Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Microsoft Previews Windows 8 with Cues from iPad and App Store

Getting it to run and having a good user experience can be quite a chore and at times impossible with an older machine, depending on the specs. There are problems with sleep mode, not coming out of sleep mode, features that won't work or work properly etc.
Click to expand...

Well, if thats the case, then they probably had hardware issues or didn't install the right drivers. Windows Update will get the proper drivers for the vast majority of hardware, so all you have to do is run that.

+1 Good to see someone on this forum who can cut through all the Anti-Windows BS
Click to expand...

Before long you'll see plenty of posts calling me a troll :D count on it. haha. All while I type this on my MacBook.

Have to agree there. WMC works very very well. There are also some very nice plugins that make it almost "Apple" like in its slick and "just works".

Just a shame they screwed up WHS and did not allow tuners to run on them. then they would have had an awesome home media setup.
Click to expand...

Yeah that would have been.

I love WMC. It's great. Especially if you have an Xbox 360 and an HDTV tuner. Record shows and stream them to your Xbox. Or live TV. No need to pay extra for DVR service.

It's not whether Windows 7 will run on a 5 year old machine... it's that who would spend $179 for a copy of Windows 7 for a machine that old?

It wouldn't even be worth it to put a cheap OEM or upgrade copy of Windows 7 on a machine that old either.
Click to expand...

Why would I spend $179? Windows 7 x64 Home Premium OEM is $99. Thats a full version. Just no technical support from MS and its "locked" to the motherboard its installed on, but not even MS will enforce that rule.

And these days a 5 year old machine could be a Core 2 Quad with 4GB of RAM and a GeForce 8800GTX. Nothing wrong with that setup at all! Will run modern games at very good settings and resolutions and eat up any other task you throw at it and ask for more. Throw a GTX 460, 560, or better in it and it'll run modern games at highest settings at highest resolutions at 60 frames or more.

Even a 5 year old Core 2 Duo and lesser non-Intel GPU from that time will be good enough to run Windows 7, provided it has at least 2GB of RAM.

Seems people have forgotten what kind of hardware we had a few years ago. Just because Apple still sells Core 2 Duos doesn't mean they're new. They're half a decade old!

The Core i7 brand itself is nearing 3 years old.

The Core 2 Duo revision in the MacBook and MacBook Air is 3 years old as well.

A lot of our "modern" technology is quite old. The graphics processor in the iPhone 4 is 4 years old. The GPU in the "Apple A5" was announced in January 2009. So yeah..

I actually like Windows, I love XP and 7. Windows 8 looks terrible, it looks like a hybrid OS that does not know what it is, the tiles and the whole metro UI is horrible.

Phones and tablets are toys, desktops and laptops are serious devices and should remain as such, made for a mouse and a keyboard. Apple has a good chance to snap many Windows fans.

Microsoft can't seem to be doing anything right lately, they make things work smooth and seemingly look nice buy people aren't falling for it.
Click to expand...

And we have another that didn't read the article or watch the video. The "standard/classic/traditional" Aero UI is still in Windows 8. You can switch instantly too it and run it just like you do Windows 7 now. The new UI is for touch applications, but you can use it with a mouse and keyboard if you'd like.

I think it's great that Microsoft have taken a risk with the new UI. There's no point if Apple is the leader in this and that all the time - there NEEDS to be competition.
Click to expand...

When was the last time Apple had a new Mac OS UI? Or even updated it beyond color changes?

When was the last time iOS UI was updated? Seriously haha. The iOS UI is the way it is because it made sense at the time. Now we know better and its in desperate need of updates, especially notifications, and Apple isn't doing it.
 
ten-oak-druid said:
In the US 1/3 of Windows users are on Windows 7 and 1/3 are still on XP. The rest are using Vista and other OS. I wonder if Windows 8 will grab Windows 7 users first or the XP and older people?

Snow leopard is the dominate OS X used. OS X overall is around 15% market share last I heard.
Click to expand...

SJdtj.png
 
Getting back to the core of the story.... :rolleyes:

Anyway... not convinced their "Tiles" approach is going to catch on. Looks weird to me. I know they bet on it with the Phone OS and it's not catching on... I guess bigger they think it might?
 
I don't think this looks anything like iPad nor are there any cues from iPad.
 
Looks interesting and nice for devices with small screens and touch interface. Might be horrible to use on a desktop just with mouse (and big screen). but even and touch system you will have a strange mix of legacy windows apps made for mouse and new tile apps made for touch. ... Overall looks promising, but not sure how usability will work out with the legacy/touch mix and machines without touch screen
 
Well.... it will be a defining release for MS... Such a big departure from the norm, if it doesn't catch on, it will hurt.

Personally... i think it will be confusing for a desktop or laptop. Nice for a tablet, but too much screen changing for desktop where you just want to click to another window.

But things must progress and the standard folder/icon UI has been around for a long time. But again... not a fan of tiles. They look uninspired and plain.
 
The UI is touch based, but can be disabled.

apps haven't yet been rewritten or optimized for touch.

Requirements should be less, but will likely be much greater than iOS. It's actually disconcerting to read all these windows 8 articles discussing kal-el, etc. It's a long-standing Microsoft tradition of throwing iron at a problem instead of optimizing their software.

Apple is the enemy of ram because they force themselves to write tight code; less memory means greater battery life.




mosx said:
It's amazing how many people are making comments without watching the video or reading about Windows 8.

The "new" UI is touch based, yes. But Windows 8 STILL has the Windows 7 Aero interface. Switching between the two is instant and MS said that Windows 8 requirements (go to Engadget if you don't believe me), will be the same as Windows 7 or lower.

Windows 8 ARM is designed for ARM processors. It WILL run on ARM processors. Don't forget that Windows 8 won't be out until around the end of next year, and in that time, ARM processors should be taking a HUGE jump, especially if nvidia sticks to their release schedule. nvidia's Kal-El then Wayne updates will take their performance above a 2GHz Core 2 Duo.

Microsoft also announced that "Windows 8 Development Platform" is cross platform, x86 and ARM.

As another poster on this forum put it awhile ago, "Apple is the enemy of RAM". Other companies are not. So Windows 8 with this new UI on an iPad like device should run great. Granted, you're not going to be playing Crysis on it, but it'll be significantly more capable than the locked down and artificially limited iPad.
Click to expand...
 
Wait...

First they tried to say that their Windows 7 worked perfectly fine for tablets (which is of course wrong).

Now they have designed an UI that is clearly designed for small touch devices and want to tell us that this works for computers just as well?

Did I miss something or is it safe to say that these people are totally confused? :p
 
ZipZapRap said:
You must not be a successful dev then. Suddenly, hundreds of millions of consumers are going to have a new OS, and a new way of interacting with their devices and your content, and you think Windows 8 won't bring anything for you? Serious?

Without even knowing what the developement tools will be, you've effectively just said you don't want to know what the biggest market for your sites will be using to view the web.

And Windows 8 will ship with IE10. Sheesh.
Click to expand...

Lol, I would so love to see you working (designing and programming) with your hands on a 24" display which is at least half a meter away from you.
 
This would look nice on my HP touchscreen kitchen computer.

But then again, HP says they're going to put WebOS on everything they sell, from phones to tablets to printers to laptops. And they're willing to license it to others.

Interesting times ahead. Many choices.
 
kind of shoots down the "Apples last longer" myth

Michael Scrip said:
If people are still using XP... it's probably on a machine they've had for a very long time.

They didn't buy that XP machine last month or last year. It's not like people are buying Windows XP instead of Windows 7.
Click to expand...

I've heard the claim that "Apples last longer than PCs" so often, but the XP stats seem to make that claim doubtful. There are a lot of old XP machines that just keep chugging along.
 
Why not make the "new" ui operating system for only touch devices and have another for desktops. It's too messy having them all in one. The new ui will be annoying to use on a laptop/desktop and the old ui will be annoying to use on a tablet as we have already seen the failure of windows 7 tablets.

It looks nice though. Oh and that idea with the keyboard halfed, having some letters on each side is an excellent idea! Well done microsoft
 
AidenShaw said:
I've heard the claim that "Apples last longer than PCs" so often, but the XP stats seem to make that claim doubtful. There are a lot of old XP machines that just keep chugging along.
Click to expand...

Way to insert a troll comment but I'll clear that doubt.

I use Windows 7/ Windows XP on my macbook. (sometimes)

For all my FPGA programming, I used Windows XP as the tools were best supported on that system.

The old XP machines are just there for the people who:

1. have found XP to be of great use for them.
2. don't need much hardware for their work.
3. don't have much resources with them.
4. enterprises who are slowly moving to windows 7.

That does not imply that Apples don't last longer than Windows laptops. Side by side, people bought sony vaio in the office and here we go... 2 years down the line and they are mostly unusable. (not all though)

So comparing a huge majority of systems, macs do last longer. My 2006 iMac is in great shape and performs great on snow leopard.

But whatever...
 
iDisk said:
APPLAUSE TO MS!!!!!!

This is by far the best implementation of Technologies I've seen, they actually have created a viable alternative for those who don't wish to be apart of Apple's eco-system... Windows 8 looks fresh, and somewhat innovative... Can't wait to see what Apple does monday though.
Click to expand...

Fresh as a Windows Phone 7 layer slapped on top of Windows 7 fresh? Or fresh like what?

It is not fresh at all. The UI comes from Zune which itself is an ancient device.
 
Speaking from a Tabled point of view, I think this is interesting. I wouldn't mind having that and my iOS on my iPad but it still seems that you can get lost in the layers of hell. Somehow he jumps back after going in right away so you don't know how much it takes to jump back to home or where you were.

I am optimistic and somewhat interested in this design, but I must admit, for me to buy my first PC windows enabled machine be it a tablet or otherwise, needs a heck of a lot more convincing...

Too early to say and at the moment my focus is on the new MacOS X 10.7, hoping it will be FAST and just in general worth the wait. The current os is actually still just MacOS X 10.5 adding the core updates to 10.6 which is great, but something new visually is very welcome.
 
kdarling said:
This would look nice on my HP touchscreen kitchen computer.

But then again, HP says they're going to put WebOS on everything they sell, from phones to tablets to printers to laptops. And they're willing to license it to others.

Interesting times ahead. Many choices.
Click to expand...


To expand, everything is changing. 2011 and 2012 I think will be a transitional year where we see the lines between mobile and desktop go away. But, I also think it's anyones game and now Microsoft has the most to loose. With everything changing and everyone after them with their own OS, it's going to be interesting to see who comes out on top.
 
mabaker said:
Fresh as a Windows Phone 7 layer slapped on top of Windows 7 fresh? Or fresh like what?

It is not fresh at all. The UI comes from Zune which itself is an ancient device.
Click to expand...

Plus, "Fresh" does not mean "good".

I could see users flipping through apps trying to figure out what the heck they have running. It could be a mess if there's no "home base" (desktop) to come back to. IMO you need something that is a known location so you don't get lost in the UI.
 
I think it's an absolutely brilliant move by Microsoft... Especially seeing as mobile devices are going the way of PC in the pocket.....

Take a phone or tablet and use a touch based UI, get home or to work and dock it to a monitor, keyboard and mouse and you can fire into a non-touch based UI like Excel etc... do REAL work, and then undock and go back to touch.

The snap feature looks like a real viable way to multi-task on a touch based ui... this is looking REALLY good.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back