Windows 8 Try Out

OK now yesterday I had a play around with Windows 8 and it is not quite as bad as I first thought.
You can get to certain things like settings and Device Manager but I still do not like it. The TILE screen was presented on a vast array of different laptops and desktops in a local store and I went to each and everyone in turn with the tiled Metro screen.

The very first thing I did is go for the monitors with my finger as this is what the Metro was designed for so it stood to reason, to my mind at any rate, that all showing this screen would be touch sensitive. Out of about 20 I tried of both desktops and laptops? ONE!

The whole idea of having bigger monitors with higher resolution is 'REAL ESTATE' but in the case of this new desktop screen that very basic fundamental idea goes out the window. That is unless they have included a setting to make the tiles alot smaller, like half the size?! I mean to say that if you think about it with such a radical new interface going on screens from as as small as 7 inches to as big as 50 inches or more, oh OK so over about 30 inch is really going to be a TV screen but its still a big thing as the HDMIs are included on up to date PCs of different forms. Even my old-ish HP Pavilion DV7 purchased as ex-demo, turned out to be refurbed and had to go back for TWO failures (one KNOWHOW did not do correctly surprise surprise), has a HDMI socket and a 1600x900 monitor built in. I purchased this in January 2012 for £370.

In fact after messing around the very naming of Windows 8 being ... well WINDOWS seems wrong. It should have been called TILING?! (chuckles).

I really do not think this will go down well over time. It feels rushed, badly designed and considering how long the interface has been 'out there' already that looks bad. A friend of mine and owner of a local store has had this interface on his phone for sometime with Windows Phone 7, or whatever they call it.

Now if they had quite simply LEFT the desktop screen as it was and as an option this would been nowhere near as bad. Later and more modern version and design of the Metro interface might have slowly encouraged those used to the classic Windows design of old to gradually migrate over.

Besides my dislike of Steve Ballmer this worries me as I do like Windows and always have done. Many years ago I was more interested in the Apple MACS but never actually ended up with an Apple though I came close in several occasions. The market share of Windows I heard about recently was quite surprising and it seems the tables have completely turned over the years with Apple and Microsoft and just like the situation with AMD and Intel you do not really want to be left with just ONE monopoly. In concentrating on their rivals on an ever consuming passion to bring in large portions of cash they have forgotten and neglected the very people they are trying to get this cash from and in these global economic bad times this is NOT a good idea and it seems that as well as government big companies still have not 'GOT IT'. See blog asaintcallesallnights.blogspot.com

Quite how it takes a large firm like Microsoft so long to implement a few design details into their Operating Systems is beyond me. The Linux community seems to do quite alright and has done so for many years. In fact since my first try at Linux which was 15 years ago now I cannot help but wonder what using Linux is like today?!

I am just hoping that if I had played around with it a bit more I might have found that some other things I complained about here were actually there. There might not be that 'Start Button' but clicking on the libraries tab and then on computer in the left pane of the window your presented you will the find Device Manager in the toolbar section on the top of the Window, just in case you are the owner of a new Windows 8 machine and were trying to find it?! (laughs)

Me? Well I have already been looking at the retina display Apple Mac Pro as my laptop replacement! My new rig, if I ever get to that stage too, will be Windows 7 based but what I keep thinking is what happens after that? With newer upgrades like DirectX for games generally being tied into to newer Windows to force people, well gamers, to upgrade may well be a shot in the foot this time around. Then there are the games developers too?! I will be watching very closely to see what they have to say about Windows 8 and I always require a very broad spectrum from a great many places before I make a decision.

I for one am hoping it is not as bad as it currently appears to me and for once I am wrong!