How do I hate Windows 7? Let me count the ways!

[bob p]

maybe it only works the easy way when you buy a MS-brand mouse. heh, heh.

[frus]

but it doesn't work for Steve!

[bob p]

That's because he has an IT department that's "helping" him.

[Steve Conner]

Traditionally, Microsoft's USB stack has always worked like this: Whenever any of the USB ports sees a device that it hasn't seen before, the driver software for the device gets reinstalled. It doesn't matter if the driver got installed before when you plugged the same device into another port. I hoped they would have changed this behaviour for Win7 but it would appear not.

If you have a laptop with a limited number of USB ports, after a while your most commonly used devices will have seen every port and the driver installations will stop.

Every USB mouse conforms to the "Human Interface Device" class and can be handled by a generic driver. But the Microsoft and Logitech ones have extra features. Win7, my installation at least, detects a Microsoft brand mouse and installs special software to handle these extra features, which I never use anyway.

Linux uses dynamically loadable kernel modules to handle USB devices. They ship with the OS so you hardly ever need to install anything, and they load silently and usually pretty quickly too. It probably couldn't care less what brand the mouse is and just uses the generic HID driver for them all.

I have no idea what Mac OS does but I expect it's something similar to Linux.

[JHow]

Steve:

Do you have the latest version of Logitech Set Point software for your trackball? That might help.


Customizing my M570 Wireless Trackball with Logitech SetPoint Software - Logitech FAQ

Also, Logitech has user forums (on which some of their support guys sometimes monitor and post). You might get lucky:

Logitech Forums - Logitech Forums

[Steve A.]

Do you have the latest version of Logitech Set Point software for your trackball? That might help.

Thanks. I just dl'd the software for my Trackman Wheel T-BB18 which I believe was manufactured in 1897 judging by the serial number.

One gripe about the mouse/trackball support in Win 7 concerns the Windows Explorer window. In XP I could switch back and forth between the tree view and the folder view easily by moving the scroll bar a bit or other gestures. With Win 7 I can move the opposite scroll bar up and down but that does not change which view is controlled by the wheel. It is easy enough to switch from the folder view to the tree view by expanding or contracting the listing of a particular folder (click the + or - box.)

I really liked how you could switch the tree view on and off in the left pane in WinXP, or use that pane for your search parameter. As I recall there were 3 very prominent buttons that allowed you to go back and forth between those 3 modes seamlessly. Speaking of the Search function that has been my biggest gripe with Vista and Win 7. I have always searched for files and folders with partial strings from the filename or date ranges, with the search starting from the current folder and optionally including subfolders to drill down. In Win2K and WinXP you could optionally search for text strings within certain filetypes (possibly TXT and DOC) although I rarely used that figure.

With Vista and Win 7 the search function is entirely different. For starters Window wants to index your hard drive and search content as well as filename. For the hell of it I just typed "test*.*" into the Start button Search window and came up with 4,530 items. I just examined the search results and there were only 264 files that matched the search string. It also appears that the Vista/7 search function does not actually create a subset of files matching the parameters you specified but rather does another search if you want to re-sort the list by time, size, type or filename. I blame that on Google- when I search for files on-line I want them put into its own subset which I can further narrow down by adding parameters.

As much as I bitch about Windows 7 I still do use it, while I have a Gateway running Win XP 64-bit Enterprise edition that I repaired a year ago which I was going to use instead but never did get around to doing that (it has an ISA slot or two and I have planned to use it for my Super DAW.)

Steve

P.S. With the Logitech driver I just installed the precision of my mouse seems to have improved and it is easier to select exact text especially in a Save or Open box. I always suspected the Microsoft tried to sabotage Logitech users since Logitech is their biggest competitor for mice and keyboards.

EDIT I've been using the current Logitech driver for a day or two now and it is a big improvement over the driver that MS assigned to it. So thanks again!

[Steve A.]

"Oh, and when you plug in a Microsoft mouse it spends half an hour installing the Microsoft mouse tool. Plug the same mouse into a different USB port and it does it all over again."
Interesting. That would suggest that the system registry is permanently recording the address of one specific USB port when it registers the mouse, and that it only looks to that single port for the mouse after it is installed. Then if it's not there, the system decides that no mouse has been installed and you get to re-install all over again. How lame.

On my computer I do sometimes get "found driver" messages if I plug a peripheral into a different USB port. Since it had already found the driver before it just takes a second or two. I suspect that Steve C. is referring to one of the programs that Microsoft uses to enhance the capabilities of their mice and keyboards and not just a particular driver.

I do agree that Windows is lame.

Steve

[Steve A.]

Snag-It! 5.2.1

I just did a Windows 7 search for documents containing the word "nextbook" in the name or the contents. It came up with 87 hits and I wanted to sort them by folder since I was pretty sure that the document I was looking for was on the E: drive. So I click on "folder" to sort the list which generates the attached list. I was expecting to see folders in the C: drive listed first (alphabetically) with the rest of the drives listed in turn. What was generated looked like something that someone on crack would produce:



I was going to use the text capture feature of SnagIt! 5.2.1 to create a short list of entries but gee whiz, the files in Window Explorer 7 are not in text format but in graphics format. (In XP I was able to capture text from folder lists and did that all of the time.)

So I guess that one of my biggest gripes with Windows 7 is that it has pretty much abandoned text displays- what you have is primarily a graphic display and then Windows converts it into text when the need arises. Not to mention the very strange listings from the so-called Search function.

Steve Ahola

P.S. Snag-It! is a very good screen capture utility and version 5.2.1 from 2001 is an anomaly since the code to deactivate the program after the 45 day free trial period does not work. I am currently up to 780 days and still going strong. (On my older computers I got up to around 1400 days!) Here is the installation file:

https://app.box.com/s/8b5e0821c94a1a07fb92

Here is a review of Snag-It! 5.2.1 but the author does not mention the inactive expiration code. (Perhaps that was done intentionally for beta testing, with version 5.2.2 intended for distribution. I dunno but it like a gift from heaven...)

http://www.techrepublic.com/article/...-screen-shots/

[bob p]

In windows, you have to buy a screen capture program.
In linux, the screen capture programs are free.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

But seriously, you can probably do a free screen capture in windows by using PrtSc and then pasting the clipboard into paint. I think I used to do that back in the dark ages.

[The Dude]

But seriously, you can probably do a free screen capture in windows by using PrtSc and then pasting the clipboard into paint. I think I used to do that back in the dark ages.

Yes you can. I use the Print Screen function quite a bit. The irony is that I use it quite often to show windows errors to our IT guy! It's easier than rewriting the text in the error message.

[Steve Conner]

IrfanView is my favourite image editing tool for Windows, it has a good screen grabbing function and it's free!

Ever since Vista, Windows uses a "compositing display manager" that feeds all of the windows and their contents through your graphics card's 3D engine to get the fancy transparency effects and animations. In order for this to work, everything has to be converted into bitmaps and this might explain why Snag-It stopped working.

Desktop Window Manager - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia <- the situation in gruesome IT nerd detail.

[Paleo Pete]

I basically hate everything Windows after 2000...didn't like win 7 the first time I used it, on this laptop, still really don't. After being a computer tech for 15 years and being able to find my way around well using anything from Win3 to XP and Vista, first thing I found out is they renamed half the things I need and moved them to other locations so I have to search for 10 minutes to find just the desktop customization and eliminate all the annoying graphics. I finally found everything and got my desktop set up pretty similar to an old style Win98 or 2000 desktop, and looked for Control Panel...more searching...and it's laid out totally different, Add/Remove Programs took me ages to find because it's not there...it's renamed...everything in Control Panel is renamed or relocated...difficult to find anything.

Microsoft never did hear the old saying, if it works by damn don't fix it...

Going from 3 or 3.11 to 95 was a change in almost everything...95/98/2000 to XP was another learn your way around...here we are again. And now you have to activate the damn thing...

Virus/malware scanning has been an issue since the win95 days, that's only partially a Windows issue. Mostly because Windows pretty much allows system level access at a user level. Since XP they've improved a little, you can set the later versions so once you have everything up and running, the user can't install software without Admin password. Better but not even close to Linux. Linux never allows system level access to software at all. Viruses can't make it far because you have to manually type in the admin password to make any changes, period.

Irfan View...been using it since about 1998 or so, my favorite image viewing/editing software by far, if I need more than it can do, (rare,) I use Gimp. Never tried the screen capture, I use PrtScrn and paste it into Paint.

I never touch anything but Logitech mice, the one I'm using right now is about 10-12 years old...one of the first optical mice I ever used, and I still use it today. Never had any installation problems with XP or win7, plugged it in and in about 30 seconds it was working. Never looked back. I never use any mouse drivers or other software, it's not needed. Even with win98 nothing but a simple driver was needed. That was my biggest gripe about early Logitech, everyone thought they had to have the full array of software on their CD. Nope, just the driver.

OK I digress...Win 7...If I try to open a file from either Windows Explorer or Irfan View I have to click inside the pane on that side, the right hand pane is not available until I do. I think that was not the case with earlier versions, that side is the one you normally need, it was automatically selected. Fresh install, way too much garbage graphics. I couldn't care less about disappearing stuff, animated everything, shadows, or any other graphics that hog video memory and therefore get you a performance hit. I can't get the standard Windows start menu at all, only a reasonable facsimile. Probably took me 20 minutes to find out how to shut down the "gadgets" I don't want or need and hog resources...

After cleaning up the desktop, it's been reliable and stable, still performs pretty well after 2 years. If I could get that kind of stability with a Windows 98 or 2000 appearance and layout, without the name and location changes, I might just start to like it...

[Steve A.]

I've been moving about 1TB worth of files around from one hd to another and have to say that Windows 7 fails miserably in what should be its primal task: a disk operating system! They have added so many bells and whistles (or is that bugs and whiskers?) that they have forgotten their roots.

#1. After copying or moving a file using the built-in Windows function you often need to hit Refresh (F5) to have the changes displayed in the Windows Explorer window. As for the tree view on the left side of the window even hitting Refresh does not update the display of folders after they have been deleted or moved, once again using the built-in Windows functions.

#2. When moving files from one drive to another you are often left with all of the empty folders on the source drive. I have noticed this using the Microsoft Utility RichCopy as well as the third party TeraCopy. When moving or copying a lot of files I never use the built-in Windows functions because they are downright stupid: if it runs into an error it will abort the copy or move function. TeraCopy and RichCopy will skip files that produce errors and process the rest of the files, listing the files that produced errors.

#3 Windows 7 Home Edition Pro will overrule the customization choices I make for folder display. I almost always want the contents of folders displayed as "General Items" with filename, size, type and modification date. Win 7 will often ignore that choice for many of the folders displaying them as Documents, Pictures, Music or Videos. As a workaround for that I have installed a utility that allows me to "Take Ownership" of folders and their subdirectories. Once I do that then my choices for folder display, etc., are respected. Unfortunately I need to run it again when new folders are created that I do not "own." I suspect that just the home editions have this limitation but it still isn't right: I bought the computer which included the operating system. I created the file and the folder so why the hell do I not automatically "own" them???


Moving on... I have noticed that the free version of TeraCopy will often crash when copying or moving a large number of files so I've been using RichCopy for operations like that. I will set up a MOVE folder on both the source and destination drives to simplify things, moving the files and folders I want moved into the MOVE folder on the source drive. (RichCopy does not allow you to pick and choose folders in a directory tree, a feature often used in newer programs hence the need for the MOVE workaround.)

https://community.dynamics.com/crm/b...y-4-0-217.aspx

One of my biggest gripes of Windows Vista, 7 and 8 has been that the search box from Win2K and WinXP was replaced with a search function that does not work for me at all because I usually like to search by filename, date and location. I have been using a filenaming system for 25 years that allows me to find files using a filename search with wildcards. I do not usually need to have the contents of files searched for a particular text string (although that is handy sometimes.) I found a program called FileSearchEX which gives you a search box very similar to the one in WinXP. I am running the free trial version right now but will probably cough up the $29 to register it since I haven't found anything comparable to that for free.

Classic Search for Windows

Steve Ahola

[bob p]

I've never had any luck getting a windows box to succeed in moving terabytes of data from one drive to another. The file transfers always crap out. My solution has been to mount the drive using a different OS.

[Steve A.]

I've never had any luck getting a windows box to succeed in moving terabytes of data from one drive to another. The file transfers always crap out.

Exactly!

My solution has been to mount the drive using a different OS.

All of the clone drive utilities use an OS I call ABW (Anything But Windows!) I've been using TeraCopy for several years now and it only chokes on extremely large file transfers. I have it set up to verify all of the transfers with checksums, something that I don't think that Windows has ever offered.

I use RichCopy for transfers that are too big for TeraCopy- it started out life in 1996 as an internal utility used by programmers at Microsoft so you know that they made it good- perhaps the only software ever released by MSF that isn't buggy...

Steve