7

As seen here, take a short survey before June 30th 12pm PDT for a chance to win a copy of Windows 7 Ultimate.

The survey link is here.

This one might seem obvious but it actually makes a difference in performance numbers overall. You also avoid the journaling aspect of NTFS that is unneeded with a cache device.

If you dedicate the device to ReadyBoost, you will only have one file on the filesystem, so any slack/waste in the 64K cluster size will be made up from the lack of $MFT reservations.

Also noteworthy but often overlooked, you can multiplex ReadyBoost devices in Windows 7 so you can use multiple ReadyBoost drives if you really want. This helps out XP Mode on memory starved machines quite a bit.

If you are looking for a Windows 7 compatible version of the Turbo Memory driver from Intel, use version 1.10.0.1003 or higher. You can find a version of this on Station Driver's page here. I don't believe these have reached Intel's page yet, even though they are WHQL signed. The interesting side effect is that the new driver will enable ReadyBoost on the Turbo Ram without assigning a drive letter or file system to it. Pretty cool.

I discovered this one by accident when trying to use Mobility Modder to update an older laptop running Windows 7 to run the latest Catalyst drivers. Unfortunately, you can install the new drivers but they will refuse to load with a cryptic "Driver reported a problem." message.

Wonder which graphics cards (desktop, mobile and AIW) should use Catalyst 9.3 with for now?
Radeon 9500, 9550, 9600, 9700, and 9800 Series
Radeon Xpress, X300, X550, X600, X700, X800, X850, X1050, X1200, X1250 X1300, X1550, X1600, X1650, X1800, X1900, and X2100 Series

Unfortunately, that is a pretty sizable group of graphics cards that came out not too long ago.

You can read more about it here.

In order to use the Microsoft Touch Pack for Windows 7 – you’ll need a Windows 7 PC that supports multi-touch. The Microsoft Touch Pack for Windows 7 will be available to PC makers (OEMs) who will have the option to pre-install some, none, or all of the applications available in the Microsoft Touch Pack for Windows 7 on PCs designed for Windows Touch (PCs that meet the logo requirements for Windows Touch) – so you should start to see these applications showing up on some touch PCs around the time Windows 7 is made broadly available. After general availability of Windows 7, we will look at making the Microsoft Touch Pack for Windows 7 even more broadly available based on feedback from customers and partners.

Read more about it here.

There have been cases where the wireless chipset on Thinkpads have been disabled even though the hardware switch for wireless had been switched on. Before v12.4 of Intel's wireless drivers, there really wasn't a consistent way to re-enable the wireless radio inside the operating system.

If you only install the updated drivers for the Intel wireless chipset, you won't get the 'On/Off' functionality.



You need to install the 'MyWifi' aka 'Software mode Wireless AP' even if you don't plan on using that feature.



A nice side effect of the new My Wifi option is that there is a Wireless On/Off available from your taskbar.

If you are having trouble enabling the Bluetooth radio even though the hardware switch is 'On', you can use the workaround I detailed here.

A nice side note: The newer versions of the Intel Matrix Storage Manager and Intel Turbo Memory Panel seem to have support for Windows 7 out of the box. You no longer have to 'fool' the installers by saying that you are running Windows Vista.

I still get the CPU pegged from time to time from the Intel Application Pinning service, which is fixed with a simple service restart. It is as if the service is stuck inside a kernel mode loop. I still haven't been able to get the Turbo Ram (non-user pinning mode) to stay consistently enabled across reboots. I always end up with a 1.37GB partition that doesn't have a drive letter and isn't enabled for ReadyBoost, from what I can tell.

I'll be one of the few non-Microsofties helping out at the Windows 7 Springboard booth all week long. I may escape from time to time to see other sessions but overall I will be there to answer questions about Windows 7 and anything else that might be of interest to people.

I've never actually been to TechEd before, so for me to be a part of it for my first time is a bit of a daunting task, but I am excited!

I seem to be bouncing from coast to coast for the month of May, but it all will be worthwhile!

This is one of my favorite new features of Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2. Replace VPN in your enterprise with DirectAccess but still enjoy multi-factor authentication.

Wondering how to set it up to try it out? Download the step by step guide!

The official description:
This paper contains an introduction to DirectAccess and instructions for setting up a test lab to demonstrate DirectAccess with a simulated Internet, intranet, and home network.

DirectAccess is a new feature in the Windows® 7 and Windows Server® 2008 R2 operating systems that enables remote users to securely access intranet shares, Web sites, and applications without connecting to a virtual private network (VPN). This paper contains an introduction to DirectAccess and instructions for setting up a test lab to demonstrate DirectAccess with a simulated Internet, intranet, and home network using the Release Candidate versions of Windows 7 and Window Server 2008 R2.

TechNet and MSDN subscribers had it first. People on BitTorrent thought they had it before them, but the checksums/images are different.

Now, you can download the Windows 7 RC build from the Microsoft sites without a TechNet or MSDN subscription here.

Beta exam 71-680: TS: Windows 7, Configuring
Registration begins: April 27, 2009

71-680: TS: Windows 7, Configuring counts as credit towards the following certification: MCTS: Windows 7, Configuration

Registration begins: April 27, 2009
Beta exam period runs: May 5, 2009 – May 18, 2009

Prometric: http://www.register.prometric.com/ClientInformation.asp

Please use the following promotional code when registering for the exam: WIN7J

Read more about it here.

This is a relatively new blog site and has a lot of great information about drivers and applications for EVDO/UTMS/3G adapters in Windows 7. Having a hard time getting proper support from Sprint/Verizon/AT&T/HP/Dell/etc? Go to this site first!

And on an even better note, there are actions underway to do away with most of the 3rd party connection software tools that seem to be the root cause of most of the Windows 7 connection issues.

The following manufacturers are on board: Acer, Asus, Birdstep Technology, Dell, Ericsson, HP, Fujitsu Siemens Computers, Huawei Communications Technologies, Option, Qualcomm, Sierra Wireless, Smith Micro, T-Mobile International, and ZTE.

You can read more about this announcement here.

Thanks go out to Patrick Elliot for the heads up on both links.

An old coworker/friend IM'd me out of the blue today asking me how I ended up on the Community Spotlight for Windows 7.. and I had no idea what he was talking about until he sent me the link. Check it out! Very cool! I am honored and humbled to be on the same page as Mark Russinovich.

OEMs have a habit of not letting AMD/ATI release updated drivers specifically for the mobility chipsets, which is particularly unfortunate when you want to be cutting edge with the latest operating system releases. On a good note, the Mobility Modder has been updated to support the Radeon Catalyst 9.2 and 9.3 releases here.

There is also an ongoing discussion on the forums related to Windows 7 support for Catalyst 9.3 of the Mobility Modder. From what I gather so far, is that the tool patches the .MSIs correctly but adds the .INF entries for the previously unsupported chipsets improperly.

Assuming you extracted the ATI drivers to the default location (%HOMEDRIVE%\ATI\SUPPORT\*):

For W7 x64: Run Mobility Modder (the beta mentioned above, not the one from the Download page) on the uncompressed drivers. Search for [ATI.Mfg.NTamd64.6.0] inside %HOMEDRIVE%\SUPPORT\[ATI version]\Driver\Packages\Drivers\Display\LH6A_INF\C7_77072.inf and %HOMEDRIVE%\SUPPORT\[ATI version]\Driver\Packages\Drivers\Display\LH6A_INF\CH_76829.inf, and change all instances to [ATI.Mfg.NTamd64.6.1].

For W7 x86: Run Mobility Modder (the beta mentioned above, not the one from the Download page) on the uncompressed drivers. Search for [ATI.Mfg.NTx86.6.0] inside %HOMEDRIVE%\SUPPORT\[ATI version]\Driver\Packages\Drivers\Display\LH_INF\CL_76828.inf and %HOMEDRIVE%\SUPPORT\[ATI version]\Driver\Packages\Drivers\Display\LH_INF\CW_77071.inf, and change all instances to [ATI.Mfg.NTx86.6.1].

If you are confused by the .INF editing, I've saved my x64 .inf and x86 .inf files. Extract them into the directories mentioned above and allow the originals to be overwritten.

Rerun the ATI setup program and it should offer to upgrade your graphics driver as long as it is one of the supported chipsets. If that doesn't work, you can always try to manually upgrade the driver from inside Device Manager and manually browse to the directory where the .INF files are stored.

Keep in mind - all of this is completely "unsupported" by ATI/AMD and myself, so if you break something, you get to hold both pieces.

I'm mostly posting this to gain feedback whether or not this issue is limited to newer builds of Windows 7 and/or specific to Thinkpads. The behavior is that the internal Bluetooth disappears on post build 7000 of Windows 7, as if you've switched off Bluetooth with the hardware switch.

The workaround I've used and recommended to others so far is to download TPFanControl (and donate), and toggle the Bluetooth hardware directly from inside the TPFanControl GUI.

This is how it looks on my system:


Once toggled, W7 should detect new hardware and your Bluetooth should be detected. It is as if the BIOS/hardware settings are getting mistakenly turned off at some point.

If you perform an upgrade (instead of a clean install) to Windows 7 build 7057, and find yourself facing the error code of 8e5e0645, it can be fixed pretty easily.
Exit out of WLM and delete the %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Live Contacts folder. Simple enough, correct? Unfortunately, I found this out after uninstalling and reinstalling all the Live applications and deleting any WLM related directory in my profile. Little by little, it ended up getting narrowed down to that directory by itself.

For some reason, I've also noticed that Desktop.ini files seem to be sprinkled across the drive when I previously "banned" them from the local drive. A quick cd /D C:\ && del /s desktop.ini fixed that problem. Only do this if you don't care about desktop.ini files, post-upgrade.

Update: Looks like someone beat me to it, and had the same issue and blogged about it too, with regards to WLM. Ditto on the desktop.ini issue. Must be common.

As always, I recommend clean installs, but sometimes I try out the upgrade process to see what breaks.

Last month, while I was at the Exchange 14 airlift, Mark R. and friends held another Springboard virtual roundtable. This time, the focus was on Windows 7. You can see an archived version of the video here and you can also check out the questions and answers that they couldn't get to during the show here.