Window 7 or 8

[Deleted]

Apr 12, 2013 11:34:59 GMT DiscoDes said:

Apr 12, 2013 10:56:02 GMT @ashmal said:

I have a Windows 7 laptop and a Windows 8 laptop. Windows 8 is pretty much identical apart from the fact you have to hack the registry to disable the tablet interface ... it's bloody annoying and not designed for a keyboard only device imho. Try it out in PC World or similar

Is it an easy hack?

fairly

www.makeuseof.com/tag/quickly-easily-disable-metro-user-interface-windows-8/

[aguavape]

Overclocking isn't for everyone, i'd rather have a known stable machine, but i need mine for work.....

An I5 with higher clock would be sufficient for the encoding these days (http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/100?vs=288) (i.e. not enough in it to justify the extra cost, and if it's a lappy OVERHEAT lol)

If you buy the right version of windows 8 you get downgrade rights to windows 7 (needs pro )

The hacks and the start menu stuff for windows 8 do make it a lot like win 7, however a few app's refuse to work on 8. Win 8 has a MUCH better file search than win 7.

I'd seriously consider getting a 128gig ssd and an external hard disk though, if it's a desktop put both in. Is also some good white box vendors kicking about but I am a big dell fan right now. (some laptops can replace the DVD caddy with a hard disk)

[gunbunny]

well with the vouchers the acer may be a good buy for you, your old lappy is certainly due an upgrade lol, you may get something for it on ebay which will make the acer even cheaper what was your clan name? our paths may have crossed in counter strike or Day of defeat. I was in WAL, B2Z, KINgs for a while and now M2S on BF3.

[andy01424]

well seems you use Win Vista already ,using Win 7 will be easy as same layout,not a fan of Win 8 looking at the tiles etc on screen put me off,prefer lovely small icons on my Win 7 plus never had any trouble with it or XP,except found Xp slowed comps down very quickly

[DiscoDes]

Apr 12, 2013 11:51:31 GMT gunbunny said:

well with the vouchers the acer may be a good buy for you, your old lappy is certainly due an upgrade lol, you may get something for it on ebay which will make the acer even cheaper what was your clan name? our paths may have crossed in counter strike or Day of defeat. I was in WAL, B2Z, KINgs for a while and now M2S on BF3.

I'm thinking I may use the vouchers for something else as the choice is limited, just save/spend more of my money

I've been looking on the simply Acer site and there's this: Acer TravelMate P253 which looks Ok but would prefer 1tb HDD instead of the installed 500gb.

I mainly played Half Life 2 Deathmatch and played for The SanctuaryUK or S-UK and played under the moniker of ScOObyDooD (sigh). I seem to remember KINgs.

[djs]

Ummm......

(is it safe to come out from behind the sofa......)

I have a few computers, some mine, some work and some others..... it's like a flippin computer zoo at times.

It's easier to count the O.S.s I don't use than the ones I do.

My favourite is windows 7 32-bit pro. That's what I run on the machine in the vaporium. The family laptop is a Lenovo with windows 7 64 (from ebuyer) and it's superb. Windows 8 is superb on a surface tablet, but I certainly wouldn't rush out to buy one on a standard laptop.

The trouble with computers/laptops is everyone thinks they know best. I play the odd game on the big bad PC (Half life 2, skyrim, fallout etc.) and they are pretty cool with a medium GPU, SSD and 24 IPS screen. I wouldn't want to change this up to windows 8 as I spent a lot of time making it (windows 7) work like my old XP desktop, as that is what all my software ran on.

Try it on both touch and non-touch screen. I bet in non-tablet mode, it's pretty good.....

[dognero]

7 any day

[Mev]

If you're not going to use it for gaming then certainly save some money and don't get a dedi gfx card, the 2nd and 3rd gen Intel onboard gfx chips are very very good and excellent for video playback. I use a 2nd gen i5 on my HTPC and it handles every video flawlessly on a plasma TV.

[giles]

I have 7 & XP, but my sister in-law's PC died a few weeks back, needed to replace it & decided to put up with 8. I just set it up so it boots into a 7/xp/whatever style desktop rather than the tablet-type icons, and she carried on as if nothing had happened. That's a boot-up option, not a hack. I don't know if there is any cost (other than disc space) to leaving the tablet icon stuff available, but it all seems fine.

[genguskhan]

Apr 12, 2013 11:26:09 GMT DiscoDes said:

Apr 12, 2013 10:51:39 GMT genguskhan said:

I use Windows 7

I use it on my gaming PC my sons gaming pc and upgraded both my laptops and they run better than vista

Yes, anything (almost) runs better than Vista but I've not had too bad an experience with it, I had Windows ME once (shudder) and came through that barely sane!

Had ME also just glad that I didn't pay for it windows 98 was good it's just a little out dated now.

[womble]

Apr 12, 2013 19:02:04 GMT giles said:

I have 7 & XP, but my sister in-law's PC died a few weeks back, needed to replace it & decided to put up with 8. I just set it up so it boots into a 7/xp/whatever style desktop rather than the tablet-type icons, and she carried on as if nothing had happened. That's a boot-up option, not a hack. I don't know if there is any cost (other than disc space) to leaving the tablet icon stuff available, but it all seems fine.

I thought about doing something like that, but it's only one click and you are onto the same desktop screen and as all the things I use are on the tablet top screen, it's just as easy to boot them from there with one click, which then also brings up the desktop screen if necessary for the program.

I've never used Win7, but I had an old accountancy package I had for WIn98 which I wanted to use on Win8, stuck the disc in, OS automatically downloaded updates it needed to work, job done, working fine.
I don't know about anyone else, but I'm dead chuffed with that.

Win8 also has things I would be annoyed at on a tablet, going into the corners to get shortcuts to different screens, I hated it at first, but now I find it really useful. it would be a pain to use these with a tablet I think.

I also have Win98 and XP pc's to use at home, they are all different, I think Win8 is probably the easiest to use from a ignorant user POV.

Win8 is odd, it's a bit of a cross between OSi on my ipad and windows(X), I must admit I like it so far.

Anyone else got Win8?

[Gasper]

Nothing wrong with either windows 7 or 8 both are rock solid and stable.

for those of you still running XP time is running out
windows.microsoft.com/en-GB/windows/end-support-help
you really should be looking at upgrading, the transition to Win 7 is easier as you still have the look/feel of earlier versions of windows and Win 8 with a click on the 'desktop' icon gives you the same, can't see what all the fuss is about regarding Win 8.

[DiscoDes]

Apr 12, 2013 19:02:04 GMT giles said:

I have 7 & XP, but my sister in-law's PC died a few weeks back, needed to replace it & decided to put up with 8. I just set it up so it boots into a 7/xp/whatever style desktop rather than the tablet-type icons, and she carried on as if nothing had happened. That's a boot-up option, not a hack. I don't know if there is any cost (other than disc space) to leaving the tablet icon stuff available, but it all seems fine.

Apr 12, 2013 19:14:34 GMT genguskhan said:

Apr 12, 2013 11:26:09 GMT DiscoDes said:

Yes, anything (almost) runs better than Vista but I've not had too bad an experience with it, I had Windows ME once (shudder) and came through that barely sane!

Had ME also just glad that I didn't pay for it windows 98 was good it's just a little out dated now.

Apr 12, 2013 20:09:14 GMT womble said:

Apr 12, 2013 19:02:04 GMT giles said:

I have 7 & XP, but my sister in-law's PC died a few weeks back, needed to replace it & decided to put up with 8. I just set it up so it boots into a 7/xp/whatever style desktop rather than the tablet-type icons, and she carried on as if nothing had happened. That's a boot-up option, not a hack. I don't know if there is any cost (other than disc space) to leaving the tablet icon stuff available, but it all seems fine.

I thought about doing something like that, but it's only one click and you are onto the same desktop screen and as all the things I use are on the tablet top screen, it's just as easy to boot them from there with one click, which then also brings up the desktop screen if necessary for the program.

I've never used Win7, but I had an old accountancy package I had for WIn98 which I wanted to use on Win8, stuck the disc in, OS automatically downloaded updates it needed to work, job done, working fine.
I don't know about anyone else, but I'm dead chuffed with that.

Win8 also has things I would be annoyed at on a tablet, going into the corners to get shortcuts to different screens, I hated it at first, but now I find it really useful. it would be a pain to use these with a tablet I think.

I also have Win98 and XP pc's to use at home, they are all different, I think Win8 is probably the easiest to use from a ignorant user POV.

Win8 is odd, it's a bit of a cross between OSi on my ipad and windows(X), I must admit I like it so far.

Anyone else got Win8?

So it seems I have nothing to worry about withe Windows 8, as I can get it to boot into a "normal" desktop then ???

[giles]

Apr 13, 2013 11:59:03 GMT DiscoDes said:

So it seems I have nothing to worry about withe Windows 8, as I can get it to boot into a "normal" desktop then ???

That's right. Sister-in-law had no trouble except once she managed to drop it back into tablet mode and couldn't remember how to get her desktop back. As I remember it was something really complicated like hitting an icon called "desktop"

[womble]

Apr 13, 2013 12:36:45 GMT giles said:

Apr 13, 2013 11:59:03 GMT DiscoDes said:

So it seems I have nothing to worry about withe Windows 8, as I can get it to boot into a "normal" desktop then ???

That's right. Sister-in-law had no trouble except once she managed to drop it back into tablet mode and couldn't remember how to get her desktop back. As I remember it was something really complicated like hitting an icon called "desktop"

That's it, there is a one click icon to get to the desktop and one click to get the other way.