News - Microsoft gimps Windows 7 for European users to comply with EU law

[Singh400]

Which is simply bad habit imo.

I think of friends/family pcs i have has to clean up over the last couple of years. Reason? They all had IE.

Having installed FF with noscript on these PC's i haven't heard a squeak from them, other people likewise have noticed this as well. I cant speak for present IE8 (had a look but not impressed/ just so used to using FF on Linux as well probably ) but the last incarnations have not given me much confidence.

How is that a bad habit? If you are comfortable/happy with something why switch? By all means explore alternatives (nor should you be forced to explore alternatives). But don't do it at the expense of cripping the inner workings of an operating system.

[Andy_Carr]

Nor does being new or having a handful of posts entitle you to that sort of attitude.

"and do some reading if you are able" indeed? Perhaps you need to do some reading yourself, including our rules on insulting other members, and expected standards ..... if you wish to continue posting here that is?

When you take that sort of tone, all it does is provoke a similar response (which, Georgy, it had better not) and it ends up wrecking threads. That is not going to happen in this thread.

Fair call

I was out of order my apologies.

[TAKTAK]

Actually... something interesting that i found in win7's media centre is that it picks up .iso's...

It shocked me when i first spotted it, and i had to hunt down the files to make sure i hadn't extracted the DVD files.

Makes things a load easier though , just playing the files straight off without mounting them before hand.

Having said that, i've just tried it in the RC and it doesn't seem to work :/

It worked in one of the beta builds , that was a great feature

(before it just gave me a thumbnail of the ISO'd series, which i clicked to find out what it was, and it just launched the DVD)

it also won't play .vob files (in media centre) anymore, it just gives me sound

edit: running a media scan and adding to the library allows me to play the vob files again, but still no ISO support , still all you have to do is take everything out of the ISO, it's a faff though

[Saracen]

Fair call

I was out of order my apologies.

Fair enough.

As that Shakespeare bloke once said, "All's Well That Ends Well".

[Andy_Carr]

Having said that, i've just tried it in the RC and it doesn't seem to work :/

It worked in one of the beta builds , that was a great feature

(before it just gave me a thumbnail of the ISO'd series, which i clicked to find out what it was, and it just launched the DVD)

it also won't play .vob files (in media centre) anymore, it just gives me sound

edit: running a media scan and adding to the library allows me to play the vob files again, but still no ISO support , still all you have to do is take everything out of the ISO, it's a faff though

If you want that functionality have a look at Media Browser and use either Daemon Tools or Virtual Clone CD, works a treat for my iso's and also adds extra functionality.

http://www.mediabrowser.tv/

[watercooled]

Sorry if it's already been said but I didn't want to check through 117 posts to find out. What happens if a less experienced user decides to install Windows 7 on their only computer (yes, I know not many inexperienced users would install an OS but installing Windows with defaults isn't hard) only to find there's no browser. Even if MS make IE available through FTP how many people are going to know how to get it, or what address to get it from for that matter? I just hope the regular version is released here - after all it's the user's choice if they want IE, or at least provide step-by-step instructions on how to get IE with command line. Really though, what was the problem with IE being bundled with Windows anyway? I mean I don't use it myself apart from anything that needs ActiveX (Win Update on XP/online AV scanners for example) and for downloading another browser, of course. Are the EU going to start suing Apple for bundling Safari, the iPhone for bundling Safari, etc etc. I'm no MS fanboy but it is MS's OS so they should be allowed to bundle their own software with it. Where's it going to stop - when all you get is the kernel?? Personally I wouldn't mind going for this 'E' version, assuming it's only IE missing.

[kalniel]

They'll have thought of that watercooled, no worries.

[watercooled]

I certainly hope so!

[gman1981]

I'm sure they will provide retailers with a CD with IE8 on it. So the retailer can then ship IE8 with it if they want! Seems like the most sensible option.

[cjs150]

When the internet was young and MS crushed netscape they clearly engaged in anti-competitive practices.

Now as far as I am concerned a browser is about as optional to an OS as steering wheel is to a car. I can choose many different makes of car but they all come with their own built in steering wheel. Why is this not anti-competitive as well - after all there are many manufacturers of steering wheels for the car mod business.

Of course the explanation is simply EU simply want to stop MS improving their OS.

I fundamentally disagreed with the EU judgment on the browser and on the media player - for the record I use Firefox as my borwser, WMP for music and VLC for movies.

EU response to MS action of removing IE is absurd. Let me try and paraphrase, we the EU decided that bundling IE as a default browser is wrong, so MS removed it, and that is wrong too. To which ever idiot is running the EU anti-competitive section there is this little thing called the internet, you will find many many different browsers on it, customers can choose which ever they want freely. Oh of course for the technologically inept you have probably just increased the cost of the OS because shops wil charge extra for installation - brilliant thinking

[watercooled]

I completely agree - I mean how many people with internet access go through the day without using a browser. Even if people prefer to use another browser they often use IE to download it and removing IE just makes things harder for users.
I'd better stop there before i start ranting again - sorry.

[Gunbuster]

I think the situation the EU wanted is with Start Pages. You change it and it stays changed (say to Google) and doesn't randomly pop IE (bing.com) because the OS doesn't really observe uninstalls or default browser behaviour.

The problem is these are politians and therefore best of the unemployable in the private sector. Also it is in MS's interest to seem like the victim not the victimiser.

A model of how IE should have been bundled is Apple's Safari, which can be fully uninstalled from OS X.

All that was needed to placate the EU was to match that functionality and as penance add another screen to the setting up your browser/windows screen with alternative browsers (as they do with search engines and photo publishing in WLPG).

[TAKTAK]

A model of how IE should have been bundled is Apple's Safari, which can be fully uninstalled from OS X.

THAT, is a very bad idea...

IEs base structure is used by many programs as a basis for internal features.. for example steam uses IE for it's ingame browser...

Having IE fully removable causes many more problems for devs...

[Gunbuster]

THAT, is a very bad idea...

IEs base structure is used by many programs as a basis for internal features.. for example steam uses IE for it's ingame browser...

Having IE fully removable causes many more problems for devs...

I understand that the engine should be still available, just the ability to uninstall to the position that these cut down Win7 versions will be, would be nice.

[TAKTAK]

I understand that the engine should be still available, just the ability to uninstall to the position that these cut down Win7 versions will be, would be nice.

Ooh, i thought by your first post you meant everything to do with IE.

In that case i agree as it provides more options to the end user

[TheAnimus]

When the internet was young and MS crushed netscape they clearly engaged in anti-competitive practices.

When IE4 came out, it wasn't bilt in to the OS.

It was also infinately better than netscape, you could all of a sudden do amazing things on a web page.

It was better by far, the practices they ingaged in, by rolling IE into key updates, mearly forced people to install it. It was very easy to use the asocations in the registry (and well documented) to change the default browser. Its a dirty trick, but if the alternative is considered better, people will still use it, look at growth of the firey ferrit.