Choosing the best version of Windows.

Many users, when buying a DVD with Windows 7, wonder which version is better - Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional, Ultimate or Enterprise (Corporate). Of course, when choosing a version, you have to proceed not only from the size of your wallet, but also from considerations of what exactly you want to receive from the operating system. It is clear that the versions differ not only in the noticeable difference in price.
Similar, even more complete information can be found on the Microsoft website. But here I will try to tell it more briefly and in a language more accessible to ordinary users.

Windows 7 Starter

Windows 7 Starter is designed for 32-bit systems and can only handle up to 2 GB random access memory. The first versions of Starter were designed to run no more than three applications simultaneously, that is, you could simultaneously turn on the browser, player and Skyre. Later, Starter was improved and now supports the simultaneous launch of several applications. No matter how much RAM your hardware has, even 4 GB or more, Windows 7 Starter will still only process 2 GB. In Initial (Starter) there is not even standard interface"Windows 7", there is only a basic "Windows 7" interface. There is no way to connect additional computers to the Internet through it.

Windows 7 Home Basic

At first, Microsoft Corporation intended for implementation only in developing countries and for 32-bit systems. OEM (that is, you can immediately buy a computer in a store with Home Basic installed) and Retail are widespread in Russia. Windows versions 7 Home Basic for 64-bit systems.

Windows 7 Home Premium

A very popular and widespread system, used both at home and in production, where there are not too high demands on the computer. A simple creature appeared here home network, you can connect computers to the printer thanks to the home group, that is, now your computer can act as a host computer. Finally, you can check out the new Aero Glass interface and discover the new Aero Peek and Aero Shake desktop features. With this version of Windows 7, additional games appeared.

Windows 7 Professional

The opportunities here immediately increased noticeably. It is now possible to use applications created for Windows XP. That is, on Windows 7 Professional you can install virtual machine, by using Windows programs VirtualPC. You can download this program for free from the Microsoft website after checking your operating system for authenticity. The check is simple - download a special file for this from the Microsoft website, run it, after a couple of minutes the computer tells you that the installed operating system is genuine. The “join to domain” function has appeared, with which you can safely and easily connect to corporate networks. The function of archiving data on the work and home networks has been added.

Windows 7 Ultimate

It has been supplemented with the function of disk encryption using BitLocker, the purpose of this function is to protect data stored on the computer from theft or loss.
A function has been added to customize the interface in one of 35 languages. The most common languages ​​are present: English, Arabic, Bulgarian, Hungarian, Greek, Danish, Hebrew, Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, German, Dutch, German, Mongolian, Estonian, Romanian, French, Japanese, etc. ..

Windows 7 Enterprise

There is nothing special to add here, because Enterprise is a regular Ultimate, but Microsoft allows you to activate it on several computers at once with one key. After installing Enterprise, you may encounter a problem that not all applications can be run on it for free. When I tried to launch Adobe Reader XI, the computer wrote to me that there is free support for this application for corporate systems absent.

“Ultimate”, “Professional”, “Home Advanced” can be installed on a virtual machine. These same versions can play DVDs without requiring you to install additional plugins. They also have Windows Media Center (a program used to watch several hundred television channels from around the world, but this requires a TV tuner).

It is no secret that today Windows 7 is gaining increasing popularity among PC users who prefer operating systems from Microsoft. Why is this happening? There are several reasons. One of which is that the system works faster, while consuming fewer resources than. Programmers from Microsoft really decided to put more effort into Windows 7 than into Vista - which, in fact, was one of the company's biggest failures in recent times. The second reason is that Windows 7 can be installed on almost any modern computer, even a netbook - and she will work on it. System requirements are quite modest.

CPU: 1 GHz (32-bit/64-bit).
RAM: for a 32-bit system 1 GB, for a 64-bit system 2 GB.
Hard drive requirements: 16 GB of space for 32-bit OS, 20 GB for 64-bit OS.
Graphic arts: if you want to enable the Windows Aero interface, you will need a video card that supports DirectX 9 with WDDM driver version 1.0 or higher; The card must have 128 MB of memory.
(data taken from the Microsoft website. http://windows.microsoft.com/ru-RU/windows7/products/system-requirements)

What is WDDM? Without going deeply into technical details, let's say that this is a video card driver, built somewhat differently than before (i.e. a driver with new architecture). As a result, the graphics system has become more stable and secure. Also, the Aero interface will only work correctly with drivers of this type. Whether this is true or not, whether this is a Microsoft commercial ploy or not, this is a long debate, and it goes beyond the scope of this article. I’ll just note that almost all Radeon or Nvidia cards released after 2004 support this driver model, and the drivers themselves can always be downloaded from the manufacturer’s website.

Windows 7 versions

But you can see such signs (or similar ones) on any site where Windows 7 is mentioned. And, frankly, for the average user they are not very informative: it looks like you need to take the Maximum version (you won’t be able to buy the Enterprise version - this version is not for free sales). But do you need it? Let's try to figure it out...

What to install - 32-bit or 64-bit?

Deciding on the edition of Windows 7

Note. It is recommended to open all links to the Microsoft website that will be in the article in Internet Explorer.

Windows 7 Starter

Windows 7 Home Basic

Windows 7 Home Premium

Windows 7 Professional

Note for a professional. Starting with this version, the distribution includes such useful snap-ins as lusrmgr.msc (Manage local users and groups), gpedit.msc (Group Policy Editor), secpol.msc (Security Policies).

Windows 7 Ultimate and Enterprise

Yes, I would like to note that Windows Media Player is available in all versions of Windows 7. Also recently it has become possible to choose desired browser at Windows installation 7 (the so-called “browser selection dialog”), almost all popular browsers are available to choose from (Opera, Chrome, Firefox, IE...).

Which version of Windows 7 should I choose?

• Category 1: Beginners / Regular users. They are either just starting to learn the basics of working with a computer, or they use the computer as a typewriter and for surfing the Internet. They periodically watch films, listen to music;
• Category 2: Advanced Users/Interested. “Just working” with a computer is no longer enough for them; they are looking for ways to make this work faster, more convenient, and easier. And also in many cases they try to understand “how it works” and “what else can be done”;
• category 3: IT professionals / students of IT specialties. For them, computers are a profession. They use it to do everything - from hammering nails with a computer to developing large control systems and security systems. They tend to require more features from the operating system.

Current official prices can be found here:
http://www.microsoftstore.ru/shop/ru-RU?WT.mc_id=StoreCountryToggle_RU

In this article I will try to answer the question of which Windows 7 is better and what you need to pay attention to when choosing. But before you compare 2 things, you need to decide by what criterion you are going to compare them, otherwise the comparison will be incorrect.

I would like to draw your attention to the fact that everything written in this article is purely my personal opinion, which comes from personal experience and does not claim to be the absolute truth.

Suppose you ask yourself the question: “Which car is better, KAMAZ 65117 or Audi A4”? Naturally, a counter question should immediately follow: “Better for what?” Or “Better by what criterion?” It is obvious that Audi will outperform KAMAZ in terms of comfort and speed, but will lose to it in terms of load capacity. With Windows 7 everything is almost the same. Therefore, I will split this article into several parts.

Which Windows 7 is better, licensed or pirated?

The logical conclusion is this: if you install pirated version, then you can put the Maximum. If you buy, then pay attention. For the average user, Home Extended is more than enough.

There is a popular misconception that different editions of Windows 7 have different performance. Naturally, this is not so. All versions of Windows 7 the same bit size have the same speed and can run the same programs. The only caveat that may have anything to do with performance is that the Initial version does not support Windows interface Aero (in other editions it is enabled by default), and if your computer is rather weak, then perhaps a small performance gain can be obtained.

Which bit size is better for Windows 7, x86 or x64?

Besides different versions(releases), Windows 7 has another parameter - bit depth. All 32-bit (x86) operating systems support up to 4GB of RAM, so if your computer has 4GB or more, then you need to install the 64-bit version (otherwise you will see 4GB or even less in the system properties). In addition, in a 64-bit operating system, performance in some applications may be higher (by several percent), but in practice this is still hardly noticeable.

Please note that not all processors support the x64 platform, therefore only 32-bit operating systems can be installed on them. This is especially true for older processors, and even some new ones, for example netbooks.
Any 64-bit processor can run both x86 and x64 operating systems.

The x86-64 instruction set is currently supported:

• AMD - Z-series processors (for example, AMD Z-03), C-series (for example, AMD C-60), G-series (for example, AMD T56N), E-series (for example, AMD E-450), E1 , E2, A4, A6, A8, A10, FX, Athlon 64, Athlon 64 FX, Athlon 64 X2, Athlon II, Phenom, Phenom II, Turion 64, Turion 64 X2, Turion II, Opteron, the latest Sempron models;
• Intel (with minor additions) called "Intel 64" (previously known as "EM64T" and "IA-32e") in later models Pentium processors 4, as well as in Pentium D, Pentium Extreme Edition, Celeron D, Celeron G-series, Celeron B-series, Pentium Dual-Core, Pentium T-series, Pentium P-series, Pentium G-series, Pentium B-series, Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad, Core 2 Extreme, Core i3, Core i5, Core i7, Atom and Xeon;
• VIA - Nano, Eden, QuadCore processors.

In the near future everything desktop computers and their operating systems will be 64-bit, and until the future has come, you can install the 32-bit version on old computers, even if the processor supports x64 architecture.

Previously, it was believed that some programs work poorly in 64-bit Windows (XP, Vista), especially games and drivers that were written only for 32-bit, but with the advent of Windows 7 x64 the situation has improved significantly and most 32-bit programs now run fine on 64-bit Windows 7. However, for some programs (especially older ones that are not updated) and drivers compatibility issue remains. That's why in general On an outdated computer (with less than 4GB of RAM), it is better to install 32-bit Windows 7.

But if the computer is very old (has a weak processor and less than 1GB of RAM), then you don’t even have to look at Windows 7.

How to find out the bitness of your Windows (XP, 7 or Vista), I already.

Which build of Windows 7 is better?

Everyone has a different opinion on this matter, but I have already stated mine above. Despite the fact that several of my friends have been sitting on different assemblies Windows (without reinstallation), I believe that if you have already decided to install a pirated version, then you should definitely install only from original image Microsoft. And builds like Zver Edition are, in general, evil, they are only beautiful on the outside, but inside there can be a bunch of glitches hidden. Although, I repeat, I do not deny that in nature there are quite successful, stable crafts that are both beautiful in appearance and have convenient functionality, for example, the already implemented Office, Nero, etc., but personally, it is much more convenient for me to install all the necessary ones myself programs.

It's up to you to decide, of course.

Many gamers have the question “Which Windows is best for gaming?” rises with a certain frequency, once every six months - a year. It’s during this period that new games come out and for many they work worse than their friends.

One of possible reasons such a situation may happen itself. Therefore it would be useful to compare various characteristics OS to see which one is best for gaming.

№1. Windows logos 7, 8 and 10

They will participate in the comparison. XP has already outlived its usefulness, and modern games are not designed for it. Vista in general was some kind of unsuccessful experiment that will forever remain in history, but not on users’ computers.

Performance Comparison

From time to time, specialists from various portals conduct tests on the performance of operating systems.

Such testing is carried out as follows: a game is launched, a program is launched that measures performance, and then a final diagram is compiled based on the test results.

For example, the three above systems were compared in the game BioShok Infinite. The result is what is shown in Figure 2.

The blue bar in this chart indicates performance at 1680x1050, and the blue bar at 1920x1080. As we see, each Windows version showed itself well and the indicators for everyone are almost the same.

Still, the best Windows in this comparison is 10, although it is only 0.2 points ahead of version 8.1 with a higher resolution. In Metro Redux, Windows 10 performed much better than its competitors.

No. 3. OS comparison in Metro Redux

Here it is ahead of version 8.1 by as much as 4 points at a lower resolution and by 3.9 at a higher resolution. One of the heaviest games to date, Crysis 3, confirmed the leadership of the tenth version.

No. 4. OS comparison in Crysis 3

Although Windows comparison in this game gave very unexpected results - the seventh version overtook the eighth, and by as much as 1.9 points with a lower resolution, but the top ten was 1.5 points faster than its closest pursuer.

Another interesting comparison was carried out by specialists from another site. They compared Windows 7 x32, x64 and 8 x32, x64. So, in their comparison, version 7 x64 won. This is the diagram we got after comparing the systems in Call game of Duty: Black Ops 2.

No. 5. Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 OS Comparison

For other games such as Assasins Creed 3 and Far Cry 3, we got almost the same result, only with an even greater gap between the seventh Windows and the eighth. All tests were carried out on the same equipment under the same conditions for all.

From all of the above, we can draw the following conclusion: the best operating room Windows system Windows 10 is second in terms of performance Windows location 7, and version 8 brings up the rear. But for now this is only an interim result.

Other characteristics are also important for a gamer, which we will consider below.

Load time comparison

For a gamer, of course, it is important that his system boots as quickly as possible. The BootRacer program tested the boot speed of the same equipment for different systems. The result is what can be seen in Figure 6.

No. 6. Boot time measured by BootRacer

As you can see, Windows 8.1 takes the least amount of time to load - only 4 seconds, and the tenth version takes the longest to load - 6 seconds.

But the truth is that the user will not feel this difference, and Windows 7, which has not been reinstalled for several years, will take much longer to load than others. So if you want to play on your computer, listen to the following advice.

How other programs work

How fast the operating system will work is influenced by many parameters, and some of them are most clearly visible not in games, but in the work of other programs.

For example, a speed test of archiving was carried out in the WinRar program. As a result, the results shown in Figure No. 7 were obtained.

No. 7. WinRar speed

The blue scale shows how the program works during multi-boot, that is, when other services and utilities are also running. The blue one reflects the result that can be obtained when only WinRar is running.

As you can see, version ten is the fastest to do its job, and version seven is again in second place. Windows 8 is increasingly looking like an outsider in the fight for the title of best OS for gamers.

The same results were obtained when testing the program Adobe Photoshop. Only in this case the loading time was measured in seconds.

No. 8. Speed Adobe works Photoshop

Again the eighth version is a little behind the seventh.