JorgeA

Glad to be of service! Are you trying these on Windows 8, or on Windows Blue? (Just curious.) --JorgeA

Excellent! I'm very happy to hear that Classic Shell works on Blue. --JorgeA

Hi Laurence, Yes, that's is the next logical step for this thread. Windows 8 will soon morph into Windows Blue, and unless we update it for Blue the list will get increasingly less useful over time. Any volunteers out there to install Windows Blue and start trying out these Start Menu/Button alternatives? I could expand the list with a separate section specific to Windows Blue (or 8.1 or whatever they end up calling it). --JorgeA

I'd like to meet this guy (or gal). --JorgeA

Cooking the books would be playing with fire, but it wouldn't surprise me if they tried some heavy spin (without actual lying) to make things look good, as with the "60 million licenses" claim. --JorgeA

Awareness of Windows 8's depressive effect on PC sales continues to spread: How Bad Is the PC Market? Analysts Count the Ways. (emphasis added)--JorgeA

Well, they could start respecting their customers and customer choice. Then again, pigs could fly and h*ll could freeze over... --JorgeA

Well, they could start respecting their customers and customer choice. Then again, pigs could fly and h*ll could freeze over... --JorgeA

Welcome to the discussion! Yes, tablet-oriented interfaces are all the rage now and lots of websites and applications are moving in that direction. I can think of the newest versions of Avast and Norton 360, for example -- they, too, have big gaudy buttons and tons of wasted screen space. Nice for those who use tablets, but it does make things harder (and uglier) for the hundreds of millions of us who do our work or surf the Web on decent-sized screens. --JorgeA

That guy apparently hasn't tried walking into (for example) a chain retailer and asking to buy a PC with Windows 7 on it. They're not set up to do that. This may change if Win8 continues to do poorly -- either the retailers will offer the option, or PCs will arrive at the store with Win7 on it or at least an "upgrade" disk as happened with Vista vs. XP. (Last year I bought at retail a PC built in 2009 that came with XP pre-installed but also Vista installation DVDs.) But that's not the case at present, so Windows 7 can't save the market. --JorgeA

Thanks for continuing to fill us in on the Neowin Follies! The argument above makes no sense. Exactly what new hardware does that poster think would "capitalize on the true value of Windows 8"? Desktop PCs with touch? Laptops with touch? Well, they're out there already, and they're hardly setting the world on fire. Anybody with a brain can figure out that this "touch" thing (the salient new feature in Win8, for whose sake the Metro abomination was conceived) is awkward and bound to get real tiring real fast. And anybody with a hand will figure it out soon enough afterward. Moreover, due to the touch feature the hardware is more expensive. So, we have the following formula: "Unnecessary feature to be used when you want sore muscles" + "more expensive hardware to accommodate said feature" which hardly adds up to a winning combination. What's so difficult about this to understand? Barking up the wrong tree. What matters isn't whether the changes are "radical," but whether they make things better or worse, easier or harder, more powerful or less powerful. In the case of Windows 8, we know that the Start Screen lacks certain features of the Start Menu (such as "Recent Items") and that, if you open it, it obscures everything on the Desktop. Also, by default, Internet Explorer from the Start Screen lands the user in the feature desert of Metro IE. Moreover, when scanning the program listings it's visually easier to read a column of short lines closely packed in the corner (as in the Start Menu), than to read several rows of spread-out tiles of different sizes all across the monitor screen. These changes (among others) make the Start Screen less powerful and harder to use than the Start Menu, which boils down to a worse experience. LOL +1000 --JorgeA EDIT: tweaks

A fool and his money... I'm taking the advice. First I future-proofed my computing with a Win7 system sporting an SSD and 2TB HDD with an i7-3770; the laptop will be next. If I can't find a lappie with a 36xxQM CPU and Windows 7 at a decent price, I'll wipe Win8 off the one I do buy (I'll triple-glove for the wiping ) and use the spare Win7 license that I purchased last year. I also have extra Office 2010 and Outlook 2007 disks (probably not to be used in the same system). Have no interest in cloud services or social media, so any new "features" along those lines in future editions are meaningless to me. Beyond that, if MSFT never gets around to fixing things, it'll be Linux boxes for me. Already ran a live DVD on the laptop for a week while waiting for the replacement HDD, and it wasn't half-bad -- whatever needed to be saved/stored went onto a flash drive. --JorgeA

I feel it stems from a kind of false equivocation: technology improves over time therefore each new technology is an improvement. While innovation and experimentation should be encouraged, failure should also be allowed, and there should be a realization that some attempts will be regressions. As time passes, the failures are less remembered than the successes thus giving the appearance of an uninterrupted string of improvements. After enough time, people start forgetting what has failed before and attempt to reintroduce bad concepts. As an example, just look at how many people are talking about full screen apps, single-tasking, and rote memorization of complex actions as innovations. We spent years trying to free ourselves of this. Even worse, Microsoft was once a primary innovator away from these computing concepts. That's a great point: we tend to remember the hits and to forget the misfires, which gives the false impression of steady progress. --JorgeA

This is more industry standard across all notebook/tablet (fondleslab) manufacturers. It is increasingly difficult outside of some whitebook brands to do proper repairs on a notebook. I get many in from friends or family and they are all big name brands which means they use non-standard parts. Especially the case with the slim-line types that use clips rather than screws to hold them together. Most often than not, it ends up you go look on Ebay for replacement parts and sometimes you can find them for a good price. Otherwise if it is a common point of failure (HP dv notebook motherboard) you are better off buying a new one. These things have been getting newer tech inside of them, but as a result the outsides are getting cheaper. People are clutzes and they drop their stuff all the time. And this stuff isn't tough enough to take that kind of punishment. Sure you can find some rugged or modular notebooks/tablets, but they are out of the way (not sold in stores) and are more expensive. I used to like taking in notebook repairs for people, but it soon became evident that they are too cheaply made and most times I can do nothing for them except say to go buy a new one. The drawbacks of making entire computers disposable like this were brought vividly to mind last week when the HDD on my Vista laptop developed a dire problem and I could no longer boot to it or even read it reliably. Were it not for the fact that I can open up the case to replace the HDD, I'd have been facing hundreds of dollars in new expenses for a whole new laptop, instead of $50 for a new 2.5" drive. Had this been a Surface, the question would have been moot, as (I understand that) opening the case voids the warranty, and in any event it's said to be really difficult to open it safely even for a professional. (Can provide links if necessary.) --JorgeA

Worst PC sales drop in history When I saw the headline I wanted to write the following words, but they're already in the article: If there weren't thousands of posts in this and the "First Impressions" thread, I'd go back and see if any of us clearly predicted that Windows 8 would actually accelerate the decline in PC sales, rather than stop the bleeding let alone cure the ailing PC market. --JorgeA

Here's a heckuva perceptive analysis, not just of why Windows RT is not meeting with success, but of why it cannot succeed: Microsoft Windows RT price cuts don’t stop the death spiral The article is so good, I could quote the whole thing. But instead I'll do it the hard way and pick a few of the highest highlights. --JorgeA

We've seen how MSFT is seeking to milk more $$$ out of its customers by turning Office into a subscription service, and making the purchase of a license so expensive that many customers will opt for the subscription. Here's another way to shear extra $$$ from the sheep: If you break your Surface RT/Pro kickstand, you will have to purchase a new Surface device To borrow @jaclaz's automotive analogy, this is like saying that if you break a door hinge, or if the windshield cracks, or if the battery dies, then you will need to purchase a whole new car. --JorgeA

Thanks for the laughs, @Formfiller. I've never understood how being "new" constitutes a reason for buying a product, much less for heaping scorn on those who aren't interested. The pencils I write with look exactly the same as the ones I used back when I was in elementary school, and they work just as well. Anybody who would criticize me for using them (instead of some newfangled thingy) would go right into my "kook" slot. Their line of argument would be merely irrelevant, but it's their inappropriately hostile attitude that would get them classified as nutjobs. Ditto for Win8tards. And that "looks dated" pseudo-argument. I don't give a rat's *ss whether it looks "new" or "dated." What does that mean, anyway, and what does it really matter? I can understand it if someone makes objectively measurable comparisons, such as "A looks sharper than B because there are more pixels per square inch" or something along those lines. I can also understand if someone claims that A looks uglier than B, or prettier, or in some other way more (or less) esthetically pleasing to them. De gustibus non est disputandum. But "modern"? "Dated"?? These are almost completely meaningless terms, and those who use them prove nothing other than their lack of independent judgment, blindly following the trends that others propose. So A "was in use 10 years ago," and B "just came out." And...? --JorgeA

Awareness (and the effects) of lackluster Windows 8 sales are starting to spill over into the wider world: Bank of America thinks Windows 8 'lacks momentum' and challenges optimism As a result, BoA has downgraded their recommendation for Microsoft stock from "Buy" to "Neutral." Notice how they have no time for MS/Thurrott-type excuses for the poor sales performance of the company's products. That "conventional wisdom," BTW, is very similar to what my historical stock research had indicated and I'd intended to buy MSFT in late summer shortly before launch. Good thing that my incurable procrastination took over and I never got around to making the purchase. --JorgeA

This whole thing about needing an Internet connection to play a game is ridiculous on its face. Why would you have to be online in order to play a game, any more than you have to be online in order to read a book?? Yeah, yeah, we know all about e-readers. At this point it wouldn't surprise me if, before long, we were required to be online even to read a d*mn book. But the point about e-readers doesn't address the issue, which is -- why would anybody consider such a connection necessary? And, more critically, why would any customer want to do it this way? The only reasonable scenario for a computer game needing to be online is for multiplayer games. (Although even that wouldn't be so for games played by small groups in the same building.) Anything beyond that is a gratuitous burden. --JorgeA

You may be more right than you think (in general if not in this particular case). I've been away for a few days, which gave me time to ponder some of these issues somewhat more detachedly. While thinking about it, and now reading about these incredible "why would I live there" and "we must all be connected all the time" comments, it strikes me that Thurrott, Adam Orth and other proponents of this stuff just don't have the wiring to get it. They seem to be incapable of understanding how or why anybody would want to lead their life differently, and specifically in a way that doesn't involve dependence on and deference to The Center. It's almost like a mental illness, or at best a dark aspect of the human character that has come to the surface (so to speak) in the neowinnies and mstards of the world. More than simply accepting it, they welcome and even prefer to be monitored, watched, tethered, given a pre-made environment, told what to do -- and they actually feel insulted ("you're Luddites," etc.) when someone dares to suggest it might be better to lead your own independent life and to tailor your immediate environment to your own requirements. It's as if deep inside they want to feel part of some giant collective abstraction and gleefully give up their freedom and individuality for the sake of participating in it. Shall we call them... --Giorgos of MYOFB

My "ideal" Linux distro would be one that combines the Windows look-and-feel of Zorin OS with the stunning graphics of Netrunner. Every other distro I've tried features what I can only describe as "powdery" or "grainy" visuals (n the start menu, wallpaper, windows borders, application menus, etc.). I'm not sure what the proper term for it is, or what causes it, but it's the best that I can come up with to indicate what I mean. From the little I know of Linux in my limited explorations of it, it will probably be easier to give Netrunner a Windows-type start menu, than to give to Zorin OS (or any other Linux I've seen) those sharp graphics. But I'm willing to be corrected! --JorgeA

Here's a good summary of the issues surrounding Windows 8. Click on the link for the details: Four reasons Windows 8 can't match Vista's adoption rate Upgrade cycles are longer Tablets are replacing PCs People don't like Windows 8 Windows 8 tablets haven't been selling --JorgeA Note: never mind that last, empty bullet point -- I can't seem to get rid of it.

Sooooo Windows 8.1 is also Windows 6.3? LOL To help us in understanding that idea, and quoting from one of the favorite books in this thread, all we need to remember is that War Is Peace Freedom Is Slavery Ignorance Is Strength -- and we'll be all right. It's an example of goodthink (see the entry, "blackwhite"). --JorgeA

Unfreakinbelievable!!! For the benefit of the time-deprived, if I may quote from some of the posts there -- --JorgeA