Windows 8 was OK. It just wasn’t made for desktop or laptop computers. I have a touchscreen PC with Widnows 8, but I just don’t use the touchscreen feature. I’m very good with a mouse and a button and I have no need to move my hands away from the keyboard every time I need to execute a command.
“They tried to get their entire audience to jump from a UI [user interface] they were comfortable with to a brand new one with a serious learning curve,” California-based Creative Strategies tech analyst and president Tim Bajarin said. “Had they done a more transitionary product, especially keeping the Start button, I don’t think the impact and perception would have been as bad.”
Completely wrong... Windows 8 was a stillbirth, trying to force folks into a touch paradigm for the desktop was, is and always will be stupid. Touch is a compromised interface, used for interfacing with devices who offer no alternative... Tablet/SmartPhone.. but its a far less than ideal way to interact with technology when you have options. Trying to force touch on the desktop was idiotic and no transitory interface would have saved this thing.
Windows 8 is an unmitigated disaster. Why should I have to scroll through screens of information to find a program I want, when a few mouse clicks or keystrokes got me there before? Why should anyone have to scan through multiple screens of information, to find something that once could be seen at a single glance?
Metro is a reasonable touch interface, but forcing it onto the desktop was beyond idiotic. MS had to live in a world of self delusion if they ever thought it would be anything but a failure.
Mac has been the biggest winner from MS’s complete flop. Their PC’s were already starting to grow significantly, but windows 8 pushed many folks over to a Mac that would have likely stayed PC if not for Windows 8. I know I personally have held off buying a new PC fully because of Windows 8, and I refuse to pay a premium just to get a windows 7 PC...
My next machine will almost certainly be a macbook pro or an imac 27. There is absolutely no argument for a Windows machine anymore. The one solid spot they had was price, but what good is a $300 machine if it is completely useless thanks to the OS? If I have to pay 700 or 800 just to get a windows 7 PC, I might as well just spend a few hundred dollars more and buy a Mac and be done with windows entirely.
I never cared for windows but it was a defacto need for the last 20 years, that is no longer the case...so within 12 months I will likely no longer own an MS OS based PC.
baulmer was too arrogant for his own good.
All the suits in ALL the tech companies are drooling over using cloud computing (aka rented server space) as a public utility type subscription service. No pay, no data.
Serious question: At what point does Microsoft give up on the OS business and focus on the areas where they still have cachet: Office/Exchange?
I’m not even slightly a techie, but have worked on a computer since the late ‘70s. Daily. I write things. I loved WORD STAR. It had everything I need and nothing but. Everything else is endlessly complicated. Currently using MS Word on MiniMac. Ugh.
I’m not alone in this. George R. R. Martin writes with a DOS word processor. The “Game of Thrones” author confesses on a chat show that he writes his best-selling books using WordStar 4.0 on a DOS machine. So don’t distract him!
http://www.cnet.com/news/george-r-r-martin-writes-with-a-dos-word-processor/
I cannot begin to tell you how happy I am about this. Where do I get this equipment?