Why does everybody bash Windows 8 so much?

[microsoft windows]

Well, Windows 3.1 is a good operating system. It's very secure on the Internet and uses very little system resources. And I can install it with only 6 floppy disks!

[TheProfosist]

Actually I don't want a start menu at all, nor this new metro thingy (I prefer to use a top bar with drop down menus, much faster...)
Under Windows 7 you just have to run a app like "Startkiller" to remove the star menu, but how do I easily remove metro under Windows 8?

Start8

[TheSoulhunter]

Actually I don't want a start menu at all, nor this new metro thingy (I prefer to use a top bar with drop down menus, much faster...)
Under Windows 7 you just have to run a app like "Startkiller" to remove the star menu, but how do I easily remove metro under Windows 8?

Start8

Not sure if trolling ;P
"Bring back the Windows® "Start" menu with Start8™!"

[TheProfosist]

Actually I don't want a start menu at all, nor this new metro thingy (I prefer to use a top bar with drop down menus, much faster...)
Under Windows 7 you just have to run a app like "Startkiller" to remove the star menu, but how do I easily remove metro under Windows 8?

Start8

Not sure if trolling ;P
"Bring back the Windows® "Start" menu with Start8™!"

I guess a little bit of both. i just Ignore Metro you dont see it if you stay on the desktop.

[rowdy]

This too: http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=38096.0

Mac OS you can install any number of times on any number of computers, in theory (although you are only supposed to install it on one).  No licence key.  No activation bull****.

GNU/Linux the same, maybe unless you have a support contract with a large Linux vendor who limits the number of nodes they will support.

A lot of games have an installation limit too.

No idea why - someone will crack it eventually anyway.

[reaper]

If you guys don't like that Metro crap then just download Classic Shell (open-source project).  It bypasses the Metro and give you back the Start menu.  I've been using it for awhile now and it's great. 

[microsoft windows]

This too: http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=38096.0

Mac OS you can install any number of times on any number of computers, in theory (although you are only supposed to install it on one).  No licence key.  No activation bull****.

GNU/Linux the same, maybe unless you have a support contract with a large Linux vendor who limits the number of nodes they will support.

A lot of games have an installation limit too.

No idea why - someone will crack it eventually anyway.

Why install Mac OS X when you can just install Windows 3.1? Windows 3.1 doesn't even need a product key. All you need is an x86-compatible computer with a floppy or CD drive and a hard disk and you're set!

And plus, Mac OS X is slow, unreliable, and way locked down. I can't even change the color of my window borders on Mac OS X. But I CAN in Windows 3.1. Or how about changing what you use for your GUI? Good luck with that in Mac OS X.

Windows 3.1 is also far more secure for Internet usage since nobody makes viruses for 16-bit operating systems anymore.

MAC OS X = MACsimizing Obsessive Stupidity for Xtreme dummies!

[keyboardlover]

That's not true about the GUI customization - OS X supports themes. (At least it did when I used it).

In fact, I recall at one point I had it looking like OS 6

[rowdy]

Windows 3.1 was not bad.  But how about Windows for Workgroups 3.11?  I used that more - it actually worked and was quite nice (although I must admit that I used to use its multitasking ability to run several DOS boxes at the same time).

Unfortunately most of the modern software I use does not run on Windows 3.1.  Chrome, Minecraft, Thunderbird, Steam, Eclipse and so on.  There probably are older versions that work with Win3.1, but they would be so full of security holes it is not funny.

You could argue why not continue to use Mac OS 9 or earlier ("Classic")?  Same thing - only older software works properly on it, if at all.

It's actually a toss-up for me between Windows 2000 and Windows XP as to which is best.  XP probably just wind out as performance is notably better than 2000.

[Malphas]

Except Windows Vista, 7 and 8 are all superior to 2000 and XP with regard to performance on modern hardware, compatibility with modern applications/hardware, reliability, security, etc.

[Hak Foo]

I've been using it since a few days after it was released.

I don't care for the new notification system.  The only way I know now if there are windows updates is to notice a small brown-on-green text message that disappears the second I log in.  No baloon on the desktop.  And then the update control panel itself is a full-screen app, rather than a conveninent "run it in the background and keep an eye on it."

Full-screen apps are pretty but only make sense when your resolution is, maybe, 1024x768 or less.  I want to resize and move my programs around to get good value out of my screen space.

[davkol]

Except Windows Vista, 7 and 8 are all superior to 2000 and XP with regard to performance on modern hardware, compatibility with modern applications/hardware, reliability, security, etc.

What a pity some new programmable point-of-sale keyboards (and other industrial hardware) aren't modern. It's a shame I have to throw away my otherwise perfectly working scanner only because it's not "modern"... oh wait, it's still supported in SANE.

[dutmai]

It is very hard to use if your monitor is not touch screen

[TheProfosist]

It is very hard to use if your monitor is not touch screen

You ever used it because thats not the case at all.

[rowdy]

Performance and compatability on modern hardware is a no-brainer.  No-one makes drivers for chipsets or GPUs for really old operating systems any more.

Now that 8 is out, and XP is soon to lose its extended extended extended support status, I wonder how long manufacturers will continue to support it with new drivers.

[davkol]

Open-source community drivers! Oh wait...

[baldgye]

Now that 8 is out, and XP is soon to lose its extended extended extended support status, I wonder how long manufacturers will continue to support it with new drivers.

2014 isn't that soon for manufactors to drop support..

[quadibloc]

2014 isn't that soon for manufactors to drop support..

After paying for a copy of Windows 3.1 or Windows 98, if manufacturers don't continue making drivers for all their peripherals for them, one is forced to actually replace the perfectly good operating system you've bought, and buy another one, in order to stay up-to-date!

I mean, it seems like switching to Linux is the only way to escape this rip-off!

[IvanIvanovich]

Oh my god, there is no 286 support?!? I can't upgrade my Goupil Golf to Windows 8 from 3.1? I has a sad. Not like it would fit on 40mb hard drive anyway... lol.
Actually I was surprised when it installed on an old Athlon 64 system of a relative. It all works fine except some the visual effects as the x300 gpu is too old.

Switch to linux is not always a help either. I noticed a lot of distros have started dumping i386 branch and other old device support. I'm still stuck on few version old crunchbang on my Via Epia I use for linux due to just that. Even linux is dropping some hardware because it is too old and not enough people use it to bother to keep maintaining for it.

Really it comes down a lot to people don't like 8 because they don't want to have to relearn anything. Many people really hate change.

[Malphas]

2014 isn't that soon for manufactors to drop support..

After paying for a copy of Windows 3.1 or Windows 98, if manufacturers don't continue making drivers for all their peripherals for them, one is forced to actually replace the perfectly good operating system you've bought, and buy another one, in order to stay up-to-date!

I mean, it seems like switching to Linux is the only way to escape this rip-off!

Can't tell if this is deadpan sarcasm or tragically serious.

[Malphas]

Windows 8 y u no run on my Babbage Engine!?

[baldgye]

Windows Vista y u no run on my Babbage Engine!?

Show Image

welcome to 2008

[1391401]

Im a start menu fanboy, I do not like the Mac-Spotlight-esque "lol who cares how this environment is set up just type something in this box and ill find it for you" navigation that is starting to be popular (e.g. Gnome 3) or the wall-of-icons BS they are throwing at us (again, gnome 3 or the iPad OSx thing and now Win .  Consequently I find the best wall-of-icons to be the Modern UI of W8.

[davkol]

BTW why not KRunner, GNOME Do or something like that? It's fast, inobtrusive,...

[cponline83]

I personally haven't try

[daerid]

Writing Software is hard. Really hard. Writing an OS is even harder. Why SHOULDN'T you pay for a newer version, with newer features, that took time to develop by real people, with real families to feed.

[daerid]

That being said I love Windows 8.

[microsoft windows]

Writing Software is hard. Really hard. Writing an OS is even harder. Why SHOULDN'T you pay for a newer version, with newer features, that took time to develop by real people, with real families to feed.

I don't pay for new software just because somebody may've worked hard to make it.  Much of those peoples' "hard work" amounts to more crap on my hard disk, more obnoxious activation and anti-piracy measures, more dumb updaters, and less cash, that I worked hard for,  in my pocket!

Just compare Microsoft Office '97 to Office 2010. Just about all Microsoft did was add cumbersome and irritating anti-piracy and activation, change some fonts, shuffle around all the menus, make the graphics shiny, and make it hog up nearly a gigabyte of extra disk space.

But Office '97 runs perfectly fine on anything from a 486 with 12MB of RAM to an Intel I5 with 8GB of RAM. And I can just take my one disk and install it on as many PC's as I feel like using the same number. And it still works perfectly fine for typing up my documents and creating charts, graphics, and presentations. I use it all the time for work and have absolutely no trouble. And if somebody throws a .docx file at me? Wordpad'll take care of that.

Or what about Adobe Acrobat Reader? What was once a simple, fast, and easy-to-use PDF reader has now morphed into a monstrous, bloated mess that takes up over 100MB of disk space and constantly asks me for updates. And then "A-Dope" wonders why I don't buy their full version. Maybe it's because I've got better things to do than spend hundreds of dollars on a piece of crap?

I don't give a damn how hard those programmers and software engineers work, or how their life situation is. That's their business, not mine. If I find their product to a be slow and irritating heap of ****, then I just won't buy it. I'm a capitalist, and I put my money where my mouth's at.

[keyboardlover]

Regarding Office 2010 at least, they added a TON of new features that boost productivity. The graphics probably take up more disk space than the binaries, but it's not like they didn't add actual value.

[rowdy]

Writing Software is hard. Really hard. Writing an OS is even harder. Why SHOULDN'T you pay for a newer version, with newer features, that took time to develop by real people, with real families to feed.

Reminds me of this:

There was once a programmer who was attached to the court of the warlord of Wu. The warlord asked the programmer: "Which is easier to design: an accounting package or an operating system?"

"An operating system," replied the programmer.

The warlord uttered an exclamation of disbelief. "Surely an accounting package is trivial next to the complexity of an operating system," he said.

"Not so," said the programmer, "when designing an accounting package, the programmer operates as a mediator between people having different ideas: how it must operate, how its reports must appear, and how it must conform to the tax laws. By contrast, an operating system is not limited by outside appearances. When designing an operating system, the programmer seeks the simplest harmony between machine and ideas. This is why an operating system is easier to design."

The warlord of Wu nodded and smiled. "That is all good and well, but which is easier to debug?"

The programmer made no reply.

[Internetlad]

2014 isn't that soon for manufactors to drop support..

To put it in perspective, XP came out in 2002, meaning that it got 12 years of extended microsoft support.

This is the sort of computer that would represent a pretty high end XP release build:



A Pentium 1.8 GhZ with a whopping 40 GB IDE HDD and 512 of DDR RAM.

Consider, now, that you can get from Dell today an i7 clocked at 3.9 GhZ, 8 GB Ram and a Terabyte drive for 799.95, and these two machines aren't even in the same solar system. You're not using a PC from 2002, so why are you so insistant on people using an OS from 2002?



Dude (pun intended) face it, XP had it's day in the sun and it's long past due to be put out to pasture.

[Internetlad]

also

[Internetlad]

Full-screen apps are pretty but only make sense when your resolution is, maybe, 1024x768 or less.  I want to resize and move my programs around to get good value out of my screen space.

You can resize apps, but only vertically. I can't remember how right at the moment. I think it's moving up to the top left and then dragging the app out onto your desktop (it will split the desktop area between the app and the desktop, or between mutiple apps)

You can do this as much as you like. Not as versatile as programs in windows, i'll grant you that, but it's still possible.

[davkol]

You're not using a PC from 2002, so why are you so insistant on people using an OS from 2002?

I call BS on this.

• There are tons of perfectly working legacy hardware, I don't think new release of some OS is a good reason to throw it away.
• Some hardware/software simply *doesn't work* on new releases of the OS.
• Performance of most netbooks is still on par with old hardware (even Pentium Ms were more powerful than early Atoms, AMD E-350 is comparable to three years old C2D)

Writing Software is hard. Really hard. Writing an OS is even harder. Why SHOULDN'T you pay for a newer version, with newer features, that took time to develop by real people, with real families to feed.

ROFL. What do I have to smoke to come up with ideas like this? O.o

[daerid]

Writing Software is hard. Really hard. Writing an OS is even harder. Why SHOULDN'T you pay for a newer version, with newer features, that took time to develop by real people, with real families to feed.

I don't pay for new software just because somebody may've worked hard to make it.  Much of those peoples' "hard work" amounts to more crap on my hard disk, more obnoxious activation and anti-piracy measures, more dumb updaters, and less cash, that I worked hard for,  in my pocket!

Just compare Microsoft Office '97 to Office 2010. Just about all Microsoft did was add cumbersome and irritating anti-piracy and activation, change some fonts, shuffle around all the menus, make the graphics shiny, and make it hog up nearly a gigabyte of extra disk space.

But Office '97 runs perfectly fine on anything from a 486 with 12MB of RAM to an Intel I5 with 8GB of RAM. And I can just take my one disk and install it on as many PC's as I feel like using the same number. And it still works perfectly fine for typing up my documents and creating charts, graphics, and presentations. I use it all the time for work and have absolutely no trouble. And if somebody throws a .docx file at me? Wordpad'll take care of that.

Or what about Adobe Acrobat Reader? What was once a simple, fast, and easy-to-use PDF reader has now morphed into a monstrous, bloated mess that takes up over 100MB of disk space and constantly asks me for updates. And then "A-Dope" wonders why I don't buy their full version. Maybe it's because I've got better things to do than spend hundreds of dollars on a piece of crap?

I don't give a damn how hard those programmers and software engineers work, or how their life situation is. That's their business, not mine. If I find their product to a be slow and irritating heap of ****, then I just won't buy it. I'm a capitalist, and I put my money where my mouth's at.

Dude, you said exactly what I was trying to say, just the other side of the coin. If you don't like the newer version, don't buy it. If you want to use it, then you should pay for it.

[daerid]

ROFL. What do I have to smoke to come up with ideas like this? O.o

Nothing, actually. I'm curious what your problem with the idea is?

[DasHHKBProM]

.

[Internetlad]

• There are tons of perfectly working legacy hardware, I don't think new release of some OS is a good reason to throw it away.
• Some hardware/software simply *doesn't work* on new releases of the OS.
• Performance of most netbooks is still on par with old hardware (even Pentium Ms were more powerful than early Atoms, AMD E-350 is comparable to three years old C2D)

• You're making a straw man arguement. I'm saying specifically Windows XP is becoming more obsolete every week in the modern computing ecosystem. Run an install of Windows 8 and XP and tell me which one is easier? Bet that XP doesn't find the network, video, chipset, ETC. drivers right off the bat and basically do your job for you. Doesn't happen every time with 8, but it's a lot more likely. That's just one example.
• You're talking about a specific task that needs to be done by a specific person. Sure, maybe Microsoft Money 1997 doesn't run on Windows 8 64 bit, but if we're talking limitations, there's a lot of stuff that doesn't work with XP (64 bit programs, DX 10+, TRIM (Garbage Collection is used on SSDs as a workaround for people who don't have OSes that support TRIM) to name a few.)
• You're comparing apples to oranges. That's like saying "Well, Smart cars don't go very fast" Yeah, that's true, but that isn't the point of them.  They have a specific job and being really fast isn't it.

Also, @DasHHKBProM, I totally agree with you.

[davkol]

Your argumentation is based on a completely invalid assumption, hence there's no point in discussing it further.

You're not using a PC from 2002, so why are you so insistant on people using an OS from 2002?

Sane people don't run the latest OS for the sake of running the latest OS. We use software (and hardware) that helps us get stuff done. MS Win8 don't (yet).

[tjcaustin]

Your argumentation is based on a completely invalid assumption, hence there's no point in discussing it further.

You're not using a PC from 2002, so why are you so insistant on people using an OS from 2002?

Sane people don't run the latest OS for the sake of running the latest OS. We use software (and hardware) that helps us get stuff done. MS Win8 don't (yet).

And what you said *is* valid?

Cause I seem to be getting things done with win8...

[iri]

i don't bash windows 8. i've never used windows since xp.

[cytoSiN]

I'm slowly getting used to Windows 8 on a 13" touchscreen Ultrabook that work paid for, but without a touchscreen, I honestly don't see the point. 

[Internetlad]

I'm slowly getting used to Windows 8 on a 13" touchscreen Ultrabook that work paid for, but without a touchscreen, I honestly don't see the point. 

I would tend to agree with you there, assuming you mean "over Windows 7"

For the most part it's Windows 7 with touch functionality. People love windows 7 but they hate Windows 7: Touch Edition?

[cytoSiN]

I'm slowly getting used to Windows 8 on a 13" touchscreen Ultrabook that work paid for, but without a touchscreen, I honestly don't see the point. 

I would tend to agree with you there, assuming you mean "over Windows 7"

For the most part it's Windows 7 with touch functionality. People love windows 7 but they hate Windows 7: Touch Edition?

Yep that's what I meant.  I really like Win7, and see absolutely no reason to "upgrade" to 8 unless it's for touchscreen functionality.  And besides live tiles, I find myself using the Win7-style "desktop" MUCH more than the metro side of things, even on the touchscreen.

I should disclose, though, that I'm using a Lenovo Yoga 13, which cameos as a slightly-too-large-but-functional tablet.  Without this specific form factor AND the touchscreen, I'm not sure I'd find much to love about Windows 8 that I can't already do in 7.

[TheProfosist]

Thats all some great BS there are great improvement under the hood that you guys seem to not care about at all.

[cytoSiN]

Thats all some great BS there are great improvement under the hood that you guys seem to not care about at all.

Oh I care, but I'd rather see those under-the-hood improvements with a Windows7 GUI.  Anyway like I said, it's definitely useful for touchscreen, but I doubt I would even have tried it yet if work didn't pay my new laptop.

[TheProfosist]

Thats all some great BS there are great improvement under the hood that you guys seem to not care about at all.

Oh I care, but I'd rather see those under-the-hood improvements with a Windows7 GUI.  Anyway like I said, it's definitely useful for touchscreen, but I doubt I would even have tried it yet if work didn't pay my new laptop.

well just dont use the GUI i dont touch it i just stay on the desktop as i would have done with Win7.

[cytoSiN]

Thats all some great BS there are great improvement under the hood that you guys seem to not care about at all.

Oh I care, but I'd rather see those under-the-hood improvements with a Windows7 GUI.  Anyway like I said, it's definitely useful for touchscreen, but I doubt I would even have tried it yet if work didn't pay my new laptop.

well just dont use the GUI i dont touch it i just stay on the desktop as i would have done with Win7.

That's basically what I do.  But there are still major changes, like no start menu, etc.  I don't mind as much because I prefer keyboard commands anyway (as you'd expect on GH), but some may be more bothered by it.

[Glod]

Thats all some great BS there are great improvement under the hood that you guys seem to not care about at all.

i was thinking the same thing

[Internetlad]

Thats all some great BS there are great improvement under the hood that you guys seem to not care about at all.

i was thinking the same thing

The jump isn't nearly as large as XP>Vista or Vista>7. Yeah, there are some new tweaks and features (I do like the new Task Manager, and for the first time in history the copy GUI makes sense) Startup/Shutdown times are VASTLY improved and the UEFI BIOS, when used correctly, can be extremely useful. When you get down to brass tacks, though,  the desktop layout is much the same, the reccomended specs are very similar and there isn't any huge new feature over windows 7 (that I know of)