Adrian Kingsley-Hughes from ZDNet Hardware 2.0 has done a series of benchmarks, not raw ones with exact numbers, but with ratings as results. He took Windows XP SP3, Vista SP1, 7 Beta 1 build 7000 (32 bit and 64 bit), 7 build 7048 (64 bit) and 7 build 7057 32 bit which is the most recent leaked build. He tested the builds on 2 separate systems with these configurations and took 31 tests in total.

• An AMD Phenom 9700 2.4GHz system fitted with an ATI Radeon 3850 and 4GB of RAM
• An Intel Pentium Dual Core E2200 2.2GHz fitted with an NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS and 1GB of RAM

Keep in mind that raw benchmark results aren’t allowed under the Windows 7 EULA. Here are the test results from both systems:  Read more...

Permalink: Windows 7 build 7057 vs. Vista, XP and older 7 builds

Rafael from WithinWindows has done it again. He has discovered a new logon UI background customization trick that Microsoft has put in Windows 7 for OEMs. It requires a registry change and a few folder changes but does it without the need of any third party tools or hacks.

This does require a bit of work to get it working. First of all you’ll have to enable the functionality in the registry by creating ( if missing ) a DWORD value named OEMBackground in HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Authentication\LogonUI\Background and enable its value to 1 or to 0 if you want to disable the functionality. Or you can just use this registry file I created, to quickly enable it.  Read more...

Permalink: Easily change your Logon Background in Windows 7!