Swag? - I think not.
After all the commotion this week about Windows 8 being shown off at the Microsoft BUILD conference and the subsquent developer release, I was rather exited to get my hands on it. I did cheat a little, I decided to virtualise it because creating new partitions and such seemed like too much effort! Setting it all up using Virtual Box was as smooth as was expected. It was only after the log on screen that the huge disappointment began.
Firstly Windows Live ID? - Nobody has used this since they were 13 and went on MSN messenger, so making somebody create an account when setting up Windows seems a bit backwards. Google integration would have been nice but its no deal breaker. Anyway after logging you a presented with this brand new start menu - shown below. Its called metro and it looks very nice, but after about 10 seconds of using it you start to realise this isn't particularly useful for a pc. This is what my major complaint is, the whole OS from ground up is being designed for use not only on PC's but on tablet computers as well. This means you get the traditional desktop and the new start menu, switching between the two gets annoying very fast.
The desktop infterface is familiar from Windows 7 and my only issue is that they have introduced the ribbon interface from office into Windows Explorer, which gives a slightly cluttered feel and doesn't feel like something I could get used to using. Aside from this not much has changed on this side.
Switching back to metro -Something which your going to need to get used to! , It has its own version on iInternet Explorer designed in the metro interface, a Facebook app called Socialite (Which I will admit is rather nice) and a twitter app called Tweet@Rama - which again is good. But all three of these apps only have any real use on a Tablet - oh and did I mention the Metro Internet Explorer does not support flash. You need to switch to desktop IE for that. Why? I haven't a clue. There are few games in this developer version and other bits to fill out the Metro start menu and they all work well, its just they don't feel like they are at home on your desktop.
On a positive side, the OS as a whole seemed to perform as well as Windows 7, even I reduced the VM to basic 2GB Ram and only one core it still seemed snappy. But my question really is why are Microsoft trying to kill two birds with one stone? Apple aren't doing it, they are just adding some consistency between the two OS's that they make which is why there are now some similarities between IOS and OSX. Android is separating its phone OS from its tablet OS, so why aren't Microsoft.
Most PC users will never use this Metro interface, it will get too annoying switching between two IE's and the back and forth from the desktop. Microsoft need to take this and make Metro it's own OS in itself and make Windows 8 a decent desktop OS.
With the age of the cloud rapidly approaching and many users shifting away from tradition desktops I think Microsoft could be in for a shock if they don't make some changes soon.
Now I know this was only a developer build and things can change between now and when its released but in its current iteration the above are my views, and the fact that they have made this preview avaliable to all says to me that this is something very close to what they want in the final version. I just hope they take everybodies feedback on board before they go ahead and release what could be another Vista. -
In other words - Check yourself before you wreck yourself!
