Windows 8 do we want it? Do we even need it?

I think it'll be interesting to see exactly how it turns out, though the idea of having basically a smartphone OS on my pc makes me want to hook up a windows 95 machine up to go online.
I don't really know how I feel about it just yet to be honest. At this point when windows 7 was announced, I was excited like you wouldn't believe.
I was sick of running XP though, always seemed a bit over-hyped to me and runs like an asthmatic ant with some heavy shopping on hardware a million times better than the reccomended requirements....
On the other hand, I am quite happy with windows 7 and I'm unlikely to be convinced that a full price windows 8 is worth spending a considerable chunk of my student loan.
I also like the background with the smiling multicoloured snake. If that's not in windows 8 then no deal!

 

That "Smartphone OS" is just a shell though, easily removable.

Also, isn't Windows and all other Windows developer related software free for students? It is for me, which perhaps is why I'm so lax when it comes to new Windows versions.

 

My friend showed me a picture of the desktop under the shell it looked very basic, though it's not final so as i said I'll wait and see. I'm just not as excited as I was for windows 7

Well my copy of windows 7 pro was only £30 for students but that was only a limited launch offer to re-gain some love after the bitter taste of vista was still in eveyone's mouth. While I might get a bit of a discount, microsoft software certainly wasnt free here in the UK last time I checked. Unless someone wants to prove me wrong. Please prove me wrong

 

Anything in the world of computing and electronics can be hacked...

Its just damn hard ;-)

 

what's with all this crazy new XBOX talk? They just started hiring for the thing

 

Fun Fact: Apple Inc. currently owns 43% of ARM, so no suprise here.

But i doubt that apple will replace the intel architecture in their notebooks and desktops in estimated time. Intels new cpus are way too powerful to be replaced by some arm chips.

 

Guys, just check out the Linux subreddit today, it looks like Microsoft is loading up its arms.

http://www.reddit.com/r/linux/

But let me give you some links to some of the stories.

Windows 8, Metro, and the Linux Desktop

Microsoft milks Casio for using Linux

 

I'll take those with a grain of salt

 

this metro ui will be perfect for tablets and other mobile devices , but for normal pcs and laptops its useless . Windows 7 is perfect , stable ,fast . Do we need anything more ?

 

That's what I said about Windows XP for 9 years.

 

I wish you'd take it with arsenic instead... :gravedigging:

 

That's the problem. This interface is being billed as the next UI for everything, and you simply cannot have a unified interface for such a wide array of devices (without seriously sacrificing something, somewhere).

 

mairsil: Just look at Unity on Ubuntu, I hated it when I saw it the first and Gnome 3 looks just as shitty, it is no wonder why I like neither of those two window managers/User interfaces, both of them are horrible.

 

This is alarming :-(
http://www.webupd8.org/2011/09/windows-8-certified-computers-may-not.html

 

This article contains not enough info and seems to me like a scare story. Nobody knows if you can deactivate UEFI, so that you can run an unsigned boot loader but not windows 8.

To me, this would be only logical:

activate UEFI -> you can only run signed bootloaders (theoretically a linux bootloader could be signed too)

deactivate UEFI -> you can run any unsigned bootloader but not the windows 8 bootloader anymore.

For security reasons this would be a good idea. No more trojans who manipulate system data (Look at the latest BIOS trojan).

 

Considering that its microsoft, I wouldnt doubt they do something like this, especially considering all the other crazy shit theyre doing to combat linux.

 

I'm pretty sure MS can block Linux but I'm almost sure that they won't do it, they're monopolist but they're not stupid.

I don't think MS would go through lots of trials (remember all the troubles with IE in Europe) and bad advertising to block an operating system which is used only by 1% of the desktop computers.

 

They'd probably face resistance from the EU (god bless the EU!).

 

I read somewhere Microsoft send some kind of a friendly gift to some body involved with Linux for an anniversary.

I couldn't find the link though. That should be enough to debunk those rumors