• Windows Vista. w00t! Vista, DirectX 10, it's all coming in a few weeks. When it does, we can finally wave goodbye and our collective middle fingers at the horror of XP, as our primary operating systems at least. Although, compatibility may force us to keep it installed in a dual-boot setup.
  
• KDE for Windows?! Oh yes, the K Desktop Environment might finally be available for Windows. Now, I know what you're thinking, the Windows Desktop Environment is the best thing Windows has going for it, particularly Vista which will be out by the time KDE for Windows is. But still, it will give us choice - KDE is better in some ways, particularly customization. I remember once reading that Microsoft hoped to force everybody to use the three standard, horrible XP themes (Blue, Silver and Olive) in order to unify the Windows XP experience. Basically, to stop people from going "Oh noes, I can't use this computer because the Start button is a different colour to mine". I know, people ARE that stupid. But screw them. Anyway; hopefully KDE for Windows will have all the Firefox losers installing it on their friends' computers and stuff (like they do with Firefox) and eventually that will lead to those people asking "I can use KDE... it's fine... so why am I still using Windows? Linux has KDE, but it's also free - free from copyright bullshit, free of charge, free of viruses and free of all the other rubbish that comes with Windows..." and they'll get Kubuntu.
  
  Hopefully, very hopefully, Gnome for Windows will follow. I prefer Gnome, because it's clean, quick and intuitive. It's more like the Windows Desktop Environment in many ways, than KDE, but it's better still. And if it does follow KDE for Windows, the Firefox Losers Effect will put it on everybody's computer and they'll all switch to Ubuntu and the world will be a brighter place. Won't happen, but it's a pleasant fantasy.
  
• Another Linux one, Beryl. Yep, the free, Open Source fork of Compiz, or whatever... it's a marvellous 3D desktop environment, similar in concept to Vista's Aero interface. The one that's taken them years to perfect. Beryl already works very well - and it's coming on nicely. Stick Beryl for Windows on top of Gnome for Windows, on top of Windows XP and suddenly you've got a potential Vista Beater. Oh the pun was intentional... anyway, in terms of the user experience for people who don't know much about computers, I think that would be a very successful combination.
  
  It's not like they're going to suddenly ditch Windows completely, you've got to wean them off it by replacing parts of it one by one.
  
• Yet another Linux one; easier to install software. A group was recently founded to make stuff easier to install on Linux, like it is on Windows. For me, installing things on Linux has always been a farce - if you have to use the terminal then it's no good. I'm hoping for something like InstallShield. Debian packages are ok of course, but still, they only satisfy dependences most of the time, not all of the time. And you get little in the way of customization for your install, the shortcuts to the software get dumped wherever the package-maker decided to put them, if at all, and some features you don't need, but have no choice but to install. That's when you can find a Debian package for the software you want of course, more often than not, you can't.
  
• A proper start to Next Gen gaming! Jees, it's getting late now. 2007 is Sony's last chance to get the PS3 out. Once they do, the 360 will have to find some real innovation from somewhere in order to compete, and this fierce competition will finally, at last, produce the kickass Next Gen games that we've been promised. The Wii, though I guess you could say it's next gen, won't compete with either the 360 or the PS3 for raw gaming quality. It will only ever compete in sales. And with all the casual gamers happy with their Wii, it will be down to only the true elite to decide whether their money goes to Sony or MS.
  
• The Rise of HD in the UK. "HD Ready flat panel TV!*" is a phrase used all too often in today's marketing, seeing as we don't have a lot of HD content to choose from here. No HD discs like HD-DVD or Blu Ray, and only limited HD TV if you have Sky. As 2007 progresses, we'll see even more HD hype, and towards quarter three, there will be a nice selection of players and HD films released. The jury's still out on whether Blu Ray's technical supremacy, but crippling DRM will beat HD-DVD's big-brand investors. This ties in with the real start on Next Gen games, as the PS3 will rely on Blu Ray for everything, and support for HD-DVD will soon make its way to the 360.
  
  I sincerely hope the hype amounts to something, and that something is HD Freeview. Experience tells me that if there is HD Freeview in 2007, it will be confined to one or two channels, and will probably be on Top-Up TV - which means it will locked out unless you pay.
  
  I'd like to see more 1080p TVs too, cheap ones.
  
• We all secretly want a go with the Wii controller. Well... I'm not too fussed, but I know everybody else is a little different to me. Anyway, if we're lucky 2007 could become The Year of The Controller. I reckon Microsoft is still shocked by how easily Nintendo just saved their entire business with one white rectangle (just like Apple did...) and they'll want in on the crazy-controller scene. Before the xbox franchise, the only hardware Microsoft made was peripherals, and their sidewinder joysticks were once something to be proud of. I reckon with their resources and previous experience they could knock something special up by quarter four of 2007. Just in time for Christmas.
  
  As to Sony, who knows? I expect weird controllers are the last thing on their collective minds right now, having missed the all important Christmas release, and luke-warm projects like Buzz and Guitar Hero doing little to obscure the fact that the PS2 is just plain old. We might see something along the lines of Buzz for PS3 (think: silver buzzers), or simple backwards compatibility, but gyroscopic masterpieces? But then, I could be wrong, Sony may be hoping their new ordinary controllers are innovative enough.
  
  And for the PC? Don't forget, it's still on the HD, Next Gen guest list. I reckon we'll see some overpriced stuff from Logitech, the odd new 360 controller that works on PC - but what I want to know is, how hard is it to make a Wii controller work on PC? I've got £10 converter box that turns a PS1/2 controller into a USB gamepad.
  
• Emulators, a fascinating subject, but we're now getting into the virtualization groove. 2007 could herald the start of reliable virtualization for enthusiasts. For the uninitiated, virtualization is about running more than one operating system on one computer at once. Take a look at this Google images search for some generic screenshots of Microsoft Virtual PC. See that? A Window on your XP Desktop showing a window on your 98 Desktop? Step that up a bit, think, a Window on your Vista desktop showing a Window on your XP Desktop, showing a program that won't work on Vista. Or even, showing something a bit experimental - virtualization is safer in many ways that just trying it on your PC's native OS. Don't forget, there's Mac OSX, All your Unix (Linux, FreeBSD etc.) and Solaris too... think of the possibilities there.
  
  And how about 360, and Wii? I'd like to see a Wii emulator that works well. We might see a decent PS2 emulator this year which runs at a usable level, on average computers, but it will be too late, with PS2 prices set to plummet like Sega's console empire after their Dreamcast nightmare, people will just buy a real one rather than muck about.
  
  360 emulators, yeah maybe, but you're looking at one frame per second or less on a menu screen for a good few years yet. PS3 emulators? Not with that cell processor in it. We'll probably not see a good PS3 emulator until 2013.
  
• Films, yes, 2007 has been the target of many a sequel trapped in development hell. One such sequel is Indiana Jones IV - but that's now been pushed firmly back to 2008.
  
  Nochnoy Dozor 3 (Dusk Watch), the third sequel to Nochnoy Dozor (Night Watch) was never exactly in development hell, but you could say it's sold its soul. The third in the Russian Fantasy Action Thriller series is to be set in the US and filmed in English, as a result of a bribe from Fox. I think part of the charm was the unusual modern Russian language and setting. Nevertheless, I'm not going to miss it - IMDB claims that the main character from the first and second parts will feature in this one too. It could just be a 2 second cameo, but still I'm willing to chance it's not.
  
• SATA Optical Drives! How much longer do we have to put up with these horrible, slow, short, ugly, inefficient IDE cables? Here's hoping that neither Blu Ray nor HD-DVD will ever be widely available as an IDE drive. Anybody with a computer worthy of such a drive will have a SATA port or two going spare. Personally, I have about 9 spare in this computer. Conroe Intel chipsets, the ones for Core 2 Duo CPUs, don't support IDE as far as I know, which is why my mainboard has a JMicron chipset for its single IDE port. Hopefully this will do something to speed the process of ditching IDE along.
  
• Proper internet TV. I want the BBC, Sky etc. to start taking the internet seriously as a way of getting their programmes to their audience. With live streams, bittorrent and direct downloads, in an easy and cheap (if not free) package, people could finally stop having to worry about which way their antenna (coat hanger?) is pointing.
  
• Cheap and effective VOIP on mobile phones? Last minute wish for quarter three, a prototype of a mobile phone no bigger than the average, not more than £130, that has all the features of an ordinary one, as well as the ability to make free (or very cheap) mobile-to-mobile calls, or mobile to PC calls, or mobile to anywhere else in the world calls with a reliable third party provider such as Skype or Verizon. Whether such things exist yet is beside the point; they're not going to be anything like current mobile phones for proportion, price or appearance.

Thanks for reading, hope you agree with some of the stuff in there, and I hope it gives you something to look forward to. When 2007 throws its shit at you like a deranged and angry monkey, just remember some of that sweet, sweet false-joy that a HD DVD player could bring...

Sirron T. Mighty -- out.