I spent the weekend using Windows 7 Beta (build 7000) and the experience has been great.  A few points worth noting:

• OS Installation - Superb!  It went very smoothly as expected.  No issues there!
• Device Drivers - I was able to get my Samsung LCD and printers working right away, talk about plug and play. :-)  My Microsoft Wireless Notebook Presentation Mouse 8000 needed a new driver but fortunately thanks to the Windows 7 Beta site from Microsoft Hardware, I got the mouse working in minutes. Nice job Microsoft Hardware team!
• Usability and Performance - The system felt zippier with especially when I took advantage of the 64-bit process of my Lenovo T60p.  File copying seemed faster too.  UI-wise, I love the improved task bar that showed the multiple stacks of windows I had open in a much more elegant way. Just hover your mouse over to the bottom taskbar and you'll see the multiple windows nicely stacked by each app. You don't need to do ALT-TAB now if you don't want to.  :-)

So, stop reading this blog post and start enjoying Windows 7 Beta now and download it here.

And wait, there's more. Our team have just released an update to the Microsoft Assessment and Planning (MAP) Toolkit 3.2 for Windows migration that is now available to install on a machine with Windows 7 Beta. Check out the MAP Toolkit now and start planning your desktop deployment projects.  We'll add Windows 7 hardware assessment capabilities soon, stay tuned for our MAP Toolkit 4.0 Beta Program in the upcoming months.

Ciao,

Baldwin