Impressions of Windows 8 RTM

[CaedenV]

So, after playing with win8 RTM a little today I got a lot of opinions from volunteers at my work. Where I work we have a wide variety of nerds ranging from entry level to ridiculously high end geeks, and who use linux, windows and mac on a regular basis.

Generally speaking everyone who played with it said 3 things the same:
1) Without knowing keyboard shortcuts they would be lost
2) The new interface is interesting, but not sure if they liked it or not
3) That it was much faster than they expected considering the hardware it was running on

what are your impressions of this final build?
Anything you would change?
Any changes from RP that you particularly like?
Anything (other than the start menu) that you feel is missing?

 

[The_Prophecy]

Considering I can't use it because even the latest Intel chipset drivers won't let the Intel SATA controller on my Asus P9X79 Pro detect any drives, I currently think it's a big bag of poo. Once my drives are available again, that opinion will quickly change.

 

[HVDynamo]

I just want the option of disabling Metro and bringing back the start menu without having to resort to 3rd party software. If they would do that, I would definitely upgrade. But as it is right now, I am sticking with Win 7.

On a side note, this kind of relates to how apple is with software, they like to decide how you should use it and take away the option to change it. Basically it is removing customization in favor of a single work flow path. In the case of OS X, I don't want anything to do with their new saving features, but can I set it back to the old way that I am perfectly comfortable doing. Nope. I have liked both Windows and OS X in the past for their strengths, but I find myself disliking both equally now. Also, before the Linux guy chimes in, I do use Ubuntu as well, and I dislike Unity. I think the real problem is that the desktop OS has really hit a plateau over around the time Windows 7 and OS X Leopard came out. There aren't that many ways to really improve it in the way of features that will stand out to the ordinary user, most room for improvement lies in stuff the average user doesn't see. I think this has left them digging for ways to make visible "improvements" with the effect that they just make something harder to use (Ribbon anyone?), or force people to relearn something for no reason.

TL;DR I think Windows 8, OS X (Lion/Mountian Lion), and Unity (Ubuntu) all suck.

 

[randomninjaatk]

I played with it some back in march, and then not till I installed the RTM last night. It definently has a learning curve, but I've found myself navigating and getting to the apps much more quickly (including task switching) with the new hot corners and start screen. I'm really enjoying it so far and looking forward to where it will go. The biggest benefit I'm looking forward too is roaming profiles, since I have a PC, laptop and a tablet in the near future.

My only major concern with most changes like the Xbox 360 is the companies posture to sell me stuff. I don't have a problem at all with this for when it comes to apps, however when it comes to movies and music its more of an issue. I use XBMC to play most of my movies as a result because I have a file server with all my blu-rays backed up and I can easily play with the software.

What I really wished is they would supplement what I already have in a nice interface. Like on the 360, if I binged searched Batman, it would show all the movies I have stored on my server and then the ones I don't have it would offer me an option to rent or buy.

Really the software already does this but it forces you to use their store for everything, instead of my nice 1080P lossless rips with HD audio or Flac audio.

Anyways thats my little rant, I guess it goes more along the lines with the 360 but also works for win8 because of the movie/tv/music store integration they have going.

 

[CaedenV]

@hvdynamo
I am with you on the 'walled garden' aspect. Thankfully in win8 all the good 'ol x86 applicaitons work fine, my real fear is that if win9 takes the walled garden approach a step further and really makes stuff unusable and cuts back on software source options.

 

[The_Prophecy]

Issue from above fixed. Had to reinstall Windows 8, but I was only about 30 minutes into moving all of my data back to the boot drive, so it wasn't a big deal. Loving it now!

 

[CaedenV]

@Prophecy
Glad to hear it! I am having my own issues installing win8 on my netbook via USB drive right now (boots from flash drive fine, but installer cannot see my HDD, but BIOS says it is there)

anywho, I just made another thread for that issue

 

[Pinhedd]

Issue from above fixed. Had to reinstall Windows 8, but I was only about 30 minutes into moving all of my data back to the boot drive, so it wasn't a big deal. Loving it now!

Have you updated your P9X79 to the new .CAP firmware format?

 

[pjmelect]

I have to learn Windows 8 for my job, and I hate it with a vengeance. Has anyone else had problems with the video drivers like I have?

 

[CaedenV]

what gpu are you using?

 

[The_Prophecy]

Have you updated your P9X79 to the new .CAP firmware format?

Yes. The update to the .CAP format is done, and there has actually been one more update beyond the shift to that format which I have also done.

 

[CaedenV]

OK, so I finally figured out the issue I was having with the netbook (HDD was messed up, all fixed now). So here are my impressions for the 32bit version running on 1GB of ram and a duel core Atom 1.66GHz:

Win8 is really not meant to run on this hardware.
1) 1GB of ram is simply not enough! Previous versions of win8 on this unit idled at ~250MB ram usage and everything ran relatively smooth. Someone at MS obviously decided that Ram is cheap enough that we should all upgrade because it idled at ~750MB, and would quickly jump into virtural memory once you open a few programs. I will throw in a 2GB stick tomorrow and see if that improves things
2) Atoms are not exactly power-house machines, but the CPU seems to keep up pretty well (for what it is). Running music in the background, and browsing the web had me at ~30-60% usage, so it is good enough for the simple tasks that it was meant for. Also, metro apps (like minesweeper and weather), which could barely run before, now seem to run OK.
3) GMA2150 sucks (this is no secret), and something better is apparently needed. All-in-all I think it runs faster than win7 did on it for things like video playback and such, but still quite rough. I bet this would work much better with my other netbook which is nearly identical except that it has DDR3 and a touch screen (sadly it is 2000 miles from here out on extended loan).
4) I like the mouse/touchpad features in RTM, much improved. My win7 mouse drivers installed properly, and so I was able to pinch-zoom and scroll with gestures. I wish win8 could natively add some sort of swipe in for the charms menu! That would really make things easier! My understanding is that most current devices and future devices will have drivers that allow for such functionality, but my little netbook is too old to get such support.
In addition to scrolling, you can now move the mouse 'past' the screen to scroll, which works well (especially when moving links around on the start screen), and use the arrow keys.
5) native resolution on the netbook is 1024x600, which is simply not enough for metro apps. Thankfully you can go into regedit, search for "Display1_DownScalingSupported" and change it from 0 to 1. This lets you run things in stretched mode 1024x768 (and at a higher resolution than GMA was meant to run at) so things will function properly in Metro, but everything looks a little squat and fat. Oddly, with this version (or maybe because I bothered to install the mouse driver), the mouse looked normal on top of the stretched interface.
6) everything feels more polished; From the way the programs interact, to the consistency of the interfaces now, it feels like a real OS, which is good.

Overall I think I like it. Hopefully adding some ram (and faster ram) will help move things along better. But for a netbook it seems to run well enough to consider the upgrade.

Tomorrow I will be getting my 2nd SSD (first attempt at RAID0 should be fun!), so once I get that installed I will put win8 on my real rig (i7 4.2GHz, 16GB of ram, GTX570, 2x240GB SSD RAID0 system drive). I am sure it will run smoothly, but I will get a much better feel for what issues are of the OS, and what issues were just my little netbook being a netbook.

 

[pjmelect]

what gpu are you using?

I am using the Nvidia 9600 which is the only graphics card I have with Windows 8 drivers as I am not a gamer. I think that maybe my card is not compatible with Windows 8 although it works fine in Windows 7 with the standard Nvidia drivers.
The symptoms are when I run a graphics intensive app it crashes to the metro (desktop) further more some apps that previously worked before the crash also start to crash until I do a restart. The default Windows graphics driver works a bit better with fewer apps crashing. Looks like I will have to get another graphics card to run Windows 8 or wait and see if Nvidia releases better drivers.

 

[CaedenV]

hmmm I used an nvidia 9600 with no issues on one of the first builds. Perhaps try using the win7 driver and see if that clears things up (win8/7/Vista share the same driver model, so it should work fine).
Also, be sure to check your temps. It could be that win8 is running more through the GPU than win7 did, so the card may be getting warm (something they were known for lol, mine has an aftermarket heatsink on it).

Otherwise, do you have an onboard graphics option? or money to throw $50 at a more modern GPU? (nothing like spending corp money on products , but they are the ones who wanted you to get it to work!)

 

[RetiredChief]

Great for Tablets, netbooks and laptops used for surfing the web, email and "garde verity" apps.

As it stands, DO NOT think it will be a big hit with corporate America.

Tried it for two days, deleted it and threw DVD in trash. - Primary reason is that when I booted Win 8 it it would affect my win 7 installation (Error message when reboot to win 7) on 2nd SSD - IT SHOULD NOT do this.
Note. Win 8 was installed with win 7 SSD disconnected and Used boot menu to boot to win8/win7 - Not a software boot menu.

 

[CaedenV]

So, I made some changes to the netbook today, and it acts like a whole different machine:
Upgrades: 320GB WD Black HDD 7200rpm (was 160GB WD Blue 5400rpm), 2GB of DDR2 800 (was 1GB DDR2 667), and I installed the 64bit version instead of the 32bit

Everything is much faster (mostly because of not running into virtual memory anymore). Programs open and close much faster, scrolling is smoother, generally a much better experience overall.
With the 64bit version (like the 32bit I tried on it yesterday) Windows idles at ~700MB of ram in use just for the OS, so for both the 32 and 64bit version you should have a minimum of 2GB of ram (which is the max for my netbook lol) to run the final build.

This is very disappointing to me because the CP and all previous builds idled at ~250MB of usage, and something in me was hoping that the final build would be even less because of getting rid of more legacy code (like the start menu and Aero interface). But, now that I have 2GB in the system it is much faster than it was before, so I guess all that heavy pre-loading is being put to good use... just disappointing.

 

[drwho1]

Start button missing (we knew that)

WMC is there but it isn't, I managed to play music, but it can't play DVD's
(MP4 video/sound runs fine but NOT DVD's VOB files)

Using Media Player Classic to watch DVD's

I really don't like the tiles (whatever M$ calls them now) but on a "good note" is that 1 click on any of them take me instantly to the normal (almost Windows 7 "feeling") minus the START button.

I still not sure on what HOLE sis M$ put their HEADS on.
The lack of the START button make things way harder than they need to be.

 

[Pinhedd]

Start button missing (we knew that)

WMC is there but it isn't, I managed to play music, but it can't play DVD's
(MP4 video/sound runs fine but NOT DVD's VOB files)

Using Media Player Classic to watch DVD's

I really don't like the tiles (whatever M$ calls them now) but on a "good note" is that 1 click on any of them take me instantly to the normal (almost Windows 7 "feeling") minus the START button.

I still not sure on what HOLE sis M$ put their HEADS on.
The lack of the START button make things way harder than they need to be.

The lack of built in MPEG playback is well known. The necessary licences are free for non-commercial or freeware use which allows popular filters like FFDShow, VLC, MPC-HC, Google Chrome, and Firefox, to offer them in their free products. However, commercial use requires licencing and since Windows is purely a commercial product this would add massive additional licencing costs to Windows that could be avoided simply by pointing people to the free alternatives. Even commercial products which have limited free versions usually don't include h264 (although they usually do include h262)

 

[nukemaster]

My poor X-FI does not work(I have a good reason for keeping it), but the with the CP it worked perfect(Without using the HDA drivers from MS and loosing all features).

Other then that, it works just like the CP. Strange with no Aero Glass look on programs, but I guess i will get use to it(I am using the Auto color to match wallpapers, Why the heck not.). If they are after clean lines, they did it.

I was extremely impressed with the RP, but this one looks more finishes, but broke my sound card.

I am not sure how much I like the new Xbox branding on everything.

 

[Pinhedd]

My poor X-FI does not work(I have a good reason for keeping it), but the with the CP it worked perfect(Without using the HDA drivers from MS and loosing all features).

Other then that, it works just like the CP. Strange with no Aero Glass look on programs, but I guess i will get use to it(I am using the Auto color to match wallpapers, Why the heck not.). If they are after clean lines, they did it.

I was extremely impressed with the RP, but this one looks more finishes, but broke my sound card.

I am not sure how much I like the new Xbox branding on everything.

You should probably blame Creative Labs for releasing new drivers only once a decade

EDIT: There's a new beta driver just for Windows 8

http://support.creative.com/downloads/download.aspx?nDownloadId=12448

 

[nukemaster]

Its just the win7 driver with a INF file for win8 Tried all the drivers on the site and even the CD driver.

I would blame creative, but it worked on the Win8 CP.

Wonder if Daniel_K(Driver modder who fixed up many Audigy users with Vista and 7.) will release some Win8 Drivers

If you just go swap to another mode(Entertainment/Game/Audio Creation), the sound comes right back.

Many users will not even know about this until they restart as a shut down is just a fancy hibernate.

Other then that, I do not see why SOO much negative feedback on Win8. It does everything I need it to(A "metro" version of Media Center would be nice).

 

[Pinhedd]

Its just the win7 driver with a INF file for win8 Tried all the drivers on the site and even the CD driver.

I would blame creative, but it worked on the Win8 CP.

Wonder if Daniel_K(Driver modder who fixed up many Audigy users with Vista and 7.) will release some Win8 Drivers

If you just go swap to another mode(Entertainment/Game/Audio Creation), the sound comes right back.

Many users will not even know about this until they restart as a shut down is just a fancy hibernate.

Other then that, I do not see why SOO much negative feedback on Win8. It does everything I need it to(A "metro" version of Media Center would be nice).

Oh okay. I haven't loaded Win 8 on the metal yet, just in a VM. I had a lot of problems with the modded Creative drivers for X-Fi so I just use the official beta ones

 

[The_Prophecy]

(A "metro" version of Media Center would be nice).

Probably not going to happen. Since they decided to remove WMC and charge less up front, allowing users to buy it for an extra $10 or so if they really need it, I don't think they see doing a Metro version of it as a worthwhile investment.

 

[nukemaster]

I get your point, but it was just the same Media Center from Vista/7.
It feels very out of place with the Metro theme they had going.

You are right, very few users use Media Center anyway.

 

[CaedenV]

Ya, not a huge fan of media center, and I never understood why MS got so hyped up about it, and then turned it to nearly abandonware just a few months later. It was a neat idea (replacing TV and such)... just poor support from content providers.

Personally I like XBMC when I have a dedicated media PC, but otherwise use WMP or VLC for most playback. I don't like the new metro 'video' and 'music' players (mostly because they seem to more interested in selling me content than playing what I want)... but they are much improved over their previous versions.