Using Windows Explorer, how to find file names starting with a dot (period), in 7 or Vista?

Use Window's "Search Advanced Query Syntax", which basically lets you do stuff that Vista and XP advanced search used to let you (that Windows 7 hid). Read about it on MSDN.

Hence, you can just search filename:. to find all files with a file name that begins with "."

The windows Command prompt method to find all "dot files" in all directories below the current directory, but excluding directory names beginning with dot:

dir .*.* /s /a-D

filename:.*. -kind:folder

This finds all files which begin with a period, even those which do not have an extension. -kind:folder excludes folders from the search. Tested on Windows 7. Should work on Vista and Windows 8.