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Peggy's just bought a new laptop and chose a Windowss 8 machine. Being a linguist she takes to computers readily. But even I've had no problems with Windows 8, and my next laptop will be running it.

 

I suspect it's at each end of the spectrum where's there's problems - relative beginners and the very experienced.

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We have Windows 7 disks that we could have installed on it, but took the view that we would have to embrace the future and get on with it. I've said that I will upgrade my laptop to Windows 8 so that at least I can get used to it and know how to support it, but I'll be doing so reluctantly.

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supporting it is virtually the same as supporting windows 7! for the average user the system isn't any different from windows 7 other than shutdown is on the charms bar and there is no "start" button.

there are annoying things like the mail app not supporting pop3 accounts properly; or the fact that proxy server settings are not rolled out to apps by default but that effects business usage instead of home users.

ive run it since original beta and RTM versions and its been stable and solid in operation. Im now using it on my home system as well as my office system and the clients I have sorted with new systems have taken to it happily after a few minutes of being shown what to do. the other annoyance is without a start button or menu you have to remember the name of the program you wish to run or have shortcuts for on your desktop; yeah you can just type on the metro screen and find what your after; but that requires you know the name of the software you want to use; in my case I have installed odds and sods to do various tasks and its annoying to try to hunt them down if you cant recall the name. but that's only a very minor thing really.

yes there are new ways of doing things; yes the metro interface is more suited to touchscreen but at the end of the day it all functions at least as steadily as windows 7; and in benchmarks ive actually gained FPS in most games and my boot time has dropped to about 25 seconds!!

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Try talking someone at the other end of the phone through manually configuring networking when you don't even know where they need to click!

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Lol! And not knowing where to click is windows 8 fault? ( just kidding with ya!!)

Networking is same as windows 7... Right click the icon and go properties! There is no fundamental difference in control panel or similar windows functional panels between 7 and 8 at all! IP address set up and all that stuff is accessed exactly the same as 7 once your into the adapter settings; and getting to adapter settings is the same as well. Major network fubar is proxy settings for apps. Which has to be set via gpedit on pro systems or via command line on standard if proxies are being used...which is a major headache for business use of 8! And a major reason I doubt most corporate systems will pick it up.

Only difference is how to get to control panel....right click start corner, or go through charm bar

One thing I do automatically now if I set up a win 8 system is right click the desktop and personalise it with the default icons: my computer, control panel, recycle bin and user files.

Edited by kirisute
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Unfortunately, not being psychic, I found it hard to tell someone how to find things in a UI I'd never seen! Eventually got a remote access request to work (by getting the user to reinstall the OS from our own media) allowing me to get in and at least see what the UI looked like. Eventually got Remote Desktop working by adding windows features and putting in a pro product key. Then had someone take it into the office, where it completely failed to work on the network. Gave up, I'll fix it when I'm in the office this week.

 

Looks as if I'm not the only one who hates it, though:

 

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/330c8b8e-b66b-11e2-93ba-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2SdMskaal

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people hate change; simple.

get past Metro and windows 8 is basically windows 7.

its been what? 20 years since we had the pleasure of a start button and now its gone...people don't like that

change to how you use the interface; people don't like that

the issue isn't with the OS; its with how people perceive the OS and the fact they don't want/like to change from what they know.

ANY new OS will have issues; as does win 8....but when you start using it; its stable, fast and effective; just as much so as windows 7.

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I don't have any gripe with the underlying operating system, it's just the Fisher-Price user interface on top. And I expect it's fine, once you have re-learnt where everything is - I just don't see any benefit from the change. Rather like when all of the menus in MS Office were changed, all it achieved was a loss of productivity and an unnecessary learning curve.

 

I saw someone on another forum getting a bit annoyed about Server 2012 having Metro - reckons there probably aren't many touch screen servers out there!

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metro itself is actually quite functional even without touchscreen.

its actually handy to just open your pc and click the mail app; or the internet app or the weather app or whatever...without having to wait for your desktop and its millions of items to load etc

its a case of trying to embrace the new with an open mind. for me, now, metro isn't a hassle in any way shape or form....shortcuts that require desktop just switch happily back to desktop mode; apps that run happily on their own just run within metro...and on the whole it works happily.

docking apps to use in desktop mode is helpful with various bits and bobs....im looking at it more as an evolutionary windows system rather than a new version of windows itself.

its like having an ipad for the first time...you just surf or watch youtube or hit facebook etc....then you evolve to typing letters and printing, then you start to link all your documents back and forth through a cloud service and so on and so forth.

 

yes its a shock to the system....but as for a learning curve...no..not really.....maybe 4 things different to learn and they become instinctual the more you use it.

the rest is just broadening horizons and seeing whats possible.

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