Yep that too. 
And yes, too bad that there is no context auto correct yet, I meant to say Exist and not Exit.
So thanks a lot **armedmonkey **for reminding us 
. I still remember that in those days several IT people called Windows ME a virus.
Are you saying that in Windows 8 they no longer give you the option to postpone it for up to 4 hours? I really hate it even with that option, because sometimes I’m not at my computer but I still don’t want it to restart. Especially at my elderly computer that I use almost exclusively for MagicJack, and then my calls don’t come through and I don’t even know it because I’m not constantly checking to make sure it hasn’t restarted. But at least I can postpone it if I’m in the middle of doing something.
You know, the whole “we’re going to update your program NOW whether you like it or not” is the biggest reason why I dropped AOL back in the day.
Doesn’t anyone in MS remember how annoying that was? I got to the point where I’d turn off the computer, because I needed to use the phone when I got offline. Nowadays, I might need to use my computer, and I need to choose when the thing reboots.
amarinth is incorrect. It’s rather easy to go to the control panel and select from one of the following:
Install updates automatically;
download updates and let me decide when to install them;
Check for updates but let me check whether or not to install them
Never check for updates.
Oooooh!
Silophant summed up what I liked about Windows 8 nicely. Some of the apps are cool. I like the full screen app aspect on a desktop for SOME apps. It’s an option I like having from time to time. Examples of stuff I use on windows 8 metro apps: BoA (cleaner and easier to use than their website), IM chatting (integrates facebook, gmail, etc into one fullscreen chatting ap).
A lot of core improvements. Right clicking on the start-button (whatever you want to call it) gives you a LOT more options than it did in 7.
The CMD/power shell whatever you call it is a HUGE improvement in 8 over 7. There is really no comparison.
Speed and reliability. I have never ever had windows 8 crash on me, not once. 7 Gave me all sorts of blue screens from time to time with weird driver issues especially with regards to graphics cards.
I love having a PIN to log in with on Windows 8 and having my log in tied to my microsoft account.
The file transfer window is magical in 8, was adequate in 7, abysmal in XP and prior.
I like the built in windows email application that integrates my work email, gmail, and other accounts. Works well and is very unobtrusive, and I like the fullscreen look.
All that being said, I voluntarily opted to upgrade my home pc from windows 7 to windows 8 and I’m so glad that I did. However, my laptop has 7 on it and I like 7 just fine for my laptop needs, so 7 stays on the laptop.
That’s already Microsoft’s motto: “If it ain’t broke, fix it 'til it is.”
Or their other motto: “Why pay for beta testers when you can charge customers to do the same work?”
I bought a Windows 8 laptop in July and this has basically been my experience as well. I had to Google how to make it take full advantage of my monitor (right click -> Screen Resolution -> Advanced Settings, click List All Modes) , but other than I that I got by on some advice a buddy of mine who bought a Surface a few months before me offered: mouse to the corners and just think of the metro interface is a big, full screen Start menu. I was functional in about 20 minutes and pretty much fully up to speed in a few days, so I really don’t understand all the hate. But then, I didn’t hate the MS Office ribbon like a lot of people initially did either.
Others have already listed some that I wholeheartedly agree with - especially boot time, Skydrive integration and very especially, the file copying dialog, which has a built in deduplication wizard.
But also, the File History backup feature - it worked in W7, bit was clunky - in Windows 8, it’s very straightforward.
Thanks!
When I started googling frantically after that showed up, my results seemed to indicate that I couldn’t stop it once it had started and that the only way to keep it from happening again was to make a change to a registry key that I don’t have.
It’s good to know that there’s a better option.
Still, that a forced reboot is the default is a horrible design choice.
This is normal for just about every product in the world. If you want a new car, you can’t have a Model T Ford any more; If you want a new iPhone, it can’t be a 3GS, and so on.
Yes, but if I want to buy a Toyota, I can buy a Camry or a Corolla or a Prius or Venza or an Avalon or an RAV4 or a Sequoia or a Tacoma. Or I can go down the street and buy a Ford or a Chevy or a Chrysler or a Honda or a Subaru or a Hyundai. But if cars were sold like computers, every car would be a Toyota Camry.
I’m not sure this even works, because you do have choices:
[ul]
[li]Windows 8[/li][li]Windows RT*[/li][li]OSX[/li][li]Chrome OS[/li][li]Linux (not very commonly found preinstalled, admittedly)[/li][li]iOS[/li][li]Android[/li][/ul]
*(OK, that’s only included as a joke).
It’s just not reasonable or realistic to expect manufacturers to maintain product lines they have classed as obsolete. I’m not sure more choices per brand is workable either
How compatible are various versions of Linux?
That analogy would only work if each car came with a lifetime subscription to all of the surface roads, some of which didn’t even go to the places you used to go to with the other cars. You could still of course use the same highways (i.e. Internet) and some of the destinations (i.e. apps) were the same, but you might have a favorite place/app that you just can’t get to anymore if you change from a Camry to a Taurus.
The new car has a steering wheel on the roof but it’s ok because you can move it somewhere more useful.
The whole car analogy just isn’t a very useful one. Car manufacturers have a range of different models available at any time, OS developers generally don’t (I’m excluding server OSes as out of scope for this discussion).
What do people actually want Microsoft to do? Never change anything? Because that’s a recipe for certain commercial failure in the software arena.
With each other? Generally very compatible, mostly because the better applications tend to be available precompiled for all the main Linux flavours, but even when this isn’t the case, it’s usually possible (I wont say easy) to compile the source yourself gpr whichever variant you have. Mostly now, you simply don’t need to though.
I think I understand most of your post, but this one confuses me. Are you just talking about having an app take up the full screen? You could do that on other versions of windows, so this confuses me.
Could you expand on this? I curious about what you do differently between your home pc and your laptop that would cause a preference of one OS over the other.