Windows 8, my thoughts and the leaked RTM

I downloaded the supposed Windows 8 RTM release that was leaked to the torrent sites and I installed it in Virtual Box to kick the tires a bit. This isn't my first experimentation with Window 8 as I've had a look at the developer preview and I think the consumer preview also. I'm not sure if there was one after that, there's references on the 'net about a “release preview” I don't know if that's new MS talk for an RC or what.

I downloaded it and installed it (which went slightly faster then I expected). The installation prompted me for my “Microsoft Account” now I had one from the MSN days (approx 2000 when I got it) but I was being spammed out of it on that account so started afresh with a live.com address a few years back. I only really use it for MSN chat these days but even that has been taken over by facebook chat. Email is tried and trusted Gmail. Anyway, I inputed the live.com account details and that was fine, installation went ahead. I noticed that this is your user account and password for accessing Windows 8 which is a huge leap into the relms of cloud computing ala Chrome OS.

The UI (Metro), seems to be responsive and fast but it just isn't designed with a mouse in mind. You can navigate using a mouse but it seems to be an after thought and not the main focus. All the apps are fullscreen with touch friendly toggles and a universal Metro UI/Windows Phone/Zune look about them. There is also a “desktop” interface which is pretty much a carbon copy of the Windows 7 desktop but without the start menu. The full screen Metro tiles UI is the start screen which makes it incredably touch screen friendly but fairly useless with the tradional mouse and keyboard input methods. I'm sure there are substantial behide the scenes updates with Windows 8 vs Windows 7 and I am told it is possible to install a 3rd party start menu on the desktop for a more tradional Windows 7 like experience.

Overall I'd not recommend it unless you had it on a tablet or some other touch input device. Windows 7 will continue to get updates and you can always give linux a go if you have a itch about changing Windows 7.

General Geeky History

I've used pretty much every version of Windows from 3.1 to 7 except 2000, but that was pretty much ME except it didn't suck.

I'm 25 now so that means my dad had a 3.11 machine when I was very young and I remember windows 95 was the thing to beat all things when It came out. Dad upgraded the 3.1 machine to 95 (I can't remember was more ram installed but I've a vague memory of it. Next there was a new desktop with 98 SE and we cept the monitor, keyboard, mouse and ancient printer from the old PC. Those were the infamous and much detested dialup years (this video will bring you back http://youtu.be/gsNaR6FRuO0). 

We moved onto a new Dell during the pentium 4 time (with xp) and that's still the "family" PC (though dad uses it exclusively). My first laptop was in or around the purchase of the Dell (maybe 6 months to a year later), it was pretty basic and slow my parents paid 400 new for it off dell. My parents were probably under the "new car" philosophy to get the kid a basic model and it'll incentivise them to work to get something better even though I was 19-20 and wasn't gonna spill crap all over it. It had a 1.4ghz celeron singlecore that could barely run xp). It prompted me to work and save and blow over 1000 euro on a 1.66ghz core 2 duo Acer (just before vista was on the cards so I got XP MCE). That was my well used (and abused) personal workhorse for ages (saw manys the OS experiment including vista, quite a few ubuntu releases and the various public, and not so public, test builds of windows 7). I'm currently on another acer that's 1-2 years old and has a 2.26ghz core i5 with 4gb ram.

Around 05/06 I heard about this thing called Ubuntu and that it was a free OS. I looked up the website and screenshots and I didn't like the Gnome top panel and dismissed it as too OSXy. I then heard about a "windows user friendly" version called Kubuntu. Our house had slow broadband at the time and I thought I wasn't gonna download it as it'd take ages. So I saw that they'd post it out for free to any country so I opted for that. I installed it on my laptop and wifi didn't work out of the box and this was a deal breaker. I wanted portability and needed wifi for college so back to xp I went (I had a system install cd).

From about 9.04 (or possibly earlier) began an on again off again flirtation with ubuntu, monitoring it's progress and doing a full install (as I wanted to go full out using as my main OS to give it a fair chance, and also I hadn't heard of virtual box at the time). I always was left thinking it's 85% there to being my main OS, ... ok it's 90% there,.... ok it's 95% there etc. But If i'm prefectly honest it wasn't until 11.10 and Linux Mint 12 that I thought "I really can use this as my full time OS and not have a niggling 1% instance where I want to use windows. I have a PS3 for gaming and Libre Office is now at a level where I don't have to install Office 2007 under wine anymore (it's possible and works 100% but after a while and the rate I tend to distro hop or try out new stuff in virtual box, the functionality gain isn't worth the hastle of installing as I don't use it really). Any games I do run are mostly emulators and casual stuff.

Terminal, I don't touch really unless it's a "copy these sudo commands into the terminal to install". I've gotten used to the fact that ubuntu and mint are easy to install software to and Wine is now virtually bomb proof unless you need direct x or .net framework or something).

In conclusion right from the beginning I was fascinated by the prospect that a full desktop OS can be completely free but in a way that has hindered it as it doesn't have the financial resources of Microsoft and Apple to iron out the niggling aspects as quickly or to get huge software vendors to support their platform. For me it has taken this long to rival them in my mind and cause me to possibly switch for good. I'm more mature now and so are (some) Linux distros. The back and forth with windows has stood to me well as both my parents and the vast majority of my friends use 7 and I can help them as I've used it extensively since the public beta.

Windows 8 hasn't impressed be at all thus far. I realise it's just a developer preview but I guess it's a "love it or hate it" interface. It's geared towards touch input (tablets and in the case of Windows Phone 7, phones) I understand that, and they are making a huge gamble by porting it over to the ARM architecture. What I wish they would do is have an option upon installation to install the Metro UI (what they call it) or to just stick with a refined and updated Windows 7 interface. I was quite pleasantly surprised by the Windows 7 "Superbar" (the bottom panel) and the Ribbon interface they employed in Office 2007 and 2010 as well as MS Paint and Wordpad and a few others. I find it's pretty intuitive yet powerful.