Windows 8 is upon us and as usual, Microsoft's approach is to release it now, gather some input, fix it later..












A few new perks, looks like they're trying to make it more like Android or Mac IE10 comes with it..

If you're going to try it, Be sure & set it up as a dual boot, or there's no going back to 7 or Vista

Biggest thing is NO START BUTTON, so I still use the conventional desktop Lots to get used to..

You can try it for free, and it will work till April 2013.. Ready or not, here it comes!

windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-8/release-preview

You're a brave man No_Max!

If it doesn`t make MAX faster I wont be using it in the near future.

As someone that works with computers every day and have since about 1985... MS seems to not realize most end users of computers don't even know they can do things with both mouse buttons let alone move to different areas of the screen sides and corners to get access to features like in Windows 8. I am a system builder and tech and own my own company. I try to makes things easy for my customers and MS is trying to make my job very hard. Also business customers want an OS that is quick to get to where they need to be and jumping around between programs and tasks easy. They want their workers to do more work in a day so Windows XP is still the choice. I really think MS is heading in the wrong direction. I know some will like the new Win 8 but most will not. What MS says about how much market share they hold with even Win 7 is more bloated than you may think. Lots of people that bought new systems with Vista or Win 7 ended up installing XP on them if they had the ability to. So even though MS say there is a certain number of computers out there with Win 7 they do not know how many went back to using XP. And they would not want the public to know that for marketing reasons. Most of the end users I have encountered hated Vista and also hate Win 7 as it is Vista renamed with very little changes. It is very confusing for the average end user to get around on and that is why they hate it. Not because it may be buggy. Most users of computers are not tech savvy. And MS usually only hears from tech savvy users wanting all the bells and whistles. They need to listen to the average users of computers…

You really see the other end of things when you have to work with the people that are not computer savvy. Most computer savvy users would be shocked at what I encounter.

I am not saying some features in Vista or Win 7 or Win 8 are not great features... it is just the way they put it all together that makes it not easy. I am all for new tech but not at the cost of making the user experience difficult.

My Company has never sold a system with anything other than XP and I guess that will be what I have to stick with again with Win 8 being what it is. There are lots of add-ons that give you lots of the neat features in Vista and Win 7 without the confusion. I always include the add-ons in the new installs of XP for my customers. I imagine other programmers will bring out features from Win 8 to add-on to XP as well.

Here is a link of a review I read tonight and it also thinks MS is out of touch with end users. The comments at the end of the review are very interesting too.

phys.org/news/2012-03-windows-big-misstep-microsoft.html

XP doesn't cut it for me.. Memory management is nonexistent above 3gb, and that's not enough. I frequently have more than 15-20 programs running, and am using 6gb completely up. Quad Core with 8 Gigs is what you need today if you do any kind of work at all. I'm getting used to 8, it's def quicker getting around on certain things and a pain in others, but it's here to stay and the natural evolution of windows continues. People that don't do much on their pc can stay with XP, but that wasn't an option for me.

You must have been running the 32 bit version of XP. The 64 bit version of XP takes you over the 4 GB limit. Even the 32 bit version of Win7 is limited to 4 GB. So you must have the 64 bit of any OS to get the extra useable memory.

One thing I have always hated is the page file that swaps running tasks in and out of. That slows the computer down. They should have eliminated that long ago. One computer from the mid 80's did not use a page file (fake RAM) and it did wonderful multitasking on a 7 Mhz 16 / 32 bit CPU with a bunch of specially designed custom co processors. Very similar to what we have today with custom graphics, sound, and IO chips. It was way ahead of the computers in its time. It did multimedia before the word was ever used. Too bad for poor marketing.

Anyone know what computer I am talking about and did you ever have one if you know?

I am sure in a Business environment Operating systems laden with bells and whistles only amplify problems, for the Guy like Bob
he is a Computer Animal and thrives on this stuff , I went to a Mac book pro a couple of years ago after the learning curve for me
is great I would be lackadaisical about spyware and Virus protection not that it is not available I just did not take the time to either
buy it or look for a suitable freebie and make it paramount in my system just another Nag got plenty of those already , I always liked the final version of XP to me it was a stable easy to use platform , Right now in 2 years i have had -ZERO- viruses and no
virus programs my downside is not understanding the Mac system and crossing video and photo like form Android to Mac
use tablets and phones a lot for quick pics but i just keep working on it till i figure it out or their is always "google it"
Bob always fixes my MS OS systems he is pretty amazing with that stuff i am the only Mac user in my family of 4 so I still fight
everyones else's computer battles.

Comtek that would be the Amiga 500 by Commodore and yes we still have a few running around. My bud's into those big time and has one mod'd with dual Power PC G5 chips, but he can watch videos on it & even run Sheep Shaver with Windows 7!
It's not that I like MS stuff, it's just that I've been a Beta tester ever since "Chicago".. Anybody know that name or remember it? (circa 1993)


PS. I reduced my Pagefile size, and told Windows 8 to boot with all 4 processors. Stable so far & a lot faster

capt bob wrote:
Our Mac's are no longer safe. In fact, recently it was learned that a new virus had infected more than half a million Mac's running OSX. It's a trojan named Fakeflash or Flashback. It has been deemed the largest scale attack on Mac OSX to date. The trend of the future for targets, according to some of the hacking think tanks is Mac OSX, smartphones and tablet devices. This is due primarily to the popularity of the operating systems. Windows is still the OS of choice out there, but as popularity increases with other OS's, so will the increase of malware/virus attacks on systems that we’ve deemed safe in the past.

No_Max wrote:
15-20 apps. You'd be on my watch list.