Microsoft Lifts Windows 7 App Limit in Starter Edition
After weeks of vociferous complaints, Microsoft announced after all that it will remove the three-application limit for upcoming Windows 7 Starter Edition.Even Microsoft staff were confused about what constituted an “application” under Windows 7 Starter’s 3-app limit.With the explosive success of netbooks in the past year and a half, the application limits had become a sore spot with purchasers and potential purchasers of those less expensive, limited function machines. Microsoft already offers a limited Windows XP Starter edition, though only outside the U.S. Due to this app limit, users will be able to run as many applications as their processors and RAM will allow at the same time, so pulling up FireFox, Media Player, Live Messenger, and Notepad all at the same time will be do-able on netbooks and other low-end systems running Windows 7 Starter. in fact this was a huge complaint for many customers, and Microsoft believes that this change will now be “an even more attractive option for customers who want a small notebook PC for very basic tasks, like browsing the web, checking email and personal productivity.”Many netbooks will run on processors like Intel’s Atom, whose integrated graphics would not be capable of rendering Aero anyway, and which does not support the hardware virtualization libraries necessary to run XP Mode.NBR testing has shown that the full-blooded, Ultimate edition of Windows 7 runs smoothly on a netbook, commentators are assuming many manufacturers in the price-sensitive ultraportable market are expected to plump for the lower-cost Starter edition.Among features not available in Windows 7 Starter edition will be DVD playback, multi-monitor support, the ability to switch users without logging off, many personalization features, the Aero Glass interface, domain support Windows Media Center, and Windows 7 Ultimate’s XP Mode for running older programs compatible with Windows XP.Company officials have said for months that all of the versions of Windows 7 will run on most netbooks.
Although Microsoft is lifting the three-app limit, the blog notes that there are still a number of other differences between the Starter and Home Premium editions, including the former’s lack of support for Windows 7’s advanced graphics, multiple monitors, Windows Media Center and XP Mode.Microsoft’s accelerated Windows 7 deployment schedule is partly in response to HP and other netbook makers experimenting with models that run on Google’s Android OS – the latest of which has just been unveiled by Asus.Even that’s just three items, and users could certainly add more to that list, breaking the old barrier.This starter Edition of Windows 7 has some missing features as well. Here is what starter does not include:
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