The Conservative Cave

The Help Desk => Computer Related Discussions & Questions => Topic started by: Mike B the Cajun on September 22, 2012, 04:58:07 AM

Title: Windows 8
Post by: Mike B the Cajun on September 22, 2012, 04:58:07 AM
With the new laptop there was an offer for an upgrade to Windows 8. It sounds nice, but there are questons.

1) How large Is the program?

2) What are some of the major differences between Win7 and WIn8?

3) Is it worth the $15 price for the upgrade?

IOW, what are the upsides and downsides of the upgrade?
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Kyle Ricky on September 22, 2012, 01:21:09 PM
With the new laptop there was an offer for an upgrade to Windows 8. It sounds nice, but there are questons.

1) How large Is the program?

2) What are some of the major differences between Win7 and WIn8?

3) Is it worth the $15 price for the upgrade?

IOW, what are the upsides and downsides of the upgrade?

1) It is the same size as a regular windows os

2) They took the start button out, added metro to the startup, and implemented hot spots throughout the desktop. It doesn't go straight to desktop when you start it up.

3) I wouldn't upgrade. Stick with Windows 7 until windows 9 comes out. (This is my own opinion - I was a beta tester for windows 8)

Basically what they did was take the Windows Mobile os (WP8) and put it on the desktop. They optimized it for touch screens, which you will be hard pressed to find a touch screen pc for home. As a beta tester of it, I do not like it. They took too much out, and added what will make too much of a learning curve for the computer stupid. If I was still doing repares and running support on how to use the os, I would recommend upgrading because I can easily charge $60.00+ an hour for my work, but coming from a respectful stand point, I wouldn't recommend it to my worst enemy.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: CG6468 on September 22, 2012, 03:48:48 PM
1) It is the same size as a regular windows os

2) They took the start button out, added metro to the startup, and implemented hot spots throughout the desktop. It doesn't go straight to desktop when you start it up.

3) I wouldn't upgrade. Stick with Windows 7 until windows 9 comes out. (This is my own opinion - I was a beta tester for windows 8)

Basically what they did was take the Windows Mobile os (WP8) and put it on the desktop. They optimized it for touch screens, which you will be hard pressed to find a touch screen pc for home. As a beta tester of it, I do not like it. They took too much out, and added what will make too much of a learning curve for the computer stupid. If I was still doing repares and running support on how to use the os, I would recommend upgrading because I can easily charge $60.00+ an hour for my work, but coming from a respectful stand point, I wouldn't recommend it to my worst enemy.

Thanks, KR. It's always good to keep up with the Windoze frequent changes.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Mike B the Cajun on September 23, 2012, 04:25:23 PM
Thanks for the information, it tells me a lot coming from a techie. I will definitely NOT be standing in line to buy it...   :-)
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: thundley4 on September 23, 2012, 06:39:30 PM
The first computer we ever bought had XP and that computer still gets used.  One has Vista on it, but I have to keep it for certain program compatibility.  Three other computers have Windows 7, and I won't upgrade until Microsoft stops supporting Win 7. 8 looks like a pain in the butt.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Kyle Ricky on September 23, 2012, 07:02:30 PM
I wil be a long time before they stop supporting Windows 7. XP is still widely used in businesses.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Thor on September 24, 2012, 01:17:14 AM
I tried the pre-release of W8. I didn't care for it. Perhaps if I had a touchscreen, then it MIGHT be better than W7. It still had some compatibility issues when I tried it. It DID seem to operate a little faster than W7, but my PC is fairly well built. AMD Phenom II X6, 8GB RAM, and the normal rest of the hardware. Honestly, it seemed like an iPhone wanna-be type of interface.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Kyle Ricky on September 24, 2012, 09:02:46 AM
Windows has been taking some queues from Apple over the past couple of years in their way of design, Thor.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Mike B the Cajun on September 24, 2012, 04:11:58 PM
My desktop is XP Pro; My now-deceased laptop was XP Pro; the new laptop is Win7 Home Premium.

XP seemed to have a cleaner look and a "looser" feel.

I upgraded the desktop from Win2k, which I upgraded  from WinNT. I bought the old laptop with XP Pro.

Current laptop has a Pentium processor. Desktop and old laptop had Celerons.

New  laptop has 4 gigs RAM and 500 gigs of hard drive; both older ones  have 512 megs ram; Desktop has 320 gig hard drive, old laptop had a 30 gig drive  :o . All of this run through a Belkin wireless/wired router, along with a HP wireless multifunction printer.

Not too bad for a system set up on the cheap. I even did my own cabling and made all my own patch cords.

Next upgrade is the TV (if the War Department agrees  ::) ).
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Kyle Ricky on September 24, 2012, 04:15:25 PM
I love XP because it didn't have any of that file security stuff in it. I used to delete files at random to see what it would do so I can learn how to fix it. Plus the themes you could get for it were really cool, also. I had a lot of fun changing the look of it and such. I learned so much running XP.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Thor on September 28, 2012, 10:35:57 PM
I love XP because it didn't have any of that file security stuff in it. I used to delete files at random to see what it would do so I can learn how to fix it. Plus the themes you could get for it were really cool, also. I had a lot of fun changing the look of it and such. I learned so much running XP.

That's one thing I DON'T like about W7. I can't access certain files that I could in XP. W8 is even worse. BTW, I LOATHE apple products, even though Gates stole Windows from apple to begin with.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: LC EFA on September 29, 2012, 05:17:50 AM
That's one thing I DON'T like about W7. I can't access certain files that I could in XP. W8 is even worse. BTW, I LOATHE apple products, even though Gates stole Windows from apple to begin with.

So far as I understand it they both copied the idea of a windowing system from XWindows (and both did a supremely piss poor job of it too).

Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Kyle Ricky on September 29, 2012, 02:36:21 PM
Stolen from Xerox.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: freedumb2003 on September 29, 2012, 05:30:52 PM
I "upgraded" to Windows 8 (beta).

It S-U-C-K-S.  They thought "hey, you don't need to actually specify which programs to run -- we'll just smash them across your entire screen and let you find them!" (among dozens of other "helpful changes.")

If it wasn't such a hassle to back it off, I would.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Thor on October 02, 2012, 03:08:50 PM
No. Gates stole DOS from IBM and the Windows style OS from apple.
Title: Re: Re: Re: Windows 8
Post by: DLR Pyro on October 02, 2012, 05:07:06 PM
No. Gates stole DOS from IBM and the Windows style OS from apple.
Gates bought DOS from Gary Kildall of Digital Research to provide an O/S to sell to  IBM.
Title: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Kyle Ricky on October 02, 2012, 07:02:50 PM
It started with Xerox Alto.
Title: Re: Re: Re: Windows 8
Post by: Thor on October 03, 2012, 11:09:46 PM
Gates bought DOS from Gary Kildall of Digital Research to provide an O/S to sell to  IBM.

Yeah, you're right. I'm gettin' old, so my memory is failing me.  :-)