Windows 8

Craig Gerard · Post by **Craig Gerard** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 5:56 am

Has anyone dived into Windows 8?

I'm preparing to take the plunge. The 'Advisor' does not highlight any significant alerts regarding software and peripherals related to my system.

If you've been there and done that, it would be good to receive your feedback.

Craig

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 7:42 am

Craig,

My son,, who uses it mainly for games, says he would not uprate from 7 to 8.

You may find helpful videos on YouTube.

I have no plans to move from XP, at least until support ends in early 2014. I believe that handling large numbers of images in stack series could be the decider but I am unclear about that.

Harold

ichbtm · Post by **ichbtm** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 8:52 am

I did the jump in december but I came back to 7 as my new usb drivers didn't recognized my external stockage as formatted anymore (usb keys, usb drives...)
I search a solution during some days and didn't found one so I came back.
I would suggest you to do a backup of your entire system disk before the installation.

pierre · Post by **pierre** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 11:17 am

I do change for win8 pro since 2 months.

Well... it works...

I don't use a touchscreen PC model so the main interfaçe is a bit bothersome as I need to switch often with the "classical" desk
for my Photo apps.

Maybe it's not so complicate to complety swap to the new desk, but it seems it will take some times to find where all the things I need are.

Otherwise: performance still same as Win7.

DQE · Post by **DQE** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 11:19 am

Background: I am inherently an early adopter of new software and hardware, usually preferring to quickly acquire the latest versions of computer-related stuff. For example, I upgraded to Photoshop CS6 from CS5 as soon as I could, mostly to gain access to some new features. I have a large, custom-built PC tower running 64-bit Win 7. It has multiple hard drives, dual video cards, and assorted hardware add-ons. Another bit of background - I both used and managed large and small computers for several decades before retiring and thus I am in various ways not a typical PC user as I enjoy my computer-related retirement hobbies.

Re converting from Win 7 to Win 8, I wouldn't regard spending the 4+ weeks (full-time equivalent) that would be required to do a clean install of Win 8 an enjoyable or good use of my time unless there is a commensurate benefit. It's mostly the installation and configuration of my zillion software packages, multiple hardware devices, etc, that takes so much time. I don't personally trust an "install in place" and I would only consider doing a full, clean install and then a full reinstallation of all my applications and hardware.

I haven't investigated how many of my essential (mostly photography-related) applications will actually work in Win 8, but I doubt it's 100.0%.

After studying the issue of 8 vs 7 to a significant extent I concluded that the risk/benefit and the cost/benefit ratios are simply not favorable for me. For me, time lost to fiddling with PC upgrades and reinstallations is the important cost, not the financial cost of upgrading to Win 8. Also, and perhaps equally important, the benefits of converting to Win 8 from Win 7 simply aren't obvious for me, as best I can tell.

Also of importance, my Win 7 installation is very stable, seldom hangs or crashes, and I've never lost a hard drive due to Win 7 going bonkers. I consider Win 7 to be the best OS Microsoft has yet provided, far better for my purposes than XP. Note that I didn't have too much trouble with Vista once it was updated and aggressively fine tuned.

Perhaps it all comes down to the aphorism "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". Just my personal opinion, and YMMV.

Sorry I can't provide direct experience with Win 8, but I hope my comments are still of some use.

[Assorted minor edits, mostly typographical and grammatical]

PRC · Post by **PRC** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 3:08 pm

FWIW - my day job is developing software and hardware solutions on windows platforms.

For the last few years I have used 32bit Windows 7, when at the end of 2012 I changed my development system I went to 64 bit Windows 7 as many of my stacks & Photoshop adventures were choking my older 32 bit OS ( not a work issue at all ).

After playing with Windows 8 I paid the 25 GBP upgrade and have loved it - the only issue I had was that some of my USB drivers were unsigned and Windows 8 protested a bit before allowing me to use them - if you trip over that issue let me know and I will post some instructions as to how.

All of my software worked with no issue with the exception of Autocad 2002 which protests a bit on startup but works ok after.

Paul C

Craig Gerard · Post by **Craig Gerard** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 3:18 pm

Thanks for the responses, they appear to be in alignment with general consensus.

I've backed up my Win 7 installation via Acronis and may install Win 8 on a separate hard drive before unleashing it on my entire system.

Touchscreen capacity is a feature of Win 8 but a touchscreen is not required; however, separate touchpads are available if you are
accustomed to or prefer such methods of interaction. Logitech have a number available and my current keyboard has a small, integrated touchpad.

I anticipate it will be somewhat disorientating at first but fully expect to tame it within a reasonable amount of time.

Ignition sequence start.......6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 (see you when I return

)

Craig

Len Willan · Post by **Len Willan** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 4:41 pm

As” one of our more quiet readers” to paraphrase Craig in an earlier post, I have been musing over the same dilemma for the last few months.

Harold in a very important recent post (Tue Apr 26, 2011) Starting From Scratch with a New PC : http://photomacrography.net/forum/viewt ... ng+scratch

It covers the multitude of questions that one has to ponder about and Craig’s new post bringing the vastly different Windows 8 into these discussions is both timely and apt,( not to be confused with Windows APPS !)

I am very strict about my use of two computers:-

1) The Work Station Computer, deliberately kept isolated from the Internet and its multitude of afflictions, here is the repository of valuable software like Zerene Stacker, Photoshop, for an example

2) The Internet Computer, used for Web Browsing, email and all other non archival work, this computer I regard as expendable.

As mentioned by Craig and other contributors Windows 8 in conjunction with its ability of 64 bit, creates the possibility of allocating and using more RAM, which is becoming more important by the day in a computer used as a work station.

Much is said about convergence in computers/ apps/ IPods/ television these days, but I would still prefer using a Windows Classic Screen and getting on with the job in hand.

Thank you to the many contributors to these parallel discussions and I can assure you that I will quietly watch this discussion evolve.

klevin · Post by **klevin** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 5:02 pm

OP,

Why do you want to upgrade? I'm not aware of any significant new functionality for us non-touch screen users, no improved security features etc. Tests have shown no big speed improvement.

So why bother?

Craig Gerard · Post by **Craig Gerard** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 5:28 pm

Installation went through without any drama thus far.....exploring further.

Craig

Craig Gerard · Post by **Craig Gerard** » Sat Jan 05, 2013 11:20 pm

Len wrote:Much is said about convergence in computers/ apps/ IPods/ television these days, but I would still prefer using a Windows Classic Screen and getting on with the job in hand.

Len,

The Windows Classic Screen is still available, so too the traditional desktop interface. The 'Start' menu has gone, or more accurately, has been replaced with additional, modular functionality and a highly customisable, interactive panel which appears at 'startup' and/or when you run your mouse over the top-right corner of the screen and select 'Start' from the flyout panel. Selecting the 'search' icon on the aforementioned 'flyout' reveals all application and program icons arranged in alphabetical order, but you can arrange them in whatever groups you choose to nominate or create and click and scroll or swipe through the extended panel. The actual search feature itself is outstanding, there is no need to look through your list of apps and programs, just type the name in the box and you are presented with a clickable icon. Access to the Control Panel and other 'settings' are also readily accessible and under the surface the layout of such dialogue windows is very similar to Win 7. Shortcuts pinned to the taskbar are still available when viewing the Classic Desktop, not much has changed in that respect.

If you happen to feel 'lost', just hit the Windows tab on your keyboard and remember there are hotspots on the edges and corners of the screen and a classic desktop module on the 'Start' panel. Right-clicking an app or program icon located on the 'Start' screen or the 'Start' screen background itself will reveal additional options via a panel which appears at the base of the screen.

Moving your mouse toward the left side of the screen initiates the appearance of another flyout panel which lists in thumbnail form all the currently opened applications; these can be opened or closed from this location. Aero is gone and this is a good omission in my opinion.

There is also a number of keyboard shortcuts which allow for rapid navigation of the interface.

I'm still finding my way around; there are some minor inconsistencies, but these could mostly be attributed to the process of acquainting myself with a new operating system.

I've also found it necessary to address some minor software issues; a few downloads were required to update programs such as EOS Utility and DPP, etc. I chose not to do a 'clean' install and the overall transition was virtually flawless, keeping in mind my system was built for Win 7 x64 so most of my hardware and software were already acclimatised to such an environment. My system drive is an SSD and holds only the OS and program files, all other files, including TEMP, and Internet files are stored on a separate HDD.

The first thing you may feel compelled to change is the desktop background image for the 'Classic Desktop', the default image is ghastly.

Whilst typing this post I noticed the appearance of a spell checker highlighting typos, this must be part of IE 10 as it was not present in earlier versions.

Initial, overall impressions....this is not merely a cosmetic makeover but rather a clever step in the right direction by Microsoft with due consideration of the inevitable "convergence" matters you've specifically mentioned whilst not neglecting the concerns of users more familiar with what could be described as a 'traditional' GUI workspace.

Craig

Chris S. · Post by **Chris S.** » Sun Jan 06, 2013 1:31 am

Craig Gerard wrote:Selecting the 'search' icon reveals all applications and program icons which are arranged in alphabetical order, but you can arrange them in whatever groups you choose to nominate or create. The search feature is outstanding, there is no need to look through your list of apps and programs, just type the name in the box and you are presented with a clickable icon.

Craig, can you make this list of applications permanently display as words, rather than icons, and span multiple columns that may cover the whole screen or multiple screens, as in Windows XP? Or is it limited to a very small size as in Windows 7? Something I greatly miss from XP is having all my applications displayed in a well-organized list that spans multiple columns. Searching for applications doesn't work well when you don't know all the applications' names--which I find to be the case. Not that I don't remember apps such as Photoshop, Zerene Stacker, or Excel. But how about the half-dozen file renaming utilities, the two-score tools for recovering data from bad hard drives, four or five photo browsers, the dozen applications for password recovery, etc.? Some of these, I might use only once in a couple of years. In XP, the all programs list could be organized like a well-run library (even if most people didn't take the time to do this, so their "all programs" list was a chaotic mess). Some propose that Microsoft crippled the all programs display to drive people to use the search feature, and this may be true. I miss the approach a great deal--has it returned?

Since the Windows 8 release, I've built two systems, one of them for myself, one for someone else. For both, I chose Windows 7, partly because published reviews and specs don't show much benefit from Windows 8 for non-touchscreen use. The classic display has been said to run as an additional application, which might add system overhead. And I have a policy not to install a Windows OS less than six months from its release date, and preferably a year. I like to let others work out the bugs, and watch to see if corporations adopt the new OS. As is well-known, Vista was widely rejected by corporate customers--and deservedly so, in my opinion. I found it to be utterly wretched to support.

Len, if you're still using a 32-bit OS for your workstation, you will probably see a big jump in performance when moving to 64-bits and a ton of memory. More still (though in different ways) if you add an SSD for your OS and apps. Craig is keeping his temp files off his, but I'm letting mine store on the SSD. There are arguments for either approach, and I'm still on the fence about which is best. But an SSD is a wonderful thing--much faster than a spinning hard drive. These improvements will surely make a much larger difference than the choice between Windows 7 or 8. Of course, 64-bit processing is available in Windows 7, and indeed, also Vista and XP.

I had been doing most of my photo processing on a 32-bit XP computer that I built four or five years ago. It has been rigorously maintained, and was running as fast as the day it was born. For an image stack I tested, the conversion from raw to tif files was taking 24 seconds per image (the Nikon conversion software had to do a lot of dust spotting for this image, which takes time). Given that this was a fairly deep stack, the conversion was going to take all night. On the new computer, it was under 3 seconds per image--and this before tweaking. After tweaking, it was more like 1.5 seconds. What a huge time saving for deep stacks!

Craig, since you did an OS upgrade rather than a fresh install, you probably can't answer this question, but I'll put it out anyway. Your approach of keeping OS and apps on one drive, and user files on another, represents a best practices approach for most users. As you likely know, it makes system maintenance--especially system recovery in the event of malware infestation or drive crash--vastly easier. I was shocked, in Windows 7, at how difficult this was to set up. It should be the default, but it is not. And setting it up requires jumping through some substantial hoops (the Microsoft advice is easy, but represents only a partial approach; doing a more thorough job is harder). Have they streamlined this in Windows 8? (Again, you probably haven't experienced with in Windows 8, as your OS upgrade likely copied this configuration from your prior Windows 7 installation.)

Cheers,

--Chris

Craig Gerard · Post by **Craig Gerard** » Sun Jan 06, 2013 5:45 am

Chris S. wrote:Craig, can you make this list of applications permanently display as words, rather than icons, and span multiple columns that may cover the whole screen or multiple screens, as in Windows XP? Or is it limited to a very small size as in Windows 7? Something I greatly miss from XP is having all my applications displayed in a well-organized list that spans multiple columns. Searching for applications doesn't work well when you don't know all the applications' names--which I find to be the case. Not that I don't remember apps such as Photoshop, Zerene Stacker, or Excel. But how about the half-dozen file renaming utilities, the two-score tools for recovering data from bad hard drives, four or five photo browsers, the dozen applications for password recovery, etc.? Some of these, I might use only once in a couple of years. In XP, the all programs list could be organized like a well-run library (even if most people didn't take the time to do this, so their "all programs" list was a chaotic mess). Some propose that Microsoft crippled the all programs display to drive people to use the search feature, and this may be true. I miss the approach a great deal--has it returned?

Chris,

I haven't delved that far into the possibilities yet, but suffice to say, there is no restriction to the real-estate available on the application/program list panels. When referring to 'panels' I am talking about full screen... panel after panel, after panel, possibly ad infinitum. I did see a demonstration on YouTube, but I've absorbed so much information in the past 18hrs I can't recall at present just which video dealt specifically with the customisation of the application/program list facility.

Craig

Len Willan · Post by **Len Willan** » Sun Jan 06, 2013 1:43 pm

Thank you Craig and Chris for your enlightenment to me and the practicality of your explanations.

The road forward is now obviously 64- bit . Rik, once again your advice is also well taken.

“When you upgrade, get 64-bit Windows. 32-bit Windows is too tight for 25 megapixels with Zerene. “

--Rik http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... hp?t=13061

microcollector · Post by **microcollector** » Mon Jan 07, 2013 4:12 pm

I started with Win 8 with the first public beta release and have had no problems with it. I did a clean install so had to reinstall programs. Data was backed up to external drives. It has made a huge difference in the boot time. I had no problems with CS6, Lightroom 4, Gimp, Zerene. Shape 7, or any other of my programs. I have found a few websites that do not play well with IE10. These are government sites related to my retirement accounts. They are usually very slow to make changes to be compatible with new browsers. Their explanation is that IE10 is not yet a public release. I am also using Office 2013 beta and Sky Drive and have found that to work well.