It’s an upgrade from Vistas that does well without a mouse
Vito Pilieci
Province
If you have ever wanted to interact with your PC the same way you do with your iPod Touch, Windows 7 may be just what you are looking for.
The new operating system from Microsoft Corp. launches on Thursday and promises, among other things, to help the software maker to leave behind the negativity surrounding Windows Vista.
One of the least-talked-about features in the new system is its support for touchscreen devices from its core, meaning it will bring touch functionality to applications and programs that don’t have touchscreen compatibility built in, provided the user has a touch-capable PC.
One of the early entrants to the touch-enabled PC space is HP, with a line of Touch-Smart desktops. The HP TouchSmart DX9000 system with an Intel Duo Core processor running at 2.26 gigahertz and four gigabytes of RAM retails for $1,749.
We tested Windows 7 running on the DX9000. The system ran incredibly well without a mouse. Selecting applications was as simple as pointing to the screen and tapping twice.
Pictures could be resized by pinching in or out with your fingers, rotating an image was as easy as moving fingers in a clockwise motion and scrolling is done by swiping a digit up or down. A touchscreen-based keyboard, which pops-up on demand, was also handy but not the easiest thing to use.
While it was easy to navigate without a mouse, it was physically awkward. While Windows 7 does an admirable job of bringing a touch interface to traditional software, the software has been optimized to work with the pointer of a mouse. You find yourself looking for tiny hyperlinks and text boxes to input commands with your fingertips and thinking, “There has to be a better way.”
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