Windows 7: Download It if You Dare
By Harry McCracken | Friday, January 9, 2009 at 9:08 am
[UPDATE 5/4/2009: If you came across this looking for the Windows 7 Release Candidate, check out this post.]
[UPDATE: So much for Ballmer’s big announcement. Microsoft has pulled the public Windows 7 beta and says it’ll try again tomorrow.]
As Steve Ballmer announced it would at his CES keynote on Wednesday, Microsoft has made a beta version of Windows 7 available for free download by anyone who wants it. Here it is. As Microsoft says, you shouldn’t install this on your primary PC, or at least not over your primary current Windows installation: For one thing, the beta will time out on August 1st, requiring you to reinstall a copy of Windows over it. But if you’ve got a spare PC or spare disk partition, there’s no better way to satisfy your curiosity about W7 than to start using it.
If you do give it a whirl, I’d love to hear what you think (here’s my pretty favorable take on the earlier preview version). Once I get back from CES, I’ll try out the new beta and let you know how I think the OS is shaping up…
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Windows 7 - Finally « Roo-minations Says:
January 10th, 2009 at 1:22 pm[…] I did this before 2.5M other people did. So I got a good key. Then I went over to Technologizer to see where the downloads for the ISO were hosted. It’s important that you get a file that […]
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January 17th, 2009 at 4:13 pm[…] Windows 7: Download It if You Dare [UPDATE: So much for Ballmer’s big announcement. Microsoft has pulled the public Windows 7 beta and says it’ll try […] […]
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Want the Windows 7 Beta? Act Fast! | Technologizer Says:
January 24th, 2009 at 11:34 am[…] all: Quickies Microsoft was planning to pull the public beta of Windows 7 off its site today. Based on popular demand, it’s decided to extend availability–but […]
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December 16th, 2009 at 1:19 am[…] Windows 7: Download It if You Dare: I briefly note that the public beta of Microsoft’s OS is […]
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January 9th, 2009 at 9:23 am
Download is up: http://arstechnica.com/journals/microsoft.ars/2009/01/09/windows-7-public-beta-is-available-now
January 9th, 2009 at 10:01 am
austin, it’s up but after I went through all of the email verifications and such the very last screen (the screen that i assume I would have gotten the serial number) was an error saying the site was down. All i need is the serial, because I already downloaded the ISO. I hope it gets fixed because my partition is all set.
January 9th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
The link now says Windows® 7 Beta coming soon!
January 9th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
It’s pretty bad when all the headlines I read for this beta release include the words “if you dare.” That sure is a ringing disapproval.
January 9th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
microsoft crashed, like mozilla did at the release of firefox3, (not a trillion dollar corporation) mozilla said “keep trying”, (a trillion dollar corporation) microsoft said “pull the plug”
January 9th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
I’m wondering whether to make the jump from Vista 32 to Windows7 64 – any suggestions? it’s a HP laptop.
January 9th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
what happens after august 1 2009 will it still be effective
windows 7 i mean
January 10th, 2009 at 10:39 am
Probably the best moves involve reversion:
1. NT 4
2. Windows 2000
3. Windows XP Professional
Microsoft makes operating systems the same way China manufactures pet food.
January 10th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
The WHY starts now ….
January 10th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
No thank you. I shall remain faithful to Firefox and in the event I can no longer use it (heaven forbid) Konqueror 4, Safari 3.1, Opera 9.5[13], Firefox 3, Amaya 10, Flock 2.0, Google Chrome 1.0, BrowseHappy, SeaMonkey, or Pencil and paper? get my vote before IE. 🙂
January 10th, 2009 at 11:38 pm
Ewww, why would anyone want Windows in the first place?
Get a Mac, they just work.
January 17th, 2009 at 8:37 am
KEVINS comments are so typical of condescending, geeky MAC users. “Get a MAC” – the percentage of people using MACS hardly fits one digit – they’re the guys that excel at PONG and who cry at PC world because there isn’t any software for them to use! There’s a reason why most people use Windows and NOT Macs.
Well, I just downloaded Windows 7 beta, put it on an old-ish machine that never worked that well in XP never mind Vista.. and I’m blown away. The user interface is VASTLY better than anything they’ve done before, Media Centre is much, much better and somehow all of my movies “look” cleaner. I can’t describe it except to say they seem to have blurred out the pixelation – the result, the whole thing just looks better. For a first public beta this rocks!
January 19th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
LOL “Get a Mac” – I got one 7 years ago, and switched back to a PC after a year. PAYING for Java updates, the latest Safari wouldn’t work without buying a new OS. Each new OS has more and more useless eye candy that couldn’t be switched off.
Overpriced hardware for people who just want to look “cool” in coffee shops.
I don’t miss anything from the Mac except spring loaded folders. Everything else Windows and Linux does better.
January 20th, 2009 at 3:43 am
I’ve installed it on my System where i used to run vist ultimate x64 and i was positively surprised by the new boot time. It’s fast, as fast as XP i dare say but looks outstanding. Vista realy is a joke compared to Windoes 7 beta. From what i have done on the beta so fare everything succeeded on Windows 7 as expected. the only software i could not install was daemon-tools. They don’t seem to plan a working version for the beta thow. The cool thing after installing was that it identified every single component in my pc. Which was not the case in vista or xp. My pc is self assembled so i probably have some unusual components.
February 18th, 2009 at 4:01 pm
# Kevin Says:
January 10th, 2009 at 11:38 pm
Ewww, why would anyone want Windows in the first place?
Get a Mac, they just work.
Why are you here anyway? Aren't you a mac user?
March 4th, 2009 at 4:44 am
hey guys never mind mac users, they just want to show off. i think windows 7 is good, and we can depend on it
March 9th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Microsoft pulled the download off there site, have to find someone that has it already or another download site.
March 15th, 2009 at 10:39 am
windows 7 is a pretty cool o.s… very popular. personal 2me it was kinda a way of microsoft sayin that it can have the stlyish features and useless software that mac users have… if u dont have windows i say get it and go 4 it.. if u want to get it go to pirate bay and get the torrent… it might take a couple of hours dependin on how many peers are on
April 23rd, 2009 at 8:01 pm
Windos 7 is the most cool/glamours OS of the OS’s.
April 26th, 2009 at 6:55 am
What’s going on dudes n duds
April 26th, 2009 at 8:32 am
Can’t you just uninstall it in the updates list like ie8
May 1st, 2009 at 8:58 am
windows 7 rocks. installed it on hp 2.2 athlon amd 64. runs like a champ. fast. everything works fine. no problem with drivers. have run it since it first came out. have iso and key. will see what happens august 1.have it installed on seperate drive.just hook it up when i want to use it,which is almost all the time. love it
May 7th, 2009 at 11:24 am
gpB44X comment1 ,
May 25th, 2009 at 5:25 am
where can i get windows 7 operating system?
November 19th, 2009 at 3:37 am
heloooooooooooooooooooo
November 19th, 2009 at 3:44 am
i wanna download thes windows now