In Pictures: The Windows 8.1 Preview

Page 4 - Seeking answers? Join the Tom's Hardware community: where nearly two million members share solutions and discuss the latest tech.
Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
Status
Not open for further replies.
Note that it's touch. Plus, if he can do it faster you just don't know the right keyboard shortcuts.

Some 3% of PCs shipped are touch. The remainder are far worse to use on 8.

I'm not going to sacrifice battery life, another $100, and tired arms for something I already had.
 
Exactly, touch won't benefit 7 right? and non touch 8 is basically 7. And you don't get something you already had, you get something better.

Also, yes I don't know all the keyboard shortcuts. (I should learn them), but many of my buddies do. The fastest of them is the touch Win8 guy by far. We all credit 8 for it, not for the guy's personal skill, as I bet many of us can operate classic windows faster than him.
 
So I should waste time just to get back to where I was?

You're probably the first person I've seen who argues that keyboard/mouse on 8 is better than keyboard/mouse on seven. Except my dad, but only because of the couple of under the hood tweaks. And that's largely due to the SSHD he switched to.

He's used seven for years, switched to 8 maybe a year ago. Still says that 8's UI is useless, but it's canceled out by under-the-hood being faster.
 
You should "waste time" to get to a faster method.

I personally use my mouse everyday (not gaming etc) with the highest sensitivity and longest travel. I also use trackballs, but it should be the same with ordinary mice. Keyboard usage on 7/8 is pretty much the same. As for mouse usage, once I got used to it. (sort of), I'm faster with 8 than 7.

It is how technology works. You get a new better system and you adapt. If you are not good enough with tech to keep up, that is fine, and you can stay with inferior methods. The new Win 8 UI is useful and productive if and only if you are willing to learn. The new Modern start screen for example is nice for a lot of live info, and you can navigate through it with faster less precise mouse movement, as the icons are larger. For all the classic things lost by the old start menu, easy new shortcuts exist, mostly the keyboard/right click tricks that you love.
 
I am willing to learn. I learned where everything is in 7. And in Vista. And in XP. In various versions of Ubuntu/Kubuntu etc. I can handle going through the linux command line reasonably.

The thing is that most of those offered something different/useful, rather than change for the heck of it. You're the only person I've ever heard, online or not, that the Win8 UI is better if you get used to it.

I don't need to use a mouse. I know exactly how many times I need to hit the down arrow. It's a lot faster to hit the Start key, type 'IP ad' to get the spreadsheet with all the IP addresses on my network, and then hit enter. In 8, I'd have to tell it that I want to look for documents, not apps. In 7 it searches everything. That's just one example.

Why would I need live info? My email is in a pinned tab in my browser. I see the (1) appear when I've got email. There's little else I need to get notified for, and that assumes I'm going to dedicate a whole screen to the start screen. Which is a waste of screen real estate.

If using a mouse is faster than a keyboard, you need to spend some time to touch type.
 
Holy crap, I am reading some of the commentards and seriously, DO YOU EVEN COMPUTER? "I can't shutdown", "There's no search", "There's no app close". Really need to learn basic skills here, you sound like those **MASKED** that have a nosebleed when you try to describe what a right-click is.

**MASKED** equals mind your language please, back-by-demand.
 
Microsoft should take some lessons from Valve in UI design like they did with their "big picture" mode for Steam. At least in the way you can set it as default or not.
 
Hoofhearted, did you even read the article? You can choose which UI you boot as default and even without 8.1 I have been able to do it since the launch of 8 with ClassicShell as well. So either by 3rd party freeware or now with Windows own settings you can get what you are moaning about - the worst problem with people in this forum is a failure to read and understand, they simply ramble on about something either because it's "cool" to be on the hate bandwagon, they are genuinely dumb, or have some serious emotional problems.
 
Last rant until the next dumb person sticks their neck out - "Windows 8 is not a desktop OS and we don't have touchscreens" - err, actually you are wrong, with the exception of the Start Menu the Desktop in Windows 8 is just as functional, actually more so, that Windows 7. Ok, so Microsoft didn't spoonfeed you by preinstalling ClassicShell for you and FORCING you to spend 100 times longer bitching about it than doing it yourself (pragmatism is therefore not your strongest asset). In Windows 7 I install a 3rd party file explorer anyway and have variously used all of the main names like Xplorer2 or FreeCommander, but if you know what any of these are you will already have a favourite of your own, but ClassicShell enhances the Desktop file explorer in Windows 8 the same way. The fact that it gives me back a Start Menu is almost incidental. Until such time as Microsoft wipes your backside for you and saves you the 5 minutes it takes to download, install and configure this program you can take solace in the fact that the desktop mode of Windows 8 will already save you many times more than that 5 minutes compared to Windows 7 desktop due to increased stability, memory management and other under the hood enhancements that everyone seems to ignore because they are solely focussed on the Start Menu like some ADHD kid that has lost his meds.
 
I was going on pretty bad about the start button a while back, but the other day I was thinking about it and... well I realized that I'm only using it about once a week for anything but a quick bar for my most used apps that are stickie'd there - if that much. And with the modern task bar its not really even necessary is it.
 
To the various GUI haters above. You kidding? This is far better than your antiquated old classic system, just you are used to it
Click to expand...
The new Win 8 UI is useful and productive if and only if you are willing to learn.
Click to expand...
with the exception of the Start Menu the Desktop in Windows 8 is just as functional, actually more so, that Windows 7
Click to expand...

Again, same mantra from the pro Win8 fanboys/MS staff/whatever. You guys just don't want to understand the "hate", do you? None of you can answer a simple question:

WHY NOT GIVE PEOPLE THE OPTION OF CHOOSING WHICH UI TO USE?

You like the Metro UI? FINE! You can have it! But don't IMPOSE that crap on people who don't like it! All MS has to do is give people A CHOICE: New UI or Classic UI. But MS arrogantly decided that people don't need a choice and, from what I've seen, Win8.1 is merely an illusion of a choice. This will only add to the frustration and anger of those who already don't like Win8!
It doesn't matter whether or not you think the new UI is better or more efficient. You're not the one who decides what is better and what isn't, or what people like or don't like. Neither does MS! If people could always choose between the "new" UI and the classic UI in previous verions, people always had that choice, WHY THE HELL CHANGE THAT NOW?

You can choose which UI you boot as default
Click to expand...

Except that... you can't! There is no choice of UI because there is only one UI: Metro! The "Desktop" in Win8 is just another part of the Metro UI. Otherwise, why else does one keep getting sent back to Metro to launch programs, change settings, etc?? That "choice" is nothing more than an illusion. A gimmick to pretend that the choice is there.

Again: GIVE PEOPLE A (REAL) CHOICE.
 
Rick et all. Really consider. Microsoft is huge with huge brains thinking through everything. Ever consider that there is a proper reason why there is no choice? You think that there was never this discussion over at Microsoft?

Oh and someone somewhere, I don't see your point. To me, and probably everyone, mouse+keyboard is faster than solely keyboard. And seriously, as if Win7 key shortcuts don't exist in 8.
 
Really? Don't think so. Mouse is inaccurate and requires feedback on every action - it's like two-finger typing.

Sure, there are things which the mouse is faster for. But have you wondered why you use the back button on the side of your mouse, rather than the trek to the back button at the top left of your screen?

Kinesthetic memory = win.
 
Again: GIVE PEOPLE A (REAL) CHOICE.

Microsoft doesn't have to give you choices, Rick - the market does it for them. There are other computer operating systems on the market with more choices than you could shake a stick at.
 


Thank goodness for that. http://distrowatch.com/
 
8.1 is the equivalent of putting lipstick on a pig.... its still a pig!!
The problem is that its a compromise....new UI is not optimised for Mouse/Key which is how most people want use it (i.e. without touch). .and when using in tablet/touch.. desktop mode is not optimised (and a real PITA to try and use touch and be productive on my tablet using excel 2013.. for example). People don't want compromise.. they want be fully effective in whatever way they want use... and Win8 does not deliver that.
 
At this point I am VERY wary of Windows 8.1

I updated my system to 8.1 once Microsoft published their public version.
Then my games wouldn't play, so I updated to the latest NVidia drivers... which were released the same day as the 8.1 update.
And... it bricked my PC.
I had to reformat and start completely fresh.

Granted this was not the official product release.. but it was a public release.. with very little warning... and very much fanfair.

So word to the wise: backup backup backup. !
 
Lipstick on a pig is still a pig. Meaning it is ugly.

But also, a pig is pork, as in really yummy bacon. Get over the UI, stop pretending that Excel and tablets can work, and see it in a new eye.

A mouse is a really handy tool. You may call it a 2 button mouse, but it does increase speed no matter how good with keyboards you are. I agree that it is not used as often, but if you do practice, you'll find serious speed.
 
I don't have a problem with Microsoft releasing an OS centered around apps, it's just that Microsoft managed to make the ugliest looking, least intuitive OS possible and then forced all of its bad points in everyone's faces. 8.1 is not an upgrade, it's a fix. Everything in 8.1 should have come standard in 8 and I'm still not going to buy it because at the end of the day 8/8.1 looks like Microsoft hired a clown for the UI/artistic direction.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom