Windows 7 Beta 1 Leaked

Coming January, Windows 7 will make its big debut in the form of the first public beta release. However, just as with any other pre-final Windows build, it has already been leaked onto various torrent websites, and Paul Thurrot, everyone's favourite Microsoft zealot ["...hopefully Web site owners will get serious about getting ready for the next IE and correct these issues." Wait, what?], has written a review of this new beta. He concludes: "In use, Windows 7 is fairly unexceptional in the sense that, yes, it has some nice improvements over Windows Vista, but, no, none of them are particularly major changes. In this sense, Windows 7 is much like your typical Microsoft Office release, a nicely tweaked version of the previous release. (Cue the obvious Steven Sinofsky anecdote here, I guess.) That said, Windows Vista is clearly in need of a spit-shine, not to mention a public execution, and Windows 7 will provide Microsoft with a way to do both."