Background

My 5-year-old daughter has always been fascinated with computers.  This is not surprising since she sees Mommy and Daddy on their computers every day.  When she was only three, we began making a game out of typing words that she was learning in pre-school, and soon she began picking out the letters of her name on the keyboard.  She would giggle for hours as we helped her identify the letters in words she knew and helped her type them on the screen.  She was typing her name like a pro long before she ever learned how to handwrite it.  Not long afterwards, I installed some age-appropriate games on my computer so she could begin developing her hand-eye coordination by operating the mouse to manipulate the characters in the game.  However, as her skills and enjoyment increased, so did her demand for time on MY machine (these demands always seemed to occur when I was in the middle of a website, photo, or video project.)  So, when I upgraded to a new desktop a few months ago, I knew that it was time for my little girl to take over my old one. Here are some of the issues I considered when setting up her computer:

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Well, I’m posting from within the Beta version of Windows 7, the newest operating system from the folks up in Microsoft-land.  After waiting with the millions of others on Friday to get my hands on this thing, I ended up downloading on Sunday night.  To be perfectly honest, other than the delayed download, the worst part of the installation was finding a Virtual Machine software that I could use with Vista Home Premium x64.  My original plan was to use Parallels, since I use it on my XP laptop.  However, Parallels doesn’t work with 64-bit operating systems.  So then I tried Microsoft’s own Virtual PC.  However, Virtual PC does not work on the Home versions of Vista.  I finally ended up using a demo version of VMWare.

A quick word about the hardware:  I am running this instance of W7 in a virtual machine with one core and 2GB of RAM dedicated to the VM.  The physical box is an Intel Core 2 Quad-core 2.33 GHz with 6 GB RAM.

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With the holidays fast approaching, people are beginning to wonder if and when they should upgrade their computers and how Windows Vista should fit into those plans. Here is a synopsis of what is coming out when and a guide that should help you determine what you need:

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