there is a way to oficially download windows 7 you just need to sign up for microsoft connect

The arrival of a new windows operating system is somewhat shocking at the moment as we have not bade our good and faithful XP ! Anyways the world is changing and we have to change according to the changes. I do hope Vienna meets our expectations

P2P sharing of Windows 7 is doing nothing but help Microsoft with their server load problem. This beta release is for everybody - so there is no legality issues as per this article.

Any experienced user knows to scan files before installation. This safeguards one from malware. Also, in the torrent community, there is a wealth of user comments on each file. It's very clear what is legit and what isn't.

The version of Windows 7 I got via torrent download is malware free. I went with a torrent because the MS servers were overloaded.

This article is completely incorrect, and is obviously written by a noob.

The writer of the above comment (Ryan) is a comlpete moron. As, this article was written in January 2008.

Check the date first you moron!

The released beta is build 7000. This speaks of an earlier one. Read it before making aggressive assumptions.

uhhhh, so people just randomly read stuff and post a stupidity comment. Well, I wanna join in too. The version this (over a year old) article states is correct. I still have it. Its better faster and greater in all ways over Vista, but leaves something to be expected over XP. Now the version they JUST released yesterday blows the doors off prevous versions on Windows. Older or new hardware it detects and benchmarks great scores . Do any of you care? No probably. Does MS or anyone else care what YOU think. Probably not. Sooo...

Yes windows 7 is officially released. I am a Microsoft Registered OEM System Builder so I have full access to downloads early. I have taken Windows 7 and installed in an my laptop (Gateway Fire Red core 2 duo) all hardware worked out of box at first load. This OS is incredibly fast, might i say even faster that XP? I never was a fan of Vista from the very first beta, right to the final release, SP1 made it only slightly better. That is if you could get it insalled with out a 2 hour phone call to Microsoft in India. OK so it has more "bells and whistles" than XP or Vista which is fine BUT the big change is that it is very fast. I hate when you spend big bucks on great hardware and get a slugish performance from your OS. go ahead and slam me for thie on MAC users OS 10 is a DOG. I accually now look forward to selling Windows 7. Thanks MS it's about time you got it right.

cine de la cine fura, cuvint cu cuvint?
http://www.windows7.cc/windows7-news/never-download-windows-7-via-torrent-sites/

My early experiences of Windows 7 are that I am very unimpressed.
There appears to be little (no?) performance/compatibility difference from Vista.
It still doesn't work 'out of the box' for several of my computers (something that every recent Linux distribution can manage these days).
I have benchmarked on 4 machines, and it remains slightly slower than Windows XP for most tasks, with on average, marginally higher memory usage. Most of the slowdown over XP seems to be related to I/O. Purely CPU bound tasks that I have tested show marginal differences between the different Windows versions. Graphics, I suspect may show more significant differences, but that area doesn't interest me, and technically, the design of the Vista graphics stack IS a step forward, irrespective of what 'fps' obsessed gamers may say.
I still hate the Windows user interface. It just seems to take longer to complete most basic tasks, such as file management than with XP, and I find the default layout of many panels to be wasteful of screen space.
Windows 7, as far as I can see, is little more than a shallow corporate re-brand of the mediocre (by modern OS standards) Vista product. My advice - one to avoid.

If you download an ISO from a torrent site and you get a virus or some other malicious program, you obviously don't have the technical know-how to use it anyways... I have downloaded Windows 7 beta three or four different times now from torrent sites, and all have been perfectly legitimate with no other software added to the ISO whatsoever...
PS.. Josef, I strongly disagree with you on your views of Windows 7... With respect to Vista, it is a million times faster, and almost seems like it knows what you want to do before you do it, but then again, I am running 64bit, so... you might try that instead; maybe that will change your opinion of it. I am also a FPS obsessed gamer and windows 7 really does outperform Vista for high-end graphics games in my experience.

Or try Suse Linux 11.1 or Ubuntu 8.1 with Beryl! Why even waste time dinking around with Micro$oft. they both even come with free office suite that can open MS Office products and a bunch of other cool stuff, and you know what? Its all FREE.

I've tried various Linux products over the years and found the installs cumbersome and can be very difficult. Even the latest and easier installs suck. I've run into many driver issues and like Mac's, you don't know what software you'll be able to run. I'm sorry Josh, any Linux program just isn't worth the time wasted trying to run it and then be limited with software in the end. Like a mac... yuck! I'm happy to pay for Microsoft products.

While there's no guarantee that all Windows 7 ISOs downloaded from torrent sites will be free of Malware and also unaltered, there's a definitive way to distinguish between good ones from the majority bad ones, atleast in the case of Windows 7 builds released publicly by Microsoft. It is to find the torrents with specific MD5 or SHA1 codes. For instance, build 7000 of Windows 7 was once available in Microsoft's website for public downloads, but no more, even though it's still available for download to MSDN and Technet's subscribers. A smart downloader would just collect the SHA1 of the required ISO from MSDN website and search it up in torrent sites to find the exact ISO files which were once offered for download from Microsoft's website. In this way we can ensure that the ISO file is in no way altered and also is malware-free.

windows 7 is a awesome but xp is still the best os to use.

am using the windows 7 beta. It works more faster than Vista and Xp.
I never paid for earlier windows release, but am thinking to buy this new version. i love it.... Thanks Microsoft

Ive been using Ubuntu for over a year now. Ive been trying to migrate away from windows for a long time, but as I work in graphics and animation, needed programs like photoshop and flash.

Im happy to say that all those problems are now over, and I can run all the software I need using Wine, the windows compatability layer in Linux. Sure things need a little configuring every now and again, but this only leads to a greater understanding of how the system works. Its not a big deal.

I dont want to try to persuade you to switch to Linux. I know I wont be able to as when I was a windows user I would defend it against Mac users and wouldnt hear a thing said against it. That is until windows XP came out, and decisions started being made for me, which got worse in Vista. I still defended it against the Mac, as I couldn't get to grips with the fish hand OS that is macintosh. But it wasnt a good relationship, and I felt that Microsoft took more than it gave.

Anyway, happy dabblings with Windows 7 all. Hopefully you wont get stiffed as badly as you all did with Vista, though somehow I think that history will repeat itself until enough people say no more. I for one will not be buying a copy.

another fine example of fascism

of course there is anarchy involved in downloading from 'illegal' sites

there is no control

that is the point

end corporate personhood

fight the false force with real power

download away

I've been dicked over by Microsoft on Windows ME & Vista; I'll get Windows 7, but I'll be damned if I'm gonna pay.

Could`nt agree with you more!!!!!!

don't blame the coders, blame the code :)

Hackers.....you dudes should suck it up and move on to more meaningful pursuits.
You whine and complain about MS and their power. Yes, they have been very successful and don't you wish you had MS shares 15 years ago. We want more powerful apps, we need more powerful hardware, we get more powerful hdw, we need better apps....we are in a trough of computing need need need.

Instead of sitting in front of your internet connection sucking out all the free stuff you can get your hacking hands on....go for a walk....meet a girl/guy......read an actual printed hard copy book....volunteer for some worthwhile charity.....get some joy out of life instead of fighting the technological machine that feeds our insatiable voracious appetite for cool stuff.

And to you malicious hackers...you are nothing more than sad, worthless cowards taking joy in other's misery. Turn off your computer and go join a chess club or a sports team.

Life is more than these stupid computers.....let's all get one (a life, that is...)

To all you Linux evangelists, I used Linux in a corporate environment. It worked. But I would rather eat my own head than install it on my home computer. Yes, it may be theoretically free, but it is not hassle free, I don't like penguins, I don't want to grow a beard, and my pro-music software has so far hated every incarnation of Linux it has been asked to work with.

Windows is far from perfect, but to date there has been NO alternative OS to tempt the average casual home user.

I will be sticking with XP-Pro for now, but watching 7 with interest to see if it is worth the upgrade.

if you have money, buy windows 7
if you don't, download it in torrent!

pls dnt hate torrents! not all people have money!
and Microsoft is too rich!

new hardware drivers that is compatible only in vista is just for business
wayway back then inventions are invented to help people, but for now is just for money

sorry for my bad english..

i like windows and Linux
i use them
windows are for my gaming while Linux is for my programming.

windows has tons of AV while Linux has less virus (virus programmers create more for windows rather than Linux (i never encounter Linux virus)) .

about issues in torrent, i hate rich people.
Microsoft is too rich and they change windows to sell another one
and the fact that new hardware drivers (branded PCs) are compatible only in vista :

i don't see another new technology...
its still the same ! hard drive to memory to processor etc. etc.
Vista has just another features that i think it can be programmed and install in XP.. like graphics card/devices is just additional processor/memory for graphics output that your processor and memory can also do..