Apple’s New Year message to Windows 7 owners

First things first, a very happy new year to all our readers here at Windows 7 News.

So what is Apple’s plan for supporting Windows 7 in boot camp?  Several months ago now the company said they’d build in support for Microsoft’s new operating system by the end of 2009.  Well that time’s come and gone now and the promised update hasn’t appeared.

It’s still possible to install Windows 7 on a Mac but there can be problems.  Some people have reported that the multi-touch mouse drivers don’t work properly while others have said the system can be slow to boot and operate, which Mac users would probably put down to the normal behaviour of Windows  :P

However there’s still no support and this has got industry watchers wondering which of the three best possible reasons it could be…

1) It’s proving more difficult than expected to get everything working with Windows 7

2) Apple are far too busy on another project that is, for whatever reason, good or bad, requiring all the time of their programmers

3) Apple recognise that Windows 7 really is the solid opposition many people in the press have been saying it is for months, and anything they can do to harm it (even in small way) they’ll do

My own opinion is that it’s a large chunk of 2 with a little bit of 3 thrown in for good measure.  Apple are competing against Microsoft after all and the boot camp support would be supporting their rivals.  They will have user data from Macs around the world no doubt that indicate how many people are using Windows on their Macs, and what versions of Windows they’re installing.  It’s possible, though still entirely speculative, that they’ve seen an upward trend in the use of Windows 7 they don’t like.

Whatever the reason, there are a lot of very loyal Mac owners who do genuinely want or need to use Windows 7 for whatever reason, and Apple have maintained a stony silence on when they’ll be helping them.  They’ve missed their self-imposed deadline and are entering 2010 seemingly not caring too much about communicating with many of their own customers.