But you don't need to understand why so many people rejected Windows 8's user interface, or even why it is so difficult to learn and so awkward to use.
Just accept those facts and move on.
That's just the point, I can move on, Windows has moved on but lot's of its users are unable to move on. Pretty sobering though depressing picture that is.
Windows 8.1. or whatever I have just found choosing 'which' laptop a nightmare.
If money was no object then no problem but my cousin told me not to worry too much nowadays they are a throw away commodity like a washing machine. So he said I wasn't to fall in love with it.....
So Windows 8.1 you have two XP users on your tail - one who is 68 and the other bless her my 92 year old Mum who said 'I'm having a new laptop'.
That's just the point, I can move on, Windows has moved on but lot's of its users are unable to move on. Pretty sobering though depressing picture that is.
Give it up mate. Most of the arguments used against Windows 8 are ludicrous, the desktop environment itself IS better than Windows 7 and that is a fact, but people are so blinded by that awfully complicated metro start screen that is actually piss easy to use if you take 5 minutes out of your day to learn it. If you use the desktop environment, very little has changed, other than it being easier to use and faster. I've long suspected the same people trumpeting Windows 7 were the same people who would quite like to go back to Windows 9x given half a chance.
The only thing I agree with is that it was an incoherent out of the box experience, particularly 8.0, and that is where much of the hate seems to come from, but people conveniently overlook the improvements (of which there are many), such is the intensity of their anger about losing their precious start menu
Give it up mate. Most of the arguments used against Windows 8 are ludicrous, the desktop environment itself IS better than Windows 7 and that is a fact, but people are so blinded by that awfully complicated metro start screen that is actually piss easy to use if you take 5 minutes out of your day to learn it. If you use the desktop environment, very little has changed, other than it being easier to use and faster. I've long suspected the same people trumpeting Windows 7 were the same people who would quite like to go back to Windows 9x given half a chance.
The only thing I agree with is that it was an incoherent out of the box experience, particularly 8.0, and that is where much of the hate seems to come from, but people conveniently overlook the improvements (of which there are many), such is the intensity of their anger about losing their precious start menu
You are of course correct. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. I'll soldier on with my difficult to use iMac, the treacherous Windows 8.1 and my alien to use iPad. Oh how I long for the simple times of my Spectrum ZX.
...people conveniently overlook the improvements (of which there are many), such is the intensity of their anger about losing their precious start menu
Naaah, we just install Classic Shell etc. Sorted.
Microsoft are still idiots though for shooting themselves in their commercial foot, and the differences, including performance, between Windows 8 and 7 (which I often dual boot to) are frankly, fairly minimal once you take Metro out of the equation. Most people should just use whichever is cheaper for them, and if they then dislike Metro, install Classic ShelI or similar.
There, however, big differences in performance between Windows XP and Windows 8 (or 7) 64 bit so I would encourage the remaining XP legions to upgrade to one or the other.
Give it up mate. Most of the arguments used against Windows 8 are ludicrous, the desktop environment itself IS better than Windows 7 and that is a fact, but people are so blinded by that awfully complicated metro start screen that is actually piss easy to use if you take 5 minutes out of your day to learn it. If you use the desktop environment, very little has changed, other than it being easier to use and faster. I've long suspected the same people trumpeting Windows 7 were the same people who would quite like to go back to Windows 9x given half a chance.
The only thing I agree with is that it was an incoherent out of the box experience, particularly 8.0, and that is where much of the hate seems to come from, but people conveniently overlook the improvements (of which there are many), such is the intensity of their anger about losing their precious start menu
I have to admit I was one of those who hated windows 8, but after my son bought a new laptop and I had a bit play with it I had it nailed with a couple of hours and the metro screen within 5 minutes. I even ended up buying a new latop for myself with touchscreen and the metro screen is so wonderful to use wuth touchscreen and when using desktop and surfing the web a touchscreen really does come into its own.
But the Desktop isn't broken in 8.1 quite the contrary, and let's face it, it's one press of the start button and your most used apps are there. Click on the arrow and all your familiar programmes fill the screen.
Leaving aside the welcome changes in 8.1 Update 1, and leaving aside anything that works so much better on touchscreens
The desktop start menu is not there.
The Metro-styled (and jarringly different and large) Charms Bar pops across if you accidentally move the mouse into the wrong area of the screen.
Without changing the defaults for some file types, Metro programs (and their jarringly different style) now appear as a window (better in update 1 than before in 8.1 when you got dumped to Metro, but not perfect).
So I would call that broken.
The fact that MS are changing it bit by bit so that it more properly reflects a true desktop environment is evidence that they too recognise that, as far as some of their customers are concerned, it is broken.
I had far more learning to do when I got my first Mac. The difference is I find the new learning experience exciting, whereas it appears most posters on here don't want a new learning experience.
Most PC users don't care one hoot about the MAC learning curve. In fact, they probably stick with windows because it is common AND it has been easy to adjust from version to version. You might have the time, energy and inclination to find the new learning exciting, but don't presume that others are the same. Other people might simply want to be able to do what they have always been able to do, quickly, efficiently and without much hassle,
But that's not an issue for me - I use Classic Shell for the start menu, and Charms Bar Killer to kill off any notion of the Charms Bar ever interrupting my work, and I'm happy. When Update 2 comes along and reinstates the proper start menu, I will probably dispense with Classic Shell (and if MS allow me to kill off Charms Bar as seems to be expected, I will dispense with Charms Bar killer as well.
As an aside, I have no great issue with a changed UI (I am happily using Firefox V29 Beta with the new Australis UI, and have quickly relearned my mouse movements to cater for the changes, and have only needed one additional addon to reinstate the Addons bar that Mozilla dispensed with), but what I do have an issue with is where there is changed functionality or where it becomes more cumbersome to do what I have always been able to do.
Use 8.1 and add start8 or classic shell etc and you get best of both worlds.
End of story.
It does puzzle when someone writes 'I use Classic Shell and never see the Modern Ui, so it's just like using W7', then they go on to pontificate in endless posts about the fact that they don't like MUI and it doesn't work for them.
Replacing the start menu with a TP App is nothing new. I had StartMenuX in Windows 7 as, I am sure thousands of others did.
............Awaits the barrage....:(
got the update yesterday and this morning, IE, chrome and FF aint responding, most apps aint working, only windows explorer, anyone experiencing this issue?
It does puzzle when someone writes 'I use Classic Shell and never see the Modern Ui, so it's just like using W7', then they go on to pontificate in endless posts about the fact that they don't like MUI and it doesn't work for them.
Two possible reasons:
Even with one of the utilities, there can be occasions where Metro messes things up.
There are plenty of Windows 8 users who haven't yet discovered the utilities.
As part of the installation process, before I could install Classic Shell, and before I found out about the intrusive and annoying Charms Bar, I had to use Win8.1 "out of the box", and that meant that I was faced with the Metro UI.
Even with CS and Charms Bar killer installed, Windows defaulted to the Metro Picture viewer, dumping me back to Metro. A number of other Windows programs also defaulted to Metro (until I installed my favoured third-party programs).
I had considered buying two Win7 licences (not OEM), but on balance I felt that Win8.1 was more cost-effective (I could buy a retail licence for Win8.1 whilst a retail licence for W7 was much more expensive), and Win8.1 would give me a longer MS support window.
It's an internet forum, people can discuss what they like (within forum rules).
In fact it seems it's the W8 likers/fanboys who seem to want to keep this thread going, with the dislikers having to defend their dislike.
What I don't understand is why don't the W8 likers/fanboys just stop reading this thread and get on with playing with their wonderful windows 8 computer?
It's an internet forum, people can discuss what they like (within forum rules).
In fact it seems it's the W8 likers/fanboys who seem to want to keep this thread going, with the dislikers having to defend their dislike.
What I don't understand is why don't the W8 likers/fanboys just stop reading this thread and get on with playing with their wonderful windows 8 computer?
Sorry, but bringing the term "fanboy" into the discussion (which is about Windows 8.1 Update 1 oddly enough) is only likely to inflame things, never mind that last sentence.
Sorry, but bringing the term "fanboy" into the discussion (which is about Windows 8.1 Update 1 oddly enough) is only likely to inflame things, never mind that last sentence.
But they come across as fanboys, whether they like it or not. And this has been about W8 not just 8.1.1.
So is it any wonder that it is about Windows 8.1 (and the forced update via Windows Update) and attracts comments from those already running Windows 8.1 Update 1.
Windows 8.1 users are, quite naturally, going to contribute, as will those with both positive and negative experiences and views.
got the update yesterday and this morning, IE, chrome and FF aint responding, most apps aint working, only windows explorer, anyone experiencing this issue?
My IE didn't work initially and it was MBAE Beta causing the SNAFU, so I'd try uninstalling your AV/AM and then reinstalling it.
Even with one of the utilities, there can be occasions where Metro messes things up.
There are plenty of Windows 8 users who haven't yet discovered the utilities.
Those who haven't discovered it yet won't have installed the utilities. Therefore they won't be doing what I said.
I've not had it mess anything up yet. No doubt we use the PC for different things, so, wouldn't doubt you may have had some difficulties you can't get round, for whatever reason.
So is it any wonder that it is about Windows 8.1 (and the forced update via Windows Update) and attracts comments from those already running Windows 8.1 Update 1.
Windows 8.1 users are, quite naturally, going to contribute, as will those with both positive and negative experiences and views.
But, if you never see it and it's never allowed on your pc, as claimed by some CS users, what is the point? They don't have negative experiences, so they say.
I guess nothing will change and we will all fall into one camp or the other. Rumours of Windows 8.1.2 in the Autumn will, no doubt add fuel to the fire.....
My IE didn't work initially and it was MBAE Beta causing the SNAFU, so I'd try uninstalling your AV/AM and then reinstalling it.
so i should uninstall my anti virus? i don't even know if i can access control panel. Tried opening the anti virus to scan for virus, that itself wouldn't open
The Metro-styled (and jarringly different and large) Charms Bar pops across if you accidentally move the mouse into the wrong area of the screen.
When using a mouse you have to take it to the top or bottom right corner of the screen and then drag down or up to bring up the Charms bar. That is a deliberate act.
The only way it could come up accidentally is if you have the mouse speed set too high, such that it zips around the screen out of control, or if you are in the habit of absent mindedly circling your mouse around the screen.
I understand the situation is different if you use a laptop touchpad with touch gestures enabled, but not with an actual mouse.
The other main operating systems, OSX and Linux have used the concept of 'hot corners' for years to bring up various functions. Windows is just catching up.
so i should uninstall my anti virus? i don't even know if i can access control panel. Tried opening the anti virus to scan for virus, that itself wouldn't open
Right-click the new, improved Start tile from the desktop to access a shortcut menu including the Control Panel. It's all Win 7-a-like from there.
Got to love the Windows 7 fanatics coming onto a thread explicity about Windows 8 and complaining about people talking about Windows 8... Not only that but calling us "fanboys". Moronic in the extreme particularly as the people happily using 8 have proved they can adapt to new things while the 7 fanatics seem to have extreme difficulty adjusting. Guess I shouldn't be surprised
Right-click the new, improved Start tile from the desktop to access a shortcut menu including the Control Panel. It's all Win 7-a-like from there.
Or the horrible [WIN] & will invoke the charms.
Thanks but left my pc and it went off (power saver) and turned it back on, left it on, turned it off turned it back on and its all fine now, thanks for the assistance
When using a mouse you have to take it to the top or bottom right corner of the screen and then drag down or up to bring up the Charms bar. That is a deliberate act.
Perhaps it was me then - I could accidentally set if off without trying, especially when I had momentarily lost the cursor on the screen (in a bright room) and began moving the mouse in order to pick it up. And when I wanted it to appear, it was hit & miss as to whether I could get the right gesture in the right part of the screen. As far as I could see, intuitive it was not (especially so with a keyboard & mouse), and it certainly did not assist me in carrying out my tasks. So off it went..
The only way it could come up accidentally is if you have the mouse speed set too high, such that it zips around the screen out of control, or if you are in the habit of absent mindedly circling your mouse around the screen.
Certainly not the former, maybe in part the latter as explained above. Whichever way, it happened more than enough times to be annoying, leading me to search out a way of killing it completely.
The other main operating systems, OSX and Linux have used the concept of 'hot corners' for years to bring up various functions. Windows is just catching up.
Seeing as such a concept is new to Windows, and windows users have managed quite well without it all of these years, it seems to be an addition that has not been missed.
But each to his own - Win8.1.1 works fine for me and my purposes now, regardless as to what should or should not happen from a MS point of view. At least we have the option to customise (or not) according to tastes & requirements (which has to be applauded surely).
Comments
That's just the point, I can move on, Windows has moved on but lot's of its users are unable to move on. Pretty sobering though depressing picture that is.
Windows 8.1. or whatever I have just found choosing 'which' laptop a nightmare.
If money was no object then no problem but my cousin told me not to worry too much nowadays they are a throw away commodity like a washing machine. So he said I wasn't to fall in love with it.....
So Windows 8.1 you have two XP users on your tail - one who is 68 and the other bless her my 92 year old Mum who said 'I'm having a new laptop'.
Give it up mate. Most of the arguments used against Windows 8 are ludicrous, the desktop environment itself IS better than Windows 7 and that is a fact, but people are so blinded by that awfully complicated metro start screen that is actually piss easy to use if you take 5 minutes out of your day to learn it. If you use the desktop environment, very little has changed, other than it being easier to use and faster. I've long suspected the same people trumpeting Windows 7 were the same people who would quite like to go back to Windows 9x given half a chance.
The only thing I agree with is that it was an incoherent out of the box experience, particularly 8.0, and that is where much of the hate seems to come from, but people conveniently overlook the improvements (of which there are many), such is the intensity of their anger about losing their precious start menu
You are of course correct. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. I'll soldier on with my difficult to use iMac, the treacherous Windows 8.1 and my alien to use iPad. Oh how I long for the simple times of my Spectrum ZX.
Naaah, we just install Classic Shell etc. Sorted.
Microsoft are still idiots though for shooting themselves in their commercial foot, and the differences, including performance, between Windows 8 and 7 (which I often dual boot to) are frankly, fairly minimal once you take Metro out of the equation. Most people should just use whichever is cheaper for them, and if they then dislike Metro, install Classic ShelI or similar.
There, however, big differences in performance between Windows XP and Windows 8 (or 7) 64 bit so I would encourage the remaining XP legions to upgrade to one or the other.
I have to admit I was one of those who hated windows 8, but after my son bought a new laptop and I had a bit play with it I had it nailed with a couple of hours and the metro screen within 5 minutes. I even ended up buying a new latop for myself with touchscreen and the metro screen is so wonderful to use wuth touchscreen and when using desktop and surfing the web a touchscreen really does come into its own.
The desktop start menu is not there.
The Metro-styled (and jarringly different and large) Charms Bar pops across if you accidentally move the mouse into the wrong area of the screen.
Without changing the defaults for some file types, Metro programs (and their jarringly different style) now appear as a window (better in update 1 than before in 8.1 when you got dumped to Metro, but not perfect).
So I would call that broken.
The fact that MS are changing it bit by bit so that it more properly reflects a true desktop environment is evidence that they too recognise that, as far as some of their customers are concerned, it is broken.
Most PC users don't care one hoot about the MAC learning curve. In fact, they probably stick with windows because it is common AND it has been easy to adjust from version to version. You might have the time, energy and inclination to find the new learning exciting, but don't presume that others are the same. Other people might simply want to be able to do what they have always been able to do, quickly, efficiently and without much hassle,
But that's not an issue for me - I use Classic Shell for the start menu, and Charms Bar Killer to kill off any notion of the Charms Bar ever interrupting my work, and I'm happy. When Update 2 comes along and reinstates the proper start menu, I will probably dispense with Classic Shell (and if MS allow me to kill off Charms Bar as seems to be expected, I will dispense with Charms Bar killer as well.
As an aside, I have no great issue with a changed UI (I am happily using Firefox V29 Beta with the new Australis UI, and have quickly relearned my mouse movements to cater for the changes, and have only needed one additional addon to reinstate the Addons bar that Mozilla dispensed with), but what I do have an issue with is where there is changed functionality or where it becomes more cumbersome to do what I have always been able to do.
Use 8.1 and add start8 or classic shell etc and you get best of both worlds.
End of story.
It does puzzle when someone writes 'I use Classic Shell and never see the Modern Ui, so it's just like using W7', then they go on to pontificate in endless posts about the fact that they don't like MUI and it doesn't work for them.
Replacing the start menu with a TP App is nothing new. I had StartMenuX in Windows 7 as, I am sure thousands of others did.
............Awaits the barrage....:(
Even with one of the utilities, there can be occasions where Metro messes things up.
There are plenty of Windows 8 users who haven't yet discovered the utilities.
As part of the installation process, before I could install Classic Shell, and before I found out about the intrusive and annoying Charms Bar, I had to use Win8.1 "out of the box", and that meant that I was faced with the Metro UI.
Even with CS and Charms Bar killer installed, Windows defaulted to the Metro Picture viewer, dumping me back to Metro. A number of other Windows programs also defaulted to Metro (until I installed my favoured third-party programs).
I had considered buying two Win7 licences (not OEM), but on balance I felt that Win8.1 was more cost-effective (I could buy a retail licence for Win8.1 whilst a retail licence for W7 was much more expensive), and Win8.1 would give me a longer MS support window.
Simple as that.
It's an internet forum, people can discuss what they like (within forum rules).
In fact it seems it's the W8 likers/fanboys who seem to want to keep this thread going, with the dislikers having to defend their dislike.
What I don't understand is why don't the W8 likers/fanboys just stop reading this thread and get on with playing with their wonderful windows 8 computer?
Sorry, but bringing the term "fanboy" into the discussion (which is about Windows 8.1 Update 1 oddly enough) is only likely to inflame things, never mind that last sentence.
But they come across as fanboys, whether they like it or not. And this has been about W8 not just 8.1.1.
Windows 8.1 Update 1 - April 8th 2014.
So is it any wonder that it is about Windows 8.1 (and the forced update via Windows Update) and attracts comments from those already running Windows 8.1 Update 1.
Windows 8.1 users are, quite naturally, going to contribute, as will those with both positive and negative experiences and views.
My IE didn't work initially and it was MBAE Beta causing the SNAFU, so I'd try uninstalling your AV/AM and then reinstalling it.
Those who haven't discovered it yet won't have installed the utilities. Therefore they won't be doing what I said.
I've not had it mess anything up yet. No doubt we use the PC for different things, so, wouldn't doubt you may have had some difficulties you can't get round, for whatever reason.
But, if you never see it and it's never allowed on your pc, as claimed by some CS users, what is the point? They don't have negative experiences, so they say.
I guess nothing will change and we will all fall into one camp or the other. Rumours of Windows 8.1.2 in the Autumn will, no doubt add fuel to the fire.....
so i should uninstall my anti virus? i don't even know if i can access control panel. Tried opening the anti virus to scan for virus, that itself wouldn't open
When using a mouse you have to take it to the top or bottom right corner of the screen and then drag down or up to bring up the Charms bar. That is a deliberate act.
The only way it could come up accidentally is if you have the mouse speed set too high, such that it zips around the screen out of control, or if you are in the habit of absent mindedly circling your mouse around the screen.
I understand the situation is different if you use a laptop touchpad with touch gestures enabled, but not with an actual mouse.
The other main operating systems, OSX and Linux have used the concept of 'hot corners' for years to bring up various functions. Windows is just catching up.
Right-click the new, improved Start tile from the desktop to access a shortcut menu including the Control Panel. It's all Win 7-a-like from there.
Or the horrible [WIN] & will invoke the charms.
Thanks but left my pc and it went off (power saver) and turned it back on, left it on, turned it off turned it back on and its all fine now, thanks for the assistance
Certainly not the former, maybe in part the latter as explained above. Whichever way, it happened more than enough times to be annoying, leading me to search out a way of killing it completely.
Seeing as such a concept is new to Windows, and windows users have managed quite well without it all of these years, it seems to be an addition that has not been missed.
But each to his own - Win8.1.1 works fine for me and my purposes now, regardless as to what should or should not happen from a MS point of view. At least we have the option to customise (or not) according to tastes & requirements (which has to be applauded surely).