Does Windows 8 Make Sense?

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Windows 8 is great, and personally, I love it and will become a fulltime user of it as soon as the final version releases. But unfortunately, my love doesn’t matter and won’t make Windows 8 success in a way Microsoft is betting on. In fact, there are things that have been bothering me since the Developer Preview was released last year, and because of that even though I am falling in love with it I haven’t been convinced that Windows 8 will fulfill the mission that has been assigned.

Fundamentally, here are two things that just don’t make sense to me.

Metro Style to Keyboard/Mouse

Admit, please. Metro Style is made for your fingers, not your Keyboard and mouse, not even your Stylus. No matter how many keyboard shortcuts and mouse left/middle/right clicks are available, you will find yourself clicking on these giant squares actually not as much fun as you click the icons on your desktop on the previous Windows.

Metro Styles is also made for tablets, not for your 24″ LCD monitors. I can see it will work great on tablets or even laptops that have a screen size smaller than 15″ but sorry, I just don’t see it will work well on my two 21″ widescreen side by side. You will have to remember and use these hotkeys to access the Charms, Panels, and Switches Menu. Moving your mouse around 4 hot corners on a giant screen or dual-monitor screen to bring up the side menus will not be much of fun.

Metro Style doesn’t make sense to your keyboard and mouse, or giant LCD screen if you want add it.

Desktop to your Fingers

Another admit, please. Desktop is made for your keyboard and mouse, not your fingers. If you ever used a touch device that runs Windows 7 or XP, you would agree that it’s just horrible using your finger on your Desktop. It’s just plain horrible.

And that’s exactly why Windows Tablet has never taken off. Apple didn’t invent the idea of tablet. It was Microsoft who introduced the idea back in 2000 with a tablet device that runs an optimized version of XP. Microsoft foresaw the future a decade ago but unfortunately had chosen a wrong product with flaw technology that failed them badly. Will this coming back turn things around to make your desktop a finger-friendly environment? I doubt it.

Desktop on a touch screen is a failed technology that everyone should avoid to use. It doesn’t make sense to your fingers on a touch screen.

That brings to

Another big questions that you may ask. Why people who only use the tablet need to pay the full price that covers non-Metro stuff as well? Or, why people who only intend to use the non-Metro feature need to pay the full price that covers Metro? Either way, people are paying for something they will hardly use, if not never, unless Microsoft releases Windows 8 with editions that separate them to suit both worlds.

It’s tough to Windows 8

Windows 8 is a touch-focused operating system so it’s quite obvious that its mission assigned by Microsoft is to make a dent to the post-PC era which is currently dominated by Apple’s iPad. If that’s true, it’s going to be tough to Windows 8 to accomplish that mission, especially with this mixed hybrid environment.

Let’s take quick look at the basic things that has made Apple’s iPad so popular.

  • A killer device
  • Lots of killer apps
  • Very intuitive user interface
  • Very affordable
  • An ecosystem that attracts tons of developers.

Did you see why it’s so tough for Windows to battle in that field? What’s even worse is the new release of the new iPad with a stunning screen at a resolution higher than any LCD monitors on the market, and still managed in a price that’s same as the previous iPad 2.

Apple has successfully set a bar so high for other competitors to battle. A device that’s been sold in 3 million units within a weekend is a hard-to-beat monster Windows 8 is facing to battle with.

But still

Let’s put some faith in Metro. Metro Style makes a perfect sense on a touch device like tablet. It’s fluid, intuitive, pretty, and fun to use. Adding a killer device that’s not cost a fortune to buy with a lot of cool apps, a Windows 8 tablet certainly will be able to make a piece of the post-PC market.

So, why not cut all the non-Metro-Sense stuff out of the Metro for post-PC, and leave all desktop-sense features where they belong to, to make Windows 8 in a better place to fulfill its mission? At least, a release of Windows 8 with editions like Consumer (Metro-only), Business (Desktop-only), and Pro (both), makes a lot more sense to me.

How about you? Does Windows 8 make sense to you?

6 COMMENTS

  1. I Completely agree with what you said. I like the Metro interface but I don’t like how it’s forced upon me to use it to access certain things while I’m on the desktop. On the flip side, when I’m in Metro I wish I didn’t have to switch back to the desktop to get access to things like the device manager. I will be using Windows 8 for the system improvements alone but I hope things will be more navigable.

  2. I agree with both of you. I tried Metro on a 13 1/2″ screen which is a good size for using a mouse with Metro. But… I got tired of the switching back and forth between desktop to Metro, Metro to desktop. Back and forth, back and forth. Ugggh! I wish that when you are in Metro you could actually have a couple of applications open on the screen, not have to go to the sidebar and switch between apps. I feel that Metro is a total 2 to 3 steps backward. Definitely only a tablet choice, not a desktop choice.

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