Windows 7 or 8?

[Chary]

Windows 8 is faster, but Windows 7 is more efficient. Win 8 is awkward to adjust to.

 

[Rydian]

Windows 8 is faster, but Windows 7 is more efficient.

lolwut

 

[Lacius]

Windows 8 is faster, but Windows 7 is more efficient. Win 8 is awkward to adjust to.

lolwut

He's saying Windows 8 is faster than Windows 7, but the user interface of Windows 8 is more time-consuming to use than that of Windows 7.

 

[Minox]

It's mostly down to preference really, there should be little to no actual difference between the two.

 

[Kajitani-Eizan]

windows 8, no question. (assuming you're getting a new computer that has the option to come with windows 8.)

 

[Exiron]

Guys, what if I tell you that starcraft (the original) works in W8 without any bat or anything? It's glorious

 

[Rydian]

Guys, what if I tell you that starcraft (the original) works in W8 without any bat or anything? It's glorious

And Diablo II works in 7 in fullscreen mode for the same sort of reason: Blizzard actually follows the programming practices put out by Microsoft.

Hell, they even released a patch to make Diablo II run standalone since they knew it doesn't respect the whole Program Files write access thing at it's core (what with writing save data to ./ and stuff), and to let it run on netbooks and such. They even tell you which files to copy off the discs.

 

[RedCoreZero]

Spoiler

XP

 

[scruffman]

Go with windows 8, it's a lot faster, and about the metro ui, just ditch it and go with a program called windows classic shell which will give you back your windows start button. That's what I use.

 

[Originality]

Can we not just go back to what FAST said in his very first post? "Teething problems". Sure Windows 8 can work, but native compatability is not 100%. There are various reasons for this, which means devs either have to update or we have to use workarounds to get around the few existing problems.

Ok? Good. Now we can all agree that no OS has ever been as good for gaming as XP
Edit: damn maniax ninja'd me.

 

[Pokecix]

Thanks for all replies!
I think im gonna get 8 and i dont think im gonna have problems with 16-bit programs since i dont use that much old things...

And am i able to use both metro and classic menu if i get Classic Shell?

 

[the_randomizer]

... Windows 8 has hardware compatability issues? I thought as long as its not ARM based, it'll work.

nVidia Optimus perhaps? People with laptop GPUs have reported issues with the dedicated GPU not kicking in, forcing users to use the IGP instead. No thanks. On the plus side, it seems to be very refined and stable, unlike Vista. What a pile of garbage that was.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Thinking of getting a Gaming Computer and not sure which is best for gaming.
I dont really care about price since i care about performance at most
I know Windows 7 is very known and with lots of tweaks

Which is best for gaming?IS there a big difference?

I'm not sure about gaming but unless you have a touchscreen monitor Windows 8 will be awkward to use.

Thanks for all replies!
I think im gonna get 8 and i dont think im gonna have problems with 16-bit programs since i dont use that much old things...

And am i able to use both metro and classic menu if i get Classic Shell?

Instead of Classic Shell I suggest StartIsBack. The difference is that Classic Shell is a clone of the Start Menu, while StartIsBack actually brings back the original Windows 7 start menu using parts of it that are still in Windows 8. That means the look, feel and functionality is going to be exactly like the Windows 7 start menu and it's more integrated with the OS.

 

[Rydian]

nVidia Optimus perhaps? People with laptop GPUs have reported issues with the dedicated GPU not kicking in, forcing users to use the IGP instead. No thanks. On the plus side, it seems to be very refined and stable, unlike Vista. What a pile of garbage that was.

That's a flaw in Optimus itself. It relies on the Nvidia drivers to tell it when a game is running or not, and unfortunately it Just Doesn't Work™ all the time (Minecraft being a common example) because it works on a list of executables/paths.

 

[the_randomizer]

That's a flaw in Optimus itself. It relies on the Nvidia drivers to tell it when a game is running or not, and unfortunately it Just Doesn't Work™ all the time (Minecraft being a common example) because it works on a list of executables/paths.

Well yeah, but I do admit it's not as bad as it once was. It was notorious for not using the dedicated GPU on programs that truly needed it, like 3DS Max or Dolphin, and it didn't end well. Glad I was able to get a custom desktop with a dedicated GPU. Why Intel and nVidia wanted to implement such a flawed system in the first place is beyond me. I know it's to "conserve battery power" or some asinine excuse, but come on you two, it sucks.

 

[Rydian]

Well yeah, but I do admit it's not as bad as it once was. It was notorious for not using the dedicated GPU on programs that truly needed it, like 3DS Max or Dolphin, and it didn't end well. Glad I was able to get a custom desktop with a dedicated GPU. Why Intel and nVidia wanted to implement such a flawed system in the first place is beyond me. I know it's to "conserve battery power" or some asinine excuse, but come on you two, it sucks.

Well the idea is great (which is why they made it), but the issue with being unable to properly detect when programs needed it or not (and thus needing to update a specific list every so often) killed it in practice.

I mean one basic idea would be to detect when programs make any DX/GL calls, but the issue is a lot of non-gaming programs use hardware acceleration nowadays, and the GPU firing up when you're on Firefox or Chrome the whole time... that's not a battery saver.

 

[the_randomizer]

Well the idea is great (which is why they made it), but the issue with being unable to properly detect when programs needed it or not (and thus needing to update a specific list every so often) killed it in practice.

I mean one basic idea would be to detect when programs make any DX/GL calls, but the issue is a lot of non-gaming programs use hardware acceleration nowadays, and the GPU firing up when you're on Firefox or Chrome the whole time... that's not a battery saver.

Yep, I had the very issue on my laptop, but that is no longer my primary machine, so yeah. But it is very poorly executed, never kicking in at the right time.

 

[nl255]

However if you do decided to go with Windows 8 you WILL need a touchscreen monitor as Metro is not very usable without multitouch. Also, keep in mind that keyboards and mice are depreciated in Windows 8 so you will want to get used to playing all your games with either touch or a controller as well as get used to doing large documents with either a touchscreen keyboard or your voice. Or you can use ugly hacks like Start8/Classic Start Menu which will be deliberately broken in the next major update (as they rely on bugs to work according to MS).

 

[Rydian]

However if you do decided to go with Windows 8 you WILL need a touchscreen monitor as Metro is not very usable without multitouch. Also, keep in mind that keyboards and mice are depreciated in Windows 8 so you will want to get used to playing all your games with either touch or a controller as well as get used to doing large documents with either a touchscreen keyboard or your voice. Or you can use ugly hacks like Start8/Classic Start Menu which will be deliberately broken in the next major update (as they rely on bugs to work according to MS).

I think you're confusing Windows 8 with Windows R/T for the first point.

 

[Originality]

RT is for ARM devices, 8 is for x86/x64 devices. At least, that's how I understand it.