Windows 8 six months in: Thoughts from a power(less) user

Crave's Eric Mack has felt at home in Windows for decades. Now that his home has a fresh coat of paint, he's still not sure if it's an improvement.

Since then I've been courted by other colonial powers, but I was conditioned at a young age to the ways of Windows and -- no matter how it came to be this way -- it still feels like home. Now my home has just received a fresh coat of paint. And even if the painters did a shoddy job and painted over all the switches and outlets and left a mess on the hardwood floor, I'm willing to wait for them to come clean things up and get my home looking better than ever.

Windows 8 six months in: Thoughts from a power(less) user | Crave - CNET

 

[goodintentions]

Hey kari, since you are here, can you help me with my problem?

http://www.eightforums.com/software...tion-controlling-led-light-windows-8-tab.html

Please help, oh wise one!

 

[Kari]

"how do i shut down windows 8" in Google = 67,900,000 results....it shouldn't be that difficult.

Again one statement that really does not deserve to be answered but as it is a typical example how the truth is altered telling only those facts that support the poster's opinion, I need to show this:

​

Kari

 

[labeeman]

Shutdown is located in a illogical spot. Under "Settings"??

OK, I understand your logics: Having Shutdown (close, end) in Start (begin) is not illogical?

On most machinery that I have worked on the STOP button is located next to the START button or switch not hidden behind the machine.

 

[symbiont]

"how do i shut down windows 8" in Google = 67,900,000 results....it shouldn't be that difficult.

Again one statement that really does not deserve to be answered but as it is a typical example how the truth is altered telling only those facts that support the poster's opinion, I need to show this:

View attachment 21146

View attachment 21147
​

Kari

I'm not distorting anything, sorry to disappoint you.



...and also, if you read my posts I'm not really aruging for or against - I'm simply stating opinion. But go ahead and put words in my mouth.

 

[Kari]

I wasn't talking about the amount of Google searches as it depends on many factors, me searching here with my set and you there with yours, it's very unlikely we get the same numbers.

I was giving an example about how you "comfortably" forgot to mention that it seems shutting down Windows 7 was in the beginning exactly as difficult to some users.

I am not putting words to your mouth. You very clearly wanted us readers to understand the point that shutting down Windows 8 is difficult.

Kari

 

[symbiont]

I wasn't talking about the amount of Google searches as it depends on many factors, me searching here with my set and you there with yours, it's very unlikely we get the same numbers.

I was giving an example about how you "comfortably" forgot to mention that it seems shutting down Windows 7 was in the beginning exactly as difficult to some users.

I am not putting words to your mouth. You very clearly wanted us readers to understand the point that shutting down Windows 8 is difficult.

Kari

No..I was stating that where it's placed isn't logical. And that the general public wouldn't google, or even know to google how to make a shutdown tile, and they really shouldn't have to. But read what you want to read. For a guy trying to be "above" arguing over trival things, you are plenty good at it. This is my last post in this thread as right now it's getting ridiculous, enjoy yourself.

 

[Coke Robot]

I have to comment about the shut down thing in Windows 8. It's interesting because it shows how people will interact with devices JUST because of what they are. With PCs, apparently one MUST go to Start, and hit shut down to shut down the PC. On a phablet or smartphone, to shut down, one must hold the power button and slide something. To sleep, just hit the power button. On the PC, you go to Start, and hit Sleep or maybe close the laptop lid. On modern devices that are mobile, there really isn't a single piece of software UI that is used to control those power settings. But on the older PC, we're still doing that in the way of Windows 95 whereas you literally can hit the PHYSICAL power button on the PC to shut down or to sleep. After thinking about this, this is SO weird when this becomes about laptops, because they have the button right there under your face, yet it is never used other than to resume the PC from sleep or to turn it back on. There seems to be this rigid tradition with Windows that 8 has fleshed out. On tablets however, even with Windows 8 on, turning the PC off is the same way as other tablets and smartphones: hit the physical power button. On a laptop that is also mobile like the tablet, use the UI to sleep or shutdown. See the strangeness there? It actually doesn't make sense to me.

And personally, part of the design on my new desktop tower will ACTUALLY be a power button that is used as much as a modern mobile device. If you tap the button piece from the front, it will shut down as usual. Tap it from the top of the piece, it will go to sleep. I sleep my PC a LOT throughout the day, as I find it genuinely pointless to do a cold shutdown. Rigid tradition ruined right there.

 

[Kari]

And personally, part of the design on my new desktop tower will ACTUALLY be a power button that is used as much as a modern mobile device. If you tap the button piece from the front, it will shut down as usual. Tap it from the top of the piece, it will go to sleep. I sleep my PC a LOT throughout the day, as I find it genuinely pointless to do a cold shutdown. Rigid tradition ruined right there.

One of the very basic native functions of Windows 7 & 8:

​

 

[Coke Robot]

And personally, part of the design on my new desktop tower will ACTUALLY be a power button that is used as much as a modern mobile device. If you tap the button piece from the front, it will shut down as usual. Tap it from the top of the piece, it will go to sleep. I sleep my PC a LOT throughout the day, as I find it genuinely pointless to do a cold shutdown. Rigid tradition ruined right there.

One of the very basic native functions of Windows 7 & 8:

View attachment 21162​

Basic function of the SOFTWARE, not the hardware. The vast majority of desktop PCs do not have a separate sleep button, only the power button. You can change it so when you hit the power button, the PC goes to sleep. But if you have to do a hard shut down for some reason, that doesn't work out too well. Laptops do have that as a basic function where the lid closing will enter it into sleep mode (the sleep mode Windows 7 introduced that functions similarly to a smartphone) and hitting the power button enters it into sleep.

The power button I have designed is unique, as it has two functions in one piece. I'll need to draw it up with my mouse to visually explain it.

 

[Kari]

Coke robot, you are right of course. I simply wanted to show how easy it is in Windows. The image shows how I have it on my HP laptops which do not have a sleep button: Power button to hibernate, close the lid to shut down.

 

[Coke Robot]

Coke robot, you are right of course. I simply wanted to show how easy it is in Windows. The image shows how I have it on my HP laptops which do not have a sleep button: Power button to hibernate, close the lid to shut down.

I understand. The observation I was making was that it's odd that something like shutting down Windows in 8 is so "difficult" when on modern mobile devices, there is no such thing in the UI. But when it's Windows and that's in the UI, it's a WHOLE debacle about something literally so trivial as hitting the physical power button.

For example, I recently did a reinstall of Windows 8 on this cruddy Toshiba laptop. A friend of mine lives with one of their younger siblings that put a shut down tile on the Start Screen because it annoyed them to open the Charms to shutdown. I thought that was deranged, as the power button on the laptop is RIGHT THERE! It made so little sense to me.

 

[Kari]

It is almost the same thing with most of the "facts" of anti 8 movement. A few weeks back I was listening a lecture where two scholars, one sociologist and one psychologist were informally presenting their results on a study of changes in Europe past two decades.

They got my interest when they surprisingly used Windows 8 as an example of resistance to change, explaining how a so simple thing than a missing button in an operating system basically reveals greater issues as for instance that a person who is known about his Windows 7 knowledge suddenly fears he will not master Eight as well thus it might have impact in his reputation and status among peers.

An interesting point which I will not completely share, but which certainly creates some interesting thoughts.

 

[Coke Robot]

It is almost the same thing with most of the "facts" of anti 8 movement. A few weeks back I was listening a lecture where two scholars, one sociologist and one psychologist were informally presenting their results on a study of changes in Europe past two decades.

They got my interest when they surprisingly used Windows 8 as an example of resistance to change, explaining how a so simple thing than a missing button in an operating system basically reveals greater issues as for instance that a person who is known about his Windows 7 knowledge suddenly fears he will not master Eight as well thus it might have impact in his reputation and status among peers.

An interesting point which I will not completely share, but which certainly creates some interesting thoughts.

Basically my thoughts for the past year and half....

 

[Kari]

Did you read this: Windows 8 is the new XP | ZDNet

I had to print it, I carry it folded in my pocket to show around. Makes you laugh.

 

[Coke Robot]

Did you read this: Windows 8 is the new XP | ZDNet

I had to print it, I carry it folded in my pocket to show around. Makes you laugh.

That article is so interesting to read, odd how it took vista to basically make people want to use xp even though it was rumored that Longhorn was to really upset the classic UI model.

Yep, just switch out xp with 8, that's basically the scenario. Just watch, in five years, people will be clinging to Windows 8 when 10 is out and everyone is complaining about people STILL on 8!

 

[Kari]

There are two really interesting (from my point of view) things in this 8 sux thing that seem to go unnoticed and forgotten to majority of anti 8 advocates:

1. As that article shows, the arguments used today are almost the same used against XP, and again against Seven.

2. Using our forums as an example, there are really a big group of members who are now calling "Windows 8 Lovers" with names (exaggeration intended to emphasize my point) who actually were very active on the Seven Forums when Seven was launched back in 2009, bashing devoted XP users who were complaining about Seven, telling how everything in life has to change and develope and how stupid it is not to accept the change.

I have been very surprised to see how many such members we have.

Kari

 

[Ray8]

One sociologist and one psychologist equals three disturbed individuals.

And why is someone who criticises some aspect of Windows 8 called a H8er, or hasn't taken the effort to learn, is a Luddite etc?

When someone who simply wants the option of using something that works, not remove the new, they are generally disparaged by those who shun the old.

Kari, your subtle putdown of those who see things differently hasn't gone unnoticed.

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
My observations on REAL Users rather than reading the "Blogosphere" , GARTNER's rubbish and comments from "The Twitter-ati" (the equivalent to Professional Politicians "Chattering Classes") is that people don't actually find W8 anything like as bad as they thought it would be - and those who have NEVER used a computer before really didn't have an issue with it.

Strangely enough the main issues were for Mouse users was not actually the lack of a start button but how the Charms / other items would appear annoyingly on their screen if they were using Word / Outlook while they were moving their mouse around the screen -- now that's an issue that never occurred to me in a million years but the "4 Corner" Navigation seems to be a bit of an annoyance to quite a few people.

Remember most of these people didn't have many standard Windows apps so the issue of endless Tile scrolling wasn't a serious problem -- even for the odd photo shop user.

Nobody AFAIK had ANY problems just clicking on Desktop from boot to start whatever they wanted to do - and after getting a few applications on to the task bar and Desktop they were quite happy --quite the opposite of what I've been reading on these Forums.

One or two people needed a bit of help in being able to create Desktop Icons but pinning applications to the taskbar seemed quite easy for them.

Now I'm not saying in a corporate world where you have literally 100's or 1000's of users all with different skill levels that W8 won't be a problem --it will -- probably a HUGE problem - but given the economic situation and the general I.T replacement / upgrade cycle times very few businesses will adopt W8 in the foreseeable future except perhaps those cases where there is a BYOD policy so they will have to ensure that a W8 system can connect to their LAN / VPN. Even here their corporate systems are unlikely to run W8 at all-- the IT dept might have a single machine or two just for testing / helping W8 users where there is a BYOD policy in place.

Of course there are problems with W8 -- in particular installing classic Windows apps where a stupid tile is created for every .exe file leading to a large number of useless and confusing tiles all over the place which requires a certain amount of knowledge to clear up.

You get the usual imbecilic sub-teen response often saying "Delete Tiles" -- but these idiots who are so full of themselves and haven't a clue what people are saying much less understand the problem -- but you have to remember that this might be easy for us but to someone who say just wants to use photo shop or Office isn't usually clued up about what tiles can be safely deleted.

All in all Ms have IMO attempted to make a new modern OS but have gone about implementing it in a bit of a cackhanded way -- there MUST be easier ways of organising things for desktop users who still prefer mouse and keyboard to touch and want to run applications in Windowed mode.

I'm sure we will see this in later versions of W8 (and I must say after over 6 months of using W8 I really have no need for the start button or a classic menu) but PLEASE BOOT STRIGHT TO DESKTOP would be my number 1 request.

Incidentally I liked W7 as soon as it was available - I hated VISTA - my hardware at the time was not up to it and the UAC thing just made me want to toss the whole machine into the Bin. I still for all sorts of reasons have to run some XP applications - but I do these on Virtual machines. I agree though when W7 arrived there were huge numbers of W7 haters -- and even XP was called Windows e(XP)ensive when it came out and you should read comments on how the activation process would never work --now we all take activation mechanisms as a normal Windows feature without batting an eyelid.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[Kari]

One sociologist and one psychologist equals three disturbed individuals.

And why is someone who criticises some aspect of Windows 8 called a H8er, or hasn't taken the effort to learn, is a Luddite etc?

When someone who simply wants the option of using something that works, not remove the new, they are generally disparaged by those who shun the old.

Kari, your subtle putdown of those who see things differently hasn't gone unnoticed.

Some clarifications needed, I see.

First, at least I have never called an anti 8 advocate as a hater. Talking about anti 8 users or advocates I however find not only "politically correct" but also quite a neutral definition. If you feel better I can start using something more neutral term. Would "Windows users who do not like the version 8" cause less distress?

Second, I have never had nor do I have anything against users who will continue using XP or Windows 98 or whatever. Quite an opposite, I really think everyone is entitled an opinion and has right to use whatever feels good. Trying to tell and show how some things could be done easier with a newer version is hardly hatred or anything negative.

Last, I have never "putdown" another member because he/she sees things differently. I am against giving wrong information and telling half truths to justify a case so yes, I might occasionally use quite a harsh language to criticize that; it serves nobody's interests to spread lies and untruths.

I would like ask you to do me a personal favor: Please help me to learn how to behave. Show me a post where I have "putdown" another member who has presented undisputed facts. Show me a post where I have called someone a hater. Show me a post where I have bashed or otherwise negated another member simply because his/her opinion has not been as mine.

Respectfully,

Kari

 

[Ray8]

I've pretty much liked every version of Windows since its inception, I never disliked Vista and even have one laptop at home that still runs Vista without problems and is used every day. I don't hate Windows 8, but I simply don't need or want the Start screen. Yes, I can use third party programs to get away from that, but how do I know that Microsoft won't implement annoyances down the track that will make life difficult for third party providers?

I still have tools at home that are over 30 years old and work perfectly; I have no need to buy a later model replacement, just because they are old. I'm actually cooking Jerked chicken right now in a turbo oven that is years old and it works better than the other turbo oven that is only a year old (which is baking the vegetables). BTW, it's cheaper to use a turbo oven on weekdays because of our sky high electricity prices than fire up an oven for a relatively small dinner. Weekends are for pork belly, roasts and the like when we're on off-peak rates.

If Microsoft gave us a choice, no one would handsome frog. Well, most of the current bitching would die a natural death.