No Wallpaper Swapping in Win 7 SE
Users, OEMs and Microsoft partners will not be able to change the wallpaper within Windows 7 Starter Edition.
While many consumers anxiously await the arrival of Microsoft’s new Windows 7 operating system, recently controversy has surrounded the Starter Edition version. Originally, SE would only allow three programs to run in the background at one time, however Microsoft eventually relented and lifted the restriction. Albeit not quite as drastic, now another restriction has surfaced: the inability to change the desktop wallpaper.
According to Within Windows, consumers cannot swap out the original windows wallpaper, change the colors or sound schemes. Apparently the same now holds true for OEMs and partners, a feature said companies normally modify in-house before shipping to retail outlets. Although Windows 7 Starter Edition isn’t available on the market, Microsoft recently confirmed the SE’s upcoming limitation in a short but firm statement.
“In Windows Starter Edition, OEMs must not modify or replace the Windows-provided background for Windows Welcome, the logon screen, or the desktop,” the company confirmed.
As of this writing, Microsoft has not yet revealed the official desktop background for SE. Consumers wanting to switch out the wallpaper for images of Fluffy or the in-laws will need to upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium. However, it’s highly likely that a wallpaper workaround will be available online long before the OS makes its debut this October.
I'm sorry, but where in that statement does it say anything about the user changing this stuff?
That's right: it doesn't. All it says is that the OEMs can't change it.
Yay, reading is fun!
@Jokemeister NO that is totally incorrect, because the SE version does cost the end user money. A more correct way to put it is if we pay for it we want everything. The end user doesn't want to be nickeled and dimed. There only needs to be two versions of Win 7, Home and Corporate and that's it, not this pay more for more features version crap. MS needs to drop SE versions of Win 7 or prepare to lose marketshare to free OSes.
@Jokemeister NO that is totally incorrect, because the SE version does cost the end user money. A more correct way to put it is if we pay for it we want everything. The end user doesn't want to be nickeled and dimed. There only needs to be two versions of Win 7, Home and Corporate and that's it, not this pay more for more features version crap. MS needs to drop SE versions of Win 7 or prepare to lose marketshare to free OSes.
i can change the wallpaper, sounds, ringtones, and theme of my crappy entry level 4 year old phone but won't be able to do it in Win7?
Start Edition: High pressure presoak
Home Edition: Undercarriage Rinse, Soft cloth buff
Ultimate Edition: Triple Polish, Clearcoat shine
I'm sorry, but where in that statement does it say anything about the user changing this stuff?
That's right: it doesn't. All it says is that the OEMs can't change it.
Yay, reading is fun!
You want wallpapers don't buy SE - simple, marketing is marketing, Microsoft has to give the users a reason to go higher and pay the premium.
If MS actually came out and said that, then go back to 3rd grade. Luckily seboj and I both passed reading. "OEMs must not modify..." Not sure about THG here, but I'm not an OEM. Perhaps, just maybe, MS meant that OEMs must not modify the background. This is an awfully stupid "feature" to remove... the last OS MS produced that couldn't change the background was what, DOS 6.22? Give me a break. They're obviously talking about OEMs pre-loading their own crap and breaking Windows 7.0 like they think was done with Vista. (How many ignorant users thought Vista always come with all this extra crap software that OEMs bundle and assumed it was MS's fault and went back to XP? All they really wanted wanted was retail Vista, not OEM fubar'd Vista).
Plus... why would they spend time removing that "feature" we've come to take for granted? It wastes developer time. I believe what MS came out and said was that if OEMs ship out 7.0 SE, they need to ship a retail copy or they'll lose their partnership / require Win 7.0 Home to be shipped at a higher cost (and thus decreased sales).
anandtech.com
yea and i bet it will be easy to
stupid limitation.
I hate it when they try to do sh*t like this....
Daamn straight. My flipping Nokia from 2006 can even change theme/wallpaper!
Also screw you Jokemiester your freaking strepid.
I will shank you.
Personally I would be OK if they just made one version that contained everything, and sell it to everybody for the same price, but it would really bump up the prices of lower end computers.
If you read the Link provided,it says Windows does a hash check on the image file so just replacing it doesn't work. But a fix is already in the works and if I was stuck with this version the first thing I would do is "fix" it.
I see it as kind of a dick move on MS's part, it's been a feature on every single version of windows ever, the only reason to remove it is to force people spend more money on upgrades.
/rant