Last month I reported that in June Windows 8.x had gone into reverse gear, losing market share for the first time, and posed this question "Statistical anomaly or downward trend?" It's too early to call it a "trend" but anyone who expected the tiled OS to make a recovery in July will be disappointed by the latest set of figures. There's a striking difference this time around, too — both Windows 8 and 8.1 show drops in July. Ouch.
Are there any Soylents here who are running Windows 8 or 8.1? What version are you running and what, if any, addons have you applied? How has it affected your purchasing decision on buying new hardware?
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Windows 8.x Loses Market Share for Second Consecutive Month
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(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:11PM
I've only seen one copy of Windows 8 running outside of a shop - and that was licensed to a geek who was going to format it and install Linux. From my experience, Windows 8 is dead on arrival.
1702845791×2
(Score: 4, Informative) by frojack on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:23PM
I've actually seen it Windows 8 on quite a few on newer laptops in the hands of some of my friends who were upgrading from older machines and had a reason to stay with windows. (They ask me how to do things on Win 8, because they know I have one of the Windows Surface Pro tablets).
Had they asked me before they purchased I would have recommended Win 7 if they insisted they needed windows at all.
The Metro interface really makes no sense on anything other than a tablet, even with a touch screen on a laptop you end up waving your arm around to do what a mouse click could accomplish.
Until Windows 9 (or what ever is next) comes out and they end this silly forced march to metro they are going to continue to squander market share.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Informative) by cafebabe on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:41PM
The rectangle interface (did it get another name or did they buy the clashing trademark?) was intended to be consistent across phones, games and desktops. Without legacy software or a legacy userbase, that would a really good idea. However, execution has been a failure. For example, if you run a "Metro" version of Internet Explorer and then run a classic version of Internet Explorer, the tabs and cookies are copied across, then classic Internet Explorer pulls pages from the OS webcache. At this point, you have two binaries, two sets of state and two subtly different renderings. From here, the tabs diverge and, presumably, two sets of Internet Explorer require security updates. And all of this is to allow the main menu of your desktop to match your phone or games console - if you're daft enough to run this across two or more incompatible processor architectures.
1702845791×2
(Score: 4, Interesting) by frojack on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:52PM
I haven't checked that out, because, well, IE! Nuf said.
True story: When I was buying the thing (for my day job) I was in the Microsoft Kiosk, trying out the Pro version (never even glanced at the ARM models), the first thing I did was install Chrome and Firefox. The MS employee just laughed and said EVERYBODY did that first. He then looked around conspiratorially, asked if I wanted to download and test OpenOffice.org. I asked if it worked, he said "Hell yes", and we both had a laugh.
When done, he software reset the demo model back to factory. (And didn't even try to upsell me the Office bundle).
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 1) by jon3k on Monday August 04 2014, @02:52AM
"(did it get another name or did they buy the clashing trademark?)"
Yes, it was rename Modern UI [notebookreview.com]
(Score: 2) by frojack on Monday August 04 2014, @02:58AM
Lol. Totally missed that.
I believe Apple did the same with iphone, and Google with Gmail. Lost those names in certain countries.
How come these guys can't use a search engine FFS?
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Hairyfeet on Sunday August 03 2014, @09:00PM
Same here, working at the shop the only Windows 8 installs I've seen were from folks foolish enough to go buy a new PC from somebody else, only to bring it to me to be wiped and have Win 7 installed. When Win 8 first came out I tried the various "fixes" hoping to save them money, different shells and tweakers and the like, final result? Lipstick on a pig, no matter what you do the metro crap will fuck with you, whether its the hot corners or some patch fucking up the shell and reverting to metro or launching some control panel item only to get "charmbarred" at the end of the day those "fixes" amounted to no different than those old transformation packs for XP. It could make it kinda sorta look like Win 7, make it behave kinda sorta like Win 7, but it didn't take long for the ugly to leak out.
I just hope the rumors aren't true about Win 9, that its an "Xbone online only, gotta check in daily powered by Bing 3.0" because from the screenshots it LOOKS like what everybody asked for, Win 7 with the speed tweaks of Win 8. If that is what it is and can be run offline? I'l be switching customers left and right, if its really an online rental OS? Then I'll be wiping it for Win 7 just as I have been with Win 8/8.x
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @09:37PM
Do you have any references to these rumours? I'm not virulently anti-Windows 8 -- probably because I'm in my 30s so I left my over-zealous activist years well in the past, and also because frankly I just don't care; if a system is usable enough, and 8 is despite what people pretend, I'm basically fine with it -- but what I've seen of 9 does look a lot less irritating than the irritating bits of 8. I'm never going to go for a online-only OS, and if that's what MS are aiming at then since I'm also increasingly unhappy with where OSX is and where it's going it looks like it'll be Linux or one of the BSDs on my Macbook and my desktop.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:06PM
unfortunately microsoft still rules oem
windows 8 is on our newer alienware (dell) boxes at work, and i'm close to the head of the queue for another
it's different (in ridiculous ways) but you do sort of get used to it
i have a linux box next to my windows (with synergy kvm), so when the windows box is 'upgraded' it will give me an excuse to develop more stuff for the linux box (lazarus instead of delphi), with only the microsoft access and autodesk shit in windows.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Hairyfeet on Monday August 04 2014, @12:29AM
Well I deal mainly with SOHO/SMBs and home users and they all HATE Windows 8 here by a pretty huge margin. And while all I have is anecdotes I believe there is a serious flaw in Windows 8 because while i have numerous Win 7 systems that have been in the field since RTM the thing that usually starts a Win 8 customer coming to me and eventually switching to Win 7 is the "refresh my PC" problem, where Win 8 begins to shit on itself and requires a refresh...and then another, and another...pretty soon they are sick of the refreshes and want to know what I can do to stop it and the only thing I can tell them is to go back to Win 7. I haven't been able to track down the exact cause but if I had to guess i think its metro, the way that its bolted on (probably with a nice side of appstore DRM shit) seems to cause corruption of the system files. maybe its Metro permissions fighting with the underlying OS permissions, damned if i know but I've seen enough of this in the shop to know its not a one time or one OEM thing.
And OT but if any of the SN mods read this they might want to look at the history of my posts as I think my little stalker has figured out how to game the SN mod system since every post I make is being modbombed into negative turf and he is grabbing enough points to be able to modbomb multiple posts at the same time. You might want to check and see if its all coming from the same IP (which I'm sure it is) and then see how many accounts are being accessed by that IP, because if he follows his usual pattern he's registering a whole shitpile of accounts to game the system.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Monday August 04 2014, @04:38AM
I'm going to be 60 in a few months. Age is no reason to stop being vocal about your beliefs. I'm anti-Microsoft, anti-Intel, and anti-Progressive, among other things. While I don't spend all my waking hours campaigning for or against the things I love or hate, I do remain "active".
Without people protesting, those "Metro" desktops would be the norm by now. Microsoft, Canonical, Gnome, and others have pushed that crap at us, and we are simply refusing it. I'm proud of my little, bitty, teeny tiny effort that has helped to push Metro out of the market. I have talked three people out of Windows 8, and have had some influence on others who were considering it.
30 something? Don't be lazy, dude, stand up and be counted!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:32PM
According to TFA, 8.1 was up 0.35% and 8.x in aggregate was down 0.1%.
That's 1/1000th of the market. It is statistically meaningless and the latest edition is up over 3x more than the total is down.
It isn't just making mountains out of molehills, it's making mountains out of drifting sands.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by sjames on Sunday August 03 2014, @11:13PM
You're looking at it funny. 8.x in aggregate is down even counting 8.1. That means there are still more people 'downgrading' then there are adopting. It isn't a big movement at all, statistically we could probably call it flat.
However, flat is really bad all things considered. Especially in the midst of a big push to drop XP (which people are clinging to even though it is EOL).
Even if MS made the big announcement and the world yawned, their figures would look better than this. The figures show active avoidance.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by FlatPepsi on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:34PM
The 2 more interesting stats I saw:
Linux is still hovering around 1.5%
XP is still around 25%
This ain't the year of Linux, and it won't be any time soon. If it exploded by 10 times overnight, it would still be a minor niche player.
XP will go away when the hardware it's on dies - and not a moment before. Even them - I see a lot of folks working to keep XP if at all possible.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:46PM
If Linux came pre-installed on every computer in every computer shop, linux would have a bigger market share.... Microsoft does everything legal and illegal to make sure that doesn't happen.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Informative) by frojack on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:34PM
I've actually bought computers with Linux Pre-installed. Dell Still offers them [dell.com]. It came with LTS Ubuntu, and the still come that way. (It took me no time at all to Nuke Ubuntu and install a proper linux distro.) Wife still runs Ubuntu on her Dell. (They are absurdly expensive). Far cheaper to pay the Microsoft tax and nuke it to linux).
But you're right, they don't push them, and their best window of opportunity to do so is RIGHT NOW with the demise of XP and the detest for Windows 8.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @09:56PM
If it's "far cheaper to pay the Microsoft tax", how the fucking HELL is it a tax?
It's fine to dislike Microsoft -- hell, anyone with half a fucking brain cell does -- but seriously, this is just bullshit.
Fuck you and fuck Soylent, I'm gone.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Horse With Stripes on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:25PM
It's interpreted as a tax because it's almost impossible to buy a computer without having to pay for Windows (whether you want it or not).
(Score: 1) by jelizondo on Monday August 04 2014, @03:05AM
It's worse! I bought a laptop, came with Win8, I had to pay to get a Win7 license.
And don't tell me I can use Linux because I can't; my current line of work demands I have Windows in my machine. (I work for some government agencies that are sooo sold to Microsoft, I expect Ballmer or Gates to be named president shortly.)
I hate having to fork money for a halfway-decent OS because what came with the machine is a POS.
Someone said that the Microsoft tax was the time we spent dealing with problems with Windows, well, that is no longer true. Now we spend time and money!
(Score: 3, Informative) by Leebert on Monday August 04 2014, @03:37AM
Are you sure?:
http://www.microsoft.com/oem/en/licensing/sblicensing/pages/downgrade_rights.aspx [microsoft.com]
(Score: 2) by ragequit on Monday August 04 2014, @05:28PM
Notice that downgrade rights only come with 8 PRO. Any other level of Win8 is not eligible
The above views are fabricated for your reading pleasure.
(Score: 2) by Leebert on Monday August 04 2014, @05:41PM
That's why I didn't say "You're wrong". I asked "are you sure?" :)
(Score: 1) by lonestar on Monday August 04 2014, @02:56AM
Oh NOEZ plz comeback LOL.
And just like that, he was gone from our lives. What a loss, gentlemen. How will we remember this particular Anonymous Coward era?
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday August 04 2014, @11:16AM
I propose that, in the future, we all contribute a share of our Microsoft tax to some worthy charity in the Name of the Anonymous Coward Who Could Not Stand To Hear Microsoft Slighted. Or we could just buy him a nice Linux distribution! Or FreeBSD!
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Horse With Stripes on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:23PM
In early 2013 I picked up a Dell Vostro 1520 with Ubuntu 12.04 LTS for just under $540 (including tax & shipping). It's not a sleek laptop, though its sturdiness was a selling point to me (I use it to code & test sites while traveling). The 15.6" screen is much better for my old eyes than one of the 11" - 14" offerings out there.
For the money, and my needs, this laptop was the right one for me. I'm not a big fan of the GUI (whatever it's called) but I'm in a code editor, browser or command line all the time so the rest of it really doesn't matter for my needs. There are much light, sleeker, faster machines available ... but sometimes 'just right' is just right.
(Score: 2) by DECbot on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:41PM
I have a Dell Mini 9 that I bought with Ubuntu installed (in my case it was a Dell version of 8.10--there was no clear upgrade path when support ended for 8.10). Yeah, the default Unity interface blows. A quick sudo apt-get install xfce4 fixed all my complaints about the interface without having to choose a Gnome2 fork.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 1) by Horse With Stripes on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:44PM
I wonder if that would still work on 12.04? I have a 12.04 desktop VM that I can clone & test it out on (man do I punish those VMs).
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @09:53PM
God bless SoylentNews. When it began there was the hope that it might be, well, less shit than Slashdot. GP being modded "Flamebait" for pointing out that Linux has a twentieth of the support of XP, and parent being modded "Insightful" for tediously harping on the same crap that would get him sued (and very rapidly found guilty of making defamatory comments) were he of any import whatsoever, rather demonstrates this is not the case.
It's just a fucking operating system, children. Microsoft simply built a system that they marketed more successfully, even despite its many obvious flaws, in the late 80s and early 90s -- a time that, frankly, I think few of you remember -- and which they exploited both through abuse of monopoly and through aggressive buyouts of competitors in exactly the same way that every other massively successful corporation always has, which includes Apple and, if Linux ever became genuinely powerful economically (and given that its major proponents are Red Hat and Oracle, both corporations beholden to their shareholders in the same way as Apple and MS), Linux. It makes your computer boot and it means you can do some work. These stupid inflammatory religious posts on the internet just make you, and the websites that you're reducing to the level of a diarrhoetic shitting contest, look breathtakingly facile.
(Score: 1) by Horse With Stripes on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:15PM
Yes, and no. It's nothing to get into platform wars about, that's for sure. But it's a very personal preference that many have strong feelings about. Plus with the business practices of <insert company name here>, or the statements made by <insert person's name here> it only fuels the fires.
I understand the contempt and disgust many feel about <insert platform or OS version name here>, though I don't necessarily share it. I work 12 - 16 hours a day, 7 days a week. 90% of the time it's in front of a computer (as a computer generalist it's what I do) so the type of computer, OS, etc makes a big difference to me. I usually end up in front of all three platforms every day, and often multiple versions/flavors of one or more of the OSes. I absolutely have preferences, though not strong enough to rant on about the other(s) or to engage in flame wars.
So it's not "just a fucking operating system". For many it's something they look at and interact with more than anything else in their lives.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04 2014, @01:26AM
So, its like a religion then. Even worse. "Strong feelings" are not a valid reason for abusing moderator responsibilities or starting flame wars.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04 2014, @02:00AM
I have strong feelings about enchiladas. Enchiladas are not a religion. "Strong Feelings" are not a valid reason for jumping to conclusions or acting like a self righteous dick.
If you can't talk about some subjects without testing positive for douchieness then hit the pine and let the rest of us adults get on with our civilized discussions.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday August 04 2014, @11:18AM
Hmm, marketing, criminal marketing. It's not about the operating system, my dear little young fellow, it's about the Benjamins!
(Score: 2) by Tork on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:32PM
Haha. Dreamer.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04 2014, @12:29AM
The USA Gov't is threatening sanctions on Russia.
That will swing the door wide open for Linux there.
The Russian Gov't is already developing its own CPU with an eye on excluding American tech from official circles.
The Chinese Gov't already excluded purchases of M$ OSes for gov't machines.
There and in Russia, the snoopy/backdoored nature of American technology is well known.
The trickle-down effect into the consumer market in both those places will be interesting to watch.
Chromebooks are doing very well in the marketplace; schools love them.
The texture of the market gets more diverse with each passing month.
Besides (now widely debunked) propaganda, the only leverage M$ ever had was bulk pricing.
The smartphone market [patentlyapple.com] shows that actually competing (against $0 software, no less) is a game M$ doesn't know how to play.
Now, add in the fact that the traditional desktop is becoming a relic, as noted in the posts directly below. [soylentnews.org].
With the widespread hatred of W8, white box builders have a better bargaining position now than in previous decades.
Now, "on every computer"--yeah, there are e.g. still a tiny number of people buying devices with WindozePhone.
There will always be tech illiterates.
Now ask folks if they're tired of blue screens, reboots, drive-by infections, and the other stuff typical of MICROS~1 products.
Now -specifically- tell them they can eliminate that.
Watch them light up and ask how they can do that.
The word is getting out: You don't need M$'s dreck to do computing.
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by Tork on Monday August 04 2014, @02:00AM
Variants of this meme have been going on for at least ten years. There's always some big reason Linux is somehow going to gain market-share and they never play out. Why? For the reason Linux Zealots just cannot possibly fathom: People prefer Windows. Sorry. I know that's just bizarre and weird to you, but it is the reason.
"Now ask folks if they're tired of blue screens, reboots, drive-by infections, and the other stuff typical of MICROS~1 products..."
They'll say: "What are you talking about?" and then ask you if you know what year it is. Maybe your lack of understanding on the topic is what's hindering your efforts to convert the unfaithful.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday August 04 2014, @04:48AM
I know what year it is - and my wife is fussing over some piece of crap on her Win7 computer right now. Some browser hijacking piece of crap, which redirects her searches. I've taken a quick look at it, and accepted McAfee's word that it had found the problem, and quarantined the suspect files. Two days later, it was back, and she's bitching about it. She has spent a week digging for it - I suppose I'll have to look at it again soon.
I simply don't have that kind of thing happen on my boxes. The worst thing that has ever happened to my Linux machines are javascript exploits - been Rickrolled lately?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04 2014, @05:07AM
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday August 04 2014, @03:39PM
You remind me of another fellow I met at a hackathon last year. Microsoft fan all the way. He had every development suite, every license, every cloud-based platform. He spent many thousands of dollars more to acquire what I had on open source for free, which is fine. He had the money to burn and didn't mind. It made him feel like he had legit software that was "business class." He was quite fast working on it, too. At least on defined tasks. But when the team ran into unexpected wrinkles, which always arise, that his software couldn't handle or that he couldn't manage because his permissions were insufficient, he froze. He tried to drop a third of our project functionality to accommodate his MS tools. We Linux guys, however, simply modified everything server-side and client-side we needed to because we could.
For me, that's the essence of Linux--you can do whatever you want, with whatever you like. No external constraints, no hidden profit motives. No BS.
That's not everyone's cup of tea. Many people find Apple or MS supply tools that help them do the job they need to do. Sure, there are occasional virii or other hassles that they have to deal with, but they shrug them off, the way that Linux users have to work through or shrug off occasional issues with their platform of choice. It's largely a matter of taste and what you're used to.
In the end, though, it seems to me that if you want to be a technologist with no limits, with nobody external dictating what you can or can't do with your computer, then it has to be Linux (or other flavor of open source) every time.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Monday August 04 2014, @03:58PM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 2) by emg on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:47PM
"This ain't the year of Linux, and it won't be any time soon. If it exploded by 10 times overnight, it would still be a minor niche player."
Linux owns the mobile market.
Linux owns the embedded market.
Linux owns the server market. At least real servers, not some Pentium-4 running Outlook.
The only place Linux doesn't own is the desktop.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Nth_man on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:30PM
"We keep hearing how GNU/Linux is a niche system, but the analyst that takes as parameter the desktop installations to measure its success, or he is completely blind, or is a clumsy manipulator: desktops and laptops are a tiny subset of all the devices that can keep a running operating system inside. Not counting appliances, routers, switches, servers, remote controls, clusters, GPS, supercomputers, and finally, the largest group of all, the mobile phones, is ignoring more than ninety percent of the market."
-- Paul C. Brown. Editor of Linux Magazine Spain. September 2009.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Tuesday August 05 2014, @04:02AM
The only place Linux doesn't own is the desktop.
The desktop is slowly dying. Sure, it will hang on for a while on the high end of things, and for legacy software. Desktop applications are 1000 times as complex and powerful as your generic "app" for a tablet. However the move away from desktops is perceptible - and MS, with their vision of Win9, is also fueling that. Many futurists predicted outsourced CPU cycles and outsourced storage. We have some of that in form of AWS and "cloud". It's not integrated well, and it has massive issues - such as the bandwidth from that remote CPU to your local GPU. But quite a few applications will be usable even in this configuration.
So Linux may never win on the desktop; but it has a chance to outlive the desktop and run whatever replaces the desktop.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:49PM
If only they counted phones and tablets those numbers would be hugely different.
Linux hasn't won the desktop, but it has won personal computing.
Too bad it got tivoized in the process.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:01PM
Well, what are people meaning by "Linux"? If they're meaning nothing more than a kernel then Linux basically has become a major player -- indeed, probably the major player -- including in the mobile market (though classifying Android as "Linux" even on the strength of the kernel is something of an oversimplification). If, however, you mean what people actually *mean* when they talk about "the year of Linux", then it's failed catastrophically, because that does not mean that a device has a Linux kernel on it lurking behind proprietry firmware and userland. It's been used, for more than a decade now, as a shorthand for a FLOSS operating system. In those terms, Linux is a major player in servers, is hopelessly beaten in mobile -- name me a genuinely FLOSS phone or tablet OS and I'll laugh you out of town because it will be used by about 50 people, and that's being generous; Chromebook OS does not count as genuinely FLOSS given that Google have locked it down like fury and to make your Chromebook less shit you have to trash it and put on something useful -- and is barely a player on desktop.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Tuesday August 05 2014, @01:05PM
Remember, Linux is the kernel, GNU/Linux is the free operating system. Otherwise compare Android vs RedHat vs Ubuntu etc.
For end-user / consumer systems, GNU/Linux has failed in terms of market share. Linux has not - it is perfectly possible to build successful consumer system on Linux as Android shows, and also perfectly possible to build a successful _desktop_ consumer system on top of a Unix-style kernel - as OS X shows.
But also remember that GNU is lead by RMS and his goal is in terms of copyright ideology - not market share or technical excellence or usability or performance or "something that actually works" or deliverability in any reasonable timescale, all those other goals are not just subservient but sacrificable. If there is a GPLed phone or tablet OS that exists and has 50 users worldwide, then RMS would probably consider that a success. Once you understand that, it becomes clear why GNU/Linux is not successful in consumer space, but Linux is.
(Score: 2) by Magic Oddball on Monday August 04 2014, @03:14AM
Odd. There's far more everyday 'end-user' people using it at least part time than when I first installed it 6 years ago, quite a few school districts & governments have switched over... Hardware manufacturers (Linksys, Logitech etc.) feel there's enough users now to bother labeling their products with Tux when appropriate, and a growing number of game publishers/producers likewise feel it's now worth their time to include it as a platform.
Yet despite all of those changes, the percentage of users has barely changed, if at all. I can't be the only person having a hard time trusting results like that.
(Score: 2) by gman003 on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:35PM
I run 8.1 on my desktop. With the addition of Classic Shell Start Menu, it is a better OS than Windows 7. However, it is not enough of an improvement for me to be assed to buy a copy for my laptop, which remains on W7.
I had a similar situation earlier - W7 was an improvement, but not enough for me to upgrade my previous laptop from Vista.
Part of it is that the main improvements are to hardware support. Vista did not support TRIM (AFAIK), which is essential for good SSD operation. But computers that came with Vista almost never had SSDs, so it was fine. Windows 8 added native support for USB 3.0, which I don't have a use for yet (got a free adapter card and my monitor's built-in hub is 3.0, but I don't have a single thing to plug in yet). 8.1 added NVMe support, which has only just made it to consumer hardware.
Basically, to me, Windows isn't something you upgrade. It's something where you buy the latest when you build a new computer, and leave it that way until it dies or gets old enough to slap Linux onto it. Maybe I'm unusual in that regard, but it works just fine for me.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Sunday August 03 2014, @07:44PM
Really? Because I couldn't get rid of Vista fast enough. There was a tremendous speed improvement on the same hardware after a fresh install of Win7.
I actually think Win7 was the single best OS Microsoft ever released. (Which isn't saying all that much).
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Informative) by cafebabe on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:46PM
They've got a good scam going here. People expect alternate releases of Windows to suck to the extent that Microsoft claims wider distribution due to licence downgrades. However, it appears that Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 all use the NT 6.x kernel [wikipedia.org]. I understand that Vista and Windows 7 are developed from the same code repository. I presume this has been extended to Windows 8.x. In which case we have the following:-
1702845791×2
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04 2014, @08:57PM
The problem is that Windows 8.1 was just a patch. By your reckoning, Windows 9 is going to suck..., and I sure hope that isn't the case.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Tuesday August 05 2014, @12:48AM
There's an easy way to tell if Windows 9 will suck. If the release gets delayed, it'll suck. But don't worry because Windows 9.1 will be out within a year!
1702845791×2
(Score: 1) by corey on Sunday August 03 2014, @10:58PM
Yesterday I finally killed off my Win 7 partition. It'd been dying for a while, after months of services mysteriously not starting due to permissions. It came to a head when the dhcp service decided never to start again and I spent hours looking up how to fix permissions from advice on endless numbers of websites with people complaining of the same problem (eg. http://windowssecrets.com/forums/showthread.php/156457-How-to-fix-quot-Error-5-Access-is-denied-quot [windowssecrets.com]). Then the Ethernet driver failed. Managed to get that working again but using static IP.
The other day - now I normally use Debian on a day to day basis but I wanted to boot Win to use AutoCAD - Windows bluescreened upon boot. Its a legit paid for copy - an upgrade of Vista I bought years ago - and so I tried to fix using the DVD. It said the reg was corrupted and fixed it. That busted windows entirely and it never booted again.
The tipping point came when I decided to format the partition and go with a clean reinstall. Went fine, until it came to activation. Wouldn't activate, must call MS. Same hardware it previously was activated on. So that's it. I'm done at home. I'll go Debian all the way now. From CAD work to photo RAW editing, to gaming. Its been solid as a rock.
As for Win 8, its been designed clearly for touch screen mobile devices, so it's not going on my desktop.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Hairyfeet on Monday August 04 2014, @02:06AM
Weeellll...to be totally fair there HAVE been releases where I have said to customers "yes this IS worth upgrading for". Examples include replacing Win9X/ME for Win2K. That was a no brainer as Win2K was MUCH more stable and better at handling memory than the mess that was 9X. Also replacing Win2K with XP X64 (which was IRL 2K3 Workstation) was also a no brainer as even if you didn't have 4+GB of RAM the bigger register made math heavy tasks like A/V work go faster. The last "its worth it" for me and my customers was XP X64/Vista for Win 7. Many can spread the bs and say that Vista and 7 are the same but that is like saying a 74 Fury II and a Porsche 911 are the same as they both have 4 tires. Win 7 had MUCH MUCH better memory management, IMHO the UI was a lot better (when I have to work on an older system without jumplists and breadcrumbs its like going back to Win98, its soo much faster to navigate in Win 7!), the caching algo works a lot better in Win 7, Readyboost is actually useful in Win 7, I could go on all day listing the positives...
With Windows 8 its just the opposite, it really tries to shoehorn you into what I call "tweeting for twits and the social shits" and before anybody screams "innovation!" I would point out replacing the steering wheel of your car with a trackball would be "innovative", that don't make it a good idea or an improvement over what you had. I'll get hate for the Win 8 fans for pointing this out and if you like Win 8? I'm glad, i'm happy somebody was able to find some joy from it but do you know what it reminds me of the most?....WinCE. Anybody remember WinCE and how MSFT thought it would take over PDAs and phones by putting itty bitty teeny weeny little desktops onto those tiny screens? Well Win 8 to me feels like somebody looked at WinCE and said "well it didn't work putting tiny desktops onto smartphones...hey I know, we'll turn desktops into supergigantic smartphones [youtube.com] and we'll take about nothing but apps and make all the apps one at a time and have an appstore, it'll be great!".../facepalm.
If there are any Windows devs here? Hi, I'm your friendly neighborhood VAR and I'd like to point out something...see Google and Apple over there? yeah notice how they have TWO Oses, one for the desktop and one for the phone? That is because what works on a 4 inch screen in a memory and CPU cycle starved environment is NOT I repeat NOT gonna be the same as what works on some 17 inch quad core laptop...okay? You couldn't get us to buy WinCE devices by making them look like micro XP systems and you aren't gonna get us to buy WinPhone by making desktops into really large smartphones, is that really so hard to understand?
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Monday August 04 2014, @04:06PM
Not a Windows dev, but I do know that Windows has three (not two) consumer OSes (excluding server stuff). Windows Phone, Windows RT and Windows.
The problem is not that they used the same OS, they didn't, it is that they have tried to do a consistent interface across OSes, and sometimes when using it that feels right and sometimes it doesn't.
So, Ok, lets say they should have different interfaces for different device types - now where is the cutoff and what is it based on, screen size, screen res, memory, CPU power ?
We have phones in this house that have more memory and CPU grunt than my (still running XP) oldest desktop, and higher screen res.
We have tablets in this house that run full Windows and desktop Office _faster_ than some of the laptops.
That is just in one household.
In your neatly divided world, what exactly is the right OS / user interface for, say, a Dell Venue 8 Pro, or an Asus TF100 ?
When does a tablet become a laptop and visa-versa ? [clicks keyboard in - oh, I guess my tablet just became a laptop, should the whole OS / UI now change ? ]
(Score: 1, Troll) by Hairyfeet on Monday August 04 2014, @05:56PM
"clicks keyboard in - oh, I guess my tablet just became a laptop, should the whole OS / UI now change ?"...That is easy...YES!! Because the input method (approximate location touch versus direction and speed only trackpad) are COMPLETELY DIFFERENT and thus a different UI is required. This is why swipe on Win 8 is so broken, because when you swipe on a tablet it knows you are doing a swipe because otherwise you merely touch the icon for what you want and it launches...simple. With a trackpad when you move the cursor (which doesn't exist on a tablet) from left to right you COULD be trying to swipe OR you could simply be trying to move to the next screen. The OS has no way to tell because all it is getting from a trackpad is direction and speed NOT location.
Watch this short video [youtube.com] that explains just some of the problems of having two UIs bolted together and why touchscreen and trackpad (about two thirds in) are so different that trying to use the same UI just doesn't work. Now if you want to give the user the OPTION of keeping metro when they plug in a keyboard? That is fine, choices are good. Its when you try to force a touch UI (which just FYI but even in 2014 less than 5% of the PCs sold have touch capability because of the high cost of touchscreens in large sizes) onto a non touch unit that mega fail occurs.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by urza9814 on Wednesday August 06 2014, @09:00PM
We've basically got three OSes, each with a totally different business model.
Apple makes an OS, slaps it on a device, and sells that device. So when the lines start blurring, Apple just makes an arbitrary decision on what devices use what interface. If something isn't selling well, they'll change it.
Linux makes an OS and sells the OS directly. So they generally made everything capable of doing everything and let the users configure whatever weird setup they want.
Microsoft makes an OS and sells it to system builders who then sell the completed device. Microsoft apparently just decided to say fuck it and make everything behave as a mobile device, and the system builders are the ones getting screwed as a result. What I'd say they should have done was have some configuration options so that you could set which interface to use by default. Windows 8 already has both, just decouple the default apps or something so if you're in desktop mode it won't keep forcing you back to the interface formerly known as Metro. Then they could have let OEMs make their own decisions about what kind of device they're selling. Designing a desktop PC? Configure Windows in desktop mode. Selling a tablet? Configure it in mobile mode. Selling a hybrid device? Configure it to both modes, and just like Windows will let you configure events like 'hibernate on lid close' they could have 'switch to desktop on keyboard attached'.
Microsoft doesn't know where the line is because they aren't building the systems. So they should empower the people building the systems to make that decision, rather than pretending there's no line at all. Because I think we can all agree that a phone and a desktop PC are totally different devices that need totally different interfaces. Nobody but Microsoft would seriously think that line doesn't exist -- the problem is merely that some devices now straddle it. If Microsoft can't control what type of device Windows is being installed on, then they shouldn't try to control what kind of interface it will have.
(Score: 1) by Squidious on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:06PM
At my company we have one desktop running Win 8 and two servers running Win Server 2012 which also has Metro (oh why why why???). I avoid Metro like the plague, keeping Windows desktops under my jurisdiction running 7 and those servers that require Windows running 2008. The users of the Win 8 box immediately begged for (and received) Classic Shell so that it very much resembles Win 7. That is, unless one accidentally let the mouse pointer wander into a corner at which point the Metro ugliness pops over.
The terrorists have won, game, set, match. They've scared the people into electing authoritarian regimes.
(Score: 2) by SuperCharlie on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:11PM
My wife got an Asus Transformer with Win 8.0 on it. (Which has its own hardware issues).. I had a Skype interview and since I really didnt want to install Skype on my Linux laptop and she was out for the day I decided to use her machine to Skype with.
I started setting it up a couple hours before the interview to make sure it all went well.
When I logged in as her, it wouldnt let me (at least not easily) change to my Skype profile without creating my own account on her tablet. No biggie I thought.. so new account.. and then .. Holy Crap how much info and cloud accounts you are REQUIRED to set up before you can hit the OS.. I felt violated and naked by the time I finally got to log in to my account and use Skype. My biggest takeaway was how intrusive the new account creation was and left me wondering if the OS even worked at all without Internet. I finished about 20-30 mins before my interview, it worked, but I was glad I hadnt installed Skype on my machine. No to Win 8.x. Just No.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:16PM
"left me wondering if the OS even worked at all without Internet."
I have not had the misfortune of using 8. Could it be an anti-piracy initiative?
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:56PM
Actually, Skype on Linux isn't that bad. I suspect your problem was with setting up a Win8 account, or maybe the Win8 version of Skype, rather than Skype itself.
The biggest problem I had running Skype on Fedora 20 (64-bit) was dealing with Pulse Audio and multiple input/output devices. Pulse Audio was about 90% of the reason I'm running Win7 rather than Linux.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Monday August 04 2014, @03:37AM
You're just lucky you didn't have to install any Windows updates. You probably wouldn't have made it in time for your interview.
(Score: 3, Informative) by choose another one on Monday August 04 2014, @03:24PM
You can easily create local (non-MS) accounts on Win 8.x - you just need to know how, and that doesn't take more than 5s on google (uh, sorry, Bing).
Once you've done that any other cloud stuff like Skype will stay disconnected from the OS account just like in the good old days. I can see why people like it connected though - being able to pick up any (windows) device in the house and login with your account and have your stuff and your cloud services instantly available actually _is_ useful. It isn't actually that much different from iTunes / Apple or Android or Kindle/Amazon accounts, except that you actually can have properly multi-user devices (latest Android apparently also does that, but haven't tried it). Having proper multi-user devices at tablet form factor is a big Windows advantage that doesn't come up much - maybe most people buy the Apple/Amazon/Android marketing that tablets are always a personal one-user-only device.
Me, I still like my local accounts, I would run my own domain controller in the house and have pro versions on all the devices, giving me the same connected if there was a cheap way to do that - but that is because I am an old fashioned cloud-phobic control freak, I know my views are at odds with the majority of today's users there. I don't like that MS hide the local account options and/or mark them as not recommended, but that is all they did really. The OS does actually still work without internet, but online activation won't work at install time, and, er, things like Skype won't work without it either...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:26PM
Out of the box I hated Windows 8.1. However, with ClassicShell and disabling "hot corners" I like it a lot. I NEVER see the metro interface plus I get the under the hood improvements. I wouldnt want to go back to Windows 7 now.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Snotnose on Monday August 04 2014, @12:31AM
Came here to say this. Got the laptop last November, after months of tweaks I haven't seen Metro rear it's ugly head in 2-3 months now. Whenever something triggers Metro I figure out what did it, and how to fix it.
Nothing wrong with Win 8.1, nothing right with Metro.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:50PM
...but my Windows 8.0 laptop can't successfully install the updates necessary to upgrade.
The laptop came with 8.0, and after playing with that for a day, I made a disk image backup, zapped the disk and installed Windows 7.
I recently decided it was time to give 8.1 a chance, so I restored the original disk image, verified that it worked, and tried up install 8.1. The install program said I had to get the updates up do date before it would install. So, I tried installing the 110 (> 1GB) updates. The install took all day but finally appeared to work, then the laptop rebooted, and it informed me that the updates failed, and spent another day rolling back.
I did some research online, and tried several different suggestions for getting the updates to install correctly, but none of them worked. I ended up wasting several days trying to get to the point where I could *begin* installing 8.1. I finally put back Windows 7.
Time for a MacBook!
(Score: 2) by quacking duck on Monday August 04 2014, @04:38PM
A friend went through this failed update process too, except he didn't waste more than several hours of failed attempts to install the updates to Win8 that the computer insisted it had found or perhaps already downloaded. This friend is a computer systems engineer, he knows computers and knows how to use Google effectively, and even he couldn't figure out how to work what should be one of the simplest, fundamental functions of a modern operating system (applying updates to itself) in a reasonable time. He returned it post-haste to the big box store and bought a Macbook Pro for only $100 more, which he fully updated and configured within an hour of getting it home.
Except for the fact you don't already have a Macbook, I might've guessed you and my friend were one and the same!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by PizzaRollPlinkett on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:53PM
Yes, I have a Windows 8.1 workstation that I built for software development. If you have any questions, just ask.
I was surprised that I could build this box for less than the cost of an Asus PC with the same specs. I thought the Windows 8 Pro (back then 8.1 wasn't out) license would make it cost more, but it didn't. I definitely wanted to build my own box so I could use best-of-breed parts and not get stuck with OEM off-brand parts. Man, for a week or two, I was strutting around talking about my new Haswell box - now there's some replacement to Haswell in the works, so I have old tech again. Bummer.
I run any and all versions of Visual Studio on it (2008, 10, 12, 13, etc), use it for IE testing, and run random things like SQL Server Studio. I have people who like Windows-based screen sharing programs, and certainly don't want to share my main desktop with them, so use this computer which isn't running anything important.
Like I said in another post, I use PowerDesk Pro from Avanquest. I could not use any version of Windows without it. I basically ignore the Metro interface and use this box for software development.
I have a lot of problems with Windows 8, but I never learned my way around Windows 7 either so it's not too bad. Any OS has quirks you have to learn, but I haven't learned the "right way" that Win7 did things, so it doesn't make much difference to me. They're all confusing. I hate trying to get a Windows box to use a CUPS network printer. What a mess!
One thing I really hate is how things don't work in Windows 8. I had to activate my OEM copy of Win8 Pro, and it would not work. I looked around Google and found out that the Metro activation was broken, and you had to jump through hoops in the old desktop interface instead. Things like that are crazy...
... but I use Fedora as my main desktop operating system, so I'm used to crazy. I just ran out of swap space with gigabytes of free main memory and had to add more swap files. I didn't think modern Linux even used swap if main memory was available. So Windows isn't more insane than Fedora.
Some stuff, like running VS and IE, you just can't do in Linux. At least not in any sane way that isn't worth $800 to build a box to save the time and hassle. I know you can fiddle around with WINE and that stuff, but who has time?
I have several versions of Windows Server and SQL Server running in VirtualBox virtual machines on Linux, strangely enough, from a past life's MSDN subscription. (Wasn't mine, but they never used the server licenses for anything, so I helped myself.) I connect to these from the Windows desktop when I have to use the EF designer in VS. Believe it or not, it's fairly fast. I was surprised.
I use Win8 occasionally. I haven't used it all summer because I've been doing something else, but used it daily earlier in the year when I was testing a web interface with IE. When I turn that box on, it pulls gigabytes of updates.
(E-mail me if you want a pizza roll!)
(Score: 1) by steveg on Monday August 04 2014, @12:12AM
Buying a computer with Windows is always cheaper than buying the same machine without Windows. Yes, you still pay for that copy of Windows, but all the vendors of the crapware that the OEM installs are also *paying* extra to get that crap installed. Essentially they are subsidizing your copy of Windows and a bit more than that.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday August 04 2014, @11:27AM
It would be interesting to see actual numbers on this. Would make paying the Microsoft Tax less painful (even though moral objections would remain) if it was actually costing the OEMs money, and by extension their partners in crime, Microsoft. But the prices of computers without operating systems or with Linux pre-installed do not seem to be in line with the retail price the Microsoft operating system. No one knows, or no one can say, how much the OEMs pay for a license!
(Score: 2) by PizzaRollPlinkett on Monday August 04 2014, @12:48PM
I built my box many months ago, and don't remember the exact numbers. I wish I did. I picked out an Asus desktop PC because it was cheap and I have an Asus laptop I like. The Asus desktop was about $900. The same specs were over $1000 with Dell and HP. (HP surprised me by being the highest of all, since they're known for cheap PCs.) The Asus PC was out of stock everywhere because Haswell had just come out.
So I went over to Newegg and made a shopping cart of the parts I'd need to build the PC I wanted. I had to get an OEM copy of Windows 8 Pro. (Back then 8.1 didn't exist yet.) I also get best of breed parts like Gigabyte motherboards, and had to order a case because I didn't have any spares left. The specs I wanted cost about $800.
I was not expecting my build to be cheaper than an OEM, but the crapware and adware doesn't really reduce the cost of a PC.
All things being equal in my case. You can get a cheaper PC, of course, but I needed high-end specs to run things like Visual Studio. Running VS on my Asus laptop is ... painful.
(E-mail me if you want a pizza roll!)
(Score: 1) by acharax on Sunday August 03 2014, @08:54PM
I've never seen anyone run it first hand (neither have I bothered running it myself, suffice to say the descriptions were enough of a turn-off for me, especially things such as permanently enabled hardware acceleration for text rendering), but I've seen plenty of screenshots posted by people complaining that a variety of programs they use don't work correctly with it. I'm rather indifferent to the OS as a result, lending to the fact I had no direct contact with it no doubt, what I am not indifferent to is the wayward design philosophy that led to its conception.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by opinionated_science on Sunday August 03 2014, @09:15PM
I have wiped every copy of windoze I have been forced to buy for the last 10 years.
The only M$ software I run is either using WINE (Crossover office, but not for M$ office, other one off tools that need WIN32) or VirtualBox, where the copy of WinXP never ages for tools that need to use the USB (looking at you Nokia).
If this seems extreme, it simply became too difficult to maintain a stable system, with the changes constantly foisted by M$ or what ever closed source software that caused secondary problems. Artificial restrictions for the purpose of wringing cash out of you.
In short, computing is simply too important a technology to be held to ransom. Companies have a vested interest in not innovating, once they obtain a monopoly, or accumulated software "entrenchment" keeps other companies dependent. FOSS is definitely part of the answer...
Perhaps the larger question is, are there better laws to prevent companies in any area becoming too large? e.g. Google? Microsoft? etc...
(Score: 2) by mendax on Sunday August 03 2014, @11:07PM
January of last year I bought an HP laptop at Costco. The screen was big, the features were right, and the price was good so I got it. To my chagrin it had Windows 8 on it. I tried to get HP to downgrade it to find out that they won't do it unless I pay a higher M$ tax to get the Windows Professional license. No thanks. So, in short, I put up with it and avoided using it when I could. But as I've gotten used to the new interface and the various other annoyances it creates I have recently come to notice that I like it... sort of.
You can get used to anything, or so I've read in the testimony of a concentration camp survivor. Well, as Windows OS's go, Windows 8 is not an Auschwitz or a Treblinka, it's more of a Dachau, an awful place but not a death camp.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 3, Funny) by cafebabe on Sunday August 03 2014, @11:29PM
Perhaps you should update your sig from:-
to:-
1702845791×2
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mendax on Sunday August 03 2014, @11:50PM
Well, Windows 8 is like my evil black cat. They are both things I have to put up with. However, I am much more fond of my cat than I am of Windows 8.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 2) by jackb_guppy on Sunday August 03 2014, @11:42PM
At work, used win8.1ent without extensions. Learned not to pick from list, press Window and start typing the name of what you want. 3 to 4 keystrokes and you are there. No mouse clicking. I also over see servers with 2012R2, 2012, 2008R2, 2008, ... 2012 machines are the hardest, because the window button is trapped on local machine and there is not "start" button, so you are swiping at the corners trying for the charm bar.
Also just move a laptop with win8home and GPT drives w/ touch screens and expensive software packet, to win8.1home, to win8.1pro, to win8.1ent, then to VM with "IDE". That was fun. Had create a VM with win8.1ent first, then save the main partition (sda5) on laptop and restore into main partition in VM (sda2). Clonezilla to the rescue!
Forced my wife to win8.1pro from XP, cold turkey. Upgraded hardware to a quad core, with 8GB of memory and a SSD also Office 2012. She hated initially, her best program SIDEKICK95 (yes, build for and run on win95) would not run on it, everything else did, even a Radio Shack USB scale with an only Win2000 driver. I still have copy of her old system in a VM, so I can fire it up if she needs it, but for almost year, NO. what I lost in the deal was my 24inch monitor, she took it and my daugther's 24 screen. Wife 32in 720P TV/monitor died. Only real adds on for functionally was 1TB internal drive to run backups to, BackBlaze to insure double backups, and IO-BIT Start8 menu. With the two screens one has an older Start Menu (she wanted) and other has 8.1 click to metro (I am use to now).
Daughter’s machine also went to Win8.1pro at the same time (was Win7 home). Had College access to OS and Office 2012. We run backup from her's to here mom's 1tb drive, then that data is also back-upped, by BackBlaze. Keeps those college papers nice and safe.
Part of that force was my wife wanted to get Win8 phones for her and daughter. They have them and they are happy. Me, use office iPhone.
Most rest of the machines in the house, Ubuntu 12.04 LTS... That on 5 machines: quad core, dual core, single core hyper-threading, and 2 atom netbooks w/ 10inch screens and 8GB SSD. Working this weekend to upgrade all to 14.04 LTS. I do have have a few special machines with IPCop (K6 & 486) and special Frankenstein with multi-boots to Gentoo/Puppy/FreeDos/WinME
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Monday August 04 2014, @02:33AM
On keyboards unable to generate the Left Amiga/Windows Button keycode, the standard key combination is control escape. Or, at least it was when I used Windows 98. I believe alt space still works too. Or at least it did when I discussed legacy cruft in Vista.
1702845791×2
(Score: 2) by drussell on Monday August 04 2014, @04:25AM
[ALT]-[SPACE] is the context menu, [CONTROL]-{SPACE] and [CONTROL]-[ESC] are start menu, IIRC...
(Score: 2) by Jaruzel on Monday August 04 2014, @02:26PM
Just tried it:
ALT + SPACE = current window 'positioning menu' Restore/Move/Min/Max/Close etc
CTRL + ESC = yes indeedy, the Start Screen.
Not that I have ANY use for the start screen on my Win 8.1 as I run this little baby at the top of my screen:
http://www.weegeeks.com/upload/ApplicationBar.jpg [weegeeks.com]
I only ever see metro/start screen if I accidentally hit the Windows key ...
-Jar
This is my opinion, there are many others, but this one is mine.
(Score: 2) by meisterister on Monday August 04 2014, @01:33AM
.. to Windows Vista, and I'm not looking back. For me, windows is a toy operating system for games, and the extra "improvements" in speed aren't even close to outweighing the fact that vista is FAR more usable out of the box.
(May or may not have been) Posted from my K6-2, Athlon XP, or Pentium I/II/III.
(Score: 1) by mrider on Monday August 04 2014, @03:28AM
...or has Microsoft discovered Soylent News?
Doctor: "Do you hear voices?"
Me: "Only when my bluetooth is charged."
(Score: 2) by mrider on Tuesday August 05 2014, @02:31PM
Considering the -1 mod, I guess the answer is "yes they have".
Doctor: "Do you hear voices?"
Me: "Only when my bluetooth is charged."
(Score: 2) by BradTheGeek on Monday August 04 2014, @03:55AM
I work in a shop that does residential repair and sales as well as small business IT and consulting. I am the repair shop manager. All we sell has 7 for our biz clients. I have a few 8/8.1 boxes around, and I work on plenty of busted residential boxes.
The core of 8 is fine. As is known the interface sucks. Classic Shell (free) fixes 99 percent of this. The rest is just making sure that default apps for commonly used file types are not metro apps. After that, most people cant tell that it is 8/8.1/
(Score: 2, Insightful) by tftp on Monday August 04 2014, @04:35AM
re there any Soylents here who are running Windows 8 or 8.1?
A large number of SN members are familiar with computers; sometimes they even work with them. It is logical to assume that a bunch of people here are aware of Win8 and use it from time to time. In my experience, a CEO had to travel and needed a new laptop. He bought one in a store. It came with Win8. He is not using it now. I am not aware personally of other cases of infestation. However the common man has no choice - all that he sees in stores is Win8. There are ways to get Win7, but that is a well kept secret. There are ways to assemble a desktop from components, and I do that - but a common man has no such option. Besides, you cannot assemble a laptop.
Generally speaking, Win8.x is not desired. People are conservative in their computer habits. It's not only something that barely computer-literate secretaries proclaim. It's also proclaimed by power users, who hate when their experience, skills and proficiency are nullified by a new toy OS that is made clearly to exploit the locked-in users. And most certainly Win8 is not appreciated by computer professionals, for all the great things that MS failed to do - such as ripping Metro/Modern out of the OS with red-hot pliers, throwing it onto a fire, and ritually dancing around until there is not a bit left.
Metro/Modern is getting some acceptance among novices who don't know anything about computers and can be fooled into believing that touch is the way to go; and it is getting the highest resistance among power users and administrators. Since the latter define the purchasing plan, there should be no surprise that Win8 is not flying off the shelves. I, personally, stopped purchasing prebuilt PCs for the business, as I consider it ill-advised to reward MS for what they have done. I have no touch monitors anywhere here, and none will be purchased. One person erroneously bought a personal computer with touch and Win7 some years ago. Pretty soon he came to me and asked how to disable touch. It appears that he hates when Windows does random things when he points at things on the screen with his finger, and later when he wipes the screen clean. There is absolutely no business case for using touch on desktops and regular size laptops, as the OS and applications are designed for a much finer pointer than a finger. Especially considering that the finger is not transparent.
(Score: 2) by Taibhsear on Monday August 04 2014, @02:54PM
I got a new ultrabook this winter and it came with win 8.1. I had to use it for a few months and it was torture the whole time. So many options that you need to use are hidden in ridiculous ways. The bios/uefi is usurped and hidden by the OS so you basically have to jailbreak the fucking device to do anything you normally would do in a couple mouse clicks in win 7. It was totally asinine. The second linux mint got hidpi support I nuked that abomination to the gods of technology from orbit and haven't looked back.