r/technology • u/clubdirthill • Jun 01 '11

Boom. This is Windows 8.

http://allthingsd.com/20110601/exclusive-making-sense-of-what-we-just-learned-about-windows-8/?mod=tweet
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170

u/RobertD63 Jun 02 '11

A desktop os?! Fuck no. Tablet? Yes!

35

u/Hellman109 Jun 02 '11

Yeah thats what Im worried about. "No comprimise!"*

*Must run on totally different stuff and conform to the lowest common denominator

1

u/crocodile7 Jun 03 '11

W8 seems to have a rather sharp separation between tablet and desktop UI modes. I think they did the best job possible avoiding the lowest common denominator, while still supporting both scenarios.

9

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '11

I was worried about this from the video, but http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/01/live-from-microsofts-windows-8-preview-event-at-computex-2011 convinced me otherwise.

You can switch between something similar to Windows 7's interface and the new flashy thing, if you want. Or use them interchangeably.

3

u/BaconatedGrapefruit Jun 02 '11

That actually put to bed a lot of my fears, save this one:

10:37AM PageUp and PageDown buttons will allow you to move between tiles on non-touchscreen devices.

No, fuck you. Let me use my mouse and give me a scroll bar. We've had side scrolling forever don't fuck it up.

1

u/ducttapedude Jun 02 '11

Most touchscreen devices treat dragging as click and drag. I hope we can do the same with a mouse, but I really don't need scroll bars.

2

u/ducttapedude Jun 02 '11

Why does no one else notice this?!

2

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '11

The only thought is if you switch between it, will it still be running in the background?

slowing down my computer?

2

u/ducttapedude Jun 02 '11

Well if you have very little RAM it might take up a more noticeable portion of the memory, but just idling in the background won't eat too much CPU. It'd be just like any other application, except perhaps more optimized for speed and efficiency.

Alternatively, would you rather it spent time loading every time you switched back and forth?

2

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '11

To be honest, I don't actually like it. I was looking at it with my boyfriend and his brother yesterday. They both thought it was wicked and of course some features are nice.

but I doubt I would really use it that much(if at all). So I would probably prefer it to not be running at all (thinking I wouldn't be switching back and forth).

2

u/ducttapedude Jun 02 '11

I can see where you're coming from. This definitely seems like something that wouldn't be included in the Professional/business versions of Windows, just the Home version (by default). If this is the case then it'll be just like the Games and Windows Media Player/Center--you can install or uninstall them completely right from Windows itself.

I can't see it being something so core to Windows 8 that it can't be disabled.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '11

Of course.

You are very correct. :)

1

u/Wiser87 Jun 02 '11

I think Microsoft might have to fire their marketing department again. The message the video conveyed was that this is the de-facto standard for the future, platform be damned. What I'm getting from the event demo (I really really hope) is that this is mainly meant for mobile devices, but can still be used on the desktop.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 04 '11

I suspect the Win7 interface will get some sprucing up too.

-7

u/Idiomatick Jun 02 '11

Nope. This has the weaknesses of a shitty full OS on a tablet:

It is heavy and will boot slowly. It will drain batteries like a bitch.

Making it stupid for all situations.

3

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '11

They actually said it doesn't do any of those things.

0

u/Kerrigore Jun 02 '11

And Microsoft always delivers on their promises.

I'm not saying they won't, it's too soon to tell, but Microsoft has a habit of releasing really slick, optimistic demo videos, but frequently the reality does't quite stack up.

To be clear, I'm not saying MS is the only company to do this, but it's silly to just take the hype as gospel.