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Kelly Poe, a fellow Windows 7 fan, launched the “Release Windows 7 Now” campaign because he’s a “BIG Windows fan and have been loving what Microsoft has done with the recent Beta Release of Windows 7,” and he’s just “jones’n” for the release of “beautiful little birdy (with the odd name).”

I’ve played with Windows 7 beta and it seemed to live up to the hype that’s spread around the web. Generally, Windows 7 beta is getting a lot of good press. In fact, you could say that Windows 7 beta, despite being a beta, has a better reputation already than Windows Vista. The fact remains though that Windows 7 is IN BETA. There’s a reason for a beta process… to allow users to preview the OS, report bugs, and support Microsoft in stabalizing the operating system prior to it’s official release. As of right now rumors are that Windows 7 will be out sometime between Nov 2009 or Feb 2010. While I love being able to play with beta’s, releasing something as complex as an operating system before it’s “ready” is just stupid.

If you feel as strongly as Poe, you can check out the “Release Windows 7 Now” campaign and show you’re support.

A new taskbar status application BatteryBar adds a slick looking battery life meter to the Windows taskbar. It comes with detailed battery life information and some gorgeous eye candy in a mouse over dialog.

(NOTE: Also check out the BatteryBar PRO review here!)

Once installed, activating BatteryBar is as as easy as could be. Simply right-clicking on the taskbar and choosing Toolbars -> BatteryBar from the menu. The meter button changes from blue to green when you are on battery power, and clicking on the meter button switches the display between actual time remaining or a percentage view. The percentage meter is calculated using a statistical prediction that keeps a history of how quickly your battery usually drains to more accurately predict battery life—so the time remaining may seem a little odd at first.

When you’re running on battery, BatteryBar shows the percentage bar in green, yellow, or red, depending on how much battery power is remaining. The bar displays the time left on your battery in Hours:Minutes.

Battery is discharging with 2 hours, 46 minutes of battery life remaining.

When charging, the percentage bar is shown in blue to indicate charging, and the estimated time to full charge is shown. The bar turns black and shows “On A/C” when fully charged.

Battery is charging with 46 minutes until the battery is fully charged.

Features

• Vista style – The toolbar is using the same look and feel as the Vista taskbar buttons
• Statistical time prediction – BatteryBar monitors your battery and keeps a history of how long it takes for your battery to charge and discharges. That information is used to more accurately predict the life of your battery
• Translations – BatteryBar fully or partially supports 13 languages. Anyone may volunteer to translate BatteryBar to additional languages
• Detailed Battery Info – BatteryBar is now capable of collecting detailed information about your battery, including max capacity (mW), current capacity (mW), charge rate (mW), discharge rate (mW), and more.
• Automatic Update – BatteryBar will check for new versions at startup and automatically download the new version

Everything listed above comes in the free version. The pro version adds the following:

• Low battery and critical battery notifications and audio alerts
• Customize 20 settings, including changing the font, low battery warning levels, and more.
• New features in future versions that will only be available in the Pro version

Check out my review of BatteryBar Pro here!

Download the free BatteryBar from http://www.osirisdevelopment.com/BatteryBar/index.html.

QTTabBar is an add-in that gives a Tab Browsing Feature to Windows Explorer. The page is pretty sparse so there’s not a lot of information directly available. However, the forums on the site show there is a bit of activity going on this project. Essentially, QTTabBar gives you tab features like in your browser. Cool idea, wonder why this isn’t baked right into the OS as it is? I know I hate having a bunch of Windows Explorer windows open!

QTTabBar requires Windows Vista or Windows XP + .Net Framework 2.0 or later ( Tested on 32bit ). You can download QTTabBar, plugins, and themes all from the main site: http://qttabbar.wikidot.com

Microsoft is so eager to make Windows 7 available to people (probably because despite ~300 million copies of Vista in use it has a negative perception) that it’s going to give away the Windows 7 beta for free.

According to Ballmer, Windows 7 will be available to developers immediately, and to the general public on Friday, January 9. It will be a free download from Microsoft’s site. Windows 7 Beta has been out in the wild (i.e., BitTorrent) since December, but if you’ve been waiting fora legit copy before you tried it out, you won’t have to wait much longer (FYI… I’ve tried it and while the task bar is a bit disorienting at first it runs very fast in a virtual machine and looks generally to be solid for a beta release).

What’s new in Windows 7? Under the covers it’s very similar to Windows Vista. However, aside from performancing tweaking the what is at the core of Vista, modifying the task bar and giving us virtual folders there are some new additions: Digital Living Room Network Alliance (DLNA) compliance in Windows Media Player (WMP) for easier media sharing, Bitlocker to Go for encrypting USB storage devices, Direct Access for network access without VPN, and new support for sensors and devices that will enable location-aware laptops.

Bill Gates wasn’t kidding when he said Windows 7 would “be more efficient.” Adrian Kingsley-Hughes from ZDNet put together 23 real-world scenarios to see which operating system would be the quickest to complete all of the tasks. He tested the 32-bit versions of Windows 7 build 6.1.7000.0.081212-1400, Windows Vista SP1, and Windows XP SP3.

Adrian used two different test systems (listed below) and tested Windows7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP against one another. Windows7 came out the winner… and it’s still beta code.

Test Systems

• An AMD Phenom 9700 2.4GHz system fitted with an ATI Radeon 3850 and 4GB of RAM
• An Intel Pentium Dual Core E2200 2.2GHz fitted with an NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS and 1GB of RAM

Kingsley gave a 1 to the operating system that finished each test first, a 2 for second place, and a 3 for third. Windows 7 scored 25 points on both systems, placing first in 21 tests, and second in two other ones. On the AMD system, XP scored 61 points and Vista scored 52, while on the Intel system, XP scored 56 points and Vista scored 57.

View the full results of his tests over at ZDNet.