Who is using Windows 8?

prowla

For me the downsides on that list outweigh the pluses.

Having to patch DLLs and add freeware/shareware to attempt to reinstate features of the previous version is daft. MS should have left them in so that they could be turned back on.

The flat Metro GUI presentation is like going back to Windows 3; it's got no style, no character, and is just plain !!!!!!. It may suit lower powered systems, but who cares? (In contrast, Windows 7 has the Aero borders, and Ubuntu even allows windows transparency to be set.)

The point about the AV being included as a plus, but the drivers being excluded is a plus is neither here nor there to me; Having a driver immediately available in Windows 7 is a good thing for when you plug things in, whereas MSE is freely downloadable anyway, so it's a once-only activity.

My main PC boots really quickly from an SSD, in fact it boots quicker than the KVM switch that my keyboard mouse and display are attached via.

I find a lot of power management a nuisance and generally switch to performance mode when mains attached.

The other pluses are relatively trivial and aren't hugely important to me.

It's not worth £25, so doubling it isn't going to make it twice as useful. (I've got 4 licenses and I've only bothered to use one.)

Me, I think I will stick with Windows 7. If I do get a new machine then I would likely move to Ubuntu and run Windows apps via XP in a VM.

Lum

Windows 7 had a lot of drivers excluded too. On both 7 and 8 I had to use WindowsUpdate to get my HP LaserJet 4Si working. But in the real world most home users aren't going to be using a 15 year old laser printer. The stuff they removed is based on actual stats of what people have. Techies are more likely to have odd hardware that isn't included, but we're also used to obtaining drivers ourselves so no big issue.

I agree that an SSD is an awesome upgrade for improved boot time. I have one in both my desktop and my laptop, but they also cost a lot more than £25. Win8 + SSD = better boot time again! My desktop spends more time faffing about in the BIOS than it does booting Windows. I probably ought to stop using Intel "hardware" RAID so as to skip that step of the boot process and instead use the new Windows 8 Storage Spaces feature instead.

prowla

I've got a HP colour Laserjet 2600n and a Brother mono laser HL2070n, neither of which are particularly up to date, but they work fin and I'll keep them til they fail.

I've also got a Canon Lide scanner, but its support stopped after XP, so I have an XP VM that I use to manage that and a couple of other older things (like a programmable remote that attaches via a serial port).

booler

Lum wrote: »

First of all, I've removed all the tablet crap. My computer boots to the desktop, I have a start button, that start button behaves exactly like it did in Windows 7.

You know what? What I see here is something like when you buy a new kettle and all of a sudden it can only boil water that is suitable for coffee. But wait ... if you buy this filter and stick it in the kettle you can make the tea that you are used to!

Why on earth should we have to make alterations to a brand new product to make it do what it is supposed to be designed for?

The truth is that M$ build softare with deficiencies that have people clamouring to buy the next version that is launched. It's as simple as that folks.

prowla

booler wrote: »

You know what? What I see here is something like when you buy a new kettle and all of a sudden it can only boil water that is suitable for coffee. But wait ... if you buy this filter and stick it in the kettle you can make the tea that you are used to!

Why on earth should we have to make alterations to a brand new product to make it do what it is supposed to be designed for?

The truth is that M$ build softare with deficiencies that have people clamouring to buy the next version that is launched. It's as simple as that folks.

Except Windows 8 is the next version and it's a bit daft of them to have crippled it in the way they have.

Jemma-T

Jemma-T wrote:

Windows 8 has been an excellent operating system.

Saying that I've had to make it look and feel like W7 to be useable using the excellent Classic Shell http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/

Happy paying just £15 for it (had been using the beta version for several months).

The biggest benefit (and why I can't go back to W7) is it can copy files to and from other drives without constant faffing about. It just does it. As you'd expect.

They have excised the excellent Microsoft Security Essentials options AFAIK and replaced it with the not much use Windows Defender. A real step back.

AVG does the job though http://www.filehippo.com/download_avg_antivirus/

prowla wrote:

So, if I have 6 computers, would I need to spend £90 to reinstate a feature on them that Microsoft decided to remove in the new OS?

Yeah, if you're daft.

Classic Shell is free (obviously) and my Windows 8 was £15.


Windows Defender is NOT a rebirth of Microsoft Security Essentials it's the same crap WD as it was before.

prowla

Jemma-T wrote: »

Yeah, if you're daft.

Classic Shell is free (obviously) and my Windows 8 was £15.


Windows Defender is NOT a rebirth of Microsoft Security Essentials it's the same crap WD as it was before.

Nope - I'm not daft enough to pay for it.

(I did interpret your £15 as for the add-on, not the OS.)

pcombo

Nope and i wont be using it.

I will use windows 7 till I am basically forced to use windows 8.

Windows 8 is to designed for a tablet. I dont like it.

My list of windows in order:

Windows 95 = Boring
Windows 98 = Beginning of the start for windows imo.
Windows ME = Rubbish
Windows 2000 = Good
Windows XP = Good
Windows Vista = Rubbish
Windows 7 = Took me a while but is good
Windows 8 = Rubbish

eelsoup

Jemma-T wrote: »

Yeah, if you're daft.

Classic Shell is free (obviously) and my Windows 8 was £15.

Windows Defender is NOT a rebirth of Microsoft Security Essentials it's the same crap WD as it was before.

With all due respect, you're incorrect. The old Windows defender only offered spyware protection, however the version which ships with Windows 8 is a full AntiVirus and Anti spyware / malware solution

Lum

booler wrote: »

You know what? What I see here is something like when you buy a new kettle and all of a sudden it can only boil water that is suitable for coffee. But wait ... if you buy this filter and stick it in the kettle you can make the tea that you are used to!

Actually it's more like the kettle is half price, and the filter is free and with it the kettle then makes tea almost as good as the full price kettle. Or you can get a third party filter that is then just as good as the full price kettle and the overall package still works out cheaper.

Oh and the silly kettle also boils water faster, so the end result is better than paying the higher price for the previous model. If you're prepared to deal with a one-off faff with the filters.

Honestly, it's less hassle than some of the hoops people jump through on these forums with coupons and clubcard voucher stacking and so on.