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Mary Jo Foley reports at ZDNet that according to sources who've had good track records on Windows information, Microsoft won't be delivering a new Start Menu for Windows 8 with its coming Windows 8.1 Update 2, after all. "Up until recently, Microsoft was hoping to make a new "Mini" Start Menu part of a second update to Windows 8.1," says Foley. "Windows 8.1 Update 2 was and still is, last I heard slated to arrive in August of this year." Microsoft's operating systems group has decided to hold off on delivering a Microsoft-developed Start Menu until Threshold, the next "major" release of Windows. Threshold, which may or may not ultimately be called Windows 9, is expected to be released in April 2015.
The original Windows 8 interface lacked the Start Menu, a familiar component of previous versions of the operating system, replacing it with the live tile-driven Start screen. Many users didn't like the change, and some PC manufacturers and developers offered ways to bring back versions of the old Start Menu. Microsoft appeared to relent at Build when it unveiled the revised Start Menu, enhanced with Windows Modern UI improvements.
(Score: 2) by Yog-Yogguth on Friday June 06 2014, @04:10PM
Try any, if you don't like it try another one. People like different things and all that. Better to have a second small computer & monitor or to use a virtual machine (you have plenty of cores so that should be no issue) than to do dual booting. I think VirtualBox [virtualbox.org] for a Windows host should do well for installing for example Linux Mint as a virtual client but since I don't really have any Windows I haven't tried it (but it really ought to work, it's precisely the kind of thing it's made for). It will also work the other way around (having Linux as the host and Windows as the virtual client) if you have real Windows installation media, but check closely before you do that and maybe get specific advice in relevant forums etc..
If you want a separate machine I'd choose a cheap laptop (possibly a 2nd hand one these days since I'm not at all interested in touchscreens) and Linux Mint. I would try to find information on the net about the laptop and any Linux experiences people have had before buying anything but if the laptop is a few years old (maybe as much as 4) then pretty much any issue ought to be resolved. One can splurge on all kinds of "certified" Linux-ready machines if one has the money but there's little need to.
If you can test the machine before buying then a USB thumbdrive is your friend (instructions [linuxmint.com] old page but still the valid one in this example). That's also an easy way to install. It will function as a LiveCD and won't install anything unless you tell it to but it also won't keep any changes, it's just a test run unless you install it or do other stuff. If everything works fine you're ready to buy and install straight away. Possible issues might be things such as the sound, WiFi, or card readers but these are examples of old issues and even newer issues like with some Intel on-board graphic chips have been solved for a while now. If there are any new issues (I don't currently know of any but I haven't bought a new machine recently) I'd say they are likely to be solved within a year at most (but there's no need to buy anything like that).
There might be people you know who use Linux or who don't mind you testing a USB thumbdrive on their machines as long as you don't install anything, you might even be able to try it at work or school or simply random shops. You might live in a place that has a Linux User Group (LUG) (use your favourite search engine for '"linux user group" + placename') or similar.
Bite harder Ouroboros, bite! tails.boum.org/ linux USB CD secure desktop IRC *crypt tor (not endorsements (XKeyScore))
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Saturday June 07 2014, @03:35PM
This is useful. Just grabbed Virtualbox. Thanks!
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek