Windows 7 gets performance patches
Microsoft has released a series of patches for Windows 7. They cover performance rather than security, but may be worth seeking out now if you’ve experienced some specific problems.
The patches come in two sets, the first of which covers bugs which can occur on any Windows 7 PC. These include some keys on multimedia keyboards, such as one to launch the calculator, not functioning. Another fix solves a problem where, after an update to some applications, the relevant icon either moves or disappears; some reporters have noted this happening with iTunes.
There’s also a fix for a bug which can be triggered by some combinations of the settings for screen savers and leave machines displaying a black screen and not responding, forcing a manual reset.
The second patch deals specifically with machines running an NVIDIA USB Enhanced Host Controller Interface (EHCI) chipset and having more than 4GB of RAM. In some cases such machines have frozen while attempting to transfer data to a USB-connected device such as a Flash memory stick or an external hard drive.
Microsoft says the various problems have all been brought to its attention either through customers contacting its support staff, or through the automated error reporting service built into Windows.
All the updates can be downloaded manually from http://update.microsoft.com now. They’ll be downloaded automatically later on for Windows Update users and will also be part of the first Service Pack for the system.
Microsoft has also released a new version of the System Update Readiness Tool for Vista, Windows 7 and Server 2008. It’s designed to fix problems on computers which can block other updates from being installed and working properly. For the majority of users no action is needed as the tool is installed and run through Windows Update after a scan to see if there are any relevant problems to be fixed.
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