Celestia under Windows 7

[Hungry4info]

Has anyone tested Celestia under Windows 7? I just acquired the OS and haven't heard anything about testing Celestia on the final released version of Win 7. Celestia testing will occupy a large amount of my time after installing it. Anything particular I should be on the lookout for?

[Chuft-Captain]

I think Chris has tried it. (He stated somewhere that it should run fine under Win7).

Make sure you use the 64bit version of the OS (if your machine is capable), and it would also be a good idea to have at least the Professional version rather than the Home version, because AFAIK the Home version doesn't include "Virtualization". -- This (with the right hardware) allows you to run old XP apps (eg. Celestia) in a "Virtual XP Machine" within the Win 7 desktop environment, it's claimed with very little overhead.
Being able to run XP-Mode ensures that you have a fallback position for running Celestia in the interim, if you were to encounter issues with for example Windows 7 graphics drivers (which may not be very mature yet).
(I have seen some people posting here recently about having some minor issues running Celestia in WIN 7 with ATI graphics)

In summary:
1. Make sure that your hardware supports 64bit OS and "Virtualization". If it's a new machine, chances are it will support both, but make sure!
2. Use 64bit OS
3. I've been told by a salesman that the "XP-mode" software has to be downloaded from M$. I'd previously been lead to believe (by M$ marketing ) that it shipped with the OS, but apparently not.
4. As always, get as much memory as you can afford. -- With 64bit OS, get at least 4GB, more if you can afford it.

CC

[selden]

I suggest just running Celestia in 32-bit mode under 64-bit Win7.

Running XP in virtual mode means that you now have another operating system to maintain. This is probably more than the average Windows user with a single computer can be expected to take care of.

XP "emulation mode" under Win7 is real XP running in a full virtual environment, although Win7 makes it relatively easy to use. However, this means that the version of XP that you have to download from MS (~150MB) is just as vulnerable to attacks as XP always has been. You have to spend just as much effort keeping it patched and secure as you do a stand-alone copy of XP. If you don't run it for a while, there are that many more (missed) patches which have to be applied when you do run it.

That said, I personally have not yet experienced Win7, only attended some presentations by the campus network security office. Maybe in the new year.

[Chuft-Captain]

I suggest just running Celestia in 32-bit mode under 64-bit Win7.

I would guess the difference is that running in 32 bit mode would use Win 7's drivers, whereas using the XP-mode would use the XP ones, so it really depends on whether there's good Windows 7 drivers available yet for your graphics chip.

I agree with Selden. You need to run it in native Win 7 if possible, but the XP-mode is there as a temporary solution if in your situation it's just impossible to use in WIN 7. (I doubt that it will be so bad that you'll have to resort to that, but if you absolutely have to keep running any XP programs at all costs, the feature is provided for that purpose).

The main reason M$ provides this is to reduce the perceived risk to Businesses of upgrading to WIN 7, by reassuring them that they'll still be able to run their existing mission critical XP applications at all costs.

I too however have not yet experienced Win7.

CC

[chris]

Has anyone tested Celestia under Windows 7? I just acquired the OS and haven't heard anything about testing Celestia on the final released version of Win 7. Celestia testing will occupy a large amount of my time after installing it. Anything particular I should be on the lookout for?

I run 64-bit Win7 and Celestia is working great for me. The only glitch I see is that the text in the splash screen is smeared. Note that I'm talking about the 32-bit version of Celestia. In general, 32-bit software runs without problems even though the OS is 64-bit. I've briefly tried to build a 64-bit version of Celestia, but 64-bit compiling isn't supported very well by MS Visual Studio.

--Chris

[DonAVP]

Can someone provide a LINK to MS were the download is for this virtual 32 bit emulator is? I did some looking around at MS and as usual nothing is obvioius and easy to get to. I found I was in areas we they are talking about trouble shooting the OS and no LINKS back or forward to anything looking like the way I could go to get to the download. I am going to receive an HP G71 w/ 4Gigs RAM and 512M NVidia card. It has the Primimum version of Win 7 which is the basic version. Don't you just love the deceptive naming they use. Upgrading is another $299, maybe cheaper if I shop around. I have an number of other programs MS Office, old Photoshop and such that I don't care to upgrade at this time. So I need the 32 bit emulator.

After I get a backup restore disk made I will start loading software from my old 32 bit system. Will let you know the pitfalls I run into. Oh, I am kind of a novice when it comes to OS's and don't want to know anymore that I need to. Just to give you an idea were I am coming from tech wise.

Don

PS if I become frustrated I will be selling a HP laptop at a good price, we will see.

[selden]

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtua ... nload.aspx

But it won't work on the Home version of Win7.
You need Professional or Ultimate.
See http://www.microsoft.com/windows/window ... fault.aspx

[Boux]

Celestia builds and runs flawlessly under Win7 64 pro.
Both native Windows and Qt versions.
Actually, it is even a little faster under Win7.

[chris]

I have an number of other programs MS Office, old Photoshop and such that I don't care to upgrade at this time. So I need the 32 bit emulator.

You do not need Virtual XP in order to run these programs. They will work just fine on any 64-bit Win7. Most of the programs that I run on Win7 are still 32-bit, and they run just as well as they did on XP. The only time that I've needed to use Virtual XP was for a Cisco VPN client.

--Chris

[DonAVP]

I have been running Celestia on Window 7 (64) for about two weeks or so. I bought a HP G71, it came with dual Pentium processors (not dual core 2), 4 Gig RAM, 320 Gig HD and 512 Meg Nvidia card.

Everything is working just fine with only exceptions are learning the new keyborad shortcut combinations from previous revisions. I cannot type Ctrl-Alt-Ent to go to full screen. Now you type Alt-Ent or use the menu pull down. I also thought that some of the keyboard shortcuts to turn labels on/off and other functionality was not working. However I realized that changes had been added for minor moons and moon for example. I will let you all know if I find any show stoppers.

Don

Did anyone see the partial eclipse on New Years Eve cel://Follow/Sol:Earth:Moon/2009-12-31T20:08:52.22791?x=NEnbjdA1Iw&y=4HiKfNqUAQ&z=MASDkJzHMA&ow=0.951452&ox=0.0125053&oy=-0.307517&oz=-0.00403586&select=Sol:Earth:Moon&fov=26.2097&ts=1&ltd=0&p=1&rf=1890195&lm=0&tsrc=0&ver=3

[abramson]

I run Celestia 1.6 in my Dell notebook with Windows 7 Home Premium 64bits. It's a Core2 Duo, 4GB RAM, and an nVidia 9400 video card. Celestia runs flawlessly. I just miss the numeric keypad (esp. to yaw...).

Guillermo

[Hungry4info]

I was only allowed to get Win 7 32-bit (as it was the free-upgrade I got with the computer). As long as I've been using Win 7, I've not noticed anything unusual about the way Celestia 1.6 runs.

[CAP-Team]

Celestia runs just fine in my Windows 7 Ultimate x64 with 4 GB RAM.
You may want to install Celestia on a second partition where you have full rights instead of the default Program Files folder.