Gallery

What you can get right now

Posted on 14 Oct 2008 at 11:19

Touch technology

Touch might be the headline feature of Windows 7 so far, but there's certainly no need to wait for 2010 to start getting hands-on with your PC.

Last year, HP introduced a very well-implemented touch layer on top of Windows Vista with its HP TouchSmart IQ770 PC. The software allows users to crop photos with their finger, quickly jot electronic Post-It notes, and browse the web simply by prodding links on the page. HP recently introduced a new TouchSmart model, the IQ500.

HP's touch technology can only be operated with a single digit, but you can get the full multitouch experience with Dell's Latitude XT tablet PC, which elegantly combines finger operation with the pressure-sensitive pen that comes with the laptop. This means you can zoom in on a photo iPhone-style by squeezing your fingers together and jot notes alongside it with the pen, for example. N-Trig, the Israeli company behind Dell's touch technology, has posted a video of its impressive touch operations at www.pcpro.co.uk/links/169dell.

Mind your language

To some, the use of American English in the Windows interface is just a quirk. But to another section of the population, it's enough to make them consider an entirely different operating system - Linux and Apple OS X both offer versions sporting a full UK English interface.

Short of hacking into the code, there's no way to replace Favorites with Favourites. But, if you happen to speak Irish Gaelic or Welsh then download a Language Interface Pack from www.pcpro.co.uk/links/169win7.

Back to "Windows 7"