I think the problem is that the way the BluRay DRM spec is written pretty much requires support in the operating system, otherwise it can be circumvented. The BluRay folks were paranoid about the so called "analog hole" and wanted to ensure that content stayed encrypted all the way from the disk to display device, and you can't ensure that without getting the OS involved.

You can argue the rights and wrongs of the BluRay DRM, the fact is that it exists and if you want devices to play the discs, then it's part of the price of admission so to speak. I suspect Apple will have to do the same when it supports BluRay movie playback on Macs, though they'll have an easier time of it because of the control they exercise over the hardware platform

Blame the BluRay association for the DHCP problem, having it was the only way to get BluRay support into the OS. So you're alternative was either:

1. No Bluray playback

or

2. Bluray playback only on machines with the hardware necessary to support HDCP.

As to the surround question, not sure what your problem is, my media center PC is connected via digital optical to my receiver and delivers flawless 5.1.

Vista's DRM means nothing of the sort, it plays back non-DRM media without any problems at all, I use a Vista machine in my home theater, and all it ever plays back is non-DRM media (mostly torrents). The only time the DRM system kicks in is when the media has DRM metadata, if you don't have DRM media you'll never know its there.

It's not just applications that will challenge Chrome OS, Joe conusmer pretty much expects that his camrea, cellphone, ipod, etc all just work (or close to it) when they plug them in, so Google has to persaude all those companies that manufacture stuff that plugs into Windows/MacOS hardware to support their new OS.

At least for some of the boards (the ones that support 384GB memory) Cisco has some of it's own IP on the board, but I very much doubt they manufacture the boards themselves, anymore than they do for other products.

I'm running an Intel x25m as my boot drive, I've used the system with and without the SSD, you'll pry the SSD from my cold dead hands. The responsiveness when using the SSD is astonishing, apps just spring open as fast as you can release the mouse button.

The fragmentation we are talking about here is not related to file system fragmentation. All the testing that has created this affect has been done with IO test programs like IOmeter that can create I/O patterns that are specifically designed to demonstrate the problem. So it will affect EXT3 or whatever LINUX file system you prefer just as much (or as little depending on your point of view) as NTFS or DOS

As I said, there are certainly applications that will not run, I was responding to the contention that "*everyone* who wants to run Windows 7 will be doing this with the a large number of their apps", which is just BS.

I suspect that Microsoft doesn't expect corporations to upgrade old Windows XP boxes to W7, they are more likely to go to W7 as part of a hardware refresh, and any system W7 enterprise/ultimate they buy after W7 ships will have the features in the hardware and the support in the BIOS. So this will prove to be just another "storm in a teacup" that websites love to pick up.

How dare you apply logic and reason to an argument on Slashdot, isn't there something in the terms of service that forbids this!

Bull***t, I'm running the RC code, and I haven't found a single application that doesn't work. I'm sure there are applications out there that don't work, but the idea that most people will need this technology is just crap.

So a few people on a bulletin board "is most of us" only if "us" is defiend as the people what 1. Read that board 2. Have performance problems with W7 I'm don't meet either of those requirements, so I guess I'm not part of this mythical "us"

I thought so as well, but over time, the number of applications installed on my system tends to grow to the point where finding the application (particularly if I don't use it all the time) becomes increasingly painful. The simple search function added to the start menu in Vista resolved that problem to the point where I don't miss the classic menu system at all.

I don't think the article is really talking about the OS per-se, more the applications that run on it. Both LINUX and Windows are pretty good in terms of SMP support in the kernel, and scale quite well. The problem is applications, many of which are not written to make best use of multiple cores (or any use at all). Then again, many of the applications we use day to day have limited scope for multi-threading because they simply don't parallelize well and no amount of compiler trickery or fancy coding is going to help these apps.

"just about every app runs in admin mode" is the most utter rubbish I've seen for a while. I have a wide selection of apps installed on my system, the only ones that trip UAC are:
DVDdecrypt (runs without admin, but bitches about it)
Core Temp (has to run as admin)
Handbrake (can't update profiles unless it's running as admin)
Everything else runs just fine. (Office, Paintshop Pro,Firefox, Thunderbird,utorrent, Omea RSS reader, and dozen or more other applications that I'm too lazy to list)