Testing Windows 8

[Menticol]

Hello guys!

I have just installed Windows 8 a few minutes ago. If anybody also did it, we can share our experiences, troubleshooting and tips on this thread.

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For the tests I'm running it on a very modest computer: Pentium Dual core 1.60 Ghz x 2, 4 gb RAM, 128MB Ati graphics card.

My opinion right now?

As a lifelong Microsoft Windows user (from 3.1 to 7) I must say that the interface is a bit confusing at the first minutes. It gets easier as you start to learn where is the new location of each thing.

Boot speed is amazing as Microsoft Promised, also shut down time is very good.

No problems so far with drivers or Windows 7 / Vista software. Didn't tested XP software yet.

I'm having problems with the "Photo" feature at the start menu. No matter my efforts, it doesn't show the files on the picture library. A friend had reported the same problem with the "Music" feature.

 

[DerStrom8]

Hi Menticol.

I created a partition oh my hard drive and set my laptop up for dual boot with Windows 7 on one side and 8 on the other. My laptop is a Lenovo Thinkpad W520, Intel Core i7-2630QM processor, 2GHz, 4GB RAM. I first tested the Windows 8 Consumer Preview in VirtualBox, to help me decide if I wanted anything to do with it or not. I liked the speed of things, so I went ahead and created the partition.

It takes a bit to get used to the setup. I installed Chrome immediately, as the Metro IE browser would only let me have one tab open at a time. I removed all the extra stuff from the start screen that I didn't want (sports, news, games, store, etc) and only put in the things I'd need. I also created a power down and restart button in the start menu, so that I wouldn't have to go the round-about way to shut it down. Now that I've made those minor modifications, I rather like the setup. The shutdown and boot speed is incredible, which is great for me considering I'm usually in a rush to get things done.

When I first created the partition, my Windows 7 side wouldn't boot. It would just go straight into system recovery. I tried several things, but eventually decided there was something wrong with winload.exe. Unfortunately, I didn't know how to fix it, and the repair installation from the disc wasn't working, so I broke down and took it to a repair guy. Sure enough, winload.exe was missing, so windows 7 never even began to start up. I got it fixed and now I have both sides working like a charm.

But I digress....

There are a few programs I need that don't work properly in Windows 8, so I am happy to still have 7 as a backup. Hopefully within the next few months more support will become available, but aside from the complicated layout and the occasional non-operational program, I rather like Win8. The more I use it, the better it seems. It's just so much faster than Win7 and I plan to use 8 as my primary OS for as long as it's not obsolete.

That's my experience.
Regards,
Matt

 

[emc2]

I installed it and played with it for about 1 hour.. I hated it so re-installed windows 7. I think windows 8 suits touch screens and is designed for them.. not a normal desktop pc

 

[PatM]

I installed it and played with it for about 1 hour.. I hated it so re-installed windows 7. I think windows 8 suits touch screens and is designed for them.. not a normal desktop pc

I had the same experience, only I had a image backup of Win 7 on a external hard drive.
I re-imaged with Win 7 and never want to go back to Win 8

 

[Willen]

I had to install 'clasic cell' to get classic start menu back as windows 7. Now it's relief that seeing customers' love towards the start menu, Microsoft added start menu back to Windows 10. I guess you people tested it too. Please share if anything special.

 

[DerStrom8]

I had to install 'clasic cell' to get classic start menu back as windows 7. Now it's relief that seeing customers' love towards the start menu, Microsoft added start menu back to Windows 10. I guess you people tested it too. Please share if anything special.

They added the Start button back to 8.1. Is the Windows 10 start menu like the Windows 7 one?

I am very hesitant to install Win10. I have heard rumors that it is going to become a service, which you'll have to pay for monthly or annually (not sure which). No idea if these claims are accurate though.

 

[Tony Stewart]

I have win 8.1 and win7
But I prefer to setup my PC's with my own Apps and use few of the Windows Apps except Live mail.
For pictures I use Irfanview for fast edits, copy paste, draw, merge, add below, shrink/enlarge, compress, convert , change color, thumbnails, slideshows etc.
Irfavniew works with hundreds of file formats with addon installed. music, videos, etc.
For picture fine tuning , backup to Google drive, .... Picassa
For streaming TV, Movies.... KODI using 1Channel addon
I also use Portable Apps for dozens of categories including Open Office.
and I use the Classic Start Menu App.

Win 10 will give users the option of mobile or desktop use with more features but less transparency and user control.

 

[Ian Rogers]

They added the Start button back to 8.1. Is the Windows 10 start menu like the Windows 7 one?

I am very hesitant to install Win10. I have heard rumors that it is going to become a service, which you'll have to pay for monthly or annually (not sure which). No idea if these claims are accurate though.

I have heard that there will be a "level" of service... I have heard it will be a three tier service, I'm still trying to find out more!!

 

[Willen]

I do not know the rumour heard about paying for Win 10 monthly, maybe I did not search about it. Sorry to saying the elligal thing, but around my area (probably Nepal, India etc), always people use 'cracked' version of windows, or they crack windows activation after installing using cracker. So no activation and registration needed. So the cost for a windows is $0.5 for copied Windows DVD. How much are you paying for a windows DVD?

 

[analog1]

you might consider window 10 now. I personally hated win 8 hard to navigate with just one click.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

you might consider window 10 now. I personally hated win 8 hard to navigate with just one click.

Well 10 isn't out yet, and 8 is no different to 7 anyway (as long as you install Classic Shell).