Microsoft to end Windows 8 discounts on January 31 Say what you will about Windows 8; at least the upgrade from Windows 7 is cheap. Or it is for now. After January 31 will be a different story. Ever since Windows 8's October 26, 2012 launch, Microsoft has been offering retail Windows 8 Pro upgrade DVDs for $69.99. Online upgrades have been even cheaper, at $39.99. And …
I live on a small island, population ~ 450.
The local PC builder guy gives you the choice of installing Linux for £60* less than with Windows on new builds.
It works out cheaper to have a locally built machine than having to send a broken one away to be fixed.
(They tend to get smashed on the way back and it becomes an endless task)
Consequently most people here are running LInux. I only know of one Mac user and he got pwned not long ago!
(300 miles to get a Mac mended!)
I've seen a few ipads around, mostly for children. A neighbour just got one and promptly regretted it, her actual words were "It's crap!".
Personally, I run Kubuntu 12.04 with XP in a VM. I won't be buying any more Microsoft products.
Anon to stop Google et al. tracking me down.
*The last time I asked him, about six months ago.
Wrote :- "I live on a small island .... The local PC builder guy gives you the choice of installing Linux for £60* less than with Windows on new builds. It works out cheaper to have a locally built machine than having to send a broken one away to be fixed."
I'm curious - why can't the local builder repair the broken one? Not un-repairable throwaway Apple crap hardware of course, but ones built with a bit of sanity.
"I'm curious - why can't the local builder repair the broken one? Not un-repairable throwaway Apple crap hardware of course, but ones built with a bit of sanity."
Because if you buy a Dell, say, you have to send it away to the approved repairers or whoever is stated in the guarantee. .
"oh no, can't repair this. Has to be couriered to Dell. I'll build you a new one. I'll even dispose of the old one for you in an environmentally friendly way."
*puts everything into new case
*replaces motherboard
*scrapes hdd for possibly interesting media
*installs ubuntu
"Here you go sir, I've built you a brand new computer!"
""oh no, can't repair this. Has to be couriered to Dell. I'll build you a new one. I'll even dispose of the old one for you in an environmentally friendly way.""
You don't really understand life in a remote community, do you. Get caught at this sort of thing and you'd end up inside a wicker man with someone with a lit torch about to reprimand you.
That's why, when I bought my new laptop a couple of weeks before Christmas, I deliberately chose the "older" model that still came pre-installed with Win7, rather than the latest model with Win 8. As an added bonus, it was reduced by £150 because it was 'end-of-line'... :o)
I do not intend to upgrade to Win 8, despite the £15 upgrade offer, since it doesn't have a touchscreen (where, incidentally, I see the whole Win 8 thing is moving towards).
My theory is that MS are using Win 8 to get users to become accustomed to the 'tiles' metaphor, and keep the 'old-style' desktop for legacy apps. In Win 9, we will probably see the latter disappear in favour of a windowed, VM-like desktop, so that legacy applications can still be run, in a similar way that Windows 95 removed the necessity to run Windows on top of DOS, but still providing a DOS-like CLI in a window.
...Microsoft should give up trying to make Windows all things to all people, and ending up with what it more and more reflecting in the UI the horrible kludge that the underlying code always has been, and instead market two distinct versions: one for those who want computing as an appliance---those who have no interest in what goes on under the hood; and another for folks who like to tinker or who actually need to get serious work done and so be in control of the stuff they use to get that work done.
I think the upgrade assistant is confused.
Your USB3 will work but not with whatever drivers/tools you have installed now, Windows 8 has native USB3 so will provide its own drivers.
If you have a bluetooth stack I'm guessing your laptop is Toshiba if that's the case you'll find the Windows 7 one works fine but you'll probably need to uninstall it and then reinstall after the upgrade. Your MS tools will also be fine. I haven't found anything that runs under 7 that won't run under 8. Also there is compatibility mode for really troublesome apps.
Of course the best thing to do is not to actually upgrade but run a clean install.
Windows has for a long time lived off their market share. A lot of people use windows because they always have: that's what they learnt in school/used at work. Try to redesign windows and suddenly these users can't make the easy transition. Why, when your business is largely built on historical market share, would you give users that otherwise don't really care reason to shop around!? Apparently M$ are trying to copy all the cool kids with their profitable app stores, but they don't seem to have the marketing bluster to pull it off.
Metaphorically speaking, pretty much all of Microsoft's recent 'development' is autopedophobic machine-gunning!
Are there actually any valid figures on how many windows sales are actual upgrades to existing systems as opposed to direct OEM installations? I suppose Redmond might consider that commercially sensitive...
My guess would be that the vast majority of people simply buy a new computer from time to time and run whatever comes on it. At best, they'll do the SP upgrade, if they think about it. But I reckon only the homebuilders and speed freaks ever buy an OS directly...
A further complication is the number of corporate buyers who will get a new PC (with the OEM Win8 on it, because the majority of OEMs still don't give you a choice) and then just slap on the corporate volume-licensed image (either Win7 or XP). These people have technically bought Win8, but would have preferred not to and aren't using it.
I'm sure *that* figure is commercially sensitive, but MS must have a pretty good estimate because anyone with a volume licence for XP or Win7 but not one for Win8 is almost certainly doing exactly this.
I just bought a laptop for my new employee and it came with Windows 8. What a horrible OS, how on earth did they manage to screw up a near perfect OS (i.e. Windows 7)? It makes absolutely no sense for devices that do not have touch screens and even then you then have to combat the switching between a 2d and 3d world with their weird new start menu, everything just seems harder and more complex. I definitely won't be upgrading any of my existing PCs!
Foolish to think they would suddenly change their entire pricing model to mirror Apple's, but I'd forgotten how much full versions cost so buying ahead in case I need it seemed sensible... , maybe I'll dual-boot it on my Mac as my main PC probably needs replacing soonish and can live with W7 until then.
I bought one of Google's $249 chromebooks for evaluation. If I was a diligent IT manager, I'd be very tempted to buy everyone one and finally ditch MS - along with all the SQL, Outlook and Sharepoint servers, Office licences, virus defences and backup facilities. Users would be happy to get a sexy new laptop, and it would decimate support costs.
But most IT managers will rail against Chromebooks, because their departments, budgets and influence will shrink.
OS's are a horrible topic at the moment. Windows is changing their look/feel further and losing sight of the desktop user for a more integrated experience across devices. This might work or it might fail. Microsofts record of irritating mistakes and major fails are beaten back by a consistent interface and almost hassle-less installation of tools/programs. 98 sucked until release 2, same with xp and vista never worked. The footprint increases and the security slowly tightens but improvements often get in the way of users.
Personally I have windows 7 but I prefer XP. My requirement for a good 64bit windows was the problem. This system exists to play games on and thats all. I have a fedora linux partition and have almost instantly found myself moving over.
But all is not rosy. Linux is fragmented by distributions but thats not really much of a concern. Recently we had the move to Gnome3 interface which I kinda like but it gets in the way too. I have tried Unity and found people united by their hate for it, with fair reason. I run a mint distro with cinnamon which I think is the best of the lot which is easy to use and still more secure than windows. However a rare glitch has stopped me using it on my desktop.
Linux is the better OS if you know how to use a computer and dont need windows specific software. However most users like the bliss of ignorance because they dont want to know what they are doing, they want a system to do what they know. So for these people they are trapped. Either they will like or dislike the new OS but their understandable desire to just use the computer with minimum fuss will keep them trapped with windows. Some will complain, some will like it. But change is more difficult than complaining.
I am shocked at the excessive pricing of microsoft products. I expect they will be priced out of the market at some point. Especially with google and apple squeezing the market. And linux will likely remain in the domain of the geek. But thats a good thing. Look at the trouble ubuntu is getting while they try to go mainstream
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