[unixfox]

Windows 8 continues to SUCK even with 8.1 upgrade. I see NO significant improvement other than a version number change.

Way to go Microsoft, you have succeeded in alienating even more of your base.

[SeekAndFind]

RE: Way to go Microsoft, you have succeeded in alienating even more of your base.

Then why is Windows 8.1 gaining ground as per this article?

[RedWing9]

I disagree. I didn’t go to 8 right away, but just moved to 8.1 from 7 and I’m loving it. I know there are plenty of problems with the deploy of 8.1 that the common non-techy will not enjoy. Once you get there and configure it to your liking this system is just as good as Win 7 and blows XP out of the water.

I run a home built machine (as I have for 15+ years) with a Intel i7, 16gb, 240gb SSD, two 512gb RAID 0, discrete graphics and audio. The only incompatibility I had was with an Intel driver.

[livius]

Win 8 (or 8.1) is a horrible version. It’s opaque, frustrating and not good at all for business users. They wanted the interface to be similar to the Windows phone (touchscreen), wanted to drive everything to the cloud, and completely dumped the business users are who doing more than social media but actually want easily accessible programs that work all the time. MS is also trying to drive Office Suite users to its cloud-based Office 365.

In a lot of ways, MS jumped the gun. I don’t think people are demanding total cloud-based services quite yet, and making everything cloud based at a time when many areas still do not even have stable or sufficient internet service or bandwidth for users to be able to connect reliably or steadily is a mistake. Also, doing away with things in their Office Suite that are still essential for most users (such as the ability of Outlook to get POP based e-mail, something it can no longer do even though the majority of e-mail in this country goes through ISPs that use a POP3 system) is a big mistake. This is particularly true since the users of Windows 8 are generally working at a desktop or a large laptop, using big complex programs, and are not the unemployed Pajama Boy sitting around using a phone or tablet to text his friends about Obamacare in between sending out the occasional selfie.

So MS is now suggesting complicated work-arounds or additional non-MS add-ins that can restore some very basic functionality (the start button, for example), and generally floundering.

It’s a pity. Windows 7 was good, stable, if not very fast, and they shouldn’t have tried to make such a radical change, especially to technologies that are less than developed.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

I will not upgrade from XP and will never buy another MS product.

I will keep XP but not for online usage. That will be done via a VM running Linux Mint. XP will be for utility use only. So far it has worked great.

[sportutegrl]

I spend all of my time on the desktop, running google chrome. I never go to the windows 8 box screen. I have google+ and use all google apps, which do not run in the windows 8 screen. I wish someone would have told me that before I bought this expensive touchy laptop. I had to sign up for a windows 'account' to even use that stupid box screen, the windows apps are totally useless compared to gmail, google maps, google calendar, etc. What is up with the stupid hissy fit between google and windows?

[USS Alaska]

Way to go Microsoft, you have succeeded in alienating even more of your base.

I sold UNIX based products since the early 80s but even I have come to accept microsoft as the dominating force in PCs and moving into all things portable.

[BillM]

Give me a break! We have W8 on phones, tablets, laptops, desktops and servers. It’s unbelievably easy to coordinate everything!