WINDOWS 8.
It's unusual, to say the least, for us to spend a year with a product before publishing our review. In the case of Windows 8, we've written thousands of words already, starting with our first hands in September of 2011, followed by deep dives on the Developer Preview, Consumer Preview, Release Preview and RTM build. Even our readers have had ample time to get acquainted with the OS. it's been available as a public download since February. And yet, we've never tested a final version of the software running on brand new, made-for-Windows-8 hardware. With the OS now on sale (alongside dozens of new PCs), it's finally time for us to double back and revisit everything we've previously written in the form of a final, comprehensive review.And what a challenging assignment this was: it's hard enough to give an OS the full review treatment without burying the reader in minute details. It's even tougher when the software was built for so many different kinds of hardware. Combining a traditional desktop with Windows Phone inspired Live Tiles, Windows 8 was designed to be equally at home on traditional PCs and more finger friendly devices, like tablets and hybrids. In addition to walking you through the operating system's various gestures and built in apps, then, we'll spend some time talking about which form factors are best suited to this redesigned version of Windows.
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| Available in Tablets Windows Phone and PC. |
USER INTERFACE.
As you've probably heard by now, the Start button is
no more. Well, it's there, but you'll have to hover with your mouse in the
lower-left corner to make it appear. So, it's exactly where you'd expect it to
be. it's just hidden until it's clear you need it. And what if you're using a
touchscreen PC, like a dockable tablet? Your device will almost certainly have
a dedicated Start button, the same way every Windows-compatible keyboard has a
Start key. You can also find a shortcut to the Start menu in the Charms Bar,
which you expose by swiping in from the right side of the screen. Not being
able to click on the Start button is an adjustment, to be sure, but we're also
confident you'll fall into a rhythm pretty quickly. After all, hovering where
the Start button used to be isn't that different from clicking it, and hitting
the Start key with your pinkie feels natural as well.
When Windows
users say they wish Microsoft hadn't axed the Start button, what they're really
nervous about is the fact that the Start Menu is presented so differently. When
you hit the Start key, you'll no longer see a stack of fly-out menus; instead,
you'll be whisked away from the desktop to a full screen assortment of
finger-friendly Live Tiles, which you scroll through from left to right. In
other words, that minimal, unfamiliar screen is the new Start
Menu.
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| Interface Mode |
PERSONALIZATION OPTIONS.
To some extent, you can control the look and feel of Windows 8. No, there's no bringing back the Start button, but you can select different color themes for your Start Screen. Toward the end of the Windows 8 development process, Microsoft added so called Personalization Tattoos essentially, Start Screen backgrounds with patterns and borders. So long as you're signed into your PC using a Microsoft account, this, too, will follow you to other Windows 8 devices you might log into. Get another Win 8 PC down the line, and it will show your paisley background as soon as you sign in for the first time.
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| Personal configured |
DESKTOP.
In a move that will please power users, Windows 8 also ushers in improved multi-monitor support, with the ability to display different desktop backgrounds on multiple displays, as well as have a single picture span those various screens. You also have the choice of expanding the Taskbar across those monitors, or setting it up so that a pinned program only appears on the same screen where that app is running. All told, it's a welcome improvement, though it would be nice if you could run Modern UI-style Windows 8 apps on more than one monitor at a time. Also, if you do have a multi-monitor setup, you'll find it's trickier than usual to pull up the Charms Bar using a mouse.
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| New Design |
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| An office in your PC |
GAMES, MUSIC AND VIDEO.
Out of the box, Microsoft's Music app includes free, ad supported streaming, available in 15 markets to start. Though the games compatibility is still somewhat compartmentalized, this music streaming feature will work across Windows 8, Windows Phone 8 and Xbox. Obviously, Microsoft has been in the business of selling music for some time, so by now its catalog is quite voluminous at 30 million songs. If you like, you can purchase Xbox Music Pass, an ad-free subscription, for $10 a month. Under this plan, your songs will follow you from device to device, just like the rest of your settings. Here, you'll also get the option of downloading music and listening to it offline, which you can't do with the free, ad supported service. Similar to iTunes, too, Music includes a matching feature that takes music you already had stored on your computer and finds the cloud-based version.
Out of the box, Microsoft's Music app includes free, ad supported streaming, available in 15 markets to start. Though the games compatibility is still somewhat compartmentalized, this music streaming feature will work across Windows 8, Windows Phone 8 and Xbox. Obviously, Microsoft has been in the business of selling music for some time, so by now its catalog is quite voluminous at 30 million songs. If you like, you can purchase Xbox Music Pass, an ad-free subscription, for $10 a month. Under this plan, your songs will follow you from device to device, just like the rest of your settings. Here, you'll also get the option of downloading music and listening to it offline, which you can't do with the free, ad supported service. Similar to iTunes, too, Music includes a matching feature that takes music you already had stored on your computer and finds the cloud-based version.
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| Entertainment |
WINDOWS STORE.
When Windows 8 went
on sale a few days ago, Microsoft said the Windows Store was home to thousands
of apps, though it declined to provide a precise number. For now, there are no
first-party apps for Facebook and Twitter, which remains true on Windows 7 as well.
Other missing biggies include: Foursquare, Mint, PageOnce, TripIt, NPR, Draw
Something, Words with Friends, Temple Run, Spotify, Springpad, Remember the
Milk, Instapaper, Pocket Flipboard, Steam, Instagram, Nook and Rdio. Still,
there's reason to think many of these will arrive soon enough: in the weeks we
spent working on this review, Netflix, The New York Times, Skype, Hulu Plus,
Fruit Ninja, Angry Birds, Zinio and Bank of America all went live in the store.
Dropbox, ESPN and PayPal are all coming soon, according to Microsoft.
Navigating the store feels like using any
other Windows 8 app; you'll start off by seeing recommended apps, along with
tiles for new releases and the top free apps. Keep scrolling to the right and
you'll see apps broken down by category, such as social or entertainment.
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| Buy your apps in Windows Store |
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| Download and install app in your PC |
SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
According to Microsoft, Windows 8 requires 1GB of RAM and 20GB of free disk space. Other system requirements include a 1GHz processor that supports PAE, NX, and SSE2; 1,366 x 768 resolution; and DirectX 9 graphics. If you're upgrading your current machine, you can be running an OS as old as XP with Service Pack 3. Heads up: Microsoft warns that if you're upgrading from XP or Vista, you'll need to re-install your apps.
What's less clear is whether your current laptop's trackpad will support Windows 8 gestures. Some existing PCs will benefit from updated drivers that let you perform all the Windows 8-specific motions from your trackpad, but of course, we can't make any guarantees there.
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| Available on suprmarkts only for $39.99 USD |
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