Restaurant POS Windows 7
Windows 7 is a very nice looking operating system, however, it requires lots of resources and has some compatibility problems with many POS peripherals. Do not expect to load Windows 7 on a machine that is 2 years old... it will run unbelievably slow. For the least expensive and most reliable POS system possible, we recommend using Windows XP Professional or Windows XP Embedded (WE/POS).
To its credit, Windows 7 is much more attractive cosmetically than either XP or Vista. FreePOS recognizes these cosmetic improvements and will automatically fade windows and run with Aero Style graphics. If you don't mind spending a few hundred dollars extra per station on hardware upgrades, the visual bells and whistles are really stunning.
Windows 7 comes in a lot of different varieties. FreePOS will run best on Windows 7 Professional 32 bit edition. The 64 bit versions of Windows 7 are not as compatible with 3rd party peripherals as the 32 bit version is. The HOME versions of Windows 7 are lacking features that a multi-terminal POS system will require. Do not use Windows 7 Home Or Home Premium.
Windows 7 requires LOTS of memory. We recommend the following minimum hardware configuration if you plan to deploy Windows 7:
- RAM: 2GB minimum, 3GB preferred
- HARD DISK: 80GB SATA minimum
- Intel CPU: Core-2-Duo E6400 or higher
- AMD CPU: X2 7850 or higher
- Video Card: Direct X compatible with 128MB Onboard or better
In particular, we suspect systems with these components will NOT run Windows 7 very well:
- RAM: 1GB or less
- HARD DISK: 80GB or less
- CPU: Intel ATOM CPUs will be bad, AMD Sempron CPUs will be bad. Any single core CPU less than 2.4Ghz clock speed will be a bad choice.
- Video cards: Most systems with integrated video will be slow
