Windows 7 system requirements

1. 1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
2. 1 gigabyte (GB) RAM (32-bit) or 2 GB RAM (64-bit)
3. 16 GB available hard disk space (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)
4. DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver

Additional requirements to use certain features:

• Internet access (fees may apply)

• Depending on resolution, video playback may require additional memory and advanced graphics hardware

• Some games and programs might require a graphics card compatible with DirectX 10 or higher for optimal performance

• For some Windows Media Center functionality a TV tuner and additional hardware may be required

• Windows Touch and Tablet PCs require specific hardware

• HomeGroup requires a network and PCs running Windows 7

• DVD/CD authoring requires a compatible optical drive

• BitLocker requires Trusted Platform Module (TPM) 1.2

• BitLocker To Go requires a USB flash drive

• Windows XP Mode requires an additional 1 GB of RAM, an additional 15 GB of available hard disk space, and a processor capable of hardware virtualization with Intel VT or AMD-V turned on

• Music and sound require audio output

Product functionality and graphics may vary based on your system configuration. Some features may require advanced or additional hardware.

Windows 7 Keyboard Shortcuts

Windows 7 may just be the most keyboard-friendly operating system yet. Without ever laying a finger on your mouse, you can dock windows, quick-launch your favorite apps, enable external displays, and much more. Sure, you have to memorize a few new key-combos, but once you’ve integrated them into your daily routine, you’ll wonder how you ever got along without them.

Start-Menu Searches: Windows key

This carryover from Vista is arguably one of Windows’ must underused and undervalued features. A simple tap of the Windows key activates the Start menu, where you can type the first few letters of a program name, Control Panel setting, Word document, or whatever and then hit Enter to launch it. Why reach for the mouse?

Minimize (Almost) All Windows: Win + Home

This combo lets you send all open windows packing--except the one that’s currently active. Sure beats clicking Minimize on a bunch of individual windows. When you tap the shortcut a second time, it restores all previously open windows.

Make Windows Transparent: Win + Space

This is the keyboard equivalent of mousing over the transparency tool in the right corner of the System Tray--great for those times when you need to something on the desktop (like a gadget) but don’t want to minimize all your windows. After tapping Win-Space, your windows will stay see-through until you let go of the Windows key.

Quick-Launch Taskbar Apps: Win + (1-9)

As you know, Windows 7 makes it a snap to “pin” frequently used programs to the taskbar. But did you also know that these programs are automatically assigned a number and corresponding Windows-key shortcut? Just press Windows-1 to launch the first pinned program (the one closest to the Start button), Windows-2 to launch the next one, and so on. Fastest app-launching known to man! Except, of course, for this…

Quick-Launch Any App: Hotkey

Like Vista before it, Windows 7 lets you assign a quick-launch hotkey to any installed program. Just right-click the program’s icon, choose Properties, and then click the Shortcut tab. Click once in the Shortcut key field, then press the hotkey combo you want to assign (Ctrl-Shift-H, for instance). Click OK and you’re done! Assuming you have a good memory, app launching doesn’t get any faster than this.

Dock Active Windows: Win + Left or Right Arrow

A great shortcut for users with widescreen monitors, this combo docks the active window to the left or right half of the screen (depending on which arrow you tap), at the same time maximizing it top-to-bottom.

Magnify Your View: Win + (+)

Windows 7’s built-in magnifier lets you zoom in wherever you place your cursor. Just tap Win-plus (that’s the Windows key and the plus key) to enable the magnifier and set a 200% zoom level. When you mouse to any edge of the screen, your view scrolls accordingly. The more you tap the keys, the higher the zoom. Of course, you can just as easily zoom out again with Win-minus.

Open Presentation Settings: Win + P

Good news for business users constantly struggling to get Windows to cooperate with projectors: A quick tap of Win-P activates a monitor-settings panel. Click Duplicate or Projector only to send your display to the big screen, or Extend if you’ve connected a second monitor and want extra screen real estate.

Create a New Folder: Ctrl + Shift + N

Forget the old way of creating new folders. In Windows 7, all it takes is a tap of Ctrl-Shift-N. This works in any open Explorer window, but also on the desktop. After the new folder appears, just type in a name as usual and hit Enter.

Bring Gadgets to the Fore: Win + G

Now that Windows’ gadgets are no longer relegated to the Sidebar, they’re free to sit anywhere on your desktop. Of course, that means they can get obscured by other windows. As you now know, a tap of Win-Space makes those windows temporarily see-through, but what if you want to put the gadgets on top of your windows? No problem: Just tap Win-G.

Google puts The Pirate Bay back in its search index

Google has restored The Pirate Bay to its search engine index after briefly removing it last week following a copyright infringement complaint
The complaint, dated Aug. 22, came from Destined Enterprises, which specializes in adult entertainment, according to a copy of the complaint posted on ChillingEffects.org. It cites the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which exempts service providers from liability if infringing content is removed.

The complaint lists Web pages with infringing content, most of which appear at least by name to be adult oriented. Google has removed at least some of them from its index, including direct links to bit torrents indexed by The Pirate Bay. However, the main home page for the site is back in the index.

Google officials in London could not be immediately reached for comment.

The Pirate Bay is a search engine that finds torrents, or small information files used to download digital content via the peer-to-peer BitTorrent filing-sharing network. It also is a tracker, which coordinates the download of material with the torrents.

Although by no means the only torrent search engine, it is among the most popular and loathed by the entertainment industry for facilitating the download of material under copyright without permission.

The Pirate Bay has had an eventful year. Swedish authorities charged four of its operators with being accessories to crimes against copyright law. The operators were each sentenced in April to one year in prison and ordered to pay around 30 million Swedish kronor (US$3.6 million) in damages. They appealed, and a hearing is scheduled to start Nov. 13 in Stockholm.

In another twist in the site’s saga, one of the lay judges who was supposed to hear the appear was dismissed last week after it was revealed he works as a product developer for the streaming music service Spotify. In Sweden, lay judges serve alongside professional judges in most Swedish courts, and The Pirate Bay appeal will be heard by three professional and two lay judges.

The appeal comes as a Swedish company is still working out issues related to its proposed acquisition of The Pirate Bay. Global Gaming Factory X (GGF) has offered to pay 60 million Swedish kronor (US$8.64 million) in cash for the site.

But GGF was delisted from the Sweden’s AkieTorget stock exchange on Sept. 9 due to irregularities in the way it informed the market about the transaction, which has been approved by GGF shareholders. Its stock will start trading again on Wednesday on Mangoldlistan, a Swedish exchange run by a securities brokerage company.

T-Mobile Ties Wi-Fi BlackBerries to PBXes

T-Mobile USA is expanding beyond its consumer roots on Monday with T-Mobile Wi-Fi Calling with MobileOffice, a service that lets businesses extend capabilities of their desk phones to BlackBerry smartphones.

The service will tie into office PBX (private branch exchange) systems so employees can use their T-Mobile BlackBerries in the office on Wi-Fi, using the same number as on their desk phones. They will also have one voicemail box and call filtering system for both phones. Companies could even remove their desk phones and simply use the BlackBerry.

Extending PBX features to mobile phones is nothing new, but creating a service offering specifically for businesses is a rare move for T-Mobile. The nation's fourth-largest mobile operator has overwhelmingly marketed to consumers, making its name with devices such as the youth-oriented Sidekick texting phone. The carrier, based in Bellevue, Washington, tends toward prepaid and less-expensive monthly plans than the larger U.S. operators.

But T-Mobile already utilizes Wi-Fi in its HotSpot@Home service, which lets customers make unlimited calls with a Wi-Fi-enabled cell phone over their home wireless networks. Adapting this idea to enterprises could make for a compelling option for cost savings and convenience. The system can save customers money on international long-distance calls and roaming, as well as reduce the consumption of domestic minutes, according to the carrier.

Wi-Fi Calling with MobileOffice works with a wide variety of PBXes and lets administrators apply authentication, call logging and security to employees' use of the BlackBerries in the office, T-Mobile said.

T-Mobile will work out the price of the underlying BlackBerry Mobile Voice System with each customer, according to a representative from the carrier's PR agency. Companies with more than 100 T-Mobile voice and data lines will get free unlimited Wi-Fi calls on BlackBerries nationwide and from abroad to the U.S. Companies with fewer than 100 lines will pay US$9.99 per line, per month.

Toshiba Shows First TV Based on Cell Chip

Hoping to set itself apart from other television makers, Toshiba will soon put on sale in Japan the first television based on the powerful Cell multimedia processor, the same chip that's used in the PlayStation 3. The Cell Regza TV boasts several advanced features including the ability to simultaneously record eight high-definition channels.

The TV represents more than the culmination of four years of research and development. No other company has yet talked about putting such powerful processing inside a TV and Toshiba is betting that the functions enabled by the inclusion of the Cell give it an edge in an increasingly competitive marketplace. (Click on the images for a closer look)

The 55-inch TV will go on sale in Japan in early December and will cost around ¥1 million [m] (US$11,175). Toshiba expects to sell about 1,000 of the TVs per month when it first launches in Japan. It will first arrive in the U.S. sometime in 2010, with a European release set to happen after that, but no other details on international availability were announced.

The Cell chip was developed by Toshiba, IBM and Sony and each chip contains a single Power PC core and eight co-processors. Together the chips make heavy-duty processing of video a breeze. Compared to one of Toshiba's current TVs, the Cell Regza has 143 times the arithmetic processing capacity.

The simultaneous recording function uses two-thirds of the space on an internal 3TB hard-disk drive to provide, when run continuously, the last 26 hours of television on-demand from eight channels. Alternatively it can be switched to record fewer channels at different times to result in a longer overall library of programs. For example, if set just to record during primetime then up to a week's programming can be stored.

The eight channels corresponds to the number of terrestrial TV stations available in metropolitan areas of Japan.

The remaining terabyte of disk space can be used to record desired programs and keep them for longer than the simultaneous recording function allows.

Other visual tricks are also capable with the TV, such as the ability to have eight TV channels displayed on the screen at the same time. By keeping each of the TV tuners set to a different channel it's also possible to quickly step up and down through digital channels without the delay that is now common on most digital sets.

The hard-disk, Cell chip and most of the other intelligence and processing systems for the set are included in an external box, which is roughly the size of a a Blu-ray Disc player of a few years ago. The

The TV is being unveiled to the public at Ceatec, Japan's biggest electronics show that kicks off on Tuesday near Tokyo. At the exhibition Toshiba is also talking about future directions for the technology including the use of the Cell chip to power a 3D television and a version with a 4k x 2k screen, which has four times as many pixels as current high-def TVs.

Some of the technology from the set is also expected to make its way down to smaller TVs.

Adobe Flash Player 10.1 Comes to Smartphones

Adobe unveiled the Flash 10.1 player, which will enable all Adobe Flash content to be accessible on smartphones. This means you'll be able to play Flash-based games and view Flash-based videos and Web sites. And yes, that includes Hulu.

iPhone owners, however, aren't so lucky. Adobe said that they are still working to make the Flash Player compatible on the iPhone OS, but are hindered by limitations within the platform. Although Apple is left out this time around, the absence of Flash probably won't hurt the iPhone. The iPhone is already above and beyond other OS's in terms of its multimedia and gaming capabilities.

Apple will want to jump on board soon, though; Flash Player 10.1 opens up some interesting multimedia possibilities for other platforms. The player supports multitouch, accelerometer and screen orientation, all of which makes for the optimal video-watching experience. It also supports gesture-based controls, which is a boon for gaming. Adobe said that the player won't be a drain on battery life, either. For example, the player goes to sleep when you receive an incoming call.

A public developer beta will be available for Windows Mobile and Palm webOS will be available later this year. Betas for RIM BlackBerry OS, Nokia Symbian and Google Android will arrive in 2010. Adobe said that they are working with 19 out of the 20 major handset manufacturers so it is likely the Flash 10.1 player will eventually be available for non-smartphones as well.

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IBM Aims at Google, Microsoft With New Webmail

IBM has launched LotusLive iNotes, an on-demand e-mail, calendaring and contact management system meant to compete with the likes of Gmail and Microsoft Exchange, the company said Friday.

Pricing starts at US$3 per user per month, undercutting Google Apps Premier Edition, which costs $50 per user per year.

IBM is aiming the software at large enterprises that want to migrate an on-premise e-mail system to SaaS (software as a service), particularly for users who aren't tied to a desk, such as retail workers. It is also hoping to win business from smaller companies interested in on-demand software but with concerns about security and service outages, such as those suffered by Gmail in recent months.

LotusLive iNotes is based on technology IBM purchased from the Hong Kong company Outblaze.

"What we brought to Outblaze and to the marketplace is what you'd expect from IBM in terms of security, reliability and privacy," said Sean Poulley, vice president of online collaboration.

While alluding to Google's service outages, Poulley acknowledged that no company can guarantee 100 percent uptime for on-demand applications. But IBM has a long-standing track record of running "the world's mission-critical systems," he said.

IBM will also have an opportunity to win customers from Microsoft who aren't ready to migrate to the upcoming Exchange 2010 release, given the headaches and investments involved, Poulley said.

Overall, the main point of interest in IBM's announcement is price, said Gartner analyst Matt Cain.

"Outblaze always sold low-cost mailboxes and that's what this is," he said. "Google's long been in it, Microsoft's long been in it. Now IBM's in it."

However, that's not to say IBM's brand on the software isn't of some value, Cain added. ."From an enterprise perspective, you'd rather buy e-mail from IBM than a company called Outblaze."

It's unlikely that IBM's pricing strategy will cause competitors to lower fees for their offerings, according to Cain. For one thing, Microsoft already has a $2 per month Exchange Online option called "Deskless Worker," Cain noted.

Google Chrome OS Arriving Next Month?

Google first announced its entry into the the operating system space back in July. At that time, Google stated that Chrome OS would not be available to consumers until sometime in 2010. However, various Chinese sources have today claimed that devices running the upcoming open-source OS could be seen as early as next month.

Accoridng to Shanzi.com, Chinese hardware manufacturer Lemote may ship its line of budget netbooks with preview builds of Google's Chrome OS. These Chome OS-based netbooks could hit the market in late October. Chinese manufacturers, as Liliputing speculates, may be more willing to try new, untested technology, whereas western manufacturers may be more hesitant to take new tech on board without performing rigorous testing first.

Rumors regarding the early release of the Chrome OS are, of course, nothing new, and Google has not responded to any of the supposed claims, including those of various 'leaked' screenshots. So with Google being tight-lipped and providing no solid hint as to when we can expect to see the final OS on shelves, reports such as these can only be taken with a pinch of salt.

Amazon Settles Kindle "1984" Lawsuit

That didn't take long. Two months after a high school student sued Amazon for removing George Orwell's "1984" from his Kindle e-reader, along with all his notes, Amazon has settled the lawsuit.

Techflash dug up the the settlement, which was filed in Seattle on September 25. Amazon will give $150,000 to the plaintiff's lawyers, and lead law firm KamberEdelson LLC said it will donate its share to charity. It's not clear from Techflash's report how much money 17-year-old Justin Gawronski of Michigan and a co-plaintiff, Antoine Bruguier, will get.

In July, Amazon remotely wiped Orwell's "1984" and "Animal Farm" from all Kindle e-readers, because the publisher of the e-books didn't have the rights to sell them in the United States. The move was seen as Orwellian in itself, and raised questions of whether the consumer really owns digital content that is downloaded and paid for.

Shortly after the incident, Amazon apologized and said it wouldn't happen again. People who had downloaded the e-books, who were already refunded after the deletion, were offered their e-books back along with their notes, or they could take a $30 gift certificate instead.

In the settlement, Amazon promises never to repeat its actions, under a few conditions. The retailer will still wipe an e-book if a court or regulatory body orders it, if doing so is necessary to protect consumers from malicious code, if the consumer agrees for any reason to have the e-book removed, or if the consumer fails to pay (for instance, if the credit card issuer doesn't remit payment).

So, the answer is still "no," you don't own the digital books you download. Though I can understand the reasoning behind some of the exceptions Amazon lays out, Amazon still maintains control over your e-books. It is not the same as having a book all to yourself once you leave the bookstore.

The "judicial or regulatory order" clause is the one that concerns me most. Theoretically, if the dispute over Orwell's e-books came to blows in court, and Amazon was ordered to wipe out all copies that it distributed, we'd be in the same situation. The only difference is that Amazon can point its finger at the court system or the government, instead of taking the blame for enabling remote deletion in the first place.

When that happens, it's "1984" all over again.