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Dell 9 Mini running Windows 7

Nov. 5, 2008 Paul Thurrott | Paul Thurrott's Supersite for Windows

I’d been wondering about picking up a netbook of some kind to test Windows 7 performance on a really low-end PC. Here’s an interesting take on this from Dmitry Lyalin, who works at Microsoft:

The other day I finally did something I’ve been wanted to do since I heard the awesome announcement at PDC: Windows 7 can run on a Netbook. This was terrific news and something I was really hoping to hear. Windows XP to me is a dead operating system, for all its glory its time to move on, yet I worried with the rise of Netbooks if this was possible without a “light” version of our newer Windows releases. With Windows 7, my wish came true.

After playing around launching various applications I decided to close down everything and check the memory footprint. With nothing running I was now at around 650megs of memory use.

While its not perfect my overall experience is very positive and I simply cannot wait to see this operating system go RTM! I will continue to post on my experience as this story evolves, so stay tuned.

I was looking at the Lenovo IdeaPad S10 netbook, but I’ll have to do some comparison shopping first, I guess. I like the idea of having 2 GB of RAM as an option (I think the IdeaPad only goes to 1 GB) but I also want to test this thing on a real world netbook. I guess by 2010, 2 GB will be the minimum, as it is now on real PCs. (Unless you buy a Mac desktop, iMac, or notebook, of course.)

Related: Vista on an Eee PC?

Discuss this Article 41

kenmcnamee
on Nov 5, 2008
I was able to install Windows 7 easily on an Asus EEE PC 901 using the PDC build. It's actually very nice and now I'm considering installing it almost everywhere. It's that stable. http://blogs.vertigo.com/personal/kenm/Blog/archive/2008/10/30/windows-7...
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
So, it looks like there won't be a Windows 7 Home Basic? 3 SKUs? That's not too bad.
runner7775
on Nov 5, 2008
Here's to better performance in Windows 7 than Vista(although im running Vista and have few complaints). I have played around with the PDC build and it seems very solid and seems to perform a little better on my 2005 Dell Inspiron 2000 than Vista did. Seeing how much Vista's performance increased from Beta 2 to RTM, I can see the sky may be the limit for Windows 7. Undoubtedly, the performance of 7 will at ( the very) least marginally better come time for RTM, seeing as they will be able to remove some of the debugging code from the OS.
sjaak327
on Nov 5, 2008
Great that it runs on such a machine. I'm not in the process of replacing Vista with Windows 7 yet, as IE8 seems to be crashing an awfull lot, when the process restarts, it crashes again, only launching the 64 bit IE8 will enable me to browse again. (without flash support, obviously). I don't want to have to use Firefox, I just like IE better, in fact I love IE8, if it would only not crash :)
RaaJ
on Nov 5, 2008
Kenmcnamee: I installed the Win7 M3 build 6801 on Virtual PC 2007 running on my Thinkpad T60 with C2D T5600 1.83GHz processor and 4GB RAM (with Intel Mobile 945 chipset based on-board video.) The virtual machine has 1.5GB RAM, and 16GB HDD. I see that the VRAM allocated to the VM is 8MB. I would expect the EeePC to be on the same level in terms of hardware power. Having said all that, I can't get the thumbnail previews for minimized windows on the taskbar. Can you get them on your Eee? Or is that functionality not included in the 6801 build? I hope MSFT can find a way to do all the visual effects and eyecandy on the basic, onboard graphics equipped computers, and not limit all the fancy window previews to Dx10.1+ capable PCs.
kenmcnamee
on Nov 5, 2008
Raaj: If you're only running Windows 7 in a virtual machine then you probably won't get the Aero theme, and thus won't get thumbnail previews or the new taskbar. However, I was able to run Aero on my EEE PC and in fact WIndows 7 defaulted to that theme with full transparency effects and taskbar previews. Also, I was able to enable the new taskbar using the instructions provided by Rafael Rivera: http://community.winsupersite.com/blogs/paul/archive/2008/11/02/enable-t... My final judgement on WIndows 7 Build 6801 on the EEE PC is that it performs equally as well as Windows XP Pro did, only with a lot more visual sizzle.
subzerohitman721
on Nov 5, 2008
Sounds extremely promising. If it can run well on netbooks, hopefully the desktop one will be a game changer. But I reserve full comment when we're looking at a RTM version. On a side note, congrats to President Elect Barack Obama and VP elect Joe Biden. What a night! Peace.
kenmcnamee
on Nov 5, 2008
sjaak327: I also found IE8 on Windows 7 to be slow and unusable. I tried Firefox and that seemed to work fine but I found that Chrome seems to work the best. I think it's because it's Javascript engine is much faster than anything else and thus performs better on the Atom processor.
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
"My final judgement on WIndows 7 Build 6801 on the EEE PC is that it performs equally as well as Windows XP Pro did, only with a lot more visual sizzle." Hmm. That's something. Anyway, Sinofsky indicated that this build shouldn't be used for benchmarking so let's see how the beta performs. For those who expect a public beta, I think you're going to be disappointed. I doubt that there will be one.
kenmcnamee
on Nov 5, 2008
Shark47: I may be wrong but I seem to remember that during the install process Windows 7 had all the same SKU options that Vista currently has - from Home Basic up through Ultimate. I was presented with a dialog in which I had to choose the version I wanted to install. Sorry, I don't have a screenshot.
mikegalos@msn.com
on Nov 5, 2008
Two Quick OT Notes The first WinHEC Keynote starts at 9AM Pacific Standard Time (about 10 minutes from now) at http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winhec/default.mspx Steve Clayton did a great job discussing the PDC announcments and gave a nice plug to Paul at http://blogs.msdn.com/stevecla01/archive/2008/11/02/microsoft-3-0.aspx
mikegalos@msn.com
on Nov 5, 2008
shark There will almost certainly be a public beta. Broad scale betas aren't done to flush out the big bugs, the internal testers geneally find almost all of those. They're done to find the wierd, quirky interactions that you only find out about when you have hundreds of thousands of combinations of hardware, software and drivers.
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
"On a side note, congrats to President Elect Barack Obama and VP elect Joe Biden. What a night!" Yup, congrats to them. It was an amazingly well run campaign. I feel badly for McCain. But the GOP deserves it for the last 8 years. Just my opinion. No offense meant to anyone. Thankfully, we can now get past our political differences and get back to our usual differences.
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
"shark There will almost certainly be a public beta." Public as in open to everyone or to a select few testers? I meant, not open to everyone. Only to MSDN and technet subscribers and people like Paul, Ed Bott, etc. I thought I read that somewhere. I might be wrong, of course.
mikegalos@msn.com
on Nov 5, 2008
Subzero Wrapping my mind around the potential changes in the other Washington is a lot like wrapping my mind around Windows Azure - potential for change so major that it's hard to think of an area that isn't opened up for vast improvement. And, congratulations to both the Obama team and Rahm Emanuel on his selection as White House Chief of Staff. (For those who watched The West Wing, Rahm Emanuel was the model for "Josh Lyman" and he was just asked to take the job "Leo McGarry" had in the show. And, continuing the trivia, Barack Obama was the model for "Matt Santos".)
mikegalos@msn.com
on Nov 5, 2008
shark You don't get the massive number of configurations that you need for real config testing without a broad-scale beta.
DRWAM
on Nov 5, 2008
Those cheap netbooks seem to be kinda popular, which is why I posted 'great idea by MS' a couple threads ago when I read that Win 7 can run on them. Two things though. Leopard or a version can run on a handheld phone, but Apple won't be selling cheap netbooks in the very near future, and Vista runs fine on my $400 laptop with only 2GB [although I upgraded to 4GB on sale]. Seven running on netbooks is gonna sell, sell, sell. I am willing to bet on it.
RunTimeError
on Nov 5, 2008
This is nice to hear. Vista runs like crap on my home PC (Athlon X2, 2GB ram, 128MB GeForce) so I've been sticking to XP Pro until the PC gives up the ghost and I have to replace it. Hopefully it'll last until Windows 7 is released :)
lotsamystuff
on Nov 5, 2008
You just can't help yourself, can you?
boolean22
on Nov 5, 2008
@ Runtime... I've got it to run (Ultimate) on an Athlon 64 3200+ (yup! older) with 1GB of ram... all the Aero niceties running, tho not the WMCenter. ATI Radeon 9600 with 64mb. It might not be optimal, but it works a lot faster than expected.
sjaak327
on Nov 5, 2008
If I remember correctly I didn't got presented with a choice of which Windows 7 to install, but I noticed that when adding the install image to my wds server, the usual business home etc were there. I actually only loaded ultimate. Performance is pretty good, and besides the IE8 issue, I love the OS already, they made me very happy to include resume with movies other then recorded movies inside Windows Media centre, that alone is worth the upgrade ;)
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
"... they made me very happy to include resume with movies other then recorded movies inside Windows Media centre, that alone is worth the upgrade ;)" DVD movies too? Vista has or probably had a bug that when the screensaver appeared, it would go back to the title menu and the movie would restart. Even now, while my dvd player remembers where I stopped, Media Center does not.
mikegalos@msn.com
on Nov 5, 2008
FYI: One of the demos at the WinHEC keynote this morning was Windows 7 running on an Asus Eee PC netbook.
sjaak327
on Nov 5, 2008
@shark47 Not sure, I never use actual DVD's, I have them all ripped and converted as xvid. Will try that later.
Lindy
on Nov 5, 2008
Running Vista 2 on a the current crop of netbooks might be possible but to say its "running good" is purely subjective. Run XP or Linux on the same exact hardware and I have ZERO doubt it would run faster, and that is why all current netbooks come with XP or Linux. Show us benchmarks. I actually have Vista in a boot camp partition on my Macbook with 4gig of RAM. I run it in classic mode, turn off the side bar, turn off UAC, use FireFox3 as a the default browser, and use Symantec Corporate edition AV (which shuts OFF defender) and its almost as snappy as XP with 1gig of RAM. In fact I ran Vista in a fusion VM, giving it 2 CPU's and 2gigs of RAM and it was pathetically slow. That could be VMware Fusion's problem, then again my XP VM runs with 1 CPU and 512megs of ram WAY faster. If the standard netbook comes with 2gigs of ram and a dual core Atom CPU as the low end when Vista 2 ships and you configure it properly (strip it down) it will be fine. Raaj, You currently cant get Aero to run in any VM technology. VMware and Vitural PC give low end video cards via emulation. VMware worstation/fusion does allow for DX9 under a XP vm in case you wanted to torture you self and play a game in a VM.
djRob
on Nov 5, 2008
Is Microsoft interested in users wishes for Windows 7? For example I would gladly ditch iTunes if WMA supported podcasts?
djRob
on Nov 5, 2008
I meant Windows Media Player
DRWAM
on Nov 5, 2008
I should have never read this. I feel like a rabbit with a carrot in front of my nose. Is there a public beta or sign up? I work out at home and like to geek it up in between my sets, otherwise there's nothing to do in my basement. It's when and where I built my 3 computers and fixed several others, or just upgraded hardware and reinstalled software. I need more toys!!!! I'm kinda green right now, with envy that is, not hulking out from the gamma rays around me at work [it's a Nuclear Medicine joke]
BrightrevCarl
on Nov 5, 2008
A couple things: * That memory footprint isn't particularly impressive. It may be that Windows 7 is lighter on both the disk and the CPU than Vista, but I'd like to (and think we will) see the memory footprint reduced. * Memory is really, REALLY cheap, so this is a minor issue from a cost standpoint.
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
"I actually have Vista in a boot camp partition on my Macbook with 4gig of RAM. I run it in classic mode, turn off the side bar, turn off UAC, use FireFox3 as a the default browser, and use Symantec Corporate edition AV (which shuts OFF defender) and its almost as snappy as XP with 1gig of RAM." Yes, I sure do believe you. I run Vista (or used to until I upgraded because of iTunes and WMC) on an HP Pavilion desktop with 1 Gig of RAM and it's almost as snappy as XP with 1 Gig of RAM. The only thing I find slower is going to/resuming from sleep.
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
@sjaak327, Thanks. Was just curious to know if they've fixed that issue.
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
"It may be that Windows 7 is lighter on both the disk and the CPU than Vista, but I'd like to (and think we will) see the memory footprint reduced. " I would assume so. Sinofsky has asked people not to use this build for benchmarking, so I'm sure they're working on improving it. Or making it worse. :-)
Waethorn
on Nov 5, 2008
"That memory footprint isn't particularly impressive. It may be that Windows 7 is lighter on both the disk and the CPU than Vista, but I'd like to (and think we will) see the memory footprint reduced." Two things: If they're optimizing services, then yes, background memory consumption should be reduced. That said, unused memory is wasted memory. If you have free memory available, use it for disk caching to improve loading speed of applications and data. Idle memory load is not a good way to rate operating system efficiency unless you turn off caching. When you turn on disk caching, if programs load up faster because the disk cache is set to a higher amount by default, all the better from a user standpoint. Users don't care how much memory is used at any one time, so long as their programs load up faster. Determining how aggressive a disk cache should be, vs. how dynamic it is at freeing up memory for programs is a task best left for software engineers.
animositysomina
on Nov 5, 2008
Wae, it may be dangerous to let Win 7 to superfetch everything in memory like Vista did, because this may have been one of the reasons of the extremely poor battery performance in Vista notebooks compared to Macbooks. So I hope Sinofsky and Co understand this and maybe they will turn off aggressive disk caching into RAM when running on battery.
Lindy
on Nov 5, 2008
"Yes, I sure do believe you" Cant tell if you are being sarcastic or not, not that I care. I dont use it unless I have to. Currently I use to help relatives that have Vista on new PC's. If I decide to upgrade my MCITP - SA to an EA then I will probably have to learn way more about Vista than I care to.
mikegalos@msn.com
on Nov 5, 2008
Lindy, For someone who is commenting that eventually he'll have to learn about Vista, you sure do have a lot to say about it. Isn't the process of sharing knowledge supposed to work the other way around? First you learn something and THEN you tell people about it...
shark47
on Nov 5, 2008
Mike, If you're a Mac fanatic, all you need to know and all you probably know about Vista is the content of the Mac ads. Spew the marketing BS to a thousand people, maybe if you're lucky, 100 will switch, if not more. Lindy, that was another example of using the "generic you". :-)
Lindy
on Nov 5, 2008
I have Zero need to learn it inside and out, unless I want the higher level cert. I am on a Windows server team. My customers are developers that use/jackup my servers. I dont do desktop support at work. I only have it on my Macbook to help friends and family that are lucky/unlucky enough to have it and often need help, mostly how too. I was on a Vista pilot at work, from Beta 2 until shortly after it came out Feb of 2007?? My company like many I know of is skipping Vista. I had a Toshiba notebook at home that came with Vista in 3/07, I gave it to my sister when I got my current Macbook in 12/07, after I put XP on it per her request. I have spent much time as of late with 2008 server which is Vista stripped down to the bone and able to install stuff like DHCP, DNS, WDS, and much, more. I have had enough Vista fun for this life so far. Like I said if I decide to take the 70-620 then I will endure just enough to pass the test, and then probably wont use it again. Maybe MS will come out with Vista 2 in June of 2009 and there will be a 70-621 or 70-620-A, and I can take it instead. Their tests and classes feel like sales pitches these days.
mikegalos@msn.com
on Nov 5, 2008
Lindy If you think Windows 7 is close enough that you can pass an MCP exam on it with the trivial exposure you've had to Vista, then I encourage you to try. Preferably in a place that doesn't offer free retests. :-) For everyone else, I'd advise spending significant time with a product before you think you have actual expertise even if you've read a book or two. I know that's always been something we take into account when deciding which questions to keep in an exam and how to weight them.
Waethorn
on Nov 6, 2008
"it may be dangerous to let Win 7 to superfetch everything in memory like Vista did, because this may have been one of the reasons of the extremely poor battery performance in Vista notebooks compared to Macbooks. So I hope Sinofsky and Co understand this and maybe they will turn off aggressive disk caching into RAM when running on battery." It all depends on how the caching is done. You can cache disk contents on initial loadup, for faster reloads in the same session, or you can prefetch it using intelligent algorithms based on usage models (or a combination of both). Vista already lets you customize SuperFetch for battery usage though. The way I see it is this: The CPU uses probably the most energy of any component in a system. It's better to cache when it's idle, because when it needs to process information, it can process it from what is already stored in RAM, rather than spinning up your hard drive. If it has to do both at the same time, your battery gets drained faster. Aggressive disk caching actually improves performance and battery life more. It just needs to be optimized, but again, optimizations are best left to the engineers. If you think about how hybrid disks work, and why they're designed that way, you'll understand why I say that.
Waethorn
on Nov 6, 2008
"I'd advise spending significant time with a product before you think you have actual expertise even if you've read a book or two. I know that's always been something we take into account when deciding which questions to keep in an exam and how to weight them." "" I've seen too many f***-ups by people that try to set up SBS by using their Windows Server knowledge. Those people don't have a clue. SBS is different. You can't use your enterprise-level knowledge with this stuff, or else you break things. I've had to clean up more SBS servers because of improper initial setup than I'd care to count. If you come from an enterprise IT firm and never set up SBS, try and write the test for it (70-282). If you don't actually learn the best practises for it first, you'll fail miserably, and you should just forget about deploying it altogether.

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