12.21.2012

xMas Rebuild

Plans for my xMas weekend:  Rebuild my desktop to remove the abomination that is Windows 8.  

I have tried to live with Windows 8 for over a month- and it feels like attempting to work on a car while wearing kitchen mittens.  I understand Microsoft is trying to unify their interfaces across the different platforms (phone, tablet, desktop) but there should be differences as they are designed for different tasks: phones are for communication  tablets are for media consumption and desktops are for creating/composing/organizing.  Tiles do not work well for the later use.

Windows 8 may be good for a new computer user, but has a 'forget & relearn' curve that doesn't seem necessary for an interface that has been tweaked and revised for 12+ years.  Throwing most of the interface basis away for a new flavor while not allowing for backwards usability is a bit fool-hardy.  I also see this could likely cause a rift between corporate and home user OS versions (which Microsoft has been trying to unify since Windows 2000).

It feels like Microsoft is rushing to have everyone embrace their app store as they see Apple and Google making a decent profit.  :(

Several annoying issues that I encountered with Windows 7 are still present with Windows 8.  My favorite is Windows Explorer going AWOL for 30-60 seconds while it determines the contents of a folder (with an i7-2600k CPU, 32GB RAM and searching an OCZ Agility 3 SSD).

BOSD crashes (mostly from iTunes) have been more frequent in the past month of testing Windows 8 than I remember having cumulatively in my entire Windows 7 experience- It feels more like it was in the days of Windows 2000 where things would BSOD for no obvious reason.

Something is different with SMB shares on Windows 8- or the Windows 8 firewall behaves differently than earlier versions.  The network browser on a PCH-A110 cannot find a folder share on my Windows 8 PC.  The same share is accessible to a PCH-C200 and all Mac/Windows PC systems (and the PCH-A110 can see access other SMB shares on the network).

The Windows 7/8 upgrade has the feel of the XP/Vista upgrade (note: I liked Vista- with the proper hardware) issues all over again; while not as steep as Vista, it still has a long way to go to be usable. Mayhaps they will work out the issues and tweak the interface when Windows 9 rolls out.

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