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May was the seventh full month of availability for Microsoft’s latest operating system version: Windows 8.1 continues to grow slowly while Windows 8 remains largely flat, allowing the former to finally pass the latter in market share. At the same time, Windows 7 has managed to climb back over the 50 percent mark, while Windows XP still has more than 25 percent of the pie, despite support for the ancient OS finally ending in April.The latest market share data from Net Applications shows that Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 have gained a combined 0.40 percentage points (from 12.24 percent to...

Friendlier to PC users than its prececessor, Windows 8.1 continues to eke out a higher share while Windows 8 slips downward. Net Applications Windows 8.1 is now more dominant than its predecessor, at least based on all desktop OS traffic seen by Net Applications.For the month of May, Windows 8.1's share inched up to 6.35 percent from 5.88 percent in April. That gave it just enough of a nudge to steal third place from Windows 8, which earned a 6.3 percent share, down from 6.36 percent the prior month.Windows 8.1's gradual ascension over its predecessor in the desktop market should...

Microsoft might be preparing to give the public its first taste of Windows 9 between the second and third quarters of 2015, according to a newly leaked document. Tech blog Myce has obtained a leaked internal Microsoft document from a source in China known as FaiKee.The document, first spotted on Myce's website by Windows blog WinBeta, lists both Windows 9 and Windows Phone 9 as scheduled for a release preview between Q2 and Q3 2015. Here's a screenshot of the document: Myce A release preview is exactly what its name suggests. It's a nearly finished version of the software that the public...

Continued support for Windows XP was discontinued by Microsoft recently, so many PC people may now be migrating over to Windows 8. One thing newcomers will notice missing in the latest version of Windows: the Start menu! If you’re feeling instantly lost without the old Start menu, don’t worry; you’re not alone. Thousands of PC fans would argue that the Start menu offers a more compact, concise, customizable listing of programs and files than the tile-filled Start screen. Microsoft scoffs at that idea. It points out that every time there’s a new version of Windows, there’s an instant spike in...

Microsoft has been on a roll lately. Office for iOS (and soon Android), free Windows licenses for small devices, universal Windows and Windows Phone apps, Siri rival Cortana, even a promise to eventually return the start menu before Windows 9. But when it comes to Windows 8, it seems the company has a permanently loaded pistol aimed squarely at its feet. So it fits that just one week on from the launch of “Windows 8.1 Update 1” (the smart upgrade mouse and keyboard users have long awaited) stupidity would strike once again. “Windows 8.1 Update is a cumulative update to...

In what is surely the most customer-antagonistic move of the new Windows regime, Steve Thomas at Microsoft posted a TechNet article on Saturday stating categorically that Microsoft will no longer issue security patches for Windows 8.1, starting in May. Call this the "let them eat cake" approach to support for Microsoft's flagship operating system. ... Yes, you read that right: With three weeks left until Windows 8.1 end of support -- until the next round of security patches appear with Windows 8.1 not included in the party list -- Microsoft still hasn't figured out how to get Windows 8.1 Update...

Microsoft hopes to make it easier for Windows XP users to drop their old computers and upgrade to a newer Surface or PC by offering them $100 to do so. The Redmond-based company announced earlier this month that support and security updates will no longer be available for its popular old operating system after April 8. That doesn’t mean the computers will immediately become unusable, but they may be more vulnerable to hackers. Windows XP users can get $100 off when they buy a Surface Pro 2 or select PCs for $599 and more. The cheapest is an Acer Aspire...

I upgraded to Windows 8 about 4 months ago, and about a month ago, I started having issues with windowsupdate where the windowsupdate screen would open but everything in the screen was white, where there it normally tells you what patches you need. I tried several routes, including the Windows Update Troubleshooter found at the link above. The Windows Update Troubleshooter seems to be running, but it never comes to an end.....the blue bar just keeps rolling.....for hours if I let it. It says "Resolving problems" but nothing gets resolved. Nothing I tried worked, and so I rolled back the...

Microsoft sold more than 200 million Windows 8 and 8.1 licenses during the controversial OS's first 15 months, Tami Reller, the company's executive VP of marketing, revealed Thursday at a Goldman Sachs technology conference.Sounds impressive, right? Not exactly.Sure, 200 million is a big number -- that's about one license for every 35 people on the planet, a level of ubiquity most companies would kill for. But Microsoft isn't most companies. Put into historical or aspirational context, Windows 8 and 8.1 have underwhelmed.Not convinced? Here are five reasons not to be impressed.1. Windows 8 sales can't keep pace with Windows 7's precedent.In...

One of Microsoft's strongest supporters took a good, hard look at the soon-to-be released next version of Windows 8, which could arrive in April, and threw his hands up in frustration. The new version is called Windows 8 Update 1, and it includes a number of small changes, mostly minor tweaks. These tweaks try to fix some of the complaints people still had about Windows 8. But blogger Paul Thurrott of the influential Windows blog “Supersite for Windows” says they really just make Windows 8 more difficult to use, especially on a tablet. He took Microsoft to task, writing: Windows...

Summary: Here I take a look at the Windows 8.1 Update 1 build that leaked onto the web earlier this month. I've made no bones about the fact that I have a strong dislike of Windows 8, so even I was quite surprised by the fact that I was pleased by what I saw. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ A few days ago a Windows 8.1 Update 1 internal build leaked onto the web, and given the fact that I'm really curious as to the direction in which Microsoft is planning to take Windows in, I decided to take a look. I've made no...

So our child finally received that Asus notebook as a gift from a loved one-as some of you already know from a previous post (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/3110216/posts). After reading all of the comments, and visiting various sites concerning Windows 8, we finally got to experience the OS for ourselves. The box was delivered just in time for school. Spring college courses, as many of your know, have started. We were edger to get started with the notebook. Encouraging the kid to start familiarizing himself with the tool. I was especially curious to see for myself whether or not all the talk/bemoaning about...

HP really wants people to buy a Windows 7 PC instead of a Windows 8 machine. The PC maker has been emailing customers over the weekend noting that "Windows 7 is back." A new promotion, designed to entice people to select Windows 7 over Windows 8 with $150 of "savings," has launched on HP’s website with a "back by popular demand" slogan. The move is clearly designed to position Windows 7 over Microsoft’s touch-centric Windows 8 operating system.

SOFTWARE COBBLER Microsoft might be ready to abandon Windows 8 earlier than it planned in an attempt to reverse the slide in its fortunes.The company might announce Windows 9 as early as April, reports claim, as it tries to distance itself from the poorly received Windows 8.We reported on Friday that the Threshold project was being tipped as a major update for Windows 8, however according to Winsupersite it will instead be billed as a new Windows operating system version slated for release in April 2015.Although the launch of Windows 8 has not been the disaster that Windows Vista...

Good evening, I'm seeking your opinion/advice on these two laptops. If given the choice which would you choose and why? Our child has been given a gift: a Dell 11.6, but we may be able to exchange it for the Lenovo. I'm just wondering whether or not it would be worth the exchange. I'm inclined to think it is, but trading one for the other presents a little bit of a challenge. We must travel out of state in order to exchange the laptop. I'm wondering if it would be worth the wait and travel. Thank you, as always, for...

Windows 8/8.1 has topped 10% market share for the first time, apparently picking up a few users from among those who are finally leaving Windows XP behind. According to Web analytics firm NetMarkeshare, users of all versions of Windows 8 amounted to 10.49% of Internet users for the month of December, up from 9.25% in December. This as users of Windows XP have dipped from 31.22% to 28.98%. While the showing for Windows 8/8.1 is a milestone, it is also part of a gradual trend. Since last February, use of the operating system has risen 7.82 percentage points while XP...

Regardless of how stalled Microsoft Corporation’s (NASDAQ:MSFT) MSFT +0.69% business seems to Wall Street analysts, the fact of the matter is that this company powers 90.73 percent of the Desktops and Notebooks around the world. Its nearest competitor at second place is Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) AAPL +0.14% Mac operating system which has only 7.54 percent market share. Microsoft released its latest upgrade to the much discussed Windows 8 operating system, Windows 8.1, in October of 2013. Last month, during December, devices running the Windows 8 and 8.1 crossed over 10 percent market share for the first time. A month earlier, in...

EyeOnWindows.com - Windows Application Directory Books and Reference Applications — 20 Business Applications — 20 Educational Applications — 20 Entertainment Applications — 20 Finance Applications — 20 Food and Dining Applications — 10 Government Applications — 10 Health and Fitness Applications — 10 Lifestyle Applications — 10 Music and Video Applications — 10 News and Weather Applications — 11 Photo Applications — 10 Productivity Applications — 10 Security Applications — 10 Shopping Applications — 11 Social Applications — 10 Sports Applications — 10 Travel Applications — 10 Windows 8 Tools — 10 Windows Games — 10

Makes obvious prediction -- since it's calling the shots -- that ending support for XP will mean 'more systems will get compromised' Computerworld - Microsoft today used the hoary practice of predicting next year to drive another nail into Windows XP's coffin.

Windows 8.1 is now the fifth most popular desktop OS, at least as recorded by Web tracker Net Applications. For November, Microsoft's latest version of Windows snagged 2.64 percent of all desktop OS traffic recorded by Net Applications. That number was a healthy gain from the 1.72 percent seen in October and the 0.87 percent in September. The rise also pushed Windows 8.1 just ahead of Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks with a 2.42 percent share and just behind Windows Vista with a 3.57 percent share. Windows 8.1 popped up in June as a preview edition before officially launching in...