Upgrade to Windows 8?

[Wolf K]

John,

I'm going to top-post this just for ease of reading my response to your
comments but I'll leave the thread in-tact so others can read it and
then understand the rest.

1. Usability. Win8 with only a mouse is an exercise in frustration. It
is difficult to do gestures, say a side swipe with a high precision
mouse because the ergonomics are different. Add the fact that the Win8
interface (the underbelly) is not really intuitive on how to access
Settings or other Personalization features. The so-called Metro GUI will
get better I feel even if MS doesn't touch it, others most certainly
will bend it to their will and we'll all benefit from their efforts. [snip]

Bob's remarks merely underscore the main fail: Metro is a disaster for
anything other than touch screens.

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

1. Usability. Win8 with only a mouse is an exercise in frustration. It
is difficult to do gestures, say a side swipe with a high precision
mouse because the ergonomics are different. Add the fact that the Win8
interface (the underbelly) is not really intuitive on how to access[/QUOTE]

Intuitive to those of us who've got used to the older way, of course!

Settings or other Personalization features. The so-called Metro GUI

I've heard it called TIFKAM (The Interface Formerly Known As ...), on
the basis that it was called Metro in the pre-release versions, but that
there is some evidence it wasn't in the release version.

will get better I feel even if MS doesn't touch it, others most
certainly will bend it to their will and we'll all benefit from their
efforts.

Although it isn't really pure 8, I'd be interested to hear if you have
any views on whether 8 with Classic Shell (or the other one) is
better/worse/about the same as/than 7 (for users without touch screens,
say).

2. Security. Now embedded in Win8. I have a number of computers and
I've test driven a Win8 system into some well known sites that like to
hijack your browser and drop Trojan's. When accessed on my other Win7

[No apostrophe in simple plurals (-:!]

systems (well protected), I get all sorts of red-flags by my antivirus
software as well as redirects by DynDNS telling me the site is bad.
Win8 never missed a beat either and stopped the malware action and/or
quarantined the download. So far no malware has penetrated Win8
Interesting.
[]
3. While it will be a long time before the enterprise installations
convert from their PC's to tabletop / tablet / wallboard screen systems
for everyday use, it will happen. Right now we see more and more uses

Sometime, I suppose! My employer (a large multinational) is still on XP,
and will change to 7 later this year (or so they tell us).
[]

Now I'm sure the purists will climb all over me for top-posting so I'll
get my fire retardant shorts ready.
(-:

Thanks for you kind comment,

Bob S.

[]
You're welcome.

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

John,

I'm going to top-post this just for ease of reading my response to your
comments but I'll leave the thread in-tact so others can read it and
then understand the rest.

1. Usability. Win8 with only a mouse is an exercise in frustration. It
is difficult to do gestures, say a side swipe with a high precision
mouse because the ergonomics are different. Add the fact that the Win8
interface (the underbelly) is not really intuitive on how to access
Settings or other Personalization features. The so-called Metro GUI will
get better I feel even if MS doesn't touch it, others most certainly
will bend it to their will and we'll all benefit from their efforts. [snip]

Bob's remarks merely underscore the main fail: Metro is a disaster for
anything other than touch screens.

Perhaps, but whether 8 with Classic Shell (or even 8's intrinsic desktop
interface) is better/worse/about the same than/as, say, 7, doesn't seem
to me to have been addressed much.

 

[Wolf K]

On 2/15/2013 5:09 PM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
[...]

Although it isn't really pure 8, I'd be interested to hear if you have
any views on whether 8 with Classic Shell (or the other one) is
better/worse/about the same as/than 7 (for users without touch screens,
say). [...]

I used Classic Shell with W7 because I found Aero unpleasant (to cutesy,
if you must know), and missed XP's Control Panel. It works just as well
with W8. Once you've installed it, W8 will boot into the desktop.
Depending on how you Personalize your system, it's basically W7 all over
again. That's why I think of W8 as an update, not an upgrade. The live
corners are a nuisance from my POV, but you can turn them off if they
irritate unduly.

If you invoke an "app", you will get Metro when you exit it, and can get
back to the desktop from there (lower left tile). Apps are full-screen,
a la iPad, and have the same drawbacks: no easy way to switch between
them. None of the apps appeals to me enough to want to use them instead
of my tried and true favourites. If there were some way of destroying
Metro and the "apps", I'd do it. They just clutter up a perfectly good OS.

Be aware that W8 enforces NX: if your CPU can't do it, W8 will stop the
install and revert to whatever you have. Other than that, if your
hardware runs W7, it will run W8. There may be odd-ball exceptions to
this, but I've not heard of any.

 

[Scott]

On Thu, 14 Feb 2013 21:13:42 -0500, (e-mail address removed) wrote:

[snip]

Do the criticisms made of Windows 8 apply also to Office 2013?

 

[Robin Bignall]

You get to tell everyone that you have the latest O/S and are
2013 tech savvy.

But I don't know everyone; only a few of them, so it isn't worth it.

 

[Char Jackson]

No, forget it. I installed W8 in a virtual machine (VMWare) and I'm not
fond of it. It's not an improvement of W7. It has an awful interface and
technically it's not better that W7.

Saying that W8 has an awful interface is a little like saying Rob Kardashian
has an ugly sister. He does, but the other two aren't bad looking. Where
they get annoying is when they speak, but I digress. W8 has two interfaces,
so when you say one of them is awful, I have to assume you mean the Modern
interface because the other one is pretty darn close to W7.

 

[Anon]

Disagree. The Logitech TouchPad allows you to use it as you would a
touchscreen. Try it at a local Best Buy if you have one nearby.

Dual-booting with Win8 will make Win8 the default selection and if you
shutdown (stby mode), your next boot is fast.

Agree, if you boot to Win7, then you loose the Win8 boot advantage. Life is
full of tradeoffs but I certainly wouldn't call dual booting a very bad
idea. Makes more sense than buying a new system just to putz with Win8.

Bob S.


"Laszlo Lebrun" wrote in message On 15.02.2013 04:43, Anon wrote:

(snip)
I strongly disagree.
A touchpad isn't adding any noticeable value, since you still will have
to drive a cusor
which is just plainly sucking.
You won't get the comfort of a touchscreen with a touchpad.

(snip)
Dual-booting seven and eight is also a VERY bad idea, you lose all the
advantages of the fast Win8 Boot and get a horrible reboot each time you
want to use Windows 7.

(snip)
Windows 8 is however good if you have a low-end notebook and -even
better- if you have a -not too old- weak netbook running on a SSD. There
it rocks.

 

[Anon]

Forgot to post this earlier - maybe it will help.

http://www.logitech.com/en-us/product/touchpad-t650

http://www.logitech.com/en-us/mice-pointers/articles/win8-t650-gestures


Bob S.

 

[Ashton Crusher]

I'm currently running Windows 7 Professional 64 bit on a machine with an Intel
i7-930 processor and 12Gb RAM. Not sureif this all matters. Do I gain anything
at all by upgrading to Windows 8? I don't have a touch screen monitor and have
no desire to use one. I have an Android tablet which pretty much sits in the
house next to me by the sofa, and I have an Android smart phone which leaves the
house one or twice a week (I have OnStar in my car and I'm not one who is glued
to their phones 24/7) I mention the tablet and phone because my understanding is
that Windows 8 connects with mobile devices or some such.

So that being said, is WIndows 8 any improvement for me? Thanks.

I did the upgrade from Win7 and frankly it's not worth the trouble.
Yes, there are some slight improvements in some areas, for example,
the windows that track progress when you copy files are nicer and have
more info to look at but the functionality is no different that I can
tell. Some of the menus work more cleverly. But the overall look
from an esthetic standpoint stinks. I was given a computer that was
better than the one I was using so I put my Win7 onto that one and I'm
sticking with Win7. Also, win8 doesn't come with Media center,
although I was able to get it for free from MS after waiting a week
for the license code. Not sure if they still give it away for free or
whether my free copy will work sometime in the future should I ever
decide to use my Win8 that's sitting on the shelf. All that said, had
I stuck with my old computer that I'd put Win8 on I would not have
degraded it back to Win7, wouldn't have been worth the trouble.

 

[Ashton Crusher]

Saying that W8 has an awful interface is a little like saying Rob Kardashian
has an ugly sister. He does, but the other two aren't bad looking. Where
they get annoying is when they speak, but I digress. W8 has two interfaces,
so when you say one of them is awful, I have to assume you mean the Modern
interface because the other one is pretty darn close to W7.

It's close but it's still an ugly sister compared to Win7. The square
corners, the simple solid colors, the stark minimize, max/window, and
close buttons in the upper right of windows look terrible. It's a
real step backward in esthetics.... unless you happen to like that
look.....

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <[email protected]>, Wolf K

If you invoke an "app", you will get Metro when you exit it, and can
get back to the desktop from there (lower left tile). Apps are full-

Though I _think_ I've seen cases where the "desktop" tile hides.

screen, a la iPad, and have the same drawbacks: no easy way to switch
between them. None of the apps appeals to me enough to want to use them

Does alt-tab not work?

instead of my tried and true favourites. If there were some way of
destroying Metro and the "apps", I'd do it. They just clutter up a
perfectly good OS.

Be aware that W8 enforces NX: if your CPU can't do it, W8 will stop the
install and revert to whatever you have. Other than that, if your
hardware runs W7, it will run W8. There may be odd-ball exceptions to
this, but I've not heard of any.

(I doubt I'd install it; it'd be a new machine. As it would for the vast
majority of users; tech-savvy [or at least OS-etc.-savvy] people like
the users of this newsgroup are the exception, I think.)

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Disagree. The Logitech TouchPad allows you to use it as you would a
touchscreen. Try it at a local Best Buy if you have one nearby.

I don't know that particular touchpad, but unless it's transparent and
the same size as a screen, i. e. can be placed over one, then you can't
use it "as you would a touchscreen". The main - or, at least, one of the
very significant - points of a touchscreen is that you touch what you
want.

Dual-booting with Win8 will make Win8 the default selection and if you
shutdown (stby mode), your next boot is fast.

I have heard and am willing to believe that the boot has genuinely been
improved in 8, but comparing "stby mode" isn't like with like: 7 (and XP
for that matter) have standby modes too (which are generally faster than
a full reboot).

Agree, if you boot to Win7, then you loose the Win8 boot advantage.
Life is full of tradeoffs but I certainly wouldn't call dual booting a
very bad idea. Makes more sense than buying a new system just to putz
with Win8.

(I can't see _ever_ buying a new system _just_ to play with a new OS -
though I'm sure some people might. My usual reason for buying a new
system would be because of something I want to do that my current one
can't [regardless of OS].)

Bob S.


"Laszlo Lebrun" wrote in message news:[email protected]... []
You won't get the comfort of a touchscreen with a touchpad.

[]
Agreed - see above.

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <[email protected]>, Char Jackson

Saying that W8 has an awful interface is a little like saying Rob Kardashian
has an ugly sister. He does, but the other two aren't bad looking. Where
they get annoying is when they speak, but I digress. W8 has two interfaces,
so when you say one of them is awful, I have to assume you mean the Modern
interface because the other one is pretty darn close to W7.

Shh, you're not allowed to mention that 8 has a more conventional
interface; the 8-haters will get you (-:.

(I'm watching this long-running debate with interest, from my XP machine
[which is configured to look a lot like '9x - square corners to windows
and no big red X - though I like XP {except NTFS} and wouldn't go back
to '9x].)

 

[Bob Henson]

John,

I'm going to top-post this just for ease of reading my response to your
comments but I'll leave the thread in-tact so others can read it and
then understand the rest.

1. Usability. Win8 with only a mouse is an exercise in frustration. It
is difficult to do gestures, say a side swipe with a high precision
mouse because the ergonomics are different. Add the fact that the Win8
interface (the underbelly) is not really intuitive on how to access
Settings or other Personalization features. The so-called Metro GUI will
get better I feel even if MS doesn't touch it, others most certainly
will bend it to their will and we'll all benefit from their efforts. [snip]

Bob's remarks merely underscore the main fail: Metro is a disaster for
anything other than touch screens.

Perhaps, but whether 8 with Classic Shell (or even 8's intrinsic desktop
interface) is better/worse/about the same than/as, say, 7, doesn't seem
to me to have been addressed much.

I used it for some months on a laptop. It's just about usable with
Classic Shell, but lacks various parts cut out of Windows 7, so to
answer your point - since it has no advantages whatever over Windows 7
for normal desktop use but there are some disadvantages, why bother with
it?

 

[John Williamson]

On 2/15/2013 12:06 PM, Anon wrote:
John,

I'm going to top-post this just for ease of reading my response to your
comments but I'll leave the thread in-tact so others can read it and
then understand the rest.

1. Usability. Win8 with only a mouse is an exercise in frustration. It
is difficult to do gestures, say a side swipe with a high precision
mouse because the ergonomics are different. Add the fact that the Win8
interface (the underbelly) is not really intuitive on how to access
Settings or other Personalization features. The so-called Metro GUI will
get better I feel even if MS doesn't touch it, others most certainly
will bend it to their will and we'll all benefit from their efforts. [snip]
Bob's remarks merely underscore the main fail: Metro is a disaster for
anything other than touch screens.

Perhaps, but whether 8 with Classic Shell (or even 8's intrinsic desktop
interface) is better/worse/about the same than/as, say, 7, doesn't seem
to me to have been addressed much.

I used it for some months on a laptop. It's just about usable with
Classic Shell, but lacks various parts cut out of Windows 7, so to
answer your point - since it has no advantages whatever over Windows 7
for normal desktop use but there are some disadvantages, why bother with
it?

It seems to have some advantages if you are using a touchscreen. If not,
then it is basically the same as Windows 7 under the hood, with a few
interface tweaks when in "classic" desktop mode.

Then again, I've just restored the original XP on this netbook, as 7 was
getting to be a pain in the @rse by not supporting some (Microsoft)
software I use on a daily basis.

 

[Bob Henson]

In message <[email protected]>, Wolf K
On 2/15/2013 12:06 PM, Anon wrote:
John,

I'm going to top-post this just for ease of reading my response to your
comments but I'll leave the thread in-tact so others can read it and
then understand the rest.

1. Usability. Win8 with only a mouse is an exercise in frustration. It
is difficult to do gestures, say a side swipe with a high precision
mouse because the ergonomics are different. Add the fact that the Win8
interface (the underbelly) is not really intuitive on how to access
Settings or other Personalization features. The so-called Metro GUI will
get better I feel even if MS doesn't touch it, others most certainly
will bend it to their will and we'll all benefit from their efforts. [snip]
Bob's remarks merely underscore the main fail: Metro is a disaster for
anything other than touch screens.

Perhaps, but whether 8 with Classic Shell (or even 8's intrinsic desktop
interface) is better/worse/about the same than/as, say, 7, doesn't seem
to me to have been addressed much.

I used it for some months on a laptop. It's just about usable with
Classic Shell, but lacks various parts cut out of Windows 7, so to
answer your point - since it has no advantages whatever over Windows 7
for normal desktop use but there are some disadvantages, why bother with
it?

It seems to have some advantages if you are using a touchscreen. If not,
then it is basically the same as Windows 7 under the hood, with a few
interface tweaks when in "classic" desktop mode.

That's true - but the only common use for touch screens on desktop
computers is when standing up in retail situations, and then not very
often. I was forced to use such a system (running customised software
under XP Pro) and it was a pain in the nether end, we were forever
cleaning the screen - but that's another story. Most of us sit far too
far back to reach a touch screen - but I can see that there might well
be a use for Windows 8 on toy tablet computers and phones.

Then again, I've just restored the original XP on this netbook, as 7 was
getting to be a pain in the @rse by not supporting some (Microsoft)
software I use on a daily basis.

Although I've never had that problem personally, I realise there will
always be someone who wants to use older software, and indeed, this is
another reason for not using Windows 8 - some older software which runs
on Windows 7 and earlier will not run on Windows 8 at all.

 

[Char Jackson]

(I'm watching this long-running debate with interest, from my XP machine
[which is configured to look a lot like '9x - square corners to windows
and no big red X - though I like XP {except NTFS} and wouldn't go back
to '9x].)

NTFS might have been the thing I liked BEST about later Win OS's. Finally, I
could deal with large files without breaking them into smaller chunks, as I
had to do under FAT32.

 

[Laszlo Lebrun]

Disagree. The Logitech TouchPad allows you to use it as you would a
touchscreen. Try it at a local Best Buy if you have one nearby.

No.
With a touchpad you still have a cusor to control, with a touchscreen
not, you get directly to the tile you want to control.
A touchpad (even a large one with multitouch) is the worst solution, a
mouse is better.

Dual-booting with Win8 will make Win8 the default selection and if you
shutdown (stby mode), your next boot is fast.

As long as you won't swap between the Win versions and keep staying in
sleep mode.

I tried both, dual boot and touchpads and dropped it after a few attempts.

I continue using windows 8 on my weak netbook and returned to win 7 on
my more powerful desktop repalcement notebook.

 

[Laszlo Lebrun]

Forgot to post this earlier - maybe it will help.

http://www.logitech.com/en-us/product/touchpad-t650

http://www.logitech.com/en-us/mice-pointers/articles/win8-t650-gestures


Bob S.

Bad solution, far inferior to a touchscreen since you still have to
drive a pointer.
Any mous is more comfortable.