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I know there are already many threads about Windows 7 on the NC10 but for ease of access and perhaps something new about it, here’s my account from install to use of the new operating system.
N.B. I was lucky enough to be one of the 2.5 million worldwide beta testers for Windows 7, so this is based on a legitimate version – cracked/patched versions may differ in experience!!
Install. First install I did was over the current XP as came with the NC10. Everything went smoothly and all was well. Cut a long story short I reinstalled today and it’s THAT which I will talk about as it is a fresh install.
Using a DVD drive I installed Windows 7 from boot and wiped my C drive ready to install the OS. about 30 minutes later Windows 7 was installed, I like the prompt for the wireless connection, did not like it giving me a very forgetable password for “home networking” but other than that, I like it’s simplicity and ease to install (as well as pretty nippy too)!
Once installed, the first thing I did was to turn the UAC to it’s lowest setting, so that it wouldn’t interfere with any installs I was doing. I don’t know if this is necessary but it’s a good idea to do it at least whilst installing the otherwise incompatible Samsung stuff. I installed the LAN drivers which were from the manufacturers website rather than Samsung and were for Vista. All ok.
Next was Realtek’s driver (to make the microphone work in Win7). All installed fine.
Lastly the synaptics drivers. There’s two sorts here you can do, the synaptics website sourced drivers which work well but DO NOT allow two finger controls on the touchpad. The other is to install Samsung’s NC10 XP drivers.
Installing Samsung’s XP drivers is better as it enables the features such as pinch and chiral motion scrolling. It is also needed if you want to use TwoFingerScroll available from google code or my other thread on this site under Applications.
To install however, you cannot run the setup file as it was designed to be run only under XP/2000 and so you need to install the drivers by going to Device Manager, then updating the touchpad drivers using the right clicked selection and pointing the driver updater to the install folder for the Synaptics Touchpad Xp Drivers you got from Samsung. (btw, I will put links at the end of this post rather than throughout it).The next thing to do is to install other Samsung software to make the FN keys work as well as the screen brightness and auto dimming on battery power (and so on).
Simply install the XP (NOT VISTA) versions of Magic Keyboard, Display manager and Battery Manager which you can download from Samsung. Magic Keyboard (contrary to popular belief) is important and necessary for Display Manager to work.
I had a couple of error messages when installing Magic Keyboard and Battery Manager, but ignoring them and restarting the OS once all three were done seemed to get rid of them and having pressed all the FN keys, all seems fine and is working as it did in XP.SO, that’s the install as far as getting everything to work on the NC10 that would have done had you stuck to the pre installed XP that shipped with the Netbook.
Further info…
More things I’ve done are to install an MP3 update (which has been well written about elsewhere) so that Windows 7 doesn’t corrupt the headers to all your MP3’s!
I have also got TwoFingerScroll working correctly, this is because with the correct Synaptics drivers installed (refer to the above text) it works no problem. It seems that all that is required of the application is you have drivers capable of recognising the input of two fingers simultaneously on the touchpad so other drivers for synaptics other than those already mentioned are likely to work too.
Programs
Programs on Windows 7 can be a headache if you’re used to using something, try Windows 7 and find that it doesn’t work!Office 2007 installed without issue, all seems to be working and so do the updates.
7Zip, utorrent, Adobe CS3, Adobe Acrobat 8, THE NEW VERSION of Msn Messenger all work great.
If you want Skype you will need the beta version
My Lexmark X4875 Printer did not want to install on first attempts, however using 7Zip to extract the files from the “self-extractor” got past the first problem. Then running as administrator with all UAC controls turned to “off” worked a treat and that is working beautifully as it did in XP and Vista on my other laptop. This includes the scan feature where the printer connects to Windows 7 and scans it for software able to perform or accept a scan and also the printer is working wirelessly so the wireless security in Windows 7 is not a problem for the printer either. Good to know as Lexmark personally informed me that the printer would NOT be compatible and that they have no plans on making it compatible with Windows 7.
Other tips…
When trying to install an older application, it is well worth trying two things. Firstly running it in “administrator mode” and secdonly, if that doesn’t work, right clicking on the .exe and using the compatibility troubleshooter tool where you can tell it (the program) to run as administrator as well as in a mode for a previous version of windows. I found this to be necessary for some of the programs I installed originally, such as the Samsung ones or the Lexmark drivers. Annoyingly however this was on the first original install of Windows 7, but NOT on the second fresh install I have done today!! The explanation I have no idea to other than this is a BETA and so I put it down to that!Here’s my list of applications and how they worked for me:
• AVG Free antivirus installs ok
• Skype Beta installs ok but seems very glitchy (down to Skype not Win7)
• Office 2007 is fine
• MSN Messenger is fine
• Adobe Photoshop CS3 is fine
• Adobe Acrobat 8 is fine except for the print to PDF function. (suggest use an alternative but I haven’t got around to doing this yet!)
• utorrent is fine
• Peerguardian2 (Vista Version) has issues but does work
• Lexmark drivers, install – troubleshoot compatibility, Vista mode, save settings, run and then install.
• Nokia PC Suite 7.1, install – troubleshoot compatibility, Vista mode, save settings, run and then install.
• 2 Finger Scroll perfect.
• 7Zip works perfectly.Some links:
Samsung XP Drivers contains the touchpad driverSamsung XP Programs contains the Battery Manager, Display Manager & Magic Keyboard
Synaptics Drivers (not Samsung Synaptics)
Some helpful information that I have used:
Ade’s BlogThanks for sharing that, some useful stuff in there. And by all means start new threads on the topic, no reason to keep all Win 7 in one BIG ol’ thread!
I had not heard about that MP3 corruption issue before! Eek!
I’ve only played with it in a VM but may well be making a purchase this time round when it gets released! They seem to be moving quite quickly on it so far.
Nice review. Actually I am back to xp from Win7. Oddly enough, when I registered and got a valid key, then it started having problems. How’s that for ironlc. Word would regularly crash – never had an issue prior. The aero would do weird things, etc… I really liked many features, but couldn’t deal with the issues. It shouldn’t take 60 seconds for it to recognize a usb mouse that I’ve used before…
Will probably check it out again next revision, which will probably be soon anyway 😉 I do look forward to the laptop build personally, but don’t expect that for a while yet…
Oops, I forgot to add the link to the MP3 thingy
Most of the stuff I’ve found has been written about in other threads, but I found that when I personally was looking for the install solution on the NC10 I had to keep darting about all over the internet to find what I needed. Hopefully user experiences like mine will help people find what they need in one place lol.
I personally think that I’ll definitely be purchasing the new version when it’s out. Considering how compatible it is with pre existing hardware (I also installed it on a 3 year old Toshiba base model laptop with no issues whatsoever and no need for ANY drivers) I think that it seems Microsoft have finally got their act together in making a fast, not bad looking, I suppose reasonably safe operating system that will work for both the future and past models of computers. I’d like to imagine that from the beta experience people have they official release will be up to scratch!
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Nice review. Actually I am back to xp from Win7. Oddly enough, when I registered and got a valid key, then it started having problems. How’s that for ironlc. Word would regularly crash – never had an issue prior. The aero would do weird things, etc… I really liked many features, but couldn’t deal with the issues. It shouldn’t take 60 seconds for it to recognize a usb mouse that I’ve used before…Will probably check it out again next revision, which will probably be soon anyway 😉 I do look forward to the laptop build personally, but don’t expect that for a while yet…
[/quote1232383639]I’ve not had any issues at all with any of the MS Office 2007 programs (so far fingers crossed, touch wood, lets hope!!!!!!) so that’s strange? My bluetooth MS mouse was found straight away and installed within seconds (i.e. less than 10 seconds). Perhaps Win7 isn’t happy with older mice as mine is a very recent model even says it was built in July 2008 on the bottom of it!!
I should think the next release will be a LOT better, this is a super early release for a Vista replacement though, I don’t think the world’s really adopted Vista yet and XP on laptops/pcs is still available until July (MS extended the stop date for XP because of lovely little netbooks such as our beloved NC10) so I’d be surprised if it was released soon although there are rumours it’ll be at the end of 2009.
Anyways, time will tell and I think as beta updates/patches are released the beta will become more stable. Interestingly though, I’ve not had a single crash. I’ve had programs not work and come up with errors, and explorer stop and restart, but nothing that has lost information or restarted the computer or frozen so it must be pretty stable.one odd thing I found with Win7 is the fact that my external LG SuperMulti DVD-Rewriter would sometimes not work. Would sometimes have to disconnect the power from the drive to reboot it. Minor issue really.
jonbad,
Thanks for consolidating all the Win 7 issues to a single post. I plan on upgrading my NC10 at some point to Win7 and this will come in very handy.
I have heard some interesting information about the suspected MS release plans. Apparently MS has always been referring the this beta (build 7000) as THE beta. Like, there isn’t going to be a beta1, beta2, etc. Then MS is also expected to only have a single Release Candidate (RC). From that RC will be the final RTM (Ready To Manufacture). The MS insiders expect the RTM to be around the middle of 2009.
My source for this is listening to Paul Thurrott’s podcasts on TWiT.
http://www.winsupersite.com/Also running 7 on my Laptop,it seems to have slightly better battery and seems to stick to it!My XP install could be 5 hours and then 4hours 10 mins just for opening an application,where as 7 gives you a guide battery life and stick to it..Runs well on the 1gb,which i’m soon upgrading to 2gb
RE: Battery times, so far my battery bar is saying a rather pleasing 7 hours but I’ll leave it unplugged for the entire time to see how long it really does last and then update here.
News since first post:
the XP versions of Samsung’s Battery Manager although work perfectly well in the background do not (on my install at least) seem to like me opeing the program (which in itself is fine) but then if I click on “Options” for example, the program crashes.
I don’t personally think it’s something that’s important as when using XP I NEVER once opened battery manager and the only reason I did in Windows 7 was to see if it WAS fully working or not. Hopefully as time goes by Samsung will release a newer more compatible version of Battery Manager which I have no doubt will rectify this issue.
… battery now saying 6 hours 20 minutesJust a quick question, i’m thinking of putting win7 on my netbook as well but I don’t want to ramp it. Will it be possible to use the restore (F4) option if you decide that win 7 isn’t the way to go. I mean you only have so long to test it…
Maurice
I don’t know about the F4 function, although I don’t see why it wouldn’t work.
Personally I made a Samsung recovery 3 disc image before installing Windows 7 and plan to use the NC10 recovery discs that shipped with the laptop to reinstall XP when I’m done with Windows 7 (when it expires lol).
Then once the Samsung recovery is done, the laptop should be “as factory” and so from there I will simply use Samsung’s Recovery program and reinitiate the disc image I had made before installing Windows 7.That is probably the long way round, the easiest way around would be if it was possible to install Samsung’s Recovery program and simply put the stored disc image i made straight over Windows 7. This might work, but hoestly I haven’t tried the program yet.
The point I’m making though is that it is very possible to get your Windows XP installation back and that there are several ways to do this. The F4 function you suggest might work but I for one haven’t tried it (yet).I see. You make a good point here. First of i’m going to buy a usb dvd drive because it’s easy to use for installation. Then I’m of and will give it a go. Honestly i didn’t take a look at any of the cd’s that shipped with my Sammy because I didn’t see the point of those without a cd player…
Yeah, external DVD drives are great. I’d recommend the smaller “laptop” style drive, I think they’re referred to as slimline usually. They’re more expensive but are far smaller, only take USB power and so don’t need to take up an extra plug socket, and if you’re going to keep it they’re just that much smaller and better to store in a laptop bag etc. The larger type external drives (although cheaper) are about the same size as the NC10 itself, if not fatter!
If you think of the CD’s from the other way around, had they NOT included them, people would have complained. Also, it’s probably safer and cheaper for them to make discs instead of give everyone a pen drive as I bet most people would probably blank their pen drives and use it for personal use then be totally stuck if their system crashed. The backup DVD’s are just that – for backup – so even if people don’t have a built in DVD drive, in an emergency situation it would be easy enough to get hold of one to use the backup discs. I think they make perfect sense 🙂
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