new gaming builds...which windows?

S

setscrew

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jul 19, 2000
Messages
1,356
Building two identical gaming systems for Christmas 2014 delivery to family.

Two boys currently running C2Duo systems I built for Christmas delivery in 2009 used primarily for gaming with Win 7.

Parts will start to be assembled at end of September.

As these will be primarily be used for gaming and their only exposure to an OS has been Win 7 (ages 9 & 13), should Win 7 or Win 8.1 be installed?

Thank you for opinions and information.
 
Who will they be asking for help if they can't find/do something in a new OS?
 
If you can transfer the licenses from the old builds to the new ones, I would just use the existing Windows 7 licenses. (Save some money.) However, I prefer Windows 8.1 myself which I find runs very fast and smooth with the newest hardware out there.

Basically, if it were me, I would put Windows 8.1 on it. If you want to save a few dollars, reuse the Windows 7 licenses if you can. Windows 8.1 is easy to learn and gives the added features that Windows 7 does not have such as live tiles and a lot of excellent full screen apps. However, if you have games that already work in 7 but you now will not work in 8.1, the decision is easy.

Besides, Windows 9 is coming out next year and you could upgrade to that instead from 7.
 
They solve most of their own computer problems so I should be safe on that front.

Regarding reusing the licenses, their mother wants the systems ready to go out of box and systems completed a couple weeks prior to Christmas. As the existing Win. 7 systems will be in use daily up to that date, we shall have to add new OS purchase price to the overall cost.

Regarding game compatibility, they utilize Steam for almost every game. I assume that as these games work on Win. 7 64bit, they should also work on 8.1.

As I have zero experience with Windows 8, I am looking for an honest appraisal of its capabilities and liabilities versus Windows 7.
 
setscrew said:
As I have zero experience with Windows 8, I am looking for an honest appraisal of its capabilities and liabilities versus Windows 7.
Click to expand...


This is a difficult subject to discuss in this forum as there tends to be a lot of hype and emotion surrounding the issue. I would suggest searching around YouTube for some tutorials on Windows 8.1, there's a lot of material there that should give you a good understanding of Windows 8.1.

We have Windows 9 on the way in the next 6 months or so according to most of the rumors. If you purchase licenses now you may end up wanting to go to 9 relatively soon. There have been rumors of 9 being a free upgrade even for Windows 7 users. In any case I would expect upgrading to 9 to be initially on the cheap side, cheaper than 8.0 was when it was initially released.

But with all of this aside, it does look like 8.1 is poplar among Steam users, much more so than 8.x has been in the general market. I personally have no issues with 8.1 and actually like it overall and if I were building a new gaming machine today I wouldn't have any reason not to use it. There are free add-ons for adding in a Start Menu if it's absolutely necessary and generally 8.1 seems to perform a bit better than 7 on the same hardware. But as most things with Windows 8, some would dispute any significant performance gains. But if you're building new machines for gaming, unless you have a specific reason not to use 8.1, UI or compatibly issues, it's probably best to use the latest OS.
 
heatlesssun said:
This is a difficult subject to discuss in this forum as there tends to be a lot of hype and emotion surrounding the issue. I would suggest searching around YouTube for some tutorials on Windows 8.1, there's a lot of material there that should give you a good understanding of Windows 8.1.

We have Windows 9 on the way in the next 6 months or so according to most of the rumors. If you purchase licenses now you may end up wanting to go to 9 relatively soon. There have been rumors of 9 being a free upgrade even for Windows 7 users. In any case I would expect upgrading to 9 to be initially on the cheap side, cheaper than 8.0 was when it was initially released.

But with all of this aside, it does look like 8.1 is poplar among Steam users, much more so than 8.x has been in the general market. I personally have no issues with 8.1 and actually like it overall and if I were building a new gaming machine today I wouldn't have any reason not to use it. There are free add-ons for adding in a Start Menu if it's absolutely necessary and generally 8.1 seems to perform a bit better than 7 on the same hardware. But as most things with Windows 8, some would dispute any significant performance gains. But if you're building new machines for gaming, unless you have a specific reason not to use 8.1, UI or compatibly issues, it's probably best to use the latest OS.
Click to expand...

Seconded. Some unfortunate users have been hit with show-stopper bugs with Win8 but generally speaking it's better to use a fresh OS with fresh hardware.
 
8.1 isn't as bad as some people make it out to be. To me it just adds an extra second to open an app because of going to the metro screen.

With directx 12 around the corner it would make more sense to get 8.1 if they bring it to that OS, or get 8.1, and then upgrade to 9 when it is released. Like heatlessun said, it is rumored Microsoft will offer a cheap upgrade license to 9 for windows 8 users.
 
Keep 7, move to 9 when it comes out.

Win 7 installs are good for 30 w/o a key, so this shouldn't be a problem.
 
I recently switched to 8.1 with Classic Shell to take advantage of Storage Spaces and better SSD support (so I could drop RAID). I haven't noticed any big differences other than the two features I listed.

I would just save the money and re-use the licenses from 7.
 
bigdogchris said:
I recently switched to 8.1 with Classic Shell to take advantage of Storage Spaces and better SSD support (so I could drop RAID). I haven't noticed any big differences other than the two features I listed.

I would just save the money and re-use the licenses from 7.
Click to expand...
I would also get 8.1 if the systems are going to have SSDs. Otherwise I would stick with 7. I am pretty fluent with Windows, but 8/8.1 has me lost. If your boys are going to be solving their own issues I would stick with something familiar.
 
The OS disk(s) will be a SSD (512 GB min.).

Thank you for the opinions and insights thus far.
 
If you have to buy i would go with windows 8.1 for youngsters, I am assuming they will be able to google what ever they need to keep them running. Meanwhile i did just the opposite with my parents recently, built them a new pc and went with windows 7. They have no interest or ability to google stuff for OS issues.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top