Three Tools to Tame Windows 8

CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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May 9, 2000
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One of the major roadblocks for some of the Windows 7 users have for upgrading to the new OS is the removal of Window 7-like features. To aid in getting some semblance of personal control back over the desktop environment, Mark Wilson at BetaNews put together some tools to help you cope with the transition.

The release of a new version might be seen as a time for Microsoft to address the issues and annoyances that have plagued their customers, but for many upgraders, the switch to Windows 8 brings a new batch of things to get irritated about.
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Is it really that hard to adapt? I didn't read the article, but if it refers to work forces, I guess it would make a bit of sense.
 
I don't want a tablet OS on my desktop or laptop.
Windows 8 should be called Windows FP for Fisher Price.
 
Agreed. I also skipped Vista. I will stick with Windows 7 for as long as possible.
 
8 works well for me. And lol @ the Fisher Price comment. Same thing was said about xp and 7, and you all adopted those.

Le sigh.
 
schizrade said:
8 works well for me. And lol @ the Fisher Price comment. Same thing was said about xp and 7, and you all adopted those.

Le sigh.
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Nobody has ever said that. You just made it up. Now Windows 8 as a Fisher Price toy does have some resemblance. After all, it's not meant for kids right?

5192012043239windows8vsaol.jpeg
 
Ashbringer said:
Nobody has ever said that. You just made it up. Now Windows 8 as a Fisher Price toy does have some resemblance. After all, it's not meant for kids right?

5192012043239windows8vsaol.jpeg
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Yes they did. I was there. People were bagging all over ms because of the GUI look and feel etc. Win 2000 was the gold standard and xp was the gum ball machine.

You gotta be older than 25 to remember it.
 
schizrade said:
Yes they did. I was there. People were bagging all over ms because of the GUI look and feel etc. Win 2000 was the gold standard and xp was the gum ball machine.

You gotta be older than 25 to remember it.
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They did, but getting the UI to look like 2K was just a few clicks away. Those that screamed "2K for life" over Xp pro, were simply wrong, if they did a lot of gaming, as there was functionally little difference between the two once you got your start menu, task bar, and folders set to windows classic. Except the Wizards, 2K had few of them, Xp seemed to have one for every thing.
 
I'm sticking with 7 until I can get the 7 look completely (including working transparency). That will probably have to wait for Stardock to work its magic and I will dust off my WindowBlinds license.

I don't hate Windows 8, but damn I am not buying a car that's an ugly color. It is still a good car underneath, but the paint job sucks. And until I can get that car repainted, I'm not touching it!
 
schizrade said:
Yes they did. I was there. People were bagging all over ms because of the GUI look and feel etc. Win 2000 was the gold standard and xp was the gum ball machine.

You gotta be older than 25 to remember it.
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I'm 35 years old and I know you are fucking full of shit

Everyone fucking hated Vista, and everyone saw Windows 7 as the coming of jesus cause it had DX11 support, ran faster then WinXP and had x64 support so you could use more then 4 gigs of ram

You completely made this up on the spot to defend Windows 8, which -IS- fucking fisher price bullshit.
 
I just wish there was a windows version that assumed I was the owner and not some hacker/fiend out to delete everything...permission to go to the toilet massa windows?

Microsoft thinks you are either a blind grandmother or a system admin...why do i need all these various permission groups?
 
SkribbleKat owned you guys. I don't like Win8 either but this is how generally how people react to change.
 
Ashbringer said:
Nobody has ever said that. You just made it up. Now Windows 8 as a Fisher Price toy does have some resemblance. After all, it's not meant for kids right?

5192012043239windows8vsaol.jpeg
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Type "Windows XP" and "Fisher Price" into google... done.
 
Way to regress into a flame-session on a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT SUBJECT and ignore the article at hand, kids.

Regarding said article and the three pieces of software mentioned:

- Aero 8 Tuner and Tiny Windows Borders fix exactly what you aesthetics-haters are whinging about - they (generally) bring back the look of Aero from 7 and Vista.
- Desktop Background Tuner...well, I'm not sure why the bloke wasted his/her time even coding this - it does what Windows 8 Personalization ALREADY DOES...so, yeah. :p
 
Fester_Silently said:
Aero 8 Tuner and Tiny Windows Borders fix exactly what you aesthetics-haters are whinging about - they (generally) bring back the look of Aero from 7 and Vista.
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It actually only lets you select the color and it's intensity... which Windows 8 can already do natively.
 
The "Tiny Windows Borders for Windows 8" program works... and as far as I know there is no way of doing that natively. :)
 
...and I *must* be exhausted.

I *should* have said, "So those two programs are even more useless than I'd originally thought, eh?"

Where did the damned "edit" button get to...lol? :D
 
BDS23 said:
Is it really that hard to adapt? I didn't read the article, but if it refers to work forces, I guess it would make a bit of sense.
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The tools have nothing to do with the main aspect of Windows 8 - namely the Start Screen. The three tools are border size adjuster, Aero tuner, and background randomizer.

I'm perfectly content with the Start Screen, but I do believe that the window borders around programs in Windows 8 is enormous. I understand it's supposed to be touch-friendly, but for my 13" laptop screen, it's waste of screen real estate.

As for Aero border translucency, I don't really care about that. Ditto background randomizer.
 
Lebowski said:
I don't want a tablet OS on my desktop or laptop.
Windows 8 should be called Windows FP for Fisher Price.
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This is the same tired ass argument that every person with a low technology IQ uses.

The file system + file history, taskbar and multi-monitor enhancements, modern UI... all incredibly powerful features. There is no possible way to argue that Win7 is in the same league as Win8 (even though win7 is awesome).
 
Kind of a lame article if it doesn't offer a fix for the biggest gripe:

The loss of the Start Menu.

Classic Shell gives you back the Start Menu.
http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/

I have been using Classic shell, nearly as long as I have been using Windows 7, because it brings back customization to the Start Menu, but for Windows 8, it will be the must have utility for many people.
 
Sovereign said:
I'm sticking with 7 until I can get the 7 look completely (including working transparency). That will probably have to wait for Stardock to work its magic and I will dust off my WindowBlinds license.

I don't hate Windows 8, but damn I am not buying a car that's an ugly color. It is still a good car underneath, but the paint job sucks. And until I can get that car repainted, I'm not touching it!
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+1


Azhar said:
The tools have nothing to do with the main aspect of Windows 8 - namely the Start Screen. The three tools are border size adjuster, Aero tuner, and background randomizer.

I'm perfectly content with the Start Screen, but I do believe that the window borders around programs in Windows 8 is enormous. I understand it's supposed to be touch-friendly, but for my 13" laptop screen, it's waste of screen real estate.

As for Aero border translucency, I don't really care about that. Ditto background randomizer.
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+1 also tho don't like the start screen.

Snowdog said:
Kind of a lame article if it doesn't offer a fix for the biggest gripe:

The loss of the Start Menu.

Classic Shell gives you back the Start Menu.
http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/

I have been using Classic shell, nearly as long as I have been using Windows 7, because it brings back customization to the Start Menu, but for Windows 8, it will be the must have utility for many people.
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this was my 1st thought after reading the link. the utility only addresses minor cosmetic stuff.
 
herald said:
Agreed. I also skipped Vista. I will stick with Windows 7 for as long as possible.
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I skipped none of the OS's and I have used Linux on and of as well for at least 15 years. Windows 8 is fantastic, I just wish I did not have to wait. I also have 7 on a separate hard drive on my desktop and work laptop both with a year or more old install.

I also use xp in virtualbox as well as Linux. If you do not want 8, do not use it.
 
bcrisp82 said:
This is the same tired ass argument that every person with a low technology IQ uses.

The file system + file history, taskbar and multi-monitor enhancements, modern UI... all incredibly powerful features. There is no possible way to argue that Win7 is in the same league as Win8 (even though win7 is awesome).
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QFT.
 
ShamisOMally said:
I'm 35 years old and I know you are fucking full of shit

Everyone fucking hated Vista, and everyone saw Windows 7 as the coming of jesus cause it had DX11 support, ran faster then WinXP and had x64 support so you could use more then 4 gigs of ram

You completely made this up on the spot to defend Windows 8, which -IS- fucking fisher price bullshit.
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Whoa! Calm down there, hoss :rolleyes:. Schizrade was correct about all the Fischer Price remarks directed towards XP. Heck, I'm only 24 and I remember all the talk about XP being nothing more than 2000 with skins, product activation, and other needless bloat.

Not everyone hated Vista. Just go look up the threads created on this subforum from 2006-09 and you'll see people claim that they either loved it or didn't. Yes, it got quite a bad rap due to dropped features (e.g. WinFS), rocky driver support at launch (NVIDIA, anyone?), and those Mac vs. PC ads. I quickly adopted Vista for my last notebook as it had way better pen and ink support as opposed to the tablet edition of XP.
 
Lebowski said:
I don't want a tablet OS on my desktop or laptop.
Windows 8 should be called Windows FP for Fisher Price.
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Or Windows TP (for Touch Pad). :p
Seriously, I thing it's fine for touch screen, but not so much for non-touch screen. It should sense if a touch screen is present, and if not it should default to Windows 7 desktop mode, or give the user the choice of which to use.
 
Look, when you see Tom Cruise using a swipe/gesture controlled computer in Minority report you get a geeky hardon yeah? Well, how the hell you ever gonna get to that level of control if you keep insisting on using a mouse/keyboard?

:D
 
THOMO said:
Look, when you see Tom Cruise using a swipe/gesture controlled computer in Minority report you get a geeky hardon yeah? Well, how the hell you ever gonna get to that level of control if you keep insisting on using a mouse/keyboard?

:D
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Actually, I thought that was cool but after a moment I thought to myself - Man, my arms are getting tired...
 
THOMO said:
Look, when you see Tom Cruise using a swipe/gesture controlled computer in Minority report you get a geeky hardon yeah? Well, how the hell you ever gonna get to that level of control if you keep insisting on using a mouse/keyboard?

:D
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Tom Cruise ruins any scene with technology because I keep thinking the message on the screen will self-destruct.
 
why are people so allergic to new operating systems? People skinning xp to look like vista, removing the xp start menu to look like 95 etc. I've never had a problem with new windows os and i doubt when i can be bothered upgrading this time around it'll be any different. Everyone just whines like theist life has been completely flipped upside down.
 
ShamisOMally said:
I'm 35 years old and I know you are fucking full of shit

Everyone fucking hated Vista, and everyone saw Windows 7 as the coming of jesus cause it had DX11 support, ran faster then WinXP and had x64 support so you could use more then 4 gigs of ram

You completely made this up on the spot to defend Windows 8, which -IS- fucking fisher price bullshit.
Click to expand...

I didn't mInd Vista at all. I still use it in fact. if you can't get a clean build of Vista SP2 to work almost as well as 7 then you aren't doing it right.

Windows 8 is fine once you grow up, pull your top lip off your head and stop whining.

It's not going away so just let it go.
 
gaspah said:
why are people so allergic to new operating systems? People skinning xp to look like vista, removing the xp start menu to look like 95 etc. I've never had a problem with new windows os and i doubt when i can be bothered upgrading this time around it'll be any different. Everyone just whines like theist life has been completely flipped upside down.
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There's good change, and there's change for the sake of change (often a bad change). I can see the Win8 GUI (whatever they're calling it this week) on touch interface as a good change, but forcing it on the desktop would seem to be change for the sake of change.
 
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