Windows 8 was put on general release on the 26th October and I upgraded using Microsoft’s $15 upgrade offer as I recently bought a new laptop. And I have to say that from the moment it loaded for the first time, I hated it, I don’t mean dislike, I really mean hate it, I despise the metro START screen, it really doesn’t work as a desktop operating system, forcing a tablet style OS on desktop users is ridiculous, I firmly believe that Microsoft have screwed the pooch here; I can see many people sticking with what they know, Windows 7, this could well be the next Windows Vista!
The traditional start menu has been completely removed; your only option is use the Metro start screen; why did Microsoft elect to not keep the Windows 7 interface as an option for existing Windows users, a system that has basically remained the same for 17 years since Windows 95. The Aero interface is completely gone, the desktop looks ugly compared to Windows 7/Vista. Another odd thing, from what I could see; the only way to shut down was to log out first; why not have a log out and shut down button like every version of Windows since ’95? Maybe there is another way to directly shut down but it wasn’t obvious, even to someone who works with computers regularly!
The professional version of Windows 8 that I wasted $15 on doesn’t come with Windows Media Center by default; it’s now a optional extra, not sure how much it’ll cost because for a limited time it is free to Windows 8 users. The net result is that if you’d like to play DVD’s on your PC, you’ll need to purchase the Media Center pack or install a third party application such as Power DVD to play DVD’s in Windows Media Player, something that wasn’t required in Windows Vista or 7.
There will be inevitable driver issues, the Intel USB3 drivers are not compatible and my webcam wasn’t even acknowledged; not incompatible drivers, but no sign of it in device manager. It works fine in Windows 7, so it’s not a problem with the hardware. We can make the assumption that many pieces of hardware won’t be compatible with Windows 8, which was a big reason why Windows Vista failed, Vista was awful until SP1 was released! Windows 8 has a bigger problem as already many people in the desktop/laptop using fraternity have already denounced the new Metro theme.
Other issues; at least for me was speed; I heard statements such as Windows 8 can boot up in as little as seven seconds; something that couldn’t be further from the truth in my experience, boot up times were between 45 seconds and 70 seconds, much slower than the Windows 7 install it replaced. Maybe it would be quicker if clean installed but seven seconds seems very optimistic!
Beware; if you do want to upgrade, make sure you have three hours to dedicate to the task, downloading from the Microsoft server took about 20 minutes on my 12Mb cable internet connection, then another 15 minutes to prepare the media and another 90 minutes to install the software, assuming you followed the same path as me in using the upgrade option and not a clean install. I have installed Windows many times on machines of varying specifications and it has never taken longer than an hour before, including loading the software onto CD/DVD/USB drive. If you were wondering on my machine spec; it’s a Intel® Core™ i5-3210M, 6GB DDR3-1600, 750GB 5400rpm SATA3 HDD based system, which is no slouch when it comes to the laptop speed stakes!