I still think I could make do with the three concurrent application limits in Microsoft’s Windows 7 Starter Edition on a netbook. Luckily, I don’t have to and neither do you. Microsoft has removed that particular limitation on the Starter Edition, which I expect will be the base Windows option for netbooks when the new OS hits later this year. You can give up a collective sigh of relief because if you want to multitask with oodles of apps, you’re welcome to do so. There’s still quite a bit you can’t do with Starter Edition, however, as these features simply aren’t supported:
- Aero Glass, meaning you can only use the “Windows Basic” or other opaque themes. It also means you do not get Taskbar Previews or Aero Peek.
- Personalization features for changing desktop backgrounds, window colors, or sound schemes.
- The ability to switch between users without having to log off.
- Multimonitor support.
- DVD playback.
- Windows Media Center for watching recorded TV or other media.
- Remote Media Streaming for streaming your music, videos, and recorded TV from your home computer.
- Domain support for business customers.
- XP Mode for those that want the ability to run older Windows XP programs on Windows 7.
From a netbook perspective, none of these are deal-breakers for me, although I’d miss the Aero features. Of course, now that I have a Windows Home Server box running, I was planning to remotely stream media content to my netbook, which looks to be another “gotcha!” I suspect most netbook purchases will end up coming with Windows 7 Home Premium, although we don’t yet know what the premium will cost.
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