As you step through the various Windows 7 product editions, an interesting picture emerges. Windows 7 Home Premium is, quite clearly, the sweet spot from a functionality perspective and the reason I consider this version to be the starting point for any Windows 7 user, and the focal point of this article. When you move up from Home Premium to Professional, you get a smaller bump in functionality, and if you look over the past two parts of this series, you’ll see some of the key Windows 7 features that are unique to Professional edition and the free or cheap tools I recommend to Home Premium users to replace them. But when you jump up from Professional to Ultimate, there’s an even smaller leap. In fact, there are really only two key features that are unique to Windows 7 Ultimate. And they’re both based around the notion of encryption-based data protection.

These features are so key, in fact, that I consider it almost criminal that Microsoft doesn’t make them available to all Windows users. I’d like to see that change in the future. But for now, you’ll need to seek out other ways to duplicate the functionality in the features Microsoft provides via its BitLocker and BitLocker To Go functionality.

BitLocker came first, in Windows Vista, and provides full-disk encryption for fixed hard drives. BitLocker To Go, meanwhile, debuts in Windows 7 and adds this same encryption functionality to removable storage media like USB memory keys. You can find out more about BitLocker To Go in my Windows 7 Feature Focus article.

I’ve found an excellent replacement for BitLocker, but have yet to find anything that is as seamless and well designed as BitLocker To Go. Fortunately, there’s a nice (if temporary) workaround you can take advantage of if you’d like to use BitLocker To Go. Here’s what I found.

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Full disk encryption replacement: Zone Alarm DataLock

Cost: $20 (Normally $30)
Download: https:://www.zonealarm.com/security/en-us/zonealarm-data-lock.htm
Description: Hard drive encryption makes everything on your computer’s hard drive unreadable to unauthorized eyes. It jumbles the data in such a way that it cannot be deciphered unless a special password is entered. If your laptop PC is stolen or lost, hard drive encryption prevents your personal data from getting into the wrong hands, even if you never recover your hardware. All your data is fully protected – even temporary and deleted files. Your encrypted hard drive is inaccessible unless a special login and password are entered. No password, no access – thieves are locked out. This login cannot be bypassed by removing the hard drive or by booting off a CD.

Notes: ZoneAlarm DataLock is essentially a consumer version of a Check Point product that’s been around for a while. I’ve been using it on my own Windows 7 Home Premium-based laptop (a ThinkPad SL410) and it appears to work quite well. As with any disk encryption solution, the actually encryption process is time consuming. But once it’s done, you won’t notice that it’s there–it doesn’t impact performance at all, from what I can tell–other than when you boot the computer, since there is a separate security logon at boot time.

There are a couple of interesting differences between DataLock and BitLocker (aside from the boot time logon). First, DataLock also works with Windows XP and Vista as well as Windows 7. Second, if you forget your boot-time logon, you can actually call ZoneAlarm to get it; Microsoft doesn’t offer any kind of BitLocker recovery functionality.

There are a few questions here. ZoneAlarm notes that “not all systems will be compatible” but doesn’t explain what that means. (I had no issues installing it, but I only did so on one system.) The product costs $20, and while ZoneAlarm says you don’t need to pay a yearly license fee, once you go beyond the first year of usage, you will need to pay a small renewal fee after the first year for ongoing technical support, which presumably includes logon recovery. Also, I noticed that Windows Home Server-based PC backup stopped working after installing DataLock. I will test whether reinstalling the WHS Connector software fixes this after I return from the trip I’m currently on.

Making Windows 7 Home Premium the Ultimate OS
There’s not a lot of UI to show here: It just sits in the background, protecting your data.
Other alternatives to BitLocker and BitLocker To Go

Here are some other reader recommendations for BitLocker and BitLocker To Go replacements that you may want to check out.
TrueCrypt

Cost: FREE
Download: https:://www.truecrypt.org/
Description: TrueCrypt is free open-source disk encryption software for Windows 7/Vista/XP, Mac OS X, and Linux.

Main features:

* Creates a virtual encrypted disk within a file and mounts it as a real disk.
* Encrypts an entire partition or storage device such as USB flash drive or hard drive.
* Encrypts a partition or drive where Windows is installed (pre-boot authentication).
* Encryption is automatic, real-time (on-the-fly) and transparent.
* Parallelization and pipelining allow data to be read and written as fast as if the drive was not encrypted.
* Provides plausible deniability, in case an adversary forces you to reveal the password.
* Encryption algorithms: AES-256, Serpent, and Twofish. Mode of operation: XTS.

Notes: TrueCrypt is hard. But if you don’t mind navigating through a technical interface, it can basically do everything that BitLocker and BitLocker To Go can do. So you may find it worth the effort.
7Zip

Cost: FREE
Download: https:://www.7-zip.org/
Description: 7-Zip is an open source file archiver with a high compression ratio. It supports strong AES-256 encryption in 7z and ZIP formats, so it’s possible, in a very manual way, to protect important documents and other data files on a USB hard drive or memory stick.

After the poor reception of Windows Vista by customers, Microsoft knew it had to retrench for that system’s successor, Windows 7. And retrench it did: Windows 7 has entered the market to universally positive reviews from the tech press and customers alike. Part of the reason is that Windows 7 is a more modest upgrade than was Windows Vista. And part of it is that Microsoft tried to create a more cohesive and simpler system than it had with Windows 7’s predecessor.

So Windows 7 is a huge success, no doubt about it. But if you’re coming to Windows 7 from a previous Windows version, you’re going to notice a number of changes–some big, some small–and that’s true if you were previously using Windows Vista, XP, or an even older version. And while Windows 7’s changes are mostly improvements, unfamiliarity can lead to a loss of productivity. So if you’re looking for a way to fix some of Windows 7’s most obvious annoyances, or simply change some crucial feature back to the way it used to work, fear not: I’ve got your back.

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Taskbar

Looking at the Windows 7 user interface, the most obvious change is the new taskbar, which represents a major functional departure from the previous several Windows versions. Now, instead of just providing buttons that represent running applications and other open windows, the taskbar also comingles shortcuts for frequently-needed applications and other objects. If you’re familiar with Mac OS X, you may feel that the new taskbar is a rip-off of that system’s Dock. In many ways, however, it simply combines the functionality from the XP/Vista taskbar taskbar with the Quick Launch toolbar. Regardless of its origins, one thing is clear: The Windows 7 taskbar is different enough that it will cause some headaches for users who are accustomed to previous Windows versions.

Annoyance: By default, the Windows 7 taskbar displays only a single icon for every shortcut or button. So if you have several Internet Explorer windows (or tabs) open, you’ll only see one button. That can be confusing, but it also means there’s no descriptive text caption on the button to describe what the window(s) are displaying, as was the case with all previous Windows versions dating back to Windows 95.

Windows 7 Annoyances
How many windows of each application are actually open? It’s impossible to say.

Solution: Fortunately, you can overcome Microsoft’s less-than-ideal default taskbar behavior and arrive at a display that more closely resembles previous Windows versions. To do so, right-click a blank area of the taskbar and choose Properties. Then, in the Taskbar buttons pull-down, choose “Combine when taskbar is full.” This will cause the taskbar to make two display changes. First, each button (each of which represents an open application or window) will include a caption, and not just a nondescript icon. Second, when you open multiple windows of the same application (as with IE or Windows Explorer), each window will get its own button.

Windows 7 Annoyances
With a small change, the Windows 7 taskbar is much more usable.

Annoyance: Most people who use Windows 7 quickly come to accept the way it combines shortcuts (links to non-running applications and windows) with buttons (links to running apps and windows). But there is one bizarre limitation: You cannot add two links on the taskbar for the same application. This is particularly problematic for Windows Explorer links: If you’d like to place separate shortcuts for, say, the Documents and Pictures libraries, you can’t: Instead, Windows 7 places links to both of these locations into the Windows Explorer shortcut’s Jump List.

Solution: Fortunately, there is a way around this limitation. Here how it works: Create a shortcut to the Windows Explorer location you want on the desktop. Then, right-click the shortcut and choose Properties. In the Target field, add the word “explorer” (no quotes) before the folder path. (If the path has any spaces, the path must be inside quotes.) The shortcut’s icon will change to the default Windows Explorer icon, but you can of course change it again as needed. Now, pin this shortcut to the taskbar: Instead of pinning it to the existing Windows Explorer shortcut, it will create a new shortcut. Voila!

Annoyance: While many users will embrace the new taskbar, some wish to retain a separation between shortcuts and links to running applications and open windows. And many of these people miss the Quick Start toolbar, which Microsoft removed from Windows 7.

Solution: You can enable the Quick Launch toolbar in Windows 7. To do so, right-click a blank area of the taskbar and choose Toolbar and then New toolbar. In the Choose a folder window that appears, type the following text into the Folder field: “%userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch” (no quotes) and click Select Folder. You’ll see the Quick Launch toolbar appear in truncated form at the right of the taskbar. To modify this, unlock the taskbar (right-click and uncheck “Lock the taskbar”). Then, drag it where you’d like it and then disable two options, “Show text” and “Show title,” by right-clicking the Quick Launch toolbar. This will make the toolbar look as it did in previous Windows versions.

Windows 7 Annoyances
Yes, Virginia, you really can enable the Quick Launch toolbar in Windows 7.

Annoyance: Windows Vista included an excellent utility called Software Explorer, part of Windows Defender, that made it very easy to prevent applications from starting up when Windows boots and, in many cases, littering the notification area with unneeded icons. Windows 7, sadly, removes this utility.

Solution: Unless you want to hunt down a third party utility, you’re going to have to go old school on Windows 7 and stretch some pre-Vista plumbing skills. There are a number of places to look at if you wish to streamline the Windows 7 boot process, but one is key: The System Configuration utility–type “msconfig” (no quotes) in Start Menu Search to find it–is a spiritual predecessor of sorts to Software Explorer and it provides a list of startup apps in its Startup tab that you can edit.
Start Menu

Annoyance: While the Windows 7 Start Menu is largely unchanged from Windows Vista, many users of the new OS will be coming from Windows XP or older Windows versions, and they may prefer the classic Start Menu from those versions. Unfortunately, Microsoft has removed this option from Windows 7.

Solution: Fortunately, an enterprising third party developer makes available a Classic Start Menu replacement for the Windows 7 Start Menu, so you can get back the Start Menu that graced Windows 95 through Windows Vista. It’s part of the Classic Shell project (see below).
Windows Explorer

Annoyance: If it seems like Microsoft has changed the layout and capabilities of Windows Explorer with each new Windows version, well, they have. And this trend continues in Windows 7, which, like Windows Vista, no longer includes a number of useful toolbar buttons that were available in Windows XP and older Windows versions.

Solution: Once again, Classic Shell comes to the rescue. This Explorer plug-in provides missing buttons like Cut, Copy, Paste, Delete, and Properties, and provides other old-school functionality, such as bringing back the pre-Windows 7 file copy dialog. It also displays free disk space and the file/folder size in the Explorer window status bar. Just like XP.

Windows 7 Annoyances
Classic Shell adds a mini-toolbar to Windows Explorer (in the upper right), providing easy access to commands Microsoft removed.
Compatibility

Anytime Microsoft releases a new Windows version, there are fears that device or application compatibility issues will render an otherwise decent upgrade into a disaster. And while this was certainly true with Windows Vista, Windows 7 does a much better job of maintaining backwards compatibility. Of course, no software is perfect.

Annoyance: An application won’t install or run under Windows 7.

Solution: Like previous versions of Windows, Windows 7 provides a nice suite of compatibility tools. These tools allow the system to fool installers and application programs into believing that they are running under older versions of Windows, and they’re typically found in the Compatibility tab of the Properties window for the application in question. But Windows 7 makes it much easier to work through these issues thanks to a new Troubleshooting infrastructure that provides plain English wizards, with step-by-step walkthroughs for compatibility problems and a host of other common issues. To more easily determine whether an application can be made to run correctly under Windows 7, open the Action Center (“action” in Start Menu Search) and click the Troubleshooting link. Then, click the link titled “Run programs made for previous versions of Windows” under Programs and follow the steps in the Program Compatibility wizard.

Tip: You can run this wizard more quickly by typing “compat” into Start Menu Search.

Annoyance: An application still won’t install or run under Windows 7.

Solution: Some legacy applications simply won’t ever install or run correctly under Windows 7. In this case, new Windows features called Windows Virtual PC and Windows XP Mode will help you solve the problem using virtualization technology. Windows Virtual PC is the next generation version of Microsoft’s Virtual PC product. It requires hardware virtualization support in the PC’s microprocessor and BIOS, and offers some important benefits over its predecessors, including USB support and the ability to run virtualized (“guest”) applications alongside native (“host”) applications. Windows Virtual PC is available for free to all Windows 7 users.

Windows XP Mode is a specially packaged and complete virtualized version of Windows XP with Service Pack 3 (SP3). It is provided, for free, to all users of Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate editions. And because it runs under Windows Virtual PC, any applications you installed inside this environment can run alongside your normal Windows 7 applications. It’s the perfect solution for those few remaining applications that simply won’t run in Windows 7 natively.
Windows Update

Annoyance: Microsoft has done a nice job of improving the Windows Update application in Windows 7, but one glaring issue remains. If you leave the PC unattended overnight and the system automatically installs critical or important security updates that require a reboot, you might get back to the PC in the morning to discover that all your applications have shut down and, potentially, you’ve lost some data.

Solution: You can prevent Windows Update from automatically rebooting your PC, though it will require a bit of work. The reason is that the Registry Key that controls this functionality is missing from Windows 7.

To do so, open the Registry Editor (Start Menu Search, “regedit”) and navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Polices\Microsoft\Windows. Then, create a new key called WindowsUpdate and, inside of that key, another new key called AU. Inside of that key, create a new DWORD (32-bit) value named NoAutoRebootWithLoggedOnUsers. Modify its value data, setting it to 1. You will have to restart the computer for the change to take effect.
Final thoughts

Every version of Windows comes with new challenges and new ways of doing things. And while Windows 7 is does indeed represent a major functional improvement over its predecessor, it’s also different enough from Windows XP and Vista to cause a bit of grief. Fortunately, there are simple workarounds to most problems, and while any change can be traumatic, Windows 7 is, in many ways, the least annoying upgrade Microsoft has ever shipped.