While this isn’t really a gadget, per se, I’m really loving Windows 7.  I now have it installed on 5 different machines, all serving different purposes, and it’s really shining in every role I can throw at it.

Main Desktop

My main desktop machine, where I do most of my gaming and just general personal computing, was the first machine that I migrated to the Windows 7 Beta.  I had some issues with video card drivers at first, but that was quickly resolved.  Other than occasional video weirdness, which I think may actually be hardware related, it performs wonderfully.  I haven’t had any problems with games that would’t play or performance or anything.

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First, let me say I’m disappointed in myself for not posting before now. Life’s been kind of crazy for the last couple of weeks and I just have not had the opportunity. I’ll be posting photos and some of my thoughts on CES in the next few days.

Right now, I’m in the middle of changing my media center PC over to Windows 7. It’s interesting, running into some compatibility issues here and there with some of the third party software I use, but so far pretty good! I already made the switch to Windows 7 on my desktop PC, and I’m loving it! I’ll write up a post about that and my new hardware goodie that I bought when I did the upgrade in the next few days as well.

I’ve been reading through some of the threads on The Green Button about the Windows Media Center included in the forthcoming Windows 7 and it’s starting to get me really excited.  From what I understand, they’ve done some really cool things with the interface to really polish it up.  The interface on Vista Media Center was already pretty cool, but it sounds like they’ve done some “fit and finish” type upgrades to it for Windows 7.

There are some screenshots of the interface on The Media Center Blog.  They’re kind of small but they give you an idea of what the interface looks like.

I admit that some of the features I’m looking forward to are already available in the TV Pack.  However, I haven’t taken the time to figure out how to install the TV Pack, as it doesn’t seem like it’s really a straightforward process.  The biggest feature I’m looking forward to is guide favorites so that I can set up a “Kids” favorites, etc. to make it easier to find groups of channels.

I’m attending an MSDN Developer Conference in January and we’re supposed to be receiving a DVD with the beta copy of Windows 7 on it.  In fact, as far as I can tell we’ll be the first group of people to to get it, as I’m attending the first conference that it will be available at.  I’ll report back once I get my hands on it.