JorgeA

MagicAndre, How customizable is the Ubuntu look? Let's say, Can I make it have a taskbar at the bottom, where it will show me the various windows I have open, like the Windows taskbar? Can I combine such a taskbar with that black strip across the top that shows the volume control and the time, and place it at the bottom of the screen? And, can I get rid of that column of icons on the left, and use something like a start menu? I don't necessarily want to see all of these choices diaplyed all of the time. (If this sounds to you like I would like to replicate the classic (Metro-free) Windows experience, but in Linux -- you are correct. ) Your answers could have a major influence on my computing for years to come! --JorgeA

tomasz86, Thanks for the link -- that's where the earlier 0.11% figure came from. A true apples-to-apples comparison (that is, a comparison from the same source) will have to wait till Net Market Share releases the numbers for April. But their methodology (checking the OS running the browser that's visiting a Web site) appears to be similar to Chitika's, so on the face of it the statistics shouldn't come out all that different from each other. We would think, anyway... --JorgeA

Windows 8 usage has skyrocketed from 0.11 percent to 0.13 percent, according to a new report passed along by Neowin.net. The conclusion is a bit of a hoot: Note that the percentages are for the various Windows flavors only. IIRC, the previously seen 0.11% share counted all desktop OS's and not just those from Microsoft. If we factor in the assortment of Linux distros and Mac OS's that are out there traveling the 'Net, Win8's percentage may be hardly any greater today than it was last month. One could argue that this reflects people who tried it and then stopped using it. Although that alone should tell us something, remember that the two articles in question are trying to cast Win8 usage as growing, which would appear not to be the case. My thoughts exactly! --JorgeA

belgianguy, That is a fantastic commentary! My favorite part is this: I agree with every single word you wrote there. (I'm on Vista!) --JorgeA

There's a discussion of Windows 8 over in the AVS Forum. One poster made the following excellent point: He means the lovely Charms. Surprising that more reviewers haven't picked up on this, especially the ones who claim to have been working in Win8 exclusively. It's happened to me, too -- also, when in the Desktop, with the Metro app switcher on the top left. And if I want to get the mouse out of the way of something and am unlucky enough to leave it at the bottom right corner when in Desktop mode, then not only do I get the Charms, but my open windows disappear and I'm shown the desktop. That's never been one of my favorite Windows 7 behaviors, but Win8 doubles down on it. Who was the genius who came up with a system where the user needs to learn to AVOID doing certain things in the course of normal interaction with the screen?? A properly designed OS UI should carry out user-initiated actions ONLY when the user performs a deliberate act for the specific purpose of making it happen (i.e., by clicking), not as an accidental result of doing something else (like moving the mouse around or dragging the scroll bar). That first observation above led to the following comment: --JorgeA

jaclaz, Cute! I "like" how the game is rigged. The object is to avoid going on red squares, but "you" (MS) play Green and I play Red; and then my pieces (starting on red squares) can actually only move one square diagonally, which means that they will always stay on red squares! Loved that "difference" between the short-sighted bishop and the limping knight. --JorgeA

CoffeeFiend, Thank you very much for the explanation. Putting that commentary together with what you've been saying, it's starting to make sense to me now. The May issue of PCWorld came in the mail yesterday, with Windows 8 as the cover feature. Editor Steve Fox likes the new look and the fact that MS has made a bold play for the growing tablet market. However, he's dubious about Win8's viability on desktop machines: After discussing "a potential user revolt," the lead editorial concludes: --JorgeA

I just came across a review of the Metro interface. The article was interesting, but the real stars on the page are the commenters: On that page, the comment that appears just below this last comment sounds like an even more serious indictment of Metro, but I'm not a developer so I lack the expertise to assess it. I'll be thankful to any who do know what he's talking about and who will flesh out some of what he says in the first two paragraphs. --JorgeA

Apropos of some of the images we've been seeing in this thread, check this out. --JorgeA

Great find, Andre -- thanks! The Win8 Start Menu replacements are looking better and better. I'll give this a try. A couple of other ideas: here and here. --JorgeA

CoffeeFiend, That's the best summary of the situation that I've seen anywhere. This Metro nonsense is starting to spread like a disease. A couple of nights ago I visited winunleaked.tk to see what they've come up with lately. Instead of reaching the blog directly, now they first put up a Metro-looking "Start" screen where you click on the part of the website that you want to go to. Of course, before this it used to be that you could reach the blog page directly and then click on the forum link if you wanted to visit that part of the site. Bottom line: it's more steps if you want to read the blog, and no fewer steps if you want to enter the forum. Not only does it look like Win8, it works just like Win8, too! --JorgeA

Paul Thurrott is officially undecided on Windows 8: On the other hand, Neowin.net reports that Microsoft is claiming that Of course, that could be due at least in part to curiosity over the controversial new Metro interface. Thoughts? Comments? --JorgeA

Sorry MagicAndre, it was only a rhetorical question! I totally agree with you. --JorgeA

MagicAndre, Yeah, there's speculation on the HTPC boards as to whether this will help to improve Windows Media Center by providing an income stream specific to it, or whether it indicates a desire by Microsoft to kill off and bury WMC. Personally, I don't understand the decision -- for the exact reasons you give. Why not offer it as an add-on to Win8 "home" users, too? --JorgeA

Thanks, Joe -- the info in your link gibes with what I thought, that there was no problem running VisiCalc in DOS. I may even download it, put in on a floppy, and see if it actually runs on my 8088 machine. Interesting site, BTW. I've added it to my Favorites! --JorgeA

I just came across this post on another forum, and I'd like to know if what the writer is saying was true: Ignore the double negative, I think what he means is clear. Anybody know about this? --JorgeA

I don't use AVG, so I can't speak directly to that, but -- if your AV software can find the 98SE drives where you normally keep them, you should be able to scan them without needing to physically move the drives around. This is what I do with my Win98 systems and the ESET NOD Online Scanner. Within the application, I tell it to search the network and then I select the drive(s) that I want scanned. I've also done this with Avast, installed on an XP machine, scanning a 98SE machine over the network. SuperAntiSpyware will do it, too, IIRC. Hope this helps. BTW, you can still install and use Spybot Search & Destroy 1.6.2 on Win98 systems (any flavor), including the real-time protection portions of the program. --JorgeA

See the following quote from that page: In terms of enterprise sales -- does this compensate for concerns that new Windows tablets will not be able to join a domain? Or, not really? --JorgeA

"Anything really" is the operative phrase. With the monthly check, etc., I was merely offering some sample ways to give a choice, based on the stated premise that many people would be starting simple with Metro and then some of them might want to move up to more complex computing with the Desktop. --JorgeA

Tripredacus, What do you think of the idea (proposed by many) of letting the buyer decide which UI to use exclusively (Metro or desktop)? The selection could be made 1) by the type of hardware (i.e., buy a tablet, it's Metro for you), or 2) during Windows installation, or 3) conceivably at any time afterward. The Metro screen could even have a little pop-up once a month or so that said, "Ready for the complete PC experience? Click here!" That way, folks who prefer a simpler existence can have it, without impacting others who prefer a fuller feature set. --JorgeA

CoffeeFiend, That is unbelievable! Why on Earth would they do such a thing? Don't get me wrong, it's not that I think you're providing inaccurate information, not at all -- it's that it's hard to understand why they would cripple their own product that way. Amazing. Maybe there's some underlying regulatory or licensing issue going on, but then you'd think those issues would apply equally to the other DVR-like applications that you allude to... MS has been citing low WMC usage metrics. If the percentages include data from around the world, then it's no wonder they look so low: only people in one country can really use it. --JorgeA

LOL. I thought CableCARD was the one and only reason some people used WMC in the first place. I mean, if I took that and ATSC feeds away, what are you left with? Yeah, analog 480i capturing... Great. Why not use a VCR while we're at it? CableCARD is what makes it bearable for the tiny part of the world where it's used. Hmm, I wonder if the regulations and/or WMC functionality are different in Canada, or outside the U.S. generally. Before we got the CableCARD (and convinced my wife to go along), I tested the WMC system for several months, watching and recording over-the-air programming exclusively. We were able to record and view high-def programming, no problem. Things got much more complicated when the CableCARD was added to the mix (and we don't have any premium channels). I wish. Canadian Netflix doesn't have 10% of the content of their USA counterpart but still costs the same. And since we have low bandwidth (usage) caps on our internet connections it's not much of an option either. At $4.50+taxes/GB over 50GB it could get really expensive very quickly! I mean, just watching one movie in full quality over my cap just once (2h movie @ 4.8mbit video) would cost me $23 extra (you might as well buy the Blu-Ray movie instead). Cablecos and telcos (like Bell which is our main satellite TV provider) saw some competition, and figured they'd crush it by making sure you can't use their competitors' online services by making it too expensive. Bell even tried to push for 25GB limits recently, and most "basic" broadband plans are capped at 5GB/month or lower. That 5GB/month plan is $40/mo if you don't have cable TV with them, or it's $56/mo for the 50GB plan (plus sales tax of course). Welcome to Canada! Sheez! But actually, there could be a silver lining to data caps: they might (inadvertently) slow down the devolution of our powerful PCs into dumb Internet terminals, by limiting the appeal of cloud services. We tried Netflix streaming on our HTPC, and found the experience clunky and inferior to actual discs. Many movies were simply not available for streaming. For those movies we did get to stream, anytime we wanted to review something that happened before, it would reload the whole d*mn movie. Plus, it was a challenge to control the tiny cursor on the screen from across the family room. And we have DSL, so the picture quality was comparable to SD/VCRs -- HD was out of the question. We could pay more for a higher speed service, but then that would have to be factored into the per-movie rental cost, and it's just not worth it to us, we don't rent that many movies that we can't get on cable. So in terms of rentals it's Blu-rays and DVDs for us: we can FF and rewind to our heart's content, subtitles are almost always available, usually we get to enjoy special features (interviews, bloopers) that streaming doesn't offer, and even regular DVDs look better on the Blu-ray player than on the DVD player. --JorgeA

CoffeeFiend, Wow, it does sound like WMC is pretty pointless outside of the U.S. I'd wondered if the MC experience might be better in countries that don't have this CableCARD craziness. We do use it at home (it's saving us $16/month in DVR fees) to watch and record cable TV. (DVDs and Blu-rays we play through the dedicated Blu-ray player, we don't rip discs as it's mostly Netflix for us there.) For our purposes we're pretty happy with Media Center, except for the inability to capture the live TV buffer, and a strange bug where if you have a multituner setup (like the Ceton InfiniTV 4) and want to record successive programs on the same channel, it will use the same tuner for the second show, so you end up watching the start of the second show at the end of the first recording. If MS were to fix these two issues in the Win8 MC add-on, that alone might make it worth our while to get the new OS (for that one PC only). Meanwhile, I just have to pass along this commentary on the "touch-centered" Windows 8: The rest of that writer's comment, you will no doubt relate to well! --JorgeA

Yup. They're late to the game and (apparently) bringing little that's new to the table. One aspect that I'm surprised hasn't been given more attention, is the esthetic angle. Look at the picture of that Nokia Windows phone with those crude, flat tiles. Given a choice of looking at that every day vs. the beautiful floating 3D-effect buttons you see on other devices, which one would you pick? An incomprehensible decision, unless the idea is to squeeze more $$$ out of those who really want Media Center. Folks over on the A.V. / Home Theater forums are not happy about it. Media Center in the CP is reportedly unchanged from Windows 7. It would take significant improvements (such as elimination of a couple of notable flaws) for me to shell out for 8MC as an add-on. --JorgeA

More love for Windows 8 from the community: