General / Off-Topic Has anyone tried Windows 8?

[rgmarett]

I thought I'd ask this forum as everyone seems pretty sensible here. Windows 8 Pro is on offer at the moment for just £24.99 (from the Microsoft website).

Question is, I've got 7 and it works a treat, but to future proof for just £24.99 seems like a good idea. Has anyone used Windows 8 already and if so, what do you think of it?

 

[Captain B Hawkeye]

I thought I'd ask this forum as everyone seems pretty sensible here. Windows 8 Pro is on offer at the moment for just £24.99 (from the Microsoft website).

Question is, I've got 7 and it works a treat, but to future proof for just £24.99 seems like a good idea. Has anyone used Windows 8 already and if so, what do you think of it?

TBO I'm not to sure about Windows 8 but for £24.99 good price to test it out
i've talked to many people while on blog talk radio all having problems with it and going back to 7. its new so there always going to be bugs or people just leaving it as it doesn't do what they want in the first instance but for £24.99 making me think should i try it out

 

[insanephoton]

Having recently made the jump from Vista to Win 8 Pro, I wouldn't go back, but then again Vista was always something of a lemon.

I haven't encountered any major problems with it, just some minor issues that either got sorted out or were not very important.

 

[Kesomir]

Go grab start 8 from stardock if you upgrade to 8, it gives you the start menu back, plus a load of other tweaks like boot to desktop.

There are a lot of improvements under the hood, file handling appears better under 8 for example, but you have to deal with the jarring mish mash of desktop and modern ui. I use start 8 to hide all the 'metro' apps for example and boot straight to desktop.

 

[Genesis]

How to get windows 8 for $15 USD

How anyone can get windows 8 from Microsoft for $15.

1.
You need XP, Vista or 7.


2.
You need Paypal or a credit card with $15(16.50 with tax)


3.
Go to https://www.windowsupgradeoffer.com/

Windows PC purchase information (you can make it up, how will they ever know?)

Date of purchase *Make up any date within last 2 months.

Name of retailer * Just say whatever retailer.

PC Brand *Other

PC Model * Carbide 500r

That is all it requires, no receipt verification is needed. Anyone can upgrade to Windows 8 Pro for $14.99. It gives you a promo code, and you download and install from Microsoft Directly.

Personally I am loving Windows 8 Pro. Best $14.99 I have spent in awhile.


4.
Install windows 8 upgrade advisor. Click buy.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/buy


5.
Insert the promo code at checkout and enjoy! You do not need a CD or USB to install 8. You can reformat after it installs. It leaves Windows.old, use Disk Cleanup in admin to remove it if you want.




P.S:
If the upgrade advisor gives you errors, you will need to use another computer to purchase Windows 8. I highly recommend Start8. http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/


EDIT:
Fixed links
I've used this method across 3 computers since day 1, this method is legit. Google it.

 

[Anon-E-Mouse]

If you have Win 7 already and like it, there's no real reason to 'upgrade' to win 8. Win 8 is designed to be used with touch interfaces, which generally doesn't include desktop PC's.

Personally I can't stand the Metro interface, and won't be using it ever...

I'm sticking with Win 7, and if that doesn't get updated, I have an Ubuntu installation as well.. Win 8 will be the very last thing I install on my pc.

Of course this is all my personal opinion, and your mileage may vary.

 

[aXeL]

Windows 8 is ok. I'm trying it on a media server. It's really just windows 7 with a 'Start Screen' as opposed to a 'Start Menu'. Once I accepted that it worked quite well but if you have Win7 I see no mileage in W8 or at least the 'Pro' version didn't give me anything new.

 

[V3teran]

Yes i have tried it and i prefer Win 7 by along way.

 

[zmurf]

I use it and I like it very much. I haven't got a touchscreen computer yet so I almost never use the tile UI. In desktop mode it's almost identical to Win7, except that you have the context based charms menu on the right side of the screen (reachable by right side hot corner).

To say that Win8 just is Win7 with an extra touch UI is just plain wrong. There has been a lot of noticeable changes under the hood. Win8 uses less resources, is faster, more responsive, and boots faster than Win7... And it goes down and starts up from hibernation really quick. My computer took several minutes to go down and up from hibernation when I used Win7. With Win8 it takes less then half a minute.

According to Microsoft they have rewritten the entire driver and service handlers in Win8... which is quite a big part of the kernel.

 

[deMangler]

Although I am a long-term Slackware linux user personally I have had to stay very familiar with MS operating systems for various reasons.
I have been experimenting with Win 8 in a VM and have had to support a couple of users using it as well and I can say that it has been pretty painless.
Once you get to know your way around it it is surprisingly easy to do what you want. In fact I find that supporting Ubuntu has been more of a PITA to be honest. Still, I would never use Ubuntu or Windows 8 unless I had to so my opinion should be placed in that context.

 

[Kerrash]

.... In fact I find that supporting Ubuntu has been more of a PITA to be honest. ...

I know your feeling, I was going to install Ubuntu for my mum; but after a few hours of playing around I realized it wasn't going to work.

I thought I'd ask this forum as everyone seems pretty sensible here. Windows 8 Pro is on offer at the moment for just £24.99 (from the Microsoft website).

Question is, I've got 7 and it works a treat, but to future proof for just £24.99 seems like a good idea. Has anyone used Windows 8 already and if so, what do you think of it?

I upgraded from 7 as soon as it was available. Well worth it, everything I used was compatible; the system boots and runs faster and now I am used to the start screen I am using it faster too.

Most people I have spoken to who hate it, have not used it for very long. Everyone else I know have been using it for a long time and they are now very happy.

Like most things people are adverse to change, but once they accept it they wish they had sooner.

 

[JKF]

I tried the preview when it was released. 20 minutes later I was back on Windows 7. However, on Sunday I upgraded to Windows 8 because I need to move on from WP7 to WP8 development.

Although it's annoying that they force the giant full screen start button on you, after a bit of tweaking it's not too bad. Thought about installing one of the apps to give me a normal Desktop Start button but I seem to have gotten used to it quite quickly; probably because I just had to get on with some work.

If you get rid of the tiles you don't want and from the All Apps list pin the apps you do want to the Start Screen it's relatively painless to use.

Until the end of this month you can also get the Media Center add on for free with the pro version.

 

[Kerrash]

I expect I am not on my own saying that I installed XP for a few months then went back to 98se because it was 'better'; then eventually upgrading again.
It's funny how these things keep going full circle

 

[zmurf]

Although it's annoying that they force the giant full screen start button on you, after a bit of tweaking it's not too bad.

I actually don't understand why so many people is so utterly annoyed by the new startscreen. The workflow hasn't changed a bit.

In pre Windows 8 you press the windows key (or ctrl Esc if you don't have a windows key) and then write the name on the program you want to start.

In Windows 8 you press the windows key (or ctrl Esc if you don't have a windows key) and then write the name on the program you want to start

And myself I hardly ever see the startscreen (or the startmenu in Win7 either for that matter) since I never turn of any programs and always put down my computer into hibernation.

 

[JKF]

The Start screen is annoying because of the difficulty in finding application shortcuts for infrequently used programs; I have well over a hundred. I don't want to add them to the task bar or pin them to the Start screen because, as I said, they're infrequently used. The Start button was much more readable.

Also, it's annoying that they've forced the new Start screen on us all when there was no need to do that.

It would have been much better if they'd given us some options; boot to the Start screen or Desktop, fix the Start screen to a second monitor, allow the Start screen to be visible in the logged off state for casual use. None of these would have been difficult to implement and whilst many would opt for boot to Desktop, the Start screen would have been investigated out of curiosity during which we would become accustomed to it.

On another note, I've just had the dreaded PBSOD (Pale Blue Screen of Death) on Windows 8. On Windows 7 I never once had the BSOD. Hope it's something that will be fixed soon.

 

[zmurf]

The Start screen is annoying because of the difficulty in finding application shortcuts for infrequently used programs

You mean when you can't remember the name of the application you want to start? Because otherwise you just have to search by name.. which it does automatically as soon as you start typing... But if I can't remember the name I tend to not find stuff in the startmenu either. In the startmenu it often also place the program under a folder with the company name... so if you don't know what the company is called then it can be really hard finding stuff in the startmenu.

In both Win7 and Win8 I pin the stuff I always use to the taskbar. Then I usually create a Toolbar to the old quicklaunch directory (home\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch) and add all the infrequently used programs to that... I have something like 50-60 programs in that toolbar. But I hardly ever use it since it most often is easier to just press windows-key, type name, and press enter.

Personally I think the startmenu was a bad solution from the beginning. I didn't like it in Win95 and I don't like it in Win7. Maybe that's why I don't care. I can agree that the startscreen isn't much better... but I don't think it is any worse. (I like the concept of live tiles though... That I don't have to start a program to see information about it...)

The search by typing the name is good though... but that hasn't anything to do with either the startmenu or the startscreen. They are just the UIs used to show the result in. You have the exact same functionality in BSD/Linux/unix terminal or the spotlight in OSX... but there the result is shown in the shell or in finder respectively.

On another note, I've just had the dreaded PBSOD (Pale Blue Screen of Death) on Windows 8. On Windows 7 I never once had the BSOD. Hope it's something that will be fixed soon.

Mmm.. I Have had a couple of those on Win7 because of memory faults. They disappeared when I got new memory modules. On Win 8 I only had one. That time it was the DisplayLink Beta driver that did something nasty. But since they released a full version it hasn't happened.