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| 'Paul's take on Windows 8' |
| By Thom Holwerda on 2012-10-03 22:21:45 |
| Paul Allen, one of Microsoft's co-founders who left the company long ago, has posted on his blog about his experiences with Windows 8. He (surprise) likes it, but he does note a number of shortcomings and oddities - all of which are spot-on. However, he fails to address the core issue with Windows 8: it's forcing users to drill a small hole in the wall with a belt sander. |
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| Musings about Metro |
| By WorknMan on 2012-10-03 23:34:53 |
|
The thing about Metro is that it's rather pointless for power users/geeks to criticize it, because the fact of the matter is that it's simply not made for us, and thus we're not the ones who are going to decide its fate. The REAL test for Metro is when the millions of tech tards get their hands on it. If they like it, it it wll be a success as far as MS is concerned. If not, MS is going to be in a world of hurt. Of course, I can't imagine anybody liking Metro, whether they're computer literate or not. (I'm still advocating violence against the f--ktard who decided that horizontal scrolling was a good idea). But if there's one thing that the Wii and iPad have taught us is that techies don't know shit about what non-techies will or won't like. Do you remember when the iPad came out? Geeks around the world turned their noses up at it. 'Oh, this isn't OSX... it's just a big iPod Touch. It'll never sell.' Shows you how much we know, eh? So we'll just have to wait and see how well metro fares when the masses get a hold of it. 'BUT ... BUT ...', I hear you scream.... 'what about the rest of us?' Well, remember that Windows 7 is really nothing more than a natural evolution of Windows 1.0. So in regard to Metro, IF it is a hit with the masses, it's going to get better. Eventually it should mature to the point that MS can port full-blown versions of Visual Studio and MS Office to it, and then we can get some real apps on it. Perhaps by Windows 10? Who knows. But the point is that you're not going to install Windows 9 and find the desktop gone with Metro as it is now. MS may make dumb decisions sometimes, but they're not THAT stupid. If they were going to go this route, they would have done it in Windows 8. So basically, the point of this post is to say don't worry about Metro. And stop bitching about it too - at least on sites like this. When you post a rant about Metro on a tech site, you're just preaching to the choir. As it is, 95% of Metro can be avoided on Windows 8 if you want. And if having Metro act as a start menu offends you that much, either get a start menu replacement, or just stick with Windows 7. If you want to stick with a slower booting, slower running, less memory efficient OS just to have a popup start menu, more power to you. As for me? I'm taking the plunge. Native USB 3.0 support, taskbars on multiple monitors, native ISO mounting, hyper-V virtualization built in, a much improved task manger, etc. is worth the $40 upgrade price, IMO. Edited 2012-10-03 23:43 UTC |
 - Score: 10 |
| RE: Musings about Metro |
| By Thom_Holwerda on 2012-10-03 23:39:14 |
|
> . 'Oh, this isn't OSX... it's just a big iPod Touch. It'll never sell.' Shows you how much we know, eh? While your point is valid, I actually predicted it would sell like hotcakes ;). |
| - Score: 4 |
| No, Thom... |
| By ronaldst on 2012-10-04 00:01:07 |
|
You're not resistant to change. The apps aren't here yet. There are no Metro apps. No incentive. Most of the apps that comes with RTM are buggy and have not even reached parity with Mango apps. The Windows Store is empty. Microsoft Mahjong, while good, isn't enough. Once the Facebook, the Twitter and everything else comes along, people will warm up to the Modern UI. Once the feel part of the touch experience happens, the tablet debate will be over like it happened with the Mouse. For me, Metro is the most innovative (and I hate that prostituted word) UI advancement to happen in the last 20 years. Not cheap novelties like the Genie affect on Aqua or Live Wallpapers. I'd judge the situation at the end of the month instead of going all out this early. Worry after. Not now. This makes no sense to worry right now. The plumbing is fantastic. The product is rock solid. As for me, I use Windows 8 everyday. And I ain't going back to slow Windows 7. |
| - Score: 5 |
| Comment by jigzat |
| By jigzat on 2012-10-04 00:50:16 |
|
I have been using Windows 8 for some time and I have to say that it ain't that bad is just different. When the firs GUI's came up a lot of people complained pointing that the console was better and faster but it was a roadblock for most people, current GUI's have become bloated full of unnecessary options and features that are nice but barely used. Microsoft is trying hard and it is not a bad job and I'm a Mac OS X user by the way. Most people claim that "Metro" is designed with tablets in mind and that is only half true, the issue with W8 is the input method, a tiny cursor is incompatible and Metro could scale well to desktop with the addition of a different input method similar to Apple's Magic Trackpad and changing the accurate visual hint of the cursor with something less precise like a big highlight or a shadow that pops the current selected element, and also get rid of all the hidden panels, I seriously couldn't turn off the computer the first time, I had to Google it. Edited 2012-10-04 00:56 UTC |
| - Score: 3 |
| RE: Comment by jigzat |
| By WorknMan on 2012-10-04 01:38:35 |
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> current GUI's have become bloated full of unnecessary options and features that are nice but barely used. Translation: Power users don't matter anymore, so let's cater to the masses by dumbing down the interface. God forbid we actually come up with a solution that pleases everyone. > I'm a Mac OS X user by the way. LOL, if you like Metro, that explains a lot. |
| - Score: 6 |
| RE: Musings about Metro |
| By kaiwai on 2012-10-04 02:20:44 |
|
I'd call myself a geek/power user and I personally don't see anything negative about Metro although I am confused when Metro is geared towards tablets and consumers but then Office 365 goal is to get everyone using Office - from the fortune 500 company to Jane Home Maker. With that being said I guess Microsoft wishes to offer many options for the many different ways things can be done on Windows rather than the 'this is the way you do it and if you don't like it tough' approach that Apple seems to take when making decisions. I've loaded Windows 8 Enterprise trial on my ThinkPad X1 Carbon recently and the worse case scenario for many people it is the status quo with some minor tweaks. The biggest beneficiaries of Windows 8 will be tablet and phone users which in the case of me as soon as the Nokia Lumia 920 arrives in New Zealand. Apple was able to gain market share because the competition was so badly disorganised but with Microsoft finally got everything lined up coupled with success in the Android market what we'll see isn't a decline of Apple but a slowing down to maybe second or third place when it comes to high end smart phones (maybe we'll see their tablet market share decline - hard to turn down a similarly priced Windows RT tablet loaded with Office 2013 when compared to iPad which has none of that). Side note: I'm signed up for Microsoft's exchange service and for NZ$6.11 per month I get my domain email hosted and sorted out along with ActiveSync and Outlook Exchange support. Always up and working each and everytime so I wouldn't be surprised if the services devision sees and uptick in subscriptions especially by those organisations that wish to have only but the bare minimum sitting inside their organisation with email and other hosting handled by a service company. |
| - Score: 3 |
| Comment by Drumhellar |
| By Drumhellar on 2012-10-04 02:41:18 |
|
Thom, Which settings are accessible only through the classic desktop, and which of those are users likely to need to access? I ask only because I've been using almost exclusively the classic desktop since the developer preview came out, and anything I need to change I've avoided doing it via Metro. Also, I think that my exclusive use of classic is why I like 8 so much, and why I installed the RTM as soon as I was able to get my hand on it. If you focus on classic, there really aren't any significant differences, but those things that are different are improvements worth having. |
| - Score: 3 |
| RE: Comment by jigzat |
| By Drumhellar on 2012-10-04 03:06:50 |
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"Bloat" == "Features I don't use." But seriously, what features are you talking about? I tend to use new features, and only the bad ones I ignore. Hell, I even used Active Desktop for a while. |
| - Score: 3 |
| RE: Musings about Metro |
| By wojtek on 2012-10-04 05:29:41 |
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> The thing about Metro is that it's rather pointless for power users/geeks to criticize it, because the fact of the matter is that it's simply not made for us, and thus we're not the ones who are going to decide its fate. *THIS* A long time ago I setup a computer for my (quite comp illiterate parents)... When to think about it it was quite 'metro style' - I made desktop icons as big as possible (setting dpi do 150%, putting a few 'games icons', one icon subtitled 'internet' that launched browser :D), hide away all not nececery to use. Most of the time they use 'internet', so in the browser they have only back/stop and star page with huge tiles to favourite websites. they don't use browser tabs, just read and go back. I'm aware it's plain dumb, but it's easy, works for them and they don't anything more (and I don't need to explain). Bottomline - win8 could work quite well for them even with a pointer and 22" display. For me? I don't see myself using only one app at a time taking all the screen(s?) therefore currently I'm not inclined to try win8, however optimizations to the core are tempting (faster boot, better memory handling, etc) |
| - Score: 3 |
| 'Paul's Take on Windows 8'? |
| By eric_niebler on 2012-10-04 05:45:28 |
| More like: 'Thom's Rant on Windows 8'. |
| - Score: 4 |
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