# Windows 7 -- seven?!? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 14, 2008, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835 "2008-10-14T05:48:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2008, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835/21 "2008-10-14T20:52:31Z")
What about Windows Server 2003? ---
**Author:** ![Pimms\_o\_clock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bb73d2/32.png) [@Pimms\_o\_clock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pimms_o_clock)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2008, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835/22 "2008-10-14T21:08:59Z")
> [@Harmonious\_Discord](#): > > What about Windows Server 2003? That was essentially XP for people who knew something about what they were doing. Somewhat smaller kernel and could do a lot more than XP could. Macs are a lot better though. In fact I wanted a macbook so much I went and bought one last week knowing they would be obsolete by this week. ---
**Author:** ![CaveMike](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cavemike/32/16379_2.png) [@CaveMike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaveMike)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2008, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835/23 "2008-10-14T23:16:18Z")
Using a year in the name is dangerous when the release starts slipping. Ideally, marketing wants to release before the year used in the title. That way the product sounds new and fresh. But consider what happened to Windows 2000 – it kept slipping and eventually was released in Feb 2000. Not terrible, but what if they had used this convention for Vista? What would have happened if marketing had built up the hype about Windows 2005 and then it didn’t get released until 2006? I guess Windows Server 2003 was a reasonable exception. It was built on something stable and thus the release was predictable. Plus it was meant to replace Windows 2000 Server, so the similarity in names was a great marketing tool. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2008, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835/24 "2008-10-15T02:37:16Z")
> [@Pimms\_o\_clock](#): > > Macs are a lot better though. And Linux is the best. How is that relevant here? ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2008, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835/25 "2008-10-15T05:20:22Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > And Linux is the best. How is that relevant here? Ditto. Thanks for the non sequitur, **Pimms o’ clock**. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2008, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835/26 "2008-10-15T05:49:27Z")
> [@Rysto](#): > > according to [this](http://www.aeroxp.org/2008/10/introducing-windows-7/), Windows 7 will identify itself as NT 6.1. Well that’s just silly. The pre-releases so far have all been version 6.1.something, but it was my understanding that they just haven’t completed the kernel overhaul for Windows 7 yet and are still using the Vista kernel with some minor tweaks. A lot of folks (myself included) are expecting them to rev it over to version 7 at some point. It looks like the info in your link comes from Microsoft itself, though, so maybe not. This makes me think that all they are really doing is just taking Vista and fixing all of the things people have been complaining about in it (that it’s a resource hog, etc). ---
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2008, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835/27 "2008-10-15T06:31:27Z")
> [@Pimms\_o\_clock](#): > > That was essentially XP for people who knew something about what they were doing. Somewhat smaller kernel and could do a lot more than XP could. Server O/S’s are not XP in all but the most superficial sense. They are totally different O/S’s with massive internal differences. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2008, 6:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835/28 "2008-10-15T06:59:24Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > This makes me think that all they are really doing is just taking Vista and fixing all of the things people have been complaining about in it (that it’s a resource hog, etc). That’s my take on it, too. It reminds me of the jump from 95 to 98, or maybe 98 to 98SE. (Let’s hope it isn’t like the jump from 98 to ME.) And you have to keep in mind that the likely upgrade path for corporate users is from 7 to XP, just like the upgrade path from Vista to XP. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-7-seven/467835.md?page=1)