntu. Being able to run an OS straight from memory is definitely a plus which Microsoft can learn from.

However, while I'm using Kubuntu now I'll definitely go back to XP Pro once my new hd arrives. Why? Even though I like the look and feel of Kubuntu I clearly see my hardware is not running optimally. While Linux is definitely leaps and bounds from when I ran Red Hat before they dropped their non-business client lack of official driver support and applications can be a total pain. Sure if I were to build a new system from scratch and ensuring Linux was supported their would likely be better results, but for now my older machine will have to stick with XP.

The reason Kubuntu would be running slowly is because it is running and loading off a CD drive. Not trying to get you to even install Kubuntu on your HD when it comes in, just pointing out that (Running_from_CD < Running_from_HD)

@MordEth You have no idea how stocks work, do you? Stock values have to do with number of shares and the value of the company. Apple is 872.33 million outstanding shares, Microsoft has 9,335 million outstanding shares! You also have no idea what % of PCs in the world are actually using Micosoft operating systems, last I checked Linux based PCs actually accounting for less market share then Windows 98! (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070903-linux-marketshare-set-to-surpass-windows-98.html) Pull your head out, seriously...

I am glad to see they are pushing Windows 7 up. I tried Vista when it was first RTM, thanks to msdn. After playing with it for a couple months I switched to Ubunutu, which is what I now run on my home laptop. For work I run XP until I am forced to switch to Vista for development reasons. At home I will not upgrade my Windows Media Centers PC until I have to. I refuse to pay for Vista Ultimate to get Remote Dekstop and Media Center. I hope MSFT see a lot of the errors in it's ways with Vista and fixes them for Windows 7.

In 2008 I buy a new XP Media Center with SP3.
In 2009 I buy Vienna.
So, what for I would buy a Vista now !!!
I just zap Vista : it is no more !
Its a dead OS ! Finish !
Who really wanted it anyway !
No good is no good !
Good is coming to those who give time to time !

Ok so im running XP sp2 and Ive seen Vista on a friends computer and like mentioned it looks pretty but thats it all flash and no bang.

I think open source OS's are showing more and more potential they just need a little backing and they could really start to shine.

If ms was smart they would try to pick up some of these ppl who make the open sourse os's and put them on the development teams.

I'm not sure if ms is smart for giving up on vista or not given all the ppl who did invest in it but i do support them trying to build a new os as long as they learn from their failures.
I also agree they need to be given p4's and stuff .(though personely it should be less)

They need to build something like XP only in that it shouldnt need a monster computer backing it to wrk.

I personelly will stick with xp pro as it does quite well and it last awhile.(im goin on 5 years:D)

I Will also continue trying out the open sourse os out there as i find some have great promise.

The whole computing model that microsoft builds its business around seems out dated to me. You can't continue to release more of the same these days, you have to innovate and offer new usage modes.

I can see big things happening with online apps that render the choice of operating system redundant. I already use the google suite to negate the fact that I move between many OS environments within one day.

My first work computer was an original 1981 IBM PC. The operating system and whatever program you were running all fit on a 360K floppy. The surprising thing is that all of the programs ran reasonably fast when not reading or writing to the floppy. Everything was very lean and written in Assembly code. I've wondered what modern computers could do with code like that.

I Think you will see the first M3 build on the 27th Oct this year, as this is the first day of the PDC where Microsoft shows its new goods to the developer comminity.

So what do I do with my Vista CDs now? A 64 bit paperweight to use to hold down my Vista stack of performance tweaks while I upgrade to Windows 7.

Anybody who thinks they need to say they aren't a fanboy is definately a fanboy.. We give windows shit because we see what else is out there and then we see what MS does with Windows. The fact that you can't even run most of the software out there on it's own puts the bar squarely in MS court to make a decent fast graphically pretty OS.

Come on MS, you have spent all these years making sure we need you for running mainstream software, now step up to the plate and build a great OS. Don't keep slapping patches on what doesn't work and make.. a.. good.. OS.

If Microsoft would release just a OS, that would be fine. But they will still pack in every application they can think of trying to make the choice for you what programs you will run,

Trying to uninstall that bloat is harder than getting the crap ware off a new computer you buy from Dell or any of the other big manufactures

Mike

you've got to remember that the windows development team has a new lead engineer, and that he's proven to be more competent than the old one while he's worked on Office. that with this new guy in front the windows team was able to put out a complete running version of windows (sans GUI), including the kernel, core OS, and a web server, running on a VPC server limited to 40MB of RAM, with 7MB to spare (meaning the kernel itself is much smaller than 33MB), IS actually an impressive feat. while 40MB is large when compared to a Linux kernel, it's damned smalled when compared to NT kernels from windows 2000 and up.
while I don't think that it will actually show up in the 2nd half of 2009 like they're claiming right now, I don't think that they'll make the huge mistake they did with Vista again. there's absolutely no reason it should take another 5 years for it to be releasable.

i am SOOOO sticking with my XP x64- it's rock solid and doesn't need to get 'better' for my money.
Vista is a failure of catastrophic proportions and Vienna....don't even get me started.

People are very quick to flame both the OS and M$ but have u actually used both OS to compare? Do you realise what a massive feat of engineering building an OS that caters for millions of system configurations is like? Vendors have been reluctant to optimise drivers for 64bit versions of any hardware so blame needs to be attributed there also. I have run vista on my media centre and XP on my desktop for ages and am happy with both. Most of this Vista bashing is industry mistrust of Microshaft and the recycled hate perpetuated in media from sites like this one! Your average end user doesn't care about this, they surf the web, collect e-mail and genuinely ambivelent to anything hardware or software other than it working and what it looks like.