Windows 8 Loses DVD Support Discussion

As if those shiny discs didn't have enough problems, now DVD playback won't be a part of the standard Windows 8 experience.

Read the full content of this Article: Windows 8 Loses DVD Support

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I was going to make a joke about some other fundamental feature being taken out from Windows 8, but then I realized there wasn't anything left to take out to joke about. Windows 8 is not going to be well received...

 

Haha, I laughed at that.
I doubt DVD support is needed anymore, I haven't used a DVD drive in many years. We can easily make a bootable USB drive now. >_<

 

As long as they don't take away CD support ...

 

Better keep your mouth shut so MS doesn't pull the USB software stack out as well. They might make it a paid add-on instead.

 

:[ Okay. I don't want to pay for USB Support.

 

What I read is they take away playback codec, not reading the DVD. not a huge problem for people who buy OEM machine with bloatwares, not a problem for people who is capable to do self windows installation either.

Complain only if you are using windows media player for playback

P.S the article title is misleading enough though.

 

It doesn't seem like a major problem, never in my life have i used windows media player and even less play a DVD in WMP.

But yeah this seems like the start of the end of DVD's , they had a good run.

 

There's plenty of free programs, sure, but this is just one of a variety of bad decisions that Microsoft has made regarding Windows 8.

Did you know Windows Media Center is going to be a paid add-on now? In this day and age, when people are starting to cut cable and go with OTA HD and WMC to record, it screams of a money grab or at least an attempt to keep people paying for cable.

Not to mention the whole Metro UI thing. W8 is a tablet PC operating system, no more. There's so many inefficiencies in W8 from a desktop user's perspective it is astounding.

 

A puzzling omission, since it wouldn't cost MS anything to continue to support it. And a lot of people, myself included, have dozens or hundreds of DVD movies (particularly bargain-bin children's movies), and being able to have the kids watch a movie on the computer is convenient. That said, there are a ton of free downloads that can do the same thing, so it's not the end of the world.

Holy tangent Batman! Anyway, that's not remotely true. W8 is a desktop OS with a tablet-like graphical full-screen start menu.

 

Holy tangent, indeed . Just trying to establish a pattern of stupid moves, including removing DVD playback support. I've used W8 -- in my opinion it should be confined to tablets. It will never be on any PC I own or build for my family.

 

Who uses Windows Media Player anyway? VLC Player FTW!

 

Well, there goes re-watching Lost...

 

As Mr. Mischief said, all you need to do is download VLC Media Player (which you need to do for certain formats of video files anyway) and you can watch DVDs on a Win 8 machine. It's not that the OS won't tolerate DVDs; it's that the preinstalled Microsoft apps won't play DVDs.

 

Oh. Well, it's still a weird decision, though

Kinda like Apple's decision to "not support Flash" in Lion, but downloading it directly from Adobe will allow you to run Flash apps...

 

At this rate I see Microsoft adopting the modern games model... USB devices not functioning? No problem, that's a $4.99 upgrade for USB support. Wifi/bluetooth not working? Another $4.99. DVD playback not functioning? That's a $20 upgrade for the DVD Entertainment pack...

 

I wonder if we're only getting half the story right now. i.e., this functionality has been removed from Windows Media Player but Microsoft's "Woodstock" (the successor to Zune and a competitor to both iTunes and Spotify) will be able to play DVDs. That'll be an incentive for people to download and try out Woodstock.

 

The amount of people "cutting the cord" is wayy smaller than you think. The (imo sad, these cable/fiber companies know they have people over a barrel...) fact is, many people arent willing to have a PC in their living room. The concept screams "complicated" and "bad idea." Same goes for OTA HD, and your still screwed out of many channels, etc.

Sure, there's CableCard, but try getting your cable/fiber company to install one. Many say its like pulling teeth and on top of it you lose some functionality that many have grown accustomed to like On-Demand.

Many are using stuff like Roku boxes and Smart TV/Blu-Ray players to "cord cut" and even then, people still keep a tv service subscription.

It's not a cost-free decision. Microsoft has to pay for the licencing for the DVD decoder, ditto the PC vendor IIRC. It might be a small cost (i dunno for sure) but its a cost all the same.

People should remember that this isnt a new idea. DVD software was bundled with new PC's for years before MS built in support for DVD playback in some OEM versions of Vista and all versions of 7. Even then, PC makers continued to bundle this third-party stuff. I see no risk of that changing with Windows 8. A everyday person will pop in a DVD and it'll just work as intended.

Windows Media Player isnt bad for DVD's. I prefer it actually especially to the bundled "Power DVD" stuff that comes on many machines.

I honestly think that "DVD support" is "dead." If they dont want to pay the licencing fee here, why shift that cost to another product.

 

Any one anticipating the "MS store" or "MS play"?

defrag
chkdk
pagefile
start menu button
wireless zero

I see profit, free windows + MS store/play.

 

The only free windows I ever see happening is one that boots you up to a desktop background, no buttons, no anything.

 

Don't forget the start button - ONLY $99/yr too!

 

Paying more for more features of Windows? SHOCKING. Could you imagine a world where Microsoft had different trim levels of Windows 7 that cost different amounts, and people who had the lower-level versions of Windows 7 would have to pay to upgrade to a more feature-rich trim level of Windows 7 if they wanted the extra features?

Oh wait. Windows has always been that way. That's why there's "Win 7 Professional" and "Win 7 Ultimate" and the like.

Also, I don't understand this comment:

Win 7 has a mail client, a program called "Windows Live Mail." It's better than Thunderbird (I've tried both in conjunction with my gmail account) and offers an attractive interface and can thread messages.

 

must have IE so you can download ! o network connection must be build in then so sad.

 

Maybe just a button in the center labed "Upgrade", where it takes you to an online store to purchase upgrades.
Windows 8 - Includes patented buttonless navigation (requires keyboard for keyboard shortcuts, requires USB support pack upgrade for external devices).

Start button - includes button navigation and basic DE. ONLY $99/year
Windows Driver pack - get support for your hardware! Includes HAL. Only $199.
Windows Entertainment pack - includes Sound Effects pack, USB support pack, DirectX(tm) - $299 one time fee.

etc.

 

So there are 9 versions of Windows 8? I thought MS did not want to confuse the consumer anymore with Windows Starter, Basic, Home Premium, Professional and Ultimate. That's still awful if they have 9 choices for W8.

 

One version is ARM-only and will only come preinstalled on ARM tablets. Two versions are developing-countries-only. Two versions are for enterprise only. For the first-world consumer trying to decide which version to put on a home PC, there are going to be three choices: Home Premium, Professional, and Ultimate. (There are rumors a "Professional Plus" trim level but I haven't seen any confirmation that there will actually be a fourth trim level offered to consumers). Shouldn't be too confusing if you ask me. Most people will just get Home Premium, just like Win 7.

 

According to the wikipedia, as of January 19, 2012 over 525 million Win7 copies have been sold.

Looked up and apparently MPEG-2 patent license is 2.5$ for each player alone and there's probably even more fees associated. That's roughly a billion/milliard dollars alone spent in licensing for a feature people less and less use today and OEM vendors replace it with some PowerDVD player anyways.

 

Holy cow, an on-topic and informative post! In all seriousness, thanks, that makes sense why MS is handling it this way.

Come to think of it, on my decade-old Dell Inspiron, I think I used PowerDVD instead of a Microsoft product to watch DVD movies. It came on the machine so that's what I used.

 

People already pay between $80 and $300 for windows (either oem, retail, or included in oem price when you buy a new computer), and Microsoft can't fork over $2.50 for a dvd codec?

 

When 90% of people never use the functionality and the remaining 10% would either download a program of their choice or simply use whatever HP/Dell/Sony prepackaged (maybe not even knowing and certainly not caring that it's not a native Windows program), then yeah, saving $2.50 per copy of Windows is a sound business decision that doesn't adversely affect the customers.

It certainly makes more sense than charging EVERY customer an extra $2.50 for a codec for EVERY copy of Windows sold, even those that appear on ultrabooks or tablets that don't even have DVD drives.

 

Hmm. You know, you actually make a good argument on that point. I see what you're saying.

 

Yep, this is the worst OS ever created.

 

That's assuming, of course, that the price of Windows is lowered by $2.50 per copy. Otherwise over a hypothetical 300 million copies W8 could sell over its lifetime (just making the number up but it has to be the right order of magnitude) MS gets a cool $750M more in profits.

 

There's so many free DVD playing softwares, why does anyone care about this?

 

MS cut stuff from Windows 7. One in particular was Windows Calendar which I actually used. They said few used it and they are probably right as their usage reports would backup their claim.

 

...which, being an ongoing business instead of short-term shareholder-dividen-mongers, they would reinvest in continuing to develop and improve next-generation products.

Probably the easy-to-use, easy-to-cloud-sync, web-based Hotmail Calendar also contributed to the death of Windows Calendar. I have a Hotmail calendar linked to my Gmail account so I can easily sync a calendar between home, work, and phone.

 

I agree that cutting support for DVDs in Windows 8 isn't that big a deal to me or plenty of people, and that it's probably a sound business decision for Microsoft. However, many PC users, probably a majority, won't know how to play a DVD if it doesn't autoplay when they put the disc in the drive. Cutting support will have an adverse effect on a lot of non-tech-savvy consumers who don't know how to get players that include free versions of the codec.

On the licensing fee front, do OEM's really pay $80+ for Windows licenses? I've always assumed they get some sort of bulk discount. I could be wrong, though. And on the same note, it would surprise me if Microsoft had to pay $2.50 per license for the DVD codec - between the question of buying half a billion licenses every few years and the fact that $2.50 is a significant percentage of what they charge for a Windows license when it's only one of hundreds of features in the OS.

 

Who cares I'm sticking with W7 and happy about it, with all the bad talk about W8 there is no reason to upgrade for me.

 

Its not just about the dvd software... what if they will do this with more features? For example, what is microsoft doing with their new office pack?: a monthly payment system >.>

Yes I know you can download many programs that can do all the things you want but...
Why would I need an OS that can't do anything, or even consider paying for one? You have to repeatedly pay for so many things these days.

Frankly, I'd just buy an apple out of principle for this if most games weren't made for windows: i'd have a decent OS, with a plus minus 30 upgrade fee when they make a new one, if i'd buy a laptop system i'd prolly have a better screen than most other brands with a microsoft OS offer aswell.

Its this whole trend of selling unfinished products and then selling the things you really need seperatly (like in the gaming industry where they sell added features in DLC)

I'm a big fan of capitalism and the idea of profits but as you can see, if people let this stuff happen its only going to get worse.

 

It will auto-play with PowerDVD or whatever DVD-playing software is preinstalled by the hardware manufacturer on DVD-drive-equipped models. The only people who are going to have to manually install something are people who have done a fresh install of Windows...and those people are smart enough to download VLC media player.

Since when did "can't play a DVD" turn into "can't do anything"? The sky is not falling.

Yeah, spending $30 every single year instead of $120 every four years is going to save you a lot of money

But you don't have to pay for this feature if you're one of the few who still watches DVD movies on your computer; you can download free third-party software that play DVDs.

 

it's not really the fact that they removed DVD playback support, it's that they have continually refused to listen to anyone about how windows 8 should roll out , except themselves. They removed the desktop paradigm, which is the whole reason most non-technical users use PCs instead of iPads for everything. I know I feel like microsoft is pushing me away as hard as they possibly can on this new release. we'll see how well windows 8 is received a year out... I have a feeling it will only be slightly better than vista.

 

Best decision ever if you ask me, although W8 is going to be utterly retarded..

 

They didn't remove the desktop paradigm, they just put a different default UI over it. And as far as I understand it, non-technical users generally prefer the ease of use they get from iOS/Android/Metro UIs over the learning-curve-required experience of a typical desktop OS - that's why so many people are happy with their four-year-old, $500 laptops but want the newest iPad and iPhone the instant it comes out.

Windows 8 will certainly have its detractors when it lands, but I can't imagine it being received as badly as Vista was upon release. Vista released with tons of bugs and nonexistent driver support. The removal of some power-user capabilities like the defrag GUI, and the addition of a draconian security system that we now take for granted, with "Run as Administrator" in every savvy user's vocabulary, contributed to the dislike, but it was mainly the fact that it was released to a deadline that it couldn't quite make.

 

Imagine if Windows 7 booted up with the start menu open. That's all Windows 8 is. The minute you click on any desktop program, or shortcut to a file folder, you're right there on the desktop.

The desktop paradigm is NOT gone just because there's a full-screen start menu that's open when you boot up Windows.

 

I for one don't like getting my desktop fill with stuff, block my pretty wallpapers

my current desktop have all icons and right click menu disabled.

 

I think this is not a big problem, I have not used DVD discs for many years. Windows installation also possible from pen-drive, even from an SD card. Probably this is why the new laptops loosing their DVD-drives and more popular with mSata SSD + HDDs or the extra space can be used for fan assembly.

 

It'll still handle DVD data disks just fine; it's just DVD movies that it won't run natively anymore.