I gave it a full week before giving up. I know I'm a power user, but I just got really tired of having to hunt through five pages of scrolling with my mouse just to find a program I want to use. I know you can pin things, but I use such a variety of apps that it'd take me forever to find things.

Not to mention that Metro is a completely different ecosystem than the core Windows OS. It'd be one thing if they were fluidly merged, but switching back and forth all the time is just stupid.

That's what I do. I still get the benefits of the fast startup and use my old 7 style desktop.

Yeah, the drawn password thing is ridiculous for a desktop without a touch sensitive screen.

Just start typing the name of the app and it comes up. No need to scroll and hunt.

...or I could just use the old start menu and find what I need in two clicks.

Or you can learn to adapt to a faster method. ;) Using the mouse to hunt and click is time consuming.

I suppose if you have trouble with the concept of alphabetization, you're right. :p

if you click on the right corner and hit the search button EVERYTHING pops up. ALl your apps/programs and everything. Imo,i think its faster then the start button menu. Maybe not by much, but its faster and everything is there you need.

Yeah its just really goofy to have two completely different interfaces like this. I keep wondering what I am supposed to do with the tablet like apps with a laptop.

This touchpad swipe to toggle between the desktop and metro is also driving me nuts. Need to shut it off.

makes your screen look like a fisher price though boy!

I'm still not sold on updating.

I am now fully in the corner of those that hate the metro interface. Seems like a great OS for speed but the tablet portion of the OS is obnoxious as hell for a laptop.

I thought this as well when testing beta versions. However, the final version I think is much better, especially with the touch pad features enabled. Still takes a little getting used to though.

I do think that for a touch screen setup that Windows 8 is pretty stellar. I bought a budget closeout all in one gateway for Christmas that had a Windows 7 touch screen (2 point touch rather than Windows 8 preferred 5 point) that I upgraded to 8 and it is a great machine now where it was only ok with 7.

I still don't like 8 for a traditional desktop though that only has a keyboard and mouse.

Any more converts? I have had my copy for 2 months now but still haven't installed it.

I got a copy of Windows 7 Pro yesterday for $55.

Thank God for Windows 8! :)

I read an article the other day calling Win8 the new Vista.

I think that's a bit unfair. Vista just plain ran like shit, where Windows 8 runs fine.

The problem with Windows 8 is that, for a desktop user, there's really nothing that has improved over Windows 7. They made a few minor tweaks to the desktop UI, but nothing major. The biggest change is all the Metro bullshit, and most people on desktops don't care.

I think it would be a good idea to go ahead and buy Windows 8 for $39.99 - but just hold on to the license for now until there is a reason to upgrade.

This.

I do have to say...it's crazy how consistent Microsoft is when it comes to quality releases vs. crap releases. They basically put out a release with all sorts of half-assed new ideas that don't work very well, then fix them all a couple years later.

Windows 95 - Innovative, but buggy
Windows 98 - Not many changes, but much more stable
Windows ME - Pure crap / Windows 2000 - Compatibility issues
Windows XP - Most stable OS yet and few compatibility issues
Windows Vista - Ultra shitty performance
Windows 7 - Runs great
Windows 8 - Shitty integration of Metro UI
Windows 9 - (I bet it'll be much more cohesive by that point)

Some things that may help.

Think of the metro as the new start menu (and for god's sake type the name of the program you want. Hell even in 7 and Vista this was faster than clicking)

Learn some keyboard shortcuts (there is an app for that) such as Windows Key + M to go to the desktop. Windows Key to go back to the metro.

And I didn't read the entire thread, so this may be mentioned already but if you absolutely cannot stand metro, try this Start8. It will bring back the traditional windows desktop and start menu. This will work for people who are running 8 on laptops or desktops without touchscreens.

I will say that I hate the IE app from the metro and use IE from the desktop. I have a Surface RT so no other browsers yet.

I rarely use the start menu. I don't see why people are so butthurt about that.

Just personal style, I suppose. I use it all the time.

Yea, im not sure why MS didnt have a seperate OS for tablets and desktops? I feel like Win8 is some sort of strange hybrid/bridge OS.

TBH it didn't need to be separate, but there should have been an option in the Control Panel or something

New Metro
Traditional Windows Desktop

If you have a tablet or touchscreen, the metro is nice and easy. With a standard desktop/laptop, it is definatly a bit awkward, at best.

I'm sure it's been discussed somewhere, but kaplin's sig is utterly mesmerizing. I wanna be friends with it.

I managed to get my hands on a Windows 8 machine and wow is it bad. Maybe it's the hardware (it's an Acer laptop and the build quality reminds me of my old Asus 4G Surf) but I kind of doubt it.

Things that are nice:

- The ability to sync settings across multiple machines
- The weather app
- searching for apps works well, but just looking for "windows update" didn't return anything
- I like the design direction on a lot of the typefaces. The minimal presentation sure looks good on a mockup, but doesn't seem to work as well in reality.
- Anti-aliasing seems to be different, but that could be the screen. Sublime Text looked pretty good right out of the box without any tweaks.

Things that suck

- All the crap that Acer pre-loaded
- "Your internet connection isn't fast enough to download this app"
- Window management in Metro
- having to sign up for a Windows account so you can attach a Gmail account to the Mail app

Things that are completely unexplainable

- If you move the mouse to the bottom corner to show the start icon (or whatever it's called) and move the mouse a pixel away to click on the actual icon it disappears.
- No one unified set of settings and preferences
- No progress bar or status of app installs from the store (that I could see)

I'm going to pull an image of this thing for science and then send it along. Like Vista, this is an OS that I'll hopefully be interacting with through my forensics tools instead of using it.

Getting a new laptop today with W8. I already feel as if I'm going to hate it and I'm not even a big computer guy. I didn't even really hate Windows vista.

Its a well known fact that every other Windows OS sucks. 7 was great so I don't understand why people are surprised that 8 isnt.

I prefer Classic Shell.

I really like windows 8. One ty out know how to use it it works better than 7.

If you do any sort of Powershell scripting, check out the Powershell ISE in Windows 8. One of the single best features ever.

Start8 rocks. Their full-blown add-on is very interesting.

I'm getting used to it. It's actually not that bad.

Looks like they ripped off PowerGUI.

Now that people have used it for a while, what's the verdict.

I recent came into some RAM, so I'm going from 4 GB to 32 GB. Was in Win7 x32. So I have to decide between Win7 x64 [already have] or Win8.

No touchscreen, single 24" LCD. i5 2500K w/32GB, Invidia GeForce 9800

Primary uses

AV stream/viewing/listening
internet
CAD/Office/Adobe, plus an array of engineering/mathematic programs [Matlab, PSpice, ModelSIM, etc], photograph tweaking, storage, and sorting.

Have an AVG 2014 license already.

So are the performance, stability, security, or other aspects related to my primary uses, advancements worth the change?

Stick with Windows 7

I got my daughter a new laptop with Win8. Hated it, her and I. I grabbed a free program that changed it to look like 7 and it's fine.

I think that's the one I used.

Yep. I went back to 7.

I did not care for it and went back to 7 as well.

got a brand new dell laptop collecting dust because I hate 8.

price?

There are a number of minor upgrades in Windows 8 that are nice, but the entire "Metro" interface is completely useless.

My recommendation is Windows 8 + Start8 to get rid of the obnoxious shit.

Worst thing about windows 8 is that its almost impossible to get into safe mode if you can't get to the start menu. The FBI virus was out well before windows 8, so they should have forseen a method to boot into safe mode when turning on your computer. Its supposed to work when you hit shift + f8. Problem is that it gets to the log in screen so quickly that you don't have the time to get there.

I installed 8.1 at work. A little better but not a lot different

What he said.

Y not put windows 7 on it? I have 2 brand new laptops that I converted back to Win 7.

In many cases, that's much easier said than done. You can't simply insert a disc and install 7. Most new laptops shipping with 8 have the new UEFI partition system. Which Windows 7 can't be installed on. You have to do some DOS command line work to erase and repartition the drive just to install Win7. Which most people wouldn't be capable of. And that also borks your recovery partition as well. So it's a one-way conversion and you can't easily go back to Win8.

not gonna sell it -- I bought it for work related specific tasks. hell, it's still under 30 day moneyback and I considered it, but I need a laptop for this, so I'm probly gonna go find a 7 disc and purge that poison..

wha? oh shit.

Again, I'll throw my vote in for sticking with Windows 8 but using Start8 to ditch all the obnoxious stuff. It works great.

Yeah... here's an example: http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials...ndows-7-a.html

Some models are more difficult than others. Supposedly HP is especially difficult, as they are putting in additional measures to prevent downgrading.

Yeah, Start8 is a great solution, and that's what I'd recommend people try first. The sad part of the whole affair is that Win8 is really solid minus the metro interface. Start8 does as good of a job as any.

I remember Stardock form the early 2000s as stuff that really degraded performance over time. I take it that's not the case?

I've been running Start8 for almost a year now, and I haven't had any issues whatsoever. It lets you control basically every part of the Metro interface:

• Add back the Windows 7 style start menu
• Disable the "hot corners" that bring up other Metro features
• Disable the settings menu on the right side

And a bunch of other tweaks. It costs $5, but it's well worth it.

Good to know. I'd think the last two would just be simple reg hacks, but bringing back the start menu seems a little more intrusive until 8.1 comes out.

Whatever though. I'm all about my OS X/Linux/Win7 setups. VMs for everything but OS X.

8.1 released today. Downloading it now

Just upgraded myself. The whole "start menu is back" thing is stupid. There technically is a menu, but it just takes you back into Metro again.

Guess I'm sticking with Start8.

Yea, I noticed that too...wtf? I'll play around with I some more later.

They obviously want everyone to pony up the money and get touchscreen monitors. I'll never understand why anyone would want touchscreen for desktop computing.

There's some settings options I believe that let you adjust the start button behavior, but it looks like MS is still trying to push metro by default.

I tried to update earlier today and the 8.1 update wouldn't alert as available for download. I'll try again in a bit and play around with it once it will actually let me- which is odd, but I know they're rolling the update availability a bit at least for day 1 since it's a worldwide release according to one article. Would have figured MS could handle whatever expected traffic, but who knows?

I'll see what I find and report back.

There's definitely a load setting to boot up as a recognized desktop no touchscreen available which adjusts some of the setup and ui behavior. It was done for something to do with businesses to encourage updating to 8.1 so the employees had a more traditional desktop setup and not having a bunch of people confused about using their work computer and navigating the UI to use it as they typically have been before- 95 - windows 7.

Downloaded and installed on both my Surface RT and Surface Pro.

Failed to install on my laptop, luckily it rolled itself back

I recently got a new desktop with Windows 8 installed. I hated it at first, but I'm slowly getting used to it. It would be nice if there was a way to turn off the "point the mouse here and you see stuff" functionality. And, WTF is the thing at the top left?

You can turn off a lot of that shit (not sure about what you're describing). I had to turn off the swiping for the trackpad. It came rolling me back into the Metro startup screen. Drove me nuts.

I have read this thread, and probably don't know enough to recognize the answer if it is in here.

I just got a new Dell laptop with Windows 8. I am trying to figure out how to keep those black slide bars across the right side and lower left from popping up all the time when I don't want them.

I did the 8.1 upgrade and it didn't help anything.

It is very annoying and I appreciate any help if you understand what I am asking.

It'll cost you $5, but I highly recommend Start8. It'll let you customize all that stuff to the point that it works just like Windows 7 if you want it to.

Bottom line, non touchpad, standard desktop tower PC user with 32 G Ram and Core I5.

Primarily uses PC for

HTPC [WMC w/HDTVWonder support a must]
Internet Surfing
Engineering Calculating
CAD
Office Suite [reports, spreadsheets, GANTS, and Powerpoints]

Win8 or Win7 64b?

There are some minor under the hood improvements to Windows 8 that I like if you can get past all the Metro stuff. I'd go with Win8+Start8 personally, but Win7 will be fine.

I went with Windows 7 Pro due to all of the problems 8 is having with Quickbooks Pro.

Fyi, Windows 8.2 is just around the corner, and is supposedly to offer greater UI options to run it a lot more like the Windows 7 / pre Metro setup, and even a bit of a morphed version where you can have the desktop setup like everyone is familiar with and then the ability to place your active tiles on the desktop. So you'll have a fully functional Start button with the old school menus and then I believe you will also be able to just start typing to pull up the meta search that shows choices along the right side of the screen.

8.1 seems pretty smooth with Start8, didn't like that WMC wasn't included, but JRiver more than makes up for it.

I just got a new Windows laptop for the wife. I heard about the issues but thought it was just users complaining about change. But, no start button? No program files? WTF? Thats some arrogant engineering.

Teh problem is that Win8 was designed for tablets and touch screen monitors. Metro is useless without touch. I hated Win8 on my laptop but it makes some semblance of sense on a Surface tablet.

I have really tried to embrace Windows 8 running on a tablet. I really have. The problem is that Windows 8 just plain sucks.

Windows 8 is by far my least favorite desktop/laptop OS. It's like the Windows 8 developers at Microsoft were determined to make it as difficult as possible to perform the functions that you easily perform in Windows 7. The only way to make it usable is to add a third-party start menu such as Start8 or Classic Shell. I personally use Classic Shell, but I think the two add-ons are pretty much identical. What they do is give you a way to get to the old Start Menu that has been around ever since Windows 95. It turns the monstrosity known as Windows 8 into an OS that is once again perfectly usable.

I hope Microsoft really does return the old Start Menu with Windows 8.2, as is rumored. The "start button" that they added with Windows 8.1 is a freaking joke. I suspect some arrogant asshole at Microsoft said "So, you're pissed that we took away the Start button? Fine, I'll give you a Start button. It will take you to the Metro GUI that you hate so much. So there!". The "Start Button" in Windows 8.1 is completely useless.

Windows 8 is also by far my least favorite tablet OS. The "touch" function works, but it's damn hard to hit what you're trying to touch on the first attempt. On an iPad you can easily pinch and zoom the screen so that you CAN actually touch a hyperlink on the first attempt. On my Windows 8 tablets sometimes I can pinch and zoom, and sometimes I can't.

In my opinion the iPad is still by far the best tablet available. I'm no Apple fanboy, as I don't have any machine that runs Mac OS X. I do have 2 desktops and 2 laptops running Windows 7, two Windows 8 tablets, an Pad, an iPhone, and a Samsung tablet running the Android OS. I also have a laptop running Linux Mint KDE, and a desktop running Ubuntu Linux 12.04. I think I've had a pretty good exposure to a lot of different operating systems.

The iPad interface is simply a lot more intuitive than the Windows 8 interface, and it's not even close. The Android OS is a hell of a lot more intuitive than the Windows 8 interface as well.

Now, if you absolutely must have Microsoft Office on your tablet, then you have no choice: you really do need a Windows 8 tablet. You also really need a mouse. I've resorted to carrying around a mouse whenever I carry my Windows 8 tablet into a meeting, because it's just so damn hard to navigate Windows 8 without it. But when I don't need Microsoft Office, I leave the ****ing Windows 8 tablet at my desk and carry an iPad into the meeting instead. An iPad is much better at taking meeting notes, reading email, checking your online calendar, and surfing the Internet. The ONLY time I'll every carry a Windows 8 tablet into a meeting is if I need to edit an Excel spreadsheet in the meeting.

Sadly, however, Windows 8 is here to stay, and we all might as well learn to love it.

FYI... not sure if you've tried it....

You can do light editing of Office files on your iPad using Microsoft's Office web apps. For free. It's missing some of the really advanced editing features. But for simple stuff it works well.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/web-apps/

All I can say is... I. Hate. It.

As soon as i can, i'm having 7 installed... 8 has so many connectivity problems with websites i always use, constantly.

Sports Illustrated, ESPN, Fox Sports, Fox News, CNN, Google Chrome almost never works, just to name a few... they constantly barely work or don't work at all some days, never ever had this problem with any other version.