Microsoft released Windows 7 to the general public on October 22nd. This new operating system is much more stable and compatible than Windows Vista. Microsoft has also rectified many of the problems and nuisances that plague Windows Vista.

Many professionals consider Windows Vista to be the second coming of Windows ME. Remember that operating system? We can only speculate that either Microsoft made a huge mistake in development, or perhaps needed a scam to make more money. Either way, that's all in the past.

Windows 7 has been much easier to work with, even since the beta versions were released. iValley has been testing the operating system since the first beta release and we are very happy to report that our tests have not produced many incompatibilities or instability issues.

Microsoft still has not reduced the number of versions of the operating system available, so you still need to choose the version right for your needs. The 4 flavors available are Starter, Home Premium, Professional, and Ultimate. Starter is only available in the U.S. on small laptops, so you may not see this too often.

Be careful when selecting your operating system, or when purchasing a new system. Most business users will need either the Professional or Ultimate version, but many home users may also need the Windows XP compatibility mode, which is not available with the Home Premium version.

The main features are the same in all 3 versions, with a few exceptions. Windows XP compatibility mode and domain membership is only available in Professional and Ultimate and BitLocker and multiple language support is only available on Ultimate.

To make your decision even more complex, each of the 3 main Windows versions are also available in 32 and 64-bit.

Which to choose depends on hardware you have, what you do with the system, and what applications you run. Although most 32-bit applications will run on a 64-bit system, many hardware devices may not work. Verify drivers are available in 64-bit for your devices, like scanners, cameras, and printers.

Unlike other popular operating systems, like Macintosh and Linux, Microsoft has been slow to force developers into the 64-bit realm. The main benefit of 64-bit is speed. A bit is the smallest piece of data your computer processes. A 32-bit operating system uses 32 pieces of data per CPU execution, wheras a 64-bit operating system uses twice as large of a chunk of data. In effect, your computer can work twice as fast in the same amount of time.

Another benefit of 64-bit is the aibility to use more than 4GB of RAM. The more RAM you have, the more applications you can run simultaneouly and the more data your computer can process without having to read it from the hard drive. This means your system runs faster.

So will you select Windows 7 32 or 64-bit? If you use and cannot upgrade old applications, or have hardware that doesn't support 64-bit, then you will need to stick with 32-bit. If you have a need for speed and use new applications and hardware, then 64-bit may be a better decision. As 64-bit Windows operating systems become more mainstream, developers will provide better support.

Keep in mind there is no upgrade path to Windows 7 from pre-Vista systems and some versions of Vista. This means you cannot install Windows 7 over Windows XP and still retain all your applications. Windows Vista may be upgradable, but it depends on the verison you have. The only option for non-upgradable systems is to perform a custom installation, which will attempt to retain documents and settings, but all applications will need to be reinstalled from scratch.

For more information on Windows 7, visit Microsoft's web site at www.microsoft.com.

The new version of Office looks very much like Office 2007, but changes in the new version may prove to be very beneficial.

One great change is it will be available in a 64-bit version. For those running 64-bit Windows, you will be able to take advantage of Office at full speed.

The ribbon on Office 2010 has been much improved so you can now modify it. In Office 2007, the ribbon was introduced, but many of the commands users were used to were either removed or hidden away. With the ability to modify the ribbon in Office 2010, you can now add those commands you were missing, rearrange commands to appear in different tabs, or even create your own tab with all the commands you normall use.

From the Office Button, you can save documents directly to Sharepoint.

Outlook now gets the ribbon, like Word and Excel and includes a nice featrue called Quick Steps. Quick Steps allows you to create a button to perform multiple tasks with just 1 click. For instance, if you constantly forward messages to accounting@mycompany.com, for each message you would need to select it, then select forward, then fill in the to: field with accounting@company.com, then hit the send button. Instead, you could just create a quick step button called "To Accounting" which would perform all these steps. Next time you want to forward a message to accounting, just select the message and click the "To Accounting" button. That's it!

A few artistic affects have been added for images within your documents. This saves you from having to open the image in a program like Photoshop, add an affect, save the image, then apply it to your document. Instead, you can apply some effects right to the image within the document. For instance, if you have a color image you want to show as black and white, just insert the image in your document as normal, then with the image selected, use the Artistic Effects dropdown and selct the black and white effect to apply it to the image. Each effect will show you a thumbnail preview of what the image will look like before applying it to your image.

One annoyance we have discovered is a security feature. It is called Protected View. When you open an existing document for the first time in Word 2010, the document will open, but the ribbon is not displayed and you cannot edit the document. Where the ribbon should be will be a red box telling you the file originated from an internet location. You have to click the Enable Editing button in order to edit the document. The idea behind this is to make sure the document is safe to open before doing so and possibly getting a virus infection. Unfortunately, most users will just hit the Enable Editing button without thinking twice, which defeats the purpose. If they open the document, this is not usually by accident and was intentionally opened. Hopefully, Microsoft will provide a way to disable this useless feature.

A new cool feature is simultaneous editing. This feature allows one person to have a document open for editing and another person can have the same document open and make changes at the same time. It shows each user where the other user is editing within the document. This way two people can work on different parts of the same document without having to make 2 copies of the document, then try to merge them together later.

Word can also cache shared documents so you can edit them while you're offline and synchronize the changes with the original when you come back online. This is great for those who are constantly on a plane working on documents. The users at the office can still access the shared documents while you are making your changes and when you get back to the office, those changes will automatically be syncronized to the original file without the user having to do anything.

Office 2010 so far has some pretty cool bells and whistles to make it a good upgrade. Start planning for it!

iValley has partnered with Marlin Leasing to provide payment options for our clients.

Leasing allows your company to acquire the equipment you need for your business now, and make manageable monthly payments. At the end of the lease, the equipment can be purchased for $1, or returned to iValley.