I don't get why people would download the Windows 7 Beta or RC from a torrent site when Microsoft is offering it for free, to me that just doesn't make any sense.

Man I wish I could be a a 733t haxor pirater. It means I'm so tech savvy and am uber and smarter than everyone who pays for their software. I guess it is due to this elite knowledge of mine that I'm trying to pirate free software. Good job.

RC wasn't out then

Goddamned leeching bastards. Oh, and dirty apes too.

It's hard to "pirate" something that is free. You contradict yourself. Good job in failing. Then again can't expect anything else from a idiot.

Well it was but only to those who had a developers account at MSDN. There are actually 3 versions of the RC floating around out there. One is a Russian release , one from China, and one uploaded by a person who downloaded it from MSDN.

Its all a matter of what circles you run in I guess.

Seriously.... people are DUMB! Hmm let me get a pirated copy of win 7 RC because its soooo expensive.

Yea people are seriously dumb, like you. Let's see, maybe because RC1 wasn't out for public use yet? Also not to mention torrents can be a much higher download speed.

I'm not worried despite having downloaded it through torrents.

I agree. If I want Windows 7 RC, which I have, download it from Microsoft direct. Why would you want to go to a torrent site and allow someone else to have their hand in it, compromising security.

I can't believe how brainwashed some people are. BitTorrent is not equal to piracy. Many people use BitTorrent because is the most efficient method to download.
This is primary example how hackers are taking advantage of Microsoft's stubbornness not to provide official torrent file and ignorant users that for some very important reason, I am sure, can wait for official release of RC to the public.

Yes, it makes no sense at all. I don't mean to insult anyone, but those people who just couldn't wait a few more days before the RC was available to the general public and instead went to get it from a torrent had it coming.

Patience is getting scarcer these days...

[quote]I'm not worried despite having downloaded it through torrents./quote]

Wow, couldn't wait for a few days. Had to have it. This is the same mindset as the other idiots who downloaded through torrents. It wont happen to me! I'm 1337.

Piracy issues aside, consider the idea of medium distribution. Bittorrent technology offers a superior method of distribution than downloading directly from a single source (e.g. Microsoft's servers). Perhaps if Microsoft were to offer the download of Windows 7 via Bittorrent, there would be no need to have a 3rd party torrent release.

Well considering how it was torrented 100,000s of times and so few bots are appearing, yea I can put two and two together and say I'm safe. And how are we idiots be downloading through a better medium then pretty much any other?

Such huge downloads should be available via torrent, it is cheaper, fast, resumable and chunks are automatically verified using checksums. Most of the torrent clients have also some options to download in background when network is idle. I got the image directly from Microsoft, if they gave me a torrent I would have preferred it over direct download.

When you're downloading the ISO from Microsoft you a have a much higher degree of certainty it won't have a trojan inside. Besides, almost everyone I asked here on the first day was experiencing very decent download speeds from Microsoft. I got 770 Kb/s on the 34-bit version and 850 on the 64-bit. Some people were getting as high as 2 Mb/s. And this was on the first day! Besides, Microsoft says there is no need to hurry.

Why would you resort to a torrent when you can get it safely from Microsoft? If I didn't manage to download it on the first day I would wait a couple of days. What's the rush ?

Getting it ASAP through a torrent isn't worth the risk in this case where you have a viable alternative. Leave torrents for other stuff.

In my humble opinion there are two things that are not worth getting through a torrent, or pirated (not that one is necessarily connected to the other, and I'm not being ironic) - the Operating system and a security suite /antivirus/firewall/anti-spyware. In these core areas it is better to get it preferably from a trusted source.

Yup i was averaging around 3 Mbps. Got it downloaded, burned, and installed within a very short time span (an hour i guess?). No trojans either. A lot faster than i thought it would take that's for sure.

My PC is a virus infected whore.

What else is new ? ... i think this article should be common sense specially if its posted on a tech web as opposed to i don't know Kosmo-Girl !

Good lol it's what they get. I don't trust this site microsoft.com what's that imma go with this torrent that a few people scanned with a random anti virus and said it's okay...

Lol also at the people saying i don't trust active x from microsoft.com but I'll trust a random plug-in for firefox every time! Guess what update your IE and it's one of the most secure browsers around just don't go around saying yes to every warning it gives.

Anyone that resorted to downloading a torrent on a free public rc that microsoft hosted that is bound to be faster then a torrent and more secure needs some education on how the Internet works.

see, when the tubes clogged i was downloading at 215k on an 18 meg connection, so i torrented it and both versions were hitting 2.5 megs a second. thats my first reason; my second reason is because there were legitimate versions (which i downloaded) and it was out earlier than the Technet and MSDN.

You have to have a windows live passport account to log into microsoft.com and download. I don't have such an account so that was as far as I got. Nowhere on the download page did it explain how to sign up. I wasn't really interested in getting 7 so I didn't pursue it further, I just didn't believe that just anybody could go to microsoft.com and hit the download button so I thought I would check it out.

probably should have mentioned i was downloading through microsoft

FAIL

Just need a live/hotmail account really... And it is used for downloading any public beta from microsoft.

The problem is that they (Microsoft) make beta versions available for so long then they pull the download and only offer the key. Anyone who is behind and goes to download too late will find the download link grayed out, so a lot of people get the key from Microsoft and get the beta download from torrents. For the record, I'm runnig a real copy from Billy G. himself.

People are stupid.

This is precisely why I waited and downloaded the RC from MS servers.

It seems, for most, bittorrent ultimately means free content. But for some, like myself, it means much more robust download experience:
- automatic checksum check/re-download.
- download pause/continue.
- no need for sign-up.
- download pause/continue.
- automatic checksum check/re-download.

Yes, the first two are important enough to be repeated.

Now, if only MS provides torrent downloads, but we all know they are in close ties with the content industries (itself included), no hope there.

i tried 4!! times to download windows 7 using up 12gb/my monthly 30gb WTF!, Microshits website download manager Bullshit screws up everything, so thats y i downloaded from Demonoid on the 5th try, and guess what IT WORKED

Ah Windows problems