Why does MS Marketing Still Try To Mislead Everyone?

[Soukyuu]

when I was contemplating on whether to up(?)grade to win8.1 from win7, I also looked at VRAM usage. Guess which version had about 100MB more VRAM used in idle?

 

As a follow up, looks like I found the image where I got that statement from in my image cache. Can't seem to find the actual article this was on, but anyway:

 

[TELVM]

^ I remember that Tom's article, but I'm also unable to find it now. Weird.

[JorgeA]

Nice graphic.

 

So, all the talk about how Aero Glass was eliminated precisely so that Windows 8 would work better on cr@ppy mobile devices -- was that just a load of hooey?

 

--JorgeA

 

[JorgeA]

^ I remember that Tom's article, but I'm also unable to find it now. Weird.

 

Maybe it's been sent down the memory hole.

 

--JorgeA

[TELVM]

^ Found it, it was just my poor searching skills:

 

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/graphics-card-myths,3694-5.html

 

"... These tests were run on a Windows 7 x64 setup with Aero disabled. If you’re using Aero (or Windows 8/8.1, which doesn't have Aero), you should add ~300 MB to each and every individual measure you see listed below ..."

 

 

I'd add "and if you're using The Tiles Wonder @ 1920x1080 you're wasting 120~160 MB of VRAM at idle, courtesy of the Metro crap."

 

Almost double the VRAM draw in exchange for losing aero and "gaining" Metro, boy that's progress!

[NoelC]

Nice graphic.

 

So, all the talk about how Aero Glass was eliminated precisely so that Windows 8 would work better on cr@ppy mobile devices -- was that just a load of hooey?

 

Jorge, in a word:  Yes!

 

EVEN IF we accept that there's less processing going on now (which I don't since the borders are composited anyway), the amount of time spent by the GPU painting borders is tiny, virtually inconsequential.  How often are you opening/resizing/moving windows that the system has to work on the chrome, as compared to the time typing or reading stuff inside the client area?

 

But theory aside, no one has reported that a portable device got even one iota less battery efficient when they restored Aero Glass via Big Muscle's Aero Glass for Win 8/8.1 tools.

 

Somewhere along the way, it's been deemed okay for Marketing to just make shit up and lie to us outright, which irritates me greatly and is why I started this thread.

 

Unfortunately, we're kind of stuck with buying new versions of Windows regardless.  In that case, wouldn't it just be better to just fire all the Marketeers who are trying to pull the wool over eyes of people a LOT smarter than they are?

 

-Noel

[Guest]

[...] wouldn't it just be better to just fire all the Marketeers who are trying to pull the wool over eyes of people a LOT smarter than they are?

The purpose of the marketers is not to encourage us to upgrade, but to encourage us to upgrade more often. Big business tends to upgrade the least frequently due to the costs of retraining employees, adjusting workflows, ensuring software compliance and compatibility, etc. It is specifically the marketers' job to convince businesses that the benefit of being more secure and/or being more productive is greater than the cost of all these factors combined.

Edited June 4, 2014 by 5eraph

[NoelC]

The fundamental assumption that upgrading more often is good is flawed.  An OS needs to remain stable for 3 to 5 years (key parts MUCH longer) so that complex applications can be developed that use it.

 

Thus the marketeers have no useful function except to try to get people to do things that don't make sense.

 

Back in my day Marketing was what people who weren't smart enough to be Engineers did.  How is it these bozos are in charge now?

 

-Noel

[JorgeA]

 

Nice graphic.

 

So, all the talk about how Aero Glass was eliminated precisely so that Windows 8 would work better on cr@ppy mobile devices -- was that just a load of hooey?

 

Jorge, in a word:  Yes!

[...]

 

Thanks, Noel, that's what I suspected.

 

Efficiency having been eliminated as a candidate, the only rationalizations I can see for ditching Aero Glass are (1) (anti-)esthetic fashion; or (2) marketing B.S. that's bound to be exposed (as we just saw); or (3) a way to increase the differentiation in people's minds between Windows 8 and what came before it.

 

Of course,the third "reason" is like coming out with a new car model that "features" a coat of dull, matte primer instead of glossy metallic paint...

 

--JorgeA

Edited June 4, 2014 by JorgeA

[NoelC]

Right, then going to great lengths to make "dull, matte primer" fashionable.

 

Trying to push fashion is just ridiculous with an operating system.  It just screws everything up and we have people working hard to do exactly the opposite of what they should be doing, which is making it work better.

 

Unfortunately it doesn't seem to help much to "expose" this crap.  They just do more and more of it as though nothing's wrong.  But you can be sure they're paying attention to the lack of adoption of Windows 8.  Very few folks know all the many, many tweaks now needed to make it actually work.  My book on doing that is selling reasonably well, and there's a lot of it on the web, so it's clearly information that's needed.

 

Microsoft:

 

Build a worse mousetrap, and no matter how much your marketeers sing the world will NOT beat a path to your door.

 

Kind of a "well duh" moment, eh?

 

-Noel

[Soukyuu]

Very few folks know all the many, many tweaks now needed to make it actually work.  My book on doing that is selling reasonably well, and there's a lot of it on the web, so it's clearly information that's needed.

-Noel

Well, if I'm allowed to be cynical, their tactic seems to work out in your favor then

[jaclaz]

NoelC, on 06 Jun 2014 - 04:30 AM, said:

Trying to push fashion is just ridiculous with an operating system.

Only seemingly OT , I just discovered that you can now have coloured Telepass devices.

The Telepass is a small device (that used to be only a "neutral" gray) that is used to automate toll payment on a number of highways in Italy.

It is a small box, roughly the size of a pack of cigarettes that you glue with some velcro like fixture to the inside of your windscreen (usually hidden BEHIND the internal rear mirror).

It is something you actually get in your hands and look at roughly once in several years (when you change your car, or when the 3M adhesive fails because of heat/freeze cycles/UV rays or when the internal batteries wear off, and you get a new device in exchange), , the thingy is (due to it's position and neutral colour) hardly noticeable and in many cars can be placed in the little recess intended for spectacles/glasses and thus it is completely hidden.

This is how it used to look:

 This is what you can get now:

http://www.telepass.it/ecm/faces/public/telepass/intestazione/news74a5.html

Since I was astonished that someone could actually care about this less-than-trifling, I would call it non-existing problem, I searched a bit around, and found this (Telepass "holder" in different colours AND INCLUDING a car freshener ):

http://www.xpass.it/

Humanity is doomed. 

jaclaz

Edited June 6, 2014 by jaclaz

[NoelC]

 

Well, if I'm allowed to be cynical, their tactic seems to work out in your favor then

 

Not really - more than a few million users are needed before the market for people seeking to buy things to go with the OS is large enough to make sales really take off.  In short, it ain't makin' me rich.

 

Windows 8 is an apparent flop, and things that associate with it are flopping too.  Whether Microsoft will continue to "bet the farm" on a failed initiative is anyone's guess. 

 

I wouldn't have thought Microsoft would have kept on with it as long as they have.  Back when I worked in the corporate software engineering world as an employee, heck, I had to justify everything and was barely ever allowed to finish anything.  Anyone could see during the public betas of Win 8 that it was the wrong idea (God, was that TWO years ago already?)

 

How people in management sometimes get to make boneheaded decisions and continue attempting to make them viable for years is beyond me.  I always suspect the folks who want the boneheaded thing must have photos of the boss and a mistress and/or the boss doing something illegal, or something like that.

 

 

 

Humanity is doomed. 

 

 

Unfortunately, I share your viewpoint.  We've seen the golden age of computing come and go.

 

How many folks can make a modern system into a workhorse with which to develop the next generation of products?  Not as many as with prior systems.

 

-Noel

[jaclaz]

Unfortunately, I share your viewpoint.  We've seen the golden age of computing come and go.

 

How many folks can make a modern system into a workhorse with which to develop the next generation of products?  Not as many as with prior systems.

 

-Noel

 

Sure, but the really worrying thing is that it is not limited to computing.

 

We are actually going to follow the evolution of Golgafrinchans

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03v379k/profiles/golgafrinchans

 

 

A year after crashing on prehistoric Earth the Golgafrinchan Colonization Committee have met 573 times. The committee includes the Captain of the 'B' Ark and his two officers, a management consultant, a hairdresser and a marketing girl.

It is very important to the management consultant that the colonization committee maintains order and works along the lines of a traditional committee structure, complete with a chair (rock) and an agenda (agenda rock). His main concern is fiscal policy. Inflation has occurred since they decided to adopt the leaf as legal tender and he suggests that they can effectively revalue the leaf by burning down all the forests.

The hairdresser heads up the Fire Development Sub-committee. He was given a couple of sticks to rub together but instead he made them into a pair of scissors.

Another member of the Fire Development Sub-committee, the marketing girl, is concerned about establishing the consumer expectations for fire and how they relate to it before they create fire itself. For example, do they want fire that can be fitted nasally? She is also working on inventing the wheel, but is having a little difficulty deciding what colour it should be.

 

 

jaclaz

[TELVM]

... We've seen the golden age of computing come and go.

 

^ Exactly my feeling. In the not-too-distant future everything is going to be dumbed-down, walled-gardened, clouded, monthly-subscribed, and in general screwed up for the users in every form imaginable.

 

Enjoy W7 while it lasts, for beyond Se7en lies the abyss ...