Windows 7: You Can Disable Every Major Feature

Very cool. Good job MS...

Can I turn off UAC?

"Microsoft noted that due to all the anti-trust dealings, user feedback, and browser-OS integration controversies, it has decided to allow users to turn off almost everything, except he core OS itself."

but is the one feature we want to disable! ;-)

1st UAC, next Security Notifier. Not the best move, but a great move for MS.

You can turn of UAC in Vista so yes you can turn it off in Windows 7

"the disabling feature will only be available after installation is complete."
What about OEM installations? Can for example DELL simply replace IE with Firefox or is this "only after installation" requirement there to insure something like that could not happen.

Thank you for letting me turn off Media Player and Internet Explorer. I'll keep solitaire and minesweeper.

Whats Microsoft? Some kind of toilet paper company???

Ok. So I guess it's a move in the right direction. But the point I think MS is missing out on is not only do we not want all that crap running... we don't want it eating up Gbs of space on our hard drives. Maybe Windows 8 will finally let you pick during install. One can always hope.


On second thought... since MS loves to have 30 different SKUs... why not just a another one where it lets you pick what you want during install.

This is good to keep the EU out of its hair, but is it enough....

I am still in the camp that Microsoft should sell Windows as a barebone OS with no additional components at the standard $199.99 price point.

Then force customers to purchase add-on packs for all other features that were available in earlier releases of Windows.

EXAMPLE:

Internet/Media Pack (IE8, WMP, Games, etc)
Security Pack (AntiVirus, Spyware, Firewall, etc)
Home Entertainment Pack (Windows Media Center, etc)

The features and list could go on and on...

This should be put up or shut up time for the consumers to let them know that world governments are controling what you are able to have on your computer.

Hell, just for S/G, Microsoft should make their own Linux Platform.

I pulled windows 7 after seeing all my apps fail to run. Good luck selling this one, Microsoft.

Barebones with aero would be nice. Everything else I prefer to go 3rd party

Driver Signing in x64.

I'll disable Windows DVD maker.

I have no idea what you are using sir, but i am running 7 x64 as the main OS on two machines ans 32 on my macbook. all run everything fine, including Games.

the only program i found that doesn't run is Daemon tools.

I think what you meant to say was, "I have never tried Windows 7 but I don't like Microsoft so I hope it fails."

Windows 7 works awesome. I have the 7022 build and the only problem I've had is that IE8 locks up and requires a task manager shutdown. Really annoying...considering a absolutely hate firefox.

If I could turn off the DRM, this might make me actually use windows 7. Oh, that's not an option? Nothing to see here, move along back to your Linux system. Windows 7, 25% less pig, 50% more lipstick.

LOL please you tool. "Eating up GBs of space on our hard drives"? Give me a break. If your hard drive is that small then you should seriously question your hardware or choice of OS to begin with. MS is smart by making the installation easy and quick and keeping files around so you dont have to have the installation disk when adding features you removed. People like you are not happy no matter what the situation is. Your goal in life it to b!tch and moan no matter what. Sad just sad.

Agree, with the age of terabyte hdd, giving 10 gig to the OS is not a big deal. Heck give 100 gig to the OS is not a big deal. :-)

Not sure exactly how it works, but in Vista/XP if you remove IE (via nLite/VLite) you can run in to some nasty problems, so turning off IE in Win 7 may lead to some problems.

I wonder how many people who post here really read the articles first or if they just see 'Microsoft' and 'Windows' and out comes the hatred and made up nonsense just to seem cool.

M$ is not talking about removing the programs entirely, they are talking about disabling them. "This means the files (binaries and data) are not loaded by the operating system (for security-conscious customers) and not available to users on the computer. These same files are staged so that the features can easily be added back to the running OS without additional media." Are you mentally retarded or do you simple have so much blinding hatred that you refuse to accept what they tell you?

I personally would disable DVD Maker, I used to use WMP all the time before Winamp but I would keep it just incase. IE is helpful for my bank's website, it doesn't like me using Opera and Firefox is just a joke these days, I refuse to use it.

All in all a good PR move my M$ and saves me having to delete shortcuts or set default programs for certain file extensions. Well played Bill, well played

Freaking awesome. I really hate using some of those programs or being forced to have them. Goodbye UAC, Security Center, IE8, Windows Media Player, and Solitaire.

Shadow, since it's an option offered by the OS itself and NOT some 3rd party program then I'm pretty sure they've managed to get it to work, seeing as they made it and all.

Shadow, since it's an option offered by the OS itself and NOT some 3rd party program then I'm pretty sure they've managed to get it to work, seeing as how they are the ones that made it and all.....

Turning off the .Net Framework is a very, very bad idea. That would be a disincitive to developers using the .Net Framework which is the single easiest way to assert high security applications on the desktop.

i kinda like windows media player, but god damnit if it ever pisses me off....

Yea, I hate FireFox as well...pure crap. Anhow Windows 7 is going to be a major hit, I like everything I've seen, used and read so far on the subject. It's time to buy some MS stock I think before the general publich figures out what is coming.

I think this move is a positive all around. For #1 reason, it helps reduce the bloat of the OS making it run smoother on lesser / underpowered machines for basic stuff. Makes security better for those who want to disable internet and movie makers/picture viewers on work computers, Also by disabling IE8 will prevent it from being the "default" application every time a help window, program window, or anything that connects to the web from coming up.

It's so annoying that I use firefox as my default browser but yet some of my apps keep popping up an IE window, and unfortunately IE is known for its back-door security flaws. (multiple windows of death anyone?)

What Vista failed to do is support low end, low ram/cpu systems which are pretty much terminals and mobile devices that many folks ran XP, heck some still run 2000

can you turn off themes too?

I think it's more the load time, and usage of RAM.
Also many mininotebooks will go with Win7.
They often still come with 8 and 16GB SSD's,or 32GB MLC SSD's.

If I look at Win98Se which fit on a 1GB HD, I think I wouldn't mind going back to an OS taking up that little space (not to mention loadtime and system response speed).