> 64 bit memory management was by far the most important upgrade.
agreed agreed agreed. Also agree with the rest of your response, and would like to add -- the search on start menu on Win7 has a really annoying, almost whimsical delay. I use mstsc a *lot* (as an admin) and I've found that you need to count one-one-thousand-two-one-thousand after typing it before hitting return, or you get the file explorer instead. Why? Who the HELL knows. Just some quirk they never got around to fixing, apparently.
I'm not sure that I completely agree. Surely, the necessity of "do you really want to do this" "yes""do you really want to do this" "yes" "do you really want to do this" "yes""do you really want to do this" "yes" "do you really want to do this" "yes" throughout the day was irritating, but things like network file transfers that should have taken minutes taking hours is what really killed it in our environment. I mean, Win7 still says "you need admin access to do this" and it's not that much of a deal.
That's all I've got. A standalone device,,, very interesting. Depending on price and availability, I'd like one.
Back in the nineties there was a watch that was a pager, and you could also get news headlines and stock reports on it. I wore mine 24 hours a day and got a skin infection... wait, too much information. Suffice it to say, I really liked that product and this one looks very interesting.
"Win7 is mediocre." "Win7 is by far the best OS Microsoft has ever made."
A prime example of how two different statements can be true simultaneously.
Enh. I wouldn't say that. I think what was said was that Windows 7 was an incremental improvement over Windows XP. Now, XP, as far as Windows goes, was a pretty successful, stable, useful OS. Test by, it's been with us for 13 years, and many users still don't want to part with it. 7 had some annoyances (would Microsoft PLEASE the HELL stop rearranging the control panel? PLEASE?) but is pretty decent. It even looks like the classic desktop if you turn Aero off. About like XP looks like when you turn the "fischer-price" desktop off. Hm, I'm seeing a trend here. Windows 8 might be decent if you could TURN METRO OFF. Just sayin'.
The point continues to be, Windows with 7 is probably as good as Windows is ever going to get. In the old days there were reasons to make radical changes because the current version sucked so bad, or because new types of hardware had to be supported. There is very little need for that in the desktop world anymore, and change for the sake of change is not a good sell.
Not to mention, 7 had XP compatibility mode, which worked really well and solved three or four migration issues I had. (Eventually the software in question either was upgraded to be compatible with 7, or I migrated to a different application. But for OS migration, XP compatibility was essential.) They really went out of their way to make the upgrade to 7 issue free. Turn Aero off, and it even looks like XP.
So, what the hell happened with 8? With all they had learned with Vista and 7, (the first being how not to do a release, the second how to do a successful release) why the hell would they pick the technique that did not work? That must have been an interesting board meeting.
> If you rely on a third world sheeper for your core infrastructure then you are quite fucked! Penny wise pound foolish if something happens and they can't figure it out fast enough. I can see help desk going over there, but the loss of productivity from one user to the whole fucking enterprise is HUGE.
...as we have found many times. But upper management sees that IT costs are cheaper, and apparently that's all that matters.
I think I forgot more than ME/Phone/Mobile but the list I came up with just popped into my head. About the table: it was really innovative and a useful product. I once used it in a museum and it's very responsive and easy to use. Maybe the reason that MS didn't promote it was that is was/is not something that is very useful in a business. It could make a very cool coffee table though.
I have to disagree. Having it built in to conference tables would streamline brainstorming sessions and other types of collaborative efforts to a high degree. I think corporations (at least some of them) would have snapped at it. And then Apple would have cloned it.:-)
> I think a lot of corporations will simply slipstream classic shell into their custom win8 installs, and save a small fortune on retraining costs and endless support calls.
I think a lot of corporations will simply reimage new hardware with Windows 7 and save a small fortune on retraining costs and endless support calls.
You don't understand. Like a lot of places, Windows admin here is offshore. After a few hours training, third world sheepherders are handed a stack of procedures and turned loose on the machines. Changing the GUI is a very very VERY bad thing in this kind of environment. And a CLI only environment? Great for someone who knows what they're doing, a recipe for disaster otherwise.
I'm sure it seemed like a great thing, but Microsoft is now a prisoner of their own mindshare. For better or worse, the perception is that anyone can do Windows admin -- it's just pushing buttons. You and I know that's not true, but we have lost our voice with management. And it's not hard to foresee that big changes to how the server operates is a good way to have really bad things happen in the middle of the night.
You really need to work on this. Saying stuff like "Actually, a start icon in the lower left is exactly what I wanted" makes no logical sense. If you were a computer-illiterate user, you might want that, but then you wouldn't be posting here. And no computer literate person would care whether there was a button to take you to the start screen, because if you had embraced the Win8 paradigm, you would have embraced the lack of conveyance and wouldn't have a problem putting the pointer over invisible hot areas in order to make things happen, and if you had not embraced the Win8 paradigm, a mere button to do the same action as the hot corner is not nearly enough. So, what you said just sounds like a feeble attempt to promote 8.1.
What you need, I think, is a less feeble attempt. That's going to need more thought than "I really like (whatever Microsoft just released)." Especially if it totally reverses one's previous assertion that "Microsoft doesn't need to do this". (The advantages of posting anonymously, so there's no tracking your previous comments.)
Windows 7 was mediocre? Sure, its not as good as Linux, but its by far the best OS Microsoft has ever made
I think what he means is that 7 was only an incremental improvement over XP. I upgraded to 7 for the superior memory management (and went to 64 bit at the same time so I could install more than 4 gigs) but in day to day usage, it's not much different from XP, and some of the differences (like going full screen if your pointer gets near the top, and the pointless rearrangement of the control panel) are annoying.
> The whole point of this update is that Windows 8 is now pretty much the same as Windows 7. The Start Menu is back, and the only other major difference is the new flat look
What are you smoking? Can I have some? That's demonstrably not true. The start button takes you back to the Metro screen, not anything remotely like the start menu, and all the hot corners and charms crap are still there. How did you miss the tens of reviews on 8.1 that covered this?
> Then why are you talking about stuff you know nothing about?
What part of "I own a device running Windows 8" did you miss in my previous posting? It was only five sentences.
I'm posting on this topic because I have to support Windows, and when Microsoft craps out something that's obviously going to be difficult to support, I get concerned.
> You think a good business strategy is to rely on making minuscule changes to spreadsheets and word processors - expecting - consumers to buy the new version??
Listen to this, he speaks the truth. Back in the bad old days we paid hundreds to upgrade to the new version of Office in the hopes that basic features would finally work. Now that they do, there's no overriding reason to buy the next version. So after the market saturates, sales would inevitably plummet. (I'm still using Office 2000... works fine.) Microsoft got used to the profits it made while their software was on the steep end of the curve. Now that the curve has flattened out, they're lost. A more foresighted company would have seen this coming and moved into other applications. (snerk)
To state it more simply, buying pricy upgrades for minor GUI changes is not money well spent. Especially since the free alternatives are getting more sophisticated.
Many people here forget that Innovations aren't always successful. MS has put quite a few innovations on the market: MS Bob The stupid paper clip That table on which you can move windows around with your hands MS Outlook Kinect WP 7 Windows 8 I would say only two of them were successful: Outlook and the Kinect.
You forgot Windows ME/Phone/Mobile
The Surface (the original Surface, before they repurposed the name for that stupid tablet) that table where you can move windows around with your hands was actually a really innovative product that could have been successful. But Microsoft refused to promote it, and it remains only a curiosity and TV prop. Although I don't have proof, I strongly suspect that the reason Microsoft did not promote it is that it did not match the business plan of "Windows everywhere", being a substantially different interface from everything else they had done.
> From a business point of view, Microsoft's hope is Asia. The OECD is fully saturated with Microsoft product, but there's huge growth potential in Asia. (Growth potential, mind. MS will have to work very hard to realise that potential.)
The problem is Asia doesn't fit Microsoft's business model. They're already used to relatively cheap devices running free (as in beer) software. Microsoft would be going head-to-head with free OS and free office suites and other applications. What price do you think Microsoft should charge for their OS and office suites in order to compete? Anyone?
Microsoft may continue to sell stuff in the US and perhaps Europe, but the business model has changed in a very basic way, and the business model of multi-hundred-dollar operating systems and office suites is chugging along mostly on inertia these days.
I don't intend to. The convertible on which we have Win8 has been a complete bust. As a touch interface 8 sucks, and going back to 7 makes the touch screen worthless. We'll be giving the device away, and looking into the Samsung Note for a touch device. My workstation is running 7, and will continue to do so. Why would I buy a new OS that has a bunch of stuff I don't want and then have to disable it? What REASON is there for me to upgrade?
Slashdot Mirror
I think you're right.
> 64 bit memory management was by far the most important upgrade.
agreed agreed agreed. Also agree with the rest of your response, and would like to add -- the search on start menu on Win7 has a really annoying, almost whimsical delay. I use mstsc a *lot* (as an admin) and I've found that you need to count one-one-thousand-two-one-thousand after typing it before hitting return, or you get the file explorer instead. Why? Who the HELL knows. Just some quirk they never got around to fixing, apparently.
I'm not sure that I completely agree. Surely, the necessity of "do you really want to do this" "yes""do you really want to do this" "yes" "do you really want to do this" "yes""do you really want to do this" "yes" "do you really want to do this" "yes" throughout the day was irritating, but things like network file transfers that should have taken minutes taking hours is what really killed it in our environment. I mean, Win7 still says "you need admin access to do this" and it's not that much of a deal.
Except you were talking about Classic Shell, claiming that it didn't do certain things when, in fact, it does.
Nice try at moving the goalpost though.
I certainly was not. I was talking about Windows 8.1, which, if you scroll back to the top, is the topic of this thread.
That's.... actually... promising.
That's all I've got. A standalone device,,, very interesting. Depending on price and availability, I'd like one.
Back in the nineties there was a watch that was a pager, and you could also get news headlines and stock reports on it. I wore mine 24 hours a day and got a skin infection... wait, too much information. Suffice it to say, I really liked that product and this one looks very interesting.
"Win7 is mediocre."
"Win7 is by far the best OS Microsoft has ever made."
A prime example of how two different statements can be true simultaneously.
Enh. I wouldn't say that. I think what was said was that Windows 7 was an incremental improvement over Windows XP. Now, XP, as far as Windows goes, was a pretty successful, stable, useful OS. Test by, it's been with us for 13 years, and many users still don't want to part with it. 7 had some annoyances (would Microsoft PLEASE the HELL stop rearranging the control panel? PLEASE?) but is pretty decent. It even looks like the classic desktop if you turn Aero off. About like XP looks like when you turn the "fischer-price" desktop off. Hm, I'm seeing a trend here. Windows 8 might be decent if you could TURN METRO OFF. Just sayin'.
The point continues to be, Windows with 7 is probably as good as Windows is ever going to get. In the old days there were reasons to make radical changes because the current version sucked so bad, or because new types of hardware had to be supported. There is very little need for that in the desktop world anymore, and change for the sake of change is not a good sell.
Not to mention, 7 had XP compatibility mode, which worked really well and solved three or four migration issues I had. (Eventually the software in question either was upgraded to be compatible with 7, or I migrated to a different application. But for OS migration, XP compatibility was essential.) They really went out of their way to make the upgrade to 7 issue free. Turn Aero off, and it even looks like XP.
So, what the hell happened with 8? With all they had learned with Vista and 7, (the first being how not to do a release, the second how to do a successful release) why the hell would they pick the technique that did not work? That must have been an interesting board meeting.
> If you rely on a third world sheeper for your core infrastructure then you are quite fucked! Penny wise pound foolish if something happens and they can't figure it out fast enough. I can see help desk going over there, but the loss of productivity from one user to the whole fucking enterprise is HUGE.
Repeatedly paying for the same thing is called renting.
Well said. At a very high rate, for value received.
I think I forgot more than ME/Phone/Mobile but the list I came up with just popped into my head.
About the table: it was really innovative and a useful product. I once used it in a museum and it's very responsive and easy to use. Maybe the reason that MS didn't promote it was that is was/is not something that is very useful in a business. It could make a very cool coffee table though.
I have to disagree. Having it built in to conference tables would streamline brainstorming sessions and other types of collaborative efforts to a high degree. I think corporations (at least some of them) would have snapped at it. And then Apple would have cloned it. :-)
> I think a lot of corporations will simply slipstream classic shell into their custom win8 installs, and save a small fortune on retraining costs and endless support calls.
I think a lot of corporations will simply reimage new hardware with Windows 7 and save a small fortune on retraining costs and endless support calls.
You don't understand. Like a lot of places, Windows admin here is offshore. After a few hours training, third world sheepherders are handed a stack of procedures and turned loose on the machines. Changing the GUI is a very very VERY bad thing in this kind of environment. And a CLI only environment? Great for someone who knows what they're doing, a recipe for disaster otherwise.
I'm sure it seemed like a great thing, but Microsoft is now a prisoner of their own mindshare. For better or worse, the perception is that anyone can do Windows admin -- it's just pushing buttons. You and I know that's not true, but we have lost our voice with management. And it's not hard to foresee that big changes to how the server operates is a good way to have really bad things happen in the middle of the night.
You really need to work on this. Saying stuff like "Actually, a start icon in the lower left is exactly what I wanted" makes no logical sense. If you were a computer-illiterate user, you might want that, but then you wouldn't be posting here. And no computer literate person would care whether there was a button to take you to the start screen, because if you had embraced the Win8 paradigm, you would have embraced the lack of conveyance and wouldn't have a problem putting the pointer over invisible hot areas in order to make things happen, and if you had not embraced the Win8 paradigm, a mere button to do the same action as the hot corner is not nearly enough. So, what you said just sounds like a feeble attempt to promote 8.1.
What you need, I think, is a less feeble attempt. That's going to need more thought than "I really like (whatever Microsoft just released)." Especially if it totally reverses one's previous assertion that "Microsoft doesn't need to do this". (The advantages of posting anonymously, so there's no tracking your previous comments.)
Go ahead fix it at work you dont have admin.
Oooh, good point. But when all is said and done, it's moot, because your local admins wouldn't be stupid enough to push it out in the first place.
Windows 7 was mediocre? Sure, its not as good as Linux, but its by far the best OS Microsoft has ever made
I think what he means is that 7 was only an incremental improvement over XP. I upgraded to 7 for the superior memory management (and went to 64 bit at the same time so I could install more than 4 gigs) but in day to day usage, it's not much different from XP, and some of the differences (like going full screen if your pointer gets near the top, and the pointless rearrangement of the control panel) are annoying.
> Correct, there's no reason to downgrade to Windows 7 if you install Windows 8 plus ClassicShell.
There are many reasons. Win8 starts out ugly, and then the more you dig into it the more annoying it becomes.
Rather, there is no reason to "upgrade" to Windows 8 plus any free (and not corporate supported) addon, if you're already using Windows 7.
> The whole point of this update is that Windows 8 is now pretty much the same as Windows 7. The Start Menu is back, and the only other major difference is the new flat look
What are you smoking? Can I have some? That's demonstrably not true. The start button takes you back to the Metro screen, not anything remotely like the start menu, and all the hot corners and charms crap are still there. How did you miss the tens of reviews on 8.1 that covered this?
> Then why are you talking about stuff you know nothing about?
What part of "I own a device running Windows 8" did you miss in my previous posting? It was only five sentences.
I'm posting on this topic because I have to support Windows, and when Microsoft craps out something that's obviously going to be difficult to support, I get concerned.
Perl.
You have a problem. You decide to use Perl. Now you have two problems.
> You think a good business strategy is to rely on making minuscule changes to spreadsheets and word processors - expecting - consumers to buy the new version??
Listen to this, he speaks the truth. Back in the bad old days we paid hundreds to upgrade to the new version of Office in the hopes that basic features would finally work. Now that they do, there's no overriding reason to buy the next version. So after the market saturates, sales would inevitably plummet. (I'm still using Office 2000... works fine.) Microsoft got used to the profits it made while their software was on the steep end of the curve. Now that the curve has flattened out, they're lost. A more foresighted company would have seen this coming and moved into other applications. (snerk)
To state it more simply, buying pricy upgrades for minor GUI changes is not money well spent. Especially since the free alternatives are getting more sophisticated.
Many people here forget that Innovations aren't always successful. MS has put quite a few innovations on the market:
MS Bob
The stupid paper clip
That table on which you can move windows around with your hands
MS Outlook
Kinect
WP 7
Windows 8
I would say only two of them were successful: Outlook and the Kinect.
You forgot Windows ME/Phone/Mobile
The Surface (the original Surface, before they repurposed the name for that stupid tablet) that table where you can move windows around with your hands was actually a really innovative product that could have been successful. But Microsoft refused to promote it, and it remains only a curiosity and TV prop. Although I don't have proof, I strongly suspect that the reason Microsoft did not promote it is that it did not match the business plan of "Windows everywhere", being a substantially different interface from everything else they had done.
Insecure dictators have a history of making sure there's no-one available to replace them, as part of their strategy to avoid being replaced.
Oh, brilliant point. So, a successful replacement, if such a thing were still possible, must come from outside the company.
> From a business point of view, Microsoft's hope is Asia. The OECD is fully saturated with Microsoft product, but there's huge growth potential in Asia. (Growth potential, mind. MS will have to work very hard to realise that potential.)
The problem is Asia doesn't fit Microsoft's business model. They're already used to relatively cheap devices running free (as in beer) software. Microsoft would be going head-to-head with free OS and free office suites and other applications. What price do you think Microsoft should charge for their OS and office suites in order to compete? Anyone?
Microsoft may continue to sell stuff in the US and perhaps Europe, but the business model has changed in a very basic way, and the business model of multi-hundred-dollar operating systems and office suites is chugging along mostly on inertia these days.
> Never used it, huh?
I don't intend to. The convertible on which we have Win8 has been a complete bust. As a touch interface 8 sucks, and going back to 7 makes the touch screen worthless. We'll be giving the device away, and looking into the Samsung Note for a touch device. My workstation is running 7, and will continue to do so. Why would I buy a new OS that has a bunch of stuff I don't want and then have to disable it? What REASON is there for me to upgrade?