Windows 8
 

After a full day of forcing myself to use it I have to say it's the most non-intuitive OS I have ever used. Let me back up a little and say I'm 48, have been it IT for 28 years, and am not into the "social media" craze; no twitter, no facebook, i don't game online, nada.
I upgraded an old tablet I had to see what all the Ballmerboys were talking about. I was cursing the entire day trying to figure out how to do thIngs, where to find things, and why I have to jump out to tiles to do desktop stuff only to be sent back there to actually do it.
Now I can see this as a phone OS; that makes sense and I'm sure the younger crowd will love it for that - but that's it for me, the PC OS is just stupid, unless on course if you want to do everything in Microsofts cloud. For me almost all the tiles on the man screen are useless because A. I don't have a Microsoft account and B. I don't want all my crap in the "cloud". So for me I can see one or two useful tiles.
As far as this OS in the Enterprise, there is no way.... No real admin would ever say this is a good OS for the enterprise unless it's locked down so much it would not be functional. There may be companies out there that let their employees do whatever they want on their computers, then this may work for them, but I have never heard of them.

I feel REAL sorry for older PC purchasers that are fed a line at the store and decide to go with this OS, they will be lost. I also feel sorry for us in IT that will eventually have to deal with this OS because MS is betting the bank on it, unless of course it turns into another Vista and they develop windows 7.5

My guess is this will finally push more people who were on he fence over to Macs, even a few enterprises.

Your opinion may vary...

Bob James

Interesting.

We just bought two new computers and put Win 7 Pro on them. We can "upgrade" to Win 8 for $20 but I was not going to jump on it.

It took me a couple of weeks to figure out how to configure Win 7 to fit our needs.

"non-intuitive OS" eh?

Microsoft's problem is that they don't educate the user beforehand, as Apple does. ...I mean, really, is lobster-claw zooming intuitive?

It's new. It's different. You may have to 'think differently' (where have I heard that before)

Anyway, "Metro" is pretty much just a giant "Start" button. ...with some fast info available to those who learn new things.

That said, I really don't like it all that much. It's too 'playschool' ... just like the ipad. But in Windows case, it mixes a playschool overlay on serious functionality. (weird)

Don't want to hijack but...

Bob, my rarely used home computer (basically a simple word processor, photo editor, email checker) is a vista machine... I'm wondering if I should upgrade to 7?

I'm typing this on my work XP machine.

Thanks in advance.

Yes this is how I see it, and yes I know I can start what I need to from tiles, but how do you quit an App?, let's say you are in Desktop and you want to run Services; you have two options; search for it and run it, or go back to tiles and open it from there which takes you back into Desktop. Just try to scroll in IE every time without having he charms bar come up....

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-8/basics#1TC=t1

Like I said this is just how I see it

Scott, sure upgrade it Windows 7 is still the best OS Microsoft has put out...

It's for apparatus with touchscreen and an attempt to integrate them all. Apple is going the same route. Eventually all the 'smart' devices will know and design to your app's or TV viewing habits. For example, you'll start to watch some program on a phone device and finish it when home on the TV. If one has a touch / tab hybrid PC, probably a great improvement. Otherwise, not.

What I find interesting is how Microsoft is forcing the product to move. They've priced the OS lower and PC manufacturers now offer far lower priced machine's then older or those with Win 7 OS. Since I'm shopping for new notebooks, those with Win 7 are generally priced higher and yet being snapped up. I fall in that catagory as Win 7 with Pro or Ultimate gives the flexibility of running 64 bit and older 32 bit programs plus you can run XPVM (virtual machine). I'm getting machines with Win 7 home prem and paying for the Pro or Ultimate upgrades. But well worth it as it saves me thousands of dollars vs. buying new CAD or Adobe programs, etc.. No way will Windows 8 do it for me.

Never upgrade to any Windoz product until the first service pack has come out. They push these things out every fall hoping for Christmas sales, and long before the program has been debugged.

Then it falls on the shoulders of the users to debug the crappy program and then and only then does MS put out fixes...

The 11th commandment.

Just for giggles, download a copy of Linux Mint and give it a whirl and see what you think

I dunno... I know that was the case, but also noticed the early and wide distribution of Developer and consumer previews of this Win8 code.

Also a 20+ year IT veteran, this is possibly the worst OS ever developed. I'm certain that OS2 is probably more functional today than Windows 8 will be by next year.

They give us a traditional "desktop" that you can access from "Metro" however it has everything that the Windows 7 desktop has except.... THE START BUTTON! They left off the most important item.

So now you need to learn to love your "windows" key on your keyboard and hope to heck that your app is listed on the "metro" home page, otherwise you're going fishing. I'm constantly going back and forth between "metro" and what we used to call the "desktop."

So lets say you do use "metro" as your primary interface, well it's not very intuitive either, and if you click something that you can't open by default it sends you to a "store" to get that app. There are not enough explicatives in the English language to convey my frustration with that.

For my last rant I'll just say that the damn thing wouldn't shut down by itself. Ok, so my motherboard is not from this year so I suppose it's my fault. However the remedy for this requires that you disable "hybrid boot" which is one of the key new features of Windows 8.

Microsoft has lost all hope.

Scott, there are a bunch of vid's on how to turn off Metro UI.

Here's one...

<iframe width="640" height="480" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/DaRoBPp4dYg?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Looks very easy, and you get the "Start" button back

I actually added the start button back via one of the suggestions on Youtube but then it patched and now it's dead. It still says "start" but you can't click it. Once I get some time I'll fix it.

Good video Island, but it begs the question why would I upgrade to downgrade, or it that Ballmers master plan?

I've read many reviews today some really negative and some positive ones, but I think the sweetspot is Engadget commenting that if you do not have a touch PC/tablet/blah blah and only have a mouse, this is not the OS for you.

I have to agree as I am using a mouse and because my tablet (with pen) is older than last year none of the hot corners with with the pen and mouse is frustrating.

Back to Ubuntu...

Yep, it's not for most. I've been big on tablets since even before Apple invented them. ;)

This is what I wrote about Win 8 a year ago.
That still holds. The bulk of changes are geared towards tablets/touch devices.

I also have no desire to 'upgrade' my computers to Win8. ...not even my tablets.

The Hardware, however... that Surface machine is very nice. --Good work Red-west.

Yeah, another 20 year techie here. Just bought a Surface RT today. It takes some getting used to, but the thing rocks! Way better than either iPad or Android table for getting work done. As the eco system grows, it will be a major player in the enterprise. At home, maybe not.

Also spun up a new Server 2012 and Exchange 2013. Again, totally different beasts. :)

I just built a dozen PC,s and I used Windows 7 for all of them. Unless you're buying a brand-new PC and it only comes with Windows 8, I'd stick with Windows 7. Win7 seems to be reliable, easy to use and relatively fast on every PC I've loaded it on. All of the PC's have at least 2GB of RAM, decent hard drive and nice video card.

I'm playing with Windows 8 and I have very mixed feelings about it... I'll play more before I go into any detail...

My next build will be Windows 7, as I already have the OS for it. I might upgrade my Slate 500 to window 8.

Ubuntu lost me for a few reasons - the renaming of ethernet devices due to udev rules based on MAC address, and Unity/Gnome3. Happy using Mint w/ MATE and/or Cinnamon

Microsoft had to get in the social stuff cause it was falling behind, this is a strategic move..

For business/professional they couldn't have not hoped to convert the business side.. There must be a supported way... NO way that companies will let the users show facebook, twitter, tumbler,etc.. on the main screen.

I read that WIN + D will get you to the DESKTOP MODE. I'll try later today and report back...