I've gotten comfortable with the OS and have a good feel on the differences. Its new Win GUI (old name Metro) is just for touch devices and really has little use on the desktop, especially with multiple monitors. However, it doesn't really get in the way either. I'm occasionally running into a document or file type that win wants to open in one of its "Apps" and I have to pick and set a regular desktop default, but that's the only current hindrance and I'll eventually get all the defaults set.

With the Start button gone, I instead hit the Win key or click a Charms bar icon to get where or what I need. Nothing really better or worse from where I sit, just different.

For this machine, which was running Vista, performance has made a huge improvement, as I also upgraded to SSD at the same time. SSD wouldn't work well without native TRIM support in Vista so I've held off until now. But with a nice SSD, this has been $40 well spent on the OS. This ~4 year old machine has a new lease on life as a speed demon, and boots from the OS select screen (still dual booting vista just in case) in about 2 seconds.

If I had been running 7, I doubt I would need or want to upgrade, but from Vista it's been a no-brainer. I've read 8 is faster/more efficient than 7, and it does feel so, but I've not run both on the same hardware to say how much. So, unless you need or want that efficiency boost, I'd say 7 is fine until win8 app store takes off, if that happens.

WinRT and Surface are a totally different story I'm curiously waiting to unfold. Anyone using these?

>WinRT and Surface

Not using, and don't intend to.  The IT review headlines have been generally running fair-to-poor on this. I'm waiting for the Win8 Pro Surface.

>The IT review headlines have been generally running fair-to-poor on this

Really? I've not had time to follow it at all, what are the primary gripes?

This is in line with what I've seen. Last half of the article.

http://bgr.com/2012/11/19/microsoft-surface-review-month-one/

Quote from: Drastic on November 19, 2012, 04:57:34 PM
I'd say 7 is fine until win8 app store takes off, if that happens.

Yea that's what I'm doing but don't they have two sorts of app stores now; one for win8 and winRT/phone8?

The main thing for me is that I like a nice hierarchical way to arrange program icons by dragging and dropping into folders

- graphics and design
 -- Adobe CS6
 -- Adobe CS3
 -- irfanview

- office and productivity
 -- Office 2007
 -- workrave

The reason for this is that I have things like a "Utilities" folder. Most of these programs are thigns I only use when there's a specific problem. I might go a year before using Current Ports Viewer. But then when I have a problem with something that won't load and I suspect a port problem, I can't remember the name of the damn program and I'm off on Google searching for it and all that while it's on my machine all the time.

That's the only thing I miss from Metro

I have been experimenting with a program  called Classic Shell that gives back that functionality, returns the start button, lets you control the "hot" corners and more. But it also seems to slow down the right-click behavior and suddenly I can't get to the Control Panel from the Metro screen.

So I find Windows 8 okay, but I do wish there was a better way to organize my applications hierarchically as in the days of old.

Quote from: Chunkford on November 19, 2012, 06:28:58 PM

Quote from: Drastic on November 19, 2012, 04:57:34 PM
I'd say 7 is fine until win8 app store takes off, if that happens.

Yea that's what I'm doing but don't they have two sorts of app stores now; one for win8 and winRT/phone8?

I don't have RT or Phone8, but my understanding is you buy an app, you have access/rights to it anywhere with 8. Should work, but may be app specific, but from what I understand it's all under one roof.

That would be ideal but I suppose it depends if the publishers make the app for the different versions. As far as I understood it, RT is for AMR architecture while Win8 is for intel architecture which means software wont work on both. I think they have to be written differently for each one.

Of course I might have all the dots not joined up properly in my head.
Posts like this doesn't help - http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/155521/what-is-the-difference-between-windows-8-winrt-and-windows-rt

It gets very confusing

Quote from: rcjordan on November 19, 2012, 05:10:22 PM
This is in line with what I've seen. Last half of the article.

http://bgr.com/2012/11/19/microsoft-surface-review-month-one/

Article seems positive overall with the big nags being lack of apps and a bit slow responsiveness launching/using them, which can be normal for first a version & early firmware of a product.

I've read so many heated arguments about how terrible Win8 is, Nielsen's bit being the latest, but it's just blowing things way out of proportion. A win7 killer it is not, and the touch derived interface is a bit weird at first, but it's certainly not the monster these guys make it out to be. I guess the more negative the report, the more views they get.

MS is still too easy to hate on.

>hate

Yeah. To be clear, I'm not in a rush to buy yet another tablet so I'm waiting for the full Win8 rather than some bastardized OS like RT. 

Yeah, I'm with you, I would wait for the full monty too, I'm just hoping for some ipad competition.

Thanks for the review.  I'll hold off upgrading Win 7.

It is good to know that Win 8 is at least a step forward in Windows evolution and not a dud like WinME.  I'm not a huge Windows fan or user but I do like having some competition in OS's.

All that said I would love to seriously give Win Live 8 Phone a try for a couple weeks.

Interesting convo that's reveals a direction Win8/RT is going - http://www.quora.com/Microsoft/Why-hasnt-Microsoft-been-able-to-solve-the-problem-of-Windows-getting-so-slow-after-about-a-year-of-use

Quote
The answer is fairly basic: Microsoft does not own the entire software stack (application, O/S, drivers, firmware).  Thus, anyone can create software that can clutter up the registry and add to the startup services.  A company like Apple controls the stack more tightly and can limit the items that could cause a slow down.  This is particularly true for mobile platforms.  This is one reason Microsoft really likes Windows RT... they control the full stack.

RE: Surface pro, I'm wondering if MS just priced themselves out of the market with a starting price of $900.

Yup. You've seen the news that MS has cut their production order for the RT version in half?