With Windows 7, PC users will at last have a strong, modern successor to the sturdy and familiar, but aged, Windows XP, which is still the most popular version of Windows, despite having come out in 2001. In the high-tech¹ world, an eight-year-old operating system is the equivalent of a 20-year-old car. While XP works well for many people, it is relatively² weak in areas such as security, networking and other features more important today than when XP was designed around 1999.

随着Windows 7的上市，个人电脑用户终于能有一款强大而新潮的替代产品，来淘汰稳定、熟悉但年代久远的Windows XP。尽管早在2001年就上市，但Windows XP仍是目前最受欢迎的Windows操作系统。在高科技领域，一款拥有8年历史的操作系统就相当于一辆拥有20年历史的汽车一样。虽然XP受到很多人喜欢，但很多方面的性能相当薄弱，例如安全性、网络连接性以及其他现在重要性超过1999年左右XP设计时的性能。

After using pre-release versions of Windows 7 for nine months, and intensively testing the final version for the past month on many different machines, I believe it is the best version of Windows Microsoft has produced. It's a boost to productivity and a pleasure to use. Despite a few drawbacks, I can heartily³ recommend Windows 7 to mainstream⁴ consumers.

我使用预先发布版的Windows 7已经有9个月了，最后这个月在很多不同机器上对最终版软件进行了大量测试，我相信这是微软所推出最好的Windows版本。Windows 7提高了生产力，操作令人愉快。尽管还存在一些缺点，但我仍衷心地向主流消费者推荐Windows 7。

Like the new Snow Leopard⁵ operating system released in August by Microsoft's archrival, Apple, Windows 7 is much more of an evolutionary⁶ than a revolutionary product. Its main goal was to fix the flaws in Vista⁷ and to finally give Microsoft customers a reason to move up from XP. But Windows 7 is packed with features and tweaks that make using your computer an easier and more satisfying experience.

去年8月，微软竞争对手苹果公司 (Apple)发布了新的雪豹(Snow Leopard)操作系统。和雪豹一样，Windows 7更多的是一款改进产品，而非革命之作。其主要目的就是解决Vista的缺陷，最终给微软用户一个淘汰XP的理由。但Windows 7带来了诸多新功能和调整，让你更加轻松便捷地使用电脑，带来更加令人满意的体验。

Windows 7 introduces real advances in organizing your programs and files, arranging your taskbar and desktop⁸, and quickly viewing and launching the page or document you want, when you want it. It also has cool built-in touch-screen features.

Windows 7在组织你的程序和文件，安排你的任务栏和桌面方面作出了实际改进，能够迅速地在你需要的时候，浏览和启动你想要的网页或文件。这一软件还有很酷的内置触摸屏功能。

It removes a lot of clutter⁹. And it mostly banishes¹⁰ Vista's main flaws -- sluggishness¹¹; incompatibility¹² with third-party software and hardware; heavy hardware requirements; and constant, annoying security warnings.

Windows 7取消了很多繁琐之处，基本上消除了Vista的主要缺陷──反应迟缓、不兼容第三方软硬件、繁重的硬件要求以及不断跳出、令人心烦的安全警告。

I tested Windows 7 on 11 different computers, ranging from tiny netbooks to standard laptops to a couple of big desktops¹³. These included machines from Lenovo, Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Acer, Asus, Toshiba and Sony. I even successfully ran it on an Apple Macintosh laptop. On some of these machines, Windows 7 was pre-loaded. On others, I had to upgrade from an earlier version of Windows.

我在11个不同的电脑上测试了Windows 7，从轻薄的上网本到标准笔记本电脑再到两台大型台式机。这其中包括了联想(Lenovo)、惠普(Hewlett-Packard)、戴尔 (Dell)、宏碁(Acer)、华硕(Asus)、东芝(Toshiba)和索尼(Sony)等厂商的产品。我甚至成功地在一部苹果Macintosh 笔记本电脑上运行了Windows 7。其中一些机器是预装的Windows 7。在其他机器上，我必须从较早版本的Windows进行升级。

In most cases, the installation took 45 minutes or less, and the new operating system worked snappily and well. But, I did encounter some drawbacks and problems. On a couple of these machines, glacial start-up and reboot times reminded me of Vista. And, on a couple of others, after upgrading, key features like the display or touchpad didn't work properly. Also, Windows 7 still requires add-on security software that has to be frequently updated. It's tedious and painful to upgrade an existing computer from XP to 7, and the variety of editions in which Windows 7 is offered is confusing.

大多数情况下，安装过程耗时不超过45分钟，新操作系统运行的顺畅良好。但我确实遇到了一些缺陷和问题。在两台机器上，漫长的启动和重启时间让我想到了 Vista。在另外两台升级后的机器上，显示或触控式鼠标等关键功能不能正常工作。此外，Windows 7还需要安全软件插件，必须频繁更新。在一部现有电脑上从XP升级到Windows 7让我觉得冗长而痛苦，Windows 7以诸多版本推出也让人困惑。

Finally, Microsoft has stripped Windows 7 of familiar built-in applications, such as email, photo organizing, address book, calendar and video-editing programs. These can be downloaded free of charge, but they no longer come with the operating system, though some PC makers¹⁴ may choose to pre-load them.

最后，微软在Windows 7上取消了熟悉的内置应用程序，例如电子邮件、图片组织、通信录、日程表以及视频编辑软件。这些软件可以免费下载，但不会随操作系统提供，不过一些电脑厂商可以选择预装这些软件。