Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Windows 8 Metro: The fall of windows or the best invention ever
Options
Comments
-
-
-
-
The STOP error screen has been severely dumbed down and even has a smiley on it, I kid you not. Sad Mac, anyone?The Blue Screen of Death no longer shows as much technical information about the error that caused the computer to stop. Why do that? Granted the basic home user won't need such info, but I would.
The hardware requirements are good, just 2gb for 64-bit and a 1ghz processor.
The hardware requirements are listed as the same as Vista or 7. In fairness it ran really well on my XPS M1330 when I tried it. I always found the same machine quite slow on Windows 7 x64 so I'm using the 32-bit version of Windows 7 on it.0 -
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
Small irk of mine but am I the only person who cringes every time I see the god damn awful colour scheme that Windows 8 has in literally every single screen shot that you see of it.
That awful turqoise/purple/sickly blue colour mix - makes me want to punch the screen any time I see a picture of it...
I'm assuming it's pretty easy to change the colour scheme but still - who ever is in charge of designing that colour scheme shouldn't be in a job
It's really making me hate Windows 8 before I even give it a proper trial run.
I've had Windows 8 installed in a VM before this but never gave it a proper workout to test it to see what it's like to work with in a day to day situtation. Pretty much installed, used for 10 minutes and said **** off and deleted it striaght of the VM. So I'm going to give it one last trial run for a few days to see what I think of it and to see can I learn to use it. I had teething problems when I switched from Office 2003 to the 2007 with the ribbon interface but after actually giving it a go for a few days I loved the new interface. For some reason I'm not nearly as optimistic about this interface but I'm not going to fully condemn and bash it until I do try it out.
Currently downloading the preview again so thinking of giving it a small partition and a proper full install rather than just running it in a VM to be fair on it. But if I can't figure out how to change the colours of that Metro design it can feck right off again. :mad:0 -
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
The suggestion that all computer users should be corralled into using a new OS with an interface and paradigm predicated on trying to capture the smartphone/tablet marketplace is to at least some of us pretty scary.
Well I can agree it's scary, but I think saying that "it's terrifying reflection on where our society is at and going." is a bit of an over-reaction
Change is scary, but often it's both good and necessary. Windows 95 changed a lot, both within Windows itself and in pushing the command prompt to the back, people were scared of these changes but I don't think anyone would go back to DOS with Windows 3.11. People were scared when the Windows 9x kernel was going to be replaced with the NT one for consumer versions of Windows, but I'm pretty sure most people wouldn't go back either. There was all kinds of panic about Vista, about how DRM and TPM support would make it unuseable, how UAC would break everything, the new taskbar, search system etc. Vista was a pretty bad OS but not for the reasons people feared, and the new stuff it introduced like UAC, the taskbar, search etc all work great with Windows 7.
I think an OS needs to grow and evolve, or else it becomes stale and irrelevant. It can't just be a pointless update to run on our 5 year old desktops and laptops, it needs to be designed to work with whatever we are using in 5 years time. Although I'd expect that, like with many Microsoft products, version 1 of a concept is quickly replaced with a hugely improved version, and with Windows 9 we will see a hugely improved version of the Metro concept, that will make everybody happy. But Windows 8 is still a necessary step along that path.
I actually got to play with one of the Samsung developer tablets with Windows 8 and Office 13 the other day. I was hugely impressed with it. Performance was excellent, it opened and searched a large outlook mailbox with ease, ran Word and Excel ever bit as well as my laptop, browsing the net was very fast and responsive (despite being tethered to my phone for connectivity). And of course general OS usage, browsing files etc was all very snappy. From what I remember they were Core i5 chips with 4GB RAM, plenty for most peoples needs, and don't forget that is a year old device. It certainly didn't feel hobbledI know you've expressed an interest before in the idea of one device matching all your requirements, but TBH no tablet I've seen thus far has been close to offering what a laptop can offer performance-wise and unless something amazing happens with the first generation of Win8 tablets I don't see that changing. Which means that the usage scenario you're hoping, in the context of Win8, can only happen if everyone's hobbled with an OS designed to run on a high-spec smartphone (which, realistically, means saying "An OS designed to run on mid-level hardware from 3-5 years ago"). At an enterprise level, that's pointless to me. Obviously a lower end ARM tablet won't perform as well, but that has always been the PC philosophy, a range of options to suit everybody's needs.
And it all worked really well with touch, I was easily able to navigate Outlook, read emails, tap out a quick reply, edit Word docs and spreadsheets etc. I know people are mostly concerned about how it works with a keyboard and mouse. To me at least, the sacrifice has been worth it to gain this level of touch functionality. Though I have to admit, from trying Win 8 on my laptop, I don't really mind it with a KB and mouse. I have to relearn a few habits, but it didn't take me long to start working as quickly and fluidly as I would with Windows 7.
I'm skeptical about the store too. I like the general idea, but don't really know enough about the implementation. I don't know what they are doing around updates with it, but they would be missing a huge opportunity if they didn't put in something like PSI.Beyond that, I'm skeptical about the Windows Store - because while it might be able to act as a repository of sorts, I've not seen any talk about MS actively pushing this idea. They should be looking to buy the likes of Secunia (or pushing out an MS equivalent of the PSI), not arsing around trying to copy what Apple did years ago.0 -
Join Date:Posts: 10279
Well I can agree it's scary, but I think saying that "it's terrifying reflection on where our society is at and going." is a bit of an over-reaction
It's not how I would have worded it, but the Metro Windows 8 Style UI is a bad indictment of "shiny form over function" as a current trend, IMO. Not because touch-oriented interfaces are inherently bad, but trying to blat them onto everything is to miss the point quite badly (an issue made more perversely funny by Microsoft snidely dismissing Aero, the resource-hogging load of nonsense they inflicted on us in late 2006, as being old hat, as though the new UI won't end up being considered old hat in the exact same way...)Change is scary, but often it's both good and necessary. Windows 95 changed a lot, both within Windows itself and in pushing the command prompt to the back, people were scared of these changes but I don't think anyone would go back to DOS with Windows 3.11. People were scared when the Windows 9x kernel was going to be replaced with the NT one for consumer versions of Windows, but I'm pretty sure most people wouldn't go back either. There was all kinds of panic about Vista, about how DRM and TPM support would make it unuseable, how UAC would break everything, the new taskbar, search system etc. Vista was a pretty bad OS but not for the reasons people feared, and the new stuff it introduced like UAC, the taskbar, search etc all work great with Windows 7.
I think you're commingling two things there and muddying the issue.
Change can be traumatic if it's handled badly, but it doesn't have to be. The problem I think a lot of folks have with Microsoft's UI changes is that they don't provide any kind of transition mechanism, and in the case of the likes of Office they seem to be hoping that they can both change the UI and then charge for training courses on how to use the new product, which is so far from the way everyone else would approach such a change as to be mind-boggling.
Vista in particular is not inherently a bad OS, but was lumbered with a bad start and takes a fair bit of tinkering to get properly operational. Even at that, though, there were obvious good ideas present that you could look at as reasons to migrate - UAC being a good example, ie MS finally trying to start addressing security hierarchies properly.
In the same way, 7 is basically admitted by everyone to be "Vista with the bugs fixed". It works fine. But in the time since 7 launched, I don't see that the way people use non-touch computing devices has changed so much that the new UI is required, and frankly to suggest that people are too thick to handle more than one type of interface is to ignore the fact that all of us deal with a half a dozen or more computer interfaces on a daily basis - between your Sky Box or equivalent, your TV, a bank ATM, your thermostat and your mobile, it quickly becomes apparent that this argument is bollocks.I think an OS needs to grow and evolve, or else it becomes stale and irrelevant. It can't just be a pointless update to run on our 5 year old desktops and laptops, it needs to be designed to work with whatever we are using in 5 years time. Although I'd expect that, like with many Microsoft products, version 1 of a concept is quickly replaced with a hugely improved version, and with Windows 9 we will see a hugely improved version of the Metro concept, that will make everybody happy. But Windows 8 is still a necessary step along that path.
I actually got to play with one of the Samsung developer tablets with Windows 8 and Office 13 the other day. I was hugely impressed with it. Performance was excellent, it opened and searched a large outlook mailbox with ease, ran Word and Excel ever bit as well as my laptop, browsing the net was very fast and responsive (despite being tethered to my phone for connectivity). And of course general OS usage, browsing files etc was all very snappy. From what I remember they were Core i5 chips with 4GB RAM, plenty for most peoples needs, and don't forget that is a year old device. It certainly didn't feel hobbled Obviously a lower end ARM tablet won't perform as well, but that has always been the PC philosophy, a range of options to suit everybody's needs.
And it all worked really well with touch, I was easily able to navigate Outlook, read emails, tap out a quick reply, edit Word docs and spreadsheets etc. I know people are mostly concerned about how it works with a keyboard and mouse. To me at least, the sacrifice has been worth it to gain this level of touch functionality. Though I have to admit, from trying Win 8 on my laptop, I don't really mind it with a KB and mouse. I have to relearn a few habits, but it didn't take me long to start working as quickly and fluidly as I would with Windows 7.
I'm skeptical about the store too. I like the general idea, but don't really know enough about the implementation. I don't know what they are doing around updates with it, but they would be missing a huge opportunity if they didn't put in something like PSI.
The thing is, though:
the tablet marketplace that Microsoft perceive to exist is the niche where neither laptops nor phones really cut the mustard (the latter are too small, the former too big and require both hands). What you've just described sounds lovely, yes, but it is something that would replace a laptop, not supplement it. And have a price tag to match, and Christ only knows what in terms of support offerings.
The lower-end stuff like WoA is where it gets interesting, but at the same time performance concerns kick in and frankly I'd rather have seen WinPho8 ported across to that hardware and performing excellently (perhaps with the developers of Documents To Go brought in to help with the Mobile version of Office?) than what we're likely to get, which is more hardware that can run it in an ok but unexceptional fashion (reinforcing the whole "ugh, this OS sucks" aspect because MS insist on using retardedly low minimum specs).
In the context of my role, here are the concerns I have:- What's the battery life like, and can they be swapped out by the end user? (High power processors + full-screen multitouch interface + full version of windows = arse battery life, at a guess)
- What's the cost like? (Unless it's substantially under a grand, it's price-uncompetitive with a laptop, especially when you factor in the docks etc that you need to be able to offer it as a realistic alternative to a laptop)
- What's the support like? (Of the various reasons I regularly curse Apple, far and away the most prevalent is the turd-like nature of their after-sale hardware support. 1-2 weeks collect-and-return/"Go to the apple shop" turnaround time is simply unacceptable as far as I'm concerned for a warranty hardware repair, especially when other vendors offer NBD onsite coverage. If the iPad in the enterprise is the competition here, good support is critical. ANd that's before you get to things like Full Lifecycle Management and the like, policies which in my current place of employment require us to purchase only equipment which can be guaranteed to be fit for purpuse and warranty-protected for at least 3, preferably 5, years...any notion of refreshing the range every 12-18 months isn't going to work)
- What's the benefit? (As with the iPad, I've had many arguments with folks about this. I can sort of see the benefit to developers, and to Microsoft, but what about for the people expected to buy it? "It's shiny" doesn't cut the mustard. "It'll impress clients" is a fair enough answer, but if it's a public relations/client relationship management issue then it comes out of sales budgets. "It lets me work on the go" however is a bollox answer, because a laptop would do just as well but likely have a better long-term lifespan).
- What, if any, is the migration path? (Unless they've given substantial thought to people moving their existing hardware to Win8, they're stuck waiting on enterprise hardware replacement cycles and given both Win7's relative youth and quality and the feasibility of keeping hardware from the last 24 months running for another 5 years without a serious performance hit, that is unlikely to mean many make the jump).
There are probably more, but to be honest those questions are already enough to have me thinking "Switch to it as primary OS on the day of launch? **** no!"...0 -
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Change is good. I remember clearly using DOS and Windows 3.11 frequently and then Windows 95 came along and it seemed so different. However my overriding memory of that now is that what made it successful was that it worked and seemed intuitive. Perhaps I'm looking back through rose-tinted glasses or I'm too stuck in my ways, but Windows 8 so far hasn't had the same effect.
Maybe they're planning a new coke, classic coke campaign 0 -
Advertisement
-
![[Deleted User]](/applications/dashboard/design/images/defaulticon.png)
Advertisement