Windows 7 Beta Leaked on BitTorrent

The first beta of Windows 7, Microsoft's coming replacement for Windows Vista, is due to arrive at January's Consumer Electronics Show, but already leaked version are circulating on popular BitTorrent sites.

Early reports suggest that there is little difference between the coming beta and early builds released to developers back in October. If the first beta of Windows 7 will have features not found in earlier releases, it appears you're going to have to wait for the official release to find them.

That said, ZDNet's Adrian Kingsley-Hughes reports that the latest build is, if nothing else, much more stable than its predecessors, going to far as to say that "this is the kind of code that you could roll out and live with... [it] exceeds the quality of any other Microsoft OS beta that I've handled."

One thing to note, if you're hoping that Windows 7 will save you from your Vista woes, from everything we've seen, Windows 7 is clearly evolutionary, not revolutionary. Windows 7 is about fixing and refining Vista, not starting over from the ground up (Vista itself might see some significant improvements in the coming SP2 update).

Among the most noticeable changes are the new taskbar which acts not unlike OS X's dock application (though it looks more like KDE 4's taskbar), allowing to you see running applications alongside "pinned" icons for launching other apps. While some feel that the new taskbar tries to do too much and becomes confusing in the process, I've actually found it a very nice improvement -- switching and launching apps from a central location makes sense, but that could be due to my OS X work habits.

One thing you won't find in the task bar is the ability to get an XP-style single column start menu. You can customize the start menu of course, but it takes up quite a bit of screen real estate no matter how minimalist you make it.

When it comes to speed the jury is still out. Some early benchmarks suggest significant speed gains over Vista, especially on less powerful PCs, but other tests have been less conclusive. Given that beta software is generally not known for having massive speed boosts, the fact that early betas can at least match Vista's performance could be a good sign -- especially if Microsoft can continue to optimize Windows 7 as the beta testing period progresses.

Windows 7 beta 1 may be available via BitTorrent, but we don't recommend spending the time to download it. Still, if you just can't help yourself and you've already grabbed a copy and installed it, be sure to let us know what you think of beta 1.

by Scott Gilbertson for Wired.com

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