Windows 8.1 a hero or a zero

ThemeOne

For me 8.1 is a zero.

I didn't want the Start button back if all it was doing was taking me to the Start Screen, but now there's no choice not to have it!

Agree with others that 8.1 seems to start slower - 8.0 always felt nice and snappy.

The option to boot straight to Desktop works fine, though the option to disable pressing the Windows key taking you to the Start Screen didn't work for me.

I also seem to have a power management issue now. In 8.0 I used the Run box for everything, so logged off last night by typing logoff in the Run box - this morning find the monitor in sleep mode as expected, but the PC itself still running on full power.

earthstorm

only issue i found after upgrading to 8.1 is that my PC no longer recognises my soundcard, even though the drivers are upto date

penrhyn

Dear Microsoft, no one wants a windows phone, no one wants a Windows tablet. Accept this and when you get round to Windows 9 get back to basics and release a decent PC operating system,

WTFH

Problem is, penrhyn, there's a lot of money to be made in unified systems where devices work well together and have the same look & feel.
Microsoft are doing reasonable well in the car market with their mobile operating system, but I think Windows 8 is going to be another windows 98. Interesting idea, but lacking the code behind the idea to make it a good product.

UnderPressure

I really do not understand all the hate towards Windows 8 but then I never understood the hate towards Vista either, I had machines capable of running Vista and also had enough knowledge and confidence to get on with it and never had a days worth of trouble with Vista not a single day!

Same with Windows 8, upgraded all my machines on the day of release and never had any issues at all with it, sure it took a bit of getting used to and I really do not take advantage of all the capabilities of Metro and the various apps from the store but as an every day operating system it is great, not one single issue.

Having said all that I did find an hour to download the 8.1 update to my laptop yesterday, the download and install went fine, I was shocked at the size of it at 3.2gb, I was even more shocked when I fired it up fro the first time as apart from the appearance of a new Windows button on the task bar I can see no differences at all, not for what I use my machines for anyway, no doubt I will stumble across some oddities along the way but on the whole I am having a great experience as ever with Microsoft's operating systems.

UnderPressure

penrhyn wrote: »

Dear Microsoft, no one wants a windows phone, no one wants a Windows tablet. Accept this and when you get round to Windows 9 get back to basics and release a decent PC operating system,

I just upgraded my mobile contract and got a Samsung Galaxy S4 running of course Android, I would not touch anything from Apple but that is a whole other thread

I did look at the lumia's but with the recent changes at Nokia I am not convinced on the longevity of the current Lumia range, when I see what Microsoft has up it's sleeve hardware wise, on my next upgrade I may well give a Windows phone a go.

So far as tablet Android is King for me and always will be, the price of the Surface is the biggest put off for me, can buy better running the much lighter Android a lot cheaper, it is a no brainer really for me anyway.

earthstorm

you will find another thing with 8.1 in that under my computer all your folders along with the local drive etc. are under a new heading 'This PC'

Also i did not like the time it took to upgrade on my Dell Vostro 200 Win 8.1 took 1 and half hours to upgrade.

UnderPressure

earthstorm wrote: »

you will find another thing with 8.1 in that under my computer all your folders along with the local drive etc. are under a new heading 'This PC'

Also i did not like the time it took to upgrade on my Dell Vostro 200 Win 8.1 took 1 and half hours to upgrade.

Ahhhhhh yes, I forgot about the new "This PC" thing, I presume that will make it easier to find things on networked machines, again though all my other machines are always listed under the network tab so seem s a bit pointless really, I suppose it tidies it up a bit? mmmmmm not sure why they have done this tbh.

ThemeOne

Another thing I'm not happy with is that if you don't upgrade to 8.1 and stay on 8.0 you're now only supported for the next two years apparently. It's only 8.1 that will carry through support to the original W8 end-of-life.

Lum

ThemeOne wrote: »

Another thing I'm not happy with is that if you don't upgrade to 8.1 and stay on 8.0 you're now only supported for the next two years apparently. It's only 8.1 that will carry through support to the original W8 end-of-life.

Once again, proving that this is just a glorified service pack. same thing happened to the earlier XP service packs.

It makes sense though, why waste effort patching up things for people who wont install the latest patch?


My impressions after a day or two are that the upgrade process has some issues, for example I can no-longer open up Computer Management by right clicking This PC and choosing manage. I get the UAC prompt, but nothing happens. On my laptop that I clean installed it works fine.

I think I'll be clean installing my desktop at some point this week.

I wouldn't normally moan about having to do a clean install, I'm very familiar with the need to do so as the upgrade process has never been perfect (Win 3.1 -> 95 anyone?) but since MS have made it so damn hard to clean install, that upgrade better damn well be perfect, and it isn't.