App Store

The App Store, what an awesome concept. Thousands of apps that you can download to your iPhone or iPod Touch, some for free and others at a price. Like I said an awesome concept, but how well does it really work? In my experience it works really well, you get amazing apps. Apps that you will use just once, that you download for the fun and then apps that you will use every day. There is an App for almost anything, you can search the web for Apps, get what you want, it connects to iTunes and downloads the App for you... Or does it? If that App is in your region then you are ok, but if that App is not in your region, well then you won't get that App. Once your iPhone or iPod Touch is registered in a specific location you are stuck in that location. You cannot register in another location, or migrate to another location without losing all your Apps. This really sucks as these devices should be boundary less. Yes there are Apps that will are location specific, but not the apps the amount that I've come across. This is really a letdown. It's like owning your own car, BUT you are only allowed to drive it in your own backyard, kind of pointless really...

Windows 7

So... I'm not always one of the first people to install Microsoft products, especially in Beta form. I also don’t like the fact that you have to pay huge amounts of money to use their software, that is at the best of times, not the most stable or quickest software. I mean it has more bugs than the insect farm at the local zoo, BSOD's popping up out of the blue, making even the local IT guy scream, but could this be the Lady Bug from Microsoft. The one that does not make you scream or run away and hide, but rather makes you want to play with it, use it and smile...

So let's find out! I registered and downloaded the beta as the thread's that I read on the web and the comments from friends was out of this world, for Windows in any case. Installation was really quick and I had no problems with the normal drivers, it was all installed, bar my internal HSDPA card, but that was to be expected. The user interface is different in a good way, I like the way the taskbar works, just icons that are stacked with a preview option when you hover over it. The new Network connection icon in taskbar also has better functionality, you can connect to your Broadband connections with fewer clicks and screens. All the software that I used in Vista works on "7", but that is a given as "7" is a leaner, cleaner and meaner Vista, almost a dream Vista. In terms of performance "7" is a lot better, not as resource intensive as Vista, boot times are quicker, memory allocation and management is also better, I have not suffered from any slow response from any of the apps I use, and sometimes a few of them run at the same time, or all of them at once.

Well I still need to play a bit more with "7" to really feel comfortable with it and make it my OS in the long run, but so far, if first impressions are anything to go by, then "7" could be the way to go...