Once those forum doubters have died there will be a new generation using W8 and moaning about W9....It's what they do on forums.
I've been working in computers for the last 20 years I've never seen an operating system get so universally bashed and get such bad word of mouth, especially from IT pro's.
Windows 8 is an unintuitive pile of crap. To make it usable on a laptop or desktop I would simply have to hack it with a bunch of third party apps. Windows 7 on the other hand got praised quite highly, it fixed ( sort of ) the horrendous performance issues with vista and had a nice clean understandable interface which was a progressive step up from XP
Microsoft are lucky they pre-install on new consumer laptops, so the user doesn't have a choice when they go into PC world.
I've been working in computers for the last 20 years I've never seen an operating system get so universally bashed and get such bad word of mouth, especially from IT pro's.
Windows 8 is an unintuitive pile of crap. To make it usable on a laptop or desktop I would simply have to hack it with a bunch of third party apps. Windows 7 on the other hand got praised quite highly, it fixed ( sort of ) the horrendous performance issues with vista and had a nice clean understandable interface which was a progressive step up from XP
Microsoft are lucky they pre-install on new consumer laptops, so the user doesn't have a choice when they go into PC world.
That's the problem, IT Professionals and geeks just don't see it as intuitive because it doesn't work how they want to use it. If you give it to a complete novice or a child then, at least the ones I know, just sail through it with no problem.
Third party apps were used in W7 by plenty of people who wanted to tweak it.
I don't say there is not room for some improvements. Blue may provide some answers for those looking, or it may not.
I know we will never agree, but I understand your point.
As for PC world and the like......They know no better. With the Desktop I just bought there was a choice of operating system. But most people aren't going to bother with anything else except the high street.
I've been working in computers for the last 20 years I've never seen an operating system get so universally bashed and get such bad word of mouth, especially from IT pro's.
Windows 8 is an unintuitive pile of crap. To make it usable on a laptop or desktop I would simply have to hack it with a bunch of third party apps. Windows 7 on the other hand got praised quite highly, it fixed ( sort of ) the horrendous performance issues with vista and had a nice clean understandable interface which was a progressive step up from XP
Microsoft are lucky they pre-install on new consumer laptops, so the user doesn't have a choice when they go into PC world.
An "IT Pro" would know that installing a piece of software =! "hacking Windows".
I use Windows 7 at work all day and then Windows 8 on my laptop at home. Windows 7 is perfectly serviceable and Windows 8 in desktop mode feels pretty much the same except the taskbar is cleaner as it doesn't have a rarely used start button.
Whilst I use it on a single laptop, only occasionally using it with an external monitor, my Dad uses it on a Windows 8 desktop all day every day on a three-monitor setup alongside a windows 7 laptop connected with an external monitor (so 5 screens in total - he is a financial trader and so has lots of charts to display).
An "IT Pro" told him oh windows 8 is terrible, don't use that. Thankfully, he listened to me instead, not only does Windows 8 boot faster, it has much better multi-monitor support e.g. the taskbar appears and runs on every monitor the same, it doesn't matter which one is primary, secondary and tertiary and he experiences no disadvantage in using that desktop. He is perfectly able to compare given that he uses a Windows 8 machine and Windows 7 machine side-by-side every day.
In my line of work, I've come across many IT Pros and, suffice to say, sometimes they just don't know a lot. They often don't know much beyond their jobs whether it is as a DB admin or technology consultant or whatever. Just working in IT for a living doesn't automatically make you "in the know" or give you an opinion more valuable than others. If you've used something then your opinion has only similar weight to someone else who has used it.
Not related to your post but wanted to say the following:
I've done a lot of reading about Mac and OS X recently as the other viable alternative because it gets so much praise by many people. Yet, everywhere I go, I keep reading about all these keyboard shortcuts they recommend using and learning and third-party software they recommend installing because the core OS doesn't have it all (e.g. Alfred) or they don't like the way it does it.
Yet for Windows, everyone wants all choice, options and configurations embedded, they want everything to be mouse-driven etc. Double standards.
I use Windows 7 at work all day and then Windows 8 on my laptop at home. Windows 7 is perfectly serviceable and Windows 8 in desktop mode feels pretty much the same except the taskbar is cleaner as it doesn't have a rarely used start button.
If there is no start button, it cannot be "rarely used", it cannot be used at all if it isn't there. But there's a start button on my Windows 8 setup as I have 'hacked it' with Classic Shell and I use it constantly for many things; it is far easier to use for me than using Metro.
But, horses for courses. Some people clearly seem to like big buttons and I have no problem with that. My SOLE objection to Windows 8 is the absence of a built-in 'classic' front-end option - the absence of choice. I will NOT have MS telling me what to do and how to use their software based on their fancy whim (without a legacy option) and I suspect that most of the anti-Metro brigade feel much the same.
Note that I said anti-Metro not anti-Windows 8. The distinction is important.
Can only speak for myself,my Vista Laptop screen broke 2 months back, so had to decide on buying a win 7 or 8. looked up all the feedback on win8 and didn't like what i read.went down to currys and looked on you tube for demonstrations, Am sure their are millions who love win8 but i would never use half of it, all the apps are a waste of space for me, so it's no use saying just ignore them,decided on win 7 and found all the bargains have gone and win7 laptops are more expensive than win 8,?
Decided to rig a Pc Monitor to my old Vista Laptop and everything's running fine. so without doubt microsoft have made a massive mistake bringing win 8 out. making so many of their customers unhappy is not good business.
Can only speak for myself,my Vista Laptop screen broke 2 months back, so had to decide on buying a win 7 or 8. looked up all the feedback on win8 and didn't like what i read.went down to currys and looked on you tube for demonstrations, Am sure their are millions who love win8 but i would never use half of it, all the apps are a waste of space for me, so it's no use saying just ignore them,decided on win 7 and found all the bargains have gone and win7 laptops are more expensive than win 8,?
Decided to rig a Pc Monitor to my old Vista Laptop and everything's running fine. so without doubt microsoft have made a massive mistake bringing win 8 out. making so many of their customers unhappy is not good business.
I agree. From what I've read your experience is a fairly common one. It's not the IT professionals who are driving the negative response, it's ordinary consumers.
People expect things to work "out of the box" these days. It's no good saying...It'll work ok if you download so and so. Many people, despite what a few posters here have said, don't find Win8 intuitive. It has a UI that was designed for touch screen, but sales of touch screen PC's and Laptops haven't taken off.
So for many people Metro is just "there", an irritant they didn't want. Yes, they can work round it. But why the hell should they have to ? Why not just have the best version of each OS on the appropriate device. I'm no expert, but presumably Win8 without Metro would be an improved version of Win7 ?..why not give people that option.
ps..Another thing. I can't imagine the bad publicity has done much for the sales of Surface and Nokia. The Win8 version used on those devices may be superb, I don't know. But why not let consumers make up their own minds if they want to go down that route with larger screen devices. They may have been pleasantly surprised and found that people were prepared to buy into an integrated system. But now they have to get around the animosity caused by trying to ram it down people's throats.
Actually, when I saw the UI for the first time, I honestly thought that it was some children's app left on screen by a previous customer. I couldn't believe that anyone would design such a garish, ugly interface for adults.
Actually, when I saw the UI for the first time, I honestly thought that it was some children's app left on screen by a previous customer. I couldn't believe that anyone would design such a garish, ugly interface for adults.
I think Windows 8 looks as though it has been designed by Playskool for 3 year olds. It's vile. "Oh look, shall we see what's behind the blue tile?" At least Mac OS X and most Linux distros with a GUI (eg Ubuntu) have a usable desktop and none of this Duplo crap.
That's the problem, IT Professionals and geeks just don't see it as intuitive because it doesn't work how they want to use it. If you give it to a complete novice or a child then, at least the ones I know, just sail through it with no problem.
Third party apps were used in W7 by plenty of people who wanted to tweak it.
I don't say there is not room for some improvements. Blue may provide some answers for those looking, or it may not.
I know we will never agree, but I understand your point.
As for PC world and the like......They know no better. With the Desktop I just bought there was a choice of operating system. But most people aren't going to bother with anything else except the high street.
If IT pro's take a while to figure out the UI and get frustrated then someone not au fait with computers is likely to find it confusing. Stuff like the non-sensical hot corners and charm bars etc are a big old mess. Particularly annoying if you are using multiple monitors. Again you would probably want to do some registry hack to disable that nonsense.
It certainly is hacking the OS if you are installing third party apps to give you back the traditional start menu that you get in windows 7.
In actual fact a co-worker purchased a new laptop for his 6 year old daughter and she seems to find it very frustrating and unintuitive so I'm not buying the argument that kids will just pick it up. the Metro or modern interface does look very fisher price so perhaps it might appeal to the under 5's ?
I seriously hope MS doesn't continue the whole Metro trend in future versions of Windows. Even if there was a way to disable it entirely and return to normal desktop experience, that would be so much better.
Some of the changes in 8.. I really do like such as the new toolbars thingies in explorer. I kinda like the theme too, the flat and boring style is growing on me.
Windows 7 will definitely be the new XP, hanging round for the next decade or perhaps even longer depending on how much MS listens to our feedback regarding the vile changes.
I seriously hope MS doesn't continue the whole Metro trend in future versions of Windows. Even if there was a way to disable it entirely and return to normal desktop experience, that would be so much better.
Some of the changes in 8.. I really do like such as the new toolbars thingies in explorer. I kinda like the theme too, the flat and boring style is growing on me.
Windows 7 will definitely be the new XP, hanging round for the next decade or perhaps even longer depending on how much MS listens to our feedback regarding the vile changes.
So you like W8 but not the start screen.....So don't use it and enjoy W8. Many people who are using it don't see anything but the desktop and use it exactly as they did in 7.
Personally I use a mix of both on my PC, but mainly it's used as my W7 laptop was....No problems so far.
So you like W8 but not the start screen.....So don't use it and enjoy W8.
That's fine at the moment, but there are reports that the upcoming Blue update might disable some or all of the functionality of the utilities which for many people transform Windows 8 from unacceptable to tolerable - plus concerns that MS might still plan to remove the desktop and the ability to run EXE programs in a future version of Windows.
So you like W8 but not the start screen.....So don't use it and enjoy W8. Many people who are using it don't see anything but the desktop and use it exactly as they did in 7.
Personally I use a mix of both on my PC, but mainly it's used as my W7 laptop was....No problems so far.
There are other things that I don't like too much as well. I'm a software developer and I just can't work as efficiently as I do in Windows 7 but my job means I need to keep on top of the latest technology so I reluctantly have to use Metro at times and it's so frustrating.
Granted, the third party Start Menu applications make Windows 8 much more usable.
I'm dreading future versions of Windows because I fear they will further 'metrofy' it. Metro is fantastic for tablets but not desktops.
Visual Studio 2012 is equally horrendous with the gray flat theme they've got going on. It literally hurts my eyes and I personally find it impossible to work with, for lengthy projects. For the first time ever, I'm seriously disappointed in Microsoft.
plus concerns that MS might still plan to remove the desktop and the ability to run EXE programs in a future version of Windows.
They're committing suicide if they do. Metro is a joke for anyone who wants to do anything resembling real work on their computer. Maybe is fine for people whose computer use is nothing more than Facebook and Angry Birds, but it's a disaster for the rest of us.
"IDC: Global PC shipments plunge in worst drop in a generation. Sure, a lot of that was due to the growth of tablets and smartphones and the rise of the cloud, but Windows 8 gets to take a lot of the blame too. After all, the debate wasn't whether or not Windows 8 was any good. It's not. The debate was over whether it could be saved.'"
I think Windows can be saved, but Microsoft will probably end up with indigestion with the mountain of humble pie they will have to consume.
Indeed, I was going to mention a similar reports on other tech pages. IMO they won't disable any of the third party apps. I have an open mind as to whether they will add there own start button for non touch users.
Only time will tell and there are more important issues to worry about until then....:)
There are other things that I don't like too much as well. I'm a software developer and I just can't work as efficiently as I do in Windows 7 but my job means I need to keep on top of the latest technology so I reluctantly have to use Metro at times and it's so frustrating.
Granted, the third party Start Menu applications make Windows 8 much more usable.
I'm dreading future versions of Windows because I fear they will further 'metrofy' it. Metro is fantastic for tablets but not desktops.
Visual Studio 2012 is equally horrendous with the gray flat theme they've got going on. It literally hurts my eyes and I personally find it impossible to work with, for lengthy projects. For the first time ever, I'm seriously disappointed in Microsoft.
Yes I have to trial visual studio 2012 shortly for our .net projects. It seems the menu system is all capitals by default?
I think Microsoft have gone mad, well if you look at some youtube vids of Steve Ballmer perhaps they have.
Comments
I've been working in computers for the last 20 years I've never seen an operating system get so universally bashed and get such bad word of mouth, especially from IT pro's.
Windows 8 is an unintuitive pile of crap. To make it usable on a laptop or desktop I would simply have to hack it with a bunch of third party apps. Windows 7 on the other hand got praised quite highly, it fixed ( sort of ) the horrendous performance issues with vista and had a nice clean understandable interface which was a progressive step up from XP
Microsoft are lucky they pre-install on new consumer laptops, so the user doesn't have a choice when they go into PC world.
Third party apps were used in W7 by plenty of people who wanted to tweak it.
I don't say there is not room for some improvements. Blue may provide some answers for those looking, or it may not.
I know we will never agree, but I understand your point.
As for PC world and the like......They know no better. With the Desktop I just bought there was a choice of operating system. But most people aren't going to bother with anything else except the high street.
An "IT Pro" would know that installing a piece of software =! "hacking Windows".
I use Windows 7 at work all day and then Windows 8 on my laptop at home. Windows 7 is perfectly serviceable and Windows 8 in desktop mode feels pretty much the same except the taskbar is cleaner as it doesn't have a rarely used start button.
Whilst I use it on a single laptop, only occasionally using it with an external monitor, my Dad uses it on a Windows 8 desktop all day every day on a three-monitor setup alongside a windows 7 laptop connected with an external monitor (so 5 screens in total - he is a financial trader and so has lots of charts to display).
An "IT Pro" told him oh windows 8 is terrible, don't use that. Thankfully, he listened to me instead, not only does Windows 8 boot faster, it has much better multi-monitor support e.g. the taskbar appears and runs on every monitor the same, it doesn't matter which one is primary, secondary and tertiary and he experiences no disadvantage in using that desktop. He is perfectly able to compare given that he uses a Windows 8 machine and Windows 7 machine side-by-side every day.
In my line of work, I've come across many IT Pros and, suffice to say, sometimes they just don't know a lot. They often don't know much beyond their jobs whether it is as a DB admin or technology consultant or whatever. Just working in IT for a living doesn't automatically make you "in the know" or give you an opinion more valuable than others. If you've used something then your opinion has only similar weight to someone else who has used it.
Not related to your post but wanted to say the following:
I've done a lot of reading about Mac and OS X recently as the other viable alternative because it gets so much praise by many people. Yet, everywhere I go, I keep reading about all these keyboard shortcuts they recommend using and learning and third-party software they recommend installing because the core OS doesn't have it all (e.g. Alfred) or they don't like the way it does it.
Yet for Windows, everyone wants all choice, options and configurations embedded, they want everything to be mouse-driven etc. Double standards.
If there is no start button, it cannot be "rarely used", it cannot be used at all if it isn't there. But there's a start button on my Windows 8 setup as I have 'hacked it' with Classic Shell and I use it constantly for many things; it is far easier to use for me than using Metro.
But, horses for courses. Some people clearly seem to like big buttons and I have no problem with that. My SOLE objection to Windows 8 is the absence of a built-in 'classic' front-end option - the absence of choice. I will NOT have MS telling me what to do and how to use their software based on their fancy whim (without a legacy option) and I suspect that most of the anti-Metro brigade feel much the same.
Note that I said anti-Metro not anti-Windows 8. The distinction is important.
Decided to rig a Pc Monitor to my old Vista Laptop and everything's running fine. so without doubt microsoft have made a massive mistake bringing win 8 out. making so many of their customers unhappy is not good business.
Very well put. From my point of view I would add I REALLY miss the Aero interface, and the arguments against it don't stack up for me.
I agree. From what I've read your experience is a fairly common one. It's not the IT professionals who are driving the negative response, it's ordinary consumers.
People expect things to work "out of the box" these days. It's no good saying...It'll work ok if you download so and so. Many people, despite what a few posters here have said, don't find Win8 intuitive. It has a UI that was designed for touch screen, but sales of touch screen PC's and Laptops haven't taken off.
So for many people Metro is just "there", an irritant they didn't want. Yes, they can work round it. But why the hell should they have to ? Why not just have the best version of each OS on the appropriate device. I'm no expert, but presumably Win8 without Metro would be an improved version of Win7 ?..why not give people that option.
ps..Another thing. I can't imagine the bad publicity has done much for the sales of Surface and Nokia. The Win8 version used on those devices may be superb, I don't know. But why not let consumers make up their own minds if they want to go down that route with larger screen devices. They may have been pleasantly surprised and found that people were prepared to buy into an integrated system. But now they have to get around the animosity caused by trying to ram it down people's throats.
Yes, they should put one in every box.
Actually, when I saw the UI for the first time, I honestly thought that it was some children's app left on screen by a previous customer. I couldn't believe that anyone would design such a garish, ugly interface for adults.
Haha true
I think Windows 8 looks as though it has been designed by Playskool for 3 year olds. It's vile. "Oh look, shall we see what's behind the blue tile?"
If IT pro's take a while to figure out the UI and get frustrated then someone not au fait with computers is likely to find it confusing. Stuff like the non-sensical hot corners and charm bars etc are a big old mess. Particularly annoying if you are using multiple monitors. Again you would probably want to do some registry hack to disable that nonsense.
It certainly is hacking the OS if you are installing third party apps to give you back the traditional start menu that you get in windows 7.
In actual fact a co-worker purchased a new laptop for his 6 year old daughter and she seems to find it very frustrating and unintuitive so I'm not buying the argument that kids will just pick it up. the Metro or modern interface does look very fisher price so perhaps it might appeal to the under 5's ?
Some of the changes in 8.. I really do like such as the new toolbars thingies in explorer. I kinda like the theme too, the flat and boring style is growing on me.
Windows 7 will definitely be the new XP, hanging round for the next decade or perhaps even longer depending on how much MS listens to our feedback regarding the vile changes.
Personally I use a mix of both on my PC, but mainly it's used as my W7 laptop was....No problems so far.
It's pretty obvious that TheBigM wasn't referring to the start button in W8....
There are other things that I don't like too much as well. I'm a software developer and I just can't work as efficiently as I do in Windows 7 but my job means I need to keep on top of the latest technology so I reluctantly have to use Metro at times and it's so frustrating.
Granted, the third party Start Menu applications make Windows 8 much more usable.
I'm dreading future versions of Windows because I fear they will further 'metrofy' it. Metro is fantastic for tablets but not desktops.
Visual Studio 2012 is equally horrendous with the gray flat theme they've got going on. It literally hurts my eyes and I personally find it impossible to work with, for lengthy projects. For the first time ever, I'm seriously disappointed in Microsoft.
They're committing suicide if they do. Metro is a joke for anyone who wants to do anything resembling real work on their computer. Maybe is fine for people whose computer use is nothing more than Facebook and Angry Birds, but it's a disaster for the rest of us.
ZDNET : "Windows: It's over"
"IDC: Global PC shipments plunge in worst drop in a generation. Sure, a lot of that was due to the growth of tablets and smartphones and the rise of the cloud, but Windows 8 gets to take a lot of the blame too. After all, the debate wasn't whether or not Windows 8 was any good. It's not. The debate was over whether it could be saved.'"
I think Windows can be saved, but Microsoft will probably end up with indigestion with the mountain of humble pie they will have to consume.
"Microsoft's Windows 8 Plan B(lue): Bring back the Start button, boot to desktop"
http://www.zdnet.com/microsofts-windows-8-plan-blue-bring-back-the-start-button-boot-to-desktop-7000014075/
Indeed, I was going to mention a similar reports on other tech pages. IMO they won't disable any of the third party apps. I have an open mind as to whether they will add there own start button for non touch users.
Only time will tell and there are more important issues to worry about until then....:)
Yes I have to trial visual studio 2012 shortly for our .net projects. It seems the menu system is all capitals by default?
I think Microsoft have gone mad, well if you look at some youtube vids of Steve Ballmer perhaps they have.
http://www.theverge.com/2013/4/16/4229900/windows-8-1-boot-to-desktop-option
It should have been an option from the beginning, especially for business users.