Friday, June 28th 2013
Windows 8.1, and Why You Should Let Go of Windows 7
When Steve Jobs went upstage in early-April 2010 to unveil the iPad, it was expected to be the next logical step to Apple's successful miniaturization of the MacBook to the category-defining MacBook Air. It was expected to be an OS X-based handheld that ran on hardware not much different. When Jobs revealed the iPad to be an upscale of the iPhone idea, rather than a downscale of the MacBook idea, the industry was never the same again. The successful reception of the iOS on both the iPhone and iPad is what could have been the genesis of the Windows of today, which looks great on smartphones, tablets, and touch-enabled notebooks, but is hated on desktops, particularly by the PC enthusiast community. Much of that hatred is misdirected, and is a waste of time. Here's why.
While Microsoft Windows CE and Windows Phone powered PDAs for years before the smartphone revolution, Microsoft's most popular creation in the mobile space has been Windows Phone 7, and its successors. The brand new 'tile' interface, coupled with clear, finger-friendly, and forgiving UI elements finally gave Microsoft the UI design it was looking for. Rather than making a repeat of Apple's winning formula of upscaling Windows Phone 7 to a software for tablets (i.e. being content with Windows RT), Microsoft extended the UI to the entire Windows product family, including operating systems for the PC, and shockingly, even Windows Server. With the new Windows 8.1 Release Preview, it's clear that Microsoft isn't going back on the direction Windows 8 took, and so as PC enthusiasts, we're forced to ask ourselves if putting up a fight against it, by clinging on to Windows 7, is really worth it.
The Start Menu that never really left.
The guiding principle behind a tile-like UI on mainline PC operating systems isn't that people would drop their mice and stretch their arms out to the monitor (a touchscreen), and begin using their PCs that way. It was so the PC in itself could evolve. The biggest point of contention for PC enthusiasts refusing to upgrade to Windows 8 and its inevitable successor is the lack of a Start menu. Well, not sure if you noticed, but the Start menu never left. It's only not a menu anymore, it's a screen. When you click on the start button on older Windows desktops, whatever shows up as a result, has your undivided attention. You're either looking for a program to launch, a document you were just working on, or finding your way to the key areas of the operating system. Your business with the Start menu gets wrapped up in a few seconds. So why not stretch that Start "thing" to cover the entire screen, and make it more functional?
Submenus of the Windows XP Start menu stretched out to the entire height of the screen, and with enough items, you could practically fill the screen with an extremely collapsed Start menu. Ask yourself if a fullscreen Start screen is really that different, after all, when Microsoft shrunk the Start menu to a fixed-size one in Windows Vista, by dropping in a scroll-bar, it sparked outrage.
Finding programs, documents, or OS-related functions using the Start screen takes nearly the same time once you get the hang of it, and can actually be quicker. When people screamed from the rooftops asking for their familiar Start button back on the taskbar, Microsoft obliged. The upcoming Windows 8.1, which will be a free upgrade to current Windows 8 users, features a Start button, right where you expect it to be. Before you get excited, all it does is spawn up the Start screen. Windows 8.1 also features an option with which your computer starts up straight to the desktop, instead of the Start screen.
The Modern UI bloat that doesn't really exist.
Another point of contention for Start screen opponents is the modern UI apps that come included with the operating system constituting bloatware. Well, they don't. These are apps that tell you the weather, list out the headlines, track your stocks, and so on. The default set of apps that come with Windows 8 barely have a couple of dozen megabytes in memory footprint, which is made up for by an overall better memory management by Windows 8. Besides, enthusiast PCs begin at 4 GB of memory, 8 GB is considered mainstream for gaming PCs, and enthusiast builds are getting the whiff of 16 GB already. Plenty of room in there for an app that tells the weather.
The grass on the other side stays greener even after you get there.
With the Windows 8.1 Release Preview we got to play with, Microsoft made it clear that it's not going to make steps backwards. There's "a" Start button, not "the" Start button. What shows up after you click it is bigger and better than its predecessor's Start screen. There are new tile-size options, including "large" (double the area of a medium tile), and "tiny" (a quarter of the area of a regular tile). The new "tiny" tile size is perfect for organizing shortcuts to scores of programs or games, the tiles have just enough room for a clear icon.
Windows 8.1, like its predecessor, starts up quicker than Windows 7 does. The kernel of the operating system never really shuts down, but hibernates, and wakes up in a snap each time you power up the PC. The new Storage Spaces, which is similar to Linux LDM, lets you better organize data across multiple physical hard drives.
Windows 8.1 introduces a new display driver model, WDDM 1.3. This brings with it a few new display features, including the standardization of wireless display, 48 Hz dynamic refresh rates for video playback, V-sync interrupt optimization, video conferencing acceleration, a Direct3D API feature so major, that it warrants a version number change. Introduced with DirectX 11.2, a new API feature called "tiled surfaces."
Tiled Surfaces is analogous to the OpenGL mega-textures technology demonstrated by id Software on "Rage," which helped it create vast, detailed, and smoothly animating 3D scenes. Instead of streaming textures as the scene is being rendered, mega-textures allows developers to deploy larger textures that are fewer in number, and dynamically show portions of it. These textures needn't be loaded to the video memory entirely, can stay on the disk, and the API would access portions of it as they become relevant to the scene, as it's being viewed. In essence, mega-texturing is a sort of "virtual-memory" for GPUs, and could shift focus from larger video memory to faster memory, in the upcoming generations of GPUs.
In conclusion
Suck it up. Windows for PC isn't going to change, and was always prone to significant change. Windows 95 was Microsoft's response to PCs that were firmly capable of GUI, at a time when people at large were getting the hang of using a mouse. Windows 8 and 8.1 are just as landmark, whether we like it or not. Microsoft is catering to a large mass of people that are getting the hang of a touchscreen, and prefer a uniform experience between devices both on the desk, and on the move. Improvements such as new "tiny" tiles make the Start screen just as functional and quick to use as a menu, and Microsoft isn't stopping with its innovations that will get increasingly out of reach for Windows 7 users.
The Start Menu that never really left.
The guiding principle behind a tile-like UI on mainline PC operating systems isn't that people would drop their mice and stretch their arms out to the monitor (a touchscreen), and begin using their PCs that way. It was so the PC in itself could evolve. The biggest point of contention for PC enthusiasts refusing to upgrade to Windows 8 and its inevitable successor is the lack of a Start menu. Well, not sure if you noticed, but the Start menu never left. It's only not a menu anymore, it's a screen. When you click on the start button on older Windows desktops, whatever shows up as a result, has your undivided attention. You're either looking for a program to launch, a document you were just working on, or finding your way to the key areas of the operating system. Your business with the Start menu gets wrapped up in a few seconds. So why not stretch that Start "thing" to cover the entire screen, and make it more functional?
Submenus of the Windows XP Start menu stretched out to the entire height of the screen, and with enough items, you could practically fill the screen with an extremely collapsed Start menu. Ask yourself if a fullscreen Start screen is really that different, after all, when Microsoft shrunk the Start menu to a fixed-size one in Windows Vista, by dropping in a scroll-bar, it sparked outrage.
Finding programs, documents, or OS-related functions using the Start screen takes nearly the same time once you get the hang of it, and can actually be quicker. When people screamed from the rooftops asking for their familiar Start button back on the taskbar, Microsoft obliged. The upcoming Windows 8.1, which will be a free upgrade to current Windows 8 users, features a Start button, right where you expect it to be. Before you get excited, all it does is spawn up the Start screen. Windows 8.1 also features an option with which your computer starts up straight to the desktop, instead of the Start screen.
The Modern UI bloat that doesn't really exist.
Another point of contention for Start screen opponents is the modern UI apps that come included with the operating system constituting bloatware. Well, they don't. These are apps that tell you the weather, list out the headlines, track your stocks, and so on. The default set of apps that come with Windows 8 barely have a couple of dozen megabytes in memory footprint, which is made up for by an overall better memory management by Windows 8. Besides, enthusiast PCs begin at 4 GB of memory, 8 GB is considered mainstream for gaming PCs, and enthusiast builds are getting the whiff of 16 GB already. Plenty of room in there for an app that tells the weather.
The grass on the other side stays greener even after you get there.
With the Windows 8.1 Release Preview we got to play with, Microsoft made it clear that it's not going to make steps backwards. There's "a" Start button, not "the" Start button. What shows up after you click it is bigger and better than its predecessor's Start screen. There are new tile-size options, including "large" (double the area of a medium tile), and "tiny" (a quarter of the area of a regular tile). The new "tiny" tile size is perfect for organizing shortcuts to scores of programs or games, the tiles have just enough room for a clear icon.
Windows 8.1, like its predecessor, starts up quicker than Windows 7 does. The kernel of the operating system never really shuts down, but hibernates, and wakes up in a snap each time you power up the PC. The new Storage Spaces, which is similar to Linux LDM, lets you better organize data across multiple physical hard drives.
Windows 8.1 introduces a new display driver model, WDDM 1.3. This brings with it a few new display features, including the standardization of wireless display, 48 Hz dynamic refresh rates for video playback, V-sync interrupt optimization, video conferencing acceleration, a Direct3D API feature so major, that it warrants a version number change. Introduced with DirectX 11.2, a new API feature called "tiled surfaces."
Tiled Surfaces is analogous to the OpenGL mega-textures technology demonstrated by id Software on "Rage," which helped it create vast, detailed, and smoothly animating 3D scenes. Instead of streaming textures as the scene is being rendered, mega-textures allows developers to deploy larger textures that are fewer in number, and dynamically show portions of it. These textures needn't be loaded to the video memory entirely, can stay on the disk, and the API would access portions of it as they become relevant to the scene, as it's being viewed. In essence, mega-texturing is a sort of "virtual-memory" for GPUs, and could shift focus from larger video memory to faster memory, in the upcoming generations of GPUs.
In conclusion
Suck it up. Windows for PC isn't going to change, and was always prone to significant change. Windows 95 was Microsoft's response to PCs that were firmly capable of GUI, at a time when people at large were getting the hang of using a mouse. Windows 8 and 8.1 are just as landmark, whether we like it or not. Microsoft is catering to a large mass of people that are getting the hang of a touchscreen, and prefer a uniform experience between devices both on the desk, and on the move. Improvements such as new "tiny" tiles make the Start screen just as functional and quick to use as a menu, and Microsoft isn't stopping with its innovations that will get increasingly out of reach for Windows 7 users.
353 Comments on Windows 8.1, and Why You Should Let Go of Windows 7
I don't think that it's wrong for anyone to use a particular O/S or not. Everyone is different and has their reasons, be they logical or otherwise. People like my father, who type with one finger and knows pretty much nothing about computers... He doesn't know the difference between XP and 7. The common "XP" layout is something he has finally grasped over many years. I couldn't imagine the rage if I would install Windows 8 on his machine lol.
I like having it in a corner of the screen that I can easily click on and click away from while being able to see stuff on the desktop. Going back and forth between a fullscreen menu just felt needlessly complicated when I did use Metro.
Do MS seriously think that their childish attempt will get through people who have legitimate argument not to use Windows 8? Seriously how could a company's head go through their ass so far it popped right back up?
If so then I am likely sold. ONLY if it make my games run/look better.
Idc about anything else..lol..
Fight the power!
messexperience is just as fast (if not faster) than a structured menu?You say people get a more "functional" Start Menu, what is functional about a screen where you get the most from apps optimized for smartphones and tablets, what is functional if you are restricted to a downgraded multitasking experience where you can only use 2/3 + 1/3 split screens. What is functional about a dull unicolor full-screened menu where you have to switch constantly between that and your desktop to get simple things done like tuning your music in a full-blown desktop player. What is functional about a Start Menu thats feels intrusive and practically makes Windows a non-windowed OS.The new Start Menu is a good idea for touch-enabled displays but for traditional PCs is odd.
they must add something or tweak something more but not tell us coz many people complain about win 8
And it's not just PC enthusiasts they pissing off too in fact everyone i personally know dislike win8 and some have asked me to put win 7 on the system..
In the end if they wanted to cater to more people and get more sales ( if they cared ) they would just add the real start button.
So add the start button and i will buy it and not until as i don't want to buy it and mod the OS as all that be saying to MS is that they can bend ya over and shaft ya till no end as later it would not surprise me if they blocked those apps later.
If you think MS should be Apple, you can agree that 8 and 8.1 are a reasonable step forward. They can introduce a marketplace that they control, force developers to pay for the ability to be featured on their store, then make a GUI homogenization that customers demonstrably don't want. All of this offers "better stability and a more unified experience" from device to device.
In a perfect world, this sounds great. In reality, Windows phone became Windows everything. Homogenization for the sake of homogenization is stupid. Minor performance increases (which the article concedes are chipped away by less than useful widgets), an as yet unused directx variant, and quicker booting are not worth the extra expense. People are telling MS this by not buying it, but they want to find a different answer.
Despite this evidence, you praise MS for an as yet unreleased OS. To judge without any concrete evidence is hubris. The community may be beta testing, but this means nothing about the final OS. Blindly accepting whatever we get, and praising the "gift" we have been given, is stupid.
To the author; wow. You have often dabbled into the area of a corporate sales person. It has been tolerable, but this tears it. You write from a bias that is not informative. The reason I read an editorial is that the author instills value into their opinions. As you don't explicitly offer why I should give a damn about your words in the article, I have to rely on your track record. For every informative point you've made in the past week you've written a corresponding article blatantly praising a company without any thought. Fluff pieces for the sake of pushing an agenda do not warrant my attention to your opinions. Perhaps you can provide something substantive, but your track record indicates otherwise.
To whit, your article is fluff. It deserves the responses it is getting, as the title is troll baiting 101. I'm done reading your work until editorial credibility can be established.
What is getting to me is just how every one seems to fight over some thing that well we have little to no control over. Fact is windows 7 works windows xp works ME works 98 works even 95 will work! Use what you like. I like 7 the looks the feel the every thing about it just works for me. I have seen 8 like it sure looks great on them tablets and touch screens. For my desktop I want what Windows is all about 7! I'm a PC and windows 7 was my idea! :D
I honestly gave it a try before adding the Stardock enhancements. I understand that the Start Screen is just a blown up Start Menu, but it is unwieldy and SLOW. Way more stuff gets pinned there with every install that you ever see in the Start Menu. It is the most disorganized pile of doodoo I have ever seen. And why am I allowed to only use one program at a time? So, Start8 to return a functional, real start button and Start Menu, and ModernMix to control those Start Screen apps and use them in smaller versions from the desktop.
I am now, thanks to Stardock, liking some of the other benefits of W8, like quick boots, better memory management, etc, and also get my desktop, where I can enjoy those apps without them hogging the whole screen. Only major gripe is the nagging freezing that seems to go on. When they tackle that instead of fluff, I might make it more than a testbed OS.
What I would most prefer is basically the same windows 8 start menu now but without the tiles and translucent for the most part. It would have the time and maybe weather where the right corner pulls screen thing does. The search bar would be in the same spot the current one is up top.
One can dream.
If there are any "negative effects its M$ that brought it upon themselves.
It is up to Microsoft to please its customers.
Want more sales? Go fix your POS.
I am a desktop user, and none of these changes Microsoft is talking about look to be fixing any of the core problems that haunt Windows 8. Wooooo changes! So what?
I was attracted to Windows 8 because I wanted the better Task Manager and better Copy dialog. However when I tried Windows 8, I found it to be a nearly unusable, non-stop train of frustration and misery. I would go so far as to posit that stock Windows 8 is an unmitigated disaster for desktop users. Thankfully other brave souls have created solutions that I was able to utilize to restore Windows 8 to a usable state. I use StartIsBack and I found a desktop theme that doesn’t drive me crazy.
My main monitor is a Dell U2711 (27in, 2560x1440) and for me, the Modern UI Start Screen is a complete farce. There is nothing it does, that the Windows 7 style Start Menu doesn't do better. While the Start Screen's search function has been kinda fixed in 8.1, it still doesn't address the insane amount of extra mousing required versus the Start Menu.
This brings me to another point about the absurdity of using the Modern UI Start Screen and Apps on a Desktop PC. Because it is full screen, everything requires ridiculous amounts of mouse movement to reach various UI elements. As an example, shutting down the computer with a mouse in stock Windows 8, requires around 100% more mouse movement and an extra click compared to using the Start Menu.
I also fought an issue with the Desktop Modern UI theme. I always set my Taskbar Buttons to “Combine when taskbar is full.” Because of the following:
1. The title bar text on windows, like file explorer, is black.
2. The text in the taskbar is white.
3. There is no separate adjustment for window border color and taskbar color.
It is impossible to have good readability in both the task bar and title bars. One is left with four choices:
1. Bright colors with good title bar readability
2. Dark colors with good task bar contrast and unusable title bars
3. Medium colors with poor contrast and readability in both areas.
4. Hassling with finding a custom theme that doesn’t do something else equally stupid.
As a last positive aside, I don’t miss Windows Aero Glass, and I especially like not getting kicked back to Windows Aero Basic when I load a program that won’t run with Aero Glass.
One thing is for sure we can all bitch about it till hell freezes over not a whole lot any one here can do about windows we get what we get from THEM! Don't like it? Don't buy or use it is all I can say. At least windows is not like dumping us altogether we do have support and every thing with windows7!
Most of my clients are looking more in to Linux for their future investments if windows continues like this. What a shame.