BitLocker was introduced with Windows Vista and, as far as I know, it was not very popular. This might be because it is available only for Windows Vista Ultimate and Windows Vista Enterprise. But the main reason probably is that it is complicated to set up. I compared BitLocker to TrueCrypt a year ago and concluded that the Open Source tool is the better drive encryption solution. BitLocker in Windows 7, however, has significantly improved. In this article I discuss BitLocker’s system drive encryption, and in my next post I will review BitLocker-to-Go, the new encryption solution for removable storage devices.
BitLocker for Vista was too complicated to set up once the operating system is installed. Users had to shrink the system partition to make space for the BitLocker partition. Microsoft acknowledged that this was too difficult for end users, and too time consuming for administrators, and released the BitLocker Drive Preparation Tool, which is part of the Ultimate Extras and is also available for Windows Vista Enterprise.
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