Issue Making Changes To Windows 7 Before Using Hoster

[Harryoke]

Just prefacing this by saying I am not a techy guy, I know just enough about computers to get by and be a little dangerous, but I do follow directions well.

When I made changes to my Vista laptop when I added Hoster to it, it went pretty smoothly. Recently I got a Windows 7 laptop and added Hoster to it, and this is where the flags went up. I am writing this to bring it to the attention of whoever, and also to be sure I did the right thing.

First flag was that I was not sure if the WIndows 7 changes were the same as the Vista changes...so I looked at the website, and not finding the answer submitted a ticket and asked on the forum. Dale provided a link to the Windows 7 changes. Later the ticket also said the changes needed to be made, but did not provide a link to the specific Windows7 changes, rather alluded to just do the Vista changes.

Next flag was while doing the changes, I was feeling whoever wrote them had not actually sat down with Windows 7. I was following it letter to letter, but I was not seeing the same things the author was. For example, the numerous times they said to "right click on the desktop where there are no icons" to open dialog for video display...this did not happen on my Toshiba, so each time I had a setting to set, I had to search the control panel and ultimately find the settings...was not crystal clear. Someone less savvy than me would have not been able to change the settings.

Change number 9, windows sidebar, completely baffled me...could not find it and found no reference to it, so did not change anything about it.

Same problem with the Aero theme. THe route prescribed to disable it did not translate to my computer. I am seeing that I have Aero themes available, but see no way to disable.

When it tells me to "right click on the desktop where there are no icons" and then hit classic view...or open control panel and click classic view, there is NO classic view choice in these areas. On my Vista machine yes, on my Windows 7 machine, no. I was able to change Visual Effects and a few other things by searching in the control panel for those words.

I may suggest that a specific Windows 7 change list be offered with navigation specific to that program to make the changes easier for us lo tech folks. I did start working off of the list Dale provided...and noticed that change 6 and change 8 seemed the same.

Here is the vista list I was looking at provided by MTU: http://www.mtu.com/upgrades/hoster/v...de-hoster4.htm and here is the check list I got from Dale at the forum: http://www.mtu.com/upgrades/hoster/windows7-changes.htm

In conclusion, I think I got them all done, except for the Aero Theme disabling. It was a little frustrating, and I was having issues at the MTU site as well with pages timing out. May have been a Firefox issue...I went back in with IE and didnt seem to have the problems.

[ddouglass]

MTU website is written for IE and not for Firefox. I am not versed in Firefox so can't help you with that part.
For the Sidebar, not all versions of Windows 7 or Vista for that matter have this feature. The instructions are written for all versions.
No one else has ever said anything about right clicking on the desktop not working. And this has always worked that way in all of Microsoft's operating systems. I find it hard to believe that short cut would no longer be there. When you right click do you see anything? Like a list of items? Is "Personalize" there? ( I believe step #4 should also be Personalize, not Properties). Since you found it through the Control Panel then I assume you already fix this much.
For the Aero Theme, this will also be in your display settings. If you do not have the Aero Theme selected then it is already disabled.
The link I gave you is the specific list for Windows 7, and the individual who created that list does use a Windows 7 computer, so according to his machine this is correct.

[Roy Dennis]

Originally Posted by Harryoke

Next flag was while doing the changes, I was feeling whoever wrote them had not actually sat down with Windows 7. I was following it letter to letter, but I was not seeing the same things the author was. For example, the numerous times they said to "right click on the desktop where there are no icons" to open dialog for video display...this did not happen on my Toshiba, so each time I had a setting to set, I had to search the control panel and ultimately find the settings...was not crystal clear. Someone less savvy than me would have not been able to change the settings.


Change number 9, windows sidebar, completely baffled me...could not find it and found no reference to it, so did not change anything about it.

Same problem with the Aero theme. THe route prescribed to disable it did not translate to my computer. I am seeing that I have Aero themes available, but see no way to disable.

When it tells me to "right click on the desktop where there are no icons" and then hit classic view...or open control panel and click classic view, there is NO classic view choice in these areas. On my Vista machine yes, on my Windows 7 machine, no. I was able to change Visual Effects and a few other things by searching in the control panel for those words. .

Harryoke is correct about the right click on desk top. It should be Right click and from the window that pops up choose" Personalize" then a window opens to change visuals and sound, there you can select "Classic View" by doing this you disable Aero theme.

Also when you right click on the desk top the window that opens has "Screen resolution" option, this is a better way to get to this set up area than in the instructions.

Originally Posted by Harryoke

I may suggest that a specific Windows 7 change list be offered with navigation specific to that program to make the changes easier for us lo tech folks. I did start working off of the list Dale provided...and noticed that change 6 and change 8 seemed the same..

I think Harry is right.

Roy

[Harryoke]

Thanks Dale and Roy. I will play with it tomorrow again when I have the Windows 7 machine up. I am on the office PC now. It was difficult navigating to many of the settings. On second look at the list, I also had an issue with the System Restore enabling...there was no option on my machine to create a restore point...so I assumed that system restore was already enabled, and moved ahead without actually creating one...could not navigate to a place that allowed me to.

The virtual memory dialog was difficult as well...things did not appear exactly as described in 7. I am running 4gb of memory, so I did set the recommended size to whatever was showing, and the maximum size to 8000. Just a little guess work involved and some creative navigation.

Change #4 was difficult to navigate as I described originally, and there was NO hibernation tab. I could not find anywhere to disable hibernation. Eventually I found Windows 7 power options and that offered a sliding bar setting which I pulled to the bottom to disable shutdown/hibernation.

Change 6 I discussed, but keeping in mind that the screen with all the settings we are all used to could not be found, I think the hardest part was finding the setting for 16 or 32 bit color. I had to really hunt for that.

I definitely have to look into the Aero Theme issue...I want to resolve that for sure. I should have some face time with the new computer tomorrow, Tuesday for sure.

Thanks Guys!

[admin]

Harryoke, thank you for reporting your confusion.

The instructions were "evolved" from Vista, and no, I did not have a Win 7 system in front of me... our bad.

We WILL upgrade the instructions, and try to address some of the different Win 7 versions. They are NOT all alike, and we don't test on all of them.

[Harryoke]

Thank YOU!!