Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Windows 8 will fail?
- Thread starter Black Magic
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
How so? Plenty of OEMs kept installing XP post-vista and MS had to extend the support period for Windows XP.
Windows 7 is only 3 years old and XP was 5-6 years old at the time of Vista's release....
Windows 7 won't be going anywhere for quite a while I should think.
----------
Nice try. Win2k was not a consumer targeted release and win98 and win2k are not even on the same OS lines (NT line vs Win 3.1 line).
The comparison you should be making is XP to Vista (5-6 years) but then even during the 3 year period between Vista and 7 many OEMs were still providing Windows XP.
I'm not even sure why you are being attack about the Ballmer comment you made. You were actually answering a question I asked in the original post.
The thing that everyone forgets is that you can use the metro start screen just like the start menu.
Boot up into Windows, have your old school programs pinned to the start menu. The first thing you see if the start screen, you click on the program you want (say, Word) and word launches on the desktop.
It's literally no different from Windows 95 where you could set the start menu to show automatically at startup.
Boot up into Windows, have your old school programs pinned to the start menu. The first thing you see if the start screen, you click on the program you want (say, Word) and word launches on the desktop.
It's literally no different from Windows 95 where you could set the start menu to show automatically at startup.
You mean except for the fact that it isn't a start menu and it takes up the whole screen?
IMO w8 will run great on tablets and phones but on laptops and desk tops (vastly non touch screen machines) will be very clumsy. But once it is released we will see what the customers think.
Shorter than the 5 year gap between XP and Vista.
That was an anomaly - not the way things usually go.
Win 3.0 -> 3.1 -> 95 -> 98 -> 2k -> xp were all about 3 year gaps (or less)
Vista -> 7 = 3 year gap
XP to Vista blew out because security on XP was so bad they had to do a major os re-write in XP SP2 which took development resources away from what became Vista.
if you count XP SP2 as a different OS version to XP rtm (and it was very, very different) then the typical 3 year gap is reasonably consistent.
I am undecided on Windows 8 yet, so not sure about whether it will fail or not, I haven't used it much and am not a huge fan of this metro stuff but it's different
I like changes in some of these things
for phones I went from iPhone to BB to Android
for desktop I went from Windows XP to OS X and now thinking of going back to Windows to try version 8
I like changes in some of these things
for phones I went from iPhone to BB to Android
for desktop I went from Windows XP to OS X and now thinking of going back to Windows to try version 8
Ms offers a full 90 day demo of the final version windows 8 to try.
I installed it on a 6 year old Pentium 4 box. At first I thought MS had made a terrible mistake, I hated it, but then I took the time to learn the new ways of doing things and I enjoyed it much more.
Its clearly better for tablets but I'm using it on a TV where the interface works much better too with full screen easy to access apps.
So I went from thinking it would fail to thinking its a move MS had to make to succeed it a fading Traditional PC market.
RT may struggle since it cant run existing programs, but not windows 8.
Oh for pete's sake... just press a single key and the start screen goes off into oblivion.
Or... just start typing what you want to do and press ENTER.
Or... use one of the windows hacks that will bypass the start screen and even put a start menu on the Win8 task bar. (I'll even go so far as to guarantee the one day MS will actually add the ability to skip the start screen altogether).
I've been well and truly sucked into the Apple ecosystem, but having played with Windows 8 RP in a VM on my iMac I think it will do very well.
Don't understand peoples "desktop" comments unless they'll miss their fancy pictures and hundreds of unnecessary icons. Looks to me like Microsoft are trying to move the game forward again after several years of stagnation (is W7 that much different to XP, or even 95?) and I think this might just do it.
Don't understand peoples "desktop" comments unless they'll miss their fancy pictures and hundreds of unnecessary icons. Looks to me like Microsoft are trying to move the game forward again after several years of stagnation (is W7 that much different to XP, or even 95?) and I think this might just do it.
Even though i'm primarily an OSX user, I use Windows at work, and i'm sure I will continue to do so in the future. I hope Windows 8 turns out to be a success. PC sales are slumping, and this release is very crucial for Microsoft. We need competition in the marketplace.
I don't plan to use Win8, but if I ever did, I'd probably opt to install one of the hacks that bypass the start screen and puts back the start menu.
However, what I find annoying about Win8 is how it keeps dumping me back and forth between the traditional Windows interface and the new "previously known as Metro but now known as Modern" interface. I was trying out a preview release of Win8, and I was especially annoyed at how some control settings were in the Modern interface and some were using the traditional interface, so to fully configure my system, I needed to keep swapping between the two interfaces. I'm not fond of the flat square look of Modern, but I could get used to it if it was the only thing I had to look at. But every so often I get dumped back into the traditional interface whether I want to or not. If I say, **** this, I'll just stay in desktop mode all the time... Well, can't do that either, every so often I get dumped into Modern. Very irritating. At least on Lion / Mountain Lion, you can totally avoid Launcher if you want, and when you do invoke it, it doesn't look out of place -- it uses the same basic design aesthetics as the rest of the OS X interface.
Without Metro or whatever you call it now, what is Windows 8? I think Metro has to be one of the big selling points to anyone adopting the OS.
Businesses will be requesting Windows 7 for a long time from Dell, HP, Lenovo etc. Sure consumers will get Windows 8 on devices and new PC's, but then again the consumer PC market is not exactly thriving right now.
Hopefully for Microsoft those consumers will drive the latter business adoption of the OS, much the way consumers drove the iPhone and iPad into business.
Businesses will be requesting Windows 7 for a long time from Dell, HP, Lenovo etc. Sure consumers will get Windows 8 on devices and new PC's, but then again the consumer PC market is not exactly thriving right now.
Hopefully for Microsoft those consumers will drive the latter business adoption of the OS, much the way consumers drove the iPhone and iPad into business.
Metro on the desktop doesn't work for me. I actually prefer Windows 7 and all the old school goodness like resizing Windows and such. Metro is cool on the phone and its tolerable on the XBOX.
On your second comment, surely you don't think the iPad Mini hype is exclusive to MacRumors do you?
I don't think it will fail ...
one thing for sure, Win8 its a lot faster and more fluid comparing to OSX, which IMHO has drastically degraded its style by forcing fake leather in their design.
Also the gestures in windows 8 makes a lot more sense than gestures in Mountain Lion.
Will probably buy logitech's trackpad, unless apple releases drivers for its magic trackpad and enable win8 gestures
http://www.logitech.com/en-us/promotions/win8-landing
I was excited with iCloud with cloud syncing, sadly Apple's implementation falls short since its mostly tied in their own service.
While Microsoft chose an open approach by embracing service we already use, like linkedin, facebook twitter, google account... You'll be amaze on how everything is pre populated when you first sign in your Microsoft account.
Oh about the cloud syncing? Win 8 sync these:
1) Pictures
2) Videos
3) Background, colors, account picture
4) Passwords
5) Language preferences
6) App Settings
7) Browser settings, history and favorites...
list go on and on, its what apple should have been. Microsoft really nailed this one. win8 is brilliant and gorgeous.
one thing for sure, Win8 its a lot faster and more fluid comparing to OSX, which IMHO has drastically degraded its style by forcing fake leather in their design.
Also the gestures in windows 8 makes a lot more sense than gestures in Mountain Lion.
Will probably buy logitech's trackpad, unless apple releases drivers for its magic trackpad and enable win8 gestures
http://www.logitech.com/en-us/promotions/win8-landing
I was excited with iCloud with cloud syncing, sadly Apple's implementation falls short since its mostly tied in their own service.
While Microsoft chose an open approach by embracing service we already use, like linkedin, facebook twitter, google account... You'll be amaze on how everything is pre populated when you first sign in your Microsoft account.
Oh about the cloud syncing? Win 8 sync these:
1) Pictures
2) Videos
3) Background, colors, account picture
4) Passwords
5) Language preferences
6) App Settings
7) Browser settings, history and favorites...
list go on and on, its what apple should have been. Microsoft really nailed this one.
win8 is brilliant and gorgeous.
You and others. That's why I think we'll see a MS-sanctioned method to disable/bypass it one day. For example, I can see where one could configure it based on the device that's currently using it. On a desktop machine you could disable it and boot right to the traditional desktop - complete with start menu. Or... when you detach the screen from your ultra-book or dock (thereby turning it into a tablet), it automatically switches to metro.
That said, I don't know why they haven't already done it. I suppose it's MS's way of forcing users to adapt to the new way of doing things.
It is them forcing people to use it. You could disable the Metro screen and bring back the old Start menu in the old developer preview via a registry hack, but they removed the work around afterwards.
...by completely removing the old start menu from the OS completely.
Though I do have one question. Yeah, the new Metro start screen does look different, but it performs exactly the same otherwise. To me, other than it quickly filling up the whole screen for a second, there are no disadvantages in using it. Why does everyone want the old start menu back so bad when the replacement works just as well?
I think people just have a hard time envisioning how they would actually use it. I say just load Win8 90 day trial up on a free partition, get the drivers for Win8, and try the OS with an open mind setting it up with your accounts and personalizing how you like. Most who do this actually come out saying its pretty good. Ive been running Win8 since consumer preview daily and its slowly gotten better as Microsoft worked on it and Win8 drivers like my trackpad driver that brings in new gestures showed up.
I can swipe in from the left to bring in the last app, swipe in from right to show the charms and time, swipe form top to bring up app bar, and 3 finger swipe to go forward or back.
Learning how to use and take advantage of Win8 is key and it wont happen if you dont give it a chance.
Attached a screenshot of my Start Screen how I do it. Putting all this hidden in a start menu is way harder than having it laid out on my Start Screen for this many things and I always can search by just typing.
Attachments
Last edited: