Are Windows 7 Testers Going Unheard?

nandemoari writes "Windows 7 beta testers are disputing whether or not Microsoft is taking notice of their feedback. The dispute follows a blog post by Steven Sinofsky, the man in charge of engineering Windows 7. He notes that in one week in January Microsoft received data through Windows 7's automatic feedback system every 15 seconds. According to Sinofsky, it's impossible to keep everyone happy. That's partly because there are only so many changes Microsoft can make to the system and still finish it, and partly because in many cases testers often have opposing views about a feature."

Major usability issues

[Enderandrew]

How about the litany of major usability issues that Windows has had for years that MS wants to constantly ignore? Especially given that Gates has sent memos out criticizing the Windows team, and they still don't address these issues.

Usability took a big step backwards with Vista, and most of those issues haven't been addressed in 7.

I'm not sure they were will. Is 7 better than Vista? Yes. Is 7 better for enterprise users when paired with Server 2008? Certainly. Is 7 better than XP for Home users? Not really. Don't believe the hype.

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[account_deleted]

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Re:publicity stunt

[clang_jangle]

They really can't afford for Windows 7 to get the same public backlash that Vista got.

Haven't you noticed the stepped up astroturfing? They've about got it covered.

Re:Opposing views...

[ricebowl]

Users: No drm!
RIAA/MPAA: drm!

I'm not sure why you've been modded Troll, unless maybe you were felt to have lacked a point, but I only wish that most users were sufficiently interested and educated as to be aware of the DRM. Or the impact that it has on their machines, or its usability.

Re:Cunning stunt

[Anonymous Coward]

What's so funny about master debt eaters?

Re:FTFA: 2000 bugs fixed

[Stickney]

I only wish Linux had numbers like this. For all the hours I've spent building ndiswrapper or ATI display drivers on any number of boxes... I don't even have that much weird hardware, but Linux printing support is way behind, 3D display is way behind, sound support is sometimes flawless and sometimes nonexistent.

Not that I'm about to use Windows, but it would be nice.

Re:publicity stunt

[Tom]

They really can't afford for Windows 7 to get the same public backlash that Vista got.

And yet, it will. News are made today, not reported, and the media found out with Vista that "new OS by redmond monopolist sucks" makes for more headlines, better headlines, over a longer time period, than "next windos version exactly as expected".

The media will eat them, because they're sharks and they can smell blood.

Re:Unheard?

[nabsltd]

You don't need DRM in the OS to watch BluRay, DVDs, or any other DRM-protected content.

XP can't play back DVDs at all without a non-Microsoft piece of software added, yet once you add that software, DVD playback works fine. Same with Apple FairPlay (iTunes Music Store), Audible.com .aa files, etc.

There is no reason that Vista (or Windows 7, 8, 9, or 42) could not be designed the same way.

Re:Vista is good. But there's a bigger problem.

[jebrew]

As a long time Windows user, this is the reason I've got xubuntu on my laptop. I'm still having trouble navigating everything, and I don't understand a lot of it, but my experience with XP's activation and the issues I've had with trying the 7 beta have thoroughly convinced me that Microsoft is attempting to commit some bizarre music industry like suicide by choking off legitimate customers.

Pirates will ALWAYS break your security, please stop punishing paying customers for it.

Re:FTFA: 2000 bugs fixed

[rantingkitten]

Yeah, sure, drivers. I heard that with XP. I heard that with Vista. Every single cherry install of XP or Vista I've ever done, without exception, has failed to load ethernet, wireless, video, or soundcard drivers. Every. Single. One.

That's especially great when you check under Device Manager and see five or six "unknown devices" and Windows helpfully offers to search online for the drivers. Thanks, jackasses.

Meanwhile, I have to use a second computer to not only find out what hardware this thing has by looking up specs -- cause Windows sure as hell ain't gonna tell you -- but go to each individual manufacturer's website, click through search opens, and hopefully come out on the other side with a couple of executable driver installers, each and every single one of which will want to install a horseshit systray thing to hog memory, extraneous entries in the program menus, a few desktop icons, and various other party favors.

Even when the drivers install, they don't work half the time. I just got done fighting with some Brother printer driver one of the marketing girls installed on her machine, actually -- after I had to manually point it at the driver files it just finished installing, it took me half an hour of screwing around to get it to even *see* the printer. Ready for the desktop!

Meanwhile, with Ubuntu, the biggest driver headache I've ever had was back in the Dapper Drake days where I had to wrap the Windows drivers for a Broadcom wireless card. That hasn't even been an issue since 7.04 as far as I know -- at most you click "enable restricted drivers" and away you go. The aforementioned Brother printer worked immediately when I plugged it into my Ubuntu machine, by the way.

Microsoft bragging about driver support is laughable not only for the fact that their hardware and driver support effing sucks, but unlike Linux, Microsoft can't even use the vendors-aren't-supporting-us excuse.

Finally:

The remaining devices were almost all served by downloading drivers from Windows Update

Has anyone, in the history of humanity, ever gotten that to work? I don't mean the part where it connects to some anonymous server in Redmond and sends them god-knows-what information -- I mean, has anyone actually come out on the other end of that process with a driver? In fifteen years I haven't seen it happen even once, and I don't think I've ever heard of it happening.

all drivers included, "almost all" could be downoaded easily. No matter what you think of Microsoft, that information is pretty much astonishing.

It'd be astonishing if it were true, but somehow I doubt reality is anything close to this. Your quote comes from the pen of Steven Sinofsky, the guy in charge of Windows 7 engineering, and like every other claim Microsoft makes about how great their OS will be this time, it's just as much BS now as it was every other time we've heard it.

Re:Major usability issues

[SanityInAnarchy]

But I have to choose between Windows and playing all games.

I don't.

All I really have to do is be careful which MMOs and casual games I pick up. If I'm playing a game in a window, I'd like my IM working, and I wouldn't mind email, too -- and those are two things I don't do on Windows.

But, if I'm playing something like Natural Selection or a Half Life episode, I'm not likely to want any distractions outside of the game itself.

And by the way: Yes, they work on Linux, at a lower framerate and considerably more hassle than occasionally booting Windows. It's not just about framerate, either -- on Windows, I can play them fullscreen, 1920x1200, with most of the effects enabled. And that's on a laptop.

Oh, and there's the 64-bit problem. Sure, I'm on XP now, but if I ever do upgrade to a decent 64-bit Windows, quite a few games support it now. Wine doesn't, and it doesn't look like it's coming anytime soon.

Now, stuff that really works well on Wine, I'll play. For example, Warcraft 3 installed easily, runs fullscreen with all effects enabled, with no noticeable disadvantage to playing on Windows.

Re:Vista is good. But there's a bigger problem.

[drsmithy]

The licensing model of Vista (and Win7) is like dongle, only worse: it's a dongle with an expiry date. It penalizes the customer. If I buy an authentication key, *I* should be the one to say on which computer I install it. I shouldn't have to call Redmond for permission if I change computers.

1. It's no different to XP, which everyone seems to now hold up as some sort of gold standard.
2. It's still streets ahead of OS X, and OS X's licensing doesn't seem to have slowed it down too much.

Interesting

[SpitfireSMS]

As a 7 beta tester who has posted multiple feedback, and actually had replies, I have to say they are at least trying.

I believe they sort through them to find the people that might actually have a good idea of whats going on, and act upon those because they actaully have somewhere to start and head toward.

If you want to be heard, leave a good analysis of whats going on and maybe some suggestions as well.
They arent just going to hire people to go through these and analyze the 12 different bugs that 12,000 people are complaining about.

To me at least, it appears they are trying.

Re:Vista is good. But there's a bigger problem.

[craiglarry]

Try this one. For several years I've used winxp and changed hardware and so forth and had no need to revalidate until two weeks ago. This is all on the same computer. Now I've had some problems and needed to reinstall. Three times and every time I not only need to validate it over and over but I must talk to the nice MS agent and beg him to OK my install. First it tells me I've installed the OS "TOO MANY TIMES" Then it tells me I've installed on another computer. Nothing they say applies to my situation, and they tell me they know my prod code is good. They don't know why it rejects me. They give me new install id and tell me they can't help me. If I need to reinstall I will have to do this again. That's just good ole MS, isn't it? I already have ubuntu 8.10 installed.