Windows 8 Pro Upgrade will cost $40 till Jan 31,2013

[noman]

MS announced yesterday that any user of XP, Vista and Windows7 (any
edition) will be able to upgrade to Windows 8 Pro for $40, for few
months initially. During that time WMC (Windows Media Center) can also
be added to the system for free.

<http://windowsteamblog.com/windows/b/bloggingwindows/archive/2012/07/02/upgrade-to-windows-8-pro-for-39-99.aspx>

It's the best promotional pricing MS have ever offered on a new
operating system (and its pro version). It basically takes away the one
complaint I had - need to buy the pro version, or an update pack to get
WMC. Windows 8 was already very suitable for an HTPC, with its metro
interface, but now that WMC is also included, upgrading to Win8 becomes
any easy decision.

I'll upgrade my desktop as well, as I have generally liked the
improvements in this new OS, few of which are:

1) Improved desktop rendering. I am not sure if it's WDDM 1.2 or what,
but the desktop in Win8 is rendered a lot better. V-sync in desktop was
added with Vista, but with Win8 the basic windows operations feel lot
more fluid. I even like the squared up corners for every window. MS have
decided, not to include AeroGlass, which I'll miss. WDDM 1.2, does have
better GPU power management options as well as better resource sharing
(same GPU across multiple apps, which was supported in WDDM1.1 as well
but is now refined further)

2) Hugely improved task manager. It's just amazing.

3) Improved file copy options. Ability to mount the ISOs and other disk
images natively within the OS.

4) Metro interface - Very suitable for HTPC, with a great on-screen
keyboard. Not bad for desktop either, but the use will be limited unless
good metro applications show up later. I don't mind the new start-screen
by the way.

Then there is also better hardware support. USB 3.0 is natively
supported. The inkjet printer I have (on WiFi network) works LOT better
compared to Windows7, where a PC reboot at times requires the printer to
be restarted as well before it can be recognized correctly (no such
issues when connected by USB, and while it may be a printer driver
issue, I haven't seen this problem yet with Win8 previews) Boot times
are *much* shorter and there is a better VM client, with a hyper-visor
that was only available before in the server edition of windows.

Windows 7 has worked very well. I am still on the original Win 7
ultimate install that I did almost three years back. It's the longest I
have gone with any OS without a reinstall, but now the time to upgrade
has almost arrived.

My 2�
--
Noman

[rms]

Windows 7 has worked very well. I am still on the original Win 7
ultimate install that I did almost three years back. It's the longest I
have gone with any OS without a reinstall, but now the time to upgrade
has almost arrived.

I adopted W7 on release because of the $40 preorder deal back then, and
I'll do the same now. Surely the pressure is even higher on MS to make this
offer now compared to back then, due to increased competition from apple,
and the perception that W7 is fine while W8 only offers a different UI?

rms

[John Lewis]

On Tue, 03 Jul 2012 13:30:33 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
wrote:

>My 2¢

All you have mentioned is only peripherally important.

The important piece will be something that you have not mentioned.
Backward compatibility with existing applications.

If Windows 8 RTM is proven NOT to break ANY application that currently
works fine in Windows 7, then it may be a buy. Until I am reasonably
assured of that functionality, I shall personally hold off and let
other customers be the guinea-pigs ( er, fully-paid-up RTM
beta-testers... nice to know that MS makes the price of entry to the
beta-test only $40 -- what a steal! And their wisdom in extending the
beta-test to 1/31/2013.....). Thank you greatly for volunteering so
readily.

BTW, Win7 Ultimate comes with both the 32-bit and 64-bit ISOs and
dual-boots on the same authentication key. If Win 8 Pro Full Retail
does not include both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions bootable using
the same authentication key, another nail in its coffin -as far as I
am concerned. I will not pay for 2 copies. I have several 32-bit
applications that will not run on Win7-64, but work perfectly in
Win7-32,

John Lewis


>--
>Noman

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Tue, 03 Jul 2012 13:30:33 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
wrote:

>It's the best promotional pricing MS have ever offered on a new
>operating system (and its pro version).

When I saw the announcement, the first thing that came to my mind is
that this is Microsoft's response to Apple's OS upgrade strategy (OSX
upgrades are about that price), and more importantly it ensures
adoption of the whole Win8/Metro thing and fends off another Vista
fiasco.

The "Apple counterattack" theory would also be in line with the fact
they recently announced they will be making their own tablets (making
sure Apple no longer is the only one with the advantage of tight
hardware and software integration).

So while yes it's a good deal, Microsoft isn't stupid and it's mostly
just to be sure that Win8 takes off like gangbusters (it will) and
once that happens, a lot more people will want their mobile device to
work well with their desktop (helping them in the mobile area where
they've been lacking).

I know a lot of people aren't excited about Metro on the desktop and
I'm not sure they should be, but even though I've already hedged my
bets such that I'm good either way, I predict MS wins this battle in
the long run.

Although this "battle" I speak of has nothing to do with gaming
really, as MS is uncontested there.

[Andrew MacPherson]

> MS announced yesterday that any user of XP, Vista and Windows7 (any
> edition) will be able to upgrade to Windows 8 Pro for $40, for few
> months initially.

Very clever marketing to avoid an embarrassing launch. Even I might be persuaded to
pick up a copy now, cheaply, just in case they (or someone else) desktop-ise it in
a couple of years.

I may have to hold my nose to do it though, and I certainly won't do it if -- as I
suspect -- there's no way of storing or postponing the upgrade indefinitely.

Andrew McP

[Lou]

"Rin Stowleigh" wrote in message
news:1327v7lev939rm0r8...@4ax.com...

.......................

It looks like a good deal if you need another copy of W7. You can use
this offer for W7 Pro also.
From Anandtech on MS W8 offer:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/6065/windows-8-upgrade-will-cost-just-3999


"On that note, for those of you still on Windows XP, the fact that
Microsoft is offering Windows 8 Pro as opposed to Windows 8 (consumer)
should be of particular interest. Windows 8 Pro comes with downgrade
rights, which allow the owner to legally install older versions of
Windows. So for those of you needing to upgrade from XP but still
wanting to hang back with Windows 7, this is a de-facto $40 Windows 7
Professional upgrade too."

I still haven't convinced my wife to upgrade from WXP.

[noman]

On 7/3/2012 3:03 PM, John Lewis wrote:
> On Tue, 03 Jul 2012 13:30:33 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
> wrote:
>
>> MS announced yesterday that any user of XP, Vista and Windows7 (any
>> edition) will be able to upgrade to Windows 8 Pro for $40, for few
>> months initially. During that time WMC (Windows Media Center) can also
>> be added to the system for free.
>>
>> <http://windowsteamblog.com/windows/b/bloggingwindows/archive/2012/07/02/upgrade-to-windows-8-pro-for-39-99.aspx>
>>

[Win8 feature description snipped]

>
> All you have mentioned is only peripherally important.
>
> The important piece will be something that you have not mentioned.
> Backward compatibility with existing applications.

It works same as Windows7 in that regards. The games that I tried
(recent ones, old DX7, windows pre-directx, and GoG/DOSBox) have all
worked fine.

> nice to know that MS makes the price of entry to the
> beta-test only $40 -- what a steal! And their wisdom in extending the
> beta-test to 1/31/2013.....). Thank you greatly for volunteering so
> readily.

I have tried three builds of Windows 8 on my PC in the past year
(currently running Windows8 release preview) There is no reason to go
blindly in.

> BTW, Win7 Ultimate comes with both the 32-bit and 64-bit ISOs and
> dual-boots on the same authentication key. If Win 8 Pro Full Retail
> does not include both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions bootable using
> the same authentication key, another nail in its coffin -as far as I
> am concerned.

It should work the same way.
--
Noman

[noman]

On 7/3/2012 5:10 PM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
>
> So while yes it's a good deal, Microsoft isn't stupid and it's mostly
> just to be sure that Win8 takes off like gangbusters (it will) and
> once that happens, a lot more people will want their mobile device to
> work well with their desktop (helping them in the mobile area where
> they've been lacking).

I do have a Windows phone, and it's way better than both iOS and
Android. The UI is extremely well done.

> I know a lot of people aren't excited about Metro on the desktop and
> I'm not sure they should be, but even though I've already hedged my
> bets such that I'm good either way, I predict MS wins this battle in
> the long run.

Yes, Metro on the desktop is another matter. And it'll take some time
getting used to. It has been re-tuned quite a bit in the last few months
between the several beta/preview builds that came out (developer
preview, consumer preview, release preview) and there are still some
changes that we'll only see in the RTM build.

It's a huge change, both from UI and functional perspective. But the old
desktop is there and functions using the same old methodology. My kids
by the way, love the new start screen and metro apps. However even they
go to the desktop IE when accessing sites like pbskids.org as it's more
familiar to them rather than the sparse metro version (and also the
metro IE didn't support flash plugin until recently)

Here's an interesting and very detailed article from Microsoft's
director of program management on user experience. A lot of folks may
not agree with the content, but it's a good read.

<http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/05/18/creating-the-windows-8-user-experience.aspx>

Another good article is about how Windows 8 will handle multiple monitors..
<http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/05/21/enhancing-windows-8-for-multiple-monitors.aspx>

--
Noman




--
Noman

[noman]

On 7/3/2012 8:34 PM, Brian Mathews wrote:

> But who needs to go back to Vista, or CE, 8 is a totally crap OS..
>

Windows 8 actually runs great. It starts (and sleeps/wakes-up) very
quickly and the desktop remains fast and responsive, more so than any
other past MS offering.

I am not a big fan of the new start screen, but it's something that at
worst I'll hardly use (like the current useless start menu). As long as
I can pin the often used applications to task bar (or icons on desktop),
and can type first few letters to find applications/files/emails, then
nothing changes. I may even end up using the start screen eventually.
--
Noman

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Thu, 05 Jul 2012 11:56:13 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
wrote:

>On 7/3/2012 5:10 PM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
>>
>> So while yes it's a good deal, Microsoft isn't stupid and it's mostly
>> just to be sure that Win8 takes off like gangbusters (it will) and
>> once that happens, a lot more people will want their mobile device to
>> work well with their desktop (helping them in the mobile area where
>> they've been lacking).
>
>I do have a Windows phone, and it's way better than both iOS and
>Android. The UI is extremely well done.

That statement seems too general. I have my opinions as well
(including the fact that I love the MS development platform, and I'm
aware of many aspects of the Metro UI that are much better designed,
functionally if not aesthetically, than offerings from Apple and
Google), but I think it's important to elaborate on what we mean by
"way better".

First, the most important feature of a smartphone is the apps and
content available for it. Apple just wins here, partially because the
iPhone got the headstart on everyone else. If history repeats, this
will be a short-lived advantage. Microsoft has the best development
tools in the industry, thus a lot of people WANT to develop for
Windows Phone and and Metro in general. I'm actually surprised that
Windows Phone hasn't already gained more marketshare from this fact
alone. WP7 has been slow to get a lot of apps, and many apps just
aren't available for it at all. In the mobile app world, the
development priority right now is (1)iPhone, (2)Android, (3)
everything else. And, some shops are dropping Android support because
of the costs of supporting such a fragmented OS on gazillions of
different devices.

Second, unless there has been some emerging news I've missed, WP7
devices will not run WP8. That seems to me a sign that Microsoft
really screwed something up here. One of their strengths has been
preservation of backward compatibility. Apple hasn't made this
mistake, even though they are on the obsolescence fast-track.

http://www.stuff.tv/news/phone/news-nugget/windows-phone-8-won%E2%80%99t-be-compatible-with-current-devices

Third, I haven't seen the feature sets of the Windows phones, but
until they catch up with Apple, they are going to continue to fall
behind.

For example, lots of people buy Apple devices because they are into
music, either consuming it or creating it. When I wanted a music
player that could wirelessly stream to my car stereo, the iPod was my
only viable choice... Zune's still existed at the time, and they were
okay for music if your idea of music was just downloading from some
store and listening on your earbuds, but for technophiles who want
advanced features, Apple has always been the leader. Also, Apple has
had low-latency audio drivers in all their mobile devices (not just
iPods but phones, etc) for a long time. Not only did Microsoft exit
the market with regard to Zune players, but I don't think they have
any facility for handling low latency audio needs in even their latest
phones. I've seen one article that says Metro itself is void of this
functionality, which means folks will have to stick to Win32 desktop
apps for that for now.

Speaking of which, here is a link that might be of interest to gamers
as well. Most games are more GPU-dependent than CPU dependent, but
this article seems to indicate that Windows 8 has done a great job at
kernal optimizations and overall OS speed improvements. Audio
production tends to put a load on my Core i7 that no game comes even
close to. A lot of the computations involved in audio synthesis give
a pretty good workout for a CPU, so although this article is from a
specific vendor of PC audio software, the benchmarks might still be of
interest to gamers here.

http://blog.cakewalk.com/windows-8-a-benchmark-for-music-production-applications

[Werner Punz]

Am 04.07.12 02:10, schrieb Rin Stowleigh:

> I know a lot of people aren't excited about Metro on the desktop and
> I'm not sure they should be, but even though I've already hedged my
> bets such that I'm good either way, I predict MS wins this battle in
> the long run.
>

The deal is good, but Metro on the desktop is unfortunately dreadful. I
will stay at win7 even 40USD is way to much for what we will get.

[Werner Punz]

Am 05.07.12 21:10, schrieb noman:

> Windows 8 actually runs great. It starts (and sleeps/wakes-up) very
> quickly and the desktop remains fast and responsive, more so than any
> other past MS offering.
>
> I am not a big fan of the new start screen, but it's something that at
> worst I'll hardly use (like the current useless start menu). As long as
> I can pin the often used applications to task bar (or icons on desktop),
> and can type first few letters to find applications/files/emails, then
> nothing changes. I may even end up using the start screen eventually.

The question comes down to, do you want to pay 40$ for something which
in my opinion is worse usabilitywise than Win7, for me the answer is no.
I dont have to upgrade to every windows version there is.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 12:21:57 +0200, Werner Punz <we...@gmx.at> wrote:

>I dont have to upgrade to every windows version there is.

Actually you kind of do, sooner or later, especially if you're a
gamer. Don't assume the extensive support life of XP will be typical.

[noman]

For me usability wise, Windows8 release preview is already ahead of
Windows7. I mentioned in the first post, the several tangible benefits
that I have experienced. When you add in the fact that a home premium
edition can be updated to a pro edition (my HTPC will finally have
remote desktop host, among other things), jumping on this $40 deal
becomes an even easier decision.
--
Noman

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 11:26:24 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
wrote:

You could also use Logmein free for that functionality (including the
ability to control your HTPC from a tablet while laying back on the
couch).

Also some cable companies now offer iPad apps which make the most
badass channel / surfer DVR control that even the top-end remotes
can't compete with, though that is not a complete HTPC solution.

[noman]

On 7/5/2012 3:26 PM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
> On Thu, 05 Jul 2012 11:56:13 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
> wrote:
>
>> On 7/3/2012 5:10 PM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
>>>
>>> So while yes it's a good deal, Microsoft isn't stupid and it's mostly
>>> just to be sure that Win8 takes off like gangbusters (it will) and
>>> once that happens, a lot more people will want their mobile device to
>>> work well with their desktop (helping them in the mobile area where
>>> they've been lacking).
>>
>> I do have a Windows phone, and it's way better than both iOS and
>> Android. The UI is extremely well done.
>
> That statement seems too general. I have my opinions as well
> (including the fact that I love the MS development platform, and I'm
> aware of many aspects of the Metro UI that are much better designed,
> functionally if not aesthetically, than offerings from Apple and
> Google), but I think it's important to elaborate on what we mean by
> "way better".

For me, the Windows phone OS is unmatched when it comes to consolidating
and displaying information to the user. The chrome-less UI uses almost
every inch of the screen. Switching active applications is very well
done. Live tiles are great. Photos, messages, mails, SMS can be tracked
in threads spanning multiple applications transparently. We have had
iPhones for a while (currently an iPhone 4s), and I feel very
constrained now whenever I use iOS. WP OS basically feels like a
next-gen OS compared to iOS.

>
> First, the most important feature of a smartphone is the apps and
> content available for it.

Apple has more apps in the app-store, but WP marketplace has most of the
ones that matter, if not all.

> Second, unless there has been some emerging news I've missed, WP7
> devices will not run WP8.

It's not a big deal. The OS/phones get updates and fixes. In fact, most
Windows Phone 7 users will get an update (called 7.8 for some reason)
that will bring in some features from WP8. One in particular I am
waiting for is where you can further customize the live tiles on the
main screen.

> Third, I haven't seen the feature sets of the Windows phones, but
> until they catch up with Apple, they are going to continue to fall
> behind.

I have a Nokia Lumia 900, which I got for $20, and then later got a $100
rebate from Nokia. The only thing where iPhone 4s has an undeniable
edge, is its camera. It's way better than what comes on Lumia900. I also
like the smaller iPhone4s size. And while this Nokia phone has lower
resolution than iPhone4s, the AMOLED screen looks great especially at
showing black levels. The screen is also lot more readable when you are
out in sunlight. I even like how it's constructed. I just wish that it
was a bit smaller.

> For example, lots of people buy Apple devices because they are into
> music, either consuming it or creating it. When I wanted a music
> player that could wirelessly stream to my car stereo, the iPod was my
> only viable choice...

Bluetooth stereo works perfectly fine whenever I have tried it, even via
Blackberry. Some of it depends on the bluetooth system in your car though.
--
Noman

[Mel Franks]

"noman" <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote in message news:jsvkpe$rm3$1...@dont-email.me...

Those of us currently running the release preview can also "upgrade" using the
$40 upgrade option, with the caveat that it's basically a clean install and only
personal files and settings will be transferred.
This saves the hassle of having to reinstall an older OS just for the upgrade.
I personally keep my OS seperate on an SSD so this will make it really easy.

I really like Windows 8, and at $40 it's a no-brainer as far as I'm concerned.
It's interesting watching the hate Metro has garnered, as I'm just not seeing any
real downside to it. I virtually never used the Start menu, and use the Start
screen just a little.
I do like some of the Metro apps however, and am interested in seeing what
develops in that arena.

[noman]

On 7/6/2012 11:30 AM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
> On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 11:26:24 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
> wrote:
>
>> For me usability wise, Windows8 release preview is already ahead of
>> Windows7. I mentioned in the first post, the several tangible benefits
>> that I have experienced. When you add in the fact that a home premium
>> edition can be updated to a pro edition (my HTPC will finally have
>> remote desktop host, among other things), jumping on this $40 deal
>> becomes an even easier decision.
>
> You could also use Logmein free for that functionality (including the
> ability to control your HTPC from a tablet while laying back on the
> couch).

For me LogMeIn or VNC are distant second to Remote Desktop. The
difference is night and day. In addition to the more responsive
experience with RDP, I also use the hack where multiple sessions become
possible (one user logged in, while you remotely login to another
account) which is technically only a feature of the server editions. For
an HTPC, it's a very useful feature, as someone can watch TV or play
game where I can use remote client to log in for some administrative work.

>
> Also some cable companies now offer iPad apps which make the most
> badass channel / surfer DVR control that even the top-end remotes
> can't compete with, though that is not a complete HTPC solution.

I use WMC with MCE remote ($15). I have XBMC to handle certain tasks,
and a multi-tuner/cable-card ready box in the home network that allows
me to watch/record cable programming in HD anywhere on any W7/Vista WMC
PC (three channels simultaneously). When it comes to watching LiveTV
through cable-card with encrypted channel support in US, nothing can
touch WMC. No cable company provided DVR box/app or MAC or Linux
application has this much functionality and/or is cable-labs certified
to watch and record standard and premium channels while respecting the
copy-once/copy-freely DRM flags.

Through an FCC mandated regulation, the cable companies are forced to
provide a cable-card to the customers, so they can have their own DVRs
instead of paying extra to the cable providers. The cable companies are
also forced to offer cable-card self activation to make this process
more hassle-free for the customers. Comcast started this self-install
sometime last year, and it was very rough early on. Only a few of their
support people even knew that they were offering such services and had
little idea how to activate and stage these cards. In time, things got
better. I bought the Silcondust HDHomerun Prime a month ago, and stopped
by at local Comcast office to pick up an "M-card" (multi stream cable
card). I ran into activation problems but eventually (within a day) the
cable-card specific support folks at Comcast were able to set things up
properly.

Ok, this is way off-topic now. But basically for the HTPC I have, Win8
Pro will be a very welcome addition, especially with the $40 deal and
the free WMC update.
--
Noman

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 12:07:29 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>

Yes, it is a well-thought-out UI and this is one reason historically
Microsoft is not always first to the game, but they know how to win in
the long-term.

>> First, the most important feature of a smartphone is the apps and
>> content available for it.
>
>Apple has more apps in the app-store, but WP marketplace has most of the
>ones that matter, if not all.

Well I will give you some examples. Musical apps like TouchOSC,
FLStudio for mobile and iMaschine aren't even on anyones radar for
Windows Phone last time I checked, and they can't be until Windows
Phone and/or tablets has proper audio support.

Also, one of my cars is an "exotic" foreign sports car (i.e. very fast
trooper-magnet which begs to get a speeding ticket the minute you pull
it out of the garage). I've never mentioned it in this newsgroups, I
don't think, because it's never been relevant to a discussion before,
but now it is. So, in that particular vehicle I run "defensive"
measures against douchebag LEO such as the specialized smartcord and
iPhone app described here: http://bit.ly/N4ApxE

It keeps me abreast via social network uploads of where the
donut-gobbling fat bastards are regardless of whether they are running
radar, laser, LIDAR, or have just set up a DUI checkpoint. (And no I
don't think all cops suck, I've just run into so many that act like
real cockbiters because they've pulled me over for no apparent reason
other than jealousy before).

Windows Phone? Sorry, there's not an app for that that's compatible
with with proper detection devices. And it ain't happening until they
get the marketshare problem solved. It doesn't matter how good the
phone is if the apps I really need aren't there. Oh and the above app
does come in an Android version, but it sucks apparently for everyone
that falls outside the 20% or so of Android devices that it works
reliably on.

A buddy of mine just a few months ago was telling me how rediculous it
was that he couldn't download Skype for his phone a year after MS
bought the company! I believe they have resolved that now, but jeez
the amount of time it took was simply wrong.

>> Second, unless there has been some emerging news I've missed, WP7
>> devices will not run WP8.
>
>It's not a big deal. The OS/phones get updates and fixes. In fact, most
>Windows Phone 7 users will get an update (called 7.8 for some reason)
>that will bring in some features from WP8. One in particular I am
>waiting for is where you can further customize the live tiles on the
>main screen.

I do recognize that individual needs differ, and that the availability
of Metro apps *will* grow even if it has not yet grown to the point
that will suit my particular needs. And the phones are cheaper, so
the need to upgrade with each OS should be less of an ordeal.

>> Third, I haven't seen the feature sets of the Windows phones, but
>> until they catch up with Apple, they are going to continue to fall
>> behind.
>
>I have a Nokia Lumia 900, which I got for $20, and then later got a $100
>rebate from Nokia. The only thing where iPhone 4s has an undeniable
>edge, is its camera. It's way better than what comes on Lumia900. I also
>like the smaller iPhone4s size. And while this Nokia phone has lower
>resolution than iPhone4s, the AMOLED screen looks great especially at
>showing black levels. The screen is also lot more readable when you are
>out in sunlight. I even like how it's constructed. I just wish that it
>was a bit smaller.
>
>> For example, lots of people buy Apple devices because they are into
>> music, either consuming it or creating it. When I wanted a music
>> player that could wirelessly stream to my car stereo, the iPod was my
>> only viable choice...
>
>Bluetooth stereo works perfectly fine whenever I have tried it, even via
>Blackberry. Some of it depends on the bluetooth system in your car though.

Well at that time I was looking at music players, because I didn't
wanted a "car jukebox" device that was independent of my phone. To be
fair, Microsoft was not the only odd man out, I looked at all
alternatives (including Creative MP3 players which I'd had good luck
with in the past, and others) and couldn't find BT audio as an option,
and at that time MS was still selling its Zune players.

I would think the newer Windows Phones would have to have this feature
by now. I just don't like to be years behind the tech curve.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Fri, 6 Jul 2012 14:07:43 -0500, "Mel Franks" <m...@xcom.net> wrote:

>I really like Windows 8, and at $40 it's a no-brainer as far as I'm concerned.
>It's interesting watching the hate Metro has garnered, as I'm just not seeing any
>real downside to it.

The hate you see is just luddite syndrome. Most people are reluctant
to technological change once you drift outside technophile circles. I
confess than when I first saw iPads announced, I thought "what the
hell would I do with that thing, it's just a gigantic iPod touch?" I
now do all kinds of things with the iPad I didn't forsee at that time,
including writing apps for it.

[noman]

On 7/6/2012 4:30 PM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:

> Windows Phone? Sorry, there's not an app for that that's compatible
> with with proper detection devices. And it ain't happening until they
> get the marketshare problem solved. It doesn't matter how good the
> phone is if the apps I really need aren't there.

Of course, there are fewer applications on WP marketplace compared to
App-store. There will be few edge cases, where there's no suitable WP
app for now, such as the ones you mentioned. However it won't affect the
99% of the folks buying these phones, and I am indeed talking about the
overall picture.

> A buddy of mine just a few months ago was telling me how rediculous it
> was that he couldn't download Skype for his phone a year after MS
> bought the company! I believe they have resolved that now, but jeez
> the amount of time it took was simply wrong.

Yes, this is where WP has to catch up. Absence of Skype, Spotify or even
Cut the Rope would be felt by a lot of users. I too am not sure why
Skype took so long. Skype beta for WP7 only became available early this
year I think, and now it's fully supported. Spotify is there, but
Pandora isn't (although there are unofficial user apps to give you access)

In general, things have improved a lot in past six months for WP
marketplace.
--
Noman

[Xocyll]

Rin Stowleigh <rstow...@gmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails
of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

You never need to upgrade to _every_ windows version there is.

You could easily stick with XP and completely skip Vista and Win 7 and
jump straight to Win 8.

Just as people hung in with 98 until XP came out and completely skipped
WinME.

It's not like the hardware has made quantum leaps that actually require
the latest OS, especially with so much of gaming being driven by the
limitations on console hardware.

Yeah maybe WinXP can't use the latest Direct-X features, but how many of
them are actually _necessary_.

Every few years you'll have to jump to a newer version of windows, but
they never have to be consecutive version. Not unless Microsoft start
taking a very long time between OS releases OR there is a quantum leap
in computing power that the current OS cannot take advantage of but the
next version can.

MS would certainly like you to believe that you need every version as
soon as it's available, but it's never been true.

Xocyll
--
I don't particularly want you to FOAD, myself. You'll be more of
a cautionary example if you'll FO And Get Chronically, Incurably,
Painfully, Progressively, Expensively, Debilitatingly Ill. So
FOAGCIPPEDI. -- Mike Andrews responding to an idiot in asr

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 01:07:29 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>
wrote:

>Rin Stowleigh <rstow...@gmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails
>of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>
>>On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 12:21:57 +0200, Werner Punz <we...@gmx.at> wrote:
>>
>>>I dont have to upgrade to every windows version there is.
>>
>>Actually you kind of do, sooner or later, especially if you're a
>>gamer. Don't assume the extensive support life of XP will be typical.
>
>You never need to upgrade to _every_ windows version there is.
>
>You could easily stick with XP and completely skip Vista and Win 7 and
>jump straight to Win 8.
>Just as people hung in with 98 until XP came out and completely skipped
>WinME.

Meh.. semantic nitpicking. Why not just say "nobody really needs a
computer to get by in life". True perhaps but laughable at the same
time.

>It's not like the hardware has made quantum leaps that actually require
>the latest OS, especially with so much of gaming being driven by the
>limitations on console hardware.
>
>Yeah maybe WinXP can't use the latest Direct-X features, but how many of
>them are actually _necessary_.

None of them are _necessary_. Using a combustion engine as a
technology for daily travel isn't necessary either, but most people
acknowledge they are living in the stone ages if they don't. This is
why I said "actually you kind of do, sooner or later, especially if
you're a gamer". Note use of "kind of" and "if you're a gamer".

>Every few years you'll have to jump to a newer version of windows, but
>they never have to be consecutive version. Not unless Microsoft start
>taking a very long time between OS releases OR there is a quantum leap
>in computing power that the current OS cannot take advantage of but the
>next version can.

Its not about quantum leaps in chip design, it's about the support
lifecycles of any software product. Game (and all software) vendors
care about getting paid for their expensive labor, so they tend to
target a specific OS configuration. Falling too far outside that
configuration means no longer getting updates and support. That
eventually becomes a security risk and maintenance headache that
anyone smarter than a caveman would do well to avoid; at the same time
anyone is free to be a caveman if they choose.

>MS would certainly like you to believe that you need every version as
>soon as it's available, but it's never been true.

MS has at some times been clever with marketing and other times not so
much, but I can't recall a time when they've ever pitched their
software as "you need this NOW". They usually try to add value
through features and their marketing is usually about showing the
"nifty" things that can be done with said features (whether anyone
really thinks they are nifty or not is a different story, but like I
said if nothing else the support cycle is reason enough to upgrade,
eventually). I never said that upgrading upon initial release of a
new version of it is necessary and I don't recall MS saying that,
ever, either.

[Xocyll]

Rin Stowleigh <rstow...@gmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails
of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 01:07:29 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>
>wrote:
>
>>Rin Stowleigh <rstow...@gmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails
>>of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>>
>>>On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 12:21:57 +0200, Werner Punz <we...@gmx.at> wrote:
>>>
>>>>I dont have to upgrade to every windows version there is.
>>>
>>>Actually you kind of do, sooner or later, especially if you're a
>>>gamer. Don't assume the extensive support life of XP will be typical.
>>
>>You never need to upgrade to _every_ windows version there is.
>>
>>You could easily stick with XP and completely skip Vista and Win 7 and
>>jump straight to Win 8.
>>Just as people hung in with 98 until XP came out and completely skipped
>>WinME.
>
>Meh.. semantic nitpicking.

Well you did say it.

>Why not just say "nobody really needs a
>computer to get by in life". True perhaps but laughable at the same
>time.

There are still people in the world who have never used a computer in
their lives.

No doubt there are people for whom the statement "You don't really need
Facebook to get by in life" would be equally laughable because they
couldn't conceive of not having it - doesn't actually make it a
necessity though.

>>It's not like the hardware has made quantum leaps that actually require
>>the latest OS, especially with so much of gaming being driven by the
>>limitations on console hardware.
>>
>>Yeah maybe WinXP can't use the latest Direct-X features, but how many of
>>them are actually _necessary_.
>
>None of them are _necessary_. Using a combustion engine as a
>technology for daily travel isn't necessary either, but most people
>acknowledge they are living in the stone ages if they don't.

Really, so all those "green" types who bicycle to work and such
acknowledge themselves as living in the "stone ages"?

>This is
>why I said "actually you kind of do, sooner or later, especially if
>you're a gamer". Note use of "kind of" and "if you're a gamer".

I *AM* a gamer and I'm still using WinXP.
Having never seen any of the bells and/or whistles available in the
later DX versions I don't miss them and XP has the advantage of a
smaller footprint and greater compatibility with older games.

Not ever gamer has to play every latest game with every bell and whistle
imaginable enabled.

In fact, wasn't it the Hardcore gamer set who would turn off most of the
bells and whistles in order to have the absolute highest FPS possible?


I've installed Win7, and frankly I prefer XP - it's faster, sleeker and
hasn't moved a bunch of settings around just for the sake of moving
them. The extra graphics that can be possible under it in some games,
don't change the fact that I don't like the UI changes, so Win7 is not
as nice to use. Every previous version allowed you to use the older
settings, so why not Win7?
Isn't Win8 coming with that retarded designed-for-touchscreen-tablets
interface? Yeah that makes a lot of sense for non-touchscreen computers
running non-touchscreen applications and games. I'll just run right out
and buy that.


MS is shooting themselves in the foot with random UI changes for the
sake of making changes. People don't want to have to learn a new
interface with ever OS version - they want all their "finger macros" as
it were to still work. I click on this and that happens, I press this
key combo and this happens.

Most people don't see an OS as an adventure or a learning opportunity,
it's just the underlayer that allows their apps to work, change how that
works and it just causes annoyance.

New features, great! New interface that breaks what used to work, fuck
that noise!

>>Every few years you'll have to jump to a newer version of windows, but
>>they never have to be consecutive version. Not unless Microsoft start
>>taking a very long time between OS releases OR there is a quantum leap
>>in computing power that the current OS cannot take advantage of but the
>>next version can.
>
>Its not about quantum leaps in chip design, it's about the support
>lifecycles of any software product. Game (and all software) vendors
>care about getting paid for their expensive labor, so they tend to
>target a specific OS configuration. Falling too far outside that
>configuration means no longer getting updates and support. That
>eventually becomes a security risk and maintenance headache that
>anyone smarter than a caveman would do well to avoid; at the same time
>anyone is free to be a caveman if they choose.

How much updating is required? You write a game for XP and it's a known
quantity, a fixed target, unchanging - not unlike consoles in that
regard. Whereas the latest OS is always being tweaked - sure some of
those tweaks are security related, but not by any means all of them.
Some of those tweaks my break your game and make your company look bad
until you get a patch out.

Why did XP get that extra long lifecycle - because MS couldn't get
people to switch to their newer "better" OS's, and when the business
sector refuses to switch you can't just say "we're cutting off support"
if you ever want them to be customers again.

Is there any actual reason WinXP can't run Direct-X 10 or 11 other than
Microsoft trying to force people over to Vista/7/8?

>>MS would certainly like you to believe that you need every version as
>>soon as it's available, but it's never been true.
>
>MS has at some times been clever with marketing and other times not so
>much, but I can't recall a time when they've ever pitched their
>software as "you need this NOW". They usually try to add value
>through features and their marketing is usually about showing the
>"nifty" things that can be done with said features (whether anyone
>really thinks they are nifty or not is a different story, but like I
>said if nothing else the support cycle is reason enough to upgrade,
>eventually). I never said that upgrading upon initial release of a
>new version of it is necessary and I don't recall MS saying that,
>ever, either.

Their TV ads sure push every new OS version like it's the be all and end
all of everything - everything you ever wanted and walks your dog too.

Isn't the whole reason for this thread, MS trying to get people to jump
to Win8 on initial release by giving a discount?

[Xocyll]

Rin Stowleigh <rstow...@gmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails
of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

There change for good reason and then there's change for the sake of
change.

Putting a touchscreen oriented interface on a non-touchscreen computer
is stupid.
People who don't want that aren't Luddites any more than people who
don't want steering wheels on their motorcycles are.
It doesn't belong on there in the first place, it's an interface for
another environment.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 10:42:04 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>
wrote:

>Rin Stowleigh <rstow...@gmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails
>of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>
>>On Fri, 6 Jul 2012 14:07:43 -0500, "Mel Franks" <m...@xcom.net> wrote:
>>
>>>I really like Windows 8, and at $40 it's a no-brainer as far as I'm concerned.
>>>It's interesting watching the hate Metro has garnered, as I'm just not seeing any
>>>real downside to it.
>>
>>The hate you see is just luddite syndrome. Most people are reluctant
>>to technological change once you drift outside technophile circles. I
>>confess than when I first saw iPads announced, I thought "what the
>>hell would I do with that thing, it's just a gigantic iPod touch?" I
>>now do all kinds of things with the iPad I didn't forsee at that time,
>>including writing apps for it.
>
>
>There change for good reason and then there's change for the sake of
>change.
>
>Putting a touchscreen oriented interface on a non-touchscreen computer
>is stupid.
>People who don't want that aren't Luddites any more than people who
>don't want steering wheels on their motorcycles are.
>It doesn't belong on there in the first place, it's an interface for
>another environment.

You are completely out of the loop if you think the whole touch-screen
thing is just change for the sake of change. It is a countermeasure
to a very real threat Apple and tablets have brought them.

[Xocyll]

Dude, there are perfectly good reasons for a touch screen interface on a
touch screen tablet.

There's no reason whatsoever for a touch screen UI on NON-TOUCHSCREEN
equipment, except MS trying to force everyone to use the same interface
on everything no matter how badly it fits.

It's a bad as forcing people to use a console controller to play a
shooter - it works when the game is designed to be used with a
controller (usually involving auto-aim) and it totally blows when it's a
game designed for use with mouse and keyboard.

Apples (no pun intended) and Oranges.

A touchscreen interface on non- touchscreen equipment makes as much
sense as a steering wheel on a motorcycle.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 14:04:28 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>

Unless your entire battle strategy hinges on a consistent experience
across desktops / tablets and phones.

They are doing what they're doing for very specific reasons, ones I've
documented many times over in this NG.

I'm not saying I like everything they're doing, nor am I saying you
should. I'm saying it's not just change for the sake of change.

>except MS trying to force everyone to use the same interface
>on everything no matter how badly it fits.

They are not the only ones, Apple is sort of doing same with what
feels like a merging of features between their OS.

>It's a bad as forcing people to use a console controller to play a
>shooter - it works when the game is designed to be used with a
>controller (usually involving auto-aim) and it totally blows when it's a
>game designed for use with mouse and keyboard.

Again on what's good / bad whatever. Once again console controllers
didn't just magically occur the way they did just "for sake of
change".

>Apples (no pun intended) and Oranges.
>
>A touchscreen interface on non- touchscreen equipment makes as much
>sense as a steering wheel on a motorcycle.

Most PC monitors going forward will probably have touch screen as
standard equipment, IMO, but then again most of the monitors of the
future are probably not just monitors, but just docked tablets.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/microsofts-surface-tablet-do-we-have-an-ipad-killer

I'm not saying this will impact the PC gaming landscape in the short
term, or that it's remotely good for PC gaming. If you had said "the
Metro UI does absolutely nothing for PC gaming" I would have agreed
with you 100%, but that wasn't your position.

[PW]

So if I install another HD (prob an SSD) for Win8 so I can dual boot
with Win7, I am assuming I may have to purchase another copy of MS
Office, all my Adobe stuff, etc...? Will there be a licensing issue?

-pw

[Xocyll]

Oh I know exactly what they're doing. But it's not a good reason to
force an interface onto computers that is designed for something else.

It _might_ be good for MS's bottom line (assuming the sheep will
actually fall for the "I use this interface on my computer, so I should
by an MS tablet that has the same interface instead of buying another
apple tablet.") Of course the opposite could be true - "I hate this
interface, so why would I want to use it on a tablet too, when I'm
already used to the way apple's interface works on their tablet."

Forcing a bloated UI that can't actually function on my PC onto me does
NOT make me want to run out and buy an MS phone or tablet.

If they want to have that as an OPTION, that would be fine - but that's
not the way MS has been going of late - it's here's the new UI, you will
use it, like it or not.
Which is why loads of people still use XP.


To use the same analogy as before, a motorcycle company could come out
with a bike that had a steering wheel and gas pedal to provide the same
"user interface" as a car.

They're not going to actually make many sales of those though- no
existing rider would buy one, and the few previously car only people
would find out quickly that it's not the standard interface because it
doesn't really work well on a motorcycle.

The various companies have tried automatic transmission motorcycles a
couple times and they were failures every time.

>I'm not saying I like everything they're doing, nor am I saying you
>should. I'm saying it's not just change for the sake of change.
>
>>except MS trying to force everyone to use the same interface
>>on everything no matter how badly it fits.
>
>They are not the only ones, Apple is sort of doing same with what
>feels like a merging of features between their OS.

Yeah but Apple has always been high-handed and forced things on their
users, and apparently their users like that.
I'm not an Apple user for a reason.

>>It's a bad as forcing people to use a console controller to play a
>>shooter - it works when the game is designed to be used with a
>>controller (usually involving auto-aim) and it totally blows when it's a
>>game designed for use with mouse and keyboard.
>
>Again on what's good / bad whatever. Once again console controllers
>didn't just magically occur the way they did just "for sake of
>change".
>
>>Apples (no pun intended) and Oranges.
>>
>>A touchscreen interface on non- touchscreen equipment makes as much
>>sense as a steering wheel on a motorcycle.
>
>Most PC monitors going forward will probably have touch screen as
>standard equipment, IMO, but then again most of the monitors of the
>future are probably not just monitors, but just docked tablets.

Why would anyone give up a 20+inch widescreen monitor in order to use a
10.6 inch tablet as a monitor? That's retarded.

>http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/microsofts-surface-tablet-do-we-have-an-ipad-killer
>
>I'm not saying this will impact the PC gaming landscape in the short
>term, or that it's remotely good for PC gaming. If you had said "the
>Metro UI does absolutely nothing for PC gaming" I would have agreed
>with you 100%, but that wasn't your position.

It does nothing for computing in general on PC's.
An OS/UI packed with stuff meant for different hardware - stuff that
_can't_ work on regular PC hardware is just BLOAT, and that's bad for
every possible kind of PC computing you might do, not just gaming.

What is MS actually trying to force a minimum 8gig ram requirement?

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 18:54:50 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>

Computers are designed to process zeros and ones. The software that
runs on them is what dictates what they are designed for, and in this
case Microsoft writes the software we are talking about. What does
that tell you?

>It _might_ be good for MS's bottom line (assuming the sheep will
>actually fall for the "I use this interface on my computer, so I should
>by an MS tablet that has the same interface instead of buying another
>apple tablet.") Of course the opposite could be true - "I hate this
>interface, so why would I want to use it on a tablet too, when I'm
>already used to the way apple's interface works on their tablet."
>
>Forcing a bloated UI that can't actually function on my PC onto me does
>NOT make me want to run out and buy an MS phone or tablet.
>
>If they want to have that as an OPTION, that would be fine - but that's
>not the way MS has been going of late - it's here's the new UI, you will
>use it, like it or not.
>Which is why loads of people still use XP.

I think you may not be aware that it *is* an option... you can click
on the desktop tile and use Windows largely as you have been.
Obviously there's no way to incorporate the Metro UI into gazillions
of legacy apps, and there are lots of applications of computing (for
example software development) that still require a mouse and keyboard.

>To use the same analogy as before, a motorcycle company could come out
>with a bike that had a steering wheel and gas pedal to provide the same
>"user interface" as a car.

The analogy isn't valid unless the company made the bike it so that
you could flick a switch and between usages.

>They're not going to actually make many sales of those though- no
>existing rider would buy one, and the few previously car only people
>would find out quickly that it's not the standard interface because it
>doesn't really work well on a motorcycle.
>
>The various companies have tried automatic transmission motorcycles a
>couple times and they were failures every time.
>
>>I'm not saying I like everything they're doing, nor am I saying you
>>should. I'm saying it's not just change for the sake of change.
>>
>>>except MS trying to force everyone to use the same interface
>>>on everything no matter how badly it fits.
>>
>>They are not the only ones, Apple is sort of doing same with what
>>feels like a merging of features between their OS.
>
>Yeah but Apple has always been high-handed and forced things on their
>users, and apparently their users like that.
>I'm not an Apple user for a reason.

There are pros and cons to each companies' approach. Apple users
frequently run into things they don't necessarily like or they deem as
areas that could use improvement, but they like some of the "perks" of
the Apple platform, such as zero worries about compatibility between
hardware and software (as well as third party components), and the
general stability that comes with that.

>>>It's a bad as forcing people to use a console controller to play a
>>>shooter - it works when the game is designed to be used with a
>>>controller (usually involving auto-aim) and it totally blows when it's a
>>>game designed for use with mouse and keyboard.
>>
>>Again on what's good / bad whatever. Once again console controllers
>>didn't just magically occur the way they did just "for sake of
>>change".
>>
>>>Apples (no pun intended) and Oranges.
>>>
>>>A touchscreen interface on non- touchscreen equipment makes as much
>>>sense as a steering wheel on a motorcycle.
>>
>>Most PC monitors going forward will probably have touch screen as
>>standard equipment, IMO, but then again most of the monitors of the
>>future are probably not just monitors, but just docked tablets.
>
>Why would anyone give up a 20+inch widescreen monitor in order to use a
>10.6 inch tablet as a monitor? That's retarded.

Because lugging a 10.6 tablet around with them all day long is easier
than lugging a 20+ inch monitor around with them all day long. You do
realize some folks' profession requires this, right? It's easy to get
locked into tunnel vision and expect that everyone's computing needs
are similar to our own, but I assure you that's never the case. There
is a wide spectrum of varying needs that spans various computing
scenarios with mobility at one end and performance at the other end of
the spectrum. Also, computing has changed a lot just in the last
couple of years. Lots of folks are using specialized tablet or phone
apps to do things they used to use the web for, but much more
efficiently. With well-designed specialized apps, you're not slogging
through tons of rendered HTML, so for getting work done you typically
need MUCH less screen space if the mobile app is well designed.

>>http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/microsofts-surface-tablet-do-we-have-an-ipad-killer
>>
>>I'm not saying this will impact the PC gaming landscape in the short
>>term, or that it's remotely good for PC gaming. If you had said "the
>>Metro UI does absolutely nothing for PC gaming" I would have agreed
>>with you 100%, but that wasn't your position.
>
>It does nothing for computing in general on PC's.
>An OS/UI packed with stuff meant for different hardware - stuff that
>_can't_ work on regular PC hardware is just BLOAT, and that's bad for
>every possible kind of PC computing you might do, not just gaming.

What is your definition of "regular PC hardware"? The Metro UI is
actually very light on resources, probably much more so than Aero was,
and most people should have had PC's with a GPU adequate for Aero five
or six years ago. If anyone has such an antiquated PC that it doesn't
meet min spec for Windows 8 then shame on them for allowing themselves
to become a dinosaur.

>What is MS actually trying to force a minimum 8gig ram requirement?

I don't know where you got that idea. Windows 8 RAM requirement is
same as Windows 7 for 32 and 64 bit versions.

[Tim O]

I think if you're considering this, you're not ready to change OS's.

My original Win7 64 bit install is still running like a champ. This is
the precarious position MS has put themselves in... They have now
designed an OS that is so solid that they have to try and make it
appear obsolete with gimmicks.

Just wait and see how it pans out, you have until early next year to
get the deal if Windows 8 turns out to be something substantial.
Considering pretty much every other OS is a klunker, thats where this
one is falling in the sequence.

[John Lewis]

On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 14:19:16 -0400, Rin Stowleigh
<rstow...@gmail.com> wrote:

>On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 14:04:28 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>
>wrote:
>>

>>A touchscreen interface on non- touchscreen equipment makes as much
>>sense as a steering wheel on a motorcycle.

>Most PC monitors going forward will probably have touch screen as
>standard equipment, IMO, but then again most of the monitors of the
>future are probably not just monitors, but just docked tablets.

Must invest in a company manufacturing LCD-screen cleaning solutions.
Larger screens == more business....

John Lewis

[noman]

On 7/7/2012 8:36 AM, Xocyll wrote:
>
> I *AM* a gamer and I'm still using WinXP.
> Having never seen any of the bells and/or whistles available in the
> later DX versions I don't miss them and XP has the advantage of a
> smaller footprint and greater compatibility with older games.

Both Vista and Win7 are drastically better than WinXP in terms of
performance, stability and security, especially if you use the 64bit
versions. These newer OS are more usable as well, as to how you conduct
searches, access recently used documents, alt-tab between full-screen
gaming applications, run windowed games etc.

I have no problems running any older game on my PC.

> Not ever gamer has to play every latest game with every bell and whistle
> imaginable enabled.

Bells and whistles are one aspect (and a very important one
traditionally for PC gaming over the decades) but to have games simply
run better due to how the OS handles things in the background, can't
just be waved away as a trivial thing. When I first ran Oblivion on a
64bit OS (Vista), I was amazed to find that all level load screens when
traveling outdoors were completely eliminated. That's when Oblivion was
a 32-bit app. It was Vista's "Super fetch" loading world data (geometry,
textures) in the RAM beyond the 1.3GB or so that the application could
use, at times even in advance. And then the 64bit OS made the whole 4GB
($20 or so these days) usable for this advance pre-fetch of data.

The end result was a better gaming experience, on the same hardware,
just due to the change in OS.
--
Noman

[noman]

That's a good question and I don't know. Office normally offers three
activation licenses, but to find out if a dual boot machine uses two
Office licenses, you should call MS. They say that a license is per
hardware partition/virtual blade, but I don't know if dual-boot counts
as two partitions for them.
--
Noman

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Tue, 10 Jul 2012 11:40:23 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
wrote:

>The end result was a better gaming experience, on the same hardware,
>just due to the change in OS.

The RAM available to 32-bit helps in some games as you pointed out,
Windows 7 tends to make better use of multiple cores with regard to
running background services that power OS features. This doesn't
directly impact game performance in a way that would show dramatic
gains in a one-off benchmark, but overall makes even poorly threaded
games run smoother with less hiccups. And then we could take about
DX10 and DX11 improvements, which are not as negligible as some would
like to think. The Dunia engine in FarCry2 runs much faster (and
looks better) in DX10 than you can ever get it to run in DX9.

I think some folks remember early benchmarks showing XP faster than
Vista when it first game out and vendors had not optimized drivers and
such. What they don't realize is that the game vendors also optimize
for a particular target platform (the current target is of course
Win7), so even some of those games that used to perform better XP now
perform better on Windows 7 through patches, assuming reasonably up to
date CPU/GPU etc.

There are all types of hobbies like coin or stamp collecting, etc that
let an enthusiast live in the past and still fully enjoy the hobby; PC
gaming just isn't one of those hobbies.

[Xocyll]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of

the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>On 7/7/2012 8:36 AM, Xocyll wrote:
>>
>> I *AM* a gamer and I'm still using WinXP.
>> Having never seen any of the bells and/or whistles available in the
>> later DX versions I don't miss them and XP has the advantage of a
>> smaller footprint and greater compatibility with older games.
>
>Both Vista and Win7 are drastically better than WinXP in terms of
>performance, stability and security, especially if you use the 64bit
>versions. These newer OS are more usable as well, as to how you conduct
>searches,

I can count on one hand the number of times I've used a windows search
function to find something. I store things in particular places so I
know exactly where to look for things - been doing that since before
Windows.

>access recently used documents,
Again I know where my docs are so if I need to re access them I just go
to that directory and there it is. The whole "Recent Documents' folder
on the start menu gets removed on my systems.

>alt-tab between full-screen
>gaming applications,

I generally only run one game at a time, so tabbing between two or more
is a moot point.

>run windowed games etc.
I rarely do this, but I've never had a problem doing it on any version
of windows I've used (95/98/XP) so it's hard to see what could be better
than no problems at all.

>I have no problems running any older game on my PC.

There are games that won't even run on XP, even in compatibility modes.
Hell there's some that won't even run on 98.

>> Not ever gamer has to play every latest game with every bell and whistle
>> imaginable enabled.
>
>Bells and whistles are one aspect (and a very important one
>traditionally for PC gaming over the decades) but to have games simply
>run better due to how the OS handles things in the background, can't
>just be waved away as a trivial thing. When I first ran Oblivion on a
>64bit OS (Vista), I was amazed to find that all level load screens when
>traveling outdoors were completely eliminated. That's when Oblivion was
>a 32-bit app. It was Vista's "Super fetch" loading world data (geometry,
>textures) in the RAM beyond the 1.3GB or so that the application could
>use, at times even in advance. And then the 64bit OS made the whole 4GB
>($20 or so these days) usable for this advance pre-fetch of data.

I don't really recall any outdoor loading screens, the only loading I
got was entering cities (if not using the outdoor city mod) or entering
caves/missions/etc.

>The end result was a better gaming experience, on the same hardware,
>just due to the change in OS.

I do rather wonder on your experience before though.

How does Vista/whatever run Morrowind - now there was a game with a lot
of outdoor loading with those small outdoor cells.

[PW]

On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 21:04:19 -0400, Tim O <timo56...@hotmail.com>
wrote:

>On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 14:28:54 -0600, PW
><emailad...@ifIremember.com> wrote:
>
>>So if I install another HD (prob an SSD) for Win8 so I can dual boot
>>with Win7, I am assuming I may have to purchase another copy of MS
>>Office, all my Adobe stuff, etc...? Will there be a licensing issue?
>>
>>-pw
>
>I think if you're considering this, you're not ready to change OS's.
>
>My original Win7 64 bit install is still running like a champ. This is
>the precarious position MS has put themselves in... They have now
>designed an OS that is so solid that they have to try and make it
>appear obsolete with gimmicks.
>

Same here! But I am curious if my software will have any issues with
Win 8 so I thought I would do a dual boot to check it out. Then
again, my clients are not early adopters. I don't know how many are
going to buy a new PC anytime soon.

[PW]

On Tue, 10 Jul 2012 11:56:42 -0700, noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom>
wrote:

I've heard that if you change any major part (motherboard, CPU, Video
card) there will be problems but I have not had that happen to me yet.

-pw

[noman]

On 7/10/2012 8:46 PM, Xocyll wrote:
> noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
> the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>
>> On 7/7/2012 8:36 AM, Xocyll wrote:
>>>
>>> I *AM* a gamer and I'm still using WinXP.
>>> Having never seen any of the bells and/or whistles available in the
>>> later DX versions I don't miss them and XP has the advantage of a
>>> smaller footprint and greater compatibility with older games.
>>
>> Both Vista and Win7 are drastically better than WinXP in terms of
>> performance, stability and security, especially if you use the 64bit
>> versions. These newer OS are more usable as well, as to how you conduct
>> searches,
> I can count on one hand the number of times I've used a windows search
> function to find something. I store things in particular places so I
> know exactly where to look for things - been doing that since before
> Windows.

The reason you don't use search is because it's a pain to do in WinXP,
even after they added the live-search feature in the task-bar.

It doesn't matter where you store the files, the fact that you can hit
the start button and type something and you get an immediate list of
matching options is just immensely helpful. And the result can be
executable programs, control panel options, documents, photos, and even
emails (the body of which carried that text). It was one of the best
features of Vista, and was carried over to Win7 and Win8.

Your lack of use of 'recent documents' can also be tied to the feature
implementation in previous OS. Vista onwards, you can pin the
applications to task bar, so the most used ones can be launched with
single click. If you right click those pinned applications, you get a
contextual menu that carries your recent usage (most often viewed/recent
folders, if it's explorer, or webpages, documents, photos, IP addresses
you have used telnet/ssh for etc) It's a wildly useful feature.

A lot of times, your usage pattern gets shaped by the tools you have at
your disposal, and not otherwise. You may get very comfortable with
those, but it doesn't mean, you can't maximize your productivity further.
--
Noman

[Xocyll]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>On 7/10/2012 8:46 PM, Xocyll wrote:
>> noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
>> the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>>
>>> On 7/7/2012 8:36 AM, Xocyll wrote:
>>>>
>>>> I *AM* a gamer and I'm still using WinXP.
>>>> Having never seen any of the bells and/or whistles available in the
>>>> later DX versions I don't miss them and XP has the advantage of a
>>>> smaller footprint and greater compatibility with older games.
>>>
>>> Both Vista and Win7 are drastically better than WinXP in terms of
>>> performance, stability and security, especially if you use the 64bit
>>> versions. These newer OS are more usable as well, as to how you conduct
>>> searches,
>> I can count on one hand the number of times I've used a windows search
>> function to find something. I store things in particular places so I
>> know exactly where to look for things - been doing that since before
>> Windows.
>
>The reason you don't use search is because it's a pain to do in WinXP,
>even after they added the live-search feature in the task-bar.

No the reason I don't use it is because I have no use for it.
I'm highly organized, I sort and separate things and when I'm looking
for something I pretty much know exactly where it is.

>It doesn't matter where you store the files, the fact that you can hit
>the start button and type something and you get an immediate list of
>matching options is just immensely helpful. And the result can be
>executable programs, control panel options, documents, photos, and even
>emails (the body of which carried that text). It was one of the best
>features of Vista, and was carried over to Win7 and Win8.
>
>Your lack of use of 'recent documents' can also be tied to the feature
>implementation in previous OS. Vista onwards, you can pin the
>applications to task bar, so the most used ones can be launched with
>single click. If you right click those pinned applications, you get a
>contextual menu that carries your recent usage (most often viewed/recent
>folders, if it's explorer, or webpages, documents, photos, IP addresses
>you have used telnet/ssh for etc) It's a wildly useful feature.

Maybe you missed the part where I said I removed "recent documents" from
the start menu. It's something else I have no use for, and so I remove
it from the start menu - I like a nice clean menu with only the things
_I_ want on it.

>A lot of times, your usage pattern gets shaped by the tools you have at
>your disposal, and not otherwise. You may get very comfortable with
>those, but it doesn't mean, you can't maximize your productivity further.

My usage pattern is shaped by what I actually use, and Microsoft adding
things I have no use for, changing how to get to things I do use and
which have had the same way of accessing since Win95 is frankly "change
for the sake of change." Ramming them at the user, with no way to shut
off those changes is why I went back to XP - sure I can turn off some of
the things, but not all of the UI changes can be disabled.

Forcing users to retrain isn't a gain in productivity, it means
productivity DROPS. Maybe the new ways might be faster once they're
learned - maybe, but there's a distinct loss first.

But really, CTRL-ALT-DELETE takes me to the task manager in 95/98/XP and
I'm guessing in ME and NT.
Only it takes me somewhere else in Win7 (and I'm assuming vista and
win8) and as far as I know there's no way to change that.

I want to go _directly_ to the task management screen when I need to go
there, not to some intermediate stage from which I can then choose to go
to it.
If I need to go there it's usually because some game/app has
crashed/locked in a way that it maxing out the CPU and it needs to be
killed NOW, not after loading some intermediate screen which of course
has to wait for CPU before it even displays.

Been there, done that in Win7, wasn't impressed at all with the extra
minute or 2 wait before I could kill the rogue app over the WinXP times
to do same.

If MS wants to add new features, by all means add new features - but
don't replace existing shortcuts with new features and relegate the old
features (if they are retained at all) to some sub-menu 2 or more layers
deep or make it a part of some other function.

Every time MS puts out a new OS they change something, usually for the
worse, just as various companies remove functions from software because
their studies show only a portion of their customers use those
functions. NOTE that I said portion, not none, and that portion are
arbitrarily deprived of things that improved their productivity.

There's a bizarre thought process going there; "Only 10% of our users
use this sort function, lets remove it." Where's the thought that says
10% of our customers use this, lets retain it since some of our
customers are still using it.

My father used an old version of Word perfect years after a good dozen
newer versions came out. Simply because they'd removed a function he
depended on, and it was a function that no other word processing
software had either.
A function that had been part of the software from day 1 and it was
suddenly, silently dropped because the majority of users didn't use it.

As a result he never bought the newer versions, so that decision cost
them a couple grand anyway just in lost sales for the word processor and
also meant he never bought any of their other products.

[JAB]

>> The reason you don't use search is because it's a pain to do in WinXP,
>> even after they added the live-search feature in the task-bar.
>
> No the reason I don't use it is because I have no use for it.
> I'm highly organized, I sort and separate things and when I'm looking
> for something I pretty much know exactly where it is.
>

Well I snipped all the rest as this is the important bit. I can honestly
say that I really don't give a crap (in the nicest possible way) about
all the new features that have been added to the UI over the last few
versions as my PC is a games PC and nothing more. That means as long as
I can play games and access the internet I'm happy. Advance searching
... well my documents are in the folder called documents, my downloads
are in the one called downloads and my pictures are in the one called
... well I think you get the idea now.

Of course if it was a work PC then I would have a different view but
it's not. I would guess that 99% of its time is spent playing games,
e-mailing, surfing or news groups. You don't need a flash interface to
do that.

[Matt v3.3]

On 12/07/2012 10:53 a.m., Xocyll wrote:

Re: searches and recent menus

>> The reason you don't use search is because it's a pain to do in
>> WinXP, even after they added the live-search feature in the
>> task-bar.
>
> No the reason I don't use it is because I have no use for it. I'm
> highly organized, I sort and separate things and when I'm looking
> for something I pretty much know exactly where it is.

I think the point is more how (quickly) you can get to it. In Win7 it
takes me two short-distance clicks to open recent [anything]. In WinXP
it used to take me several clicks and mouse movements of navigating
menus/folders. And like you, I keep my stuff well sorted, I know where
everything lives. I skipped over Vista and went from XP to Win7, and the
extra efficiency was an eye-opener. That stuff really is an improvement,
even though likewise, I previously had no use for it.

In short, what noman said [TM] :)

(Not that everything in Win7 is better though, with the hidden control
panel settings and so forth mentioned)


--
};> Matt v3.3 <:{

[Spalls Hurgenson]

On Wed, 11 Jul 2012 17:53:47 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>

wrote:

>noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
>the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>
>>On 7/10/2012 8:46 PM, Xocyll wrote:
>>> noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
>>> the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>>>
>>>> On 7/7/2012 8:36 AM, Xocyll wrote:

>Maybe you missed the part where I said I removed "recent documents" from
>the start menu. It's something else I have no use for, and so I remove
>it from the start menu - I like a nice clean menu with only the things
>_I_ want on it.

You can remove the Recent Documents menu from the start menu on WinV/7
as well

>But really, CTRL-ALT-DELETE takes me to the task manager in 95/98/XP and
>I'm guessing in ME and NT.
>Only it takes me somewhere else in Win7 (and I'm assuming vista and
>win8) and as far as I know there's no way to change that.
>

Use CTRL-SHIFT-ESC to access the task-manager
(this works as far back as Win3, IIRC and is the "official" way to
open the task manager)

(although I actually prefer to use something like Clavier+ and bind it
to Winkey+Q ;-)


Mind you, I'm not arguing in favor of WinV/7/8; if XP does the job for
you, stick with it. I run a mix of WinOS systems and all of them have
their rough edges. If/when you do transition to the next version,
hopefully the two hints above will make the switch a bit less jarring.

[Xocyll]

JAB <n...@luck.com> looked up from reading the entrails of the porn

spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>>> The reason you don't use search is because it's a pain to do in WinXP,
>>> even after they added the live-search feature in the task-bar.
>>
>> No the reason I don't use it is because I have no use for it.
>> I'm highly organized, I sort and separate things and when I'm looking
>> for something I pretty much know exactly where it is.
>>
>
>Well I snipped all the rest as this is the important bit. I can honestly
>say that I really don't give a crap (in the nicest possible way) about
>all the new features that have been added to the UI over the last few
>versions as my PC is a games PC and nothing more.

That's about 50% true for me but I take your point.

>That means as long as
>I can play games and access the internet I'm happy. Advance searching
>... well my documents are in the folder called documents, my downloads
>are in the one called downloads and my pictures are in the one called
>... well I think you get the idea now.

Indeed, that's basically how I do it, with the caveat that I also
subdivide documents, pictures, downloads, whatever by type.
IE F:\bin has the subfolders archives, demos, exes, fonts, html, pdfs,
text for those various subtypes. F: is the downloads drive.
G:\pics has 66 subfolders.

>Of course if it was a work PC then I would have a different view but
>it's not. I would guess that 99% of its time is spent playing games,
>e-mailing, surfing or news groups. You don't need a flash interface to
>do that.

Don't really need a flash interface for any of it.
Comes, I guess, from having started with computers before there were GUI
interfaces.
What I used to do with .bat files (shortcuts for starting programs) now
gets done with hotkeys - I don't navigate menus or click icons unless
it's something I use so rarely I've never set a hotkey combo for it.

[Xocyll]

"Matt v3.3" <ethers...@paradise.net.invalid> looked up from reading

the entrails of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the
signs say:

>On 12/07/2012 10:53 a.m., Xocyll wrote:
>
>Re: searches and recent menus
>>> The reason you don't use search is because it's a pain to do in
>>> WinXP, even after they added the live-search feature in the
>>> task-bar.
>>
>> No the reason I don't use it is because I have no use for it. I'm
>> highly organized, I sort and separate things and when I'm looking
>> for something I pretty much know exactly where it is.
>
>I think the point is more how (quickly) you can get to it. In Win7 it
>takes me two short-distance clicks to open recent [anything]. In WinXP
>it used to take me several clicks and mouse movements of navigating
>menus/folders. And like you, I keep my stuff well sorted, I know where
>everything lives. I skipped over Vista and went from XP to Win7, and the
>extra efficiency was an eye-opener. That stuff really is an improvement,
>even though likewise, I previously had no use for it.

Well, to each his own, but as I said I have so little use for a search
function (and the indexing overhead) I remove the search feature from my
start menu completely.
The only defaults on my start menu are programs, settings and run, I
have no use for the rest of the defaults.

>In short, what noman said [TM] :)
>
>(Not that everything in Win7 is better though, with the hidden control
>panel settings and so forth mentioned)

I hate the way MS hides things with each new OS version that used to be
more easily accessible.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Thu, 12 Jul 2012 08:56:12 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
<spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:

>Use CTRL-SHIFT-ESC to access the task-manager
>(this works as far back as Win3, IIRC and is the "official" way to
>open the task manager)

Yeah, there was a time when CTL-ALT-DEL meant warm reboot :)

I usually find myself just right-clicking the task bar to get to
task-manager these days.

[Ross Ridge]

Matt v3.3 <ethers...@paradise.net.invalid> wrote:
>I think the point is more how (quickly) you can get to it. In Win7 it
>takes me two short-distance clicks to open recent [anything]. In WinXP
>it used to take me several clicks and mouse movements of navigating
>menus/folders.

That sort of works for me with recent applications, but it rarely works
for me with recent documents. By the time I want to go back to some
document, it's been pushed off the list of recent documents by a bunch
of other junk. Applications and games I use regularily I put on the
quick lauch bar, so it not a big improvement anyways. Just that now
the icons I have pinned on the taskbar take up more space.

I never understand why people like typing things into the search box to
access everything, though. I can click through program menu and launch
one of my over 100 games installed in less time than it takes me to move
my hand from the mouse to keyboard and back again, and that despite the
fact that Windows 7 made browsing programs more clunky. When I want to
start some application half the time I don't even know what its name is.
At least search function is easy to disable though, too bad you can't
get the old programs menu back though.

My biggest complaint about Windows 7 is that Explorer longer remember
the size of the window for each folder. Now it only remember one size
for all folders, so directories with lots of files are shown at the same
size as ones with only a couple.

Every new release of Windows after Windows 98 has removed some bit of
user interface functionality I often use, while offering little in the
way of any UI improvement that actually ends up benefiting me. If it
wasn't for all the non-UI technical improvements under the hood I'd be
still be running Windows 98.

So I'm not looking forward to seeing how Windows 8 makes things even
worse for me. Especially with the Metro UI that isn't exactly getting
good reviews.

Ross Ridge

--
l/ // Ross Ridge -- The Great HTMU
[oo][oo] rri...@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
-()-/()/ http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca/~rridge/
db //

[noman]

On 7/12/2012 9:31 AM, Ross Ridge wrote:
> Matt v3.3 <ethers...@paradise.net.invalid> wrote:
>> I think the point is more how (quickly) you can get to it. In Win7 it
>> takes me two short-distance clicks to open recent [anything]. In WinXP
>> it used to take me several clicks and mouse movements of navigating
>> menus/folders.
>
> That sort of works for me with recent applications, but it rarely works
> for me with recent documents. By the time I want to go back to some
> document, it's been pushed off the list of recent documents by a bunch
> of other junk.

If you are talking about jump-lists, you can pin an object, so it always
shows up there. I have pinned explorer to my taskbar, and it's such a
time-saver to right click and pick the recently used and pinned folders.

> I never understand why people like typing things into the search box to
> access everything, though. I can click through program menu and launch
> one of my over 100 games installed in less time than it takes me to move
> my hand from the mouse to keyboard and back again,

I barely use start menu to browse through applications. I find it
useless. The applications or games I use frequently are either on the
desktop or the taskbar. For those I use less often, I very likely know
the name, but not where they might be in the start menu. So hitting the
Windows key (or the start button) followed by few letters is a big time
saver. I also use it a lot to bring up an email, based on its content.
It's just great, how the search encompasses almost every useful thing -
file names and extensions and contents (within text files, pdf, doc, xml
etc), applications, control panel objects, system functions, email
headers and contents etc

> At least search function is easy to disable though, too bad you can't
> get the old programs menu back though.

If you mean indexing-service, then disabling it is possibly one of the
worst things you can do to your PC. The overhead of running it is pretty
much zero. It also takes the backseat, letting up on CPU usage, when
someone is actively using another application.

> My biggest complaint about Windows 7 is that Explorer longer remember
> the size of the window for each folder. Now it only remember one size
> for all folders, so directories with lots of files are shown at the same
> size as ones with only a couple.

Yes, this is annoying. I think Windows 8 also behaves this way, but I'll
check again.
--
Noman

[noman]

Yes, that's how I bring up task manager when the PC is responsive.

On a side-note, the task manager in Windows 8 is simply awesome. I am
not sure how this type of project got approved internally at MS. No one
would have complained if they kept the old one, and a less than minute
percentage of users would ever dig in to see the enhancements.

As absurd as it sounds, I'd say that the new task manager alone is
enough reason for me to upgrade to Windows 8.
--
Noman

[noman]

On 7/12/2012 9:31 AM, Zaghadka wrote:
> On Tue, 03 Jul 2012 13:30:33 -0700, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
> noman wrote:
>
>> 2) Hugely improved task manager. It's just amazing.
>
> But probably nothing MS can't roll back into Vista SP3 and/or Win7 SP2,
> for "genuine" users. I mean, it's not like the thing has a "ribbon"
> interface, and it runs under the DWM, right? Is there a Metro version of
> it/does it use Metro or Win8 specific stuff?
>
> Seems like a carrot to me, is all I'm saying. It is purty though.
>

I think, it can be easily brought back into previous OS. It has nothing
to do with metro. However, I don't see anyone spending time and money to
do the backporting and then to do QA. I am surprised just by the fact
that this feature made it into Windows8.
--
Noman

[fer...@i'm.still.not.keen.on.spam]

Have you tried Classic Shell from sourceforge? Not quite as good as
the Windows 2000/XP classic shell, but a vast improvement over the
default Vista/7 UI.

And you can get the Quick Launch bar back too:
www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/888-quick-launch-enable-disable.html
Pinning things to the Task Bar has never appealed to me.

And I must be doing something wrong, because I've never gotten the
much-praised Windows 7 Search to find anything useful. I use Super
Finder XT instead, but there are others.

[Ross Ridge]

Ross Ridge wrote:
> I never understand why people like typing things into the search box to
> access everything, though. I can click through program menu and launch
> one of my over 100 games installed in less time than it takes me to move
> my hand from the mouse to keyboard and back again,

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote:
>The applications or games I use frequently are either on the
>desktop or the taskbar.

I do the same, but that's nothing new. Windows 95 let you have
application shortcuts on the desktop and Windows 98 let you have them
on the task bar.

>For those I use less often, I very likely know the name, but not
>where they might be in the start menu. So hitting the Windows key (or
>the start button) followed by few letters is a big time saver.

The fact that doing this forces my hand off the mouse means that, for
me at least, doing this ends up taking more time.

>> At least search function is easy to disable though, too bad you can't
>> get the old programs menu back though.
>
>If you mean indexing-service, then disabling it is possibly one of the
>worst things you can do to your PC. The overhead of running it is pretty
>much zero. It also takes the backseat, letting up on CPU usage, when
>someone is actively using another application.

I ment the search function, but I also have the indexing service disabled
as well. Its overhead isn't even close to zero, and for me its always
going to be a complete waste whatever it is. I have absolutely no use
for it, so there's no reason for me to have it enabled.

[Sheldon England]

FWIW, I am of the same opinion as Xocyll and the others who don't just
upgrade OS for the sake of upgrading.

At work we have Windows 7, XP, and even an old 98 machine so I am
familiar with and use them all. I am also a recovered former Mac user
for context.

At home I stick with XP because it does more than I need. I am primarily
a gamer with a bit of writing, desktop publishing, and general
browsing/e-mail. I probably use 2% of it's functions.

I may use Word three or four times a year, Excel maybe once every couple
years. I have been using MS Word since the mid-1980s and since then it
has not added a single new feature that I have a use for. Sure, you can
awkwardly create a publication with it ... but I prefer to use desktop
publishing software for this. I use Photoshop for editing images,
InDesign for page layout, Illustrator for illustrating, etc. I don't
need an all-in-one that sorta does the same thing but in a clunky,
bloated pile of software.

On my home PC I have one icon on the desktop ... the recycling bin. All
the applications I use and games I play frequently are on the quick
launch bar or in the start menu. All of my documents are stored in "my
documents" in various directories of organization. All of my photos are
stored in "my photos" in various directories of organization. Etc.

I have never used the Explorer search to find a program or file and
don't know how that could be faster than looking where I purposefully
stored it. I never even use Internet Explorer for anything.

Yes, I may miss out on some graphic sizzle because of the DX limit but I
have seen the sizzle through vids and it just isn't incentive. As I once
posted -- if it were the difference between 5% cool and 95% cool I would
be motivated. Instead, it is like the difference between 97% cool and
99% cool. I can live without that 2%.

Windows 7 hasn't impressed me enough to move. Windows 8 isn't even on my
RADAR. I guess I have until mid-2014 to "upgrade".


- Sheldon, PC gaming Luddite

[KCB]

"noman" <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote in message
news:jtndns$91o$1...@dont-email.me...

Yes, that does sound absurd.

[Xocyll]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>On 7/12/2012 9:31 AM, Ross Ridge wrote:
>> Matt v3.3 <ethers...@paradise.net.invalid> wrote:

<snip>

>If you mean indexing-service, then disabling it is possibly one of the
>worst things you can do to your PC.

Why on earth would disabling something you don't use even come close to
being a "worst thing"?

If you don't use it, there's no possible reason to leave it running,
that's just wasting resources.

One of the first things I do with any new install of windows is
disabling all the services Microsoft has turned on by default that I
have no use for whatsoever.

Gee I wonder why I have always had rock-solid systems that went for
years without ever needing a reinstall (even when popular wisdom said
they needed regular reinstalls?)

The worst thing you can do to your PC is leaving an OS in it's default
install mode. One size does NOT fit all.

[Xocyll]

Rin Stowleigh <rstow...@gmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails

of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>On Thu, 12 Jul 2012 08:56:12 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
><spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>Use CTRL-SHIFT-ESC to access the task-manager
>>(this works as far back as Win3, IIRC and is the "official" way to
>>open the task manager)
>
>Yeah, there was a time when CTL-ALT-DEL meant warm reboot :)

Same basic decision tree.

Oh no, the machine has locked up, Reboot it.
Now it's the machine has locked up, bring up the task manager and maybe
you'll be lucky enough to be able to kill the locked up app instead of
rebooting.

Speaking of crash rebooting (and the inevitable drive checks) why on
earth did Microsoft put a press key to abort the drive check in and a
longish timeout before it would proceed, why isn't there a press a key
to start it now option? Especially since only an idiot _wouldn't_ check
the drives after a crash.

Lets make people doing the right thing, wait even longer, while the
impatient can click a key and skip the check and fuck their system up -
great setup there Microsoft.

>I usually find myself just right-clicking the task bar to get to
>task-manager these days.

Doesn't work very well when you're in a full screen app (game) and
there's no bar to click on when things lock up.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Fri, 13 Jul 2012 10:27:16 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>
wrote:

True, but then again an extra mouse click following CTRL-ALT-DEL is
nothing to complain about either, especially assuming you're going
there to kill a locked up app. Multi-purposing the keystroke
combination to also do things like logout and switch users was a
logical choice given the evolution of Windows.

[Xocyll]

Perhaps you missed the previous message where I mentioned that the extra
step caused a delay of a couple minutes before I could even get to the
task manager due to the intervening screen and a huge delay in it even
displaying.

Lockups in the past (under XP) have had the task manager pop up IF and
only if C-A-D was hit almost instantly - any delay and the machine just
locked.
Sometimes the task manager didn't even display properly, but the app
names appeared and could be selected if you were lucky and the rogue app
killed.
In some of those cases (under XP) and you got the task manager up and
then by mistake changed focus away from it, you couldn't get back ever,
only do a hard reboot.

Put an intervening screen in there and the chances of even getting TO
the task manager much less being able to actually do anything when you
get there get much, much smaller.

Sometimes you only have seconds to kill the app before it locks the
machine - putting an intermediary step on the way to the manager just
wastes time and makes that lockup more likely.

IF MS wants to add login and such crap to that, they should make it an
option you turn on if you want - not just do it whether you want it or
not.
Random changes to the UI are not benefits.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Fri, 13 Jul 2012 11:59:24 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>

I've had my current machine for over three years (upgrading only the
video card), and I've done this countless times in various games and
never seen a delay in bringing up the task manager or screen before
it. What are your system specs?

[noman]

On 7/12/2012 6:21 PM, Sheldon England wrote:

> I have never used the Explorer search to find a program or file and
> don't know how that could be faster than looking where I purposefully
> stored it. I never even use Internet Explorer for anything.
>

With Vista and Windows7 the search is not some special separate feature
that you have to select and then type in a text and choose from few
options. It's integrated into the OS itself. Hit the start button and
type, let's say "2011 tax", and you'll get the document, an email that
may have that in the body or header, or a song or a photo. You are
presented by the options instantaneously, since the OS indexes the
document/photo/mail/download folders (and any additional ones you may
want to add)

If you write "Witcher", you get a link to run or uninstall witcher, any
user guide/walkthrough and patches for that game that you may have
stored on the PC. You can even see where the saved-games are stored,
based on the folder name.

It's amazing how well it works.
--
Noman

[noman]

On 7/13/2012 8:21 AM, Xocyll wrote:
> noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
> the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>

>> If you mean indexing-service, then disabling it is possibly one of the
>> worst things you can do to your PC.
>
> Why on earth would disabling something you don't use even come close to
> being a "worst thing"?

First of all, I was implying that Windows Search is an extremely useful
feature of the OS and turning the service off affects that. It doesn't
take meaningful resources away from you.

Second, doing that to various parts of the OS without exactly knowing
what's going on doesn't help either.

> If you don't use it, there's no possible reason to leave it running,
> that's just wasting resources.

Modern OS are far better in managing resources than you think. They are
also very adaptive, letting go of the CPU or the physical memory if they
detect user activity or resource conflicts.

Also you are not always sure of inter-dependency between different OS
features.

> The worst thing you can do to your PC is leaving an OS in it's default
> install mode. One size does NOT fit all.

I'd never suggest anyone to go ahead and start disabling OS services, at
least not through the services panel. If there's a control panel applet
for it (for instance Indexing Options), then at least there's an
indication that someone thought about how the user experience would be
with these services on or off.

In general leaving the OS as is, presents you with far fewer problems.
--
Noman

[Ross Ridge]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote:
>I'd never suggest anyone to go ahead and start disabling OS services, at
>least not through the services panel. If there's a control panel applet
>for it (for instance Indexing Options), then at least there's an
>indication that someone thought about how the user experience would be
>with these services on or off.

Windows Search can be disabled using the "Turn Windows features on or
off" option in the "Program and Features" control panel. Turning it
off effectively uninstalls it, there's isn't even a service to disable
anymore. Note that the Indexing Service listed there is an entirely
different feature, an old obsolete search index that's disabled by
default.

[Xocyll]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>On 7/13/2012 8:21 AM, Xocyll wrote:
>> noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
>> the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>>
>>> If you mean indexing-service, then disabling it is possibly one of the
>>> worst things you can do to your PC.
>>
>> Why on earth would disabling something you don't use even come close to
>> being a "worst thing"?
>
>First of all, I was implying that Windows Search is an extremely useful
>feature of the OS and turning the service off affects that. It doesn't
>take meaningful resources away from you.

It's useful to YOU, some of us have no fucking use for it at all.
Ross made it perfectly clear he had no use for the search function, so
leaving part of it running all the time is sheer idiocy.

>Second, doing that to various parts of the OS without exactly knowing
>what's going on doesn't help either.

It's not hard to find out what things do - google is your friend.

>> If you don't use it, there's no possible reason to leave it running,
>> that's just wasting resources.
>
>Modern OS are far better in managing resources than you think. They are
>also very adaptive, letting go of the CPU or the physical memory if they
>detect user activity or resource conflicts.

It doesn't matter how good they are at managing resources.
The very act of managing them uses resources.
An app or service that isn't running isn't consuming ANY resources,
ever, nor can it cause conflicts with other software.

[Which could certainly be the fault of the other piece of software, but
who cares. If I want/need to use App X and it has conflicts with some
service I don't use, the solution is not to keep the service and lose
the app. Losing the unused service to start with means I never have to
find out if it conflicts with anything.]

>Also you are not always sure of inter-dependency between different OS
>features.

It usually not too hard to find out and some of it is dead obvious.

>> The worst thing you can do to your PC is leaving an OS in it's default
>> install mode. One size does NOT fit all.
>
>I'd never suggest anyone to go ahead and start disabling OS services, at
>least not through the services panel. If there's a control panel applet
>for it (for instance Indexing Options), then at least there's an
>indication that someone thought about how the user experience would be
>with these services on or off.

And there's other service MS want to have running even if you have no
use for them and they're on by default and some of them don't have any
way to shut em off except the services panel in the admin tools.

There's things in there that are also set to automatic or manual that I
want completely disabled.
Netmeeting (don't use it),
Automatic Updates (I never let ANYTHING ever auto-update - I monitor
updates and make sure they can be backed out of if there's a problem,
they don't get to just apply themselves any time they like),
Clipbook (don't use it),
Remote Assistance, Remote Registry (Changes to this system are made from
this keyboard, nowhere else),
Smart Card (not a whole lot of use to have running on a computer with no
place to put a smart card),
Uninterruptible Power Supply (there isn't one),
Wireless Zero Configuration (I don't use wireless networking, but this
service is on by default, even in machines that don't have a wireless
adaptor.)
Oh and how about the Print Spooler also on by default - even though this
system does not have a printer to access.

Even the things that are normally set to manual so they can start - I
don't want anything able to start them, since they're services that I
have no use for.

These are things that are of use to some people, and things MS thinks
everyone might have a use for, so they get enabled by default (or are at
least available to be use for something like remote desktop assistance.)

They're of no use to me, so they're all disabled.

>In general leaving the OS as is, presents you with far fewer problems.

Right, that's why all MS's OSs have been so rock solid and stable right
from install.
Oh wait, didn't both Win95 and Win98 have reputations as OSs you had to
reinstall every 6 months or so? We won't even touch on WinME.

Funny, my systems didn't need to be reinstalled, but then I never left
the MS defaults in place so my systems were actually stable.

[Xocyll]

This one is a Quad core Phenom 955 with a GTX550Ti.

I first installed Win7 on this machine's previous incarnation - An
Athlon64 with a AGP nVidia 6800 card.
It was around for a bunch of years because _everything_had to be
upgraded at once and it took a bit of time to save for, since I had
other things (games, DVDs) that my cash also went for.
No big deal to save for a video card - takes longer when it's a new
motherboard, and CPU, and RAM, and Video Card, and harddrive and a new
power supply to run it all.


As for the time it takes, it's going to depend on the CPU usage - get an
app that's gone rogue and using 100% and opening any other screen is
going to take time - resources are maxed.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 16:01:00 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>

I've never seen the overall CPU go to 100% in my current machine (that
would imply all four cores are pegged, and even my most CPU intensive
activity -- audio production, doesn't come close to that level of
utilization). I've seen the mixer thread hit 80% on a single core
during lots of intense synthesis, and that can cause popping/cracking
and other nasty surprises that force me to start looking into more
effencient ways of utilizing CPU (like bouncing down tracks).

But in games? Not even close.

[Xocyll]

Depends what else you have running.
I currently have 2 apps running, Firefox displaying one page, no tabs,
and Agent. I'm currently at 51% CPU usage because I have various @Home
tasks running (and it's configured to only use up to 50% of CPU - was
75% at one point but I dropped it down since some games actually mange
to use more than one CPU core these days.) Those are running 24/365.

>But in games? Not even close.

Again, depends what else is running not everyone shuts everything off
when running a game.

I have 4 cores so I use them as much as possible; first 2 for whatever
I do manually including gaming, cores 3 and 4 for @home tasks.

I've tried shutting the @home stuff off but it turns out it really has
minimal effect on gaming if any at all, so there's not much point.


I don't turn off my computers unless I'm doing a hardware change, which
is one of the other reasons I find the win7 intermediate screen annoying
- I use log in functions so rarely, having them pop up instead of the
task manager is very annoying to me.

Once again MS assumes that everyone turns their machine off every day
and/or changes accounts. I do neither.

[Rin Stowleigh]

On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 19:48:00 -0500, Xocyll <Xoc...@kingston.net>

Generous of you to donate electricity to SETI. But, I think your
perspective on MS here is a limited one. MS is writing software for a
very large audience. Your opinion seems founded in the belief they
should prioritizeyour individual tastes over the collective needs of
that audience.

[Xocyll]

The problem is that that intermediary screen isn't a small popup window
(like the task manager), it's full screen, so instead of a small window
popping up over the full screen app that won't close or let you tab out,
you're trying to change focus for another full screen and it fails to
display properly or takes forever to display at all.

If they wanted an all-in-one screen like that - why link it to an
existing hotkey combo that people expect to do something else?
Why not just link it to something else, F10 ctrl-alt-F10, whatever.
Why overwrite something that already does something?

Rebooting the machine
Windowskey, uparrow, enter, choose standby, shut down or restart (or
click your way there.) I can literally have a reboot going a second or
so after deciding I need to do so.

Last I checked, the win7 one defaults to shutdown and I have to click on
a dropdown menu to even choose to reboot instead.

And it requires a mouse, which is a problem if the mouse dies (or the
trackpad) or the mouse driver is scrambled by an app or game (it's
happened to me in the past, which is why I like that WinXP and previous
have hotkeys as well as mouse click points.)

That's a gratuitous UI change, it's MS saying "We think you should do
this, this way. Yes, we've been telling you to do it that other way for
17 years, but we changed our minds so now you have to do it this way."

Or how about moving the system configuration stuff.
Or admin tools (which incidentally take a LOT longer to load than under
XP.)
I just loved changing drive letter under Win7's disk management;
Click on drive, choose change letter, drop down menu, choose letter,
click ok or apply. Error message: "The Parameters are incorrect"

I had to google to find tools in Win7 that have icons in the control
panel under win95->WinXP.

Or the fact that Win7 has taken a huge leap backwards when it comes to
drive letters; Win95 and 98 required to be on the C: drive, Windows XP
(from it's NT roots) would install anywhere and would happily be the Z:
drive if you wanted.

Win7 will install anywhere and then arbitrarily declare that whatever
drive that is is now the C: drive, so if you have apps that actually
depend on accessing something on the actual C: drive - that have links
to that, you have to go in and change YOUR settings (if you can) to
accommodate Windows.

Or how about the "That stuff belongs to the other OS on this computer,
you can't even LOOK at it much less touch it" crap.
installing the same game under Win7 as under XP, and I wanted to copy my
settings over to win7, only win7 wouldn't even let me access the root
folder, much less get to the actual files.


It's MY computer and I'm the only person who ever uses it and here is
windows telling me I'm not allowed to access my own files.

Reboot to XP, copy files out to another drive then reboot to win7, copy
files into appropriate folder.

This is not progress, this is MS telling you how you are going to use
your computer.

I'm not 8 years old and Microsoft isn't my Mother, I'm not interested in
them telling me they know what's best for me.

[noman]

On 7/14/2012 1:51 PM, Xocyll wrote:
> noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
> the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>

>> First of all, I was implying that Windows Search is an extremely useful
>> feature of the OS and turning the service off affects that. It doesn't
>> take meaningful resources away from you.
>
> It's useful to YOU, some of us have no fucking use for it at all.

That's like someone who can perfectly walk, telling me that the
wheelchair is fine, and he'd never walk.

>> Second, doing that to various parts of the OS without exactly knowing
>> what's going on doesn't help either.
>
> It's not hard to find out what things do - google is your friend.

More than half the articles you will find on the net about this topic at
various tech sites are irrelevant at best, and utter garbage at worst.
That's the bad part of this information age, where misinformation and
misconceptions also spread quickly and folks quickly form opinions based
on little to no knowledge and corner cases. That's why SecuROM is the
biggest evil in the world for some, Origin is a spyware, Vista sucks and
hard-disk activity means super-fetch or indexing should be disabled. I
still see folks giving useless recommendations, where installing a
driver means you have to reboot PC multiple times in and out of safe
mode, wiping the registry clean, because that's what worked for someone
on one occasion.

>> In general leaving the OS as is, presents you with far fewer problems.
>
> Right, that's why all MS's OSs have been so rock solid and stable right
> from install.
> Oh wait, didn't both Win95 and Win98 have reputations as OSs you had to
> reinstall every 6 months or so? We won't even touch on WinME.
>
> Funny, my systems didn't need to be reinstalled, but then I never left
> the MS defaults in place so my systems were actually stable.

First of all, this is an idiotic argument. Second, google searches are
unfortunately not enough to make these kinds of decision for most folks.
Often times, you end up with a solution for a symptom, which simply
needed an explanation.

Going back to your example, unless you are running a 486 with 4MB RAM
and Win95, enabling all the default services that you disabled will not
impact any game/app/desktop performance one bit. Your OS will still be
stable. And one day, you may even stand up from your wheel chair and walk.
--
Noman

[Ross Ridge]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote:
>That's like someone who can perfectly walk, telling me that the
>wheelchair is fine, and he'd never walk.

Huh? I think it's more like you're a cripple telling everyone they
should own a a wheelchair because you never know when you might end up
needing one.

[Xocyll]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>On 7/14/2012 1:51 PM, Xocyll wrote:
>> noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
>> the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:
>>
>>> First of all, I was implying that Windows Search is an extremely useful
>>> feature of the OS and turning the service off affects that. It doesn't
>>> take meaningful resources away from you.
>>
>> It's useful to YOU, some of us have no fucking use for it at all.
>
>That's like someone who can perfectly walk, telling me that the
>wheelchair is fine, and he'd never walk.

That's a particularly idiotic comparison.

I don't do searches on my computer, I already know where everything is.

Just because it's useful to YOU doesn't mean it's anything more than
wasted resources to someone else.

You wouldn't keep a wheelchair around your house just on the odd chance
you might possibly need one sometime would you?

Keeping a service I don't use running on the off chance I might just
forget everything and have to have Microsoft find my stuff for me is,
well, like buying meteor insurance. The chances of my ever needing it
are so slim they're effectively zero.

>>> Second, doing that to various parts of the OS without exactly knowing
>>> what's going on doesn't help either.
>>
>> It's not hard to find out what things do - google is your friend.
>
>More than half the articles you will find on the net about this topic at
>various tech sites are irrelevant at best, and utter garbage at worst.
>That's the bad part of this information age, where misinformation and
>misconceptions also spread quickly and folks quickly form opinions based
>on little to no knowledge and corner cases. That's why SecuROM is the
>biggest evil in the world for some, Origin is a spyware, Vista sucks and
>hard-disk activity means super-fetch or indexing should be disabled. I
>still see folks giving useless recommendations, where installing a
>driver means you have to reboot PC multiple times in and out of safe
>mode, wiping the registry clean, because that's what worked for someone
>on one occasion.

And it's not hard to figure out which sites those are.

Everything on the net needs to be taken with a grain of salt - no single
source is ever trustworthy. However if multiple trustworthy sites all
say the same thing, it's a pretty good bet the information is right.

>>> In general leaving the OS as is, presents you with far fewer problems.
>>
>> Right, that's why all MS's OSs have been so rock solid and stable right
>> from install.
>> Oh wait, didn't both Win95 and Win98 have reputations as OSs you had to
>> reinstall every 6 months or so? We won't even touch on WinME.
>>
>> Funny, my systems didn't need to be reinstalled, but then I never left
>> the MS defaults in place so my systems were actually stable.
>
>First of all, this is an idiotic argument.

Not really, the OS was widely believed to be so unstable and crufty it
had to be reinstalled regularly. I believe people said it slowed down
over time as the registry got more and more fragmented (or something
like that.)
I ran a lean, mean striped down version with only things necessary being
run, and my installs of Win95/98 ran for _years_ without reinstalls, and
very few crashes.

>Second, google searches are
>unfortunately not enough to make these kinds of decision for most folks.

I'm not most folks. Ross isn't most folks.

Most folks don't even know how to do a decent google search.

>Often times, you end up with a solution for a symptom, which simply
>needed an explanation.

That's one explanation.

>Going back to your example, unless you are running a 486 with 4MB RAM
>and Win95, enabling all the default services that you disabled will not
>impact any game/app/desktop performance one bit. Your OS will still be
>stable. And one day, you may even stand up from your wheel chair and walk.

I'm not in a wheelchair. My OS does everything I need it to and doesn't
do anything I don't want it doing.

I notice you carefully clipped out all the examples I gave of services
either running by default or being able to be run that are of no
possible use to me. Services that have no business ever running on my
system.

I prefer to make my own decisions and remove things MS thinks I need,
but that I don't actually need, or want.
Do what works for you, I'll do what works for me.

You're as likely to convince me I need MS's Search function as you are
to get me to join the Hari Krishnas. Your odds of either are longer
than you winning the next hundred lotteries with Million+ dollar
jackpots, in a row.

[noman]

On 7/17/2012 6:56 PM, Ross Ridge wrote:
> noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote:
>> That's like someone who can perfectly walk, telling me that the
>> wheelchair is fine, and he'd never walk.
>
> Huh? I think it's more like you're a cripple telling everyone they
> should own a a wheelchair because you never know when you might end up
> needing one.

Cripple or not, I can still find a file, folder or email based on its
name or content, faster and in a more intuitive way compared to what
either one of you can do. I win :)
--
Noman

[noman]

On 7/17/2012 11:32 PM, Xocyll wrote:

> I don't do searches on my computer, I already know where everything is.
>

You can't know where everything is, on your PC. You can't find a list of
files immediately (word documents, text and emails) that mention the
word "FXAA". It's not a matter of opinion. You are hampered by your
habits (I won't call them needs, because they aren't) and don't want to
come out of your comfort zone.

> Everything on the net needs to be taken with a grain of salt - no single
> source is ever trustworthy. However if multiple trustworthy sites all
> say the same thing, it's a pretty good bet the information is right.

But that's the thing, the abundance of information about a topic on the
net has no bearing on the accuracy or relevancy of that information.

> I prefer to make my own decisions and remove things MS thinks I need,
> but that I don't actually need, or want.

Ok, I won't post further on this topic.
--
Noman

[Ross Ridge]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote:
>Cripple or not, I can still find a file, folder or email based on its
>name or content, faster and in a more intuitive way compared to what
>either one of you can do. I win :)

No, we win. We don't have to search for files, folders or e-mail
messages. We're not crippled.

[Ross Ridge]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote:
>You can't know where everything is, on your PC. You can't find a list of
>files immediately (word documents, text and emails) that mention the
>word "FXAA". It's not a matter of opinion. You are hampered by your
>habits (I won't call them needs, because they aren't) and don't want to
>come out of your comfort zone.

Wow. Why would I need a list of files with some random word in them?
I need to know where a specific document is, and I can easily and
intuitively I find it in the "Documents" folder. I don't need a list
of irrelevent junk, like a screenfull of crash reports that my recent
experiment with Windows Search spammed me with.

Obviously Windows Search is very useful to you. I'm sure you would be
lost without it. But not everyone has a bajillion documents scattered
randomly about their hard disks. Some people either don't have a lot
documents or keep their systems well organized so they can access files
quickly. People like this don't need Windows Search.

You really are the cripple saying everyone should own a wheelchair in
case they ever become crippled.

[Xocyll]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

Oh so now you're saying that MS's search function will open _any_ email
client and search email for you?


Funny you mention intuition;
I'm looking for a particular pic, but I don't remember the directory
it's in or it's name - how is Microsoft's Magical Search going to help
me?

On the other hand going to my pics directory and looking at the
sub-directory names can spark the memory of which sub-dir it's in or at
least likely candidates, then I can look in it/them and find the pic,
even if it has a name like 3030516816_a41fba523d.jpg (that's a picture
of a knitted miniature Freddy Krueger btw.)

More importantly, memory can shortcut things again if there's several
possible choices, since looking at the pics in that sub-dir can make me
remember if the one I'm looking for is among the ones I've seen in that
sub-dir already or if I should switch to another choice.


IE I'm looking for a particular picture of my sister's cat, I know they
were saved, but I don't remember where.
I go to G:\pics and see that I have a nokia_pics dir, and since the pics
were taken with my nokia phone, that's where it would be, but it takes
seeing that name to remember that - they could just as easily been saved
under the cat's name.
However there's 200 pics there, all in the format Image0000.jpg - no
search function in the world is going to tell me which one I'm looking
for, only looking at them and I didn't even remember the format until I
saw the files.


Seems like all search can do in that situation is jump me to the pics
directory, and since that's the _shortest_ part of the journey to the
pic, that's really not a whole lot of help - Ooh, Ahh, MS search saved
me 1/3rd of a second in a search that took a couple minutes to complete.

Since getting there manually takes all of one second, it probably
wouldn't even save that much time.

[Xocyll]

noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> looked up from reading the entrails of
the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say:

>On 7/17/2012 11:32 PM, Xocyll wrote:
>
>> I don't do searches on my computer, I already know where everything is.
>>
>
>You can't know where everything is, on your PC. You can't find a list of
>files immediately (word documents, text and emails) that mention the
>word "FXAA". It's not a matter of opinion. You are hampered by your
>habits (I won't call them needs, because they aren't) and don't want to
>come out of your comfort zone.

I have no need of finding a list of files mentioning FXAA.
Oh and btw, have you heard of grep?
I have no word files.
As I asked in the other message, does MS's search function search ALL
possible email clients.
[I use a cloned copy of Agent for email, since I was doing usenet before
I did email and I have no use whatsoever for all the html and such bells
and whistles most email clients are infested with - plain text only
thanks.]

>> Everything on the net needs to be taken with a grain of salt - no single
>> source is ever trustworthy. However if multiple trustworthy sites all
>> say the same thing, it's a pretty good bet the information is right.
>
>But that's the thing, the abundance of information about a topic on the
>net has no bearing on the accuracy or relevancy of that information.

Did you perhaps miss that important word in what you quoted above.
Let me make it more clear for you - TRUSTWORTHY sites. As in they
actually verify the information they have articles about - that's a far
cry from multiple kiddies' Geocities sites all repeating the same
misinformation. Or whatever the new geocities is these days.

Professional sites that present misinformation as fact don't stay around
very long since they kill their own reputation as a source of facts.

>> I prefer to make my own decisions and remove things MS thinks I need,
>> but that I don't actually need, or want.
>
>Ok, I won't post further on this topic.

[unibalm]

On Wed, 18 Jul 2012 23:01:21 -0400, Ross Ridge
<rri...@csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:

>noman <no_...@zzzyahoo.yycom> wrote:
>>You can't know where everything is, on your PC. You can't find a list of
>>files immediately (word documents, text and emails) that mention the
>>word "FXAA". It's not a matter of opinion. You are hampered by your
>>habits (I won't call them needs, because they aren't) and don't want to
>>come out of your comfort zone.
>
>Wow. Why would I need a list of files with some random word in them?
>I need to know where a specific document is, and I can easily and
>intuitively I find it in the "Documents" folder. I don't need a list
>of irrelevent junk, like a screenfull of crash reports that my recent
>experiment with Windows Search spammed me with.
>
>Obviously Windows Search is very useful to you. I'm sure you would be
>lost without it. But not everyone has a bajillion documents scattered
>randomly about their hard disks. Some people either don't have a lot
>documents or keep their systems well organized so they can access files
>quickly. People like this don't need Windows Search.
>
>You really are the cripple saying everyone should own a wheelchair in
>case they ever become crippled.
>

Do you really keep all your "documents" in a "Documents" folder? I
think I organize my partitions, folders, files, programs, working
projects, etc., in a fairly logical order -- but as I've moved from
mega to giga to terabytes of info, and as my projects have become more
complex, I find myself using search more and more. One thing I use
it for is to select a partition, folder, or subfolder, and collect all
files of a certain type, then move them to a dedicated folder. So I
use it to help keep my filing system neat and efficient.

No matter how efficient my folder/file structure I still find search
indispensable just to save time rooting around. For example in a gfx
project I might have several gigs of pics with only a relatively small
percentage of them having passed thru' a beta stage where it's
worthwhile to collect them in a program like lightroom for
processing/elimination. During a project I'll collect folders of pics
to use just for research and inspiration. Many times, weeks after
I've left a stage of a project behind, I'll want to revisit certain
ideas/pics and all I'll remember is general folder/file structure so
as a first resort I'll search in a group of folders and subfolders for
a string of letters. In 3D projects search is even more handy.

It works for me. I wouldn't be lost without it but I sure would be
slowed down. Does that make me "crippled"?

[Ross Ridge]

unibalm <uni...@csipga.zzzz> wrote:
>Do you really keep all your "documents" in a "Documents" folder?

Basically. There's a Documents folder were the few OpenOffice and
other documents that I actually created are in. There's a docs folder
with subfolders that has all the documents (mainly PDFs) I downloaded.
Pictures go in the Pictures folder and Videos go in the Video folder,
etc...

I don't have a lot documents on my PC, and I need to find one I know
where it should be.

>[...] One thing I use

>it for is to select a partition, folder, or subfolder, and collect all
>files of a certain type, then move them to a dedicated folder. So I
>use it to help keep my filing system neat and efficient.

To find files by type you don't need a search tool like Windows Search
that indexes the contents of files.

>[...] Many times, weeks after

>I've left a stage of a project behind, I'll want to revisit certain
>ideas/pics and all I'll remember is general folder/file structure so
>as a first resort I'll search in a group of folders and subfolders for
>a string of letters.

If you're searching by file name, then that's also something you don't
need Windows Search and its index of file contents for. If you're
searching picture metadata, then you're in the relatively rare position
of having something to search for. All my images are named something
like IMG_1234.JPG and it would take much longer to tag them all than the
total time I've spent having to find a specific image. (And as most of
my pictures aren't of people they'd just unhelpful tags like "tree" or
"flower".)

>It works for me. I wouldn't be lost without it but I sure would be
>slowed down. Does that make me "crippled"?

Sounds like have a bijallion files scattered over your hard drive, so
yah, in the metaphor I adapted from noman's, you are. Some people can
benefit Windows Search, some people won't. If you're like me and have
no use for it then there's no reason to have enabled on your PC.

Not everyone does a lot on their PC. They browse the WWW, they play
games, they don't generate a lot of documents. It's not like Windows
Search is some great pancea, either. It doesn't automagically present you
with whatever document you happening to be thinking of. It just changes
the problem from having to know where to find a document to knowing what
to search for to find it. Unfortunately, most people aren't that good
at coming up with search terms.

[unibalm]

On Sat, 21 Jul 2012 10:08:50 -0400, Ross Ridge
<rri...@csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:

>unibalm <uni...@csipga.zzzz> wrote:
>>Do you really keep all your "documents" in a "Documents" folder?
>
>Basically. There's a Documents folder were the few OpenOffice and
>other documents that I actually created are in. There's a docs folder
>with subfolders that has all the documents (mainly PDFs) I downloaded.
>Pictures go in the Pictures folder and Videos go in the Video folder,
>etc...
>
>I don't have a lot documents on my PC, and I need to find one I know
>where it should be.
>

Fair enough.
I have a lot of documents with various extensions, some of which have
multiple backups going back to earlier stages of a work, branches of a
work, etc. These'll often be correlated with image types model types
script types etc, and I'll periodically be forced to create new
subgroupings, hence to collect files of the general kind that fit
those subgroups, then winnow it down. Windows search makes things
like that easier (as well as batch rename utilities, etc.)

>>[...] One thing I use
>>it for is to select a partition, folder, or subfolder, and collect all
>>files of a certain type, then move them to a dedicated folder. So I
>>use it to help keep my filing system neat and efficient.
>
>To find files by type you don't need a search tool like Windows Search
>that indexes the contents of files.
>

You don't seem to be talking about the windows search function
detailed in "help: windows search". Because that's exactly the
function that windows search is made for. I don't know what you mean
by "indexes the contents of files". Windows search indexes by
filename, extension, date, etc., not by content. When I do a search
over a large volume, a partition etc., I'll tell win7 to remember the
result so future searches are much faster.

>>[...] Many times, weeks after
>>I've left a stage of a project behind, I'll want to revisit certain
>>ideas/pics and all I'll remember is general folder/file structure so
>>as a first resort I'll search in a group of folders and subfolders for
>>a string of letters.
>
>If you're searching by file name, then that's also something you don't
>need Windows Search and its index of file contents for.

Well, you're wrong. If I didn't have windows search I'd have to use
the search function of a third party filebrowser app.

>If you're
>searching picture metadata, then you're in the relatively rare position
>of having something to search for. All my images are named something
>like IMG_1234.JPG and it would take much longer to tag them all than the
>total time I've spent having to find a specific image. (And as most of
>my pictures aren't of people they'd just unhelpful tags like "tree" or
>"flower".)
>

Yes, I see. But yours is a very simple case.
By the way, I also disable windows functions (and a lot of third party
functions that are auto-enabled on install, but that I don't use),
because it speeds up boot time and just seems to make my PC run much
cleaner. If someone doesn't need windows search then sure, why not
disable it? But I'm not sure that you understand the function, or at
any rate how it might be used -- or of course it might be that you're
speaking of some other windows search than that detailed in "help:
windows search"

>>It works for me. I wouldn't be lost without it but I sure would be
>>slowed down. Does that make me "crippled"?
>
>Sounds like have a bijallion files scattered over your hard drive, so
>yah, in the metaphor I adapted from noman's, you are.

Well, that isn't quite fair, since I explained above how I use windows
search to help organize my folder structure and make it more
efficient.

>ome people can
>benefit Windows Search, some people won't. If you're like me and have
>no use for it then there's no reason to have enabled on your PC.
>

Right. and I wouldn't therefore call you "crippled" since there's
nothing to cripple. But it's a plain fact that in my case, and in the
cases of many others, it would be crippling to disable windows search
- not liberating.

>Not everyone does a lot on their PC. They browse the WWW, they play
>games, they don't generate a lot of documents. It's not like Windows
>Search is some great pancea, either. It doesn't automagically present you
>with whatever document you happening to be thinking of. It just changes
>the problem from having to know where to find a document to knowing what
>to search for to find it. Unfortunately, most people aren't that good
>at coming up with search terms.
>

I find that as my usage gets more complex I'll begin to embed search
terms in filenames: category, sub-category, sub-sub, "bak", "copy",
etc. So when I find that convenience dictates that I make a new
folder I can e.g. do a search for a term that re-occurs in many
categories. After search collects them I can copy them to the new
folder, wherein I might do a batch rename.

[Ross Ridge]

unibalm <uni...@csipga.zzzz> wrote:
>You don't seem to be talking about the windows search function
>detailed in "help: windows search". Because that's exactly the
>function that windows search is made for. I don't know what you mean
>by "indexes the contents of files". Windows search indexes by
>filename, extension, date, etc., not by content.

No, I'm talking about Windows Search. What it does that I can't do as
easily without it is provide fast searches of the content and metadata
of documents, at least for the document types it understands. Like the
example noman gave earlier, without it I can't quickly get a list of
all the documents on my computer containing the word "FXAA".

If all I want to search for files by name I can do it from the command
line. For example, to move all the JPEG images from one directory tree
to another I could use the "robocopy" command.

[noman]

On 7/22/2012 9:03 AM, Ross Ridge wrote:
> unibalm <uni...@csipga.zzzz> wrote:
>> You don't seem to be talking about the windows search function
>> detailed in "help: windows search". Because that's exactly the
>> function that windows search is made for. I don't know what you mean
>> by "indexes the contents of files". Windows search indexes by
>> filename, extension, date, etc., not by content.
>
> No, I'm talking about Windows Search. What it does that I can't do as
> easily without it is provide fast searches of the content and metadata
> of documents, at least for the document types it understands. Like the
> example noman gave earlier, without it I can't quickly get a list of
> all the documents on my computer containing the word "FXAA".
>

Yes, but since filenames and extensions are also part of search index,
they show up in the result as well. Search for FXAA may show up a file
as well, with that in its name. You can type Dirt2 and the save-game
folder will show up, as it's part of My-Documents.

You can even type some generic questions and get immediate (and almost
always relevant) links that take you to that OS function. For instance
you can type "add user", "disable aero", "adjust sleep options" etc.

The fact that all of that is integrated in one place, and the search
results can be files, folders, emails, OS functional links etc makes
this quite a handy feature.

> If all I want to search for files by name I can do it from the command
> line. For example, to move all the JPEG images from one directory tree
> to another I could use the "robocopy" command.

These days, I use the search box in explorer window for these
operations. It's quite easy to go to the parent folder, type err..
"mentalist", and then move all the files elsewhere.

Talking about explorer, I am getting more and more impressed by the new
ribbon bar in Windows8. I keep it minimized, but often times when
managing files, it can pop up a functionality that earlier used to be
buried deep within nested menus.
--
Noman

[noman]

On 7/19/2012 8:17 AM, Xocyll wrote:

> I have no need of finding a list of files mentioning FXAA.
> Oh and btw, have you heard of grep?
> I have no word files.
> As I asked in the other message, does MS's search function search ALL
> possible email clients.

If the email client is storing the messages as a text file, then you can
just add that particular file-type to the indexer. If it has a
proprietary format, then you can install filters (provided by the email
client developer for example) to index the content. For instance, when
you install Adobe PDF reader, it installs a PDF content filter for
Windows search.

Of course, Windows Mail (Outlook or Live Mail) are supported by default.

Nice thing is that you hit the start button and type what you are
looking for, and the search results are almost always very relevant.
--
Noman