"Why I?m uninstalling Windows 8" Article

Read here: Why I

 

I've seen some pretty good critiques of Windows 8 that bring up good points... and this was not one of them.

It's clear the author went in with an anti-W8 mindset, expecting "more of the same" W7-style. Obviously, that's not really what W8 is, and he clearly misses that. Just as a single example, he criticizes the Mail app for lacking search, when the search feature is accessed the same way across all Metro apps, as this article demonstrates.

 

I agree with the article, W8 is a mess but I disagree it should be dismissed out of his disgust...................

 

Personally... I just don't get why they are going to a tablet interface. The reason there is a tablet interface in the first place is because the desktop interface would be stupid on a tablet. Why can't they figure out that it goes both ways?

I plan on saving my copy of windows 7 and putting windows 8 on a different hard drive so I can chuck it out the window when I hate it.

 

Why not just use native VHD boot for Windows 8?

 

Yeah that article is lame. I get his frustration, but how many times can the words abysmal, awful and abominable be used in one article before it's too many? But seriously, a few more days of this Windows 8 crap and I might be starting my own blog to join his cause.

 

99% of the user gripes could be mitigated simply by offering the Windows 7 Start Menu and Taskbar. Microsoft, why are you so stubborn?

 

The one problem I see is this would be a slap in the face to OEM's. It appears the PC OEM's are in proccess of offering their own start menu or software to access it. An update by M$ would now create two accesses to the same menu. There is no standard from M$ in controlling these creations/access so it would be also hard to control conflicts as well. So it appears, at least for now, M$ has shot itself in the foot but we did all try and warn them!

For PC's it appears issues are appearing even before the RTM and release to general market. It is a shame the majority of it is from policy/procedural issues rather than code. It is funny though, in beta if there were code issues they get addressed and fixed ASAP. PC Usability issues to date seem to be just totally ignored. I guess we get to critize their flawed code but not their flawed vision.

What confuses me is that Win8 was released for PC's for beta and development. Being so stuck on the new UI why not release it people with unlocked PADs? This is where M$ is stating the UI is primarily targeted too. But then can anyone be suprised about the user back lash when a product is expected to be tried out on a market it was not really meant for? Though with M$ intention to stick with the product for the unintended market why not just tailor it usability for that market?

In the end it is just confusing at best or extremely frustrating at worst. Just too many unanswered questions that appear to have no rhyme or reason. The one last thought, maybe we are all wrong and M$ has something up its sleave no one has anticipated or seen yet. Maybe they have been right all along and there is a method to the madness.

Just a bit off topic, M$ is looking to create a huge metro user base at its current user base expense. This creates a market to developers for creation of metro styled apps. creating a bypass to metro sends a message to creators that the user base is not there from the get go. Too me this is not very responsible of M$ but the only thing we can do is just refuse to use the OS.

Continuing with that M$ is now pushing for developers to make apps for metro. What is funny is they bashed recently the side bar but Metro seems to be more dangerous. In a recent email from M$ they claim you can use Visual C++, Visual Basic, Java, C++ etc. directly in programing for a metro APP. Access directly to .Net and/or direct programing is as, if not far more, dangerous to the system than the side bar...............

 

Did they have something up their sleeve with Vista or 7 on launch? No. Unless you count stinky armpit hair. But at least with 7 you pretty much got what you saw in the RC when it launched, and it was smooth and easy to use.

I'm not buying Windows 8 unless a miracle happens.

 

The interface is unprofessional and lackluster.

Sticking to Windows 7.

 

I'm not crazy about Windows 8 either but what would be the point in releasing a newer version of Windows if for the most part will be the same as Windows 7? It's already almost the same as W7 when you navigate to the desktop. MS does need to move on to something fresh. They tend to try to take risks the way Apple does but the difference is Apple takes baby steps into bringing their customers to new tech rather than dropping a huge bomb on them all at once.

 

The taskbar is still in Windows 8. The start menu has been replaced by the start screen, yes, but the taskbar remains for all your program-pinning and window-managing needs

 

It doesn't have to look different to be an upgrade. Faster boot times, performance upgrades, better stability would be fine too imo. At this point, the major disadvantage is Win 8 actually has 2 interfaces that look and feel worse than Stardock Desktop on Win7. Apple does that all the time just look at the differences between iphones and ipads from one generation to the other -- they are smaller the difference between Win7 and Aero part of Win8.

 

Apple sometimes does great dramatic changes too, though. Both companies have "paradigm shift" OS upgrades and "refinements of an existing concept" OS upgrades. Look at the change from OS9 to OSX. That was a paradigm shift. The different versions of OSX have each been refinement-of-existing-concept upgrades.

XP to Vista and Vista to Win 7 were refinements of an existing concept (Vista had some issues, but it did include some important interface improvements over XP, most notably the start-menu search). Windows 8 isn't refinement of an existing concept, but instead is a paradigm shift, the first in a looooooong time for MS. It'll probably be followed with several versions of Windows that are refinements of an existing concept.

For those not familiar with the change from OS9 to OSX...not only did it include sweeping aesthetic changes and layout changes (the layout of the "resize" and "close" buttons on in finder windows, for example) but it introduced the Dock and made it the primary method of launching programs:

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/labs/docs/macosx.pdf

I'm sure that in 2001, some Apple users were very resistant to the Dock and OSX's pervasive interface changes at first as well. Eventually, over the years, though, the concept became so ingrained in people's method of operating computers that many PC OEMs started packaging OSX Dock ripoffs on their machines (Dell Dock, Vaio Gate, etc).

 

The difference with OSX is that initially, Apple shipped their PCs set up to dual-boot.

 

People will just call that a simple service pack and dismiss it of being worthy of a paid upgrade and frankly it wouldn't be worth it.

 

For a while. Then then Apple stopped, and every single new Apple shipped with OSX and OSX alone. And Apple users either embraced it or dealt with it. Nobody uses OS9 anymore. And nobody demands an OS9 interface for OSX anymore.

Whether you wade in step-by-step or whether you jump off a diving board, you end up in the same place eventually...swimming.

Exactly. The people who think the Win 7 interface would complain about having to pay to upgrade to Win 8, and everyone else would deride Windows as the next Blackberry 7...a stodgy interface refusing to change with changing times.

 

Do you really think that Windows is all about the GUI? Hardly. Lots of background changes, and I won't even profess to claim to know what they are, but I do know it's significant. Again (for the thousandth time at least) give us a new GUI, fine, but give us at LEAST one step legacy OS GUI option to help with the transition. I welcomed Windows 95 with open arms from Windows 3.1, it was a significant GUI and architectural change. I welcomed Windows 98, even though it was more or less Windows 95 it offered lots of enhancements over Windows 95. I welcomed XP completely. As a matter of fact, something that I have never done in my life before, I waited for release day of XP at midnight to get a copy at CompUSA (RIP). I more than welcomed Windows 7 especially after the debacle that was Vista. Windows 8 I took a look at without trepidation only to be severely confused and disappointed. Ok touch screen support is great, I get that. But why force the same interface to non touch devices? It makes ZERO sense.

Taskbar operates somewhat similar but it's not the same.

 

Cute attempt at an argument, except there's one tiny little point that's being missed here: People aren't complaining about change in the abstract, what people are complaining about is the particularly inept change of an interface we see in Win 8, which is ill suited for 99.9% of PCs that are currently in use. What some people are also complaining about is the neutering of a GUI in order to fit into the power requirements of yesterday's hardware on a class of devices, tablets, that has roughly zero percent market share in the Windows world.

Finally, I'll just note that I do find it mildly amusing how people like this poster try to posit the false alternative of either the change to the Win 8 GUI we see, or no change at all. This is, of course, a transparent straw man, and not worth a response.

 

I don't have a problem with Metro being in Win 8. I have a problem with the ham handed way that it and the ribbon interface are being integrated with the rest of the OS.

 

It was alright... but not my cup of tea.

 

If I can just quote myself for a second, remember when I said that ^^^^?

Yeah, well turns out now I'm kinda mad at Windows 8, a reaction I was actively suppressing in the hope of being pleasantly surprised. For whatever unknown reason, either a bug or just a badly installed driver, I got an error stating irql not less or equal on my latest boot. I chose to restore from the most recent restore point, and that turned out to be from a moment just after windows 8 was installed. All my "apps" and programs I had installed were gone, replaced with broken shortcuts and a seething pool of frustration in my thoughts.

Now I probably could have fixed this issue myself given the time and motivation, thus sparing me my lost apps. I just don't have time for that right now, so I thought I'd do things Microsoft's way. Well the automatic repair stopped the blue screen error, but I'm really not satisfied. Windows 7 ftw.

 

Listen, I am running Windows 8 Pro RTM on my laptop (non-touch), and like it. All I'm saying is that Microsoft could (and should) have taken a page out of Apple's book and initially allowed for a choice of interface before completely getting rid of the start menu. I think that would have eliminated 9/10ths of the complaints regarding Windows 8. Even Pirx may have liked Windows 8 if it included an option for "classic GUI" or something along those lines

 

If I could use it just like Win7 I would upgrade in a heartbeat.

 

There's always the skip metro suite.

 

I think it's the classic case of Microsoft being stuck like a needle in a haystack:

*if they decided to keep Windows 7 visuals and pull a Windows 98, it would seem pretty meh to to the press and thus average users, but to the IT guys and power users who like the "safe and stodgy" microsoft, it's sweet.

They want to understandably get away from that "safe and stodgy" image and become a hip brand again.

They could have used Windows Phone for tablets in this case, but there's still a significant segment who want that slate form factor but running a "real" OS. I'm one of those people and Windows 7's UI just doesn't cut it.

*If they went all metro, they'd have a stance that appeared to critics as "solidified" and "all on one page". They'd like that but the users would go crazy...it just wouldn't work...not with the app situation at the moment.

I think they decided to straddle both sides as much as possible, and I suspect the reason why they make one use metro for the start menu is so you'll be forced to get used to it for the future...maybe not 9 but maybe Windows 11 or so will be compelling enough for desktop users to stay in Metro nearly full time.

Allowing you to turn it off would just delay the inevitable....when people move to Windows 10 or 12 or whatever...they'll just be as confused...they're going to have to go through the growing pains at some point...

I really wish Microsoft would hold Samsung to the fire for the S-Launcher....but it wouldn't surprise me that they wont because Microsoft either:

A. Can't through some legal reason
B. continues to not have balls when it counts.

Is 8 perfect? No, I'll miss having Aero Glass (apparently it was removed to address critiscism that Metro and Aero weren't "consistent" together...so it's all "flatter" and more consistent now) and some of the Metro apps like messenger and mail aren't working as well as they should (i'm kinda dealing with a sync issue at the moment with all of the MS supplied Metro apps (Messenger, People, Mail,) but overall the OS seems well done and can only get better with time.

I'll be ready to move on from the Release Canadate to try the RTM to see if things have improved in the app department.

One thing's for sure, some say that any press is good press...and Windows 8 is getting lots of buzz for sure.

 

Never going to happen. Never. Certain types of work require having the freedom to arrange several windows freely. Heck, that was the reason those GUI OS interfaces were developed in the first place. What you are suggesting would take us right back to single-tasking DOS. Why anybody in his right mind would want to go back there is beyond me.

 

Remember the World's hateness of Ribbon interface in MS Office and other programs since 2007?

I still recall myself how I HATE IT WHEN I DON'T SEE A BIG PART OF IMAGE IN PAINT OR DOCUMENT IN WORD ON 16:10 LAPTOP!

 

I actually prefer the ribbon layout and have since day one. I don't think it makes sense for file explorer though (or whatever it's called now).

 

It does feel weird for the file explorer, but i'll adapt.

 

I can adapt too, but they're making these decisions that really don't improve usability and just saying "deal with it".

 

I'm not sure the ribbon falls in that category, it does move everything around which makes thing unfamiliar when they didn't need to be though. There are other choices that i agree fall into the category you just described. I don't mind the loss of the start menu, but why can't just they put a search bar when you right click the bottom left corner à la start menu. That way search wouldn't have to leave the desktop if you don't want it to, i never use the start menu aside from the search bar anyways.

On the other hand, it does offer a unified UI for Office, Paint, Windows Explorer, etc. That is one thing i hope to see in the future, MS programs using a unified UI. I remember back when Office 2007 came out, most of the programs got the ribbon makeover, but programs like Visio, granted not technically part of Office, still used the old school UI. It was a bit unsettling when working with both at the same time or switching from one to another.

 

I have one app that doesn't work and masking it with comp manager doesn't help either... Also GFX driver/performance issues are still there (which'll hopefully be solved in due time).

 

I don't understand, why people complain about Win8. Actually, this is the first time I started using keyboard keys to use it. Also, typing a program in Metro is a great feature. Moreover, you get native USB3.0 support, sound acceleration (HARDWARE) - not emulated as it was in Vista/7 and many other functions. I like that it lacks Aero, transparency doesn't look cool anymore. I prefer black colors and for me it look just great. Ribbon is worthless to me, but native ISO support is just great. By installing Win8 I could uninstall at least 3-4 apps, which are there by default.

What I don't like is Windows Store, can't delete it and I don't consider using it.

 

Some of us complain because there are features we would have liked to see stay. That said, there is a difference with complaining about and hating Windows 8. Do i like Windows 8 as a whole, sure, i like 7 a lot too. Heck, i think that what was done under the hood is pretty darn awesome. Aero i can live without, but the question is why remove it instead of just disabling it by default (i like the flat look, but i disagree about transparency and i'D rather have the option for it)? I don't mind metro much, but it still feels disruptive to have a whole screen pop up when i want to search for a program and i'm working on the desktop. It's not a matter of it being more tedious, it just feels mildly disruptive for my work flow, i use the search function all the time in 7, i even search documents from the start menu and that is something i'd prefer not having to leave the desktop to do.

The search screen is pretty good for certain things though, but i'd still like the option to search for a program from the desktop. Windows has also always been about retaining a familiar environment and features. Windows 8 isn't exactly what I'd call a smooth transition. It won't be much of a problem for me, but from what i have seen of MS' tutorial on how to use Win 8 it's a poor effort and i can see myself on the phone with every relative that has my number or can get it by calling my immediate family to help troubleshoot their windows 8 problems which this time will be UI related.

I've been using Windows 8 for web browsing on my N50 and it's been a rather nice experience (no better or worse than 7), but for work, i'm still not sold on Windows 8.

 

There's plenty to complain about in Windows 8. You even did it in your post, so I'm not sure why you say you don't understand it. I think a lot of people have an issue with replacing the start menu with a tablet interface (Microsoft has even admitted that it's basically a touch first interface) and just telling desktop users to get over it.

Nobody's saying Win 8 is worthless. In fact, that's what's so frustrating. If there weren't so many nice features, it would be much easier to just skip 8 and stick with 7. It's a step forward in many aspects, but a step backward in desktop usability.

 

I gotta say that using it with a decent touchpad feels rather natural (imo), but with a regular mouse, not so much.

 

Well, to me MS made a big mistake. First they skipped DreamScene in Win7 (first appeared in Vista), now they skipped MediaCenter (have to buy it apart). The same goes to Start Menu. They should include it by default, user should have possibility to enable it or disable it. That's what I think about it.

In the beginning I was a bit sceptic over the OS, I also was afraid of Metro. 1 or 2 days and I now I can't move back to Win7
I have to admit that I had to remove most apps from Metro, Travels/News, etc. are worthless to me and recall me of smartphones or tablets.

 

So it turns out that you actually have the same complaints as everyone else.

 

But they are not so important to me, I won't fight the system if they don't include original Start Menu or other functions. They should adapt to our opinions. Otherwise they get poor sales. Win8 is definitely not a revolution, it's just an evolution. Revolution was during Win95 and WinXP times.

 

Its interesting. Unity and Gnome 3 in linux have displeased lots of users with their tablet centric architecture too. A read:
Why I Hate Unity | Flynsarmy

 

I really can't see Unity being tablet centric. It's kinda where Windows 7 is currently in terms of tablet ease of use.

My issue with Unity is that, at least out of the box, it's very ugly aesthetically.

 

Maybe if sales are slow Windows will release an update that will install the older type start menu, I just can't see offices using Metro, seems like its more for consumers.