Windows 7 RC Download

Well after much speculation over the official announcement that the Windows 7 Release Candidate (RC), 5th May 2009, the day has arrived and you can now head on over the Microsoft Windows 7 Beta website and get yourself a Windows 7 RC download in both 32-bit and 64-bit flavours – (officially known as build 7100).

I was a little apprehensive over the actual process of downloading a copy of the Windows 7 RC after Microsoft had “issues” with its servers when it first opened them up for the Windows 7 Beta download – However I must say that I was quite impressed when it only took me around 3 hours to download the full 3GB or so of the Windows 7 RC ISO image (which you then burn onto a blank DVD). Even on my humble rural-based ADSL broadband connection I have managed to download it fairly quickly – mind you this was before 2pm GMT, perhaps you Americans out there hadn’t all got up by then?

Anyway, if you fancy trying out the ‘Ultimate Edition’ of Microsoft’s latest operating system (O/S) for free for around a year (the Windows 7 RC version will stop working on 1st August 2010, however it will start to require 2 hourly reboots from 1st March 2010) then head on over to the following link on Microsoft’s website and follow the on-screen instructions. I suggest using Internet Explorer to do it though as trying to initiate the downloader crashed my Firefox browser.

Windows 7 RC Download

While you’re waiting for it to download, you can take a look at some of the new features in the video below:

I’ve not really played around with Windows 7 since the official beta release (32-bit) in January, so it will be interesting to see what has changed and what improvements Microsoft have added into their next-generation O/S in the meantime, this will also be the first time I’ve installed a 64-bit version of Windows, so hopefully I might see some more performance gains because of that too. Have you tested the difference between 32-bit and 64-bit Windows 7, is there a noticeable difference?

Microsoft also recommends that anyone who has already installed the first Windows 7 beta or one of the subsequent builds that have been available through “other distribution methods” would be better off formatting and re-installing afresh rather than trying to ‘upgrade’ within Windows 7.

I’ve only ever upgraded a Windows O/S once or twice and certainly wouldn’t recommend it to anyone as it never seems to perform as well in terms of speed and reliability – if I were you, I’d always re-install an O/S afresh onto a newly formatted hard disk. You may think the upgrade route will be quicker as you don’t need to re-install all your applications and data files, but as PC Pro found, the actual upgrade takes a lot longer anyway, so you don’t save that much on time either.

Assuming that Windows 7 RC is robust enough, I might use it as my primary O/S until the final retail version is released instead of my current Vista O/S, if it goes well, I might even try it out on my Dell netbook – I’ll update you all with how it works out.

Let us know what you think to the Windows 7 RC if and when you install it onto one of your computers, do you prefer to use it as your main Windows O/S even before the final retail release of Windows 7 which is expected later this year?

Via – PC Pro

Related Pages:

1. Windows 7 Beta Released
2. Windows 7 RC Essentials: Getting Started Guide – Part 2
3. Windows 7 RC Essentials: Getting Started Guide – Part 1
4. Windows 7 Review – Introduction
5. Microsoft Releases Windows 7 Downgrade Plans

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