Is it possible to scrap Modern from Windows 8/8.1?

[Agorima]

With the near-ending support to XP I'm looking around for updating my system.

I know Windows 7 SP1 is surely better than Windows 8/8.1, but I'd like to know if It's possible to scrap the idiotic and toyish Modern (and many other useless features) from source install to make the system faster and behaving like the older Win 7.

Edited January 4, 2014 by Agorima

[Soukyuu]

If you are so against "modern UI", you'll save yourself a lot of trouble by just going with win7, really.

The best you can do is mod win8.1 with SIB/classicshell + aeroglass to hide as much metro as you can, but it will still creep on you now and then. ModernUI is deeply rooted in win8.x, so there is no way to truly get rid off it without breaking the system.

[NoelC]

Absolutely it is possible. I'm running a Windows 8.1 system that's every bit as desktop-functional as a Windows 7 system.

Metro/Modern doesn't creep in at all here. My workstation is a 100% desktop powerhouse. It boots straight to the desktop and can't actually run a Metro/Modern app because UAC is disabled. I've figured out how to do recurring System Image backups with shadow copy integration, and even made it much more secure than what Microsoft delivers out of the box.

I've tweaked Explorer to be more functional (e.g., showing a higher density of files in the display, not showing Favorites or Libraries, etc.) and I'm running BigMuscle's Aero Glass for Win 8.1 RC to make it as easy on the eyes as Windows 7's Aero Glass implementation, and Ivo Beltchev's ClassicShell Start Menu replacement.

This machine is on 24/7 and is what I run my software company from - I develop software with Visual Studio, do documentation, do web development, do graphics processing with Adobe Creative Cloud, do my accounting, collaborate with audio and screen sharing, listen to music, and tons of other stuff - often all at the same time. In short, it does everything I need with much capacity left over, and without any Metro/Modern BS at all.

And it's perfectly stable. The longest it's run (between Windows Updates requiring reboots) is 17 days so far.

I've written a ebook on exactly how I've done it called "Configure the Windows 8 'To Work' Options".

-Noel

Edited January 5, 2014 by NoelC

[Soukyuu]

well then try clicking on that network icon... or install a new program and see Metro's UI ask you which program you want to open a file with... or insert a CD/connect a new drive and see a metro popup ask you what you want to do with it. You can hide it, but you will still see it now and then.

[vinifera]

...

but I'd like to know if It's possible to scrap the idiotic and toyish Modern (and many other useless features) from source install

...

get yourself Windows 8 Embedded

at least during its beta it was possible to remove metro crap components

it should be same as finished product too

Edited January 5, 2014 by vinifera

[NoelC]

well then try clicking on that network icon... or install a new program and see Metro's UI ask you which program you want to open a file with... or insert a CD/connect a new drive and see a metro popup ask you what you want to do with it. You can hide it, but you will still see it now and then.

Okay, if you're talking about the look and feel of a few badly formatted dialogs, I agree. I more interpreted the "never see Metro/Modern" as "never see the Start screen".

That said, after having used it and set up the associations the way I like it's been quite a while since I've seen the "you have new programs that can open this type of file" - literally weeks since I've seen a flat, big-font dialog. But I don't install/uninstall a lot of stuff in my host system; I use VMs for testing stuff.

I even reconstituted the old Task Manager from the recovery environment.

-Noel

Edited January 5, 2014 by NoelC

[SanicHegehog]

well then try clicking on that network icon... or install a new program and see Metro's UI ask you which program you want to open a file with... or insert a CD/connect a new drive and see a metro popup ask you what you want to do with it. You can hide it, but you will still see it now and then.

Totally agree with this. You may install StartIsBack or Classic Shell all you want, but you'll not be able to use the neat network manager from Windows 7. It's so annoying when you have to enter passwords for VPNs, for example. You can't even click outside the password prompt, as this whole Metro thing slides back and resets your input.

I asked authors of both StartIsBack and Classic Shell to figure something out, but they said they wouldn't be doing that

For the Open With dialog, you can partially fix it with a tool called OpenWith Enhanced, but it has its own problems on Windows 8.1. It fails to register file associations sometimes.

[Soukyuu]

You are right in the sense that you can hide almost all of it, NoelC, but that's not what I understand under "get rid off it completely". Might be a bit pedantic, but eh. Oh and I actually prefer most of the new desktop programs like explorer (the ribbon has it's uses, and I like the new default location) and task manager (finally I can see what's thrashing the HDD and STFU it without having to mess with performance monitor. also startup).

To be honest, I was switching back and forth between win7 and win8.1 because I'm missing some stuff from both OSes. In the end, I think I will be sticking with win8.1 despite the metro annoyance.

[NoelC]

Yes, there are a few subtleties of WIn 8.1 that aren't too bad. Like you, I don't mind ribbons at all. I'm a positional thinker, so if it's a 2 dimensional landscape of buttons and stuff, for me that's just as easy to get used to as remembering the position in a menu.

I'm not fond of the new direction in desktop UI implementation by Office or Avast, though (which look bad even on Win 7). Those applications, that have no window borders and don't conform to the system theme, are kind of out of left field. I guess the intent is to support touch operation, or maybe to look like the flat, lifeless Metro/Modern tiles, but they just come off as an eyesore.

It's as though someone forgot that a lot of the utility in a UI comes from adherence to guidelines, which promotes integration - using things together. Now it seems to be more about ignoring such guidelines and each application for itself.

-Noel

[DosProbie]

well then try clicking on that network icon... or install a new program and see Metro's UI ask you which program you want to open a file with... or insert a CD/connect a new drive and see a metro popup ask you what you want to do with it. You can hide it, but you will still see it now and then.

I have metro hanging around but I changed all my defaults to my favorite app extensions like VLC, Xnview etc. in my UA 8.1 Install, so no more nags

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts

[Soukyuu]

Yeah, once you set all of them up, you won't see those.

BTW, NoelC, why did you restore the old task manager? I've been playing around with it and found it to be better than the old one.

And the main reason I'm posting this is that I found out you can actually switch back to showing separate cores instead of overall CPU usage:

[NoelC]

No strong reason. I just like having them both.

Just earlier today I was debugging a thrashing issue in a program under development and it was very handy to have both the CPU overview and the memory use graphs showing simultaneously.

By the way, you can customize some of the panels of the new Task Manager to show a lot more information as well.

-Noel

[tomasz86]

BTW, NoelC, why did you restore the old task manager? I've been playing around with it and found it to be better than the old one.

And the main reason I'm posting this is that I found out you can actually switch back to showing separate cores instead of overall CPU usage:

The new Task Manager shows much more information compared to the old one but is also way slower to launch. If there's is an issue and the CPU usage is 100% it may take ages for the new Task Manager to simply show up, especially on a slower computer. The old one doesn't have this problem.

[Soukyuu]

To be fair, an old/slow machine shouldn't be running win6.x+ - it's much more productive to run linux on it instead, with some light desktop environment.

[dencorso]

Substitute by Process Hacker and forget Task Manager...