.... why no start button ? what muppet thought that one up? seriously ? whats the gain ? ... nothing, whats the pain .. squillions of confused users.
Probably the same one that said "I know, lets get rid of the standard menu bar in our applications that is a standard GUI style worldwide on every OS for the last 20 years and invent something called the 'ribbon'."
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Who gave you that Ugging infraction? Yeah that's right it was me!
Talking of touch screens, I think MS are going towards this far too quickly and assuming the rest of the world will follow just as quickly. We're in a massive recession worldwide, people don't have the money for tablets etc.
A touch screen is simply a glorified mouse pointer anyway and frankly I prefer a full sized keyboard and mouse as its far more practical.
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Hope there is never a 9. Should never have been a 7 or 8. Let's go back to Win 3.1/Win 95-98/ME and just redo those the way they should have been done in the first place. How about a Winux? Combo of Windows and Linux. OK, Lindows will work, too.
lol there was a Lindows, which became (after litigation) Linspire which is now owned by Xandros which is a commercial Linux distribution with an incredibly dull website even though Xandros ala 4 or 5 years ago was one of the best looking linux dirtros out there ... sigh
MVC is the current buzz in web application architectures. It comes from event-driven desktop application design and doesn't fit into web application design very well. But luckily nobody really knows what MVC means, so we can call our presentation layer separation mechanism MVC and move on. (Rasmus Lerdorf)
Hope there is never a 9. Should never have been a 7 or 8. Let's go back to Win 3.1/Win 95-98/ME and just redo those the way they should have been done in the first place. How about a Winux? Combo of Windows and Linux. OK, Lindows will work, too.
I disagree. Win95 imo was ok but clearly not up to the job for today. 98 was ****, Me was actually pretty decent IMO - the BSODs reduced dramatically over Win98 even though many people slated it saying 98 was better (no idea how that works).
IMO, XP was the ultimate though. Used by everyone from home users to huge companies, police forces, councils etc. It was a great all rounder, supported almost everything, could be adapted to do everything and was almost crash resistant.
Win7 is pretty decent too but the amount of people using it is still less than XP and that says something IMO. Even though I use 7 myself with minimal hassle, there are still some things that were easier on XP.
XP definiately has my vote as the best MS system. Even now many places are still refusing to upgrade from it and it was the first M$ OS that forced M$ to continue supporting it after their cancellation of support.
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Yep, knew about Lindows. Hope no one else is gonna take me too seriously here on my comments. I will not go to Win 8 or higher. Used Win 7 and it isn't too bad, but as with all of Micro$oft's changes... costs too much and the changes just are not worth it.
I disagree. Win95 imo was ok but clearly not up to the job for today. 98 was ****, Me was actually pretty decent IMO - the BSODs reduced dramatically over Win98 even though many people slated it saying 98 was better (no idea how that works).
IMO, XP was the ultimate though. Used by everyone from home users to huge companies, police forces, councils etc. It was a great all rounder, supported almost everything, could be adapted to do everything and was almost crash resistant.
By today's standards 95 and 98 are both crap but nostalgia has a funny way of making people remembering things better than they were.
Windows 7 is so much better than XP though. The CPU scheduler actually understands the difference between physical and logical cores, it has TRIM support for SSDs, the 64-bit support is solid, the UAC is much better compared to Vista and you don't run as admin all the time unlike standard XP.
People say XP is great but usually forget how awful it was when it came out. It wasn't until 4 years later (SP2) that it became decent. It had driver issues, stability problems and all the programs people brought over from 9x had tons of issues since they were all written for the old architecture. (Granted that is hardly the fault of the OS but that didn't stop people from blaming it.)
Those of us that had been on Windows 2000 thought the fisher price user interface was silly. I remember when XP was coming out people were swearing they'd never upgrade to it and that Windows 2000 was what they were going to stick to.
I think the Windows 8 user interface is dumb and I'm not planning to upgrade to it right away. I like Windows 7 and there is still another 8 years of support for it so I can take my time. I might give Windows 8 a try on one of my spare computers some time soon though.
I've been using 7 since before it was released and it has been a pretty solid and stable OS for me. XP certainly became good and I got a lot of work done on it but 7 is still better.
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Originally Posted by tangoforce
Win7 is pretty decent too but the amount of people using it is still less than XP and that says something IMO. Even though I use 7 myself with minimal hassle, there are still some things that were easier on XP.
XP definiately has my vote as the best MS system. Even now many places are still refusing to upgrade from it and it was the first M$ OS that forced M$ to continue supporting it after their cancellation of support.
Can you cite your source for XP being more widely used than Windows 7? These sources which offer a good cross section of the internet say otherwise:
As for support, I think you are being disingenuous to Microsoft, they always support their OSes much longer than their rivals. They are planning to support Vista until 2017 and 7 until 2020. That is a really long time to support one piece of software. They supported Windows 2000 until 2010 and NT4 until 2004. And they don't just sneak the dates up on people, they are published way in advance. They can't support it forever, people have to upgrade eventually or be left behind. I'm all for some good Microsoft bashing but lets try and keep some perspective.
to be fair, that wont be hard I think there are only abut 42 Vista users left
+ I think its only quite recently that Win7 got the best of XP as the most used windows and I read 2 conflicting reports recently ... (cant find them when I need them of course) 1 said XP , the other said 7 , so I think its only recently tipping which when you think abut how long XP has been out there is quite amazing.
I do remember the fuss when XP came out though it was slammed as well, I actually liked it from the get-go (I think, its been a long time and my memory ain't what it used to be) but most of the problems were as you say driver/application support based which will probably not be the case with 8.
Your apps and devices will still work under windows 8 .. you just might not be able to find them~!@
Still using 8 here in the VM which I read everywhere is not a fair way to judge it, its still fast but still very annoying especially without touch, which is daft cos when I am in there using photoshop or VCC etc the last thing I want is touch...
If I want to test in IE I have to be careful that I get the 'real' IE and not the app since with the app I cant see anything else I am doing, multi-tasking-a-no-no.
Sorry but its stupid, on my Android phone it makes sense since I have 4 inches or so to play with, on my dual head 27+23 its laughable.
I really think this could go oh so very wrong for microsoft, Metro might make Bob and ME and Vista UAC look like a mere flesh wound next to this.
Or I could just to too old and stuck in my ways (perfectly possible) , luckily however I still have my charm and good looks to get me through
MVC is the current buzz in web application architectures. It comes from event-driven desktop application design and doesn't fit into web application design very well. But luckily nobody really knows what MVC means, so we can call our presentation layer separation mechanism MVC and move on. (Rasmus Lerdorf)
As firepages says, I think if it has tipped, it's only recent. XP was slated a lot back in the day especially for its raw sockets however it was really the first in a new generation of OS's that combined both home and business computing and stability. Sure it may not of been brilliant until SP2 came out but when it did, it was a very good OS.
Yes I do like Win7 and yes it is very good - I can't deny that, it's on my main desktop machine and I've no intention of going back to XP but all my VMs still run XP along with my other machines purely because it is so usable and easy to get things done with. In all, a very good OS. As for support, XP came out in what.. 2000? Support ended recently for it in the last year or two if I remember correctly. Now apparently I've slated them for that. On the contrary, I did no such thing, I merely pointed out that it was such a popular OS that it forced MS to extend their support for it. I never slated them for trying to withdraw it as its only natural that they will do so at some point.
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Yes I do like Win7 and yes it is very good - I can't deny that, it's on my main desktop machine and I've no intention of going back to XP but all my VMs still run XP along with my other machines purely because it is so usable and easy to get things done with. In all, a very good OS. As for support, XP came out in what.. 2000? Support ended recently for it in the last year or two if I remember correctly. Now apparently I've slated them for that. On the contrary, I did no such thing, I merely pointed out that it was such a popular OS that it forced MS to extend their support for it. I never slated them for trying to withdraw it as its only natural that they will do so at some point.
Fair enough, sorry for misunderstanding what you were trying to say.
By the way support for XP will end in 2014. Non-security relates updates have stopped though. It came out in 2001.
I think the balanced tipped at least 6 months ago. I guess that can be considered recently in the grand scheme of things. According to the Wikimedia stats the balance tipped for their visitors around September 2011.
I think Microsoft made a huge error in letting XP be the only OS for so long. Back when they were releasing new versions every couple years people expected it and were ok upgrading. Now some people have gotten complacent and lazy (I'm speaking in general, not anyone specific.) and they don't see why they should have to upgrade.
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Last edited by oracleguy; 07-09-2012 at 05:16 PM..
I've been using Windows 8 for a few months as my primary work system and I haven't experienced any decline in my efficiency (and, mind you, I'm a very technical user). If you want to live in Desktop mode you can. I never launch Metro unless I want to (typically for quick internet browsing or mail). Beyond that, the only cross-over is in the start menu which, for me, is better than Win7 as searching is faster. You can pin items just as you did in the old menu but with the added benefit of at-a-glance info with Live Tiles.
Another important consideration here is that you're judging Windows 8 in the hardware context of Windows 7 and prior. It can be analogized to running the original Windows GUI on a machine that had no mouse (though, admittedly, not to the same extreme). Windows 8 is wonderful and fluid with touch, and when you use only keyboard and mouse you're not getting the intended experience. Hardware will catch up, I'm sure, but it's not there yet.
Now, I'm not suggesting the upgrade will be an easy transition for everyone. Power users scarcely like change, and I see them being the ones to cling to older versions (just like they did with DOS back in the day). However this is a shift that needed to happen.
Many of you have mentioned this feels like two experiences, that it's great for a tablet but sketchy for a PC. And, as it stands at this exact moment in time, I don't disagree. The bigger picture, though, is that those lines are blurring more everyday. The PC in its current form factor, being immobile and chained to a desk with a keyboard and a mouse, is dying a slow death.
Products like the Surface Pro represent a very real idea of an ultra mobile tablet which can just as easily serve as your primary machine. Windows 8 is an OS that, unlike every other tablet OS, allows you to be just as productive in a mobile environment as you are sitting at a desk. Have all your files and applications with you at all times, and allow your settings to sync ubiquitously in the cloud.
Like I said, it's a change -- a big change for some (lookin' at you XP users). However I honestly think it's a change which opens up more doors down the road we're going. Otherwise, we'd be left hoping that this whole mobile computing business is just a fad.
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Fair enough, sorry for misunderstanding what you were trying to say.
No worries!
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Originally Posted by oracleguy
By the way support for XP will end in 2014. Non-security relates updates have stopped though.
To be honest, I've never even needed MS support for XP. It's been a great OS to me over the years for ease of use and configuration etc. Anything serious going wrong and I'd just reformat and reinstall I'm not really bothered about the support ending.
My main machine is now Win7 and yes, I love it! It's a wonderful system, very graphical and easy to use but I only have home premium whereas I've managed to accumulate a few machines and licences with XP Pro that allows terminal services etc (headless machines hooked up only via ethernet) which I simply can't do with 7HP Thats the only thing I dislike about 7HP - no inbound remote desktop so I have to leave a VNC server running instead.
As a main desktop OS though, I can't beat it. XP was getting a bit boring to be honest although it was rock solid so when I found this machine at a bargin price (brand new, unopened) with keyboard, monitor, mouse etc for under £100 including Win7HP.. I couldn't beat it and snatched the last one off the shelf It's been the best little machine I've ever had - quietest machine I've had, most powerful (2GHz, 2GB DDR3), smallest, sleekest.. I really can't complain for an emachine No idea how emachines evern managed the OS at that price yet alone the hardware
As for Windows8.. I'm hearing far more bad stuff than good so I doubt I'm going to even bother with it - It wouldn't boot in VMWare so that was more than enough for me!
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Otherwise, we'd be left hoping that this whole mobile computing business is just a fad.
and thats what MS appear to be hoping about desktop computing ... just a fad
Photoshop/AutoCad/MyOB/Quicken/DTP/Office suites ..etc etc .. all just a fad as well ? please try doing anything other than conceptual art in photoshop via touch, or your month end accounts or.... well you get the picture, a large proportion of the common usagae of computers will benefit not a jot from a touch interface , you will need to hook your device up to a Monitor(s) keyboard and mouse (or some other pointing device that is sharper than a finger)
So if you assume the above to be true... why default to a touch user interface ?
Why not give an option of desktop as default ... in fact why not detect the size of the screen & if it is touch-enabled only then default to Metro (so my phone gets Metro, my Tablet gives me a choice and my desktop gets .. errr a desktop)
I am sure Microsoft could outsource such a project if their programmers are having problems using VCC++ on their touchscreen tablets
MVC is the current buzz in web application architectures. It comes from event-driven desktop application design and doesn't fit into web application design very well. But luckily nobody really knows what MVC means, so we can call our presentation layer separation mechanism MVC and move on. (Rasmus Lerdorf)
and thats what MS appear to be hoping about desktop computing ... just a fad
You're speaking as if the desktop has been removed completely! The desktop in all its glory is still a big part of the operating system. Microsoft has communicated that by saying that the next office will run in Desktop Mode.
All that has changed here is you're adding another method of input into the mix -- touch. You speak as if every desktop PC user is a programmer, or an accountant, or a graphic designer. The fact is, an extremely large number of people use PCs as internet machines, bill payers, e-mail creators, and game players. These experiences are streamlined in Metro and present a very attractive UX.
For the coders, the desktop still exists. You have mouse, you have keyboard, you have everything you input with today (and more). Yes, the start menu is gone - but did you truly live in the start menu? Can you not pin applications to the Metro Start Menu the same as you did before?
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I am sure Microsoft could outsource such a project if their programmers are having problems using VCC++ on their touchscreen tablets
This is an important point to remember. We (MSFT Engineers) are power users, coders, spreadsheet crunchers, and the like. Many of us (including me) have been using Windows 8 for months, and Microsoft has far from come crashing to a halt.
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OK, Lindows will work, too. 
Thats the only thing I dislike about 7HP - no inbound remote desktop so I have to leave a VNC server running instead.
No idea how emachines evern managed the OS at that price yet alone the hardware 
