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I built an 8.1 system last month. It was not 'hate at first sight' for me. But it is, well, still windows. Good luck with getting anything to work unless you first force an update of all the built-in apps.
One thing I like is the way it breaks out my Visual Studio installation into all the components. There is actually no need to trawl for GUIDGen or the VS Command Line.
Having said which, I haven't switched it on since.
I'm going to sell it to a Windows mug enthusiast as a going concern.
I also have an ancient box running 7 in the kitchen, which is good enough for any home work. My main PC's everyday are both 13.10 Ubuntu, which is fine by me. Free everything, no 'eye of the needle' booting, no expensive or adware riven applications and AV.
Just point and shoot.
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I used to hate it, but I don't mind now. Its on my work machine. I wanted to hate it, but I realized that I spend about 95% of my day in Visual Studio and don't have to directly interact with it. When I do, it isn't that bad. I guess it depends on what you have to do with it. Learn some shortcut keys and focus your energy somewhere else.
Hogan
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Agreed. I've been using my Surface Pro essentially as a workstation for over a year now (I got a USB3 dock providing connections to my regular keyboard/mouse/3 monitors/everything else I can throw at it), and with all the shortcuts and pinned icons I have, I hardly ever see even the start screen, let alone any metro app.
It's really not as in-your-face as people make it out to be, once you actually start using it as if it was just 7.
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I do agree with u Hogan!!It is actually the case of "Change" happening and few of the users dont want it to happen!!!
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I'm not trolling, lord knows i do enough of that on Reddit.
On a serious note what exactly do you hate about Windows 8?
I use it at home and do some light development on it as well and i honestly like it, the 'Start' menu sucks balls but i just start typing and find what i'm looking for that way. Aside form the 'Start' menu i honestly don't know what people don't like about it
Don't comment your code - it was hard to write, it should be hard to read!
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I could get used to it, given a touch monitor.
My 8,500+ users though... They just moved way too much of the cheese making it a support nightmare in a corporate environment. We'd have to ship a "How Do I..." guide with every machine we deploy to the desktop. Mostly on how to use a mouse with a "touch" O/S.
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Ok, so its not so much personal taste and more of a support nightmare which i can understand. When you mention the touch monitor is that just for the new 'Start' menu? or all around use?
Don't comment your code - it was hard to write, it should be hard to read!
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It's personal taste too. I hate having two desktops.
The touch monitor would be all-around if you were using a ton of Metro apps. Normal Desktop isn't so bad. It just needs the Start menu back. The swiping menu thing just makes it harder to find what you're looking for without extra mouse clicks.
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I don't see it as two desktops.
I see it as one desktop with an expansive start menu (oh yeah, they call it metro).
When I use my win7 machines I have my desktop and a start button which opens the start menu.
The start menu contains some recently used and preset programs. I can toggle between that and the all programs (to get a list of programs installed on the machine).
When I use my win8 machine I have a start menu (metro, same as if I had clicked the start button on win7), except that I can organize my start menu by breaking it down to groups by categories and move the tiles to their respective groups. If I scroll down I can see all the programs installed on the machine.
In either case (or computer), I can install my programs and use them on my desktop same as I've always worked on the desktop. I can develop software on either one, I can test, run, install and uninstall as well. It's just the same.
Whenever I've installed upgraded versions of a previously install program, my first step is to figure out where they moved menu options. They're still there (usually), they just look different or are in a different place.
It's all about how YOU look at it.
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That's cute. Considering that one of my old laptops is still running on Vista.
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For personal use the cheap Start8 program neuters Modern/Metro just fine for me, but I can well understand how, even with Start8 or something like it, supporting mobs of users of all skill levels across an enterprise would be a nightmare.
Even using Start8, you can easily, by accident, get thrown back into the Modern tile-pit.
A friend of mine, in her seventies, a world-class art-history of Asia expert, describes learning to use Modern on her new Win8 laptop as being like having to live in world where the English alphabet has been suddenly replaced with Egyptian hieroglyphics 
I'm trying to get her to buy and install Start8.
“The best hope is that one of these days the Ground will get disgusted enough just to walk away ~ leaving people with nothing more to stand ON than what they have so bloody well stood FOR up to now.” Kenneth Patchen, Poet
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They said if one knew all the Word 2.0 toolbar icons, one could pass the basic Chinese exam
Upgrade to 8.1 and she can read the titles of the icons going downwards on the Start screen. I'm sure she will appreciate reading the Metro titles instead of the crowded, 8 pt System font desktop titles on the 22" full HD screen.
For anything else, press WinKey+X.
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If you take the ui issues out, win 8x is way better in the view of performance upgrades. I barely wait or wait for not more than 10-15 secs to boot my pc unlike the predecessors where I waited for ages.
I am sure ms is working on rooting this ui issue out in their future updates and who knows it could well be the best from ms then.
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5 whole minutes?
You didn't have your mind made up before hand, did you.
Nope.
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No, I didn't. I gave it a chance.
The Win8 machine I built is in a VM. When you don't have a touch monitor Win8 Modern/Metro is a royal pain in the add to the use with a mouse.
Now, we have 8,500+ users. That's a lot of training on how to do things the "Modern" way.
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I was on the same page a while back.
I posted a RANT about fighting with it.
Here is my take on the various responses you are getting (like mine):
1) Many people have taken the the TIME to learn the "windows 8" way of doing things, they like the OTHER features more than enough to overweight the Learning Curve
2) Some people are doing the same thing, every day with it. That makes it easier.
3) Many have Administrative Rights (one of my issues was trying to help someone copy a file that the OS decided they did not have access to!)
I wish there was a 10 minute YouTube video showing us MERE MORTALS how to get our job done, based on being HAPPY with windows 7 (start, search, taskbar launch folder, etc), so we can figure out windows 8.
The IDIOCY of having EVERYTHING launch from a Start Button (we got used to), suddenly change without making that transition easier is MIND BOGGLING.
Every other version of windows, the upgrade was more "additive". I had to ADD to my knowledge to use the system. But the rest of the system still worked the same. Windows 8 IS NOT THAT WAY! It feels like a RUG PULL.
And when you have to install the machine, and you have 30hrs to get 60hrs of work done. And they changed everything, it is FRUSTRATING. I get paid by the HOUR. When it takes me 3hrs to figure out how to do something (or worse, that I cannot do something), that I used to do in 15 seconds. I CANNOT BILL my clients for that time. It just cost me HUGE MONEY. That has been my experience...
==
TO that end, I contacted a friend of mine. He showed me how to use the annoying right side of the screen and search, plus a couple of other hints, and I LEARNED about the "explorer runs at PEON security levels", so I can get to an administrative command prompt and do what I need there... Which, without the search feature, I still don't know how to run an administrative command prompt in windows 8... LOL
So I feel your pain, but I can say that you can overcome it when you stop thinking about how stupid it was for them to make the changes this way, and just deal with the changes made. There are SOME improvements. And I am COUNTING on windows 9 being much better (that is the earliest I will switch, I have learned to ONLY use ODD numbers of Windows products. LOL)
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Oh, I didn't say that I couldn't overcome it. I just hate that they moved so much of the cheese that, like you, it takes forever to figure out how to do something that we did in seconds before.
I look at it from a support perspective. How many calls is this thing going to generate? Tons. How many people are going to need a class or a "How Do I..." guide to get used to this? Tons. That means money and to a corporation, switching to Windows 8 is more expensive than it was to go from XP to 7.
We "techies" usually figure stuff out very quickly. Other people, not so much. Some, not at all! 
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Ha!
Try encountering Windows Server 2012 for the first time, in a coms room with a mouse on top of a filing cabinet and a keyboard balanced on your knee.
I kind of see the point where they are trying to go with Win8 but how many servers do you know that have touch screens? Trying to get the mouse to hover long enough in the bottom left of the screen to get the start thing up in your average coms room is no fun! I was out at a clients site so had to go and ask their IT guys for a loan of a desktop to RDP on to it.
I did like the fact that when I eventually got the start thing up I could just start typing the program I needed to open it but why not just have that interface up all the time? Even a button instead of this hover your mouse it the bottom left corner and hover your mouse over in the right hand side crap
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You mean, like pressing the windows key?
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I like the Metro interface, but i think that putting it side by side with the more capable desktop interface is the source of all the hate that it receives.
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Interesting. What did you not like about it?
If it's the Metro view, download the Windows 7 style start button from startisback.com. I'm a developer and have been using Windows 8.1 for several months now and use it like Windows 7. I do find it faster.
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Read above replies.
Also, I can't install the Wi7 style buttons or anything else on a corporate base image that is being used for software testing.
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And I know it's not new...but...it made me smile.
In the beginning God created the Bit and the Byte. And from those he created the Word. And there were two Bytes in the Word; and nothing else existed. And God separated the One from the Zero; and he saw it was good.
And God said - Let the Data be; And so it happened. And God said - Let the Data go to their proper places. And he created floppy disks and hard disks and compact disks.
And God said - Let the computers be, so there would be a place to put floppy disks and hard disks and compact disks. Thus God created computers and called them hardware.
And there was no Software yet. But God created programs; small and big ... And told them - Go and multiply yourselves and fill all the Memory.
And God said - I will create the Programmer; And the Programmer will make new programs and govern over the computers and programs and Data.
And God created the Programmer; and put him at Data Center;
And God showed the Programmer the Catalog Tree and said You can use all the volumes and subvolumes but DO NOT USE Windows.
And God said - It is not Good for the programmer to be alone. He took a bone from the Programmer's body and created a creature that would look up at the Programmer; and admire the Programmer; and love the things the Programmer does; And God called the creature : the User.
And the Programmer and the User were left under the naked DOS and it was Good.
But Bill was smarter than all the other creatures of God.
And Bill said to the User - Did God really tell you not to run any programs? And the User answered - God told us that we can use every program and every piece of Data but told us not to run Windows or we will die.
And Bill said to the User - How can you talk about something you did not even try. The moment you run Windows you will become equal to God. You will be able to create anything you like by a simple click of your mouse.
And the User saw that the fruits of the Windows were nicer and easier to use. And the User saw that any knowledge was useless - since Windows could replace it.
So the User installed the Windows on his computer; and said to the Programmer that it was good.
And the Programmer immediately started to look for new drivers. And God asked him - What are you looking for? And the Programmer answered - I am looking for new drivers because I can not find them in the DOS. And God said - Who told you need drivers? Did you run Windows? And the Programmer said - It was Bill who told us to.
And God said to Bill - Because of what you did you will be hated by all the creatures. And the User will always be unhappy with you. And you will always sell Windows.
And God said to the User - Because of what you did, the Windows will disappoint you and eat up all your Resources; and you will have to use lousy programs; and you will always rely on the Programmers help.
And God said to the Programmer - Because you listened to the User you will never be happy. All your programs will have errors and you will have to fix them and fix them to the end of time.
And God threw them out of the Data Center and locked the door and secured it with a password.
Those who fail to learn history are doomed to repeat it. --- George Santayana (December 16, 1863 – September 26, 1952)
Those who fail to clear history are doomed to explain it. --- OriginalGriff (February 24, 1959 – ∞)
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OriginalGriff wrote: created a creature that would look up at the Programmer; and admire the Programmer; and love the things the Programmer does; And God called the creature : the User.
If that doesn't prove it's fiction, nothing does.
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So, Bill created the blue sky.. ehhm screen?
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