Most people that know me are probably
surprised to see me post something positive about Microsoft or
Windows. I am a believer in, and advocate of, GNU/Linux and open
source. That has not changed. I still use open source systems almost
all the time.
However, I am not, and never have been,
anti-Microsoft. And I believe in giving credit where credit is due. I
still have many clients that use Microsoft operating systems all the
time. And, I still have systems that run versions of Windows going back to
Windows 2 on an original IBM PC/XT. I have done upgrades, on at least
one of my systems and many client systems, to every version of
Windows that has been released.
Recently, I bought a new Toshiba laptop
to take a primary place in my daily use systems. The laptop came with
Windows 7, which I also have on a desktop system, and offered a low
cost upgrade to Windows 8 Pro when it was released. Since I already
had a system with Windows 7, I intended to use the new laptop to get
acquainted with the Windows 8 upgrade procedure and the Windows 8
operating system.
Having been through Windows upgrades
that have gone, let's say, far short of smoothly, I kept two days
open in my schedule to devote to the upgrade. On the designated day,
I went to the Windows 8 upgrade site and began the procedure.
The online upgrade adviser program
recommended that I uninstall a couple of programs and then directed me to
Toshiba's site to get other recommendations. I followed the
recommendations and began the process, fully expecting to have
issues. I removed the recommended programs and downloaded and ran
the install files for Windows 8. Then I used the Toshiba Upgrade
Assistant to reinstall the programs and drivers that had been removed
prior to the upgrade.
Total time from start to having the
system ready to use: 2 hours and 43 minutes. And, it only needed
input from me about 30 minutes! To say that I was impressed would be
a major understatement.
But, I still had not configured or tested the external devices that I often need. I was not ready to
give the upgrade a green light yet. Experience has shown that very
often the external items; like USB drives, printers, scanners,
projectors, and so forth; are where the real trouble starts. Many
of the items that I have are no longer in production and the drivers have
not been updated for new operating systems.
I will just tell you, to keep this from
getting too long, of the 40+ items that I tried only 12 needed
drivers that I had to search for. That is a record! Better yet, there
were only 3 that I was not successful with that same
day.
Less than 10 hours after I started, I
was done with the upgrade and with installation of most of my devices.
I have to admit that I was surprised at
how easy the overall process was. This is as close to an ideal
upgrade as I have seen in a commercial operating system. Well done Microsoft!
With all that said, I will have some
comments about the Windows 8 user experience in a future post. For
now, I will say that there are things I really like and things I
really do not like. So far, the things I like outnumber the things
I do not like.
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