[JorgeA]

CoffeeFiend,

Wow, it does sound like WMC is pretty pointless outside of the U.S. I'd wondered if the MC experience might be better in countries that don't have this CableCARD craziness.

We do use it at home (it's saving us $16/month in DVR fees) to watch and record cable TV. (DVDs and Blu-rays we play through the dedicated Blu-ray player, we don't rip discs as it's mostly Netflix for us there.) For our purposes we're pretty happy with Media Center, except for the inability to capture the live TV buffer, and a strange bug where if you have a multituner setup (like the Ceton InfiniTV 4) and want to record successive programs on the same channel, it will use the same tuner for the second show, so you end up watching the start of the second show at the end of the first recording.

If MS were to fix these two issues in the Win8 MC add-on, that alone might make it worth our while to get the new OS (for that one PC only).

Meanwhile, I just have to pass along this commentary on the "touch-centered" Windows 8:

Quote

After running the 64 bit Consumer Review version of Win8 on my Intel i5 quad core system, there's only a single one finger gesture that comes to mind.

The rest of that writer's comment, you will no doubt relate to well!

--JorgeA

[CoffeeFiend]

JorgeA, on 17 April 2012 - 11:03 PM, said:

I'd wondered if the MC experience might be better in countries that don't have this CableCARD craziness

LOL. I thought CableCARD was the one and only reason some people used WMC in the first place. I mean, if I took that and ATSC feeds away, what are you left with? Yeah, analog 480i capturing... Great. Why not use a VCR while we're at it? CableCARD is what makes it bearable for the tiny part of the world where it's used.

JorgeA, on 17 April 2012 - 11:03 PM, said:

it's mostly Netflix for us

I wish. Canadian Netflix doesn't have 10% of the content of their USA counterpart but still costs the same. And since we have low bandwidth (usage) caps on our internet connections it's not much of an option either. At $4.50+taxes/GB over 50GB it could get really expensive very quickly! I mean, just watching one movie in full quality over my cap just once (2h movie @ 4.8mbit video) would cost me $23 extra (you might as well buy the Blu-Ray movie instead). Cablecos and telcos (like Bell which is our main satellite TV provider) saw some competition, and figured they'd crush it by making sure you can't use their competitors' online services by making it too expensive. Bell even tried to push for 25GB limits recently, and most "basic" broadband plans are capped at 5GB/month or lower. That 5GB/month plan is $40/mo if you don't have cable TV with them, or it's $56/mo for the 50GB plan (plus sales tax of course). Welcome to Canada!

Quote

After running the 64 bit Consumer Review version of Win8 on my Intel i5 quad core system, there's only a single one finger gesture that comes to mind.

Actual laughter was produced.

[JorgeA]

CoffeeFiend, on 17 April 2012 - 11:53 PM, said:

JorgeA, on 17 April 2012 - 11:03 PM, said:

I'd wondered if the MC experience might be better in countries that don't have this CableCARD craziness

LOL. I thought CableCARD was the one and only reason some people used WMC in the first place. I mean, if I took that and ATSC feeds away, what are you left with? Yeah, analog 480i capturing... Great. Why not use a VCR while we're at it? CableCARD is what makes it bearable for the tiny part of the world where it's used.

Hmm, I wonder if the regulations and/or WMC functionality are different in Canada, or outside the U.S. generally. Before we got the CableCARD (and convinced my wife to go along), I tested the WMC system for several months, watching and recording over-the-air programming exclusively. We were able to record and view high-def programming, no problem. Things got much more complicated when the CableCARD was added to the mix (and we don't have any premium channels).

CoffeeFiend, on 17 April 2012 - 11:53 PM, said:

JorgeA, on 17 April 2012 - 11:03 PM, said:

it's mostly Netflix for us

I wish. Canadian Netflix doesn't have 10% of the content of their USA counterpart but still costs the same. And since we have low bandwidth (usage) caps on our internet connections it's not much of an option either. At $4.50+taxes/GB over 50GB it could get really expensive very quickly! I mean, just watching one movie in full quality over my cap just once (2h movie @ 4.8mbit video) would cost me $23 extra (you might as well buy the Blu-Ray movie instead). Cablecos and telcos (like Bell which is our main satellite TV provider) saw some competition, and figured they'd crush it by making sure you can't use their competitors' online services by making it too expensive. Bell even tried to push for 25GB limits recently, and most "basic" broadband plans are capped at 5GB/month or lower. That 5GB/month plan is $40/mo if you don't have cable TV with them, or it's $56/mo for the 50GB plan (plus sales tax of course). Welcome to Canada!

Sheez!

But actually, there could be a silver lining to data caps: they might (inadvertently) slow down the devolution of our powerful PCs into dumb Internet terminals, by limiting the appeal of cloud services.

We tried Netflix streaming on our HTPC, and found the experience clunky and inferior to actual discs. Many movies were simply not available for streaming. For those movies we did get to stream, anytime we wanted to review something that happened before, it would reload the whole d*mn movie. Plus, it was a challenge to control the tiny cursor on the screen from across the family room. And we have DSL, so the picture quality was comparable to SD/VCRs -- HD was out of the question. We could pay more for a higher speed service, but then that would have to be factored into the per-movie rental cost, and it's just not worth it to us, we don't rent that many movies that we can't get on cable.

So in terms of rentals it's Blu-rays and DVDs for us: we can FF and rewind to our heart's content, subtitles are almost always available, usually we get to enjoy special features (interviews, bloopers) that streaming doesn't offer, and even regular DVDs look better on the Blu-ray player than on the DVD player.

--JorgeA

[CoffeeFiend]

JorgeA, on 18 April 2012 - 12:30 AM, said:

watching and recording over-the-air programming exclusively

That's ATSC feeds, or OTA ATSC feeds. Whatever you wanna call them. ATSC is the standard used to transmit over-the-air in all of North America. Microsoft disabled that feature for us Canadians, even though we use the exact same broadcasting standards (we're supposed to be fully switched to digital by now too). Nice of them, isn't it? We have to resort to rather elaborate tricks for it to work at all, and there's no program guide for my local channels either. I wonder what other countries Microsoft has been locked from having OTA reception besides us. So yes, if I took that away from you *and* CableCARD, now you'd know what it's like in other countries I believe you now fully understand why most of us don't use it. OTA ATSC feeds work fine in basically all programs except media center (and they typically record in more "standard" formats too)

JorgeA, on 17 April 2012 - 11:03 PM, said:

limiting the appeal of cloud services

They already weren't appealing, now add all the various online hosts going offline with no warning (or being sued), azure crashing on leap days, high prices, trusting another company (and their govt & authorities) with the safety and privacy of your documents... Thanks but no thanks. Funnily, that's another area where MS is failing pretty darn hard: their Azure cloud services.

[Tripredacus]

JorgeA, on 17 April 2012 - 11:03 PM, said:

The rest of that writer's comment, you will no doubt relate to well!

Its no secret that the consumer market is trending away from everyone having a desktop in the home. This is reflected by the successes of Mac, tablets and notebooks being ever more popular. As even older people get computers, they are going for what is simple and Windows just isn't simple. The trend away from desktops was forcast a few years ago and is definately on track. I agree that Windows needs to be in that market space, but Microsoft would do better to make Windows 8 a transitional product. One that keeps the standard desktop that we are all used to, but has full capabilities to be used in a device. As noted, while the market is ready for moving to the simpler type of computer, the hardware isn't widely available, known or the price isn't right.

I wouldn't go so far as to say Microsoft is jumping the shark, but maybe is trying to move too fast. Concerning the RT issues with the different builds, that's really ARM's problem. Somehow they have been able to keep multiple different CPUs in their product line viable that aren't 100% compatible with each other. That's definately one thing that is different than the PC world, architectures aren't as streamlined in those devices, but it is definately a younger market than computing.

[JorgeA]

CoffeeFiend, on 18 April 2012 - 01:13 AM, said:

That's ATSC feeds, or OTA ATSC feeds. Whatever you wanna call them. ATSC is the standard used to transmit over-the-air in all of North America. Microsoft disabled that feature for us Canadians, even though we use the exact same broadcasting standards (we're supposed to be fully switched to digital by now too). Nice of them, isn't it? We have to resort to rather elaborate tricks for it to work at all, and there's no program guide for my local channels either. I wonder what other countries Microsoft has been locked from having OTA reception besides us. So yes, if I took that away from you *and* CableCARD, now you'd know what it's like in other countries I believe you now fully understand why most of us don't use it. OTA ATSC feeds work fine in basically all programs except media center (and they typically record in more "standard" formats too)

CoffeeFiend,

That is unbelievable! Why on Earth would they do such a thing?

Don't get me wrong, it's not that I think you're providing inaccurate information, not at all -- it's that it's hard to understand why they would cripple their own product that way. Amazing. Maybe there's some underlying regulatory or licensing issue going on, but then you'd think those issues would apply equally to the other DVR-like applications that you allude to...

MS has been citing low WMC usage metrics. If the percentages include data from around the world, then it's no wonder they look so low: only people in one country can really use it.

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

Tripredacus, on 18 April 2012 - 08:47 AM, said:

Its no secret that the consumer market is trending away from everyone having a desktop in the home. This is reflected by the successes of Mac, tablets and notebooks being ever more popular. As even older people get computers, they are going for what is simple and Windows just isn't simple. The trend away from desktops was forcast a few years ago and is definately on track. I agree that Windows needs to be in that market space, but Microsoft would do better to make Windows 8 a transitional product. One that keeps the standard desktop that we are all used to, but has full capabilities to be used in a device. As noted, while the market is ready for moving to the simpler type of computer, the hardware isn't widely available, known or the price isn't right.

Tripredacus,

What do you think of the idea (proposed by many) of letting the buyer decide which UI to use exclusively (Metro or desktop)? The selection could be made 1) by the type of hardware (i.e., buy a tablet, it's Metro for you), or 2) during Windows installation, or 3) conceivably at any time afterward.

The Metro screen could even have a little pop-up once a month or so that said, "Ready for the complete PC experience? Click here!" That way, folks who prefer a simpler existence can have it, without impacting others who prefer a fuller feature set.

--JorgeA

[Tripredacus]

Well the tablet/device thing would require a different SKU, but having a choice is just what a transitional product like Windows 8 needs. Or just put that choice in Pro and Enterprise and not in the "home" and RT versions.

A little reminder once a month? No way, unless it can detect whether or not the user has upgraded to a touch supported monitor. For example, if Windows were smart enough to detect display capabilities (they can if it has that ID thing I can't remember the name of) and say, well there no ID maybe its a CRT and don't enable Metro. Or if its a 17" LCD monitor from 6 years ago, don't enable Metro. If you want to use it? Go turn it on.

[CoffeeFiend]

Tripredacus, on 18 April 2012 - 03:09 PM, said:

they can if it has that ID thing I can't remember the name of

You probably mean DDC (or it's data, called EDID). Not that it would tell you how old a device is, or if it has touch / multitouch compatibility. If you want to test for that you typically call GetSystemMetrics with either SM_DIGITIZER or SM_MAXIMUMTOUCHES as a parameter.

They'd have to ensure it's an internal digitizer that's detected, because I definitely wouldn't want my intuos tablet to enable the "Metro for you!" mandatory bit.

Personally, I just think it needs an opt-out, some old-school checkbox or a pair of radio buttons to disable it. Anything really. So long as it can be disabled in any way but I don't see it happening anymore.

[JorgeA]

CoffeeFiend, on 18 April 2012 - 05:55 PM, said:

Personally, I just think it needs an opt-out, some old-school checkbox or a pair of radio buttons to disable it. Anything really.

"Anything really" is the operative phrase. With the monthly check, etc., I was merely offering some sample ways to give a choice, based on the stated premise that many people would be starting simple with Metro and then some of them might want to move up to more complex computing with the Desktop.

--JorgeA

[MagicAndre1981]

the only really killer feature of Windows 8 (Windows To Go) will be only part of Enterprise Edition:

http://windowsteambl...-workforce.aspx

[JorgeA]

MagicAndre1981, on 19 April 2012 - 02:43 AM, said:

the only really killer feature of Windows 8 (Windows To Go) will be only part of Enterprise Edition:

http://windowsteambl...-workforce.aspx

See the following quote from that page:

Quote

•Windows RT Virtual Desktop Access (VDA) Rights: When used as a companion of a Windows Software Assurance licensed PC, Windows RT will automatically receive extended VDA rights. These rights will provide access to a full VDI image running in the datacenter which will make Windows RT a great complementary tablet option for business customers.

In terms of enterprise sales -- does this compensate for concerns that new Windows tablets will not be able to join a domain? Or, not really?

--JorgeA

[MagicAndre1981]

the other confusing part of WIn8 SKUs is that if you want to build a HTPC you need to buy Win8 Pro + the Media Pack and got features like Domain Join or Client Hyper-V in a HTPC which you never need there

[JorgeA]

MagicAndre,

Yeah, there's speculation on the HTPC boards as to whether this will help to improve Windows Media Center by providing an income stream specific to it, or whether it indicates a desire by Microsoft to kill off and bury WMC.

Personally, I don't understand the decision -- for the exact reasons you give. Why not offer it as an add-on to Win8 "home" users, too?

--JorgeA

[MagicAndre1981]

JorgeA, on 20 April 2012 - 04:30 PM, said:

Why not offer it as an add-on to Win8 "home" users, too?

I have no idea. Ask this MS.

[JorgeA]

Sorry MagicAndre, it was only a rhetorical question! I totally agree with you.

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

Paul Thurrott is officially undecided on Windows 8:

Quote

Ultimately, I keep coming back to the same question: Does a single OS with two user experiences—Metro and the desktop—make sense? I just don't know, not yet. In a bid to find out, I've installed the Consumer Preview on all my regular-use machines and will be using only Windows 8 going forward... For now, I can say that the Metro environment makes plenty of sense for tablets, whereas the desktop is likely to continue to rule on traditional PCs. Given the Windows 8 release schedule, that might need to be enough.

On the other hand, Neowin.net reports that Microsoft is claiming that

Quote

the number of people using the preview version of the OS is already past that of the Windows 7 beta release at the same time period for both versions.

Of course, that could be due at least in part to curiosity over the controversial new Metro interface.

Thoughts? Comments?

--JorgeA

[CoffeeFiend]

JorgeA, on 22 April 2012 - 12:08 AM, said:

Paul Thurrott is officially undecided on Windows 8

If even himself isn't really liking it despite trying to the best he can... it's not looking good.

Quote

the number of people using the preview version of the OS is already past that of the Windows 7 beta release at the same time period for both versions.

I wonder how they fabricated their numbers to backup that statement.

The consumer preview is almost 2 months old, yet its market share of desktop OS'es is 0.11% according to hitslink.com (or 0.08% according to w3counter)
The first Win7 beta was released in early January 2009. 2 months later (March 2009) its market share was more than double at 0.26%

That's if you don't count the developer preview which is from last September (the first available version in both cases). That's 7 months to reach 0.11% then, while Win7 had 1.19% at that point which is ten times more. (or 0.08% and 1.75% respectively if you go by w3counter's numbers)

I'm not worried that they set criterias for the statistics so it says whatever they want it to say e.g. downloads of the ISO image based on an arbitrary date or other nonsense, like % of Win8 users visiting the Win8 blog which should be unrealistically high. It also doesn't say just how much of these are still using the developer preview with Metro disabled. And it doesn't say much (if anything at all) about how many will actually stick with it. I've tried both the DP and CP and I certainly won't be running it, be it at home or work, on any type of device.

The other thing they're not talking about is consumer approval (not that they'd be honest about this either). Everybody just loved Win7 from day one, whereas everybody just seems to very much dislike Win8 -- specifically everything to do with Metro. And you're not given any options to disable the nonsense either.

In the end it doesn't matter. It'll be one huge and embarrassing fiasco for Microsoft that will likely make Vista seem like a minor failure in retrospect. Yes, Vista was slow on under-powered hardware but otherwise it was mostly okay. Win8 is a total nightmare on all desktops regardless of hardware. I willingly bought Vista, and I wouldn't install Win8 even as a free upgrade.

[TheWalrus]

Win8=the WinME of 21st century?

[CoffeeFiend]

TheWalrus, on 22 April 2012 - 12:57 AM, said:

Win8=the WinME of 21st century?

At least WinME didn't force a stupid UI meant for an entirely different kind of device on you (it looked and worked very much like Win98 and Win95). Nor did it try to force dinky phone-like "apps" on us to replace traditional software.

Win8 is making everything useful about Windows "legacy", only to force an ill-suited touchscreen interface on mouse/keyboard users which is a gigantic setback in usability and which will just confuse everybody. It'll take some time for most users to adjust to this tacky interface and its gaudy icons, gestures, hot corners and screen edges (removing buttons), hidden elements (less visual cues), reduced discoverability, scrolling up/down with the mouse that actually scrolls sideways, everything running maximized (and with no chrome), the desktop being just another application, multitasking being very much neutered, the disjointed combo of metro and desktop environments, etc. Also, customizability has been thrown out of the window, they're forcing MS cloud services on users, ARM devices throw 20 years of backwards compatibility out the window (and they also introduce locked bootloaders), the app store that can remotely deactivate apps you paid for, the existing Metro apps are of incredibly bad quality and are very much feature-light (most are also useless without an internet connection), etc. At best it just gets in your way, it's an obstacle to getting work done and it slows you down.

They've reinvented the wheel by making it square. It creates countless major problems rather than solving any, just so they have a laughable chance at selling a few mediocre tablets (I'm sure it'll sell as good as the Zune or Windows Phone). But hey, explorer now has a ribbon, and task manager has heat maps!

TL;DR: It's far, FAR worse than WinME.