OSNews Thread "RE: disk space" by kaiwai

The RC milestone is a result of feedback from millions of customers and partners around the world. It indicates the operating system is entering the final phases of development and is ready for partners to develop new applications, device drivers and services, and ready for IT pros to evaluate Windows 7 and examine how it will operate in their environment." The public release will be May 5.

To read all comments associated with this story, please click here. Oh, and don't say, "Linux supports lots of platforms" because such a statement is completely irrelevant when it comes to actual hardware components being supported. If there's a lot of these programs included with the Windows 7 drivers, that might explain the diskspace.

I don't care how many drivers it has, a driver and its accompanying programs if necessary should never grow to the monstrous proportions that some of those in Windows have become. Look at HP's drivers, for example, their printer and scanner driver packages can be up to 500mb in size for the full download, or 45mb for the basic driver download. 45mb.. If there are a lot of large drivers provided with Windows 7 as there were with Vista..

Some of the provided drivers in OS X suffer from the same issue, so it's far from a Windows-specific bloat. A typical install of OS X Leopard, without iLife and without customizing the installation, is about 14gb due to several things--drivers, translations and duplications of translations, duplicated libraries, etc. It's sad, but Windows 7's disk requirements are pretty average when it comes to the most popular commercial desktop oses.

The hardware works with the operating system without any extra crap installed - nothing has ever stopped HP or Lenovo from saying to their suppliers, "I don't want all the crap you bundle with your drivers, I just want the drivers and nothing more - let Windows handle the rest".

I agree - but this is a trend through the industry - look at the size of Adobe Acrobat Reader for isntance - all it does it allow one to read a PDF and the size of the download cannot be justified. Its about time driver writers spent more time on the quality of their drivers rather than widgets and dongles that they insist on bundling with their drivers. Mate, you're preaching to the choir - I've been pulling my hair out for years.

77MB for a Nvidia driver, over 34mb for a Epson printer driver, then there is nero burnign rom that is expanding at a faster rate than my waist line! For me, the typical Mac install based on complete restoration off the CD DVD's provided by Apple is around 16.5GB which includes the full install of Mac OS X plus iLife.

The driver problem is far less of a problem on Mac's. I've yet to come across a driver the size of a small island like I do in the Windows world. The drivers bundled with Mac OS X are light weight and simple - they do the job required and no other stuff is bundled with it. Some hardware worked in Mac OS X Tiger and doesn't work properly in Leopard.

Some devices worked in Linux kernel 2.4.xx but don't work as well in 2.6.xx. That's just the occasional price you pay when you upgrade, most hardware engineers aren't going to write new drivers for discontinued products, and even if they wanted to, they may be forbidden from doing so by their management. Now, if the hardware in question hasn't been discontinued..

Common sense is often lacking in the world.. 2008-05-01 13:35:35 by lemur2 RE 6 : Link to the article? All Rights Reserved. OSNews and the OSNews logo are trademarks of OSNews. We are not responsible for them in any way. All trademarks, icons, and logos shown or mentioned in this web site are the property of their respective owners.