Unless you’re one of those stalwarts still clinging to Windows XP as
if it was a stuffed animal from your childhood that you need to squeeze
just to sleep at night, the announcement of a new Windows operating
system usually summons up one singular question: When can I
upgrade? Note, we said usually. For Windows 8’s errors are so
flagrant and its annoyances so widespread, this might be the first
operating system in your Windows lifetime that you’re going leave right
there on the retail shelf. That’s right. We said it. Microsoft’s not
only created a new operating system; the company has also created a
healthy amount of doubt in the minds of potential purchasers.
Here are some of the main ingredients that make up our tasty Windows “8-erade:”
1. Bring on the Advertisements
Because Windows 8 comes on the back of a bird with the word “apps”
spray-painted on its side, you’ll find that Microsoft does plenty to
integrate its virtual storefronts into the OS at any cost – go figure.
We’d expect nothing less from Redmond, or Apple, or Google. But here’s
the kicker: Microsoft’s implementation is just downright ugly.Case in
point? The Video app. Not only does this thing struggle to play videos
that Media Player itself can handle (why the app doesn’t correctly
integrate your system’s codecs, we’ll never know), but the first thing
you see upon launching it is not a gallery of your videos, or a top-20
list of local videos you’ve watched, or anything like that. No, you get a
spotlight of all the quote-unquote awesome content you can purchase
from Microsoft directly – your videos require you to scroll a
full screen’s width to the right just to access, and all you get is a
big box for the video you’ve most recently played and a “show more”
button that lets you check out other videos in your User folder.Yuck we
say to that, yuck we say to the similar treatment found in Microsoft’s
Music and Xbox Companion apps, and yuck we say to Microsoft putting its
paid-for content blatantly front and center.
2. Where the Heck Am I?
Since Windows 8 is like Windows 7 with a fancy new tablet design
bolted onto the side (we’ll get to that later), Microsoft has done an
amazing job of splitting important content and options between the two
different environments. And by amazing, we mean not-so-amazing.For
example, your standard Control Panel sits in what we’ll call the
“Windows Classic” environment – same ol’ Control Panel you should be
used to using by now. You can jump to the main Control Panel shortcut
from Metro, but not its individual components. Similarly, you can’t use
the Control Panel to edit the individual settings found within Metro –
that requires you to go to Metro’s PC settings application, which can be
found quasi-buried in Metro’s general Settings sidebar.Got it?..In
essence, you set up your system settings in two different settings
locations. And while we see how that might work on paper – Metro
settings follow Metro, Desktop settings follow Desktop – this walled
garden approach is unnecessary. Settings are settings; If you can’t
adjust Metro in Desktop, Microsoft should at least give users a better
way to access each environment’s settings options from the settings
panels of the other. One scant link in the Control Panel’s “Users” menu
doesn’t cut it.
3. Strapping a Bomb to a Monkey
We brought it up, so we might as well finish the thought. The Windows
Metro UI could not feel any more like its own operating environment
that’s been strapped, rather crudely, onto the back of Windows 7.Sure,
there are a few cosmetic upgrades to the classic desktop – many we like,
in fact. That doesn’t remove the disjointing effect of having to
constantly shift your focus between a svelte, common experience and a
graphical monstrosity. From clearly understood data and organization to
pictures! Huge, pretty pictures with small amounts of text and lots of
square graphics! From the good ol’ Windows we’ve come to love over the
years – one you can truly navigate with just the click of a mouse – to a
storm of giant panels that can’t be closed or minimized unless you
start mashing your keyboard or start dragging your content all around
your pretty solid-color display. From awesome and easy file management
in Windows Explorer to… whatever the heck you consider the process of
selecting files within, say, SkyDrive and the Metro UI.Shoot, plug-ins
aren’t even supported on the Metro version of Internet Explorer. You
have to select the “View on the desktop” option, hidden beneath a wrench
icon near IE’s Metro address bar, just to watch a freakin’ YouTube
video. Come on.There was really nothing Microsoft could have
done to prevent this mash-up: It was destined to happen as the company
tries to push more than a decade of collective user experience toward a
completely new kind of interaction. We just wish Microsoft did it
better. Or, heaven forbid, gave users the choice to abandon Metro
entirely and run Windows 7+, er, Windows 8’s “Desktop mode” if they
wanted.
4. Pooping on the Power User
We, at Maximum PC, love the ability to tweak, customize, and control
our gadgets, hardware, and software however we see fit. It’s the Maximum
PC way. What isn’t the Maximum PC way, however, is Windows 8’s Metro
UI.Is it really that hard, Microsoft, to allow advanced customization
within your smorgasbord of squares? Sure, you can make some tiles take
up two horizontal spaces, and you can shrink some of these
larger tiles back to a single tile’s worth of space. And yes, you can
grab tiles and slap them into new columns – yippee! – but that’s about
it.You know what would have been amazing and incredible to see in the
Metro UI? At least the same level of customization that one could find
on (or hack into) one’s smartphone.Why not give users the option to set
their tiles to any square size they want? If Metro is supposed to be a
tablet interface, why can’t you mash multiple tiles onto a single
“group” tile that expands when clicked or tapped on? Why do some tiles
carry live information, but tiles that should display data or
act as visual hotspots in theory (like, say, the tile for your Video
app, or Messaging app) just exist as naked icons?Why can’t you select
and shuffle around multiple tiles at once? Why can’t you use a gesture
to “paint” tiles to select them, instead of having to right-click
everything? Why do Metro windows only scroll horizontally? Why can’t you
edit the color, title, or icon of individual tiles? Why can’t you
quick-launch into applications from your lock screen (what good is a
mere icon), or highlight over these icons for a quick look at whatever
new tidbits might be lurking within your OS??
5. Let Users Dictate Services
It’s great and all that Microsoft has made an attempt to integrate
third-party services directly into Windows 8 – in fact, the feature
(found in both the People and Messaging apps, to name a few) made our
list of “8 Things We Love About Windows 8.”What we don’t love, however,
is the fact that Microsoft’s the one dictating which services get
invited to the Windows 8 party and which are left sad and alone at home.
We envision a future where we can only use Windows 8 to manage a
handful of social networks and instead have to use Internet Explorer –
or, more likely, a browser that isn’t horrible – to catch our friends
elsewhere. Or perhaps some other third-party apps: You’re not going to
find your Steam contacts within Windows 8’s contact list, nor your AIM,
Yahoo, or Google Chat friends within Messaging (as of right now within
the Consumer Preview), et cetera.We would have much preferred Microsoft
to make a handshake instead of a closed fist. Why not offer an easy
method for giving third-party apps and services the ability to organize a
data stream that could then be pulled into Windows 8’s big apps? And
then, if users wanted, they can go about setting up their Windows apps
almost like an RSS reader, adding the services they care about instead of integrating third-party services Microsoft thinks they
should care about.And heaven help the person who runs more than one
Twitter account or checks more than one Gmail account– you can currently
only tie your Windows apps to a single account per Windows user
account.
6. Why Break What Worked Great?
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one
persists to adapt the world to himself.” – George Bernard ShawOr, to
say it another way, there’s no need to fix that which wasn’t broken.
Worse, that which Windows users were familiar with (and fond of) based
on their experiences with operating system’s many versions over the last
many years.
Here’s a “brief” list of things we miss, having made the (temporary) switch to Windows 8:
- Closing apps without always having to use our keyboard (Metro).
- Being able to run more than one app or window on a screen at a time
(Metro) – and, no, pinning an app to a one-third sidebar doesn’t count.
- How our keyboard’s Windows Key used to pull up a handy list of
applications and other shortcuts (Start Menu) instead of just opening up
a portal between two diametric interfaces (Metro).
- When operating systems were more about delivering data and
information to the user (Desktop mode) than graphics and pizazz (Metro).
- Being able to quickly see all the programs that we’re running by
glancing at our desktop (Desktop mode) versus having to perform
semi-precise actions to reveal what our operating system is doing
(Switch List).
- Being able to scroll over thumbnails and click to access content –
thumbnails now disappear on Metro’s hot corners when you try to do what
you’ve previously done for so very, very long.
- Having applications that scrolled vertically instead of horizontally
(Metro), which often leads to more wasted white space that could
otherwise be filled with useful data.
- Being able to use our mouse wheel to scroll vertically (Metro), and
the consistency of knowing that down was always down, not right (Metro),
and up was always up, not left (Metro).
- Normal font sizes instead of giant, header-like text everywhere.
- When a PC’s operating system was designed for a PC, not a tablet.
- Being able to log onto our systems without having to “unveil” the
damn password box, the digital equivalent of a sweeping bow and a
trumpet fanfare.
7. Puff up the Cloud
Now that Microsoft is playing in the cloud – giving users the ability
to transfer their files and settings across any Windows 8 systems they
log into with their Microsoft Account – it’s time for Microsoft to up
the ante when it comes to the security options it offers its account
holders.We’d love to see at least some information on the Microsoft
Account website to indicate which systems a person has logged in on
using his or her Microsoft Account – better still, some way to block
that login from being accepted on a particular PC if you don’t want that
system or its user to have access to you any longer. Cooler still would
be some kind of two-way authentication factored into Microsoft’s login
process (we know, we know; more security steps) to ensure that even an
attacker with physical access to your system and all your credentials
will still have a heck of a time breaking into your Window 8 account.In a
perfect world, Microsoft would even give Windows 8 users a nuclear
option: The ability to set a previously registered computer for a
complete and full format the next time Windows 8 boots. While an
Internet-based kill switch might be a little drastic, it’s a pretty big
deal that Windows 8 is tying so much of one’s life into the cloud. If we
live in a day an age where we can safely eliminate all of the
information on our missing smartphones via a website, surely it’s time
to build a little more peace-of-mind into Windows 8’s cloud security.
8. No Obvious Reason to Upgrade
We touched on it in the intro, but we’ll etch it in stone in our
final point: Windows 8 presents no compelling reason for a user to
upgrade, period. If it seems as though we spent a lot of time critiquing
the look and feel of Windows’ new interface, and for good reason: At
the end of a day of Windows 8, that’s all you’re left with. Minus a few
fun features here and there (Storage Space, File History, Shutdown
Hibernation, et cetera), there’s little more than window dressing to
inspire users to flock to their local Microsoft stores upon Window 8’s
final release. Windows 8 is, for lack of a better word, a new makeup kit
for Windows 7.Touchscreen systems aside – you’re really going to want
Windows 8, given that Metro was made for you – the quote unquote
improvements built into Windows 8’s Metro apps definitely appearpretty.
And there’s no question that the future, full-screen Metro treatment of
third-party apps like Facebook, or Twitter, or Angry Birds will surely
be something to see. But we don’t think that cosmetic trumps
functionality in every occurrence: A huge-font Twitter app with one user
profile per screen swipe pales in comparison to what you get from the
best Twitter apps already available on Windows 7 today, for example.
In other words, Windows 8 is going to give a lot of pretty people
plenty of new methods for interacting with their information in a prettier way.
It’s also going to confuse the bejesus out of them if they’ve used
Windows at any point over the last, say, ten years, and we don’t think
that Microsoft’s latest OS is going to deliver best overall user
experience. Prettier, yes. Better, no.
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