The "Is Windows 8 a Flop?" Thread

Thanks uber much.

rwenzori said:
There are plenty rumours of MS trying to get into an annual release cycle - here is one:




WinBlue in 2013 makes plenty business sense if Win8 is flopping. A rapid release cycle makes business sense if you are playing catch-up big time, as MS are, having been left in the dust in the "mobile space" as they have by Apple and Android, like an ox-wagon in a race with a McLaren F1. But then, the tortoise did beat the hare in a similar match-up once, they say.
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Dutchuncle777 said:
Ultrabooks seem to be stuck with 4GB RAM. Newer ones may be upgradeable to 16GB, but many are not. I am in between Linux and Windows 8 right now. The use of Windows only for syncing my phone with my computer - contacts, calendar, etc. I like using Nokia Suite which has no Linux equivalent. Sending SMS from the computer.

How does Windows 8 and ultrabooks work together? Is it a reasonable match or what would you suggest? RAM usage by the OS seems very high, when I checked out various demo laptops at Incredible. It seems that 1.2 - 2.6GB may be used just for Windows 8. If the ultrabook has no discreet graphics adapter, pretty little RAM remains available to user apps and documents.

What is your user experience?
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W8 uses less resources than W7. Not sure what is running on the demo machines, but W8 will run fine on almost any system. I've booted it with 128MB RAM, and it's still usable (Metro apps are rather slow to launch though).

Not sure why you don't think an ultrabook and W8 isn't a good match? The OS would run on 5+ year old systems, so it works perfectly on an ultrabook. Mine has 4GB RAM, the new i7, and a fast SSD. I can play BF3 (on low) which is awesome. And it handles me having a few instances of Visual Studio, Outlook, Photoshop, and a browser just fine.
Oh, and 6 hours battery easily with heavy usage.

@Elite Override, not to make you feel silly, but after giving a friends mom a 10 minute lesson on it she is now able to use it perfectly. And managed to work out everything I didn't show her. Same with my mom. Neither of them had even the slightest grasp on technology, and can hardly do anything beyond sending a BBM.
They were my test subjects. And both proved without a doubt that the new interface is dead simple.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ODFvy1mjoY
 
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In a 2 GB VM it was slow. I don't buy these "it's faster" claims.
 
If ever the world was looking for a new OS to replace Windows it is right now. I am. MS has made a cardinal decision and is going full steam into a direction that many don't want to go. If ever competitors had a chance to get in it is now. But who/what? OS X? Linux?

Google should act decisively now and get something out ASAP ... and they can do so. Who better to push Linux with proper support and backing by OEM's? One can only hope. As it stands I so not want to follow MS where they are heading. MS wants to build their one walled garden now and we are standing at the gate. Go in, or turn left/right?
 
roguemat said:
W8 uses less resources than W7. Not sure what is running on the demo machines, but W8 will run fine on almost any system. I've booted it with 128MB RAM, and it's still usable (Metro apps are rather slow to launch though).

Not sure why you don't think an ultrabook and W8 isn't a good match? The OS would run on 5+ year old systems, so it works perfectly on an ultrabook. Mine has 4GB RAM, the new i7, and a fast SSD. I can play BF3 (on low) which is awesome. And it handles me having a few instances of Visual Studio, Outlook, Photoshop, and a browser just fine.
Oh, and 6 hours battery easily with heavy usage.

@Elite Override, not to make you feel silly, but after giving a friends mom a 10 minute lesson on it she is now able to use it perfectly. And managed to work out everything I didn't show her. Same with my mom. Neither of them had even the slightest grasp on technology, and can hardly do anything beyond sending a BBM.
They were my test subjects. And both proved without a doubt that the new interface is dead simple.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ODFvy1mjoY
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Thanks, this may nudge me into the right direction....... :)
 
BeVonk! said:
If ever the world was looking for a new OS to replace Windows it is right now. I am. MS has made a cardinal decision and is going full steam into a direction that many don't want to go. If ever competitors had a chance to get in it is now. But who/what? OS X? Linux?
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I'm one of those wot doesn't want to slip on the tiles. I can only agree with you and wish.

BeVonk! said:
Google should act decisively now and get something out ASAP ... and they can do so. Who better to push Linux with proper support and backing by OEM's? One can only hope. As it stands I so not want to follow MS where they are heading. MS wants to build their one walled garden now and we are standing at the gate. Go in, or turn left/right?
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I'm standing there too. Win7 is bearable, at a push, and I suppose it will still be around a while. After that? A Mac, hackintosh, Linux Mint, who knows.
 
My question is, if people are loving windows 7 so much and they can't possibly ask for something better they install Windows 8.

In my opinion that YT review of Win 8 nailed it

Yes, Win 8 is pretty. But is it practical?

I installed it on a VM and I hated it. I honestly think people who say they prefer Win 8 to Win 7 are lying just to make them selves feel better just because they are running the latest product from MS.

And I bet the Win 8 users are struggling their ass off but are too proud to rollback to Win 7

/end of rant
 
Rickster said:
Yes, Win 8 is pretty. But is it practical?
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As a regular user of PCs running Win8, Win7 and OSX ML, I'd say so. I find it highly efficient and fast for desktop/mouse use, but don't think its the prettiest of the lot. Win7 with Aero and ML still look more polished for me.

Rickster said:
And I bet the Win 8 users are struggling their ass off but are too proud to rollback to Win 7
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Yeh right, really struggled to post this from Win8 ;)
 
BeVonk! said:
If ever the world was looking for a new OS to replace Windows it is right now. I am. MS has made a cardinal decision and is going full steam into a direction that many don't want to go. If ever competitors had a chance to get in it is now. But who/what? OS X? Linux?

Google should act decisively now and get something out ASAP ... and they can do so. Who better to push Linux with proper support and backing by OEM's? One can only hope. As it stands I so not want to follow MS where they are heading. MS wants to build their one walled garden now and we are standing at the gate. Go in, or turn left/right?
Click to expand...

I expect that the average consumer will realise they don't really need a traditional PC and will opt for an Android or iOS tablet on their next upgrade cycle or mobile contract renewal, while keeping their old Win7 PC's until they stop functioning.

Businesses will skip Win8, and hang on to Win7 as long as possible. When businesses reach their next upgrade hardware cycle and win7 becomes unavailable even to them, some might opt for Win9 and I suspect some will switch over to an alternative OS, such as Mac OS or Linux.

Businesses with any foresight at all might start to prepare for either eventuality now, by training their IT support staff to deal with the alternatives, and making sure that all relevant servers will be compatible with those alternative OS's as well as Win 9.

Even among those businesses that switch over to an alternative, I think they will still keep their core Active Directory + Exchange systems + anything absolutely dependant on the MS software stack, with everything else being considered for a switch over
 
Large corporations are in a very difficult position now. MS is clearly going touch screen with Windows. In large corporations (take the City of Cape Town with 23 000 staff members and a very big and important MS client as an example) the roll-out of new touch screen harware will take forever-and-a-day. To roll out Wondows 8 now with its touch orientated Modern interface will be a mess. Only an important few will get touch screen computers in a large organisation. Who wants Modern UI with a mouse and no touch screen? Not me.
 
Personally the only thing I like about Windows 8 is the the revamped Security codewise of the Operating System otherwise its merely palatable for me . IMO
 
There is a reason why Steven Sinofsky (ex-president of the Windows Division) left Microsoft.
 
I use WinXP,Win7 & Win8

WinXP - It 's now left behind, but still a good OS
Win 7 - Good OS, fast, stable and nice looking

Win 8 - I found it to be slow, unpredictable and unstable for many tasks

I will revert back to Win 7 on my desktop and wait for the next version on Windows and see....

Sorry Microsoft, Windows 8 is a fail....
 
BeVonk! said:
If ever the world was looking for a new OS to replace Windows it is right now. I am. MS has made a cardinal decision and is going full steam into a direction that many don't want to go. If ever competitors had a chance to get in it is now. But who/what? OS X? Linux?

Google should act decisively now and get something out ASAP ... and they can do so. Who better to push Linux with proper support and backing by OEM's? One can only hope. As it stands I so not want to follow MS where they are heading. MS wants to build their one walled garden now and we are standing at the gate. Go in, or turn left/right?
Click to expand...

Frankly this is a perfect time to expand Android into the desktop space. (now that would piss metro-ites off)

Frankly if I wanted to run a touch interface on a desktop I'd run Android in a VM.
 
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Have following O/S running on various machines:

Osx snow Leopard
Mint 10
Mint 13 (with cinnamon)
Ubuntu 12.04 / 12.10
Windows 7
Windows 8

Windows 8 is a solid technical upgrade to Windows 7 BUT it's Metro Apps and interface are a usability disaster - while Metro as a "start" menu is okay for most users (who probably only need to access 4 or 5 apps quickly and it's fine for that) the metro apps are abominable - they are slow, buggy, under featured, and lack well known mouse oriented UI elements.

Windows 8 reminds of when Ubuntu switched to Unity - the initial implementation was terrible and alienating (hence mint 12 in the mix above) but by version 12.04 they had learnt from their mistakes and it's now a pleasure to use.

Windows 8 is undercooked from a UI perspective - I'm giving it a miss on my main home machine for the time being.

Also doesn't help that it requires a CPU / BIOS capability (PAE and NX/XD) that makes it impossible to install on some older machines (eg IBM T42)
 
rwenzori said:
I'd never have believed ANYTHING on god's green earth could be worse than Vista
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You never used Windows ME, did you?

I've been using Windows 8 on my laptop and my office computer with no headaches. I'd like to try it on a touch screen, but that will just have to wait.
 
Thought about something here. From my limited experience Win8 seems to be more responsive and faster in most ways vs windows 7. I havent closely monitored resource usage but from what I've heard its pretty good. Quite a few other technical improvements under the hood too.
Only thing most people seem to hate is Metro.
Just load Classic Shell or something = win. Not sure why people are complaining. Seems like a win win.

@African Tech: I agree with your points. In time if Metro is not successfully adopted I'm sure they'll change it. They're huge - and they'll chase the money and have the cash to make it happen.
 
Rodent-Boy said:
You never used Windows ME, did you?
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I thought Windows ME was actually quite good. It gave me the same amount of crap (A few blue screen's of death to brighten up my day) as Windows 98 SE but it had built-in support for USB flash drives that Windows 98 did not have. That was the main reason I upgraded from 98. I really think that too many people exaggerate how bad ME was probably when comparing it to XP and not to 98 which was the OS it replaced.
 
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