Windows 7
When Microsoft stated that they would be listening to their users, surprisingly, they meant it. They are leaps ahead of their Vista product. I still won’t forget when they released a preview of “Longhorn” and its amazing GUI. Naturally, when Vista was out, it was just a bit of a let down to say the least.

Windows 7 is definitely catching up to the polish that Apple has been serving with Mac OS X for so long. Vista was a subtle step in the right direction, where Windows 7 totally takes the bar and runs with it. Getting rid of the title bars in the task bar is a great step, and allows for less clutter, and more application real estate.

Microsoft also adds features like, application previewing, “peeking” at windows hidden underneath others, and shaking an app to minimize the rest among others. These features are a great boost to productivity and makes the task bar more like an OS X dock then ever before.

Windows 7 Desktop

Snow Leopard
Mac OS X on the other hand, has been trying to keep the polish every year by adding incremental features to OS X but mainly keeping the overall UI similar.

Leopard unified the different iterations of UI from the Aqua, to the brushed metal years, and finally to the new glossy template. Snow Leopard is rumored to introduce a new UI theme introduced, code-named Marble. Most theories point at it being a variation of the glossy, with more black and less white. This would be in line with the latest Apple hardware which has added touches of glossiness and black to everything and using white much more minimally.

Artist Rendition of Marble Interface

Though the new GUI polish is welcomed, it would be nice to see Apple take some huge leaps like Windows 7 just to keep the pace between them. I am curious to see if the Windows 7 UI will change some of Apple’s strategy with Snow Leopard, and force some graphic enhancements to their old yet refined UI last minute before release. Who knows with Apple though, they might surprise us and have much more in store with such features as resolution independence and strengthened  support for graphics processors.

I think the drastic UI changes to the desktop will come in the next release, since they were focused on optimizing Snow Leopard in terms of hardware. In this area, Snow Leopard will shine. In the end, Marble might be all that Snow Leopard needs to wow the end-user in the UI department. The coming month will definitely reveal this. We will just have to see!

Final Thoughts
Windows 7 is significant enough of an upgrade that on my Macbook Pro Unibody, I run the beta of the new Microsoft offering on Bootcamp. I usually keep a Wndows flavor running with Parallels, but with the improved GUI, and Parallels lack of support do to virtualization, it is worth it to reboot in to Windows 7 to appreciate the new elements. Depending on Snow Leopard’s final release, I will have to see if Windows 7 ends up being my default OS! I will keep you guys updated to see which OS I stick with after Snow Leopard launches in the coming month or so!