Reconciling 2 Worlds With Windows 8.1

Just about one year ago, Microsoft gave us two new operating systems.

One was a new version of Windows: the one for use with mouse and keyboard, the one whose desktop at this moment lights up hundreds of millions of screens, the one with a software library of four million programs.
The other was a new operating system for tablets. It was modeled on Microsoft’s lovely tiled Home screen for Windows Phones: colorful, clear, elegant, filled with fluid touch gestures. You can’t run Photoshop or iTunes or Quicken on it; this new system requires a whole new type of app. Since Microsoft doesn’t have a name for this OS (it abandoned the names Metro and Modern), I call it TileWorld. All of this might have been fine, except for one tragic miscalculation: Microsoft mashed these two new operating systems together into something called Windows 8.

Now you have two Web browsers to learn. Two completely different Help systems. Two (actually three) control panels. Two kinds of programs: the traditional ones, which have menus and overlapping windows, and TileWorld apps, which don’t have either of those things.

Reviewers and PC fans gave Microsoft quite a swat on the nose. PC World wrote that Windows 8 is “not worthwhile” for desktop computer users. PC Magazine: “Too drastic for some.” InformationWeek: “A big flop. Its Frankenstein interface combines two fundamentally incompatible operating systems.”
PC sales plunged 14 percent in the months after Windows 8’s release. The executive who masterminded Windows 8 abruptly left the company.

Microsoft, licking its wounds, spent a year trying to fix Windows 8. On Thursday, you can download the result: Windows 8.1. It’s free to anyone who already has Windows 8, and it will come preinstalled on new computers. Full disclosure: I have written a how-to book on Windows 8 and will be updating it for Windows 8.1.

The changes to TileWorld are nearly endless — and terrific. The anemic, pared-down starter apps, like Photos and Mail, have matured. Now you can edit photos in Photos (not just look at them) and drag e-mail messages into folders. The muddled Music app has been redesigned, smartly and handsomely. A suite of utility programs is there now, right where they should have been the first time around: Alarms, Calculator and Sound Recorder. There are also all-new apps, too, like Food and Drink, Health and Fitness and Reading List. It lets you save Web pages, e-mail messages and Twitter posts for use when you have no Internet connection.

You have more options to tailor your desktop, Start screen and Lock screen in Windows 8.1. For example, you can make your Lock screen a slide show, so that your tablet is a photo frame whenever you’re not working.

There's a good video here as well:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/17/t...-worlds-of-windows-8.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

 

[Rickkins]

I suppose I will give it a try... primarily to see if it is in any way usable, without having to resort to a third party start menu. I'm not hopeful, but I will give it a try.(this despite having previously made up my mind not to...)

 

[BlueMasterFX]

I suppose I will give it a try... primarily to see if it is in any way usable, without having to resort to a third party start menu. I'm not hopeful, but I will give it a try.(this despite having previously made up my mind not to...)

When I installed Windows 8.1, I just could not stand not having the Start Menu on the desktop. It feels so awkward. I immediately installed Start 8 and all feels great again. Seriously why do I want a full screen start menu when I can have a smaller one that also links to my important folders. Microsoft is a joke. I still don't get why they can't implement the old start menu back. Or at least give me a choice to pick which menu I want on the desktop.

 

[Jf1450]

Give me a call when "TileWorld" will run things like SQL Developer, TOAD, Stat, PeopleSoft Application Designer, UltraEdit, Autosys, Control-M and several other software development tools simultaneously in a multi, overlapping window environment.

-jeff

 

[sygnus21]

As one who's been using Windows 8, and now 8.1, and gotten use to things, I have to agree with this....

The more you work with Windows 8, the more screamingly obvious the solution becomes: Split it up. Offer regular Windows on regular computers, offer TileWorld on tablets. That way, everyone has to learn only one operating system, and each operating system is suited to its task.

Yeah Microsoft could have been a bit more attentive to desktop users here; and even though I've got my machine to boot to desktop mode, I'm am constantly jumping between worlds for my daily usage, (even with quite a few items pinned to the taskbar); but... if you think about it, weren't you doing that anyway via the "traditional" start menu?

But yeah, a totally dedicated desktop with a traditional start menu would have been a welcomed update for desktop users, even if it linked to tileworld.

My two cents.

 

[PhyllisColeman]

hope it will patch up all the bad spots caused by its previous version and i am set to add another .1 to 8

 

[DJRoff]

As one who's been using Windows 8, and now 8.1, and gotten use to things, I have to agree with this....

The more you work with Windows 8, the more screamingly obvious the solution becomes: Split it up. Offer regular Windows on regular computers, offer TileWorld on tablets. That way, everyone has to learn only one operating system, and each operating system is suited to its task.

Yeah Microsoft could have been a bit more attentive to desktop users here; and even though I've got my machine to boot to desktop mode, I'm am constantly jumping between worlds for my daily usage, (even with quite a few items pinned to the taskbar); but... if you think about it, weren't you doing that anyway via the "traditional" start menu?

But yeah, a totally dedicated desktop with a traditional start menu would have been a welcomed update for desktop users, even if it linked to tileworld.

My two cents.

My own two cents:

The more I worked with 8.0, and now with 8.1, the more I feel at home. Sure, there are features I don't use, but as I progressively bring the ones I do "front and center", the better it feels.

It's true, the new Start Button doesn't behave the same way our beloved button did in Win 7/XP/95, but, as before, it brings us to a list of programs, utilities, and functions. How much you customize the Start Page is up to you, but I have mine organized so that similar things are grouped together (such as, all my imaging programs in one set of columns). Now, with 8.1, there is an easy-to-find down-arrow that simply brings up a mass list of all installed programs, if I want it, but the most commonly-used ones are already in the columns, and labeled by grouping. So in my mind, what I've got now is WAY more functional than the old start button ever really was. Add to that the ability to have it overlay your desktop background, instead of a blank blue screen (the option directly underneath the boot-to-desktop one, in Taskbar & Navigation), and suddenly you're feeling like you really have something the way you've always wanted it.

Top that off with the fact that the new upgrade seems to run smoother, faster, and with fewer glitches.... I for one am lovin' life!

 

[Lee]

Sure hope this is not one of those. . ."Where we go again. . .

 

[sygnus21]

So in my mind, what I've got now is WAY more functional than the old start button ever really was. Add to that the ability to have it overlay your desktop background, instead of a blank blue screen, and suddenly you're feeling like you really have something the way you've always wanted it.

Top that off with the fact that the new upgrade seems to run smoother, faster, and with fewer glitches.... I for one am lovin' life!

Agreed :thumb:

And I always thought 8 performed and ran better than 7 anyway, even before the update.

 

[acr731]

Microsoft is a joke. I still don't get why they can't implement the old start menu back. Or at least give me a choice to pick which menu I want on the desktop.

What confuses me is the decision against releasing a retail ISO. The only way you can get 8.1 (without MSDN or TechNet subscriptions) is to first install 8, then upgrade. Microsoft has said 8.1 is free to everyone who already has Win8, so why the hard stance?

Am I the only one who finds it beyond stupid that you can't get an 8.1 ISO, even if you can prove you have legally purchased Win8?

 

[nguchiro]

I live in Africa and the best we have here is about 100Kbs. How on Earth MS expects us to download 3.5 Gb?

I have been using windows 8 for 3 months now and hate it with a passion. My only consolation is that I installed Classic Shell whic brought some sense back into the OS. As a professional I could not care less about FACEBOOK and the like. It seems that 8.1 is just the finished version of 8 just like 7 was the finished version of Vista. Tiles belong to touch screen and not desktop PCs.

My other PC runs win 7 with classic shell also and it is much more user friendly albeit horrid when it comes to the search function.

MS has created a chimera. I have always been an avid windows user but now with all this tiles facebook business I really feel that I have been left out.

By the way; win 8 is causing me so many headaches. It misbehaves so much that it is driving me crazy. The cursor jumps around. Metro jumps in when I am working and all manner of problems. My laptop is the HP compaq running on AMD.

 

[joel406]

Microsoft is a joke. I still don't get why they can't implement the old start menu back. Or at least give me a choice to pick which menu I want on the desktop.

What confuses me is the decision against releasing a retail ISO. The only way you can get 8.1 (without MSDN or TechNet subscriptions) is to first install 8, then upgrade. Microsoft has said 8.1 is free to everyone who already has Win8, so why the hard stance?

Am I the only one who finds it beyond stupid that you can't get an 8.1 ISO, even if you can prove you have legally purchased Win8?

I found the IOS's online just fine. A little google searching goes a long way. I been running 8.1 for like a month.

Where have you been?

 

[acr731]

Microsoft is a joke. I still don't get why they can't implement the old start menu back. Or at least give me a choice to pick which menu I want on the desktop.

What confuses me is the decision against releasing a retail ISO. The only way you can get 8.1 (without MSDN or TechNet subscriptions) is to first install 8, then upgrade. Microsoft has said 8.1 is free to everyone who already has Win8, so why the hard stance?

Am I the only one who finds it beyond stupid that you can't get an 8.1 ISO, even if you can prove you have legally purchased Win8?

I found the IOS's online just fine. A little google searching goes a long way. I been running 8.1 for like a month.

Where have you been?

Where have I been? Not searching for them, at least not yet.

Does Google point the way to legitimate sources? If it isn't going to be legal I'm going to steer clear. I bought Win8 and would rather get 8.1 the right way. And that doesn't include having to first install Win8, then wait for the upgrade to finish 2 or 3 hours later.

I just want to do one clean installation, not the way Microsoft is wanting us to do it.

 

[waltc]

Microsoft is a joke. I still don't get why they can't implement the old start menu back. Or at least give me a choice to pick which menu I want on the desktop.

What confuses me is the decision against releasing a retail ISO. The only way you can get 8.1 (without MSDN or TechNet subscriptions) is to first install 8, then upgrade. Microsoft has said 8.1 is free to everyone who already has Win8, so why the hard stance?

Am I the only one who finds it beyond stupid that you can't get an 8.1 ISO, even if you can prove you have legally purchased Win8?

I found the IOS's online just fine. A little google searching goes a long way. I been running 8.1 for like a month.

Where have you been?

He's right, though...evidently a developer leaked them to the 'net to counter Microsoft's imbecilic decision not to provide an iso for its retail 8.0 iso customers. You know, Microsoft hands it out gratis to its MSDN/Technet subscribers because the iso installation isn't worth a plugged nickel without a legitimate 8.0 key, but then turns around and denies the same convenience to its retail customers. Everything with Microsoft this entire year has been one step forward and two steps back. The lack of common sense and customer sensitivity the company has shown this year is incredible, imo, all the more because Microsoft used to be so different.

Yes, the real 8.1 iso is readily available for anyone who wants to obtain it--it still requires a legitimate 8.0 key to activate on Microsoft's servers--and my opinion is that everyone with a legal 8.0 key should download it and burn the iso to a disk backup just for their own convenience and peace of mind. It's bizarre of Microsoft to want to inconvenience its retail 8.0 customers in this manner. If they for some reason need to reinstall 8.1, they should not have to first reinstall 8.0 from their Microsoft-supplied 8.0 iso and then go back to the Microsoft store and download the 8.1 auto-install update all over again. That's absurd.

 

[SIW2]

It is a shame. There is some great skill at MS and they are capable of great things. I get the distinct impression they don't know what to do. There have been so many obvious blunders , annoying a lot of customers, developers, sysadmins, you name it. It is symptomatic of a far greater issue the new CEO will need to sort out.

 

[HOODY]

OK if you have a D/L for the 8.1 version post it, I can't find one. And not the "preview" iso, the full install one that was released.

Googling only finds sites with the "Preview" ISO's

 

[sygnus21]

While I totally agree with Walt, I wouldn't recommend posting a public link to those sites as it could put this site and the admin staff in a precarious position. I would leave that decision up to the staff as to whether to post or not.

But yeah, Microsoft's stance here is a bit baffling, especially considering the download size of the update.

He's right, though...evidently a developer leaked them to the 'net to counter Microsoft's imbecilic decision not to provide an iso for its retail 8.0 iso customers. You know, Microsoft hands it out gratis to its MSDN/Technet subscribers because the iso installation isn't worth a plugged nickel without a legitimate 8.0 key, but then turns around and denies the same convenience to its retail customers. Everything with Microsoft this entire year has been one step forward and two steps back. The lack of common sense and customer sensitivity the company has shown this year is incredible, imo, all the more because Microsoft used to be so different.

Yes, the real 8.1 iso is readily available for anyone who wants to obtain it--it still requires a legitimate 8.0 key to activate on Microsoft's servers--and my opinion is that everyone with a legal 8.0 key should download it and burn the iso to a disk backup just for their own convenience and peace of mind. It's bizarre of Microsoft to want to inconvenience its retail 8.0 customers in this manner. If they for some reason need to reinstall 8.1, they should not have to first reinstall 8.0 from their Microsoft-supplied 8.0 iso and then go back to the Microsoft store and download the 8.1 auto-install update all over again. That's absurd.

 

[BlueMasterFX]

What confuses me is the decision against releasing a retail ISO. The only way you can get 8.1 (without MSDN or TechNet subscriptions) is to first install 8, then upgrade. Microsoft has said 8.1 is free to everyone who already has Win8, so why the hard stance?

Am I the only one who finds it beyond stupid that you can't get an 8.1 ISO, even if you can prove you have legally purchased Win8?

I found the IOS's online just fine. A little google searching goes a long way. I been running 8.1 for like a month.

Where have you been?

He's right, though...evidently a developer leaked them to the 'net to counter Microsoft's imbecilic decision not to provide an iso for its retail 8.0 iso customers. You know, Microsoft hands it out gratis to its MSDN/Technet subscribers because the iso installation isn't worth a plugged nickel without a legitimate 8.0 key, but then turns around and denies the same convenience to its retail customers. Everything with Microsoft this entire year has been one step forward and two steps back. The lack of common sense and customer sensitivity the company has shown this year is incredible, imo, all the more because Microsoft used to be so different.

Yes, the real 8.1 iso is readily available for anyone who wants to obtain it--it still requires a legitimate 8.0 key to activate on Microsoft's servers--and my opinion is that everyone with a legal 8.0 key should download it and burn the iso to a disk backup just for their own convenience and peace of mind. It's bizarre of Microsoft to want to inconvenience its retail 8.0 customers in this manner. If they for some reason need to reinstall 8.1, they should not have to first reinstall 8.0 from their Microsoft-supplied 8.0 iso and then go back to the Microsoft store and download the 8.1 auto-install update all over again. That's absurd.

So what does the update actually download? Does it download the ISO and mount it or is it a special version of the Windows installer? Maybe the ISO is stored somewhere temporary in the operating system?

Well who knows what happening over at Microsoft. They keep emphasizing this union between smartphones, tablets, and desktops so they all have this same interface. Does Microsoft think we're that stupid? Look at Apple. They have different interfaces on their desktop and phones/tablets. I don't hear anybody complaining about how to navigate through them.

If Microsoft is shooting themselves in the foot, good. They deserve that. Someone need to tell them how to run things. Desktops are desktops. Tablets are tablets. They want to compete in the tablet market? Then make sophisticated applications on the tablet that are better than iOS and Android. Not shoving the whole tablet interface on a desktop operating system. They're delusional.

They keep crying about how they don't want to rewrite Windows. Well they have to bite the bullet. If tablets are the future, then the tablet should have an operating system built for that type of hardware. If possible port that same OS onto the phone. There, you have one OS built for touch from scratch.

Leave the desktop and laptop hardware alone and force people to buy tablets so they can experience Windows on touch. If its a great sucess, people will start abandoning the desktop and shift to touch. Doesn't Microsoft want this to happen? Its a great strategy to increase their Marketshare and move into the future. If people are already hating Metro on the desktop, what makes you think they want to buy a Surface? Idk Microsoft leaves me speechless.

 

[HOODY]

Sounds about right to me Bluemaster

btw: there is NO ISO downloaded during the "update" only the install files. I and many wish it was an ISO saved to HD, its what we been looking for.

And funny now looking I don't even see the windows.old folder lol

 

[whs]

I suppose I will give it a try... primarily to see if it is in any way usable, without having to resort to a third party start menu. I'm not hopeful, but I will give it a try.(this despite having previously made up my mind not to...)

Hopefully you are not going to spend any money on 8.1 because you will be disappointed. But it is a nice toy - worth about as much as the rubber ducky in my bathtub.