Apparently the latest Microsoft OS, Windows 7, premiered today. Lifehacker, as their apt to do, offered an overview of the release. What struck me the most were the system requirements.
That is way too much RAM and disk space. I could barely run it on my one year old 64 bit laptop with 2 GB RAM! The bells and whistles aren’t cool enough to compel me to upgrade the RAM or buy a new machine.
There are literally thousands of older machines that run perfectly well but have been shelved only because of newer, bloated OSes. The primary reason I gave up years ago on Windows (back when XP first appeared) is that I didn’t like the idea of having to buy a new machine just so I can run the latest OS. There is no reason a computer, much like your car or TV, can’t run effectively for ten years or more.
My desktop computer is at least five years old (I bought it used three years ago). It runs a 2.3 gigahertz, 32 bit processor with 1 GB RAM. Barring anything catastrophic, I figure to be happily using this machine for another 5 years.
(The monitor for said machine sadly died this morning. According to the sticker on the back, it was manufactured in Oct, 1999!)
I recently configured a 800 32 bit machine with 264 meg of RAM under Xubuntu for a friend of mine. It works just fine. Only complaint he’s had is that it sometimes lags when he uses YouTube.
My laptop is the first brand new computer I’ve ever owned and that was a birthday present.
And people wonder why I am an Open Source devotee?