I have already written a lot about these two features. I will have to wait for more technical information in order to comment further on this feature. Does this mean that I can't use Search Server 2008 with Windows 7 Professional? I guess not. Perhaps Windows 7 Professional doesn't support remote searches? It is also unclear how Enterprise Search Scopes are related to Search Server 2008. Microsoft's marketing text didn't make this clear to me. It is a mystery to me what Windows 7 Enterprise search features will have that other Windows editions will not. Windows 7 has a new search interface that allows you to search not only on your desktop, but also through remote content such as Office SharePoint Server 2007. However, I guess Microsoft wouldn't introduce such a feature if Enterprise customers didn't ask for it. Faster and cheaper bandwidths have made these more or less superfluous. Some years ago, most organizations used HTTP proxies to cache web content. I feel that it has come a couple of years too late. It is difficult to say whether large organizations will embrace such a feature. I haven't tried it yet, but I am planning to do so soon. BranchCache stores data from remote file and Web servers on a local Windows Server 2008 R2 machine, or on other Windows 7 PCs. There is no doubt that this is a typical Enterprise feature, because usually only large organizations have branches. Perhaps the fact that DirectAccess requires IPv6 and a PKI makes Microsoft think that it is too demanding for small IT departments.

In my view, this is a feature that would also be of interest to small and mid-sized organizations. Remote users can use DirectAccess to securely connect to their corporate network without establishing a VPN connection manually. I discussed DirectAccess some days ago, and I must admit I wasn't aware that it would only be made available to Enterprise customers at the time.

Windows 7 enterprise