Welcome!
This is my first post from a Windows 8 machine. Yes, and we will talk about Windows 8 Developer Preview today. In general I will use Windows 8 as a term for Windows 8 Developer Preview 32-bit. I will mention 32/64-bit wherever applicable.
An Overview
The day I heard that Windows 8's developer preview is available for download, it was quite difficult for me to hold my patience. I downloaded the 64-bit .iso version from Microsoft.
It was unfortunate that I was not having a double layer DVD-R/RW with me and the 64-bit version exceeded the single layer DVD size by a few MB. I tried using the USB flash drive of my wifey and it was also 4 Gigs max in size, So I waited for another night and downloaded the 32-bit version.
If you wish to download a copy of Windows 8 please visit http://dev.windows.com and this as well.
Finally, I was able to burn a bootable copy of Windows 8 32-bit on a DVD. I planned to install it on a desktop which I own from the past 6 years, and if you have got doubts let me tell you this is a fantastic machine! Virtually, I also own a lappy Dell XPS 16 with
Installation
To install, I booted using my DVD Combo drive. It started pretty well and without any hassle it showed me an option to select the destination drive to install on. I already had my never used WindowsXP installed on C:\ which I replaced with Windows 8. The new OS was installed easily within minutes and I saw something new as expected. It showed me a screen with a small WiFi bar indicating that I am connected. And the best part of installation, it asked me to login using my live account. A few clicks in total and you are connected, Fantastic!
My next task was to see how much memory it consumes as I had just 2 Gigs on my box. I was impressed that It was using less than 33% when freshly installed. Following is a screenshot of the new advanced task manager.
Machine Startup
You will see a fresh non-dos aka GUI based boot screen. I also got an option to boot Windows 7 (which is installed on another drive of this machine). I selected the default which is Windows 8 and it took ~28 seconds to reach the login page and another 8 seconds to enter my desktop after I keyed in my live account password, you need to swipe the big page/tile to see the option to login. Just like Windows Phone 7 lock screen if you have seen it.
Windows 8 stores your authentication data (password) locally, so that if you are not online you can still login to your box.
Metro UI
As soon as you login you will be welcomed by a fresh Metro UI. If you already own or have seen Windows Phone 7, the tiles (live tiles!) won't surprise you. A screeshot from my machine(I had to edit the facebook images from Socialite live tile):
The socialite and Tweet@rama app is quite good I will say. It integrate very well with your facebook. Both comes preinstalled with your windows 8.
Internet Explorer 10
IE10 is faster as compared to IE9 but in Metro UI view, I think IE10 has to improve alot. Though I will appreciate that the rendering is faster in IE10. I did not try any proven HTML5 websites.
Copy/Paste
There is a fresh new UI for copy/paste features. If you copy/paste multiple instances then you will see a single integrated UI for this. However, one thing I noticed; suppose you have 100 files of 1GB in size to copy to a drive and the drive already has 90 files but you just want to overwrite it. The destination has got just 500 MB of free space but the rest of the 10 files are just 100 MB in size. Windows 8 will not allow you to copy. It will ask for complete 1 GB of free space which is a bit awkward. Windows 8 should simply replace the destination folder just like it does in Windows 7. Hope Microsoft will fix this.
Summary
I have not tried all of the features of Windows 8. I will keep this blog updated as I see something new.
But, Windows 8 is awesome and highly stable. Excited to see this on tablets.
Cheers!!!
Kajal
This is my first post from a Windows 8 machine. Yes, and we will talk about Windows 8 Developer Preview today. In general I will use Windows 8 as a term for Windows 8 Developer Preview 32-bit. I will mention 32/64-bit wherever applicable.
An Overview
The day I heard that Windows 8's developer preview is available for download, it was quite difficult for me to hold my patience. I downloaded the 64-bit .iso version from Microsoft.
It was unfortunate that I was not having a double layer DVD-R/RW with me and the 64-bit version exceeded the single layer DVD size by a few MB. I tried using the USB flash drive of my wifey and it was also 4 Gigs max in size, So I waited for another night and downloaded the 32-bit version.
If you wish to download a copy of Windows 8 please visit http://dev.windows.com and this as well.
Finally, I was able to burn a bootable copy of Windows 8 32-bit on a DVD. I planned to install it on a desktop which I own from the past 6 years, and if you have got doubts let me tell you this is a fantastic machine! Virtually, I also own a lappy Dell XPS 16 with
- Quad Core i7 processor + 6 GB memory
- ATI Graphics Card 1GB + Full HD RGBLED Screen
- Windows 7
Installation
To install, I booted using my DVD Combo drive. It started pretty well and without any hassle it showed me an option to select the destination drive to install on. I already had my never used WindowsXP installed on C:\ which I replaced with Windows 8. The new OS was installed easily within minutes and I saw something new as expected. It showed me a screen with a small WiFi bar indicating that I am connected. And the best part of installation, it asked me to login using my live account. A few clicks in total and you are connected, Fantastic!
My next task was to see how much memory it consumes as I had just 2 Gigs on my box. I was impressed that It was using less than 33% when freshly installed. Following is a screenshot of the new advanced task manager.
Even though it was a fresh installation, just like other windows OS, Windows 8 kept my old WindowsXP files in a seperate directory. It included my Old Program Files, windows directory, Documents and Settings etc. It is safe to delete the old files if you do not have any data file in your desktop/my documents directories.
Machine Startup
You will see a fresh non-dos aka GUI based boot screen. I also got an option to boot Windows 7 (which is installed on another drive of this machine). I selected the default which is Windows 8 and it took ~28 seconds to reach the login page and another 8 seconds to enter my desktop after I keyed in my live account password, you need to swipe the big page/tile to see the option to login. Just like Windows Phone 7 lock screen if you have seen it.
Windows 8 stores your authentication data (password) locally, so that if you are not online you can still login to your box.
Metro UI
As soon as you login you will be welcomed by a fresh Metro UI. If you already own or have seen Windows Phone 7, the tiles (live tiles!) won't surprise you. A screeshot from my machine(I had to edit the facebook images from Socialite live tile):
The socialite and Tweet@rama app is quite good I will say. It integrate very well with your facebook. Both comes preinstalled with your windows 8.
Internet Explorer 10
IE10 is faster as compared to IE9 but in Metro UI view, I think IE10 has to improve alot. Though I will appreciate that the rendering is faster in IE10. I did not try any proven HTML5 websites.
Copy/Paste
There is a fresh new UI for copy/paste features. If you copy/paste multiple instances then you will see a single integrated UI for this. However, one thing I noticed; suppose you have 100 files of 1GB in size to copy to a drive and the drive already has 90 files but you just want to overwrite it. The destination has got just 500 MB of free space but the rest of the 10 files are just 100 MB in size. Windows 8 will not allow you to copy. It will ask for complete 1 GB of free space which is a bit awkward. Windows 8 should simply replace the destination folder just like it does in Windows 7. Hope Microsoft will fix this.
Summary
I have not tried all of the features of Windows 8. I will keep this blog updated as I see something new.
But, Windows 8 is awesome and highly stable. Excited to see this on tablets.
Cheers!!!
Kajal
