The Glade 4.0

BTW, anybody know of any way to skin Windows 8 so it looks more 3 dimensional? Even Windows 3.11 had a faux-3D look with raised buttons and shadowing under windows and such. Every iteration of Windows since has improved the look. But Windows 8 abandoned this and goes back to a very two dimensional look, I find it rather ugly, despite it still using the Aero interface engine. Windows 7 was by far the prettiest of them. Anybody know of a way to change that look in 8?

_________________
Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

You mean you don't love this?



Personally I dislike nearly everything about the aesthetics (and usability) of Windows 8, although I do agree with you, it is superior to Win 7 in almost every other way.

Which is based on Windows 8, and which certainly does not mention anything about many of the things I mentioned, such as its obnoxious update habits. Even Windows 7 is obnoxious; there should be an option for "no".



This does not seem to have helped us avoid losing a battleship in the middle of a mission.



And yet, the desktop you showed had them, and your descriptions seem to indicate that you're stuck either with the tiles, or with a right-click menu. You can't get the cascade.



I didn't object to you using it; I object to the characterization of it as some sort of revolutionary improvement when it has such an obvious drawback. You can do whatever you want; I don't care. I'm pointing out why I would never use it.



Maybe you should ask him then? I'm going based on the way things are now for Windows 8. 8.1 may be a major revision, but it's best to be conservative in estimating how it will change things. Right now, I certainly don't see that it would be useable without the shell program. As for Midgen, he can speak for himself.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

None of these represent meaningful improvement to me. In fact, getting away from cascading menus is a major drawback IMO. Cascading menus are unbeatable in terms of compromising speed, categorization, and ease of use. When EQ got cascading menus for memorizing spells it was the best interface update they ever had. It's so easy to see and understand what you have and go to the right submenu rather than try to absorb every option at once.

Number of clicks is meaningless unless you're talking about a MAJOR reduction, like 5:1 or more. Clicking is easy.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I'll just be over here basing my opinion on real world use instead of conjecture.

I, and I'm pretty sure Talya, are also basing our opinions on real world use.

Yeah, and I'm pretty sure DE's friend in EVE Online who spontaneously reboots when he doesn't want to should go in and change his update settings.

_________________
Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

Of 8.1?

Because clearly I should not listen to people who actually use it.. oh wait, that would be you. Clearly I should only base my opinion on YOUR real-world opinion.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Stop making this excuse. 8.0 is the best information most people have. If you've gotten to use it and others haven't that hardly gives you license to dismiss the reason people are suspicious of it based on the way its base version works. Performance estimates should always err to the conservative.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

How is it an excuse? It's available for free for anyone to use straight from Microsoft right this second. Use it and make your own opinion, just don't try and act like your opinion matters if you refuse to even try it.

I didn't see it in my update list.

_________________
Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

My opinion certainly does "matter" to whether I use it, no one's opinion matters (individually) to microsoft, and if you think criticisms based on the base version are invalidated in general because the 8.1 patch makes specific changes, you've lost your mind.

Speaking of which, trying an OS for free on my computers sounds about like losing my mind as well.

You're using "it's 8.1 not 8.0" as an excuse to dismiss Midgen and Talya. It's still Windows 8 until Windows 9 or whatever comes out.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

You can get it through the MS Store, or an .iso here: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/wind ... w-download



I didn't dismiss them, I just asked if they had used it. If not, maybe hold off on comments like "I'm keeping classic shell" until they have. You, though... Yeah, I'm completely dismissing anything you have to say about it. If you're not interested in ever using Windows 8 or its upgrades, what are you even doing in here? This thread is for people that use it and wish it was a bit better, and I'm here to say it is.

I haven't downloaded 8.1 because there is zero point to it.

I'm quite happy with 8.0 and Classic Shell.

I actively use the three systems I currently have running Win 8. My gaming machine, my HTPC, and my Samsung gaming laptop. They are serving me quite well as they are.

I've seen enough of what 8.1 has to offer to know that, while it's improved over 8.0 from the Metro/Desktop standpoint, it's still not enough to keep me from using Classic Shell.

I will install 8.1 when I feel like I have some free time to risk installing it (or if I decide I need to rebuild something), assuming that I can verify ahead of time that Classic Shell will run on it.

I'll try to verify for you tonight, I don't know why it wouldn't work anymore.



It's very much worth the update I think, even if the start screen changes are ignored. I've made very much use of the snapping feature since it's been updated, the menus are much better, search is much better, store is completely revamped, better multi-monitor support... There's a lot of stuff in this update.

No need, I just checked their release notes

Does that 8.1 install actually do a full-on reinstall of Windows? Any idea if the 8.1 GM release will require a reinstall of 8.1?

_________________
The Dude abides.

I believe I read that the preview version of 8.1 is not upgradeable, and will require reinstallation of your apps.

Found a source: http://news.softpedia.com/news/Upgrading-from-Windows-8-1-Preview-to-RTM-Will-Remove-All-Installed-Apps-358777.shtml

Preview to RTM can't be upgraded, but a current install can be upgraded to preview, AFAICT. I started from a fresh partition myself, Windows can sync all of your settings anyway, and ninite + MS Store app list makes getting back up and running a breeze.

And I pointed out that I would need a shell like Midgen uses in order to be one of those people, at which you had to do one of your "LOL functionality" posts. I'm interested in Windows 8 and its upgrades because eventually, there won't be support for Windows 7 anymore, and I'll be stuck with this.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I downloaded the preview for 8.1 (thanks Lenas!), loaded it into a VM and spent the next couple of hours doing what I've always done with any new Windows version for the last several iterations...

Trying to make it look and operate like XP.

No outright hate for it, but I prefer the WIn7 Pro I have installed on my work laptop. If I were building a new box today I'd try to find 7 Pro to load on it, just 'cause I'm most familiar with that and I'm not seeing any compelling reason to upgrade.

As a fairly experienced computer user, after playing for a couple of hours with Windows 8.1 it feels kinda clumsy in the gui on a non-touchscreen device. It looks flat and no previous experience with iOS, OS X, previous Windows, Gnome or KDE, CDE, Motif, or SunView/SunTools gave me a boost to the learning curve except in the most fundamental way. I don't think that's a good thing.

_________________
In time, this too shall pass.

Taskiss,

If you still have your VM running, try installing Classic Shell and see how you like it.

For my money, Win 8[.1] with Classic Shell is superior to Win 7, but it will still take a little getting used to.

Thanks! Yeah, that addresses the issues that would prevent me from using 8.1 instead of 7...

With that, I'd use 8.1 on a new build. I don't want the UI experience (or my lack of experience with the UI) to get in the way of running programs.

_________________
In time, this too shall pass.

Pretty easy, I imagine. Set it to boot to desktop and apply a gray theme + classic shell. Windows 8 desktop is probably more similar to XP visually than Vista or 7 were.