Can someone please send me the download link.
luke.mac1@gmail.com

Thanks,

Luke

To view the new Windows Vista Community check out

http://www.orkut.com/Community.aspx?cmm=3827354

CAN'T WAIT!!!

Can't wait!!!!!

Things are becoming more clear, thanks to a suddenly open and communicative Microsoft,is Longhorn now dead? I look forward to the new Vista shame about the name, they should have kept "Longhorn" as I have followed this for over 3 years and can't wait for the new O/S with all the developments made by the Longhorn guys during this time and credit to them. :)

To rancher1:

Longhorn was just a codename. For all Microsot products, they use codenames until they finda public name to use. The code name for Windows XP was Whistler.

Longhorn *IS* Vista. They are the same project.

having heard about all the prettiness of Windows Vista/Longhorn, I installed the beta, only to be confronted by a butt-ugly UI with no transparancies or funky effects whatsoever, and I can't find any documentation on the issue whatsoever - I have an up-to-date machine with a GF6600 videocard, so I don't understand why there is no mention of the lack of pretties anywhere :(

UTAKER, basicjr and geniusinsandals, unfortunately vista is only available for download to Microsoft Partners and MSDN subscribers.

However, it won't be long before it is leaked to p2p networks if it hasn't already

What are the minimum hardware requirements?

Well, I just installed Vista and it is a lot better than the last build for longhorn. seems to run stable so far. very good for beta 1

Something that came as a bit of a surprise is that ie7 now has a built in search bar, but what surprised me is the easily accesible way you can set your default search engine for it. I'd have though MS would have wanted to make it a bit more difficult in order to get more exposure for the new msn search

Hi Vista sounds good but where can I get a copy from?? I have Longhorn already Thanks for your help if you can.
Billy

May I know, How and where can i get a copy of the Windows Vista Beta?

I'm a linux user because I'm all about customizing my computer and I'm all about effects. I have to admit I'm very impressed with that interface. I just wish that they could make it use up less cpu. You think about it... I can run Fedora Core 3 on a 1ghz system with just as many effects as a 2.4 ghz windows xp system and it will run faster. It's a shame. They should cut down on useless services. The less services they have the less cpu it utilizes the less possible security holes. I mean if Mircosoft would at least try to take some ideas from some other operating systems they would have an excellent platform going on.

If you do not like certain services running then you always have the ability to disable them I am sure. Yes, it can be bloating and make excessive use of the computers resources. That's where tweaking Windows comes in.

A note to Kramy:

You sound like a sensible power
user tired of GUI eye-candy getting
in the way of productivity and
speed.

If you want immensely powerful file
searches, renaming, moving, macros,
and other GUI- and Registry-free
file management operations, get:

http://www.ztree.com/html/news.htm

Looks interesting, but part of the reason I can do many things so fast(aside from installing stuff) is that I've modded right-click menus on files. I've added quite a few programs to the "Send To" menu(file analysers, hex editors, metapad, etc.), and cascaded menus for various file formats to open in different programs.

It works quite quickly, since I can use the run box to quickly find any directory on my computer, and then just right-click a file and open in my program of choice.

It does look neat though - but I'm not sure I want to pay that much money when what I'm currently doing in Win2k works very well for me. I'll keep the link and see how "Vista" really is.

Your approach is what I've been doing for years -- but your tweaks are limited to your own PCs, right?

What if you have to visit/work on 10's of 95/98/2K/XP machines that you can't customize? You are back to the old, slow, vanilla interface(s).

ZTree travels with you on a floppy/USB key/CD/network with all your tools, scripts, keyboard macros and customizations. You have your own UI working everywhere you go and no longer have to worry about the latest skins/icons/themes that disrupt work for *power* users every few years (no matter how aesthetically pleasing they may be).

If you don't consider yourself an advanced PC user, don't even bother with ZTree -- there is a learning curve to climb for regular mouse-clickers :-)

http://vujnovic.free.fr/ztw/index.html

It looks much better than Mac OS X because it is a rip off of Mac OS X. The graphics are great but it reminds me of apple’s. Hopefully it will run without many problems unlike previous releases. Can’t wait to run it on an Intel-MAC machine :P

Which part exactly is a rip off? Please be specific. I don't see anything similar with Mac OS X when it comes to GUI theming and design. Looks completely different. If you were referring to the search bar on the toolbar, yea that may be and the way you organise files etc but the GUI look/theme has nothing to do with a rip off. Not even close.

Lots of the icons are identical, and the text font is exactly the same as OS X. Rip. :P

It looks alright. I like it, it's much better then XP, my opinion better then MacOS X. Too much white, too much bright colors hurts my eyes. This instead is soft to your eyes. However, I don't like the Window Control Buttons. I think the Whistler version of Windows had better control buttons then this one.

Nice interface shots. My particular favorite has to be the one showing the Control Panel. Very neat and clean control center appeal. I can't wait to see what intuitive and eye candy experiments people come up with with the new user interface/scripting capabilities when this thing goes officially public and final.

And now for a long, semi-useless post.

----- + ----- + ----- + ----- + ----- + ----- + -----

Processor: 1.8ghz AMD 2000+
RAM: 512mb Samsung PC2700
HD: 120gb 7200RPM Seagate
OS: Win2k PRO Sp4

Programs to install:
DirectX 9.0c
AVG
Keiro
Spybot S&D
Ad-Aware
CCleaner
Tweaknow Regcleaner
Registry Mechanic
Sun Java 1.5.0_4
7-Zip
Foxit Reader
PDF Creator 0.81
Dosbox
Azureus
PSP 5
ffdshow
GTK + MPlayer
Mozilla 1.7.8
Asus Smartdoctor
miniDNS
CPU-Z
Driver Cleaner Pro
frhed
Netbeans + JDK
Aquamark3
3Dmark2000
3Dmark2001SE
3Dmark03
3Dmark05
PCmark02
PCmark04
HDTune
Prime95
RivaTuner

Number of programs without startmenu shortcuts: 0
Number of programs under "Start -> Programs": 0
Number of programs installed in default location: 0
Total Install time: 15 minutes.

----- + ----- + ----- + ----- + ----- + ----- + -----

Do that with your new interface! :P

I think the new look is terrific. Can't wait to get my hands on the final.

Whilst most users dont like change, I embrace change with an open mind. The Aero interface was designed for a reason and it wasnt to designed to make things worse.

If users could get with the times and understand that the changes have a purpose they would be much better off. The old windows shell dating back to 95 is cumbersome, annoying & restricted. The New aero seems to be very slick and managable, also it appears to be most efficient and timesaving.

Also note aero would be half wasted for users who prefer to maximize every window. The concept of maximizing windows defeats the purpose of windows as it is a window!

I'd suggest the negative people out there learn to use the windows shell how it was designed to be used and stop being such idiots when it comes to change for the better of computing.

You are making the betanews community look stupid.

I like maximizing stuff. If it can't be maximized, I usually uninstall it or rarely use it. I can deal much better with 40 open windows all maximized than I can with a Mac with windows overlapping. I guess it's just my mind, since I seem to remember the positions of every single window I open, and am easily able to find them in the taskbar, despite them being 32x32 boxes labled "..."

That's part of the reason I dislike XP, btw - it keeps moving windows around in the taskbar.

Edit: The number one comment I get from people(in real life) is that they don't know wth I am doing, since I use tons and tons of hotkeys where it can speed something up by half a second.

Smart Folders will change your life. In Apple mail I use them to create folders for friends, business, etc and the mail goes to the right folder based on the group that I assigned them to in Address Book. Who knows if this will have that level of integration.

So far all I'm seeing is a facelift and a feature that OS X has today..

I want a simple start menu. The "Programs" section of my start menu has two folders(Accessories, Startup) which I would move if I could, and delete "Programs" from the start menu if possible.

I like the searchbox though. I almost exclusively use the run box to navigate folders in my computer.

Edit: Virtual folders are bad(for me). I don't like extra features that create overhead and bloat, if I don't have the option to completely disable them. All I want for a search is a simple search records three things about every file on my computer: Name, Extension, Size

My ideal search would accept commands like "ski *.jpg" to find any jpegs that have "ski" in them. Simple, fast, no bloat. That's what I want, that's what I'll never get.

Virtual folder and tagging are very good features to organize your informations. Look here and you may find how it is usefull

http://www.pcmag.com/sli...amp;po=1&i=1,00.asp

Can't wait for it.

Yeh...looks like I'll be switching that straight to "Classic" desktop.

"My ideal search would accept commands like "ski *.jpg" to find any jpegs that have "ski" in them. Simple, fast, no bloat. That's what I want, that's what I'll never get."

Actually, even in XP you can enable the Win2K version of search (simple). Hopefully they will support any and all old things like the Win2K style search among others.

Honestly, i thought they couldnt make the OS look any uglier than in XP, i was wrong. Classic for me as well.

Unfortunately, Win2k and WinXP searches bring up all the separate names together. So for example, that "ski *.jpg" will bring up anything with "ski" in it, but it also considers "*.jpg" separate, and brings up every single ".jpg" file. Ideally a search program would consider the extension linked to the other search terms, for example "ski camp holiday *.jpg" bringing up .jpg files with any of those 3 keywords in them.

Another thing I dislike is Microsoft's indexing service malfunctions on my computer, so is completely useless for searching. I'd be much happier with a program that has a "Rebuild Database" button that brute-force checks every single file on your computer and adds it to a database when you tell it to(much like an antivirus scan....except faster and easier to code). That way when I'm leaving my computer for a few min, I can quickly tell it to start building a DB of 90gb of data.

I've found most search programs out there are designed to make searching "simple" and "efficient", yet I _NEVER_ have to use searching to find anything of mine(I use massive hierarchies of folders).

About the only time I use searching is to find something of my Parents', finding windows crap, or looking inside files(for example to manually move email from one partition to another when swapping harddrives or transfering data from one computer to another).

they did a great job of copying the look of OS x

well os x copied a few thing from the early longhorn builds before its release so whouldnt they.