What's it like - touching-up Windows 8 ?

KingL

I've been getting behind on my 'keeping up with the Joneses' consumer-duties for the last few years and I need to catch-up and get a new lappy pretty soon. (Yes, I know about Haswell). I'll be jumping straight from XP to Win 8.

I know nothing about Win 8, but I keep reading that you really need a touchscreen with it. Fair enough, I should probably get one anyway.

Right now, I'm toying with the idea of a convertable vs. a regular laptop config, and I'm wondering about the logistics/ergonomics of the two alternatives.

Questions to you Windows 8 users: How much do you actually touch the screen? Do you just end-up using keyboard shortcuts because your fingers are on the keyboard anyway? Are you moving between the touchscreen and keyboard all the time? Is it a pain to reach all that way across the keyboard to get to the screen all the time? Would it help to have the screen closer (i.e. in tablet mode)? Is it just the OS that uses touch, or is it useful within apps themselves? I mostly use Notepad, Word and Excel, so would expect to be fingers-on keys most of the time, but what about, say, Photoshop? Is the touchscreen actually useful inside the app? Or have you just ditched the metro interface entirely?

I can't find a useful Win 8 simulator/site and haven't got the bandwidth to watch youtube videos, so I'm trying to get an idea of what it's like to use common apps on a Win 8 machine. It seems like a convertable lappy is more expensive than an traditional one, so I'm wondering whether the extra money is actually worth-it for the convenience/usability?


tia

JJ_Egan

I see no reason that you need a touch screen for Win 8 .

Sent from Win 8 keyboard and mouse non touch screen .
jje

Jivesinger

There's a document here from Microsoft which is an introduction to Windows 8, but with quite a lot of info about how the touch gestures work.
http://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/download/details.aspx?id=39055

RobTang

You don't need a touchscreen at all...

However I actually quite like having a touch screen, I do actually miss having it when I'm on my desktop or MacBook.

Its never a primary input device, but there are times when its nice to just to give a quick tap or drag web pages.

Desktop: desktop pretty much the same as windows 7.

Conv laptop: I actually really like it, its nice having a proper comp as a tablet, I although I think they still need to work on reducing power and heat.

I cant say I use too many metro apps, then again I only really use 3 or 4 apps (exc games) on my iPad, so im probably not the best example of an app user.

ThemeOne

You certainly don't need a touch screen to use Windows 8, and personally I wouldn't say it's worth the extra money, but everyone has different ideas.

With a normal laptop / desktop I really don't like the idea of keeping on touching the screen as you'd be forever cleaning it (or I would be). With a phone or tablet I suppose it's different, as you expect to be handling them anyway.

Supatramp

I very recently bought a new laptop running Win8, and the first thing I did was to download/install "Classic Shell". Also scrubbed the "Charms" bar, and my laptop pretty well operates as it's predecessor running Win7 did.

Happy days! lol

macman

W8 is generally a good stable system; like W7 but boots faster. No need at all for a touchscreen.
As above, bung on Classic Shell if you dislike the Fisher-Price style Start screen.

Esqui

I don't use a touchscreen, but I do use the extra touch functions on my mousepad. For example, I can easily bring up the tabs on IE10 with a simple swipe from the bottom, settings with a swipe from the right, and quickly go to the desktop with three fingers. The touchpad is easily enough. Just remember to turn on switching to the last app when you swipe from the left, because that is annoying as hell

KingL

Thanks for these answers.

For those with touchscreens, how does it work within the applications themselves. Does touchscreen even do anything ?

e.g. for (non specialist Win 8 apps), can I move around the menus (in, say, photoshop), using touchscreen? Can you pinch to zoom in/out within the (generic) app?

If "no", then is the answer different for win 8 apps bought from the MS appstore?

How do you do a rightclick or a double click on a touchscreen?

tia

Lum

App store apps should play nice with a touch screen.

Apps not designed for a touchscreen, e.g. most desktop apps, will generally be annoying to use, though it depends a lot on the specific app, how big its buttons are etc.

I've not used 8 with a touchscreen, but I have used XP with a touchscreen, and for right click you would do a long press and hope you kept your finger still enough to not get misinterpreted as a drag. Double click was a double tap.

Personally I don't see the point of touchscreen, even on Win8 for a desktop or laptop computer. They're great for tablets, car PCs etc. but not for desktop use where you actually need to get stuff done.